Re: advantages of forth over other languages

Andreas Klimas wrote:
>> Very im****tant in the past. But these days the *systems* are 
>> interactive and I can get around the edit/build/test loop in a few 
>> seconds even with a compile/link language. Faster than I can think ;-)
> 
> and it is still clumsy.
> you need a C-File, probable H-File, edit Makefile, take
> care of dependency have to link a lot of libraries every
> time only to get a small (test) function running.

Yes, if you have C code, you're probably going to put it in a C file. 
Thanks for pointing that out.  I'm going to take a wild guess here and 
say you're storing your Forth code somewhere.  So I'll bravely suggest 
this is a wash.

There is nothing intrinsic about writing C applications that forces the 
programmer to create header files.  But again, considering that the 
purpose of header files is to pull in references, there isn't much of a 
conceptual leap from including modular Forth files.  So again, I'll 
bravely suggest this is a wash.

Makefiles exist only if you need them.  For small C programs, I need 
nothing more than a command-line "cc somefile.c" to get the job done. 
Putting libraries in my default list means I don't have to specify them.

The point here isn't that C is better than Forth.  The point is that the 
notion that C programmers are constantly spending oodles of time dealing 
with trivia is nonsense.  For mediocre C programmers who don't know how 
to effectively use the language and the tools associated with it, yeah, 
it's a struggle.  And so it doesn't surprise me that in a Forth 
newsgroup where people who talk about C often display poor knowledge of 
the language and tools of C, there is a perception that this is difficult.

The same can be said of Forth.  If you don't know how to effectively use 
the language, it can be complex.  But again, complexity here is not an 
absolute.  It's relative to your experience and expectations.

>> But here, C folks again use the *systems* that sup****t C: generate C 
>> code with a script or another C program during the build. You can have 
>> whatever build-time computation you want that way.
> 
> more complex dependency for makefile. C code generators tend to
> be more complex as those little building words in Forth.

There is no question that C's limitations make some things more clumsy 
than in Forth.  Of course, Forth's limitations make some things more 
clumsy than in other languages.  This shouldn't be a controversial 
statement, but for some reason, the reflexive Forth fanboys of 
comp.lang.forth can't stand the notion.