Longstanding issues: structs & standalone Erlang

[Vlad Dumitrescu XX (LN/EAB)]

Hello, 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Peter Lund
> 
> When a friend (or customer) of a erlang enthusiast wonders 
> what can be done in erlang, the enthusiast naturally wants to 
> send the friend (a windows user) a demo of something that the 
> friend can run directly on his computer.
> 
> Then the enthusiast says: "sorry, but to do this you need 
> first to do A then B and C, then *hopefully* it works. Please 
> tell me if you have any problem and I'll help you out running 
> the demo".
> 
> How many minus points do you think Erlang as a language gets 
> in the friend's mind when receiving such an email??

If I send to that friend a Perl script, I don't usually package it with
a Perl distribution, but tell him to download and install one (if
needed). I don't think that such a procedure would earn negative points.

So in this case, I think it would be enough with a packaging method for
an (built and ready to run!) application, so that it can be distributed
as a single file and run with a simple command. Which could be as easy
as using 7-Zip to create a self-extracting archive.

Of course, if the app involves a graphics system besides, gs, then we
enter a different realm...

That said, I do believe that improving the layering (as Robert V.
pointed out) would be beneficial (even if maybe not in a directly
observable way). Trouble is that even if someone (outside OTP) would
take the "layering fascist" hat and do the work, I have a feeling that
the result would be similar to Richard Carlsson's reworking of stdlib:
gathering dust in a dark corner despite all the merits... 

Regards,
Vlad