Re: [colorforth] Adventures with Building Applications

["David J. Goehrig" <dave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

vaded@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>   What I really mean is as long as there is this
> dependency
> on Javascript then that defeats the purpose of something like
> colorForth.
> Javascript becomes the weakest link and once you have to parameter
> things
> down to the level of Javascript you lost all the benefits of Forth.
>   

The word dependency is kinda misleading.   There's two directions, 
server side JS => Forth and client side Forth => JS.  On the server 
side, the old code is written in JS and so is dependent on JS in that it 
is written in it.  Hence translating JS => Forth!  On the client side, 
well the client has a JS environment, so Forth => JS is the easiest way 
to get Forth on the client's system, so it is dependent on what the 
client has available.

As for looking for alternatives, like getting a Forth based browser on 
everyone's PC and phone, that's essentially impossible.  A lot of our 
applications have cellphone clients, and I do a lot of contract 
engineering for companies to port existing apps to things like 
Qualcomm's BREW.  You'd never get your colorforth app through NSTL, 
simple as that.  Apple won't put it on the iPhone either.  On the other 
hand, those phones all have web browsers with some Javascript support. 

Javascript is everywhere, on the desktop, on the phone, and on the web.  
To view a viable client platform that can literally reach billions of 
people as "the weakest link" kinda misses the point.  It is also the one 
programming language for which everyone with a browser can write 
software, and that nearly everyone can run.  On the client side, it is 
simply the best target language.  It has become the universal assembly 
language of the web.

On the server side, I can do whatever I want.  That's where I can 
leverage the benefits of Forth.  I can produce tight code that does what 
it needs, and export that functionality to the JS users.  The vast 
majority of the people who program web UIs know Javascript, but don't 
know Forth.  Enabling them to write backend processing in JS and then 
behind the scenes implementing it in Forth means they remain happy and 
productive, and most importantly lets them invest in perfecting 1 skill 
JS programming, rather than trying to perfect 2 different skills JS + 
Forth.  I reap the benefit of having more time to work on the Forth side 
of things, and my clients get their projects delivered on time.  But 
that said, we still have a large base of legacy JS code that we have to 
support, so there's real incentive to port all of that to Forth.

When you really get down to it, Javascript is just a bunch of C syntax, 
tacked on top of Self, which is itself just yet another LISP variant 
with a prototypal idiom for using assoc lists as objects. There's about 
five words you have to implement in Forth to handle the entire object 
model for Javascript, (new, get, set, apply, delegate).  Nothing hard to 
mimic in Forth. While the programmer writing JS code can't take full 
advantage of the Forth engine, he at least can be as productive as he 
can be with the tools that he knows.

From my point of view, the benefits of Forth are:

1.) I can quickly build a system that emulates the functionality of the 
old, and be able to run the old apps
2.) The resulting system will be substantially faster than, support more 
users than,  and be more maintainable than the old
3.) Gives me a migration path to bare hardware in the event I need still 
more power

The benefits of supporting Javascript are:

1.) I can continue to hire people who are Javascript experts, who can 
contribute their best effort
2.) I don't have to rewrite all the applications for existing clients 
(at great expense and no additional gain)
3.) It is everywhere, and as a target language, forth that generates 
javascript gives me the best of both worlds.

Hope that makes sense.

Dave
---

David J. Goehrig


Email: dave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx


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