Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!odi!dlw
From: dlw@odi.com (Dan Weinreb)
Newsgroups: comp.object
Subject: Re: Evaluating "Object-Oriented" Programming Languages
Message-ID: <1990Jan9.160058.21259@odi.com>
Date: 9 Jan 90 16:00:58 GMT
References: <638@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu> <706@cui.unige.ch> <644@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu>
Reply-To: dlw@odi.com
Organization: Object Design, Inc.
Lines: 30
In-Reply-To: eberard@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu's message of 7 Jan 90 03:31:53 GMT

In article <644@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu> eberard@ajpo.sei.cmu.edu (Edward Berard) writes:

I know I'm just quibbling about an unimportant point here; I'm not
really taking issue with the main body of what you're saying.

   The first version of Smalltalk was Smalltalk-72 (e.g., [Goldberg and
   Kay, 1976]), which was "available" in 1972. There were also versions
   released in 1974 and 1976 (e.g., [Ingalls, 1978]). The most important,
   and most widely distributed version became available in 1980, i.e.,
   Smalltalk-80. The August 1981 issue of Byte was a special issue on
   Smalltalk, and contained at least 5 articles on Smalltalk and
   object-oriented programming.

It depends on what you mean by "available" in double-quotes.  It was
available if you happened to be an employee of Xerox PARC.  But as of
1976, Xerox was not releasing any information about Smalltalk (any
version thereof).  I vividly remember the situation at MIT at the
time, where many people had heard of Smalltalk and were trying to find
out more about it.  The paper you cite, [Goldberg and Kay, 1976], was
not available for external distribution.  At MIT, we were only able to
read it because someone managed to extract a copy from Xerox via a
clever deception; this copy was then passed around by hand at MIT.  In
1977, some of our friends at Xerox slipped us out some information
about what was to become Smalltalk-78.  I'm not sure when Xerox
finally let down the wall of secrecy, but I'm quite sure that it was
later than early 1977.

I know it may be hard to believe now, but at the time, Xerox had a
reputation for secrecy.  Since then, of course, all that has changed,
and they distribute a wealth of fascinating high-quality research.