How about Smalltalk-2000?

Stewart MacLean stewart.maclean at nzhis.govt.nz
Thu Feb 17 03:06:37 UTC 2000


I second this!

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ivan Tomek [mailto:ivan.tomek at acadiau.ca]
> Sent: Thursday, February 17, 2000 9:22 AM
> To: squeak at cs.uiuc.edu
> Cc: recipient.list.not.shown; @cs.uiuc.edu
> Subject: RE: How about Smalltalk-2000?
> 
> 
> I agree completely. Although I appreciate all the innovative 
> proposals, 
> I have yet to see one that makes Smalltalk more expressive 
> and flexible. 
> 
> Ivan
> 
> Date forwarded: 	16 Feb 2000 20:03:21 -0000
> From:           	"Jarvis, Robert P. \(Contingent\)" 
> <Jarvisb at timken.com>
> To:             	"'squeak at cs.uiuc.edu'" <squeak at cs.uiuc.edu>
> Subject:        	RE: How about Smalltalk-2000?
> Date sent:      	Wed, 16 Feb 2000 15:06:20 -0500
> Forwarded by:   	squeak at cs.uiuc.edu
> Send reply to:  	squeak at cs.uiuc.edu
> 
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From:	Warren Postma [SMTP:wpostma at ztr.com]
> > > Sent:	Wednesday, February 16, 2000 11:57 AM
> > > To:	'Dan Ingalls'
> > > Subject:	How about Smalltalk-2000?
> > > 
> > > Voila, Smalltalk-2000, a dialect of Smalltalk-80 that acknowledges
> > > that Smalltalk has finally developed an alternative to the most
> > > unreadable part of Smalltalk-80 syntax.
> > > 
> > What's *better* about this?  Is grafting bits and pieces of Basic,
> > Python, Java, C, Fortran, COBOL, and/or <your favorite 
> language here>
> > going to make Smalltalk "better"?  Or is this simply pandering to
> > people whose vision of what a computer language "should" 
> look like has
> > been formed by exposure to those other languages, and who don't care
> > to learn anything new?
> > 
> > When I first started trying to learn Smalltalk, back around 
> nine years
> > ago, I bought a copy of Smalltalk/V for Windows v1.0, 
> loaded it one my
> > machine, started working my way through the tutorial, and I just
> > flat-out did not get it.  At the time I had about 18 years of
> > experience with ALGOL-derived languages, and this Smalltalk stuff
> > was...well, "different".  It was quite obvious to me that Smalltalk
> > was all wrong, totally illegible, screwed up, and *it just 
> didn't look
> > right*.  Now, C - C was perfect.  Wonderful.  Not only 
> that, I knew it
> > really well.  Ditto C++, although there were lots of quirky little
> > bits in there I didn't (and still don't, for that matter) grok - but
> > no matter.  It was perfect.  (Of course, ten years before *that* I
> > thought C was screwed up - any language that used *symbols* like '{'
> > instead of good old words like 'BEGIN', and which used <retch!>
> > *lower-case letters* in identifiers, wasn't worth *MY* time :-).  I
> > iterated through the cycle of "I want to learn Smalltalk - 
> this stuff
> > looks yucky - it's obviously screwed up - to h*ll with it" several
> > times until I managed to clear my "previously-conceived notions"
> > stack, and actually sat down and figured out the how's and why's of
> > Smalltalk.  If I recall correctly I finally had my "road to 
> Damascus"
> > experience when I realized that the language designers 
> weren't simply
> > being perverse when they made the "normal" "if <condition> then
> > <statement> else <statement>" logic into "<boolean> ifTrue: <block>
> > ifFalse: <block>" - it's this way because #ifTrue:ifFalse: 
> is, by God,
> > a *message* sent to a Boolean which evaluates the correct block
> > depending on *which* Boolean (true or false) receives the message. 
> > The receiving Boolean knows *which* block to evaluate simply because
> > it "knows" (by existence) which Boolean it is, and has the proper
> > logic written in to it.  That was, I think, the most electrifying
> > experience I'd had in computing since I figured out, when I was
> > sixteen, that computers weren't half as complicated as I'd 
> been told,
> > and that I could actually understand what was going on.
> > 
> > OK, count me among the pro-Smalltalk "don't change a hair for me/Not
> > if you care for me" crowd.  I find the internal consistency of
> > Smalltalk wonderful. I don't *want* a bunch of special "let's look
> > more like C/Python/ALGOL" syntax rules, VM-supported Singleton
> > objects, and/or other (pardon my bluntness) crap littering the
> > landscape.  If something is truly an improvement, great.  But "let's
> > make Smalltalk look more like <some other language>" is not a step
> > forward on either the pink or blue planes.
> > 
> > Bob Jarvis
> > Compuware @ Timken
> > 
> 
> 
> 
> Dr. Ivan Tomek,
> Jodrey School of Computer Science
> Acadia University
> Nova Scotia, Canada
> fax: (902) 585-1067
> voice: (902) 585-1467
> e-mail: ivan.tomek at acadiau.ca
> 





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