On Thu, Mar 06, 2008 at 02:39:35AM +0000, Ian Lynagh wrote:
I can't remember if it's been discussed before, but I think it might be a good idea for the FFI to be able to create these C stubs itself, if you give a certain keyword - or perhaps even by default as it's the safe thing to do, at the expense of performance.
The FFI defines an ABI spec, not an API one. As in, a C compiler is never inherently involved, (hence the ability to have Haskell compilers with a pure assembly back end). Tools like hsc2hs are there to bridge the gap to a particular language when needed. Some libraries guarantee an ABI, others just an API. Hopefully it is documented. :). In general, in order to support dynamic linking, the ABI must remain stable so tools like 'hsc2hs' often aren't needed when interfacing to C code. In any case, it is not the FFI's job, though of course, specific Haskell compilers are free to provide extensions. But I'd rather see GHC get further away from C idiosyncrasies instead of closer. John -- John Meacham - ⑆repetae.net⑆john⑈