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>people were struggling just to get Smalltalk to perform at reasonable speeds on microcomputer class hardware I've heard this before, but it confuses me as app
by bigbizisverywyz 5y ago
>people were struggling just to get Smalltalk to perform at reasonable speeds on microcomputer class hardware
I've heard this before, but it confuses me as apparently the majority of the systems at Xerox Parc (Window manager, word processor, etc. ) were written in Smalltalk. So how could these sophisticated GUI apps perform there but not on other platforms, was the hardware really so different?
- linguae 5y agoThe simple answer to this question is that not all software at Xerox PARC was written in Smalltalk. In fact, Smalltalk was just one out of a few different languages and programming environments that Xerox PARC used. For example, the Bravo word processor was written in BCPL (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bravo_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bravo_(software)). Mesa was also developed at Xerox PARC and was commonly used as an implementation language. Interlisp was also largely developed at Xerox PARC.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- cmrdporcupine 5y agoYes, they were drastically different. Xerox built their own systems. Look up the Dolphin and Alto, they were basically minicomputer-class systems with custom CPUs built out of 74 series and bitslice components, no single-chip microprocessor. And very expensive. It wasn't until the mid to late 80s that microprocessor systems built around the 68k series were able to run Smalltalk 80 well. And that was with Tektronix and others spending thousands of man hours developing techniques to implement the VM well. And many of those systems were still basically dedicated to Smalltalk and cost a fortune.