Need feedback on simple idea

Alejandro F. Reimondo aleReimondo at smalltalking.net
Fri Apr 11 21:37:10 UTC 2003


Nathanael,

> > It shows, though, that it's possible to have a very
> > simple rule that would give us the same kind of privacy as we
> > have for our instance variables right now.
>
> I absolutely agree with you. The main goal is to have a *simple* and
> *uniform* mechanism that addresses the dynamic nature of Smalltalk.

Simplicity through reduction is irrelevant.
If we obtain simplicity at the cost of loosing diversity of expression or
loosing differentiation of culture accepted elements, we imho are going in
the wrong direction.
Object technology must evolve to handle complexity, like non reductionistic
approaches in Ecology and other Ambient related disciplines; not in
decomposition of atomic/simple elements like in Physics or other hard
sciences constrained to reductionism.
So, I think it is more convenient to learn from experiences in holistic
approaches and try to move our object environment to be used not only Object
Oriented (formal, simple and clever definitions) e.g. be used not only by
reduction of things to objects.
Simplicity, complexity and beauty only defines a point of view and reveal
culture constrains that we can't evade.
I feel the elimination of a concept commonly accepted in the community like
a missing of difference, a loose in diversity.
A term exist not only by it's observed use. It exist to differentiate from
the others and the difference is not reducible nor merged in an abstract
concept without loosing something in the process ;-)
For example, I see that is a common practice in Squeak not to comment
accessors...
I comment all the messages. YES! ALL the messages.
Because I have learned to get the value of the times "spent" in commenting
messages (also when stupid methods implements the message).
Most the time I see that people want to produce software at top speed...
They think that they waste their time if they must wait... [*]
If you learn how to get value from building software objects at your
"normal" speed, the stress is reduced and software become more
understandable.
One of our main topics, I think, is to obtain a medium to build software at
normal/human rate.
I do not mean that we must insert delays in the browser nor in the compiler
(to be similar to C++ compilers+linkers) ;-)
I mean that we must consider the time that take a human to "understand" what
their hands are doing...
cheers,
Ale.
[*] typing speed is not important to build better software.




----- Original Message -----
From: "Nathanael Schärli" <n.schaerli at gmx.net>
To: "'The general-purpose Squeak developers list'"
<squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org>
Sent: Friday, April 11, 2003 5:22 PM
Subject: RE: Need feedback on simple idea


> Adam,
>
> > It shows, though, that it's possible to have a very
> > simple rule that would give us the same kind of privacy as we
> > have for our instance variables right now.
>
> I absolutely agree with you. The main goal is to have a *simple* and
> *uniform* mechanism that addresses the dynamic nature of Smalltalk.
>
> - Simple means that it should be easy to use and understand.
>
> - Uniform means that it should be applicable to both state and behavior.
> As I pointed out in my earlier post, it's not worth anything if we have
> a mechanism that only allows one to declare encapsulated state, but not
> encapsulated methods. And because I don't like the idea of having
> different encapsulation mechanisms for methods and state, I suggest a
> uniform mechanism.
>
> > I'd really like to hear more about Nathanael's idea.
>
> I'll post more about that as soon as I have some more time to really
> work on this (probably in a couple weeks). Then, I'll also be very
> interested in hearing more opinions and comments from the list. Finally,
> ideas are not born perfect ;)
>
> Thanks,
> Nathanael
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: squeak-dev-bounces at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> > [mailto:squeak-dev-bounces at lists.squeakfoundation.org] On
> > Behalf Of Adam Spitz
> > Sent: Freitag, 11. April 2003 18:02
> > To: The general-purpose Squeak developers list
> > Subject: Re: Need feedback on simple idea
> >
> >
> > Tim Rowledge wrote:
> >
> > > On a more practical point, the idea of using self-like messages to
> > > define instance variables would be acceptable IFF those
> > messages were
> > > properly private. In order to provide this privacy one
> > would need to
> > > implement some mechanism to allow properly private methods
> > and the same
> > > mechanism would (very likely) solve the worries about overly public
> > > methods already in the system. I'd be quite happy to see
> > such a privacy
> > > mechanism if anyone has good ideas.
> >
> > I don't have any *good* ideas. :) But here's what someone else did:
> >
> > The Ruby language allows "self" to be left out when it's the
> > receiver (just as Java and Self do). Ruby also has a simple
> > privacy mechanism: you can mark a method as being private,
> > and private methods can only be accessed by messages sent
> > using the "implicit self" syntax. (Is that right? My Ruby is rusty.)
> >
> > It's an ugly hack in a lot of ways, and I don't really mean
> > it as a serious suggestion. (I'd really like to hear more
> > about Nathanael's
> > idea.) It shows, though, that it's possible to have a very
> > simple rule that would give us the same kind of privacy as we
> > have for our instance variables right now.
> >
> >
> > Adam Spitz
> >
>
>
>



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