[Python-ideas] stdlib with its own release cycle ?

[Michael Foord]

2009/10/25 Guido van Rossum <guido at python.org>

> On Sun, Oct 25, 2009 at 4:38 PM, Michael Foord <fuzzyman at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Well, you can use Python C extensions with Ironclad [1]. The maintainer
> > hopes to port the core to Jython at some point as well.
>
> What do you personally think of Ironclad? And (separately) of those hopes?
>
>
It seems like it ought to be an impossible task - reimplementing the Python
C API for another platform. It actually runs surprisingly well
(astonishingly) and I know of at least one bank in London now using it in
production. The Ironclad implementation reuses the Python C source wherever
possible in order to minimise the core that actually needs implementing.

A *large* number of the Numpy and SciPy tests pass with it (~1000 of each
last time I checked) and *generally* performance is pretty good. I'd like to
see Ironclad in wider use.

The hopes of the Ironclad maintainer to reimplement the core for Jython is
certainly *plausible*, but it of course depends on him finding time in the
future.

Personally when I write IronPython code I try to avoid a dependency on C
extension modules as it seems to me that the *point* of IronPython is to
make use of the .NET framework (otherwise you might as well just use
CPython). Where Ironclad is being used is where people want to interface
existing Python systems to existing .NET systems and that makes a lot of
sense (you'd rather avoid rewriting chunks of either if you can and Ironclad
acts as a bridge).

All the best,

Michael






> > Michael Foord
> >
> > [1] http://code.google.com/p/ironclad/
>
> --
> --Guido van Rossum
>
> PS. My elbow needs a couple more weeks of rest. Limiting myself to
> ultra-short emails.
>



-- 
http://www.ironpythoninaction.com/
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