Scheme for DSSSL Back Ends?

Subject: Scheme for DSSSL Back Ends?
From: Paul Prescod <papresco@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue Apr 1 17:26:14 1997 EST
Most DSSSL implementations that are intended to produce textual output
(RTF, TeX, Mif, etc.) will have a concept of a "back end": an API that
maps make-expressions to constructs in the target language. Every full
DSSSL implementation will also have an implementation of the Expression
Language, which is basically Scheme.

It seems to me that we could define (informally) a common set of
functions for creating new back-ends in Scheme. Those back-ends would be
faster to write for non-C++ or non-Java programmers, and portable
between DSSSL implementations. These back-ends would not replace the
current ones (they might be much slower), but would augment them to make
the set of DSSSL targets as large (and as portable) as possible. Many
back-ends could be prototyped in Scheme, but "mere mortals" and then
recoded in Java or C++ after they have proven themselves.

What do implementors think?

 Paul Prescod

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