Re: dejagnu version update?

[Jacob Bachmeyer]

Rob Savoye wrote:
> On 5/14/20 10:08 AM, David Edelsohn wrote:
>   
> > Have you approached the Linux Foundation Core Infrastructure
> > Initiative for funding for both DejaGNU maintenance (patch backlog)
> > and refactoring DejaGNU in Python efforts?
> >     
>
>   Not that team, the folks I talked to thought I was crazy for wanting
> to refactor it. :-) That's been the usual answer from anyone. I even
> talked about this at GNU Tools Cauldron once. Seriously though, it'd be
> great to analyze the current code base, write an actual design document,
> clean internal APIs, and build something we can use for another 30
> years.
This is very close to the volunteer work I have been doing on DejaGNU:  
just documenting the existing API would be a major step forwards, with 
follow-up plans to slowly move DejaGNU to more modern Tcl.  Using modern 
Tcl features, like namespaces (introduced in Tcl 8.0) and slave 
interpreters (introduced in Tcl 7.6) would enable significant clean up 
and possibly even simultaneous support for multiple testsuite API 
versions, allowing even backwards-incompatible changes by preserving 
support for the old API and requiring the new API to be requested.

>  I'd start by writing a solid expect module for Python, and then
> embedding Tcl in Python as a comparability layer. I understand it'd be a
> huge project, which is why I haven't done this as a volunteer.
>   
Amusingly, I believe both of those may already be in CPAN for Perl 5.  :-)

-- Jacob