todo.nw

\section{Things to be done for noweb 3}

\begin{center}
Last serious update: July, 2000
\end{center}

Noweb 3 is almost ready to come out of alpha and become beta software.
The essential things are to get \emph{new manual pages} and
\emph{better configuration}.

To volunteer for one of these tasks, or for something else you think
needs doing, send mail to
\begin{rawhtml}
<a href=mailto:nr@eecs.harvard.edu>nr@eecs.harvard.edu</a>.
\end{rawhtml}
The tasks are in rough order of priority.

\begin{tabularx}{\textwidth}{l|l|l|X}
What&Who&Status&Details\\
\hline
\multicolumn4{c}{\textbf{Top-priority items}}\\
man&&&
Write man pages, especially documenting new options and filters.\\
config&&&
Improve configuration.  Ideally, bundle scripts in binary.\\
winmake&&&
Come up with Makefiles that work on Windows.\\
port&&&Write porting instructions.\\
Mac&&&Do a Mac port.\\
DOS&&&Do a DOS port.\\
Win32&&&Do a Win32 port (Windows 95/98/NT).\\
sort&&&
Come up with a sorting method that is consistent with noweb 2.9\\
\\
\hline
\multicolumn4{c}{\textbf{Medium-priority items}}\\
\hline
untangle&&incomplete&
Replace nw2 nountangle script with docs2comments filter in Lua, taking
ideas from unreleased Icon docs2comments filter.
Begun but not finished.\\
autodefs&&&
Rewrite the autodefs machinery in Lua, plus a couple of
language-specific filters.\\
Rat&N. Ramsey&&
Write rationale and overview for Hacker's Guide.\\
Ints&&&
Document Lua interfaces for pipeline, buffer.
How to use interfaces to build a pipeline.
How to use interfaces to write a stage.\\
Stages&&&
Document Lua functions for standard stages.\\
count&&&
Rewrite nocount in Lua to serve as an example for Hacker's Guide
(also for distribution).\\
stdfil&&&
Develop an army of standard filters, to include, e.g., nocond, nwdate,
the stupid C header trick, etc.\\
\multicolumn4{c}{\textbf{Low-priority items}}\\
\hline
order&NR&ugh&Get the order of arguments for stages straight once and
for all.  Closure args should come last so they can be optional.\\
Mcomb&&&
Merge markup.nw into markparse.nw.
Trim redundant code.
Try to control mutation so that
strsave is not needed. (possibly use Str or Atom)\\
unmarkup&&&
Test the converted unmarkup pipeline stage.
\\
Lua$+$nw&&&
Document the \texttt{case} and \texttt{globmatch} extensions to
Lua~2.5\\
Basis&&&
Document the ``initial basis'' of stuff available for people writing
Lua code for noweb (lists, environments, others\ldots).\\
filman&&&
Write man page for users of noweb filters (as opposed to Hacker's
Guide).
For example, a filter should replace the \texttt{nountangle} command.\\
sys&&&
Figure out how to reorganize the C~code to minimize and isolate system
dependencies.\\
clean&&&
Find ways to rationalize, reorganize, and reduce the code.
Figure out how to exploit the presence of CII.\\
strip&&&
Strip exceptions out of CII.\\
perf&&&
Do performance studies and figure out how to make things run blazingly
fast.\\
man&&&
Revise the Version 2 man pages.
Look for features to eliminate.\\
fileglob&&&
Find a way of doing globbing expansion of file names (need a list of
files in a given directory). 
(Needed to support -showautodefs).
NR has some old Unix code from a course he taught years ago.\\
ifdef&&&
Use the new stupid noweb trick to insert [[#ifdef]] in headers automatically.\\
Str&&&
Create Lua bindings for Hanson's string scanning, which should
simplify porting old Icon code.\\
\end{tabularx}




\section{Things that have actually been done}
\begin{tabularx}{\textwidth}{l|l|l|X}
What&Who&Status&Details\\
Pipe&nr&DONE!&
Eliminate source and sink types from MPipe, IPipe (but keeping dynamic
type distinction for Lua code).
Seek dramatic reduction in sizes of implementations.\\
totex&nr&done &
Convert totex from Icon to Lua.\\
tohtml&NR&done&
Convert tohtml from Icon to Lua.\\
noidx&NR&done&
Convert noidx from Icon to Lua.
\\
\end{tabularx}