Golang is the modern Oberon.
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Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
21–30 of 56 posts
Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#22My unpopular opinion. Here's Wirth's words: "The programming language Oberon was the result of a concentrated effort to increase the power of Modula-2 and simultaneously to reduce its complexity." He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. One of the Oberons had three different loop constructs, and…
> He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. What is interesting about Oberon is that it is a complete (i.e. OS + compiler + HW) usable system that can be understood in its entirety by a single human being within one lifetime. As far as I know it's also the only system currently in existence that fu…
I'm attempting one at github.com/civboot/fngi. Let me just say... It ain't easy, and Oberon is a huge inspiration for what's possible.
Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#23Golang is the modern Oberon.
Golang is not an OS. Golang doesn't fit in 12kib of source code. I could go on.
Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#24If you want to try out only the Oberon language, you might be interested in oberonc [0] an oberon-07 self-hosting compiler for the JVM. There are other several Oberon implementations for different platforms listed here[1]
Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#25My unpopular opinion. Here's Wirth's words: "The programming language Oberon was the result of a concentrated effort to increase the power of Modula-2 and simultaneously to reduce its complexity." He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. One of the Oberons had three different loop constructs, and…
I think the main problem is that Nicolas was like a practical PL researcher and don't think he believe was the guy to build a actual practical PL . So, more like "take inspiration from me, and see how simplicity can be done".
More that he's a practical computer architect, producing h/w as well as s/w, and there's no sense complicating one very specific part of that —the PL toolchain— if it doesn't help build the systems he wants to build.
Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#26My unpopular opinion. Here's Wirth's words: "The programming language Oberon was the result of a concentrated effort to increase the power of Modula-2 and simultaneously to reduce its complexity." He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. One of the Oberons had three different loop constructs, and…
> He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. What is interesting about Oberon is that it is a complete (i.e. OS + compiler + HW) usable system that can be understood in its entirety by a single human being within one lifetime. As far as I know it's also the only system currently in existence that fu…
Exactly. ... and not just within one lifetime — within a few years!
Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#27If you want to try out only the Oberon language, you might be interested in oberonc [0] an oberon-07 self-hosting compiler for the JVM. There are other several Oberon implementations for different platforms listed here[1] [0] https://github.com/lboasso/oberonc [1] http://oberon07.com/compilers.xhtml
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Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#28My unpopular opinion. Here's Wirth's words: "The programming language Oberon was the result of a concentrated effort to increase the power of Modula-2 and simultaneously to reduce its complexity." He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. One of the Oberons had three different loop constructs, and…
Lot's of excellent critiques and comments in this thread.
Wirth has spent most of his life in an academic environment which have shaped his opinions on teaching programming. He believes strongly that teaching programming is most effective when students can grasp the entirety of a small language.
Below are a few quotes from Wirth taken from a 2018 interview. I find myself agreeing with his opinions:
On designing a programming language:
"...a language designer picks ideas from others, facilities, features, and has the task of putting them into a coherent whole, into a framework. And that is less easy than people might think, because you want to have as much power in the language as possible, yet a compact structure and compact syntax. And that you can get I think only through experience with language design."
On teaching a first programming language
"..as I did in the Pascal times, the foundations have been laid when a person learns his first programming language. That’s the key. In order to do a good experience, you have to have a clean language with a good structure concentrating on the essential concepts and not being snowed in. That is my primary objection to the commercial languages – they’re simply too huge, and they’re so huge that nobody can understand them in their entirety. And it’s not necessary that they’re so huge."
On further development of Oberon:
"The incentive came from colleagues mentioning that they had learned very, very much from my book called Project Oberon, which is one of the very few describe a full system and its development in detail. That’s something in computer science that is wrong. People learn to write before they have learned reading."
Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#29My unpopular opinion. Here's Wirth's words: "The programming language Oberon was the result of a concentrated effort to increase the power of Modula-2 and simultaneously to reduce its complexity." He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. One of the Oberons had three different loop constructs, and…
> He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. What is interesting about Oberon is that it is a complete (i.e. OS + compiler + HW) usable system that can be understood in its entirety by a single human being within one lifetime. As far as I know it's also the only system currently in existence that fu…
> What is interesting about Oberon is that it is a complete (i.e. OS + compiler + HW) ... the only system currently in existence that fullfills that promise.
Well, Unix including the C programming language were essentially implemented by two guys (Thompson und Ritchie); at least in the beginning Unix was small enough to "be understood in its entirety by a single human being within one lifetime". The same applies to Linux (implemented by only one guy in the beginning). Also the Oberon System (written by Wirth and Gutknecht) became bigger and more complex during the years it was used at ETH; barely anyone has full detail knowledge of e.g. the whole Oberon System V4. We can assume that if the Oberon System had been more successful, it would have shared the fate of original Unix and Linux, and became too big to be understood in its entierty by a single person.
Re: Modula-2 and Oberon (2007) [pdf]
#30My unpopular opinion. Here's Wirth's words: "The programming language Oberon was the result of a concentrated effort to increase the power of Modula-2 and simultaneously to reduce its complexity." He kept on "reducing complexity" while re-building what is essentially the same, rather primitive, language. ANd he kept throwing the baby out with the bathwater. One of the Oberons had three different loop constructs, and…
> Yes. Did he do anything noteworthy after that? I honestly doubt it
Worth’s contributions may not seem significant to some, today, because he did make this contributions; championing simplicity and portability. In a lot of ways we stand on his shoulders. Anyone who feels shorted or that they don’t get their nickels worth should also read about the Oberon System which was a complete computer with peripherals and a ui.