This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Agile Buzz
by James Robertson.
Original Post: Objects? What are those?
Feed Title: Cincom Smalltalk Blog - Smalltalk with Rants
Feed URL: http://www.cincomsmalltalk.com/rssBlog/rssBlogView.xml
Feed Description: James Robertson comments on Cincom Smalltalk, the Smalltalk development community, and IT trends and issues in general.
Ian Bicking is somewhat confused about Smalltalk. Yes, Smalltalk looks different than C - but then again, so does Basic (and oddly enough, people seem to be able to use it). Here's the part that caught my eye:
Well, starting from causes, I think Smalltalk's insularity is its greatest flaw. This is in part because Everything Is An Object, and objects have fairly specific conventions. There's a considerable barrier between The Rest Of The World and Smalltalk. It's not just that the syntax looks weird to people -- though that doesn't help -- but it also looks weird to other programming languages. You can't easily map C or other libraries into Smalltalk. You can't make analogous interfaces to the interfaces found in other languages -- you can't even make a freakin' function! Sure you can do everything you need to without functions, but you can't directly map other system's APIs onto Smalltalk syntax, which means you can't map people's past programming experience, or their past programs. (It doesn't help either that Smalltalk's OO nature encourages everything to be a framework, instead of building mere libraries, but that's a topic for a different day)
Gosh, there's so much misinformed confusion there that it's hard to figure out where to start. Too many frameworks and not enough libraries? I suppose this guy has never heard of Taligent or the STL. Everything being an object is a problem? Other than making an assertion, I don't see a real argument in his post. Ahh - here it is "you can't make a function". Translation: "All this object stuff confuses me. Give me a few globals so I can feel safe again!". He then rants about not being able to script Smalltalk or use it to create CGI scripts - first off, I've created Smalltalk images that support scripting on Linux - it's not a huge challenge. The issue here isn't capability so much as culture - Smalltalkers haven't put any effort into supporting scripting, because - for the most part - they haven't been interested. CGI Scripts? I could create one in VW, although having a persistent application server that gets invoked via web server services is simpler and more efficient. I can't run Smalltalk from the command line? Apparently, he hasn't seen any of my Linux server images.
I just love it when people without any recent Smalltalk knowledge make wild assertions like this. I don't spout off about Python or Ruby - due to the simple fact that I don't know a lot about them. I think Ian needs to download a Smalltalk system and ponder it awhile before the next time he lets loose with uninformed silliness....
Previous Topic
