[MC]'s notes on [Joe Mistachkin]'s [Tcl2008] talk regarding his re-implementation of Tcl in C#.

[JJM] -- The full paper and slides will also be available (soon) from the project web site.  Also see [Eagle]

(I missed the first slide...)

Notable features:
   * Integrates with Microsoft's Common Language Runtime (CLR), Tcl/Tk, native libraries
   * Supports interactive debugging, script cancellation; read-only variables, commands; interpreter-wide variable tracing; closures; Unicode (UCS-2)

Missing:
   * No Tk commands
   * No argument expansion syntax
   * No namespace support (yet)
   * No binary, fblocked, fcopy, fileevent, format, glob, history, memory, can or trace commands
   * No registry or DDE commands
   * No asynchronous input/output
   * No server sockets
   * No slave interpreters, hidden commands, aliases, hence no Safe Tcl
   * No http, msgcat, or tcltest packages
   * For the open command, command pipelines and serial ports are not yet supported
   * For the exec command, Unix-style input/output redirection and command pipelines are not supported

Compiles with Visual Studio 2005, 2008 and/or .NET framework compiler.  Ran a demo eagle console.  "#show" special command to show output helpful for debugging

 % set x [[object create System.Int32]]
 System#Int32#216
 % object invoke $x ToString
 0
 % set y [[object create -alias System.Int32]]
 ...

Eagle, being managed code, has access to all the .NET framework.  Joe ran a demo that used .NET calls to instantiate a Windows form.

Within Eagle: [[tcl find]] finds installed versions of Tcl.  [[tcl load]] can load them. Eagle can load Tcl via a .dll; then package require Tk.  Thus Tk and winforms can be mixed.

Calling foreign functions:

 set z [[library declare -functionname GetUserNameA -returntype Boolean -paramatertypes [[list intptr uint32&]] -charset ansi -module ...]]

Eagle takes a different approach to some things than Tcl.  Semantically compatible at the script level.  Radically different underneath the hood.  No interp->result.  Interpreters in Eagle have no thread affinity; can be used from any thread.  

Question from the chat: "How easy is it to embed Eagle into a C# application?"  Answer: examples of doing that come with the distribution.  Walked through a simple example.

Question: What is the benefit of rewriting versus wrapping? Answer: Requirement was to implement the scripting language totally in 100% managed mode code.

Downloadable from http://eagle.to

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%| [Tcl 2008 Conference Talks] |%
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