Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!watmath!iuvax!mailrus!ames!uhccux!dunn
From: dunn@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (John Dunn)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Re: Success of FORTH in the marketplace
Message-ID: <4391@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu>
Date: 21 Jul 89 16:48:34 GMT
References: <33300@apple.Apple.COM>
Reply-To: dunn@uhccux.UUCP (John Dunn)
Organization: University of Hawaii
Lines: 48

>This is gonna be kind of inflammatory ... you can flame me back, but I've
>
>I'd like to see fewer claims along the lines of "It's a great floorwax, so
>it must also be a great toothpaste!" and more stories like "I successfully
>used FORTH to do an important project X," optionally ending with, "I also
>made a million bucks doing it," or "... and thus I saved my company's
>bacon."
>
>So what have YOU successfully used FORTH for?
>
Well, I wrote a paint package called "Lumena" and founded a company called
Time Arts Inc. on the product, and indeed have made several million.  (to
the IRS: it was folded back into the company, I still have holes in my
socks!).

I normally don't get on soapboxes, especially on religious issues.  To me
the proper way to decide what language to use is to decide what kind of
project you will be doing with it.  Each has its advantages, and none is
inherently *better*.  But a few words about why I prefer to program in
forth might be useful to others.

My main area of interest is real-time use of pc's for art applications, 
including music (I wrote MusicBox, which was reviewed in July's KEYBOARD
in 8086 assembley because I needed maximum speed).  What I have known
from the beginning, and have seen verified many times is that getting
the computer to do the tasks I want is the *easy* part.  The hard part,
the real art of programming, is in writing the interfact between the
computer and the artists.  Artists work in intuitive, right-brain space.
While doing art, it is an imposition to ask them to go into verbal, left-
brain mode to pick the next tool, do the next manipulation, etc.

This is where FORTH really shines.  You can write the basic interface as
you (in left-brain space) think it should work.  Then keep changing it
on the fly until it has the right artistic *feel*.  Programming in C
or any of the other compiled languages simply does not allow the tight
programming-testing loop FORTH gives.  I've tried them all, including
Turbo-C.  The only thing that comes close is LISP, which is also
incrementally compiled (or can be), but is too machine-intensive to
produce applications on a PC.

My rule of thumb is, if the user interface is a large part of what the
program is about, program in FORTH.  Otherwise a programmer-friendly
language such as C would be preferable for portability reasons, and
because FORTH tends to be difficult for a project group of more than
2 people to deal with.  Often it is a good idea to put FORTH interface
code on top of C application code.

--John Dunn