Why Smalltalk is not popular?
The recent arguments in Smalltalk made me have an Eureka moment on why Smalltalk is not popular. Smalltalk attracts brilliant people. But these brilliant people scare others away. Instead of Showing How, they Show Off. Instead of being inclusive, they are picky. Instead of discussing, they fight. So, Smalltalkers, please be humble, friendly and pacific. Show How. Invite anyone interested to join. And let's talk normally. All the best, Aik-Siong Koh -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
On 12 Feb 2014, at 14:54, askoh <askoh@askoh.com> wrote:
The recent arguments in Smalltalk made me have an Eureka moment on why Smalltalk is not popular. Smalltalk attracts brilliant people. But these brilliant people scare others away. Instead of Showing How, they Show Off. Instead of being inclusive, they are picky. Instead of discussing, they fight.
So, Smalltalkers, please be humble, friendly and pacific. Show How. Invite anyone interested to join. And let's talk normally.
I agree, of course. (With the second paragraph, less with the first: these discussion happen everywhere, ever read emails by Linus Torvalds ?) -- But I had an epiphany today, based on this discussion of what is the definition of Smalltalk. I hereby declare that we are the _third_ most popular language (family) in use today ! Based on this very reputable (ahem) index: http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html I really think that in a broad definition of Smalltalk, Objective-C is part of the family. According to the first line of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C Objective-C is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language. And messaging is at the core of Smalltalk. It also has a similar class based object model, is late bound in almost everything and has some reflective capabilities. There are even a couple of projects mixing the two explicitly. Reserve a bigger venue for the next ESUG ! Sven PS: We've had these discussions before on various occasions: it is really hard to come up with a definition of what is Smalltalk, or even a good list of what is so special about it - there really is a elusive, hard to define aspect to it.
All the best, Aik-Siong Koh
-- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
frankly I find the community here, extremely friendly , well motivated, reasonable and humble. And I dont let a couple of incidents per year change my mind of what happens here on a daily basis. Smalltalk is unpopular because it never had a big company behind it or a good marketing strategy. 99% of people out there, had, have and will have no clue what smalltalk is all about. You want to talk about ObjC ? fine . Lets be honest , objc was like 42th most popular language in TIOBE and now is like 3rd. Why ? because iOS. Thats all, not because of quality of the language , not because it has super friendly community , not because users saw the light. The only thing that ObjC shares with smalltalk is message passing. Does that make ObjC part of the family , eh , no. Unless you are prepared to let tons other languages and IDEs join you, but then you still wont have a family but a nation. And ObjC is a seriously ugly language. Its still no C++ , Javascript , Perl or PHP, but its ugly. Smalltalk is gorgeous. Also dont put too much emphasis on popularity. Java library is super popular and many of its libraries are a big pile of mess. Its quantity vs quality. C++ is on the same boat. Popularity gives you mainly quantity. My advice is don't be humble, be proud of your work and what you have accomplished with Pharo and your individual project. And if sometimes things go south , remember its much better to be passionate than being dull. Its all part of being human. Keep an open mind, and keep walking , one step at a time. On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:40 PM, Sven Van Caekenberghe <sven@stfx.eu> wrote:
On 12 Feb 2014, at 14:54, askoh <askoh@askoh.com> wrote:
The recent arguments in Smalltalk made me have an Eureka moment on why Smalltalk is not popular. Smalltalk attracts brilliant people. But these brilliant people scare others away. Instead of Showing How, they Show Off. Instead of being inclusive, they are picky. Instead of discussing, they fight.
So, Smalltalkers, please be humble, friendly and pacific. Show How. Invite anyone interested to join. And let's talk normally.
I agree, of course. (With the second paragraph, less with the first: these discussion happen everywhere, ever read emails by Linus Torvalds ?)
--
But I had an epiphany today, based on this discussion of what is the definition of Smalltalk. I hereby declare that we are the _third_ most popular language (family) in use today !
Based on this very reputable (ahem) index:
http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
I really think that in a broad definition of Smalltalk, Objective-C is part of the family.
According to the first line of
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C
Objective-C is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language.
And messaging is at the core of Smalltalk. It also has a similar class based object model, is late bound in almost everything and has some reflective capabilities. There are even a couple of projects mixing the two explicitly.
Reserve a bigger venue for the next ESUG !
Sven
PS: We've had these discussions before on various occasions: it is really hard to come up with a definition of what is Smalltalk, or even a good list of what is so special about it - there really is a elusive, hard to define aspect to it.
All the best, Aik-Siong Koh
-- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
Regarding TIOBE and popularity: http://astares.blogspot.de/2006/07/stupid-metrics.html
Well, there are some serious reasons that Smalltalk is not currently so popular. Here are a few: (1) It used to be expensive. That kept it from being adopted initially. That may no longer be the case but, once the reputation is ruined, it is hard for people to give it a second chance. (2) There is no natural bias built in. Want to program in the browser? Learn Javascript. Want to program on the server? Learn PHP. Want to take the AP CS exam in the US? Learn Java. Want to program for MacOS / iOS? Learn Objective C. Want to use the Microsoft Developer Suite? Learn C#. Want to bind to the largest set of libraries? Learn C. There is no killer application domain for Smalltalk. (3) The syntax is significantly different than languages people are familiar with. In addition, the IDE is quite different. So, transitioning is difficult. (4) There's a Catch-22. People who want to employ Smalltalk programmers can't find any, so they switch to some language they can find (e.g., Java). Then, nobody bothers to learn Smalltalk because they perceive as no demand. I think there's a real possibility that Pharo can overcome these obstacles in a meaningful way. The web technologies part is so strong already that it could easily be the next Ruby on Rails (i.e., comes out of nowhere to gain real market share by doing one thing really well). The simplicity and live coding ability could also make it a very nice teaching language, but significant work will need to be done to make it that. Cheers, Jeff On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:14 PM, kilon alios <kilon.alios@gmail.com> wrote:
frankly I find the community here, extremely friendly , well motivated, reasonable and humble. And I dont let a couple of incidents per year change my mind of what happens here on a daily basis.
Smalltalk is unpopular because it never had a big company behind it or a good marketing strategy. 99% of people out there, had, have and will have no clue what smalltalk is all about.
You want to talk about ObjC ? fine . Lets be honest , objc was like 42th most popular language in TIOBE and now is like 3rd. Why ? because iOS. Thats all, not because of quality of the language , not because it has super friendly community , not because users saw the light.
The only thing that ObjC shares with smalltalk is message passing. Does that make ObjC part of the family , eh , no. Unless you are prepared to let tons other languages and IDEs join you, but then you still wont have a family but a nation. And ObjC is a seriously ugly language. Its still no C++ , Javascript , Perl or PHP, but its ugly. Smalltalk is gorgeous.
Also dont put too much emphasis on popularity. Java library is super popular and many of its libraries are a big pile of mess. Its quantity vs quality. C++ is on the same boat. Popularity gives you mainly quantity.
My advice is don't be humble, be proud of your work and what you have accomplished with Pharo and your individual project. And if sometimes things go south , remember its much better to be passionate than being dull. Its all part of being human. Keep an open mind, and keep walking , one step at a time.
On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:40 PM, Sven Van Caekenberghe <sven@stfx.eu>wrote:
On 12 Feb 2014, at 14:54, askoh <askoh@askoh.com> wrote:
The recent arguments in Smalltalk made me have an Eureka moment on why Smalltalk is not popular. Smalltalk attracts brilliant people. But these brilliant people scare others away. Instead of Showing How, they Show Off. Instead of being inclusive, they are picky. Instead of discussing, they fight.
So, Smalltalkers, please be humble, friendly and pacific. Show How. Invite anyone interested to join. And let's talk normally.
I agree, of course. (With the second paragraph, less with the first: these discussion happen everywhere, ever read emails by Linus Torvalds ?)
--
But I had an epiphany today, based on this discussion of what is the definition of Smalltalk. I hereby declare that we are the _third_ most popular language (family) in use today !
Based on this very reputable (ahem) index:
http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
I really think that in a broad definition of Smalltalk, Objective-C is part of the family.
According to the first line of
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C
Objective-C is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language.
And messaging is at the core of Smalltalk. It also has a similar class based object model, is late bound in almost everything and has some reflective capabilities. There are even a couple of projects mixing the two explicitly.
Reserve a bigger venue for the next ESUG !
Sven
PS: We've had these discussions before on various occasions: it is really hard to come up with a definition of what is Smalltalk, or even a good list of what is so special about it - there really is a elusive, hard to define aspect to it.
All the best, Aik-Siong Koh
-- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
-- Jochen "Jeff" Rick, Ph.D. http://www.je77.com/ Skype ID: jochenrick
Excellent points. Facing most of them on the Obj-C, Java, and PHP fronts. Now, in this age of cloud/bigdata/hadoop etc, there is one place where we could make it shine: web api automation & scripting. Yes, Ruby and Python can do that too, but... with things like ZnClient and explore abilities, there is a significant advantage to Pharo. The growing space at the moment are things like Hadoop cluster 2.x. With HDFS for example, there is WebHDFS (REST API). So, this would be a space where we could become great due to the introspection abilities and livecoding. Coupled with Seaside, we could come up with fast interfaces. Now, Ruby has Sinatra for these things but we could have an edge if we start now. I am investigating Hortonworks Data Platform in depth since a couple weeks and Pharo really can help. The WebUIs (like Ambari) are decent, but nothing Seaside+Pharo cannot do fast. Lots of API are Java but the trend is to use REST things. My 0.02. --- Philippe Back Visible Performance Improvements Mob: +32(0) 478 650 140 | Fax: +32 (0) 70 408 027 Mail:phil@highoctane.be | Web: http://philippeback.eu Blog: http://philippeback.be | Twitter: @philippeback Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/philippeback/videos High Octane SPRL rue cour Boisacq 101 | 1301 Bierges | Belgium Pharo Consortium Member - http://consortium.pharo.org/ Featured on the Software Process and Measurement Cast - http://spamcast.libsyn.com Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect and Ability Engineering EADocX Value Added Reseller On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:53 PM, J.F. Rick <self@je77.com> wrote:
Well, there are some serious reasons that Smalltalk is not currently so popular. Here are a few: (1) It used to be expensive. That kept it from being adopted initially. That may no longer be the case but, once the reputation is ruined, it is hard for people to give it a second chance. (2) There is no natural bias built in. Want to program in the browser? Learn Javascript. Want to program on the server? Learn PHP. Want to take the AP CS exam in the US? Learn Java. Want to program for MacOS / iOS? Learn Objective C. Want to use the Microsoft Developer Suite? Learn C#. Want to bind to the largest set of libraries? Learn C. There is no killer application domain for Smalltalk. (3) The syntax is significantly different than languages people are familiar with. In addition, the IDE is quite different. So, transitioning is difficult. (4) There's a Catch-22. People who want to employ Smalltalk programmers can't find any, so they switch to some language they can find (e.g., Java). Then, nobody bothers to learn Smalltalk because they perceive as no demand.
I think there's a real possibility that Pharo can overcome these obstacles in a meaningful way. The web technologies part is so strong already that it could easily be the next Ruby on Rails (i.e., comes out of nowhere to gain real market share by doing one thing really well). The simplicity and live coding ability could also make it a very nice teaching language, but significant work will need to be done to make it that.
Cheers,
Jeff
On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:14 PM, kilon alios <kilon.alios@gmail.com>wrote:
frankly I find the community here, extremely friendly , well motivated, reasonable and humble. And I dont let a couple of incidents per year change my mind of what happens here on a daily basis.
Smalltalk is unpopular because it never had a big company behind it or a good marketing strategy. 99% of people out there, had, have and will have no clue what smalltalk is all about.
You want to talk about ObjC ? fine . Lets be honest , objc was like 42th most popular language in TIOBE and now is like 3rd. Why ? because iOS. Thats all, not because of quality of the language , not because it has super friendly community , not because users saw the light.
The only thing that ObjC shares with smalltalk is message passing. Does that make ObjC part of the family , eh , no. Unless you are prepared to let tons other languages and IDEs join you, but then you still wont have a family but a nation. And ObjC is a seriously ugly language. Its still no C++ , Javascript , Perl or PHP, but its ugly. Smalltalk is gorgeous.
Also dont put too much emphasis on popularity. Java library is super popular and many of its libraries are a big pile of mess. Its quantity vs quality. C++ is on the same boat. Popularity gives you mainly quantity.
My advice is don't be humble, be proud of your work and what you have accomplished with Pharo and your individual project. And if sometimes things go south , remember its much better to be passionate than being dull. Its all part of being human. Keep an open mind, and keep walking , one step at a time.
On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:40 PM, Sven Van Caekenberghe <sven@stfx.eu>wrote:
On 12 Feb 2014, at 14:54, askoh <askoh@askoh.com> wrote:
The recent arguments in Smalltalk made me have an Eureka moment on why Smalltalk is not popular. Smalltalk attracts brilliant people. But these brilliant people scare others away. Instead of Showing How, they Show Off. Instead of being inclusive, they are picky. Instead of discussing, they fight.
So, Smalltalkers, please be humble, friendly and pacific. Show How. Invite anyone interested to join. And let's talk normally.
I agree, of course. (With the second paragraph, less with the first: these discussion happen everywhere, ever read emails by Linus Torvalds ?)
--
But I had an epiphany today, based on this discussion of what is the definition of Smalltalk. I hereby declare that we are the _third_ most popular language (family) in use today !
Based on this very reputable (ahem) index:
http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
I really think that in a broad definition of Smalltalk, Objective-C is part of the family.
According to the first line of
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C
Objective-C is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language.
And messaging is at the core of Smalltalk. It also has a similar class based object model, is late bound in almost everything and has some reflective capabilities. There are even a couple of projects mixing the two explicitly.
Reserve a bigger venue for the next ESUG !
Sven
PS: We've had these discussions before on various occasions: it is really hard to come up with a definition of what is Smalltalk, or even a good list of what is so special about it - there really is a elusive, hard to define aspect to it.
All the best, Aik-Siong Koh
-- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
-- Jochen "Jeff" Rick, Ph.D. http://www.je77.com/ Skype ID: jochenrick
great topic Time to upvote outside our niche? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7225808 On Feb 12, 2014, at 3:06 PM, btc@openinworld.com wrote:
hi kilon,
Thanks for your words. I particularly like them since you've come recently to Smalltalk after a number of other languages.
There is some interesting discussion of this topic at [1] which indicate a predominance of non-technical issues and technical issues that don't apply today. Paul Grahams "Blub Paradox" [2] explains why popular is not always best. Finally, I'd like to get an update on this from this Gartner [3]..
[1] http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WhyIsSmalltalkDead [2] http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html (for the time constrained search down the page for "Blub") [3] http://blogs.gartner.com/mark_driver/2008/10/09/remember-smalltalk/
cheers -ben
kilon alios wrote:
frankly I find the community here, extremely friendly , well motivated, reasonable and humble. And I dont let a couple of incidents per year change my mind of what happens here on a daily basis.
Smalltalk is unpopular because it never had a big company behind it or a good marketing strategy. 99% of people out there, had, have and will have no clue what smalltalk is all about.
You want to talk about ObjC ? fine . Lets be honest , objc was like 42th most popular language in TIOBE and now is like 3rd. Why ? because iOS. Thats all, not because of quality of the language , not because it has super friendly community , not because users saw the light.
The only thing that ObjC shares with smalltalk is message passing. Does that make ObjC part of the family , eh , no. Unless you are prepared to let tons other languages and IDEs join you, but then you still wont have a family but a nation. And ObjC is a seriously ugly language. Its still no C++ , Javascript , Perl or PHP, but its ugly. Smalltalk is gorgeous.
Also dont put too much emphasis on popularity. Java library is super popular and many of its libraries are a big pile of mess. Its quantity vs quality. C++ is on the same boat. Popularity gives you mainly quantity.
My advice is don't be humble, be proud of your work and what you have accomplished with Pharo and your individual project. And if sometimes things go south , remember its much better to be passionate than being dull. Its all part of being human. Keep an open mind, and keep walking , one step at a time.
On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:40 PM, Sven Van Caekenberghe <sven@stfx.eu> wrote:
On 12 Feb 2014, at 14:54, askoh <askoh@askoh.com> wrote:
The recent arguments in Smalltalk made me have an Eureka moment on why Smalltalk is not popular. Smalltalk attracts brilliant people. But these brilliant people scare others away. Instead of Showing How, they Show Off. Instead of being inclusive, they are picky. Instead of discussing, they fight.
So, Smalltalkers, please be humble, friendly and pacific. Show How. Invite anyone interested to join. And let's talk normally.
I agree, of course. (With the second paragraph, less with the first: these discussion happen everywhere, ever read emails by Linus Torvalds ?)
--
But I had an epiphany today, based on this discussion of what is the definition of Smalltalk. I hereby declare that we are the _third_ most popular language (family) in use today !
Based on this very reputable (ahem) index:
http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
I really think that in a broad definition of Smalltalk, Objective-C is part of the family.
According to the first line of
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C
Objective-C is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language.
And messaging is at the core of Smalltalk. It also has a similar class based object model, is late bound in almost everything and has some reflective capabilities. There are even a couple of projects mixing the two explicitly.
Reserve a bigger venue for the next ESUG !
Sven
PS: We've had these discussions before on various occasions: it is really hard to come up with a definition of what is Smalltalk, or even a good list of what is so special about it - there really is a elusive, hard to define aspect to it.
All the best, Aik-Siong Koh
-- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
too bad, this is not forum, where you can stick certain topics on top.. because this one reoccurring on a regular basis and contributes nothing to answering the question :) but let me try to answer Why Smalltalk is not popular? because it's not. :P On 12 February 2014 18:40, Sebastian Sastre <sebastian@flowingconcept.com>wrote:
great topic
Time to upvote outside our niche?
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7225808
On Feb 12, 2014, at 3:06 PM, btc@openinworld.com wrote:
hi kilon,
Thanks for your words. I particularly like them since you've come recently to Smalltalk after a number of other languages.
There is some interesting discussion of this topic at [1] which indicate a predominance of non-technical issues and technical issues that don't apply today. Paul Grahams "Blub Paradox" [2] explains why popular is not always best. Finally, I'd like to get an update on this from this Gartner [3]..
[1] http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WhyIsSmalltalkDead [2] http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html (for the time constrained search down the page for "Blub") [3] http://blogs.gartner.com/mark_driver/2008/10/09/remember-smalltalk/
cheers -ben
kilon alios wrote:
frankly I find the community here, extremely friendly , well motivated, reasonable and humble. And I dont let a couple of incidents per year change my mind of what happens here on a daily basis.
Smalltalk is unpopular because it never had a big company behind it or a good marketing strategy. 99% of people out there, had, have and will have no clue what smalltalk is all about.
You want to talk about ObjC ? fine . Lets be honest , objc was like 42th most popular language in TIOBE and now is like 3rd. Why ? because iOS. Thats all, not because of quality of the language , not because it has super friendly community , not because users saw the light.
The only thing that ObjC shares with smalltalk is message passing. Does that make ObjC part of the family , eh , no. Unless you are prepared to let tons other languages and IDEs join you, but then you still wont have a family but a nation. And ObjC is a seriously ugly language. Its still no C++ , Javascript , Perl or PHP, but its ugly. Smalltalk is gorgeous.
Also dont put too much emphasis on popularity. Java library is super popular and many of its libraries are a big pile of mess. Its quantity vs quality. C++ is on the same boat. Popularity gives you mainly quantity.
My advice is don't be humble, be proud of your work and what you have accomplished with Pharo and your individual project. And if sometimes things go south , remember its much better to be passionate than being dull. Its all part of being human. Keep an open mind, and keep walking , one step at a time.
On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:40 PM, Sven Van Caekenberghe <sven@stfx.eu>wrote:
On 12 Feb 2014, at 14:54, askoh <askoh@askoh.com> wrote:
The recent arguments in Smalltalk made me have an Eureka moment on why Smalltalk is not popular. Smalltalk attracts brilliant people. But these brilliant people scare others away. Instead of Showing How, they Show Off. Instead of being inclusive, they are picky. Instead of discussing, they fight.
So, Smalltalkers, please be humble, friendly and pacific. Show How. Invite anyone interested to join. And let's talk normally.
I agree, of course. (With the second paragraph, less with the first: these discussion happen everywhere, ever read emails by Linus Torvalds ?)
--
But I had an epiphany today, based on this discussion of what is the definition of Smalltalk. I hereby declare that we are the _third_ most popular language (family) in use today !
Based on this very reputable (ahem) index:
http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
I really think that in a broad definition of Smalltalk, Objective-C is part of the family.
According to the first line of
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C
Objective-C is a general-purpose, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language.
And messaging is at the core of Smalltalk. It also has a similar class based object model, is late bound in almost everything and has some reflective capabilities. There are even a couple of projects mixing the two explicitly.
Reserve a bigger venue for the next ESUG !
Sven
PS: We've had these discussions before on various occasions: it is really hard to come up with a definition of what is Smalltalk, or even a good list of what is so special about it - there really is a elusive, hard to define aspect to it.
All the best, Aik-Siong Koh
-- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
-- Best regards, Igor Stasenko.
2014-02-12 15:10 GMT-03:00 Igor Stasenko <siguctua@gmail.com>:
too bad, this is not forum, where you can stick certain topics on top.. because this one reoccurring on a regular basis and contributes nothing to answering the question :)
but let me try to answer
Why Smalltalk is not popular?
because it's not.
This time I agree with Igor "extremely literal" answer. Popularity is like "being cool", a social consequence out of your control (a fad most of the times), you can't "turn cool" with pure will. But there are some attributes that might put you in the "cool technology" list some day: * Simplicity * Reliability * Performance * Modernicity * Interoperability * Ease of use Among others. I think that if you focus in what you do, do it the best you can, get feedback from "foreigners" and work hard, ceteris paribus, the success is inevitable. Regards, Esteban A. Maringolo
Will could be a push or wishful thinking so I agree on that it will not help directly. Maybe is time to watch Merchants of Cool ? https://archive.org/details/PbsFrontlineMerchantsOfCool It has everything to do with convenience and making teens fell "super powers" If enhancing the product's usability is under your control, then you might be able to manufacture some cool And thatâs a question that really contributes to the question Unless you give a shit about UX/UI to the next generation of newcomers of course sebastian o/ On Feb 12, 2014, at 4:45 PM, Esteban A. Maringolo <emaringolo@gmail.com> wrote:
2014-02-12 15:10 GMT-03:00 Igor Stasenko <siguctua@gmail.com>:
too bad, this is not forum, where you can stick certain topics on top.. because this one reoccurring on a regular basis and contributes nothing to answering the question :)
but let me try to answer
Why Smalltalk is not popular?
because it's not.
This time I agree with Igor "extremely literal" answer.
Popularity is like "being cool", a social consequence out of your control (a fad most of the times), you can't "turn cool" with pure will.
But there are some attributes that might put you in the "cool technology" list some day: * Simplicity * Reliability * Performance * Modernicity * Interoperability * Ease of use
Among others.
I think that if you focus in what you do, do it the best you can, get feedback from "foreigners" and work hard, ceteris paribus, the success is inevitable.
Regards,
Esteban A. Maringolo
Igor Stasenko wrote
Why Smalltalk is not popular? because it's not.
That can't be right⦠I'm going to have to check your math ;) p.s. I was surprised we were able to keep this thread to so few posts. Discussing this question is Smalltalk's version of discussing the weather in elevators - pointless, but irresistible... ----- Cheers, Sean -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009p4743091.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
On 12 Feb 2014, at 20:24, Sean P. DeNigris <sean@clipperadams.com> wrote:
Igor Stasenko wrote
Why Smalltalk is not popular? because it's not.
That can't be right⦠I'm going to have to check your math ;)
p.s. I was surprised we were able to keep this thread to so few posts. Discussing this question is Smalltalk's version of discussing the weather in elevators - pointless, but irresistible...
Honestly it was fun in 1999⦠it gets boring after a while ;-) Popularity is overrated. What you want is just a size that the community can sustain itself. To the current size this is âjustâ a factor 10 more, I think. Marcus
On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 8:44 PM, Marcus Denker <marcus.denker@inria.fr>wrote:
Honestly it was fun in 1999... it gets boring after a while ;-)
Just because Smalltalk is not currently popular doesn't mean that it can't be in the future. The key, to me, is finding a killer application. For instance, Processing could have been written in Smalltalk rather than Java. It would have been a great vehicle to popularize Smalltalk but the opportunity was not taken. Scratch is cool but is (1) increasingly divorced from its Smalltalk origins and (2) does not provide a good bridge to full-on Smalltalk. Perhaps Phratch can do a better job of providing that pathway. If we are interested in making Smalltalk more popular, thinking about what we can do to make it more accessible, useful, etc. makes sense. It also can be useful to examine the failures of the past in order to not repeat them. Cheers, Jeff -- Jochen "Jeff" Rick, Ph.D. http://www.je77.com/ Skype ID: jochenrick
J.F. Rick wrote:
Just because Smalltalk is not currently popular doesn't mean that it can't be in the future. The key, to me, is finding a killer application. [...] Cheers,
Jeff
If "killer application" is too big a job then at maybe a several "small killer utilities". I had occasion today to go to need to scrape about 80 product PDF manuals from a vendor's technical support site. These were presented in a table having "DocumentID", "Description" , "Version" and "Link" columns. I needed to download them from the Link and save files named as "DoocumentID-Version-Description.PDF" . As I spent the hour doing this manually one at a time, while I knew there were numerous web-scraping tools, I knew they wouldn't give the the flexibility that might be achieved with Smalltalk - being able to inspect live data to devise how to dice, slice and script this. In addition with my corporate locked-down desktop I could not install them to run anyway. A small end-user Smalltalk app doing only this, released on sites like cnet and tucow and freshmeat could build a following. People wont even realise they are downloading a whole development environment - except the help file for devising their own scripts would lead them into it. So I throw out the question.... What "small" end-user utilities do you think Pharo could perform well at? cheers -ben
btc wrote
As I spent the hour doing this manually one at a time
Why not use Zinc + Soup? ----- Cheers, Sean -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009p4743336.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
On 13 Feb 2014, at 19:55, btc@openinworld.com wrote:
Sean P. DeNigris wrote:
btc wrote
As I spent the hour doing this manually one at a time
Why not use Zinc + Soup?
----- Cheers, Sean -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009p4743336.html
Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
Zinc is what I had in mind. This is something I might work on outside of work time, to have utility "ready" for next time. However to learn the new things I needed to develop it would take longer than that one hour of work time. And you know the truth about automation... https://xkcd.com/1319/
Hahaha, yes these are always very funny. Zinc and HTTP are pretty easy to learn: http://zn.stfx.eu/zn/zinc-http-components-paper.html http://zn.stfx.eu/zn/zn-talk-pharo-conference.pdf http://zn.stfx.eu/zn/build-and-deploy-1st-webapp These should get you started, the rest is just learning more about HTTP from anywhere, combined with classic Smalltalk exploration. Regards, Sven
btc wrote
However to learn the new things I needed to develop it would take longer than that one hour of work time. And you know the truth about automation... https://xkcd.com/1319/
I wouldn't be so sure⦠in the small print it says that comic is about C++ ;) ----- Cheers, Sean -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009p4743417.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
Sean P. DeNigris wrote
I wouldn't be so sure
For fun, if you can post the link to the doc site, I'd be surprised if someone on this list couldn't implement it in 5 min⦠10 max ----- Cheers, Sean -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009p4743418.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
So I throw out the question.... What "small" end-user utilities do you think Pharo could perform well at?
Several ideas for possible killer-apps/possible killer-utilities come to my mind. One I like most: <my_idea> Build a refactoring tool for databases to refactor and cleanup schemas and data. ("Database refactoring browser"). Including visualizations, undo functionality and Smalltalk as scripting language to easily apply changes to data or the schema. So a developer, a DB admin or business user can first try changes on data/schema on a copy of the original database and when they fit later replay the changes/scripts on the original production database. Also easy visualizations of contained data is important. Even business users (without SQL knowledge) should be able to visualize, create reports or change data. As Smalltalk is closer to english and its explorative nature it could be a real enabler for such a tool as the built in scripting language. DabbleDB has shown that a tool written in Smalltalk mixed with data and applied meta infos could easily provide business value and make data more usable. Technology tends to change from time to time in companies - but accessing and maintaining the data is key... </my_idea> Too much work for a single person, but if anyone is interested tell me. Bye T.
some quotes: "Borrowed largely (or shamelessly copied) from Smalltalkâs message sending syntax ..." "Categories or through runtime functions (more on those soon) itself, but Objective Câs objects pale in comparison to those of a Smalltalk-like environment, where objects are always live and browsable" "So if a successor language is to emerge, itâs got to come from elsewhere." "It seems absurd that 30 years after the Mac we still build the same applications the same ways. It seems absurd we still havenât really caught up to Smalltalk. It seems absurd beautiful graphical applications are created solely and sorely in textual, coded languages. And it seems absurd to rely on one vendor to do something about it." see http://nearthespeedoflight.com/article/2014_02_06_objective_c_is_a_bad_langu...
I totally agreed with "Apple is a product-driven company, not a computing-driven company." But part of the irony of his post occurs between his first and last statements: First statement: "When most programmers are introduced to Objective C for the first time, they often recoil in some degree of disgust at its syntax: âSquare brackets? Colons in statements? Yuck" Last statement: "It seems absurd beautiful graphical applications are created solely and sorely in textual, coded languages." How much of the close-mindedness reflected by the 1st statement do you suppose causes results described by his last statement? Because if developers are so fickle they can't even get to a superficial improvement in _syntax_, they cannot open their minds to new ideas, hence they stuck in the same ideas for 30 years. On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 5:02 PM, Torsten Bergmann <astares@gmx.de> wrote:
some quotes:
"Borrowed largely (or shamelessly copied) from Smalltalkâs message sending syntax ..."
"Categories or through runtime functions (more on those soon) itself, but Objective Câs objects pale in comparison to those of a Smalltalk-like environment, where objects are always live and browsable"
"So if a successor language is to emerge, itâs got to come from elsewhere."
"It seems absurd that 30 years after the Mac we still build the same applications the same ways. It seems absurd we still havenât really caught up to Smalltalk. It seems absurd beautiful graphical applications are created solely and sorely in textual, coded languages. And it seems absurd to rely on one vendor to do something about it."
see
http://nearthespeedoflight.com/article/2014_02_06_objective_c_is_a_bad_langu...
+1 -----Messaggio originale----- Da: Pharo-dev [mailto:pharo-dev-bounces@lists.pharo.org] Per conto di askoh Inviato: mercoledì 12 febbraio 2014 14:55 A: pharo-dev@lists.pharo.org Oggetto: [Pharo-dev] Why Smalltalk is not popular? The recent arguments in Smalltalk made me have an Eureka moment on why Smalltalk is not popular. Smalltalk attracts brilliant people. But these brilliant people scare others away. Instead of Showing How, they Show Off. Instead of being inclusive, they are picky. Instead of discussing, they fight. So, Smalltalkers, please be humble, friendly and pacific. Show How. Invite anyone interested to join. And let's talk normally. All the best, Aik-Siong Koh -- View this message in context: http://forum.world.st/Why-Smalltalk-is-not-popular-tp4743009.html Sent from the Pharo Smalltalk Developers mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
participants (14)
-
askoh -
btc＠openinworld.com -
Chris Muller -
Esteban A. Maringolo -
Igor Stasenko -
J.F. Rick -
kilon alios -
Lorenzo Schiavina -
Marcus Denker -
phil＠highoctane.be -
Sean P. DeNigris -
Sebastian Sastre -
Sven Van Caekenberghe -
Torsten Bergmann