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Re: Foreword

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"Peter Knaggs" <pjk@bcs.org.uk> wrote in message
news:1369567383377597358.431447pjk-bcs.org.uk@news.eternal-september.org...
> "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnotz.cnm> wrote:
> > "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> wrote:
> >> On 12/17/12 12:40 PM, Rod Pemberton wrote:
> >>> "Peter Knaggs" <pjk@bcs.org.uk> wrote:
> >>>> Problem
> >>>> =======
> >>>>
> >>>> A number of people have commented on the two Forewords,
> >>>> asking why we have retained the Foreword to ANS Forth.  As
> >>>> this is a derived work, keeping the original foreword
> >>>> seemed like a good idea. I also liked introduction.
> >>>> However, I accept this can lead to confusion.
> >>>
> >>> No offense to the people here, but I really don't care about
> >>> what is or isn't in a foreword of a specification.
> >>>
> >>> I will make comments though.
> >>
> >> I'm not sure how many language standards you're familiar
> >> with.  When we started working on Forth94 (in 1986) we
> >> studied several. They all begin with some background on
> >> the language.
> >
> > I didn't say don't include a foreword.  I said I don't care
> > what they say.
>
> So why did you comment?

Why did you ask for comments, if you're actually uninterested?
That's rude and tasteless.

> > However, this foreword has NO "background on the language".
> > Perhaps, you accept a different meaning for what "background
> > on the language" should represent.  If trivial info, useless
> > dates and times, document references, is what constitutes
> > "background", then I'm wrong and it's a complete success ...
> > About the only thing informative in it was the mention of
> > Charles Moore, but only to those who're uninformed about
> > Forth, which should be the primary audience.
>
> The Foreword provides background to previous standardisation
> efforts and this one.  It does not provide background to the
> language, this would not be the place for that.

I disagree, as stated previously to Ms. Rather.

> Indeed we gave removed the old Annex C which provided such
> background as it is not relevant to anyone reading this
> document.

And yet, you recognize no such need to do the same with the
foreword(s).  Odd.

> > As for studying several forewords back around 1986, apparently
> > that's why Peter started this thread: the foreword is
> > seriously out-of-date or stale.  I'll take it you like it the
> > way it is.
>
> Please highlight the paragraph or sentence where you think I
> said that.

Well, it's a logical outcome of your request for comments on
something so simple to fix (see below) that it borders on the
utterly absurd that you'd ask us what to do about it.

> I simply said that two Forwards can be replaced by one.  I
> have proposed a merger of the two.

That can be done simply by deleting the second "Foreword" or
whatever title is present and moving some paragraphs onto the
prior foreword page.  I can't imagine why anyone would need to
provide you with comments on how to do that.  Can you?  Neither
can I.  Do you need permission from those here to do so?  No.  So,
your real motive was something else.

> >>>>      Forth was invented by Mr. Charles Moore to increase
> >>>> programmer productivity without sacrificing machine
> >>>> efficiency. Forth is a layered environment containing the
> >>>> elements of a computer language as well as those of an
> >>>> operating system and a machine monitor. This extensible,
> >>>> layered environment provides for highly interactive program
> >>>> development and testing.
> >>>
> >>> How many Forth's today actually include an operating system
> >>> and machine monitor?  (Zero.  Or, near zero ...)
> >>
> >> Virtually all in embedded systems. Desk- and laptop computers
> >> run OSs, and although embedded systems can, with Forth they
> >> don't have to.
> >
> > Correct.  Near zero ... Or, alternately, far far away from
> > millions of OSes for the major OSes and on the small side of
> > far far away too.
>
> If you consider it in terms of all computer systems, then yes it
> is a very small number.  But then so are Forth systems by that
> count.  If you consider it as a percentage of Forth systems,
> then it is significantly higher.  If you look at the sales
> figures from Forth, Inc. and MPE you will see that they
> regularly sell embedded OSs.
>

So?  A small company I worked for many years ago "regularly sold"
500 units per month.  It would've taken them over a century and a
half to sell a significant quantity, like a million units ...

> [...]
> Again, put forward some text for consideration.
>

I put forward once sentence.  That's all I'm interested in at the
moment.

*You* asked for comments.  I presented my perspective.  I openly
stated I'm not a Forth programmer too.  So, why are taking offense
when it was you who asked for them?  It's blatantly rude, perhaps
even offensive.  If you weren't sincere, you never should've
asked.  This is an open newsgroup, not a closed group of cronies.
So, it includes people with other perspectives including those
radically different from your own.  If you weren't accepting input
from everyone and only wanted a few "choice" people here to
respond, you should've requested responses from them directly.
Or, you could've said: "Let's take a vote!  We've got two
forewords in the new specification.  We only need one.  Who wants
the two forewords merged into one?"  One everyone said yes, then
you could've posted an RFC or proposal or another vote asking if
the merges and changes were acceptable.

> There are two distinct audiences for this document.  The Forth
> Community and the Standards Community.  The standards
> community are very unhappy with the uses of the word "word"
> to describe a definition.

Finally, there is some sanity in the world!

> > 2) Formal documents, especially programming language standards
> > use terms from Computer Science, not the numerous made up and
> > non-standard terms used by the Forth community and present in
> > earlier Forth standards including ANS 94.
>
> Such as?

word
cell
block
definition
fetch
store
...


Rod Pemberton

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Thread

RfC: Foreword "Peter Knaggs" <pjk@bcs.org.uk> - 2012-12-17 19:40 +0000
  Re: Foreword "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnotz.cnm> - 2012-12-17 17:40 -0500
    Re: Foreword "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-12-17 21:55 -1000
      Re: Foreword "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnotz.cnm> - 2012-12-18 19:22 -0500
        Re: Foreword Peter Knaggs <pjk@bcs.org.uk> - 2012-12-19 10:03 +0000
          Re: Foreword "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnotz.cnm> - 2012-12-21 02:39 -0500
          Re: Foreword "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-12-20 22:16 -1000
        Re: Foreword rickman <gnuarm@gmail.com> - 2012-12-19 16:09 -0500
          Re: Foreword "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnotz.cnm> - 2012-12-21 02:20 -0500
        Re: Foreword "Ed" <invalid@nospam.com> - 2012-12-23 00:43 +1100
          Re: Foreword "A. K." <akk@nospam.org> - 2012-12-22 16:44 +0100
            Re: Foreword "Ed" <invalid@nospam.com> - 2012-12-27 19:54 +1100
              Re: Foreword Alex McDonald <blog@rivadpm.com> - 2012-12-27 05:36 -0800
                Re: Foreword Alex McDonald <blog@rivadpm.com> - 2012-12-27 05:40 -0800
          Re: Foreword Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2012-12-22 10:07 -0600
  Re: RfC: Foreword "A. K." <akk@nospam.org> - 2012-12-18 08:27 +0100
    Re: RfC: Foreword Elizabeth D Rather <erather@forth.com> - 2012-12-17 22:24 -1000
      Re: RfC: Foreword "A. K." <akk@nospam.org> - 2012-12-18 20:38 +0100
        Re: RfC: Foreword "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-12-18 09:54 -1000
          Re: RfC: Foreword "A. K." <akk@nospam.org> - 2012-12-18 22:00 +0100
            Re: RfC: Foreword "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-12-18 11:21 -1000
              Re: RfC: Foreword "A. K." <akk@nospam.org> - 2012-12-20 07:56 +0100
                Re: RfC: Foreword Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2012-12-20 03:38 -0600
                Re: RfC: Foreword "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnotz.cnm> - 2012-12-21 02:20 -0500
                Re: RfC: Foreword Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2012-12-21 04:02 -0600
          Re: RfC: Foreword "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnotz.cnm> - 2012-12-18 19:24 -0500
            Re: RfC: Foreword Alex McDonald <blog@rivadpm.com> - 2012-12-18 22:46 -0800
              Re: RfC: Foreword "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnotz.cnm> - 2012-12-21 02:21 -0500
                Re: RfC: Foreword Alex McDonald <blog@rivadpm.com> - 2012-12-21 15:24 -0800

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