Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cwjcc!gatech!ncsuvx!ecemwl!jnh
From: jnh@ecemwl.ncsu.edu (Joseph N. Hall)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: Small Talk from DigiTalk
Message-ID: <4145@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu>
Date: 9 Oct 89 16:03:11 GMT
References: <24996.252C4CA5@cmhgate.FIDONET.ORG> <6486@sybase.sybase.com>
Sender: news@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu
Reply-To: jnh@ecemwl.UUCP (Joseph N. Hall)
Organization: North Carolina State University
Lines: 21

In article <6486@sybase.sybase.com> dg@sisyphus.UUCP (David Gould) writes:
>I have had Smalltalk/V on my mac for about 9 months, and I still think it is
>the best program I ever bought.  All commercial smalltalks compile down to
>bytecodes which are then interpreted.

Not true.  Objectworks for Smalltalk-80 (the fullblown implementation from
ParcPlace) compiles methods down to MACHINE CODE when they are used;
recently-compiled methods remain cached in memory.  This removes a lot of
the interpreter overhead, but, of course, doesn't make message-passing
faster in its own right ...

Objectworks is also available for the Mac, at an educational price of $150,
and provides greater functionality and portability than Smalltalk/V, although
you will need a heavy-duty Mac to run it at a reasonable speed -- unless,
of course, you've been using MPW C on a Mac Plus or something and have
no sense of the passage of time.

v   v sssss|| joseph hall                      || 4116 Brewster Drive
 v v s   s || jnh@ecemwl.ncsu.edu (Internet)   || Raleigh, NC  27606
  v   sss  || SP Software/CAD Tool Developer, Mac Hacker and Keyboardist
-----------|| Disclaimer: NCSU may not share my views, but is welcome to.