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Re: Forth as a polarising language

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Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> writes:
> By too much code bloat and not caring about UI performance at all.  In 
> the Blub sense of things: It is something these people don't even 
> comprehend that it could be done differently.  These people apparently 
> have never seen a non-lagging UI.

I've never understood what is going on with those UI's.  Part of the
problem may stem from the tragedy of X windows.  But I'm sure that those
developers have played video games, and what are video games other than
no-lag GUI's?  I have a secret plan for world domination if I ever find
myself running desktop GUI projects.  The secret plan is "hire game
programmers".  They know how to write stuff that doesn't lag.  The bad
news is they mostly use C++ these days ;-).

> AFAIK, the big majority of wood sculpturers in south Tirol prefer the 
> CNC machine, and create the same sculptures their ancestors have been 
> doing for ages.  But the creative ones all go with chainsaws, and create 
> completely new things.

Meh, I think the rage these days is 3D printing.  I don't know about
wood carving but I know some people making metal stuff, and except for
very simple parts turned on a lathe, everyone uses CNC or printing now,
even for one-off pieces.  Take a look at www.bathsheba.com and tell me
how to make stuff like that with hand tools or chainsaws.

> I don't consider dynamically typed languages as "strong typed",

That is a terminology thing--there doesn't seem to be a clear
uniform definition of that term.  Luca Cardelli's view is that
dynamic types are strong in the sense that they prevent type errors from
launching the program into undefined behavior.  I would surely say that
Scheme is a safer language than C or Forth for this reason.

> because they do try hard to figure out what the programmer wanted, and
> convert data automatically if possible.

I don't think automatic conversion is characteristic of dynamic types.
It seems pretty horrendous to me that PHP converts digit strings to
numbers if you do arithmetic on them.  Scheme and Python raise errors if
you do that.

>> departing from the style usually results in a bug.
> And you are sure that it is a bug?  All the time?

Of course not all the time.  The exceptions are unusual enough that it's
fine to handle them specially, e.g. by adding an annotation or creating
a type class, or using a dynamically-typed value if necessary.  Haskell
has a library called Data.Dynamic for that purpose, but it's rarely
used.  One place I remember it's used is in the Haskell-Erlang gateway,
which requires receiving arbitrary typed values over a network port.

>> With Haskell, it takes a while to use the type system to your advantage. 
> So you mean it does get into your way for quite a long time... until you 
> figured out which things not to do.  I think we spoke about motivation: 
> People in general (BDSM doesn't count) prefer positive feedback. 

It's just like a musical instrument, where when you first start playing
all you can get is awful noise.  People get good with those instruments
anyway.

> It wasn't sluggish as Logo, Forth compiled into fast programs
> and had fast turnaround times (and that was on an 8MHz machine, more
> than a 100 times slower than any smartphone you can get today).

Yeah, interactive shells are a big help for quick prototyping.  I
somewhat regret that I never used any of the grand Lisp environments
(i.e. the MIT Lisp machines) back in the era when anybody cared about
them.  Python has some nice interactive shells and I do use those.
Paradoxically the current prescription for "serious" Python programming
is test-driven development (TDD): you are supposed to write a test suite
for the code before you write the code itself.  So that seems like a
beat-back against interactive, exploratory development.  If those tests
have a 50% hassle factor and a type system gets rid of half of it while
adding 5% of its own, you're at 30%, which is an improvement over 50%.
The experience is really quite different from that, though--it's more
qualitative.

>> Yeah, that type of programming still exists, but it's a very
>> specialized niche by now ...  Phones have megabytes, not kilobytes.

> The thing I was doing was a battery monitor... On a tiny micro deeply
> embedded in some small device.

Sure, that's an important thing to be doing, but it's a niche; and sure,
it's a reasonable place for Forth, but it could also be programmed
directly in assembly code.

> The only larger chip without embedded micro is the power management
> circuit from Dialog, and it has no micro for mere stupidity.

I wonder if it's actually there but inaccessible?

> The price budget for a battery monitor of course is more in the 30¢ 
> region or even below.  Forget about your $3 ARM. 

In a high volume device like a phone, I'm surprised the battery monitor
isn't jammed into a corner of some multi-function ASIC rather than
being a separate part.

> Yes, but I consider low-volume sales as "uninteresting niches".  Just 
> like you seem to consider high-volume sales, where it pays off to spend 
> some extra effort to get along with 0.01% of the power consumption or so 
> as "uninteresting niches".

I don't think such niches are uninteresting.  There just aren't all that
many progammers (compared to the general programmer population) working
in them.  That's what makes them niches.

> (Ti apparently uses an MSP430 in their battery monitor, and they write
> the program in C.  It's more than 16k long as resoult, which means the
> chip exceeds the 30¢ budget).

I don't understand why the code bloat.  Are you comparing against your
B16 processor?  Are you really saying there's an 8x difference in code
density for B16 Forth vs. MSP430 C when the applications are doing the
same things?  I'm pretty doubtful there is that big a difference, and I
suspect that either the MSP430 code is using libraries carelessly, or
else it's doing fancier stuff than the B16 code.

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Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-08-29 23:00 -0700
  Re: Article Mark Wills <markrobertwills@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-08-30 01:47 -0700
    Re: Article anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2012-08-30 12:13 +0000
  Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-08-30 11:31 -0400
    Missing from USENET - was [Re: Article] Richard Owlett <rowlett@pcnetinc.com> - 2012-08-30 10:37 -0500
      Missing from USENET - was [Re: Article] Mark Wills <markrobertwills@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-08-30 10:30 -0700
  Re: Article hughaguilar96@yahoo.com - 2012-08-30 19:56 -0700
    Re: Article awegel@arcor.de (Alex Wegel) - 2012-08-31 12:35 +0200
  Re: Article "Greg Bailey" <greg@greenarraychips.com> - 2012-08-31 17:51 -0700
    Re: Article Whammo <sidciavic@gmail.com> - 2012-08-31 18:22 -0700
    Re: Article Mark Wills <forthfreak@gmail.com> - 2012-09-01 01:04 -0700
      Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-02 16:18 -0700
    Re: Article Alex McDonald <blog@rivadpm.com> - 2012-09-01 01:48 -0700
    Re: Article rickman <gnuarm@gmail.com> - 2012-09-02 18:38 -0400
    Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-02 16:59 -0700
    Re: Article Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2012-09-03 13:07 -0500
      Re: Article Alex McDonald <blog@rivadpm.com> - 2012-09-03 14:25 -0700
      Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-04 17:04 -0700
        Re: Article Ron Aaron <rambamist@gmail.com> - 2012-09-05 06:23 +0300
    Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-03 18:17 -0400
      Re: Article "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-09-03 12:37 -1000
        Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-04 04:48 -0400
          Re: Article Alex McDonald <blog@rivadpm.com> - 2012-09-04 03:39 -0700
            Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 02:48 -0400
          Re: Article awegel@arcor.de (Alex Wegel) - 2012-09-04 13:18 +0200
            Re: Article Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-04 16:03 +0200
              Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 03:29 -0400
            Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 03:24 -0400
          Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-04 08:12 -0700
            Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 16:06 -0400
          Re: Article Andrew Haley <andrew29@littlepinkcloud.invalid> - 2012-09-04 11:35 -0500
            Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 02:40 -0400
              Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-05 13:28 -0700
          Re: Article "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-09-04 08:32 -1000
            Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 02:22 -0400
              Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-05 10:08 -0700
                Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 16:07 -0400
                Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-05 13:39 -0700
              Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-05 13:35 -0700
            Re: Article "Ed" <invalid@nospam.com> - 2012-09-07 17:24 +1000
            Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-07 05:28 -0400
              Re: Article Mark Wills <markrobertwills@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-09-07 03:28 -0700
              Re: Article Ron Aaron <rambamist@gmail.com> - 2012-09-07 13:31 +0300
                Re: Article jacko <jackokring@gmail.com> - 2012-09-07 06:33 -0700
                Re: Article Howerd <howerdo@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-09-07 09:06 -0700
              Re: Article Howerd <howerdo@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-09-07 09:03 -0700
        Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-04 16:45 -0700
      Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-03 21:38 -0700
        Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 02:51 -0400
          Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-05 10:49 -0700
            Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 16:20 -0400
        Re: Article "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_have@notemailnot.cmm> - 2012-09-05 16:06 -0400
          Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-05 13:32 -0700
            Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-05 13:50 -0700
              Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-05 22:34 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2012-09-07 14:05 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-08 01:53 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2012-09-07 18:22 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-09 00:08 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2012-09-08 17:34 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-09 15:57 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Mark Wills <markrobertwills@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-09-09 08:12 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-09 22:07 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2012-09-09 15:14 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-10 01:52 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2012-09-09 19:17 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-10 15:01 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2012-09-10 07:00 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-11 01:07 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2012-09-10 18:47 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Elizabeth D Rather <erather@forth.com> - 2012-09-10 16:08 -1000
                Re: Forth as a polarising language anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2012-09-11 07:51 +0000
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-11 19:24 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-11 21:40 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-09-09 14:58 -1000
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Paul Rubin <no.email@nospam.invalid> - 2012-09-09 18:24 -0700
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Anonymous <nobody@remailer.paranoici.org> - 2012-09-09 13:42 +0000
                Re: Forth as a polarising language mhx@iae.nl (Marcel Hendrix) - 2012-09-08 10:34 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-08 07:06 -0400
                Re: Forth as a polarising language mhx@iae.nl (Marcel Hendrix) - 2012-09-08 16:14 +0200
                DEFER (was: Forth as a polarising language) anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2012-09-08 16:47 +0000
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-09 04:22 -0400
                OOP (was: Forth as a polarising language) anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2012-09-08 11:38 +0000
                Re: OOP Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-08 08:19 -0400
                Re: OOP mhx@iae.nl (Marcel Hendrix) - 2012-09-08 16:41 +0200
                Re: OOP Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-09 04:24 -0400
                Re: Forth as a polarising language mhx@iae.nl (Marcel Hendrix) - 2012-09-09 12:03 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language "A. K." <akk@nospam.org> - 2012-09-09 13:20 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-10 08:33 -0400
                Re: OOP mhx@iae.nl (Marcel Hendrix) - 2012-09-08 16:54 +0200
                Re: OOP Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-09 04:12 -0400
                OOP (was: Forth as a polarising language) mhx@iae.nl (Marcel Hendrix) - 2012-09-08 16:28 +0200
                Re: OOP (was: Forth as a polarising language) mhx@iae.nl (Marcel Hendrix) - 2012-09-08 16:56 +0200
                Re: OOP (was: Forth as a polarising language) anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2012-09-08 15:00 +0000
                Re: OOP (was: Forth as a polarising language) Roger Ivie <rivie@ridgenet.net> - 2012-09-08 11:56 -0500
                Re: OOP Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-09 04:20 -0400
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-09 00:15 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-09 00:50 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language mhx@iae.nl (Marcel Hendrix) - 2012-09-09 03:12 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Bernd Paysan <bernd.paysan@gmx.de> - 2012-09-09 16:01 +0200
                Re: Forth as a polarising language "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-09-09 14:54 -1000
                [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] Richard Owlett <rowlett@pcnetinc.com> - 2012-09-10 06:33 -0500
                Re: [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-10 08:16 -0400
                Re: [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-10 08:28 -0400
                Re: [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2012-09-10 12:43 +0000
                Re: [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-10 09:24 -0400
                Re: [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] Richard Owlett <rowlett@pcnetinc.com> - 2012-09-10 08:12 -0500
                Re: [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-10 09:32 -0400
                Re: [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-09-10 07:40 -1000
                Re: [OT] Newsreader problem - was [Re: Forth as a polarising language] Richard Owlett <rowlett@pcnetinc.com> - 2012-09-10 14:42 -0500
                Re: Forth as a polarising language Doug Hoffman <glidedog@gmail.com> - 2012-09-10 07:59 -0400
                Re: Forth as a polarising language rickman <gnuarm@gmail.com> - 2012-09-10 12:27 -0400
                Re: Forth as a polarising language "Elizabeth D. Rather" <erather@forth.com> - 2012-09-10 07:44 -1000
                Re: Forth as a polarising language rickman <gnuarm@gmail.com> - 2012-09-10 12:30 -0400
            Re: Article "Ed" <invalid@nospam.com> - 2012-09-09 14:13 +1000
              Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-11 11:26 -0700
                Re: Article "Paul E. Bennett" <Paul_E.Bennett@topmail.co.uk> - 2012-09-11 21:02 +0100
                Re: Article vandys@vsta.org - 2012-09-11 20:37 +0000
                Re: Article "Ed" <invalid@nospam.com> - 2012-09-12 20:01 +1000
              Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-11 16:50 -0700
                Re: Article Mark Wills <forthfreak@gmail.com> - 2012-09-12 00:45 -0700
                Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-12 18:44 -0700
                Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-12 20:26 -0700
                Re: Article "Ed" <invalid@nospam.com> - 2012-09-12 20:47 +1000
    Re: Article Hugh Aguilar <hughaguilar96@yahoo.com> - 2012-09-06 19:28 -0700
      Re: Article John Passaniti <john.passaniti@gmail.com> - 2012-09-07 09:57 -0700

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