Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!apple!amdahl!pacbell!sactoh0!tree!stever
From: stever@tree.uucp (Steve Rudek)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Re: Declining Forth popularity.
Summary: "How many Forth 'standards' members does it take to open a Window?"
Message-ID: <1989Dec21.162158.7055@tree.uucp>
Date: 21 Dec 89 16:21:58 GMT
References: <8912190115.AA29047@jade.berkeley.edu>
Organization: TREE BBS (916)349-0385 Sacramento, Ca
Lines: 42

In article <8912190115.AA29047@jade.berkeley.edu>, wmb@SUN.COM (Mitch Bradley) writes:
> > Dave Binette writes:
> > I would like to see..
...  
> > A window management module.
> 
> It would be extremely difficult to come to agreement in this area,
> consdering the many combattants in the "window system/toolkit war"
> (Macintosh, Presentation Manager, MS Windows, X11, NeWS, Motif, New Wave,
> Open Look, Display Postscript).  Whatever you pick, 70% of the people
> are going to disagree violently.

This is ridiculous.  I'd bet that if a vote was held, at least 99% of all
FIG members would agree it is ridiculous.  Where do they get Forth 'Standards'
teams from, anyway?  Do they recycle retired COBOL standards teams or something?
Forth is supposed to be a lean, flexible language, which encourages reasoned
but "proactive" development.  This is supposed to make the development process
FASTER.  So why is it taking Forth LONGER to reach any meaningful degree of
"standardization" than it's taking other languages?   Aren't Forth programmers
supposed to believe in cutting past the crap and getting things done?  Forth
should be the FIRST language to have a windowing standard.  The FIRST
language to have a Btree standard.  The FIRST language to have an OOP standard.
Just because you have a standard doesn't mean that people HAVE to use it.  A
standard doesn't really take away a choice, it adds a choice.

General George Patton believed in getting things done and the U.S.
Army isn't exactly an anarchy.  General Patton said "A good plan VIOLENTLY
EXECUTED RIGHT NOW is far better than a perfect plan executed next week."

And, besides, there IS a windowing standard!  IT'S CALLED "CURSES".  But TEN
YEARS after curses, Forth programmers don't have ANY windowing standard --
not even a text-based windowing standard as good as curses??  And now the
plan is to wait another five years until C PROGRAMMERS agree on the design
of a bit mapped windowing standard?  Oh well, boys and girls.  As Jerry
Pournelle likes to say, it's just "evolution in action".  Specifically, it
reminds me of the Dr. Seuss story about the South going Zax and the North
going Zax "who met face to face and stopped dead in their tracks."  If you
didn't read it when you were younger you ought to read it now.  Maybe we should
chip in to get all the members of the Ansi "Standards Team" a copy of 
that story for Christmas?
-- 
{pacbell!sactoh0! OR ucdavis!csusac!}tree!stever