Re: why use guile?

[Josh Yelon <jyelon cs uiuc edu>]

> The idea was that
> guile would be the common denominator, and that a number of different
> languages could be "compiled" into scheme, and you would write your
> extensions in whatever language you preferred. In GNOME, isn't this one of
> the reasons for using CORBA?

CORBA is nice, but it can't quite serve the same purpose as an extension
language.  With CORBA, an application can export functions, which can
then be imported into external interpreters.  But scripting languages
aren't just regular languages with some functions imported.  They also
have whole new language constructs added.  Those new constructs are
important.  Examples:

Shell Script: has two kinds of global variables: environment, and
non-environment.

Emacs Lisp: has state-saving operators like "save-excursion".

Plus, many scripting languages add special syntax for certain important
things.  For example, shell script has special syntax for running
programs and piping.

Having scheme as a standard language makes it possible for the
application to provide not only new functions, but also new syntaxes and
new language constructs.

- Josh