Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!ucsd!ucbvax!UTRCGW.UTC.COM!RAYBRO%HOLON From: RAYBRO%HOLON@UTRCGW.UTC.COM ("William R Brohinsky", ay) Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth Subject: What makes Forth FOrth? Message-ID: <9012041606.AA26530@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> Date: 4 Dec 90 14:06:00 GMT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Reply-To: "William R(ay) Brohinsky" Organization: The Internet Lines: 33 I define forth in terms of extensibility: If I can reach down into the bowels of the machine and create words that simulataneously touch the lowest levels and the highest levels of the software, that's what makes it for me. The matter of reverse polish notation is a convenience. Stacks work best with RPN, and this can be removed, if an annoyance, by extending the FORTH to accept and parse algebraic notation. Stacks themselves can be avoided: note the proliferation of Nth generation forths that support locals. Indirect threaded code doesn't make it, either: of the three forths for the AMIGA that I've seen, the two I've used make or have options to make direct subroutine threaded calls. Dictionary structure is variable, and may even be eliminateable altogether (for turnkeying). But the ability to access the hardware and hi-level data structures, or to create the operators to do so at will; this is FORTH. That's why I don't buy into ASYST, and why I've never been much interested in FIFTH or other `protected' forths: I like the ones that have words like `see' and `view', the ones that encourage digging into the innards while not making it manditory. Directly tied to this is the immediate/compiled capability: being able to twiddle from the `command line', or compile the code into a word and use it over and over again. extensibility without testability is insanity. Spell it `C' (sorry, Mitch: I realize that C is not untestable. It's just harder for me, and takes longer in general.) This surely doesn't help: your position seems different (although I haven't had time yet for more than a hasty perusal), and I'm sure there are others that feel I'm off track. Take this as a highly personal opinion from some- one who hasn't felt lost yet when asked `What is FORTH?'. raybro Brought to you by Super Global Mega Corp .com