Re: part 21 asserts forth best for small memory systems, would lisp

On Tue, 11 Mar 2008, Jonah Thomas wrote:

>
>
> Duke Normandin <dukeofperl@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> > Andrew Haley wrote:
> >
> > [snip]
> > >
> > > Forth has greater advantages when it's not tied to a lumbering beast
> > > of an operating system.  This is when Forth really sings.  Also,
> > > Forth's *margin of advantage* in embedded control projects is
> > > greater than when it's just another language running a desktop
> > > program on a general-purpose computer.
> > >
> > > [snip]
> > > Andrew.
> >
> > If Forth had succeeded instead of MSDOS/Windows and maybe even Unices,
> > what would the personal computer environment look like today? Do you
> > think that Forth could have brought us to what we enjoy and take for
> > granted today? Maybe it just the nature of the beast - allowing it to
> > excel in small, finite projects? Maybe there are just too many Forths
> > - each one capable of doing an excellent job in Forth's niche, however
> > incompatible with each other?
> >
> > Regardless, I'd sure like to see a stand-alone Forth system is all its
> > glory -- so that I could compare it to my OSX and Ubuntu boxes.
>
> Here's one;
>
> http://www.forthos.org/
> This is like eforth, loaded with GRUB. All in assembler, no C. No
> applications beyond an assembler and editor.

I just DLed the compressed CD image. I've got several 350Mhz Pentium IIs
kicking around. I'm going to give it a shot.

>
> Another:
>
> http://www.colorforth.com/
> This is like nothing else. The version at this site appears to be an old
> one, you might want to do a search for an updated system.
>
> And there are others. It's a big deal that most of the applications
> you're used to won't be on a Forth OS until somebody writes them in
> Forth or assembler or a combination. And if you write them in Forth or
> assembler or a combination for one ForthOS they won't run on any other
> ForthOS without a lot of modification.

Yep! That sucks! Would be hard to make a living writing office
productivity software for the Forth community unless you knew every bloody
Forth dialect that exists. Maybe folks clued in to that 20-25 years ago,
and said adios - I'm off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of ???
-- 
Duke Normandin
dukeofperl@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?