[r6rs-discuss] [Formal] Scheme-6 should be differentiated from earlier versions

From: Mikael Tillenius <mti>
Date: Fri Mar 9 04:26:44 2007

Aubrey Jaffer wrote:
> Many unsupported and weakly supported Scheme implementations, and
> possibly some supported ones, will remain at R5RS and call themselves
> Scheme for years to come.
>
> If both R5RS and R6RS implementations and code are described simply as
> Scheme, then the confusion caused by the incompatibility between
> Scheme and Scheme-6 will reflect poorly on the language and be an
> obstacle to Scheme's wider acceptance.
>
> Because R6RS is a major, incompatible change from earlier Reports,
> occurrences of the word "Scheme" in R6RS should be changed to
> "Scheme-6" when the aspect being discussed is incompatible with R5RS.
>
While I agree with Aubrey in the discussion about R6RS and interpreters
I think this distinction between R6RS and pre-R6RS is unnecessary in the
report. It should be clear from the context that the dialect of Scheme
that is presented in R6RS is the dialect presented in R6RS (tautology).

A list of language changes at the end of the report (as in earlier
reports) would be nice.

Outside the report I'm sure there will be some need to distinguish the
two dialects for some time. I think this will be self-regulating.

/Mikael
Received on Fri Mar 09 2007 - 04:29:10 UTC