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From: ForthNet@willett.UUCP (ForthNet articles from GEnie)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Experimental Ideas
Message-ID: <1460.UUL1.3#5129@willett.UUCP>
Date: 6 Aug 90 03:28:15 GMT
Organization: String, Scotch tape, and Paperclips.  (in Pgh, PA)
Lines: 50


 Date: 08-01-90 (08:13)              Number: 3596 (Echo)
   To: FRANK SERGEANT                Refer#: 3582
 From: ZAFAR ESSAK                     Read: NO
 Subj: EXPERIMENTAL IDEAS            Status: PUBLIC MESSAGE

 Actually this message is not directed at you specifically but just an 
 entry point to this interesting ongoing discussion. 

 For starters, your interest in the Allen Test Products "big 
 thing-a-ma-jig" ... is this approach a thing of the past with many 
 newer cars having computer chips on board responsible for a number of 
 operating characteristics?  Is it possible to hook your PC to the car's 
 computer and interogate it on its performance, maybe even tweek it a 
 little, interactively even, without worrying about a 50,000 volt spike. 
 What kind of port is it anyway? Serial or parallel? 

 Robert Berkey's comments: 
 " I still find the block and buffer structure of polyFORTH combined 
 with it's round-robin multi-tasking environment to be somewhat amazing. 
 With the right programming touch, it's simply not necessary to do 
 record and file locking. I've heard database designers agonize over the 
 enormous task of permitting large files to span disk devices.  With 
 polyFORTH that capability comes with the design, and therefore already 
 bug free, speed optimized, etc." 

 Now if there was a Stream I/O module on top of this efficient Block 
 system it might attract even more interest.  Letting the Stream Layer 
 converse with the block layer to manage all the required house-keeping 
 and giving the User the ability to view the data as multiple streams as 
 required by their application, while still minimizing operating system 
 calls that slow things down. 

 As for line editors and block editors, no thanks!  My thoughts never 
 come out as chunks of fixed size, requiring physical stamina to insert 
 a thought where it belongs, beside a related thought, with an aside if 
 I'm in the mood.  And when I need to zoom through a document the page 
 up and down keys work fine where searching isn't appropriate.  And an 
 added bonus is all that saved space on disk so I can write more code 
 and still do it on a portable with a disk that always too small. 

 Zafar Essak. 
 BC-Forth Board, Vancouver. 
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