[racket] Racket 6.0 does not work

I am a professor of Computer Science in a technological institute. My
research is comparing productivity of computer languages using Measurement
Theory. I think you already know that from my previous posts. The point is
that Racket 6.0 installer is very unfriendly. Well, it is almost like the
installer of Racket 6.0. The only difference is that Racket 6.0 does not
work.

I asked about 8 students to install Racket 6.0. Nobody succeeded. 100% of
failures. I tried the installation myself, and failed. I will give an
example.  I am using Cloud computing, and cannot modify the machine. For
instance, I cannot install a new operating system to satisfy the
requirements of Racket 6.0. Given these constraints, the situation is the
following:

cat /proc/cpuinfo

vendor_id    : AuthenticAMD
cpu family    : 21
model        : 2
model name    : AMD Opteron 63xx class CPU
stepping    : 0
microcode    : 0x1000065
cpu MHz        : 2299.909
cache size    : 512 KB
fpu        : yes
fpu_exception    : yes
cpuid level    : 13
wp        : yes
bogomips    : 4599.81
TLB size    : 1024 4K pages
clflush size    : 64
cache_alignment    : 64
address sizes    : 48 bits physical, 48 bits virtual

This particular machine has 16 cores, and the kernel is:

uname -mrs
Linux 3.2.52 x86_64

When I try to run Racket 5.36, everything works perfectly well. Here is an
example:

# mv racket racket60
# mv racket-old/ racket
# racket/bin/racket -il xrepl
Welcome to Racket v5.3.6.
-> (* 3 4 5)
60
-> (exit)

Now, let us see what happens with Racket 6.0:

# mv racket racket-old
# mv racket60 racket
# mv racket60 racket
# racket/bin/racket
racket/bin/racket: /lib64/libc.so.6: version `GLIBC_2.14' not found
(required by racket/bin/racket)
#

I would like you to understand that most people are not PhD in Computer
Science. 90% of people want to run out of the box applications. Even
programmers don't have in depth knowledge about the workings of computers
and operating systems. I don't know why Racket 6.0 needs libc.so.6, or
GLIBC_2.14. I just want to run statistics programs written in Racket from
an Internet page.

I will give you another example about Racket 6.0. There are a lot of people
that use a text editor called Vim+mzscheme. This text editor has a lot of
applications about Rasch measurement, that are used by people in the
business of education. I mean, people who work in things like SAT, GRE,
USMLE, and equivalent activities in countries around the world. These
programs test students, and the processed scores are often used by
admission offices to accept applicants. I happen to work with this kind of
programs.

Installing Vim+mzscheme is a nuisance, since people must compile Racket
from sources, and Vim from sources. In Windows, few people succeed in
performing the task. The same is true in the case of OS-X. I am talking
about Racket 5.36, for I don't know a single person who installed
vim+mzscheme with Racket 6.0.

What I need is a version of Racket that work right out of the box, at least
for OS-X, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Linux. I also need a fast editor, like
Vim.

Well members of this list, here is what I am going to do. I will download
Bigloo, learn how to use it, hire a programmer to write array operations in
Bigloo, translate a lot of programs from Racket and Common Lisp to Bigloo,
and start from zero, as in Edith Piaf's song.





* Junia Magalhães Rocha*

Doutoranda em Inteligência Artificial - Engenharia Elétrica - UFU
Mestre em Inteligência Artificial - Ciência da Computação - UFU

Docente do IFTM - Campus Avançado Patrocínio

Lattes: http://lattes.cnpq.br/3659680417351721
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