Charles Esson <charlese_at_cvs.com.au> writes Re: SFTALK - OOF

>> A little more seriously: OOF *will* take off when somebody writes
>> extensive non-trivial libraries in or with it. Not when yet another
>> slick extension comes along.

> And that won't happen until the syntax is standardized, and the syntax is
> not going to get standardized, QED.

Then a standard is not needed (how do you standardize what is not used?)

Here are some alternative thoughts to shoot at.

a. "Forth won't happen until the syntax is standardized, and the syntax is
   not going to get standardized, QED." (said 12 years ago). We certainly
   wouldn't have living Forths today (e.g. SwiftForth) if everybody had
   waited for a standard to materialize.

b. One reason OOF doesn't break through is because it is not useful enough
   to a single programmer. It might be a big benefit in multi-programmer
   teams. This might mean OOF will only happen when big users start to
   demand it. However, typical OOP projects like the Linux OS, with
   enormous programmer teams, are not using it. And the big commercial OOP
   softwareteams of our time don't have enough real competition (can you
   say Office-97?) to enable us to decide if their approaches are *really*
   working.

c. OOF *is* enormously useful, but in special domains that are not of
   extreme interest to most Forth programmers (e.g. GUI design, graphics,
   desktop programming). (If you choose to flame this one, please use
   non-trivial examples).

-marcel

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Received on Wed Jan 27 1999 - 18:40:49 PST