[Openmcl-devel] debugging debugging

[Glen Foy]

On May 7, 2009, at 8:51 PM, Glen Foy wrote:

>
> On May 7, 2009, at 8:00 PM, Andrew Shalit wrote:
>
>> It would still run as a separate application, but it could  
>> communicate
>> with the CCL via something akin to a Slime/Swank protocol, and it
>> could present things like backtraces and inspector windows in nice
>> Macintosh windows.  It would even be theoretically possible to reuse
>> some of the CCL IDE code for this purpose.  (I'm not familiar with
>> that code enough to know whether that's a practical approach.)
>
> Possibly just launch a second CCL image with a customized menu for
> debugging?
>
> The two could communicate via a socket as in Slime/Swank.


Here's a possible approach:

Instead of launching another CCL Image in the event of an error, make  
the IDE a separate application from the start.  It would include  
Hemlock, the Backtrace dialog, the Inspector and various other tools.

The IDE would never run code itself.  It would communicate with a  
separate Lisp process using something like the Slime/Swank protocol.

It the event of an error the Lisp doing the work could sit happily in  
its break loop, while the IDE managed events and displayed the  
debugging tools.

And there is no reason for the IDE to be strictly CCL.  It could, in  
fact, be a Cocoa based Slime, supporting various Lisps and even Schemes.