jamr@erc3ba.UUCP (Roach) (02/17/86)
I am trying to compile a list of dedicated Smalltalk environments which are available to users. By 'dedicated' I mean the equivalent of what one expects when they acquire a Xerox or Symbolics lisp machine. The ones that I am aware of are: 1) A dolphin or dorado from Xerox running Smalltalk-80 v2 2) a tektronix 4400 family machine 3) a sun running BS II 4) a Mac/Mac XL/Mac+ running Smalltalk-80 v1 5) Possibly Methods from Digitial Research (?) 6) Some new IBM AT product coming out. (?) I would appreciate any additions to my list if anyone knows of others. Also, does anyone have the experience of having developed a medium to large application in both Smalltalk and a lisp based system on any available lisp machine with some kind of message passing support? What I am looking for are comparsions between the two that would show why one would choose one over the other. I have lots of experience on the lisp side, but none on the Smalltalk one. Thanks for your help john malleo-roach
jes@ulysses.UUCP (Jonathan Shopiro) (02/18/86)
> I am trying to compile a list of dedicated Smalltalk environments which > are available to users. By 'dedicated' I mean the equivalent of what > one expects when they acquire a Xerox or Symbolics lisp machine. The > ones that I am aware of are: > > ... > > I would appreciate any additions to my list if anyone knows of others. > Also, does anyone have the experience of having developed a medium to > large application in both Smalltalk and a lisp based system on any > available lisp machine with some kind of message passing support? What > I am looking for are comparsions between the two that would show why > one would choose one over the other. I have lots of experience on the > lisp side, but none on the Smalltalk one. > > Thanks for your help > > john malleo-roach There is an advert on the inside cover of this month's CACM for some ST-80 that runs on IBM PC-AT. I forget the details, but I intend to get it for my ATT PC 6300+ (When I get my PC 6300+). I have had a Tektronix 4404 (about to be upgraded to 4405) for about a year. I spent about half time on it for about six months, until a crash project was dumped on me. During that time I learned Smalltalk from scratch and wrote a Dining Philosophers demo and a fairly powerful spreadsheet program. I have never used lisp extensively, but I think that lisp and Smalltalk are similar in that they are both small, elegant languages, which is deceptive since to use them you have to learn large, complex systems. For differences, note that lisp was essentially frozen in 196?, and everything since then has been added on top, whereas ST was first designed in ~1972 and has been more or less completely redesigned three times since then. So the fundamental object of lisp is the cons cell, and the fundamental operation is function call. In ST, the fundamental object is the Object, and the fundamental operation is remote function call (message send). If you are interested in object oriented programming, the basic argument for ST over lisp is that ST is based on O-O programming, while in lisp it's a veneer over the top. If you are going to use a fully O-O programming style, probably there's a performance advantage to ST, since the system is optimized for it. Also ST is more fun than anything I've ever tried. -- -- Jonathan Shopiro AT&T Bell Laboratories 600 Mountain Avenue Murray Hill, NJ 07974 (201) 582-4179 allegra!ulysses!jes
david@ztivax.UUCP (03/05/86)
Those Xerox machines are really nice!! (Dorado is not a production unit as I understand it). Several cheaper/smaller systems too, like daybreak. Someone from Xerox want to tell us something? You guys never seem to advertise your good stuff... david smyth seismo!unido!ztivax!david
darrelj@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Darrel VanBuer) (03/08/86)
Xerox has not said much about their machines for Smalltalk because they
really seem to have put Smalltalk behind them as an interesting experiment
from which they have learned useful things, which is migrating into other
developments in indirect ways. Their machines which run Smalltalk are:
Dolphin(1100) discontinued, but likely available used since no one wants to
run Lisp on them anymore.
Dorado(1132) About $90,000
There are rumors it's possible to run it on 1108, but only if you really
pester them for it.
--
Darrel J. Van Buer, PhD
System Development Corp.
2525 Colorado Ave
Santa Monica, CA 90406
(213)820-4111 x5449
...{allegra,burdvax,cbosgd,hplabs,ihnp4,orstcs,sdcsvax,ucla-cs,akgua}
!sdcrdcf!darrelj
VANBUER@USC-ECL.ARPA