>Factor is derived from Forth, but it has a different philosophy. It is
>likely that a Factor programmer will also know other idiomatic languages
>such as Python and Ruby, and a Forth programmer will also know several
>assembly languages --- but not vice-versa.
What I still need to get cleared is the difference between Factor and
Forth?
Regards,
Emeka
On Sat, Jun 20, 2009 at 6:30 AM, Hugh Aguilar <hugoagui...@rosycrew.com>wrote:
> > Message: 2
> > Date: Fri, 19 Jun 2009 10:39:30 +0200
> > From: Samuel Tardieu <s...@rfc1149.net>
> > Subject: Re: [Factor-talk] New here
> > To: factor-talk@lists.sourceforge.net
> > Message-ID: <877hz862il....@willow.rfc1149.net>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
> >
> >>From my two years experience using Factor, I never had any problem
> > defining any data structure I needed. And if by "built-in data
> > structures" you refer to builtin types (as opposed to builtin type
> > constructors), I fail to see what basic type would be missing. Could you
> > please explain what you mean here?
>
> Just as a quick example, my list program provided the ability to link two
> lists together. Factor sequences don't; they only provide the ability to
> append or prepend elements onto a list. Mine were also circular, and the
> sequences (including dlink) don't seem to be. I say "don't seem to be"
> because it is not real clear what the underlying data structure is exactly.
> Most likely sequences are lists, but we aren't told how they are
> implemented.
>
> The point that I was making is that in languages such as Factor (Python,
> etc.) there is the concept of "idiomatic programming." In Forth, this
> concept doesn't exist; you do things however you want to. In Factor,
> writing
> packages like list is frowned upon because it is not idiomatic. In Forth,
> writing packages like this is typical. Often, it takes less time to write
> your own code than to figure out how somebody else's code works. This is
> true for me anyway; I'm not very good at learning things.
>
> > As a side note, I am also a big Forth supporter and wrote several Forth
> > native and cross compilers that are used in production. But recently, I
> > noticed that Factor combinators were so useful an abstraction that
> > reimplementing them in my Forth compilers made me write even clearer and
> > simpler code. For this reason, I wouldn't recommend learning Forth first
> > as an helper step. Jumping right into Factor is the best way to catch
> > Factor idioms early.
>
> I like Factor combinators too. Combinators are by far the coolest thing
> about Factor. The problem in Lisp (and Joy) is that there was no
> distinction
> between data lists and executable lists. Factor makes this distinction,
> which is a big part of why Factor is as efficient as it is. Lisp was cool,
> but it suffered from efficiency problems for so long that it became
> sidelined.
>
> Factor is derived from Forth, but it has a different philosophy. It is
> likely that a Factor programmer will also know other idiomatic languages
> such as Python and Ruby, and a Forth programmer will also know several
> assembly languages --- but not vice-versa.
>
> BTW, I've only written one Forth cross-compiler. This was called MFX and it
> was for the MiniForth chip (built on the Lattice 1048isp PLD). This was
> when
> I worked at Testra.
>
>
>
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