I wonder what it would take to remove the dependency on the .NET runtime. Could anyone with relevant experience and knowledge comment?
Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
81–90 of 104 posts
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#82It's interesting how the F# team is pushing F# to be the language for data-rich programming. Their Type Provider concept looks promising, but some of their demos still are comically difficult coming from a R/Matlab/Python style of data-rich programming. Of course coming from C#/Java it all looks amazing. But I don't quite see how F# replaces R or Matlab, even with library support. Performance alone seems dubious valu…
"Anybody have experience where demand for strongly typed language is really needed for data analysis tasks?"
Strong-typing is not really about performance, though it does help. It's about discovering more errors at compile-time rather than run-time.
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#83Java is Oracle stack, C# is MS stack, objective-C is Apple stack. Is there an opportunity for an open language with similar VM ease-of-use/performance tradeoffs - or is hardware now fast enough for the ease/speed of dynamic languages to fill that gap (Python, Ruby, Javascript, ...)?
Haskell, Ocaml, and Scala? All are open languages, cross platform, and first two at least are Free. And Scala runs on both the JVM and .NET, covering all three platforms. Is that what you meant?
AFAIK the Scala .NET implementation is still pretty raw (though there's at least more activity on the project recently).
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
OpenJDK is not a standard. Java itself is not a standard open to third-parties, unless Sun/Oracle wants to. It's not the JDK that you need from Oracle for Java to be a standard, but rather the JCK. This issue is a couple of years old and hasn't been solved: http://www.apache.org/jcp/sunopenletter.html Unless by "standard" you mean what everybody uses.
http://openjdk.java.net/groups/conformance/JckAccess/index.h... http://www.infoq.com/news/2007/08/openjdk-jck
Notice the part where the released JDK is only available for OpenJDK.
How does that contradict what I said?
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
To run F# you need .Net runtime, which is as closed as it can be. It's like Sun open sourcing the Java compiler but not the JVM.
I guess you haven't heard of http://mono-project.com . The F# team tries to ensure it works well on Mono, and the same for the Mono team. On top of that, the specifications for the CLR are standardized.
Kind of like how I cannot watch netflix on my linux machine, despite mono and moonlight?
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
rbanffy is anti-Microsoft, and doesn't waste a second in making it known. It's no use trying to reason or discuss with him about this - others have tried.
I am not "anti-Microsoft". I am just old enough. I also worry, considering recent moves (and that's not only from Microsoft), that some companies (Microsoft among them) may be taking strategic positions to disrupt the free and open-source software ecosystems that threaten their dominance of their niches. Yesterday, for instance, Oracle made a huge PR splash in the MySQL space. One can't ignore it.
I'm glad that there are at least some people on HN who still understand the type of company Microsoft really is.
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
I believe by "haskell" you may mean "ghc"
Why? "Haskell" also works on hugs,yhc,uhc,... http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Implementations Most implementations are BSD/GPL Licensed. Haskell itself (thinking of Haskell Prime, Haskell98) is a research/community driven project and, as such, open/transparent. For GHC there is even an intermediate format allowing you to run your code on stuff like llvm.
the original message was talking of specific "stacks", which in my understanding includes an abstract language and a concrete implementation (I'd say also some accompanying development tools: if not an ide, at least a repl, debugger, build system).
"haskell" as such would not qualify, while ocaml, scala and ghc would.
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does the Apache license include patent licensing? Java is open source too.
> Java is open source too. I don't think that's correct. AFAIK there's no certified OSS Java. And if it isn't certified, it can't be called Java. It would be correct to say there's Open Source 'Java compatible' environments.
openjdk is not certified java? I know harmony did not get a tck but it seems unlikely oracle is not letting their own developers use it.
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
I guess you haven't heard of http://mono-project.com . The F# team tries to ensure it works well on Mono, and the same for the Mono team. On top of that, the specifications for the CLR are standardized.
Kind of like how I cannot watch netflix on my linux machine, despite mono and moonlight?
I don't think you have presented convincing evidence that the root cause of that is not "there are bugs in mono".
Re: Microsoft releases F# under Apache 2.0 license
#90I wonder what it would take to remove the dependency on the .NET runtime. Could anyone with relevant experience and knowledge comment?
It could be done but it would be quite the undertaking.
The compiler generates il. The basic container types wrap .net types. Alot of the built in methods and power pack methods call out to .net methods. Many of the new features rely on new clr features, such as async.
Other platforms, jdk, probably offer similar functionality but to port it would be a case of having everything broken for some time until you could get the compiler and built in methods and containers ported over.