Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!ogicse!decwrl!granite.pa.dec.com!mwm From: mwm@raven.pa.dec.com (Mike (Real Amiga have keyboard garages) Meyer) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech Subject: Re: Tcl - Tool command language Message-ID: Date: 2 Mar 90 20:07:13 GMT References: <5213@sugar.hackercorp.com> <132344@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> <363@stcvax.STORTEK.COM> Sender: news@decwrl.dec.com Organization: Missionaria Phonibalonica Lines: 42 In-reply-to: rlr@stcvax.STORTEK.COM's message of 1 Mar 90 19:32:13 GMT Enough. The following two false statements have been made, and need to be corrected. 1) "ARexx is a mini PL/I". Not anymore than TCL is "a mini shell". The two have some syntactic relationship to the "more complete" language; that's about where the similarity to it's parent language ends. Both have roots in other languages as well, and both look like they can do the job intended for them pretty weel. 2) "ARexx requires the programmer to provide a scripting language." A half-truth, at best. ARexx requires a command line interpreter, which is a much less complicated beast. For example, treewalk makes quite effective use of an ARexx interface. It's got no scripting language whatsoever - all it knows how to do is parse expressions. And we have a false implication. 3) "TCL does all the parsing, handles loops, etc", with the implication that ARexx doesn't do any of this. Again, 1/2 true. ARexx provides loops, variables, and all the hard part of the scripting language. You do have to provide a command parser. There are advantages & disadvantages to both approaches. The Usenix article is inadequate for doing a real comparison. I'm getting a copy to look at, and may have more to say later. However, I suspect that it'll have much the same problem Rexx does - most tcl programs are dependent on the application they talk to, and won't port very well because of this (unless the application runs in both places). Rexx is powerful enough that people are writing "real" (as opposed to macro for them) applications in it, so there is interest in ports to other places (the call for a Unix Rexx on comp.lang.rexx is a monthly event). I don't know if this is true for tcl or not, but time's got that anser.