Re: What is a lightweight language

[address@hidden]

Dan Weinreb <dlw@exceloncorp.com> writes:

>    Date: Thu, 6 Dec 2001 16:42:26 -0400
>    From: shivers@cc.gatech.edu
> 
> 		All you need to write is a simple s-exp parser, a simple GC,
>    and implementations of the "big five" basic forms:
>       LAMBDA
>       QUOTE
>       IF
>       DEFINE
>       SET!
>    Scheme is a very small language! 
> 
> Is that really all you need?  What happened to call/cc?  What happened
> to integers and strings and vectors?  What about "cond" and "let" and
> "apply"?

Obviously you need some primitive procedures.  Even if Olin were
suggesting using church numerals, I think he'd like to print them.

I may be inviting the wrath of other schemers, but I don't consider
call-with-current-continuation to be essential to scheme.