Dean,
Hee, hee!
I got a chuckle out of your reply. And I agree--up to a point. Those who *really* want to program computers (like you) don't need a display at all. They'll use paper tape, punched cards, or even the front-panel switches. But such people are highly motivated and very exceptional. They are able to see their program in their head, or willing to use supplemental tools such as print outs and handwritten notes to work with their code.
I think programming gets much easier when you can get a lot of context in front of the programmer. The Smalltalk browser does this, and the EToy system does it even more. These tools help because we're so much better at recognition than recall. So if Mark's goal is to teach *kids* how to program, then I think a 320x240 screen is too small. Like you, I've programmed with small video screens (40x24 characters), but I would not want to inflict that on students these days. You might find that 5% of the students really take to it, but you'd alienate the other 95%.
Re:
So, as Andreas mentioned, a lot of people once "knew" that you can't write an operating system in C. It seems that a lot of people now "know" that a 320 x 240 screen is too small for programming.
You may be right, and I'd love to be proved wrong. In fact, I'd love an opportunity to prove myself wrong! There's a part of me that thinks you could get pretty far on a small screen with the right UI. But the current Squeak programming tools are MUCH too wasteful of pixels, and Squeak's facilities for window management are awkward on small, pen-based screens.
Re:
We really should be able to craft a version of Squeak that would be a usable development and runtime environment on a machine with the power of a 33 MHz 68K and a small display. I avoid saying a "Palm" because: 1) There are many low cost handhelds in this category. 2) The Palm OS has some limitations that could impede performance.
That's one of those projects I'd love to pursue some day. PocketSmalltalk does an excellent job for application deployment, but does not attempt to provide a development environment on the handheld.
-- John
P.S. I couldn't quite believe that your entire message would fit on a 240x320 screen without scrolling, but I counted the lines and, sure enough, it would! With room to spare.