4 ms·

PDB – ANSI-C to PostScript compiler (1993)

58 points by 1ris 10y ago

arethuza 10y ago
As I recall, PDB stood for "Pure Dead Brilliant" - this was written in Glasgow... :-) This was related to the NeWS/PostScript based HyperNeWS GUI environment that I still have very fond memories of. We used it on an EU ESPRIT project with a Lisp backend (Harlequin LispWorks). Meant I got to work in PostScript, C and Lisp on the same project, which was interesting.
faragon 10y ago
Anyone knows if there is another C -> PS being Open Source? P.S. Not strictly related to this, in addition to Ghostscript (GPL), I would like to see up to date MIT/BSD Postcript interpreters and renderers. Anyone knows of any, even if being an old implementation?
- tonyedgecombe 10y ago
  https://github.com/luser-dr00g/xpost https://github.com/luser-dr00g/xpost I'm not sure how complete it is though.
  - faragon 10y ago
    Thank you!
Lord_Nightmare 10y ago
If anyone wants to play with the demo from 23 years ago, the code can still be found at ftp://nic.funet.fi/pub/languages/pdb/
- geocar 10y ago
  Sadly it doesn't look like it's been preserved: pdb2.1-demo/ pdb2.1-demo/COPYING pdb2.1-demo/bin/ pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/ pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/pdb-cpp pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/pdb-comp pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/pdb-opt pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/pdb pdb2.1-demo/bin/sun4/ pdb2.1-demo/bin/sun4/pdb pdb2.1-demo/bin/sun4/pdb-comp tar: Truncated input file (needed 253952 bytes, only 245760 available) tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors.
  - Lord_Nightmare 10y ago
    hunting for another copy... Found an intact copy: ftp://ftp.sra.co.jp/pub/lang/postscript/pdb2.1-demo.tar.gz which someone recompressed from compress to gzip at some point. The original compress archive seems to be lost except in truncated form :(
    - geocar 10y ago
      Cool thanks. Now I need to find some ancient boxes...
blackwre 10y ago
I remember seeing a demo of PDB at the British Telecom Software Engineering Centre at Glasgow running on a Sun workstation around 1993. I contacted Arthur van Hoff (who went on to Java fame) a few years ago and he put me in touch with Tim Niblett who still has some source code, but if I recall correctly, didn't feel that he had the authority to release it. https://twitter.com/avh/status/62644685486825473 https://twitter.com/avh/status/62644685486825473 I believe that PDB came out of the Turing Institute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Institute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Institute which sadly closed in 1994. It would be great to resurrect it, but we only seem to have the binaries.
- geocar 10y ago
  Can PDB compile PDB? It might not be as useful as the source code, but it would at least open the program up to being run by people without sun4 or rs6k machines.
chris_wot 10y ago
I'm really curious how to program in postscript now.

58 points by 1ris 10y ago

As I recall, PDB stood for "Pure Dead Brilliant" - this was written in Glasgow... :-) This was related to the NeWS/PostScript based HyperNeWS GUI environment that I still have very fond memories of. We used it on an EU ESPRIT project with a Lisp backend (Harlequin LispWorks). Meant I got to work in PostScript, C and Lisp on the same project, which was interesting.

faragon 10y ago

Anyone knows if there is another C -> PS being Open Source? P.S. Not strictly related to this, in addition to Ghostscript (GPL), I would like to see up to date MIT/BSD Postcript interpreters and renderers. Anyone knows of any, even if being an old implementation?

tonyedgecombe 10y ago
https://github.com/luser-dr00g/xpost https://github.com/luser-dr00g/xpost I'm not sure how complete it is though.
- faragon 10y ago
  Thank you!

Lord_Nightmare 10y ago

If anyone wants to play with the demo from 23 years ago, the code can still be found at ftp://nic.funet.fi/pub/languages/pdb/

geocar 10y ago
Sadly it doesn't look like it's been preserved: pdb2.1-demo/ pdb2.1-demo/COPYING pdb2.1-demo/bin/ pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/ pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/pdb-cpp pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/pdb-comp pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/pdb-opt pdb2.1-demo/bin/rs6000/pdb pdb2.1-demo/bin/sun4/ pdb2.1-demo/bin/sun4/pdb pdb2.1-demo/bin/sun4/pdb-comp tar: Truncated input file (needed 253952 bytes, only 245760 available) tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors.
- Lord_Nightmare 10y ago
  hunting for another copy... Found an intact copy: ftp://ftp.sra.co.jp/pub/lang/postscript/pdb2.1-demo.tar.gz which someone recompressed from compress to gzip at some point. The original compress archive seems to be lost except in truncated form :(
  - geocar 10y ago
    Cool thanks. Now I need to find some ancient boxes...

blackwre 10y ago

I remember seeing a demo of PDB at the British Telecom Software Engineering Centre at Glasgow running on a Sun workstation around 1993. I contacted Arthur van Hoff (who went on to Java fame) a few years ago and he put me in touch with Tim Niblett who still has some source code, but if I recall correctly, didn't feel that he had the authority to release it. https://twitter.com/avh/status/62644685486825473 https://twitter.com/avh/status/62644685486825473 I believe that PDB came out of the Turing Institute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Institute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_Institute which sadly closed in 1994. It would be great to resurrect it, but we only seem to have the binaries.

geocar 10y ago
Can PDB compile PDB? It might not be as useful as the source code, but it would at least open the program up to being run by people without sun4 or rs6k machines.

chris_wot 10y ago

I'm really curious how to program in postscript now.