[plt-scheme] Re: Is R6RS useless for PLT?

On Mon, 24 Nov 2008 09:15:39 +0100, "Tom Gordon"
<thomas.gordon at fokus.fraunhofer.de> said:
> If such a competitor began to attract users away from PLT,
> the PLT team might have more of an incentive to make a larger
> commitment to R6RS, just as Microsoft in the end has begun to
> support the ISO Open Document Format.
> 
> Some really good R6RS compilers and interpreters are now available,  
> which are competitive with PLT, but they still lack PLT's rich  
> programming environment and a comparably rich set of libraries.

The Microsoft analogy is weakened by the fact that PLT is free software,
so anyone who wants to grab ideas from PLT's excellent developers can
take what they like and develop such a competitor.  PLT has not
constrained anyone, so it strikes me as unbalanced to try to constrain
PLT.  I'm guessing that PLT goes beyond R6RS because they have so many
ideas they want to explore, and as people say often, "it's a free
country."  PLT is so rich with fresh thoughts (every week!) the only
reason I don't encourage them more is I hope they get some sleep.

PLT went to great lengths to support R6RS, so it seems to me they've
done their bit.  If there's something lacking technically in PLT's R6RS
support, what is it?  If we want all the wonderfulness of DrScheme in a
pure R6RS flavor and we want them to do the work, we could raise money
for PLT research groups and support the next generation of gifted
computer scientists.

-- 
Geoffrey S. Knauth | http://knauth.org/gsk