[e-lang] Stale javadoc

[Mark S. Miller]

At 06:15 PM 1/2/2004  Friday, Kevin Reid wrote:
><http://www.erights.org/javadoc/> should be updated to match the current
>release of E.

I agree, it should be. Unfortunately, I built edoc -- the tool used to build 
those tamed javadoc pages -- by modifying Sun source code for some of the 
javadoc internals. Sun correctly feels no obligation to maintain upwards 
compatibility for such hacks, and in fact broke my edoc code with the 
improvements they made to javadoc for Java 1.4. For various development 
maintenance reasons, I upgraded edoc so that it would compile against the 
1.4 libraries, and so could keep it in my source tree. However, I hadn't yet 
succeed at making it work with the 1.4 javadoc before I got distracted by 
other things (sorry). The result is that I can't even run the current edoc 
successfully by dropping back to 1.3 (double sorry).


>(Also, is there a way I can locally generate the annotated documentation
>from the E source distribution?)

Because parts of edoc were generated by modifying Sun sources, these files 
are covered by SCSL rather than an open source license. This is why I keep 
the edoc sources out of the E releases. As for my rights to distribute 
edoc separately (either source or binary), I haven't been able to figure out 
my rights under SCSL. If you'd like to try your hand at fixing edoc so that 
it works again, and if you'd like to try figuring out what SCSL says we are 
allowed to do with the results of these efforts, I'm perfectly happy to send 
you my edoc sources privately. Likewise for any other individual who asks.

Long term, this is an untenable situation. We need an edoc-equivalent that's 
open source. Perhaps we should extend Doxygen 
http://www.stack.nl/~dimitri/doxygen/ ? It's GPL, which should be ok as long 
as we run it as a separate tool. Unfortunately, I can't see myself taking 
the time needed to extend Doxygen for the foreseeable future. It would be 
great if someone else were willing to lead this charge (hint hint). 

If no one volunteers to take on either edoc or a Doxygen extension, at some 
point I will fix edoc and regenerate these pages, but I can't promise when.


Btw, I notice on http://homepage.mac.com/kpreid/Mud/ you write:
>I've played around with implementing muds in Perl, Python, E, and Haskell. 
>I'll provide details if interest is expressed.

On behalf of e-lang, I express interest ;). I think a use-oriented 
comparison of these languages would be fascinating!


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Text by me above is hereby placed in the public domain

        Cheers,
        --MarkM