On Dec 28, 2006, at 10:51 , Jecel Assumpcao Jr wrote:

[also snipped rather radically]
>
>> [community around a new Squeak?]
>
> That is something I thought a lot about back in 1998. And I watch
> closely the community's reaction to stuff like Coke or Slate. What I
> concluded was that there are several rather different groups. The
> largest group is the eToys users and they are extremely under
> represented here. There is a tiny "use Squeak to build something  
> better"
> group but most people here are in the "we need a great open source
> Smalltalk-80" (there is a lot of overlap, of course). So I don't see  
> how
> you can change things and not lose a significant part of this
> (squeak-dev) community.

In theory:  refactor.  Make the the "something better" something that  
is more abstract than either eToys or Smalltalk-80 and allow it to  
have "subclasses" that are, in effect, eToys and a great  
Smalltalk-80.  Which is not the same as a big bowl of everything at  
once.

>> Increasing complexity is easy; moving it around in tradeoffs is  
>> harder;
>> reducing it is hardest and generally require a leap of the  
>> imagination.

And/or a lot of refactoring... :-)   Or rather:  refactorings that  
require a leap of the imagination.  But probably not "extensions" to  
what is already there.

>> Sorry to say it, but Squeak still seems pretty complex to me, and  
>> moreso
>> than ten years ago. :-)
>
> Which is why it is a good thing that the version of Neo Smalltalk I am
> working on right now is 16 bits. When you only have 32K objects total
> simplicity is not optional.

That is probably a good learning experience, but I am not sure that  
this is the same kind of simplicity.

Marcel


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