[Pharo-project] Etymology of #perform:?
Smalltalk is based on message sending, but sending a method is called #perform: rather than #send:? When I read aloud the code is it "perform a message" or "perform a method", both seem to be wrong. The first since, well, methods are sent not performed. And the second since, well, the argument is a message and a not a method. What is the etymology or rational for this? Maybe if one of the old Smalltalkers (or Marcus with his awesome knowledge of Smalltalk history) can elaborate on this? --AA
2010/1/12 Adrian Kuhn <akuhn@iam.unibe.ch>:
Smalltalk is based on message sending, but sending a method is called #perform:  rather than #send:? When I read aloud the code is it "perform a message" or  "perform a method", both seem to be wrong. The first since, well, methods are  sent not performed. And the second since, well, the argument is a message and a  not a method. What is the etymology or rational for this? Maybe if one of the  old Smalltalkers (or Marcus with his awesome knowledge of Smalltalk history)  can elaborate on this?
--AA
If you analyze messages pattern, you see there is no sender but only a receiver... Thus, it's obviously not #send:, you don't tell the receiver to send, only to receive... The receiver receives and then perform a method indeed. Another point of view would have been thisContext send: aMessage to: receiver. But it's not how we write things. Nicolas
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On Tue, 12 Jan 2010, Adrian Kuhn wrote:
Smalltalk is based on message sending, but sending a method is called #perform: rather than #send:? When I read aloud the code is it "perform a message" or
You don't send a method, but a message. The message contains a method and optionally arguments.
"perform a method", both seem to be wrong. The first since, well, methods are sent not performed. And the second since, well, the argument is a message and a not a method. What is the etymology or rational for this? Maybe if one of the
The argument is a selector which is the name of the method that should be performed. Levente
old Smalltalkers (or Marcus with his awesome knowledge of Smalltalk history) can elaborate on this?
--AA
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participants (3)
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Adrian Kuhn -
Levente Uzonyi -
Nicolas Cellier