Re: thoughts on OCaml?

["Kyle R. Burton" <kyle.burton@gmail.com>]

> I've used OCaml extensively. It is my favorite language. Nice set of
> libraries, modern syntax, objects if you want them, great module
> system. Good runtime performance, and last but not least the
> quintessential polymorphic type system.

This list is true of a great many languages (well, except the thing
about the type system)...I'd like to hear your opinions or what you
mean by a couple of those points and discuss them (as long as we don't
end up in a language war).

> I've been curious why there's little OCaml traffic here.

Few users would be my guess.  Are you willing to do an intro
presentation or a practical OCaml presentation?  What about a workshop
(or a couple)?  Get others familiar with it, show them how it'll
benefit them, get people energized...

> Also curious why one would choose Lisp over
> OCaml or Haskell these days.

For me it is because of me, not OCaml.  By a vast majority, my
background is rooted in imperative languages (C++, Java, C, Perl).
The strongest type systems I've used are represented by C++ and Java.
Given all of this, strong static type systems don't yet make sense _to
me_ well enough that I can see how to solve problems with them.
Trying to not modify state (remember, the majority of my experience is
imperative), or not being able to, is a paradigm to which my mind
currently has an impedance mismatch (it's getting better as I read and
try more FP).  These are the reasons why Lisp is an easier fit for
_me_ - I can try as much FP as I can figure out how to do and fall
back to normal imperative approaches when I fail to be smart enough to
figure out a tail-recursive, referentially transparent solution.

All this said, I recognize the hole in my experience and am, albeit
slowly, endeavoring to fill it.  This group and your feedback are part
of that endeavor.


Regards,

Kyle