world as value

[Adrian Hey]

On Wed 23 Jun, Marco Kesseler wrote:
> >What I want to do is describe my entire system in 1 language. 
> 
> Again, I mostly agree with you, but one thing makes me wonder.
> Why is it so important to write the entire system in 1 language?

I can think of 2 good reasons..
1 - Idealism. I don't just want to implement systems. I want to reason about
    them. I don't think this is easy if 2 languages have different, possibly
    incompatible semantics. Cross language optimisation would be a nightmare
    too.
2 - Compatability of run time systems, data structure representation etc.
    Could I reasonably mix Clean and Glasgow Haskell for instance? I suspect
    I would find this very difficult. I could have two separate programs in
    my system, one written in Clean and the other in Glasgow Haskell and use
    the OS to interface them (assumming there is an OS, often there isn't in
    embedded sytems). This would probably be safe, but awkward.

BTW, I'm going away for a couple of days, so this will be my last message on
this thread for a while. See you when I get back if it's still going. 

Regards
-- 
Adrian Hey