Patrick Castle wrote:

> 
> There is something I don't understand however.
> 
> If it is true that you can't deploy your projects as .exe files I'm not sure
> I understand what the point is of working so hard to evolve a development
> like Squeak. I'm sorry if that sounds like the dumbest question anyone could
> possibly ask, but in my mind, development environments that can't deploy
> projects as individually executable files are usually reserved for demos or
> those learner CDs on books for Visual Basic or something like that aren't
> they??
> 

This is a C or VB way of thinking about things! 

The advantage of an exe is that it will run (all things being
favourable) on a given system. The disadvantage is that it'll only run
on a particular platform. (But do note that just about any complex
Windows program will be a whole series of .exe files and .dlls in an
.exe wrapper.)

Many Smalltalks (including Squeak) and Java use the concept of a virtual
machine (vm). Here the vm is platform specific, but the code isn't:  I
can run exactly the same Java or Squeak code on an IBM mainframe, a Mac
or Windows box, but I need a different vm for each. (For example, my
current set up is a dual boot box running Linux and Windows. Both have
different VMs, but the same image and changes file.)

Consequently, Squeak "distributables" need to consist of the vm and an
image cut down to the very bare necessities of what you want to
distribute. If you wanted to distribute more than one of these stand
alone programs, it would probably make more sense to say "download
Squeak and file in my code". 

Lex Spoon has done some "proof of concept" stuff on making such
distributables, but the actual distributables are no longer on the
server (or, better, the server has gone to the great /dev/null in the
sky!). You can find some of the notes on how to do this by doing a
search on the gatech Swiki for hanoi. You might find the distributable
by doing a Google search: if not, I've a copy I can send you. Lex also
did a distributable called julexp which is probably a better
demonstration as it does something usefull, but I've never seen it.

Actually stripping down an image is something of an arcane art. There
are some details in the "Welcome to....." section which comes with the
main Squeak distribution under "Shrinking Squeak".

Hope this helps

Cheers

John

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