[COFF] Gnu Smalltalk or...? [was: Most Popular Programming Languages 1965 - 2019]

[Tomasz Rola]

On Tue, Dec 24, 2019 at 09:46:18AM -0800, Bakul Shah wrote:
> My scheme of choice is Gambit Scheme. Gambit is quite portable &
> fast. You can always compile to a binary if performance is an issue.
> There is now Gerbil Scheme, that sits on top of Gambit and is geared
> toward systems programming. It seems to provide a lot of additional
> features, using Scheme’s extensibility but I haven’t used it yet.
> https://cons.io/tutorials/ <https://cons.io/tutorials/>

Thanks. As it sometimes happens, I have Gambit on my system, among few
other Schemes. It just did not look attractive when I looked at
it. But I have unpacked the newest version and guess what, two years
later it looks better... I will have to write some small code snippets
to see how it behaves (slurping and sorting twenty million lines of
txt, something like this).

> I find scheme code clear and concise (but not as concise as array
> languages such as k, my other language of choice, where I have to
> relearn the code every time but then it is only a handful of lines.). 

I think I will postpone learning APL and its cousins for a while. They
certainly had an edge when one could stuff complete solution on few
punched cards. This had to impress the by-lookers like hell, when
everybody had to tuck a box or few full of cards with them. On the
other hand, maybe I will have a look at k, who knows.

> These days python has become quite the glue language, used for all
> sorts of things, from AI to GPIO fiddling. Not my favorite language
> but a working knowledge in it has been useful.

Exactly my opinion too. I would say it makes for a nice sandbox
language where playing with stuff already inside is nice experience,
but doing new stuff, not so much.

> I would have loved to use SmallTalk 30+ years ago. Now not so much.

Ah. Maybe I should just stick with Gambit and relegate Smalltalk for a
low priority hobby/edu project.

-- 
Regards,
Tomasz Rola

--
** A C programmer asked whether computer had Buddha's nature.      **
** As the answer, master did "rm -rif" on the programmer's home    **
** directory. And then the C programmer became enlightened...      **
**                                                                 **
** Tomasz Rola          mailto:tomasz_rola at bigfoot.com             **