Squeak-dev January 2008

squeak-dev@lists.squeakfoundation.org

147 participants
192 discussions

Editing class method sources in single place
by Jerome Peace 31 Jan '08

31 Jan '08

Editing class method sources in single place Hi Sophie, *** >itsme213 itsme213 at hotmail.com >Thu Jan 31 01:09:07 UTC 2008 <... ...> see: http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/squeak-dev/2008-January/124659.… >I see several scenarios where the general purpose tool of multiple browsers >can be improved. Ah, but the question is by whom? With what resources? and at what cost? The pool of "good" smalltalk developers is small. And the resources for projects have to come from somewhere. I can joyfully self fund projects that please my curiosity. Others have their own criteria. The multiple browsers that exist now are sufficient to the purpose of satisfying my curiosity and developing code. Or finding and fixing bugs. The screen sometimes gets cluttered. And that is an annoyance. But it is not a sufficient annoyance to delve into a repair project. At least from my point of view. The other part of the question is what do YOU want to do about this? Are you willing to write a more detailed user story? Delve into browser code and learn enough to create your own tool? Hire someone in the good smalltalk programmer pool to create the tool for you? (Tim's efforts only costs a few billion euros). Or search around for solutions already coded. Tweak has a browser with one extra level of abstraction. so when ever you do a new search instead of a new browser you get a new entry in the top list. You can go to that list and switch between "browser lists". So you would need to find someone to port that to the current squeak. I say this to encourage you. I love your questions and discussions on the list. I just wish to point out that in a moneyless economy other's resources and your personal contributions need to be considered and balanced. As long as the browsing tools are adequate, I can't see where the resources to improve them will come from. Yours in curiosity and service, --Jeorme Peace ____________________________________________________________________________________ Looking for last minute shopping deals? Find them fast with Yahoo! Search. http://tools.search.yahoo.com/newsearch/category.php?category=shopping

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Multi-core Futures was: Promoting Squeak/Smalltalk
by Laurence Rozier 30 Jan '08

30 Jan '08

If one is seeking to be a serious software developer<http://squeak.funkencode.com/2007/10/17/for-serious-software-developers-onl…>then the current size of the Squeak community is not an adequate foundation. The Smalltalk community seems to have given up on this larger vision but it may prove to be the most viable way to a vibrant future. Imagine a future where some descendant of Croquet islands is baked into the fabric of everyday devices<http://www.meshverse.com/2007/10/29/how-everything-will-touch-the-meshverse/>. That is my primary motivator for expanding the Squeak community base. Laurence On Jan 30, 2008 10:33 AM, Laurence Rozier <laurence.rozier(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Jan 30, 2008 4:20 AM, Colin Putney <cputney(a)wiresong.ca> wrote: > > > > > On 29-Jan-08, at 9:48 PM, Laurence Rozier wrote: > > > > > While I don't agree, I also don't see anything inherently wrong or > > > bad about this view - to each his own. However, it isn't consistent > > > with the original goals of Smalltalk nor the "programming for the > > > rest of us" statement currently on the Squeak About page. I know > > > there are others who don't want to see the community expand very > > > much and if that is a consensus then the About page ought to be > > > changed to reflect it. Although Smalltalk as an SDK is a stretch in > > > my view, Croquet makes clear who its audience is - truth in > > > advertising. If the Squeak community really doesn't want Squeak to > > > be for "everyone" that ought to be clear up front. > > > > Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating that we make the community > > into some kind of elitist club where outsiders aren't welcome. I > > really like the way this community treats newcomers, and I wouldn't > > want to change that. I'm a recent arrival myself! > > > > What I *am* saying is that I don't think we should be trying to > > achieve "popularity." > > Agreed. > > > We should put our efforts into developing our > > technology and empowering the community. > > I agree - the question is what is needed to empower a community that > includes "everyone"? > > > If that happens to attract > > new members, great! If not, that's fine too. The community we have > > today is large enough to be successful. > > I suppose it depends on what the definition of "success" is. The constant > and justified "million euros" comments are a clear reminder that there are > unmed needs. In 2000, I had to hire a Smalltalker for an internet startup. I > interviewed or had conversations a good number of very experienced folk all > of whom really wanted to be making their living from Smalltalk. It was hard > then and still is. Yes Seaside and Croquet are opening doors but do the math > - that's not an abundance of positions even for the most talented > Squeakers. Getting a Squeak based project funded inside a company(large or > small) is also hard. As a result Smalltalk and Squeak will continue to > survive well into the future, but most of the people attracted to it(along > with their families, friends and co-workers) will not get to use it broadly. > We'll continue to use software that just sucks or is a poor imitation which > is sad because it doesn't have to be that way and for a few short years it > wasn't<http://squeak.funkencode.com/2007/11/10/smalltalk-reloaded-bits-of-history-…>. > There are ways out of the current mess, but people first have to acknowledge > the mess and/or there has to be a significant wave of new adopters. Then the > community has to be willing to make the difficult tradeoffs needed to climb > out of the quicksand. In my view, survival is a necessary ingredient for > success not the goal. > > Laurence > > > > > > > Colin > > > > >

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eCompletion bug?
by stephane ducasse 30 Jan '08

30 Jan '08

Hi it seems that eCompletion does not handle well messages when there are sent to class ie Point allInstV is it me or a well-known limitation? Does anybody has a fix? Stef

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Re: Promoting Squeak/Smalltalk
by Bill Schwab 30 Jan '08

30 Jan '08

David, Welcome aboard. You are not completely wrong; you are also not completely correct. I agree that growing Smalltalk's user base would be a wonderful goal. I also suspect it is not realistic, nor is it essential to Smalltalk's future success. Case in point: YOU found it; others will too. Our goal should be to have a best of breed tool waiting for them when they start to experiment. As far as making a system in which to develop languages (a very reasonable assessment of Squeak's origins), there is indeed use for such things, if only to some computer scientists. To me, computers are a tool, and I am quite content to program them in Smalltalk and focus on my real work. IMHO, the Squeak community should embrace both concepts. Some assume that means we must fork off a true Smalltalk system, leaving a volatile branch being for UI and language tinkerers. However, I suspect that most of those wanting a bleeding edge system would be very well served by running such code on top of any good Smalltalk environment. You will sometimes see the phrase "don't break our toy." I have no desire to do that; I simply would like the toy refactored such that a robust tool (useful to people like me) would lurk underneath the toy. Then new arrivals such as yourself would have the benefit of the system style suited to their needs, with both styles supported by the same broad community. Bill "David Zmick" <dz0004455@...>dz0004455@... wrote: I have been wondering how to make smalltalk a more "popular" language, because i think it is excellent, and i think it would be good to try to get other people to use it, because, i don't notice to many younger programmers, like myself, using smalltalk, though, i may be wrong. One of the first thing i would think of to promote smalltalk would be writing programs in smalltalk instead of just making smalltalk better, i am not trying to discourage improvement on smalltalk, but if all you are developing is a language for people to continue to develop a language in, it seems like a waste of time. The only program I know about, as in big, large scale programs, written in smalltalk is PetroVR, i may be wrong there to, but i see smalltalk as an excellent development environment and language, but, nothing big is written in it, and it will never grow if the community is focused entirely on making smalltalk better. I might be completely wrong, but that is what i have seen, but, i have only really payed attention for a couple of months, and i think it would be good to see some growth in smalltalk's popularity. :) Wilhelm K. Schwab, Ph.D. University of Florida Department of Anesthesiology PO Box 100254 Gainesville, FL 32610-0254 Email: bschwab(a)anest.ufl.edu Tel: (352) 846-1285 FAX: (352) 392-7029

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Re: lessphic? may be a future for morphic
by Edgar J. De Cleene 30 Jan '08

30 Jan '08

Stef, Juan and all Squeakers: I repeat here my last mail about this issue Morphic 3.0 deserves lot more as "your stuff lack my XYZ needs" attitude. In fact, is a beauty waiting gentlemen come to help ! As I said in "Discussion about development of Squeak 3.10" <v3dot10(a)lists.squeakfoundation.org> , Juan convinces me as at this time he should work in his image and don't try Morphic 3 runs in "normal" Squeak (as I previous think, Stef) I'm very sorry can't meet in person with Juan often and work together. Juan, if you need I test some in Mac, XP, and Linux, I'm here. Edgar

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Extended Serial Port from John McIntosh
by Germán Arduino 30 Jan '08

30 Jan '08

Hi: I'm trying to get the package of the subject to learn somethings about serial port, but the downloaded zip (EnhancedSerialPorts-JMM.11.cs.zip) seems to be corrupted. Anyone can point from were download this code? TIA. gsa.

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Project purge
by Luke Gorrie 30 Jan '08

30 Jan '08

Howdy! Next question :-) How can I remove a project from an image? I've tried to follow how ProjectViewMorph does it but I haven't figured it out. What I really want to do is write a method that will purge all child projects of the current project. Thanks! -Luke

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Running code on image startup
by Luke Gorrie 30 Jan '08

30 Jan '08

Howdy! I'd like some morphs to update themselves when the image is started, but I don't see a convenient "image started" hook to attach to. Can someone suggest a way? (The morphs are supposed to present a directory based on the files in some directory and I want to be able to maintain those files separately from the image.) Hacking SmalltalkImage>>snapshot:andQuit:embedded: is tempting but perhaps excessively kludgy. :-) Cheers, -Luke

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Re: Tentative of start 3.11
by Matthew Fulmer 29 Jan '08

29 Jan '08

On Tue, Jan 29, 2008 at 11:52:41AM -0300, Edgar J. De Cleene wrote: > Guys: > > I send tons of mail to Ralph, but no answer. > > Following previous ideas of reach MininimalMorphic from the top, I rip > several things . First of all, I am glad you are declaring 3.10 stable. However, I think it is a bad idea to start a new release without too much discussion. How about we arrange a meeting on #squeak at some time when we are all likely available, like Saturday, 2 Feb at 1600 UTC or so, to discuss what we want 3.11 to be? I agree that MinimalMorphic is a good agenda item for 3.11, but as Keith and I have been and many folk down at #squeak have been discussing for a few months, I don,t think the release team should continue focusing on a single release, since that is NOT what squeak is. I summarized my position in a previous mail, but I never got a response from you: What are these previous ideas? How are you planning on managing http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/squeak-dev/2008-January/124332.… Keith can describe his goals with Level Playing Field better, but basically we will need version stewards for each supported version of squeak that the release team manages. Keith is doing a lot of work on 3.7, so he could manage that. You are very knowledgeable about 3.11 and FunSqueak, and could probably manage that. I am currently spending all of my time on Etoys on an XO, so I could steward updates into that release. That would leave 3.8, 3.9, 3.10, Croquet, and Sophie without stewards. Also, we should decide what we are going to put into the update stream, or leave it alone for now. MC wasn't working, I doubt installer scripts would be any better. We should also discuss what to do about the VM, or if we leave that unofficial. What we have now is to different visions on how Squeak should proceed into 2008, and none of us really knows what the other is doing. Right now, the most important thing the release team needs is communication. Edgar is the 3.10 release team, and Keith, Goran, Randal, and I have been discussing the future a lot. Pavel and Ralph may have good things to say too. . I think a meeting is the biggest thing we need to do right now. How does 1600 UTC Saturday 2 February sound? IRC or Skype would probably be best. The biggest problem the 3.10 release had was a lack of communication between Ralph and the volunteers. Let us not repeat that mistake. > I put the interim image at > http://ftp.squeak.org/3.10alpha/Squeak3.11.alpha.7160.zip I'll check it out soon. What is in it (or not in it)? -- Matthew Fulmer -- http://mtfulmer.wordpress.com/ Help improve Squeak Documentation: http://wiki.squeak.org/squeak/808

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[help] How can I get from an array of byte sized integers to a bitmap.
by Jerome Peace 29 Jan '08

29 Jan '08

[help] How can I get from an array of byte sized integers to a bitmap. I have an array of integers (all less than 255 ). I have a color form and a pallette for 255 colors. I have the number of columns and rows that the array represents. I want to create a bitmap to map the array onto its pallette. I'm not quite sure what the intervening steps are. Has anyone solved this problem before? The application I have will essentially update the array over time and I wish to display it visually. I would like to do it in a time efficient way rather than pixel by pixel. I've looked at the options in the image and I am not sure which ones are right. Ideally once the color form is set up I should be able to update it just by updating the bitmap from the array periodically. Anyone know of an easy and robust way to do this? Yours in curiosity and service, --Jerome Peace ____________________________________________________________________________________ Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ

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