Development - Smalltalk

Smalltalk Performance

billb — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:59:00 -0600

Updated Sept 24 2008: extract from old article.

One of the more popular classes in any OO environment is the Process class. The Squeak implementation of Smalltalk even has a special OSProcess plugin to the virtual machine ( VM ) that provides 'eyeball-to-eyeball' OS level support for threads. I keep trying to come up with big XML workloads to test the limits of the stdin/stdout channels.

Links - Pharo Smalltalk

billb — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 16:23:04 -0600

March 19 2009: Pharo will be going beta with version 1.0 !!! I thought they said it would take three years ... glad it didn't :-).

Links - Squeak Smalltalk

billb — Fri, 09 May 2008 14:48:35 -0600

March 19 2009: Squeakland-EToys updated, see the EToys download page.
Updated July 10 2008: Pharo - new, leaner fork of Squeak. See related link.

From Wikipedia on Squeak Smalltalk:

Links - Seaside Hosting Examples

billb — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 12:28:20 -0600

Note: my understanding of these services is evolving and may be incorrect at this point. Updates coming soon probably ...

Of course, the best example of a Seaside-powered site may be the Seaside site itself. But there are several interesting ( and either cheap or free ) hosting sites for Seaside web applications.

Links - Smalltalk and SOUL

billb — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 09:26:53 -0600

A strong candidate for a Smalltalk RDF/OWL inference engine is the Smalltalk Open Unification Language (SOUL).

Smalltalk - The Language That Refuses to Die

billb — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 13:36:13 -0600

Update Sept 7 2008: Added link to article Smalltalk Jobs

Mea Culpa

First, I offer the reader a confession: I gave Smalltalk up for dead ten years ago.

I'm not proud of it. I had a choice between being an advocate of superior software technology or being an up-to-date payer of mortgages. I decided on mortgage payments. In the intervening years of C++, Visual Basic and Java, I didn't look back too much. Other than recalling how I solved a problem in Smalltalk and an occasional bout of Squeak watching, Smalltalk was a thing of the past.

The Great SOA Versus OO Debate

billb — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 15:43:41 -0600

This page was moved to A Debate About SOA Versus Objects on the Home site.

Links - Smalltalk and RDF/OWL

billb — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 17:12:17 -0600

Updated: Sept 10 2007

There is a small but persistent Smalltalk/OWL project. From their project information page:

The Smalltalk OWL Project was launched 1 Jan 06, the overview of the effort is:

read more

Link - Smalltalk Projects at Apache.org

billb — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 11:29:19 -0600

The purpose of the mod.smalltalk project is to integrate Smalltalk with the Apache Web Server via Fast CGI.

On the page describing Fast CGI, they say:

FastCGI is a fast, open, and secure Web server interface that solves the performance problems inherent in CGI, without introducing the overhead and complexity of proprietary APIs (Application Programming Interfaces).

read more

Link - VisualWorks Smalltalk

billb — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 12:38:28 -0600

VisualWorks Smalltalk has drifted and evolved across the years eventually winding up with CINCOM. While not Open Source, it is a mature product and CINCOM has a liberal download policy for non-commercial use. They encourage you to register before downloading, but do not absolutely require you to do so, which shows the right spirit.

Links -Smalltalk

billb — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 16:27:24 -0600

Updated: Sept 10 2007

Smalltalk.org is the main link - it's a good kick-off point for Smalltalk adventures. The whysmalltalk.com site is also a good resource, even if some of the event announcements are several years old.

A great list of free Smalltalk books on the web.

Links - Smalltalk Web Servers: Seaside and AIDA/Web

billb — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 15:59:29 -0600

Updated Sept 7 2008: added seaBreeze link

Seaside

To get a good feel for Seaside development environment, read the excellent technical introduction by Shaffer Consulting.

Note that the article was written in 2005 and may be obsolete in parts. For example, Seaside now supports several object-oriented databases, including Gemstone.