Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!mailrus!ames!pacbell!vixie!smegma!mdg
From: mdg@smegma.UUCP (Marc de Groot)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Re: type checking
Message-ID: <504@smegma.UUCP>
Date: 14 Sep 88 17:03:10 GMT
References: <8808121826.AA23206@jade.berkeley.edu> <1575@crete.cs.glasgow.ac.uk> <7071@well.UUCP> <1457@ficc.uu.net>
Sender: usenet@smegma.UUCP
Reply-To: mdg@smegma.UUCP (Marc de Groot)
Organization: A moving point in 4-space
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In article <1457@ficc.uu.net> karl@ficc.uu.net (karl lehenbauer#) writes:
>Neither does the Forth language nor any Forth environment to my knowledge
>adequately support the development of millions of lines of code by hundreds 
>of programmers, which is the scale of the activities at this mail address.

One of my clients has a data acquisition package for the IBM PC written in
Forth.  14 megabytes of source, or approximately 100,000 lines of Forth code.
The project has been running for six years.  The code is VERY maintainable,
due to the self-discipline of the programmers involved.  The project has been
worked on by about a dozen different people over six years, some who were short-
term, and others who have been there the whole time.

They have even developed a "programming option" for their package, which is
programmed by scientifically-oriented end-users IN FORTH.

They have very good market acceptance.  Their product consistently out-performs
similar packages coded in C.

There are many environments that allow development of millions of lines
of Forth code.  I would submit for the consideration of the net that Forth
suffers more from bad image than bad performance.
-- 
Marc de Groot (KG6KF)
UUCP: uunet!hoptoad!smegma!mdg         Internet:mdg@smegma.UUCP
"Quoiqu'elle soit tres solidement montee, il faut ne pas *brutaliser*
la machine." -Oliver Wendell Holmes