Re: ELPA submission: drepl (REPL protocol)

[Augusto Stoffel]

On Tue, 31 Oct 2023 at 09:08, Philip Kaludercic wrote:

> The idea seems interesting, I'll have to try it out at some point
> (though I don't really use Python or Lua much, so I hope you plan to add
> more languages in the future).

Sure, let me know if you have any ideas.  A good candidate, as I
mention in the readme, would be a language that has a good embeddable
REPL library that you hack into (as opposed to a program where the
REP-loop is more or less hardcoded).

> Code-wise, I just have a few minor comments:

> -(defface drepl-prompt-invalid '((t :inherit (error default)))
> +(defface drepl-prompt-invalid '((t :inherit (error default))) ;why both?
>    "Face for continuation prompts when input is invalid.")

This is really needed to avoid comint-highlight-input from interfering
in continuation prompts.

> +;; Are classes needed here or could you use `cl-defstruct' with
> +;; `:include'?
>  (defclass drepl-base ()
>    ((buffer :initarg :buffer :reader drepl--buffer)
>     (status :initform nil :accessor drepl--status)

I would use a more lightweight alternative to EIEIO if available, but
cl-defstructs don't form a hierarchy for method dispatch purposes.  (Not
that I'm using this feature _right now_, but morally it's the right
thing.)

>  (cl-defgeneric drepl--command (repl)
>    "The command to start the REPL interpreter as a list of strings."
>    (ignore repl)
> -  (error "This needs an implementation"))
> +  (error "This needs an implementation")) ;Mention what "this" is

_This_ is the method.  This is one of the two things that cannot have a
default implementation and should be implemented by every subclass :-).
Is the message confusing?