The ML Kit, Version 1, is now available.
Mads Tofte
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Version 1 of the ML Kit is now ready for distribution.
The ML Kit is a straight translation of the Definition of Standard ML
into a collection of Standard ML modules. For example, every inference
rule in the Definition is translated into a small piece of Standard ML
code which implements it. The translation has been done with as little
originality as possible - even variable conventions from the Definition
are carried straight over to the Kit.
If you are primarily interested in executing Standard ML programs
efficiently, the ML Kit is not the system for you! (It uses a lot of space
and is very slow.) The Kit is intended as a tool box for those people in
the programming language community who may want a self-contained parser or
type checker for full Standard ML but do not want to understand the clever
bits of a high-performance compiler. We have tried to write simple code
and module interfaces; we have not paid any attention to efficiency.
The documentation is around 100 pages long and is provided with the Kit.
It explains how to build, run, read and modify the Kit. It also describes
how typing of flexible records and overloading are handled in the Kit.
The ML Kit is written by Nick Rothwell, David N. Turner, Mads Tofte and
Lars Birkedal at Edinburgh and Copenhagen Universities.
The ML Kit is available via anonymous ftp. Here is a sample dialog:
ftp ftp.diku.dk ftp lfcs.ed.ac.uk
Name: anonymous Name: anonymous
Password: <your loginname@host> Password: <your loginname@host>
ftp> binary ftp> binary
ftp> cd diku/users/birkedal ftp> cd export/ml/mlkit
ftp> get README ftp> get README
ftp> get COPYING ftp> get COPYING
ftp> get src.tar.Z ftp> get src.tar.Z
ftp> get doc.tar.Z ftp> get doc.tar.Z
ftp> get tools.tar.Z ftp> get tools.tar.Z
ftp> get examples.tar.Z ftp> get examples.tar.Z
ftp> bye ftp> bye
The file README contains installation instructions. Note that no binaries
are distributed and that you must build these using either Standard ML of
New Jersey, or Poly/ML.
SML/NJ is in the public domain and is available from LFCS, as above, but
in directory export/ml/njml Poly ML is a commercially supported system,
available from Abstract Hardware Ltd. (a...@ahl.co.uk)
--
Send compilers articles to comp...@iecc.cambridge.ma.us or
{ima | spdcc | world}!iecc!compilers. Meta-mail to compilers-request.
Mads Tofte
1) the correct ftp address to Edinburgh is ftp.lfcs.ed.ac.uk ,
not lfcs.ed.ac.uk .
2) As pointed out by Andrew Appel, Standard ML of New Jersey is not in
the public domain, although it can be copied and used under liberal terms.
-- Mads Tofte