On Thu, May 21, 2020 at 11:34 AM Vitor Medina Cruz <vitormcruz@gmail.com> wrote:
Sorry, I mean how so are Smalltalk systems less compatible than web browsers are?
Different dialects have different features (e.g. Namespaces, Traits), syntax, image format... Smalltalk is a concept, with Smalltalk-80 as the canonical reference, not even a specification, because ANSI Smalltalk was the closest thing to a standard (Like ECMA TS39 is for JavaScript), but it was DoA.
This means between different distributions of Smalltalk (VA, Squeak, Pharo...)? Same code are not as compatible between different Smalltalks distribution as a web application is between different browsers? How so? Why?
Because of history for the most part. Smalltalk comes from a pre-opensource era, where commercial vendors were the norm, and competition was not collaborative as it might be now. Each one took its own path and merging everything back is non-viable, both for technical and commercial reasons. When/if smalltalk grows to a web scale, then the need for standards and constraint will arise. Regards! Esteban A. Maringolo