[racket] Racket 6.0 does not work

On Mar 5, 2014, at 4:03 PM, Junia Magellan wrote:

> 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.


Hi Junia, 

I feel your pain and I am sorry that we caused it. 

We started distributing Racket, neé PLT Scheme, to the world exactly 19 years ago. From the beginning we targeted middle schools and high school students (12-17 year olds) and their teachers who do not have any degree in CS at all. Our goal has always been to help introduce such inexperienced people to computing and programming systems. We have therefore targeted Windows, Mac, and *nix but we always assumed that the latter were highly experienced computing professionals who would have no problems with standard *nix procedures while the former (WIndows an Mac) needed platform-specific installers that do it all. For the same reason, our bundle also includes DrRacket, a full-fledged editor that can assist total novices (such as middle school students) and highly experienced programmers (such as myself) in an appropriate manner. Again, we assume that programmers with Emacs or Vim experience can help themselves, and _third_ parties have supplied appropriate tools. 

Nevertheless we clearly made a mistake with the current Linux distribution and I express my regrets for this mistake.  

Give us another chance with v6.1 -- Matthias

p.s. Do keep in mind that the FFL may not have regretted losing their battle and that they may continue singing the song, but they did return to the fold. First Airborne. 


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