alt Hacker NewsI Built a Scheme Compiler with AI in 4 Days
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The column-number switch on the site is a clever idea, but I don't think it works. The columns are limited to a fixed height (that depends on their number). The fixed height forces readers to scroll down each column and then back to the top to read the next.
The site should imitate newspapers either more or less closely. In either case, first limit column height to something like 80% of the viewport to eliminate scrolling within columns. The column switch can select column width as a fraction of screen width.
More closely: when the content is too long for one set of columns, split it into multiple newspaper-style pages. The reader scrolls vertically through the newspaper pages.
Less closely: use columns arranged side-by-side in a horizontally scrollable container. The reader scrolls vertically to reach the container, then horizontally through the columns.
Cool. I'm also working on a Scheme compiler for embedding. Bytecode VM as well as AOT compilation to Zig. 100% written by Claude Opus under my supervision and guidance. I've given it an extensive set of tests and benchmarks (r5rs and r7rs) which helps A LOT. I currently use it embedded in a modal prose editor, mostly running integration tests for now.
> There’s probably more I built that I have already forgotten about.
This is a big gripe of mine at the moment. I rarely have any confidence that I know how the thing works, or what additional things it does / does not do but which I expect.
Recent example: all API endpoints should require a bearer token. Imagine my surprise when half of them didn’t enforce this effectively, 3 days later. A bearer token would work, but also providing no bearer token would also work. Over the course of time, tests were removed / things were modified to get to the goal and say “done, boss!”
I’ll note that for this project, “don’t look at the source code” was a requirement. Things have been corrected before release, but the amount of potential foot guns is so damn high.
> I run into bugs all the time so it’s probably not ready for anyone other than me to use, but I’ve managed to go pretty deep (if not wide) in just a few days of work.
Having similar experience with my experimental code generator to Rust. Every time a yet another example does not work, Claude fixes it. However, I am curious whether it would converge to a bullet-proof solution, or I have to carefully read the code and come up with proper abstractions.
What does "Write Yourself a Scheme in 48 Hours" produce? From OP I'm guessing it's something less than (73% of) R7RS.
https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Write_Yourself_a_Scheme_in_48_...
Quickly building "near production level"? Are we talking about this Matthew Phillips?
https://docs.astro.build/en/guides/build-with-ai/
What a happy coincidence!
detractors of AI claim this stuff is in its training data so it could be a copy which is valid. The crazy thing is the fact that it can definitely build something that does not exist.
This is cool, I got Codex to vibe code a Forth compiler for the NES and it worked fine, but I have to say that it is decidedly not fun.
Instead of figuring out how to solve every bug and becoming intimately familiar with with the code, I just delegate all the work to virtual interns and I sit and wait.
I decided to write my own Forth compiler without AI assistance as a result. Side projects should be fun and for learning.
Not judging people who use these tools, I use them too, but i just have been using them less for anything I am doing for fun.