5 ms·

A Forth to Scratch compiler

71 points by CarolineW 10y ago

Retr0spectrum 10y ago
There are quite a few interesting transpilers involving Scratch. For example, https://phosphorus.github.io/ https://phosphorus.github.io/ lets you transpile Scratch code to JavaScript for improved performance. Other projects of note are an LLVM frontend for Scratch: https://github.com/bobbybee/scratch86 https://github.com/bobbybee/scratch86 And a corresponding backend: https://github.com/bobbybee/scratch-llvm https://github.com/bobbybee/scratch-llvm
- saghm 10y ago
  Compiling to JavaScript to improve performance? There's something new
stevekemp 10y ago
It is nice to see the recent rise of posts about FORTH. It's a language I first played with back on the 48k ZX Spectrum in the late nineties. When I first used it I loved the way you could redefine the language, at run-time in the REPL. These days I just love the purity and cleanliness of the language. I don't have a single compelling use-case for it, but over the years I've written my own implementation in C, Java, and Perl. Having recently started playing with hardware it is nice to see you can even run it on ESP8266 / Arduino hardware.
- xzm 10y ago
  Very timely remark :) Take a look at what jcw (of tclkit fame) is doing: http://jeelabs.org/2017/02/various-shades-of-forth/ http://jeelabs.org/2017/02/various-shades-of-forth/
  - stevekemp 10y ago
    Thanks for the link, they were indeed timely pieces!
- qwertyuiop924 10y ago
  It looks like it might be a nice language to write stuff for the GBA with. Or the GB/CGB, for that matter, but space is much more limited there.
ycmbntrthrwaway 10y ago
This project completely misses the point of Forth. Forth is an interactive assembler. This one has no REPL. Control structures are easy to introduce in the Forth itself because IF, ELSE and THEN are separate "immediate" words that just manipulate the return stack and compile some branching code immediately when parser encounters them. This compiler has no return stack at all and just looks for IF..ELSE..THEN during parsing. Forth is ugly outside but has beautiful implementation. This compiler is some ugly python code inside.

71 points by CarolineW 10y ago

There are quite a few interesting transpilers involving Scratch. For example, https://phosphorus.github.io/ https://phosphorus.github.io/ lets you transpile Scratch code to JavaScript for improved performance. Other projects of note are an LLVM frontend for Scratch: https://github.com/bobbybee/scratch86 https://github.com/bobbybee/scratch86 And a corresponding backend: https://github.com/bobbybee/scratch-llvm https://github.com/bobbybee/scratch-llvm

saghm 10y ago
Compiling to JavaScript to improve performance? There's something new

stevekemp 10y ago

It is nice to see the recent rise of posts about FORTH. It's a language I first played with back on the 48k ZX Spectrum in the late nineties. When I first used it I loved the way you could redefine the language, at run-time in the REPL. These days I just love the purity and cleanliness of the language. I don't have a single compelling use-case for it, but over the years I've written my own implementation in C, Java, and Perl. Having recently started playing with hardware it is nice to see you can even run it on ESP8266 / Arduino hardware.

xzm 10y ago
Very timely remark :) Take a look at what jcw (of tclkit fame) is doing: http://jeelabs.org/2017/02/various-shades-of-forth/ http://jeelabs.org/2017/02/various-shades-of-forth/
- stevekemp 10y ago
  Thanks for the link, they were indeed timely pieces!
qwertyuiop924 10y ago
It looks like it might be a nice language to write stuff for the GBA with. Or the GB/CGB, for that matter, but space is much more limited there.

ycmbntrthrwaway 10y ago

This project completely misses the point of Forth. Forth is an interactive assembler. This one has no REPL. Control structures are easy to introduce in the Forth itself because IF, ELSE and THEN are separate "immediate" words that just manipulate the return stack and compile some branching code immediately when parser encounters them. This compiler has no return stack at all and just looks for IF..ELSE..THEN during parsing. Forth is ugly outside but has beautiful implementation. This compiler is some ugly python code inside.