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Pharo 7.0 released

pharo.org

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Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#121
post #104
post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do. By saying "there is such functionality, but you should try this instead , because using it from commandline won't tell you why this is interesting". Which isn't directly answering the question, but pointing the asker in a good direction.

Until the asker has been shown that their commandline requirements can be met — they will not be interested.

But it's entirely missing the point in that you don't use a Smalltalk environment so that you can run some hello world example from the command line.

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#122
The main issues that prevents me to have an interest in Pharo are the following two: - There is no real multithreading support - It's not easily embeddable

I believe that there are attempts to tackle these problems but what is the status?

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#123
post #40

Why would I use this instead of C++ for example

One reason would be for trying out the environment, which represents a totally different approach to programming than the traditional file based and textual approach, instead of having your coding and runtime as part of the same environment, where you're communicating with live objects.

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#124
I lol'd when the quote, "Pharo is a pure object-oriented programming language and a powerful environment, focused on simplicity and immediate feedback.", is accompanied with a relatively chaotic artwork of the development environment.

Anyways, the dedication of the team is really remarkable. It looks like a really useful learning/teaching tool for OOP. I'll try and hopefully beat my prejudice.

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#125
post #105
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I couldn't understand the fascination with the integrated environments though. The only thing I can recommend it watching some Alan Kay videos or Pharo demos. Windows and Linux UI conditioned everyone to think of UI as a crutch for incompetent users, rather than a tool useful in its own right. This cannot be undone in a single reply, no matter how elaborate it will be. Traditional tools are definitely more polished…

Any good Pharo demos that you can recommend?

Gtoolkit [1] is a cutting-edge example of what's possible. I say "cutting edge" because it relies upon a dev version of Bloc, which is the new graphics system being developed for future versions of Pharo.

Any sluggishness you experience with Gtoolkit, by the way, is because Bloc is being hosted in Morphic (the current graphics system) temporarily.

[1] http://gtoolkit.com

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#126
post #102

does it have decent hidpi support yet? I remember trying out pharo 6 briefly and being unable to get it usable on my laptop.

This has been a point of contention for lots of people, including myself. From what I remember, it was supposed to happen for Pharo 7 but now I see that it didn't. Squeak and Pharo are great but the font rendering is terrible, I can't stress how bad it looks on hidpi screens. That makes it unusable for me since it gives me headaches. It's a shame too since they have spent a lot of time working on related frameworks (…

I agree that the appearance of the system in this regard probably turns off lots of users. There are some in the Pharo community who are quite aware of this fact, but there are simply not enough contributors at the moment to deal with it on their own.

I am more hopeful about Bloc, however. The stack is not any more insane than that of a web browser.

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#127

"Everything's an object" is object oriented programming done right and I can see why Ruby and other languages used those ideas from Smalltalk. I couldn't understand the fascination with the integrated environments though. It was my biggest stumbling block. Is there a pathway to use Pharo with my traditional tools?

You don't like having a system fully built in one language / paradigm ? It felt very exciting and relaxing to me. But to each his own.

POSIX is similar to what you describe. It's a unified paradigm that wrestles the complexities under one paradigm. UNIX philosophy of each tool doing one thing, and doing it well, combined with the constructs that are provided through shells such as inter-process communication and piping everything has turned out to be quite the solid foundation for software development. I'm not saying we couldn't learn lessons from Pharo, but that I'm not so quick to dump everything else to live inside their bubble just yet.

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#128
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until the asker has been shown that their commandline requirements can be met — they will not be interested.

But it's entirely missing the point in that you don't use a Smalltalk environment so that you can run some hello world example from the command line.

A simple hello-world command-line example may be used to demonstrate:

— How to run a Smalltalk source code file as a script

— How to use stdio, How to use file handles

— How to load Smalltalk source code from files, save, deploy , and invoke on remote machines

Until `virtualized` has seen that basic stuff can be done, why should they care?

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#129
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I just want a "hello world" example to get an idea what I am actually dealing with. How do I run a "hello world" program from the command line? The trouble is that what you are dealing with is a graphical interactive programming environment. Sure, you can run it from the command line like /bin/perl, but to understand what you are dealing with you have to open it up and try it on its own terms. If you aren't interes…

>If you aren't interested in a novel immersive programming environment then you can safely ignore Pharo too. I was curious and so downloaded and ran the default image, and I'm beyond captivated by it, but I have to agree that neither the link nor the homepage do a good job of enticing me to do so, or even hinting and what can I expect. If I didn't feel like setting up and checking out random projects I stumble upon,…

> maybe it should try to sell itself, at least a little, for the uninitiated?

Guessing this is a hard problem. People have been working on marketing Smalltalk for almost 50 years now. If there were an easy solution I reckon they'd have found it by now :)

Re: Pharo 7.0 released

#130
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I looked for any useful documentation for a few minutes and just gave up. I don't want to read a book. I don't want to watch a video. This is not my first programming language, thank you. I just want a "hello world" example to get an idea what I am actually dealing with. How do I run a "hello world" program from the command line? How can I deploy that to another machine that doesn't necessarily have a GUI?

You don't. Smalltalk means GUI, pretty much.

Headless (no GUI) Smalltalk apps have been used commercially for decades.
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