Longstanding issues: structs & standalone Erlang

[Kostis Sagonas]

Bengt Kleberg wrote:
 > i would like to suggest another possiblity:
 > software that has grown organically (without overall plan and/or 
 > guidelines) and always remains backwards compatible, often comes with 
 > complex dependencies between its components.

Very true.

 > i doubt that it is impossible to have the same functionality, as in the 
 > current complexly dependent erlang/otp, in a layered erlang distribution 
 > if the backwards compatibility could be allowed below 100%.

This is also true.  The only point I would like to add is that
"overall plans and/or guidelines" are not enough, I am afraid.
These guidelines should be backed up by software tools that enforce
the layered software development property.
Such tools are currently lacking.

Kostis