[comp.lang.forth] Dick Pountain: Object-Oriented Forth ?

henk@euraiv1.UUCP (Henk Langeveld) (11/05/88)

In the October issue of Dr. Dobb's Journal I saw an ad from Academic 
Press, which mentioned the following book: Object-Oriented Forth,
  Implementation of Advanced Data Structures, edited by Dick Pountain.
  $19.95, ISBN 0-12-563570-2, 1987, 119 pages.
Can somebody tell me anything about this book?  Have I missed some review
in any of the appropriate magazines ? Please answer to me by e-mail,
do not post to the net.
-- 
Henk Langeveld @ Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam The Netherlands.
Vakgroep Automatische Informatieverwerking (AIV) mcvax!..!eurifb!euraiv1
FORTH programmers do it WORD for WORD

clifford@nmtsun.nmt.edu (Clifford Adams) (11/12/88)

	I have the book; it is good reading for FORTH enthusiasts. The
book includes an implementation of simple data structures (like
Pascal's data structures), which is cleanly written.  Next comes a
discussion of object programming.  This section is good, but a little
disappointing.  The programs given allow OO programming, but with some
severe restrictions.  This section has an excellent summary of hidden
vocabularies, however, including code to make and seal your own.  The
last two sections deal with linked lists (and queues, stacks, etc...)
and memory management using a heap.

	Overall, the book is well worth reading.  There are some
annoyances, however.  For one, the author aliases "endif" to "then",
because of strong personal preference.  Another problem is that the
book re-defines the backslash word, which is commonly used for
comments.  The book assumes 16-bit stack items.  The book does have
some nice code, however, which could be very useful in some
situations.

	In general, I liked the book, although I was hoping for more.

-- 
 Clifford A. Adams    ---    "I understand only inasmuch as I become."
 ForthLisp Project Programmer        (Goal: LISP interpreter in Forth)
 caasnsr@nmt.edu            ...cmcl2!lanl!unm-la!unmvax!nmtsun!caasnsr
 (505) 835-6104 | US Mail: Box 2439 Campus Station / Socorro, NM 87801