On 10/4/2010 1:04 PM, Colin Putney wrote:
On Mon, Oct 4, 2010 at 11:56 AM, Andreas Raabandreas.raab@gmx.de wrote:
In practice, there is a *huge* advantage for porting if all you need is a C compiler and a bit of knowledge about the underlying OS support.
This brings up a question that I've been wondering about for a while. How useful is Slang these days?
I'm sure Eliot will write a long reply, so I'll send the short version: Very useful. Not for porting but for developing and debugging.
Cheers, - Andreas
I can totally see how it would have been faster to get the new VM up and running in Apple Smalltalk in the first place, but I'm wondering if these days it's more trouble than it's worth. Most dynamic languages (eg, Ruby, Python, Perl, Javascript) are implemented in straight, idiomatic C and benefit a lot from the fact that many, many people already have the skills needed to work with the language and toolchain.
In contrast, the Squeak VM is written in a language that almost nobody knows, using tools that almost nobody understands. Outside of the current maintainers it's a very short list, and many of the people on it aren't active in the community anymore. "Implemented in its self" is kind of neat, but as a practical matter, Slang is not Smalltalk, and a developer skilled in both C and Smalltalk still has a lot to learn before he can contribute to the VM.
So here's a question to the folks that are actively hacking on the VM: is Slang still beneficial in your day-to-day work? Do you write and debug using the simulator? Is it worth the high barriers to entry for the uninitiated?
Colin