Squeak-dev February 2010

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89 participants
595 discussions

Generators in Smalltalk?
by Andreas Raab 29 Mar '10

29 Mar '10

Folks - One thing I really like about Python is Generators (http://docs.python.org/tutorial/classes.html#generators). They allow code to provide a stream (iterator) interface where it's not easy to provide the interface explicitly. I.e., it would allow one to provide a stream interface to an arbitrary computation like: gen := Generator on: [:yield| 3 to: 1 by: -1 do:[:i| yield value: i]]. gen next. "=>3" gen next. "=>2" gen next. "=>1" gen next. "=>nil" This *ought* to be really simple to do in Smalltalk by using blocks and some voodoo in the execution engine. Has anyone ever done that? Cheers, - Andreas

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Fwd: [Pharo-project] Pharo changing the game
by Eliot Miranda 21 Mar '10

21 Mar '10

---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> Date: Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 3:44 PM Subject: Re: [Pharo-project] Pharo changing the game To: Pharo-project(a)lists.gforge.inria.fr, johnmci(a)smalltalkconsulting.com On Thu, Feb 11, 2010 at 3:26 PM, John M McIntosh < johnmci(a)smalltalkconsulting.com> wrote: > Er, maybe I'll rant here since it' seems to me this the day for that. > Perhaps flavoured a bit with > Ralph's accidental post about cilantro. > > Should we not be talking about the Smalltalk 2010 ANSI proposal? Why the > lock in to the > Smalltalk ANSI INCITS 319-1998 (R2002) standard? > I haven't seen much movement since Bruce kicked it off ( http://openskills.blogspot.com/2007/10/ansi-smalltalk.html). One of the hurdles was the amount of money ANSI wanted for participation in the standard. I for one couldn't afford it and couldn't see how Cadence, my then employer, would fund it. I think that goes for most of the non-vendor community. See Clay Shirky's TED presentation<http://www.ted.com/talks/clay_shirky_on_institutions_versus_collaboration.h…>on institutions for why IMO ANSI is a non-starter. ANSI is irrelevant; it meets it's own needs, not the needs of the Smalltalk community. It can only ever create an obsolete standard. We need to design our own standard that meets our needs. If we can design a standard that is relevant the community as a whole will increasingly adhere to it over time, and as that happens it will become more useful, and, because it is defined by us, can evolve over time, both in content and at a meta level in its standards-making processes. > I think this fits into Stephane's comment about moving forward. > IMO, moving forward means finding new forms, not putting a new badge on the same old corpse. We need a sci-fi movie not a zombie movie ;) > On 2010-02-11, at 1:51 PM, Lukas Renggli wrote: > > > >> Now why don;t people want a better smalltalk? > > > > Sure, everybody wants a better Smalltalk. > > > > The ANSI standard does not make scripting impossible, it does not > > forbid first class instance variables, it does not forbid a MOP or a > > module system. > > > > The ANSI standard only talks about the basic Smalltalk syntax, > > Collections, Magnitudes, Streams. That's it. I don't think it is > > limiting in any way. > > > > Lukas > > > > -- > > Lukas Renggli > > http://www.lukas-renggli.ch > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Pharo-project mailing list > > Pharo-project(a)lists.gforge.inria.fr > > http://lists.gforge.inria.fr/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/pharo-project > > -- > =========================================================================== > John M. McIntosh <johnmci(a)smalltalkconsulting.com> Twitter: > squeaker68882 > Corporate Smalltalk Consulting Ltd. http://www.smalltalkconsulting.com > =========================================================================== > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Pharo-project mailing list > Pharo-project(a)lists.gforge.inria.fr > http://lists.gforge.inria.fr/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/pharo-project >

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Low Space Warning
by Jon Hylands 10 Mar '10

10 Mar '10

Hi guys, I'm getting a weird problem, and its been so many years since I saw this, I'm at a loss as to what to do... On my robot Brainbot, I have a 2.83 GHz Core 2 Quad with 2 GB RAM and a 32 GB solid state HD. It is running Windows XP Pro. I'm getting a Low Space Notifier whenever I try and copy text to the clipboard, or when I try and paste. I can do other development things, writing a saving code, and opening browsers and windows with no problems. Task Manager says Squeak is taking up 37,980 K, and the machine has 1.2 GB of free physical memory. I'm running the following VM: Squeak 3.10.6 (release) from Aug 30 2007 And the following image: Squeak 3.10.2 latest update: #7179 When I run Utilities garbageCollectAndReport, I get this: 6,038,864 bytes (internal) 506,832,208 bytes (physical) 373,974,352 bytes (total) I am running the following GC setup code in that image: Smalltalk setGCBiasToGrow: 1. "do an incremental GC after this many allocations" SmalltalkImage current vmParameterAt: 5 put: 8000. "tenure when more than this many objects survive the GC" SmalltalkImage current vmParameterAt: 6 put: 4000. "grow headroom" SmalltalkImage current vmParameterAt: 25 put: 24*1024*1024. "shrink threshold" SmalltalkImage current vmParameterAt: 24 put: 48*1024*1024. Smalltalk setGCBiasToGrowGCLimit: 16*1024*1024. Smalltalk setGCBiasToGrow: 1. Those are basically values I copied from something that appeared on this list a few years ago. Any ideas? Thanks, Jon

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Towards a Trunk Release [help needed]
by Andreas Raab 04 Mar '10

04 Mar '10

Folks - This is part two of two about upcoming releases. Besides the 4.0 release we need to get ready for a release from the trunk. If you look at rather long list of improvements this is a good time to get a release out. One of the things that's a bit odd here is that we don't know yet whether the trunk release will become 3.11 or 4.1. That's because it depends on whether we can get the relicensing done before the trunk release is ready or not. If the 4.0 release happens relatively quickly, we can go straight to 4.1. However, at the board meeting we had agreement that we didn't want to introduce an artificial dependency here, so we'll be working towards 3.11 and if 4.0 gets done in time we'll just jump straight into 4.1. To avoid confusion, let's refer to it as "trunk release" until we have more clarity of what version it is likely to be. The real question is what remains to be done for the next release. In theory, we could just release a trunk image pretty much "as is" but from my perspective this is aiming too low. I'd like to make this a richer release than what a trunk image contains. To do this we'll have to find consensus about: * what documentation to include * what external/optional packages to include * what the welcome screen should look like * what extra projects to include * ... and more .... and that's besides the usual release work of ensuring that we've got the tests green, packaging Squeak for the platforms and so on. I think what we're looking for here is really a release manager and team that think a bit like a product manager. We have a Squeak image and there's plenty of interesting code out there, what we need to do is to build an interesting AND useful artifact that we like as a starting point for people to explore Squeak. I know some people have expressed interest in the release manager role for the next release (nudge, nudge Edgar :-) so again we need volunteers both for driving the process, decide on the deadlines, and get things done as well as team members for the various bits to be done. Please don't be shy. If you'd like to actively participate in the next release, post your thoughts. Cheers, - Andreas

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Monticello-kb.368 (Shout styling for the MCSnapshotBrowser)
by Andreas Raab 03 Mar '10

03 Mar '10

Hi Balázs - This does not work for me. I don't get any styling when I browse packages after loading this package. Any ideas? Cheers, - Andreas

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Trax
by Stephen Pair 03 Mar '10

03 Mar '10

With all of the recent interest in version control for squeak (and git, bazaar, mercurial, etc), I figured I should mention a project I was working on a couple years ago and which has stagnated (due to my shift in attention to another project). I've never published this code before (and haven't just yet, but will if there is interest). I've uploaded a vide here: http://www.vimeo.com/9799424 Trax was inspired by git (but does not use git). Its repository format is very similar (but not identical) to git. There are some differences in how I chose to handle repository replication and merging of tags. I hope others working on similar projects might find it useful (for either reusing code or just some ideas). I certainly prefer an all Smalltalk version control system (all things being equal), however it might ultimately be more practical to leverage the countless work put into one of the popular version control systems and taking some of Trax and integrating it with git (or bazaar, mercurial or whatever) would be interesting. Sorry for the crude nature of the video, it was originally meant only as a dry run and to help me create a script for a more polished video (and sorry for no docs, I do prefer written, searchable docs to videos, but videos are much quicker to produce). Below is the video description and a few screenshots: This video is a demonstration of Trax, a git inspired object versioning system for squeak. Any object that can be serialized can be stored and versioned in Trax and the lineage of those objects can be browsed in the version history browser. Additionally, I plugged Monticello packages into Trax such that Smalltalk source code can be versioned. I modified the package browser to make it possible to commit packages directly from it and I created an n-way merge tool. Below are some notable points where various topics are discussed. Sorry for the watermark and disorganization...this video was a first cut that was originally intended to just be used in creating a script for a final, more polished presentation. Due to a lack of time and the need to work on another project, I've decided to just publish this raw video in the hopes it might inspire others to pickup the code, reuse it in other projects, or just get a few ideas. 00:00 - intro 07:00 - discussion of the underlying file structure 26:30 - introduction of the version history browser 36:00 - introduction to the Smalltalk n-way merge tool 38:40 - demo of a 3 way merge 41:00 - demo of committing code from the package browser (and showing the lineage of a 3 way merge in the version history browser) 53:35 - demo of tagging a version 54:00 - demo of publishing to one repo, then replicating to another repo Here is a screen shot of the version browser: Here is a screenshot of the Smalltalk n-way code merge tool (showing a 3-way merge in progress): And, here is a screenshot of the commit dialog: - Stephen

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Daily Commit Log
by commits＠source.squeak.org 01 Mar '10

01 Mar '10

Changes to Trunk (http://source.squeak.org/trunk.html) in the last 24 hours: http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002857.h… Name: System-ar.273 Ancestors: System-dtl.272 Add cleanUp:except: to provide a list of exclusions from the cleanup actions, e.g., "Aggressively clean up but preserve projects and change sets" Smalltalk cleanUp: true except: {Project. ChangeSet}. ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002858.h… Name: Monticello-ul.374 Ancestors: Monticello-ar.372 - replaced MCMethodDefinition's Definitions class variable with a class instance variable. The cached definitions are no longer registered for finalization. - a bit of cleanup around MCDefinition's Instances class variable ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002859.h… Name: Monticello-ul.375 Ancestors: Monticello-ul.374 - replaced MCDefinition's Instances class variable with a class instance variable. Smaller WeakSets are better than a large one. ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002860.h… Name: ST80-dtl.111 Ancestors: ST80-dtl.110 Move MVCProject>>currentVocabulary from package Protocols to Morphic to address MVC reloadability issue. Test Smalltalk at: #Vocabulary to allow future unloadability of Protocols package. ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002861.h… Name: Morphic-dtl.367 Ancestors: Morphic-dtl.366 Move MorphicProject>>currentVocabulary from package Protocols to Morphic to address MVC reloadability issue ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002862.h… Name: Protocols-dtl.24 Ancestors: Protocols-dtl.23 Move Project>>currentVocabulary methods to other packages to resolve MVC reloadability issue. ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002863.h… Name: Multilingual-nice.91 Ancestors: Multilingual-ul.90 Let Unicode leadingChar be encoded 0 instead of 255. According to proposal at http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/squeak-dev/2009-August/138915.h… Warning: this causes a minor bug for A macron (char value 256 & 257) because of dirty old hack in CompositionScanner (these vales are hijacked for encoding stopConditions EndOfRun and CrossedX) ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002864.h… Name: Graphics-nice.112 Ancestors: Graphics-dtl.109 Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 1 ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002865.h… Name: Multilingual-nice.94 Ancestors: Multilingual-nice.91 Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 1 ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002866.h… Name: Graphics-nice.113 Ancestors: Graphics-nice.112 Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 2 ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002867.h… Name: Multilingual-nice.95 Ancestors: Multilingual-nice.94 Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 2 ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002868.h… Name: Graphics-nice.114 Ancestors: Graphics-nice.113 Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 3 ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002869.h… Name: Multilingual-nice.96 Ancestors: Multilingual-nice.95 Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 3 ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002870.h… Name: Tests-ul.50 Ancestors: Tests-nice.49 - integrity tests for Dictionaries (except for WeakKeyDictionaries, because those state may change while the tests are running) ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002871.h… Name: Kernel-dtl.414 Ancestors: Kernel-dtl.413 Eliminate the "special menu..." pick from StringHolder class>>shiftedYellowBottonMenuItems for Morphic Retain a hook for it in MVC. Rationale: The special menu items selection is currently broken, but never did anything useful in Morphic AFICT. Best to just remove the option when not in MVC, but leave the MVC hook in hopes of fixing the original MVC implementation later (other MVC issues prevent this now). This changes adds another #isMorphic send, which is undesirable. However, a number of menu construction methods already have this issue, so a general solution is needed for tailoring these menus to different project types. ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002872.h… Name: Graphics-nice.115 Ancestors: Graphics-nice.114 1) Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 4 (clean-up) 2) Workaround after setting Unicode leadingChar = 0 : CharacterScanner does not understand #scanMultiCharactersCombiningFrom:to:in:rightX:stopConditions:kern: ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002873.h… Name: Multilingual-nice.97 Ancestors: Multilingual-nice.96 Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 4 (clean-up) ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002874.h… Name: Collections-nice.324 Ancestors: Collections-ar.323 Fix endOfRun and crossedX encodings in paragraph composition - Part 4 (clean-up) EndOfRun and CrossedX now are unused TextConstants. ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002875.h… Name: Multilingual-nice.98 Ancestors: Multilingual-nice.97 Remove hardcoded 255 leadingChar in Unicode value, now that Unicode leadingChar = 0. ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002876.h… Name: Files-ul.70 Ancestors: Files-nice.69 - fix for http://bugs.squeak.org/view.php?id=7456 ============================================= http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/packages/2010-February/002877.h… Name: Tests-ul.51 Ancestors: Tests-ul.50 - added a test for FileDirectory >> #= =============================================

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The Trunk: Tests-ul.51.mcz
by commits＠source.squeak.org 28 Feb '10

28 Feb '10

Levente Uzonyi uploaded a new version of Tests to project The Trunk: http://source.squeak.org/trunk/Tests-ul.51.mcz ==================== Summary ==================== Name: Tests-ul.51 Author: ul Time: 28 February 2010, 10:17:22.644 pm UUID: dd228ee4-b6fb-f147-90c3-26c8c4f1bcd4 Ancestors: Tests-ul.50 - added a test for FileDirectory >> #= =============== Diff against Tests-ul.50 =============== Item was added: + ----- Method: FileDirectoryTest>>testEquality (in category 'tests') ----- + testEquality + + self assert: FileDirectory default = FileDirectory default. + self deny: FileDirectory default = FileDirectory default containingDirectory. + self deny: FileDirectory default = nil!

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The Trunk: Files-ul.70.mcz
by commits＠source.squeak.org 28 Feb '10

28 Feb '10

Levente Uzonyi uploaded a new version of Files to project The Trunk: http://source.squeak.org/trunk/Files-ul.70.mcz ==================== Summary ==================== Name: Files-ul.70 Author: ul Time: 28 February 2010, 10:16:23.19 pm UUID: 2055a9ce-5ca1-0344-9d2e-aac5aae1e458 Ancestors: Files-nice.69 - fix for http://bugs.squeak.org/view.php?id=7456 =============== Diff against Files-nice.69 =============== Item was changed: ----- Method: FileDirectory>>= (in category 'comparing') ----- = aDirectory "Compare two FileDirectory instances." + + ^(aDirectory isKindOf: FileDirectory) and: [ + (pathName asString - ^(pathName asString compare: aDirectory pathName asString + caseSensitive: (self isCaseSensitive or: [ aDirectory isCaseSensitive ])) = 2 ]! - caseSensitive: (self isCaseSensitive | aDirectory isCaseSensitive)) = 2!

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Re: 0006721: Identity dictionarys sometimes can't find their keys
by Jerome Peace 28 Feb '10

28 Feb '10

Hi Levente, Thank you for your suggestions. I am not aiming myself at revising my tests. If you wish to add to them great. I suggest adding specific suggestions and code to the mantis report. For some dictionaries "nil" has become a valid key. The tests in the report were designed for 3.9 - 3.10 where Dan Ingalls innocent suggestion that #= replace #== caused a coder to break #comeFullyUpOnReload. I had to design a test that proved dictionaries we not getting hashed correctly just to prove somebody had caused a problem. The difficulty with dictionary problems is they appear like a will-of-the-wisp causing very hard to track down mischief. Trust me on this. The problem may be recurring so its important to have tests IN THE IMAGE. That can be run to find them. For Identity dictionaries these test have proven to work if used. I haven't experimented with the new dictionary flavors or even with other dictionaries, just the one class. The thing I am asking for help with is getting the test from change sets on a mantis report to live code in an image. I don't have any skill with MC. I am a Luddite with regards to it and have not taken the first steps to mastery. This suits me as a debugger. I can find, analyse, and patch bugs with the old methods. It leaves a gap in getting code committed. So I either need a book on MC for Luddites or someone to help by committing the code to resolve the issue. That's what I asked for. Once the tests are where they can be used, improvements will be welcome. The existing tests are good enough to start with. Without something the image is likely to have bugs way to hard to chase. More help in devising and PROVING tests that will find other problems is welcome. It was not the aim of my post however. Cheers --Jer >Levente Uzonyi leves at elte.hu >Sun Feb 28 13:19:40 UTC 2010 replied to: >On Sat, 27 Feb 2010, Jerome Peace wrote: > >> Hi all, >> >> I could use some help getting some crucial tests into trunk. >> >> The patches are in the mantis report of the title. >> http://bugs.squeak.org/view.php?id=6721 >> > >nil is a valid key in Dictionary and IdentityKeyDictionary. A better test >would be something like this: > >{ Dictionary. IdentityDictionary } do: [ :dictionaryClass | > dictionaryClass allInstancesDo: [ :dictionary | > dictionary keysAndValuesDo: [ :key :value | > self assert: (dictionary at: key) == value ] ] ]. > >Or, if you want to use lower level (private) methods: > >{ Dictionary. IdentityDictionary } do: [ :dictionaryClass | > dictionaryClass allInstancesDo: [ :dictionary | > dictionary array doWithIndex: [ :association :index | > association ifNotNil: [ > self assert: (dictionary scanFor: association key) = index ] ] ] ] > >> The ill hashed dictionaries have been detected in Fun Squeak. >> > >The tests above can be used to track down dictionaries which have an >invalid state. > > >Levente > >> I am worried that there is something in the main image that causes conditions to occur so that dictionaries are not rehashed when needed. >> >> The problem is that a mis-hashed dictionary will show up only as other symptoms. Code that seemingly doesn't work as expected. Without a ready test to run tracking it back to the true problem is difficult. >> >> I have no MC skills so I am asking for someone to take over harvesting from the report. >> >> Thank you in advance. >> >> Yours in curiosity and service, --Jerome Peace >

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