A problem hindering SmallTalk's popularity:

Andy Stoffel Andrew.Stoffel at jenzabar.net
Thu Jul 25 21:20:00 UTC 2002


> From: Lily Smith [mailto:yinyuqin2000 at yahoo.com]

> I am new to SmallTalk. I have to learn it because I have to 
> take a class on SmallTalk.

Welcome :-). It's a friendly (though different) place. 
The software is friendly, and the people too :-).

> The major reason that why SmallTalk is way less popular 
> as Microsoft VB is that SmallTalk lacks documentatation 
> and a good tutorial. 

Hmmm.... if you mean that you can't go into a bookstore (or look on 
Amazon.com) and find several thousand Smalltalk (t not T)
books... you would be correct. Unlike Microsoft, which seems to 
encourage the proliferation of tomes, large & small, to encourage 
you to see beyond the limitations of most of its' products...
learning Smalltalk is a voyage of "learning discovery" that 
requires some motivation....

> I know SmallTalk can do almost everything that VB can,

Almost ? Examples ? I'm curious.... I'm just a neophyte
'Squeaker' but find that, even though I haven't done a lot
of "heavy lifting" with Squeak/Smalltalk yet, it soothes
the synapses after a long week of wrangling ancient/
legacy software at my day job.

> Even my teacher does not know how to implement a radio
> button group. He spent half an hour in class, trying to show us how to 
> add a radio button group. He failed. 

Not to disparage your teacher but that's not the best way to teach..
IMHO The "I don't know, let's learn it together" approach only works
in certain limited cases. And then only if the task attempted is
successful.

> Well, it is just my complaint on this language. I hope SmallTalk geeks
> should come up with a very good tutorial book for SmallTalk newbies.

There are several Squeak (the Smalltalk flavor this mailing list 
is geared towards) specific books and tutorials....

> Otherwise, it will never be popular.

Is this a popularity contest ? Why wasn't I told ? 

-Andy-
-- 




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