Path: csiph.com!aioe.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Rod Pemberton Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth Subject: Re: Yet another language ( was Yet another draw of rectangle) Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2016 00:42:09 -0500 Organization: Aioe.org NNTP Server Lines: 43 Message-ID: <20161129004209.27f63172@_> References: <6755c77f-2dd0-43cc-af59-91ea3449dbbc@googlegroups.com> <14a2bc75-d574-4103-b6fa-5ff0fedfc63a@googlegroups.com> <87polpbrw3.fsf@nightsong.com> <87r3649c25.fsf@nightsong.com> <2c1337f8-05f8-43e9-8094-e8c015d00ccf@googlegroups.com> <87mvgrandj.fsf@nightsong.com> <42f2d0ba-a1bc-41b6-bc35-50a065bf0f9d@googlegroups.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: n4wpt9zq8xR26Ttf9mo2BA.user.gioia.aioe.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Complaints-To: abuse@aioe.org X-Notice: Filtered by postfilter v. 0.8.2 X-Newsreader: Claws Mail 3.13.1 (GTK+ 2.24.13; x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu) Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.forth:52944 On Tue, 29 Nov 2016 15:22:40 +1100 "HAA" wrote: > hughaguilar96@gmail.com wrote: > > It would make more sense to compare Forth to C than to assembler > > --- Forth and C have similar uses --- of course, C has been > > described as a portable assembly-language, and for a long time I > > thought of Forth as being an over-grown macro-assembler, so > > comparing both of them to assembler is reasonable. > > Interesting C being described that way. It's low level in a sense > but users are still at the mercy of compiler, presupplied libraries > and standards. Forth is one of the few languages that's truly 'grass > roots' - where users could create from ground up. No reliance on > anybody or thing. Anyone that's used MASM has probably discovered > there are things which can't be done, except perhaps awkwardly. So > Forth gets a tick over asm :) > "... where users could create from [the] ground up." I'd argue that statement describes the failing of Forth, not it's merit. That's part of the reason why Forth is called a "write-once" language. The others being that it's simple syntax can be exceptionally cryptic, the code can be untraceable or difficult to understand, and Forth requires the user to juggle stack items. Without a large, standardized, and ubiquitous set of functionality, every Forth application has to develop it's own solution to the same basic programming problems and situations. This requires extra work, time or man-hours, on the part of the programmer, and interferes with portability, as the resulting code is non-standard. The code is unique to that application, when every application could've used the same functionality. It also means that any bad solutions or poor designs will be passed along forever with that application. It also means that numerous programs will most assuredly have bad, buggy, or limited implementations of functionality which is commonly used. A programmer needs to have a certain set of standard tools or components which are widely available and easy to use. Rod Pemberton