[ANN] Squeak/.NET bridge

Benjamin Schroeder benschroeder at acm.org
Sun Sep 14 02:50:33 UTC 2003


On Saturday, September 13, 2003, at 08:52  PM, Aaron J Reichow wrote:

> Ben-
>
> Cool work!   Thanks!

You're welcome - and thanks!

> Some questions:
>
> 1. Is the bridge two-way? That is, can some other .NET language usage 
> use
> Squeak code?

It isn't two-way yet, except for a couple of special cases (which I'll 
elaborate in my answer to your second question).  The Ruby version of 
the bridge is more two-way, allowing you to start an instance of Ruby, 
evaluate some code, and call particular methods against the results 
(using some simple reflection-like methods).

I think that we'll try to add those same features to the Squeak bridge 
in the future.  It should be possible, because it's mostly built on top 
of the same things that make event handlers work.

> 2. How far does the interop go? Can you subclass a .NET class (dotNet
> Array subclass: #MyArray ...)?

You can't yet subclass (although we're thinking about how to do it, or 
at least "fake" it), but you can implement .NET interfaces.  The 
implementing interfaces is late-bound - your Squeak class just has to 
respond to the appropriate messages.  We have an example of that at

	http://www.saltypickle.com/SqueakDotNet/Interfaces

Also, Squeak blocks can handle .NET events.

	http://www.saltypickle.com/SqueakDotNet/Events

The machinery that the bridge uses to do these two things could be used 
to build more two-way communication.

> 3. Any plans to get this working on WinCE with the Compact .NET 
> Framework,
> or on other platforms with Mono or dotGNU?

We haven't made any plans to do that kind of thing, but (without 
knowing much about those platforms) it might not be too difficult.  If 
you're interested in using the bridge on any of those platforms, I'd be 
happy to consider trying a port, or helping you or anyone else do one 
as well - just let me know.

Thanks,
Ben Schroeder



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