The Kawa compiler currently uses reflection to determine properties (such as exported function definitions) from referenced classes. It would be better to read class files. This should not be too difficult, since the gnu.bytecode library abstracts over class information read by reflection or class reading.

We'd like a command for compiling compile a list of Java and Scheme source files thar may have mutual dependencies. A good way to do this is to hook into javac, which is quite extensible and pluggable.

One could do something like:

This approach may not immediately provide as robust mixed-language support as ideal, but it is more amenable to incremental improvement that a standalone stub-generator.

This project is good if you know or want to learn how javac works.

Java 7 supports MethodHandles which are meant to provide better performance (ultimately) for dynamic languages. See JSR 292 and the Da Vinci Machine Project. MethodHandles will be used to compile lambdas in Java 8. Kawa can already be compiled to use Methodhandles, but only in one unimportant way. There much more to be done. For example we can start by optimizing arithmetic when the types are unknown at compile-time. They could make implementing generic functions (multimethods) more efficient. At some point we want to compile lambdas in the same way as the Java 8 preview does. This can potenitally be more efficient than Kawa's current mechanism.

Kawa supports most of the functionality of R6RS and R7RS. However, various R6R7 or (more importantly) R7RS features are missing, and should be added. For example, both R6RS or R7RS library definition syntax are unimplemented. In a related matter, Kawa supports most of the functionality of syntax-case, but some pieces are missing, and no doubt some of it is incorrect. Adding the missing pieces and testing for correctness of corner cases is needed. Andre van Tonder's R6RS expander may be helpful.

It would be useful to extend the import form (and also the require form when no explicit filename is given) to search a “source path” for a matching source file, automatically compiling it as needed (as done in the require form when an explicit filename is given). In interactive mode, if the module is already loaded, check if it is updated - if not recompile and re-load it.

Implement SwitchExp as a new class extending Expression, and compile it using the existing gnu.bytecode.SwitchState. Use it to optimize Scheme's case form. This might be better done without a new Expression, but instead using a special Procedure with custom “validation” and code-generation.

(This is a fairly small starter project.)

Kawa has some limited support for parameterized types, but it's not used much. Improve type inferencing. Support definition of parameterized classes. Better used of parameterized types for sequence class. Support wildcards. (It might be better to have wild-carding be associated with declarations, as in Scala, rather than uses.)

Kawa doesn't have true function types: Parameter and result types are only handled for “known” functions. Adding first-class function types would be a major task, possibly depending on improvements in Parameterized types.

Add support for full continuations, which is the major feature missing for Kawa to qualify as a “true Scheme”. One way to implement continuations is to add a add that converts the abstract syntax tree to continuation-pass-style, and then exhand the existing full-tail-call support to manage a stack. There are other ways to solve the problem. This may benefit from Faster tailcalls.

Make --full-tailcalls run faster. This may depend on (or incorporate) TreeList-optimization.

The TreeList class is a data structure for “flattened” trees. It is used for XML-style nodes, for multiple values, and for the full-tail-call API. The basic concept is fine, but it could do with some re-thinking to make make random-access indexing fast. Also, support for updating is insufficient. (This needs someone into designing and hacking on low-level data-structures, along with lots of profiling and testing.)

C# recently added asynch and await keywords for asynchronous programming. Kawa's recently improved support for lazy programming seems like a good framework for equivalent functionality: Instead of an asynch method that returns a Task<T> the Kawa programmer would write a function that returns a lazy[T]. This involves some design work, and modifying the compiler to rewrite the function body as needed.

This is related to full continuations, as the re-writing is similar.

Improvements to the read-eval-print console. In addition to a traditional Swing console, it would be useful to support using a web browser as a a remote terminal, possibly using web-sockets. (This allows “printing” HTML-expressions, which can be a useful way to learn and experiment with web technologies.) See here for an article on the existing Swing REPL, along with some to-do items. Being able to hide and show different parts of the output might be nice. Being able to link from error messages to source might be nice. Better handling of redefinitions is discussed here in the context of JavaXF Script; this is a general REPL issue, mostly independent of the GUI for it.

An interesting possibility is to use the IPython framework. There are existing ports for Scala: either IScala or Scala Notebook.

It would be nice to update the XQuery (Qexo) support to XQuery 1.1.

It would be nice to support XQuery updates. This depends on TreeList-optimization.

Kawa supports a small subset of the Common Lisp language, but it supports a much larger subset of core Common Lisp concepts and data structure, some designed with Common Lisp functionality in mind. Examples include packages, arrays, expanded function declarations, type specifications, and format. A lot could be done to improve the Common Lisp support with modest effort. Some Common Lisp features could also be useful for Scheme: Documentation strings (or markup) as Java annotations, better MOP-like introspection, and generic methods a la defmethod (i.e. with multiple definition statements, possibly in separate files, as opposed to the current make-procedure) all come to mind. Being able to run some existing Common Lisp code bases with at most modest changes should be the goal. One such package to start with might be a existing test framework, perhaps FivaAM. Full Common Lisp compatibility is nice, but let's walk before we can run.

A lot of work is needed to make JEmacs useful. One could try to import a useful package and see what works and what fails. Or one may look at basic editing primitives. Enhancements may be needed to core Emacs Lisp language primitives (enhancing Common Lisp support may help), or to the display engine.

Emacs now supports lexical bindings - we should do the same.

There is some Kawa support for Eclipse (Schemeway), and possibly other IDEs (NetBeans, IntelliJ). But many improvements are desirable. REPL improvements may be a component of this.

It would be nice to integrate the pretty-printer with the REPL, so that window re-sizing re-breaks the output lines. It would be nice to enhance the pretty-printer to handle variable-width fonts and other “rich” text. Figuring out how to make the output formatter more flexible, more efficient, and more customizable are also desirable.

Hop is an interesting design for integrating server-side and client-side programming using a Scheme dialect. These ideas seem like they would port quite well to Kawa.

Add quaternions to the numerical tower, such that Complex extends a new abstract class Quaternion extends Quantity. These are useful for 3D rotations. A reasonable design is here.

Support localization by extending the SRFI_109 syntax, in the manner of (and compatible with) GNU gettext. I.e. optionally specify a localization key (to use as an index in the translation database); if there is no key specified, default to using the literal parts of the string.

Implement a “bind” mechanism similar to that of JavaFX Script. The idea is when you initialize a variable or field, instead of initializing it to a fixed value, you bind it to an expression depending on other variables. We install “listeners” on those variables, so when those variables change, we update the bound variable. This feature is useful in many application, but the initial focus could be GUI programming and perhaps web programming.

Kawa does a lot of optimizations and inlining. This conflicts with being able to “reload” a module into an already-running interactive environment.

We could add an option to load a module in “reloadable” mode. Kawa already patches an old function object (a ModuleMethod) so existing references to the function get automatically updated. However, there are problems if the “signature” of the function changes - for example if the return type (declared or inferred) becomes more general. In those cases the best thing is to re-compile any code that depends on the modified function.

Reloading a module that defines a class is even trickier, at least if there are existing instances that should work as the updated class. We can handle the special case where only method bodies change: In reloadable mode, each method body is compiled to a separate function, the actual body indirects to the function. We must also recognize that we compiling a new version of the same class, which requires a textual comparison between the old and new versions, or a structural comparison between the old class and the new code.

When it comes to top-level variables, an issue is when to re-evaluate the initializing expression. It is reasonable to do so if and only if the expression is modified, which again requires a textual comparison.