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From: "Rod Pemberton" <dont_use_email@xnothavet.cqm>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Re: gforth too bloated ?
Date: Wed, 14 May 2014 20:02:55 -0400
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On Wed, 14 May 2014 12:17:16 -0400, Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid>  
wrote:

> I'd hope a compiler with good locals support could handle writing all
> the traditional primitives directly in Forth without any special tools
> or generators:
>
>    : 2dup { x y } x y x y ;
>    : dup { x } x x ;
>    : swap { x y } y x ;
>    : drop { x } ;
>
> et cetera.  These would all be defined in a library that gets loaded
> into user programs by default but could be overridden, like the Haskell
> prelude.

First, if locals are implemented on a separate stack, as a few others
here have said they've done for their Forth implementations, how would
those definitions even work?  They would need to work against the data
or parameter stack, not the separate locals stack.

Second, why are special tools or generators needed to code the
traditional primitives directly in Forth?

Third, can't you do the same thing by defining some Forth variables?

VARIABLE A
VARIABLE B

: A@ A @ ;
: A! A ! ;
: B@ B @ ;
: B! B ! ;

: 2DUP A! B! B@ A@ B@ A@ ;
: DUP A! A@ A@ ;
: SWAP A! B! A@ B@ ;
: DROP A! ;

So, what is the real difference with locals?  Is it where the local
is stored?  e.g., on the stack instead of in memory.  If that's the
case, a word LOCAL , functioning similar to VARIABLE , but which
allocates space on the stack, would be better.  Wouldn't it?


Rod Pemberton