Date: Mon, 05 Oct 1998 11:32:42 -0400 From: Jerry Hicks <jhicks@glenatl.glenayre.com> To: "Louis A. Mamakos" <louie@TransSys.COM> Cc: Andrzej Bialecki <abial@nask.pl>, Jeroen Ruigrok/Asmodai <asmodai@wxs.nl>, Jerry Hicks <jhicks@glenatl.glenayre.com>, FreeBSD Small <freebsd-small@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Command-line i/f (Re: PicoBSD) Message-ID: <199810051532.LAA10779@jhicks.glenatl.glenayre.com> In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sat, 03 Oct 1998 19:45:30 EDT." <199810032345.TAA21910@whizzo.transsys.com>
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> > > Again, I fully agree with you - that's also my intention. And I see a > > Forth -based shell as a means to accomplish it - to glue all these > > elements together, at the same time giving it flexibility and programming > > abilities far beyond those of /bin/sh. > > I can certainly see how having an extensible shell would be a very > attractive thing. But if you expect mere mortals to be able to > run (and extend) the thing, I think a FORTH-based approach is doomed > to fail (again). Not necessarily... Quite a few mortals know how to code Forth. I have enjoyed a fair amount of success over the years introducing Forth to new programmers. Anyone who used WordPerfect or bootstraps a late model Sun also qualifies as a user of a Forth system. > Why wouldn't something based on TCL be a better choice? Sysadmins are > probably more likely to be familiar with it (perhaps due to experience > with "expect"). It has a pretty reasonable syntax, and perhaps > a more familair procedural type model. I can see getting a complete Forth onto the PicoBSD floppy within 8K or so. We can't do that with TCL. Forth is considered a procedural language, although there are some implementations which offer expert systems and object-oriented support. I'll bet we will find a new set of FreeBSD aficionados created when some implementation gets released. See comp.lang.forth for lively discussion. Forth is very much alive and kicking. When one is seeking a minimalist solution, I can't think of a better alternative to assembly code. Cheers, Jerry Hicks jerry.hicks@glenayre.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-small" in the body of the message
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