Sunday, January 25, 2009

Shed Skin 0.1

(Shed Skin is an experimental (restricted-)Python-to-C++ compiler.)

After several years of development and thirty releases, I have finally released Shed Skin 0.1. While still experimental, all the basic pieces are now in place:

-type inference that works for many smallish programs
-support for a useful subset of Python
-support for a good subset of the standard libraries (about 17 modules, such as random, re, os, os.path..)
-extension module generation (including extension classes)
-support for the most common platforms

For this release, I was able to add a Jpeg decoder, at 1,200 lines, an iPod Shuffle programmer, at 600 lines, and a mastermind program to the set of example programs. This brings the total number of example programs to 30, at about 9,000 lines in total.

For Shed Skin 0.2, I hope to be able to focus on improving type inference scalability. So far, I've spent surprisingly little time on type inference itself, because what I had worked well enough for most test cases. I have quite a few ideas to further improve scalability, and am sure some of these will help a lot.

This release would not have been possible without the generous help of Google (through their GSOC and GHOP programs) and the following people (please let me know if I missed someone):

-B********e
-Brian Blais
-Paul Boddie
-Djamel Cherif
-Mark Dewing
-James Coughlan
-Michael Elkins
-FFAO
-Luis M. Gonzales
-Karel Heyse
-Denis de Leeuw Duarte
-Van Lindberg
-David Marek
-Jeff Miller
-Joaquin Abian Monux
-Harri Pasanen
-SirNotAppearingInThisTutorial
-Dave Tweed
-Jaroslaw Tworek
-Pavel Vinogradov

Finally, I dedicate this release to Hai Fang Ni. Thanks for all your support, and a happy Chinese newyear!!