[Ocaml-biz] IDEs

[Brandon J. Van Every]

Blair Zajac wrote:
>
> Where do you see that people are using more GNU Emacs instead
> of XEmacs?

My straw poll at ML Seattle was "what editor do you use?"  5 people said
Emacs and 1 person said Vim.  I will ask (tonight!) whether they use GNU
Emacs or XEmacs.  It would be useful to set up a poll and send it to
caml-list.  Hm, how does one poll e-mail lists that don't have polling
facilities?

> If you're going to support GNU Emacs, then I think you should
> also support
> XEmacs, as they're not that far apart from each other.

I don't agree.  From a compatibiility standpoint, GNU Emacs is what
drives development and XEmacs plays catch-up.  As a business guy, I'm
mainly interested in things working well out of the box.  That's going
to happen on GNU Emacs, it doesn't happen on XEmacs.  The equation would
only reverse if XEmacs had some decidedly superior GUI features that
actually benefitted OCaml.  I've studied up on their differences to a
fair degree.  They are not the same, and it *is* significant work to
make sure both are working well.

Again, let's hear it from an XEmacs adherant why this is really not
true, before deciding to support every / all tools out there.  Generally
speaking, I don't see supporting every / all tools as a strategy.  We
need to focus on a package of tools that are best of breed for
businesses.  Leave the rest to "diffuse open source development,"
incorporate them when/if they mature.


Cheers,                         www.indiegamedesign.com
Brandon Van Every               Seattle, WA

"We live in a world of very bright people building
crappy software with total shit for tools and process."
                                - Ed Mckenzie