[TUHS] sml/nj and unix/plan9

[Dan Cross]

On Mon, May 4, 2020 at 8:49 AM <gdiaz at qswarm.com> wrote:

> Was sml/nj part of UNIX at some point? was it considered as a language to
> use
> (proof tools may be)?
>
> I was wondering if there is any history in common between the two. I've
> been
> unable to find anything :-?, please share your stories! :-D
>

There was certainly proximity, if not a direct connection.

Is it true that the language was too slow to be generally useful? There
> seems
> to be commentaries along these lines on the internet.
>

This question is difficult to answer. As a _langage_ there's little that
makes SML inherently slow; the MLton compiler does full-program
optimization with advanced optimizations and generates code that's pretty
performant. There are certainly other SML implementations that generate
slow code; MoscowML comes to mind: it generates a byte code that's not
known for speed. SML/NJ is pretty zippy, but I've never tried to write
anything performance-critical with it.

        - Dan C.
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