[Nix-dev] Fractalide is ready to use.

[stewart mackenzie]

Hi all,

I'd say Fractalide is in a state ready to use now. It's still very
experimental so don't bet the house on it.

Fractalide is a flow-based programming platform implemented in Rust,
it uses Nix as its package manager, and aims to thwart three classes
of problems: Memory safety, Dependency Hell and Code Reuse (or lack
thereof).

Points of interest:
*) First (?) language designed to use nix as its package manager.
**) Each component can setup its own OS dependencies (say openssl, db
drivers etc)
**) The repo is lazily evaluated thus can expand massively and you
only compile what is needed (similar to nixpkgs)
*) Components have capnproto contracts between them, (in an effort to
implement some semblance of the langsec.org know how. We also use the
nom parser combinator, as a second langsec muscle flex)
*) Its implemented in Rust, so you get to safely have your cake and
speedily eat it.
*) This kind of platform elevates the concept of devops to new levels imho.
*) We use nix to replace make.
*) We're currently implementing a hypercard whereby we swap out
hypertalk for flow-based programming, so feedback is desired. This
allows for fancy graphics.

Happy hacking!

/sjm