[fpc-devel] Possibility to add a branch for experiment with formal annotation

[Tom Verhoeff]

We (Software Engineering & Technology group of CS dept. at Technische
Universiteit Eindhoven) are working on an extension to (Free)Pascal,
by adding a facility for including formal annotation in programs
(pre/post conditions, invariants, etc).

We would also like to construct some tools for static analysis of (large)
Pascal programs.  We investigated some options (continue with our own
tools, use an external framework, e.g. using a scanner/parser generator
like GOLD).  Our conclusion is that FPC seems to be the most viable basis
in the longer run.

We would like to do our own development, i.e. make a branch of 2.0.4,
but retain the possibility to incorporate changes from the main FPC
development effort, and also have the possibility to give back our
work and have it incorporated into FPC (under the same license).

Currently, we have a separate source repository starting from 2.0.4,
and we have extended FreePascal minimally with syntax like

	{@ boolean-expression}

to mean something like 'while not boolean-expression do' (i.e. the
program hangs if the condition does not hold).  This experiment
was carried out to determine how easy it is to adapt the scanner,
parser, and code generator.

QUESTION: Would it be possible for us to "obtain" a branch in the FPC
subverion repository for our work?  That would simplify both the
incorporation (merging) of changes from the FPC team, and vice versa.
Or do you have alternative suggestions?

Can we contact someone off-list to discuss this further?

Best regards,

	Tom Verhoeff
-- 
E-MAIL: T.Verhoeff @ TUE.NL     | Fac. of Math. & Computing Science
PHONE:  +31 40 247 41 25        | Eindhoven University of Technology
FAX:    +31 40 247 54 04        | PO Box 513, NL-5600 MB Eindhoven
http://www.win.tue.nl/~wstomv/  | The Netherlands