Richard,
I just don't think a language is significantly different because it
has more or less words than it had at one time. What distinguishes a
language from other languages is structural, grammatical, syntactic.
Both spanish and english acquire new lexicon all the time... rarely
does this new vocabulary require a rewrite of the grammatical rules
that sit at each language's base. Nobody looking at Rev's script
would ever say it wasn't an xtalk language. Adding a load of new
words and functions doesn't change this, never will. None of what I
am saying is an evaluation of Rev. The reason both SuperCard and Rev
can make available hyperCard stack translators is because of this
structural kinship. It is a badge of honor. Every time a new domain
specific version of C comes out, i role my eyes and groan. You can't
make a purse out of a sow's ear. Garbage in – garbage out. XTalk
heritage is a selling point! Adding functionality on top... well
that is even better. It matters what sits under and supports any new
functionality.
I am certainly not saying that xTalk is the end-all-be-all language.
The future holds promise (I hope). What I am saying is that a
flexible natural language syntax leverages human cognition and
learned abilities... enabling a short learning curve and the ability
to concentrate on problem domain instead of tool domain. Allan Kay
and Bill Atkinson understood and honored this premise.
I don't need to be sold on the positive attributes of Rev. The
problems I have had with SuperCard have nothing to do with the
product. I love supercard! And nothing at all to do with its
development team (person). The organization is too small for decent
product development funding. And, (from what I have been told) the
product is owned by a group that does not own access to all of the
kernel upon which it is built.
Randall
On Dec 22, 2008, at 10:41 AM, Richard Gaskin wrote:
Randall Lee Reetz wrote:
As I said, there are important aspects of the Revolution product
that ARE unique... the use and GUI centered IDE, the multi-
platform develop and publish flexibility, the viability of the
user community and this online support group, the stability of
the company and the rapidity and reliability of the pace of
version development cycle, the constant evolution of the product
in lockstep with platform evolution, etc. But the subject was
the scripting language itself.
While of course Revolution is just one implementation in the xTalk
family of languages, its specific dialect at this point is probably
30% or even 40% or more unique, or at least distinct from the
Mother Tongue, HyperTalk.
If we exclude all externals (since they were written in other
languages) and look only at what's natively in the engine, it might
even be the case that Rev has added as many new tokens as were in
the entire HyperTalk 2.x language.
All tokens related to arrays, sockets, URLs, new forms of repeat,
icons in ask and answer, scrollbars, color, blendlevels, images,
groups, gradients, aliases, system color and folder pickers,
compression/decompression, binary file I/O, binary operators,
Unicode, window modes, mouseMove and other messages, buffer
control, video playback, QTVR control, drag-and-drop,
executionContexts and other debugging/logging info, script-local
vars, animated GIFs, image export formats, screen shots, new date
and time formats, backdrops, timers, serial I/O, audio recording,
substacks, template objects, labels as distinct from names, and
dozens of new properties for even buttons and fields, just to name
a few - all unique to Rev.
And then there's a good number of tokens not in HC that Rev has
adopted from other xTalks, like SC's frontScripts, backScripts,
graphic objects, transfer modes, and the merge function, and OMO's
libraryStack message, just to name a few, along with a new altID
property to make such ports even easier.
If it appears all Rev brings to the table is multi-platform support
and its IDE, that perception will change as one spends more time
with the Rev Dictionary. A LOT has been happening since the engine
was born in '92.
I don't even use the Rev IDE nor its externals. With just the core
language in the engine, I simply couldn't go back to HC or even SC
if I had to. While we're all using xTalks, I've adopted a coding
style that makes such extensive use of the expanded syntax and
object model that I doubt much of what I do would run anywhere else.
Sure, Rev feels familiar to any xTalker. I guess that's a good
sign of how passionate Mark Waddingham is about maintaining the
flavor of the language (he was once nearly willing to engage in
fisticuffs with me in his defense of the language style <g>; I
acquiesced, of course, since he's both younger and stronger than me
and more importantly fighting with a greater sense of purpose).
But for all its familiarity, Rev is a brave new world among xTalks,
one that has earned through the sweat of its many programmers a
place of unique honor among the xTalk dialects.
True, Mark Lucas, SuperCard's lead programmer, is perhaps the
greatest Mac programmer I've ever been privileged to know
personally, and under his stewardship it's no surprise SuperCard
has done as well as it has. But while Mr. Lucas may do the work of
a ten men, not only does he have a stronger loathing of the Windows
API than even myself, but he would also be among the first to note
the challenges of doing this sort of work for multiple platforms.
Drag and drop, for example, is a complex API on OS X; add in
Windows and Linux and the complexity grows geometrically.
For all the inspiration Rev has drawn from its lineage, the Rev
engine is quite an achievement in its own right. Browse through
the Dictionary and you'll see what I mean.
--
Richard Gaskin
Fourth World
Revolution training and consulting: http://www.fourthworld.com
Webzine for Rev developers: http://www.revjournal.com
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