Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!europa.asd.contel.com!wlbr!voder!pyramid!leadsv!momenta!jims
From: jims@momenta.com (Jim Straus)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Re: Modular coding style
Message-ID: <1991May22.161451.4051@momenta.com>
Date: 22 May 91 16:14:51 GMT
References: <9105211731.AA00822@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU>
Organization: Momenta Corporation
Lines: 26

Mitch.Bradley@ENG.SUN.COM writes:

>Glen Haydon has been advocating a commenting style where the source
>file (or whatever) basically contains English text, and the actual
>code is treated as "commentary" that happens to be executed.  Instead
>of enclosing the English inside "comment" delimiters, you enclose the
>Forth inside "executable" delimiters.  For instance, Forth code might
>be enclosed by  )  and  (  :

>        )  DUP ROT .   (

>If you ignore that fact that the first and last characters of the file may
>have to be different, it's it's basically a different way of looking at the
>same thing.

>I believe that Glen got the idea from Jef Raskin.

>Mitch.Bradley@Eng.Sun.COM

Jef also advocated changing the parenthesis around so the Forth code would be
enclosed in the parenthesis correctly, so a person familiar with English would
parse the text correctly.

This idea is remeniscent of Donald Knuth's WEB system.

-Jim Straus