ForthNet@willett.UUCP (ForthNet articles from GEnie) (01/05/90)
Category 2, Topic 8 Message 29 Fri Dec 22, 1989 R.BERKEY [Robert] at 05:35 PST To: Silver, Rutgers University >I go into cold sweats thinking about playing directly with the >underlying machine's guts, do you Forthers not have terrible >problems switching between architectures? Once you've banged some bits you may wonder what you were worried about. Seriously, what's the worst that can possibly happen? For most people that's erase the hard disk, and that's a risk taken all of the time anyway. For my AT, life got easier when I added a reset switch, and a control-break driver that makes maximum attempt to bring the interpreter back to life. As for switching architectures, it's not something that's occurred to me to be a problem. Maybe it's like that those fluent in both Spanish and English can think and dream in either one. ----- This message came from GEnie via willett through a semi-automated program. Report problems to: 'uunet!willett!dwp' or 'willett!dwp@gateway.sei.cmu.edu'
ForthNet@willett.UUCP (ForthNet articles from GEnie) (01/05/90)
Category 2, Topic 8 Message 30 Fri Dec 22, 1989 R.BERKEY [Robert] at 05:36 PST To: Silver > Is there a terse but intense introduction that someone has lying > around? ...10-20 pages... _Understanding Forth_, by Joseph Reymann fills the bill, but it is unfortunately out of print. FIG has a Forth-83 reference card, although this only covers some 132 words, and all systems have more. ----- This message came from GEnie via willett through a semi-automated program. Report problems to: 'uunet!willett!dwp' or 'willett!dwp@gateway.sei.cmu.edu'
ForthNet@willett.UUCP (ForthNet articles from GEnie) (01/05/90)
Category 2, Topic 8 Message 31 Sat Dec 23, 1989 NMORGENSTERN [Leonard] at 14:16 EST To: Silver, Rutgers University >I go into cold sweats thinking about playing directly with the >underlying machine's guts, do you Forthers not have terrible >problems switching between architectures? Yes, we get cold sweats, a lot. I also got them the first time I drove a car by myself. Actually, the real danger begins when you start feeling confident. Switching between architectures, never simple, is actually easier in Forth than in many other languages. To illustrate, suppose that you want to use the obscure MS-DOS call "Redirect Device" which is Int 21H Function 5H Subfunction 03H. Simple enough: write a CODE definition, and give it a suitable name, say REDIRECT. If you port the application to Unix, and Unix has an identical or almost identical function, you would write the word REDIRECT differently, of course, but the action and the name would be the same. The problem arises when the Unix version differs significantly from the MS-DOS version. Then you have to make a decision: keep the action as it was, gaining portability, but possibly losing efficiency under the new system, or rewrite it. And if the latter, what should it look like? Not an easy choice of course, but once you have made it, writing the new word in Forth is straightforward. The same principle holds for microprocessor architectures, printers & other peripherals, etc. The problem lies not in Forth, but in the incompatibility of the 2 systems. ----- This message came from GEnie via willett through a semi-automated program. Report problems to: 'uunet!willett!dwp' or 'willett!dwp@gateway.sei.cmu.edu'