[squeak-dev] Are Objects really hard?

Lawson English lenglish5 at cox.net
Sat Feb 11 21:40:31 UTC 2012


Even so, I suspect kids find smalltalk easier to learn than adults, 
especially adults with prior programming experience.

L.

On 2/11/12 2:31 PM, Chris Cunnington wrote:
>
> @/Paul DeBruicker/
>
>
> "In the meantime, there was the need for a new kind of object oriented 
> language that could be programmed by young children.
>
> I had been thinking about it, but was interrupted by a hallway bet 
> about "how large  would a description of the world's most powerful 
> computer language be?"
> Having understood John McCarthy's LISP by then, I said "Half a page!" 
> They said "Prove it".
>
> Two weeks later I had this for the kernel of a new kind of 
> object-based language, using some of John's techniques, but put in 
> directly executable form.
> The kernel of Smalltalk. How small powerful "computer math" can be.
>
> One month later my colleague Dan Ingalls had programmed this into one 
> of our minicomputers and we suddenly
> had a working, very high level, simple and powerful dynamic object 
> language!"
>
> http://www.vpri.org/pdf/m2004002_center.pdf
>
> Written by Alan Kay and from VPRI.
>
>
> Not surprisingly, Alan Kay had many objectives he wanted to achieve. 
> Two are mentioned in the first sentence. The inciting
> incident is a bet. In the fifth sentence he says "a new kind of 
> object-based language" was created.
>
> Note Bene: He does not say a new children's language was created. 
> Under pressure from the bet, his priorities separated, and he created a
> new OO language. The impetus to use it to assist children in education 
> reasserted itself later.
>
> The bet in question was not about a children's language. It was about 
> the "most powerful computer language".  He uses the word
> "power" in this passage three times and word "child" once.
>
> So there you have it, Paul. You just stood at the moment of creation.
>
> Chris
>
>

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