[racket] Best Way to Really Understand the Compilation and Execution Model?

None of the Arc code I'm currently concerned with currently requires
this property.  Everything except phase 0 is idempotent.

-Nick

On Mon, Aug 5, 2013 at 10:26 AM, Eric Dobson <eric.n.dobson at gmail.com> wrote:
> I don't think expanding into a define and a define-for-syntax will
> work. If I understand Nick correctly then Arc doesn't have phases and
> state should be shared across the uses in macros and uses in the
> program. I.e.
>
> (define cdr/only-once
>   (let ((state #f))
>     (lambda (list)
>       (if state
>           list
>           (begin
>             (set! state #t)
>             (cdr list))))))
>
> Should only ever take the cdr once even across expansion/runtime.
>
>
> On Mon, Aug 5, 2013 at 10:12 AM, Vincent St-Amour <stamourv at ccs.neu.edu> wrote:
>> For that, you could have Arc's `define' expand into both a Racket
>> `define' and a `define-for-syntax', which I believe is what Jens was
>> suggesting. You may want to do something similar for `require', too.
>>
>> Vincent
>>
>>
>>
>> At Mon, 5 Aug 2013 10:06:36 -0700,
>> Nick Sivo wrote:
>>>
>>> I'm aware of defmacro and even understand its implementation (cute
>>> trick!), but I need to eventually get something like this to work:
>>>
>>> (require compatibility/defmacro)
>>>
>>> (define (my-cdr lst)
>>>   (cdr lst))
>>>
>>> (defmacro drop-first-form args
>>>   `(begin ,@(my-cdr args)))
>>>
>>> (drop-first-form
>>>  (displayln 1)
>>>  (displayln 2))
>>>
>>> Where the above just works and displays 2.
>>>
>>> I'll check out the latest research papers too.
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Nick
>>>
>>> On Mon, Aug 5, 2013 at 1:40 AM, Noel Welsh <noelwelsh at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> > Does defmacro do what you want?
>>> >
>>> > http://docs.racket-lang.org/compatibility/defmacro.html?q=defmacro#%28form._%28%28lib._compatibility%2Fdefmacro..rkt%29._defmacro%29%29
>>> >
>>> > In terms of grokking the macro system you probably want to read some of the
>>> > research papers, which you can find from links here:
>>> >
>>> > http://racket-lang.org/people.html
>>> >
>>> > Racket's macro system is really cutting edge, so it doesn't have a large
>>> > body of text explaining it.
>>> >
>>> > HTH,
>>> > N.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Sun, Aug 4, 2013 at 9:50 PM, Nick Sivo <nicksivo at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> >>
>>> >> Hello everyone,
>>> >>
>>> >> I work on Hacker News[1], which is written in Arc[2], and am tasked
>>> >> with making it faster.  The Arc compiler targets Racket[3], but
>>> >> doesn't do so in such a way that function names or source locations
>>> >> are preserved.  This makes output from the sampling profiler and error
>>> >> messages mostly useless.
>>> >>
>>> >> I'd like to make Arc work as a Racket language (and in the process
>>> >> preserve srclocs and names), and have made some progress[4].  However,
>>> >> I'm hitting a wall trying to implement Arc's macros.  Specifically, I
>>> >> need to find a way for the macros themselves to use previously defined
>>> >> Arc functions as part of their processing. I understand that there are
>>> >> good reasons for Racket's hygiene and syntax phases, but I'm
>>> >> implementing an existing language that has its own strong opinions.
>>> >> I'm almost certain that accomplishing my goal is possible with the
>>> >> right understanding, but despite reading much of the Racket Reference,
>>> >> I don't truly get it yet.
>>> >>
>>> >> With that motivation in mind, what's the best way for me to become
>>> >> intimately familiar with Racket's runtime, execution and compilation
>>> >> model? Should I read through and make sure I understand the debugger?
>>> >> The macro stepper?  Is there any kind of guide to Racket Internals?
>>> >>
>>> >> Thanks for any advice.
>>> >>
>>> >> Best,
>>> >> Nick
>>> >>
>>> >> [1] https://news.ycombinator.com
>>> >> [2] http://arclanguage.org
>>> >> [3] Well, really mzscheme
>>> >> [4] https://github.com/kogir/rark
>>> >> ____________________
>>> >>   Racket Users list:
>>> >>   http://lists.racket-lang.org/users
>>> >
>>> >
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