first of all, u\you should read Squeak By Example. Most book don't teach how to make things like that because in smalltalk, since you can browse all of the source code from within the environment, you can figure out how to make things like windows, or, anything in m\smalltalk, without having to look it up! that is one of the reasons I like smalltalk, you dont need any large reference manuals to work :)

On Fri, Jul 4, 2008 at 4:05 AM, Michael van der Gulik mikevdg@gmail.com wrote:

On Fri, 4 Jul 2008 14:04:52 +0800 Stephen Ng stephen.ng@planetnutek.com wrote:

...

Hi everyone,

First off, I am really new to smalltalk. I have tons of experience with languages like C but have never made the move to OO type languages.

Secondly, I've been reading up as much as I can on OO concepts and perhaps I can say that I feel comfortable with smalltalk syntax. My question is how does one start learning about the MVC or Morphic interfaces in order to use smalltalk in writing programs that make use of lots of windows with text fields etc like in traditional business systems? I cannot seem to find complete info on these topics. Many tutorials just spend lots of time painting pretty lines and patterns and fall short of showing someone like me how best to use the MVC, Graphics-* or Morphic-* class categories and their classes. I understand Morphic is the new wave as far as Squeak is concerned and I would be just as happy to use it. However, all the literature on the web is really disparate and does not approach the subject in a holistic way. I've even tried looking at the classes themselves in the Browser but the whole thing just gets very confusing.

I'd appreciate it if anyone can provide some pointers, direction, literature (up to date with Squeak) etc.

Hi Stephen.

Welcome to the community!

For traditional business programs in Squeak, I think that Morphic is the hard way to do it. I tried, made a bit of progress but then gave up in disgust.

What I recommend is that you start from our documentation page - http://www.squeak.org/Documentation/. The book to read is "Squeak By Example".

For business information system development, I'd recommend getting in to web development using Seaside: http://www.seaside.st/. Your applications in this environment will look a lot more professional than they would in Morphic.

And do ask questions here, or join us on the IRC channel on freenode.net, #squeak. Often there are people there :-).

Gulik.

-- Michael van der Gulik mikevdg@gmail.com _______________________________________________ Beginners mailing list Beginners@lists.squeakfoundation.org http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/beginners

Thanks. I'll check these out.

Stephen

On 04/07/2008, at 4:05 PM, Michael van der Gulik wrote:

On Fri, 4 Jul 2008 14:04:52 +0800 Stephen Ng stephen.ng@planetnutek.com wrote:

...

Hi everyone,

First off, I am really new to smalltalk. I have tons of experience with languages like C but have never made the move to OO type languages.

Secondly, I've been reading up as much as I can on OO concepts and perhaps I can say that I feel comfortable with smalltalk syntax. My question is how does one start learning about the MVC or Morphic interfaces in order to use smalltalk in writing programs that make use of lots of windows with text fields etc like in traditional business systems? I cannot seem to find complete info on these topics. Many tutorials just spend lots of time painting pretty lines and patterns and fall short of showing someone like me how best to use the MVC, Graphics-* or Morphic-* class categories and their classes. I understand Morphic is the new wave as far as Squeak is concerned and I would be just as happy to use it. However, all the literature on the web is really disparate and does not approach the subject in a holistic way. I've even tried looking at the classes themselves in the Browser but the whole thing just gets very confusing.

I'd appreciate it if anyone can provide some pointers, direction, literature (up to date with Squeak) etc.

Hi Stephen.

Welcome to the community!

For traditional business programs in Squeak, I think that Morphic is the hard way to do it. I tried, made a bit of progress but then gave up in disgust.

What I recommend is that you start from our documentation page - http://www.squeak.org/Documentation/ . The book to read is "Squeak By Example".

For business information system development, I'd recommend getting in to web development using Seaside: http://www.seaside.st/. Your applications in this environment will look a lot more professional than they would in Morphic.

And do ask questions here, or join us on the IRC channel on freenode.net, #squeak. Often there are people there :-).

Gulik.

-- Michael van der Gulik mikevdg@gmail.com

Don't take what I wrote to be negative. I am greatly enjoying learning Squeak and Smalltalk. It is a great personal amplifier. But, unless you are into web development (as already mentioned), there isn't really a business side to Squeak.

On Sat, Jul 5, 2008 at 7:11 AM, Herbert König herbertkoenig@gmx.net wrote:

Hello everyone; this is just getting too interesting. It is like the classical Zen path to Enlightnment:

"How long will it take me?"

"10 years."

"No, I mean if I really try?"

"20 years."

"No, you don't understand...I'll try REALLY hard..."

"30 years."

I am in nearly the same place David is, except that I have asked all these questions myself already, and have gotten the same responses! I am SLOWLY learning Smalltalk, so I have seen others pick it up much faster through the same process. Anyway, I found a framework that made sense to ME (Aida) and started building SOMETHING. Then Squeak started to make more sense. It's a process, I think, NOT a recipe, and we are all wired differently.

Anyway, that would be my suggestion. Look at all the books, yes. Listen to what people are telling you...yes. But in your heart you KNOW that the ONLY way any of it is going to make sense is by USING it. It took me almost FOUR years before I could do that, but now I am doing "useful" work. Very, very, occasionally I can figure out out something within a "framework" by "reading it," as has been suggested to you. Mostly I am still just using the frameworks, much like you would in a traditional language. And, like any language, start from one example, get stuck, and if you can't read the code in a browser, the most amazing thing about Squeak is NOT the implementation, but the PEOPLE. If you can type fast, you'll get fast help!

Hello David,

DF> Squeak is a toy for academics and hobbyists to try out new ideas and DF> explore computing at a higher-level. It wasn't designed for doing DF> conventional application development and you won't find much support DF> in Squeak for normal commercial programming. In fact, just the

Squeak is used in several commercial web apps, one example being gas billing by Janko.

Janko, by they way, is a shear force of nature. If you use Aida and need help, he is contagious. I would be willing to show you around Aida due largely to all the help Janko has given me!

Then there are commercial apps in Squek which have nothing to do with

seaside or aida. Look at Squeak people for Tansel Ersavas' he has done several Squeak apps.

I myself query databases with Squeak, partly using a neural network. Then I generate csv and management always has people at hand to make their reports in Excel and Word.

Have you written any "tools" for this? I have been doing some of this for very challenging information, but like the "easy documentation" and fast change ability of a visual query designer and the browsing ability of something like DbVisualizer. I have been fantasizing about a Squeak based database exploration tool that could design queries and "drop down" into Smalltalk collections for the really hard work.

A likely boring example follows:

Take, for example, our hospital chart times. Each time something is charted, we get a time stamp. We have studied the accuracy of these (particularly when they are back-dated) and found them to be tolerably accurate. What we NEED, though, is the arrival and discharge time PER UNIT. For example, a patient could flow like this:

Arrive ER Leave ER Arrive ICU Leave ICU Arrive PCU Leave PCU Arrive 3C Leave 3C Arrive ICU Leave ICU

Where ER, ICU, PCU, 3C are just different units. It is quite common for patients to move back and forth among units depending on their condition.

Now, the EASY think for us would be if an arrival and discharge time was documented! This is a whole other topic about the documentation demands on nursing staff! So, for now, just assume we want to solve the problem given the above information. The problem you run into with any type of query grouping is that you run into the situation where you get the first FIRST ICU time and the last LAST ICU time in the example above, not the first and last time for each instance of an an ICU visit. So, code works great for stuff like that, but it would be nice to handle the initial pull of chart times for a date range in a simple query designer! Especially since I am leaving out the joins necessary to get patient account numbers, etc...!

Just wondering if someone has already done what I am thinking about!

You have a very valid point regarding office like user interfaces.

If that's required for your definition of 'conventional application development' you're absolutely right.

Although, I have always pictured WxSqueak as a possible alternative for "conventional development," and have learned enough Smalltalk to go back to it and check it out again. It looks like a viable alternative to me to use my existing Domain Model objects from, say, an Aida application, and provide a native Windows view...

DF> For enterprise application development using Smalltalk, you are DF> probably better off with a commercial Smalltalk.

Ask Qwaq or dabbledb about that.

Yes, but I think they have skills I do not! They can build the TOOLS I am using!

The other reasons against Squeak are in acceptance by management

I am lucky enough to work somewhere that I can use what gets the job done, and we are struggling financially, so "free" is good if the ROI does not suffer due to "lost productivity" using "lesser" tools. I'm NOT saying Squeak is "lesser," I'm saying we considered wether it was first (less stable, etc...). What I found was that the open source support system surrounding Squeak is superior to anything out there! You guys are just incredibly knowledgeable and very, very, willing to help!

Rob

Hello Rob,

RR> Have you written any "tools" for this?  I have been doing RR> some of this for very challenging information, but like the "easy

not really.

My QueryBuilder just concats fixed stings with person names, products and date or time ranges taken from the UI.

RR>  The problem you run into with any type of query grouping is that RR> you run into the situation where you get the first FIRST ICU time RR> and the last LAST ICU time in the example above, not the first and RR> last time for each instance of an an ICU visit.  So,  code works RR> great for stuff like that, but it would be nice to handle the RR> initial pull of chart times for a date range in a simple query RR> designer!  Especially since I am leaving out the joins necessary RR> to get patient account numbers, etc...!

We can exchange details by private mail. I would not call what I've done a query designer, but from your example units and patient names would come from database tables, selected in Squeak ListMorphs.

Time ranges come from a MonthMorph and the necessary joins are fixed strings. After I've done it, I find it easy.

RR> Just wondering if someone has already done what I am thinking about!

Not sure but let's exchange mail.

Cheers,

Herbert