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Re: Evidence that Functional Objects is real?
In article <X6ZM5.14913$1C6.727575@news20.bellglobal.com>, "Maury
Markowitz" <maury_markowitz@hotmail.com> wrote:
> Well I can't say anything about the F.O. case, but if you consider the
> many other examples I think you'll find that you're boss's fears are well
> grounded. Ever heard of ProGraph?
I've used it :-)
> Your boss appears to be worried that the language could simply
> disappear at any moment, ruining a huge investement.
> Don't diss him for that.
Fortunately for Dylan, there is more than one implementation, they are
quite compatable (and getting better), and one of them is Free -- as in
speech, and as in beer as well.
If you start using Functional-Developer and the company disappears
without trace then:
- the product won't suddenly stop working. It'll probably take at least
two major Microsoft OS releases for that to happen.
- you can start using Gwydion Dylan instead. No fancy IDE, but if it
stops working -- or has a show-stopper bug -- then you can fix it
yourself or say HEEEELLPP here and someone will pop up and fix it for
you (possibly even in a timely manner if you offer to pay them).
I've been subjected to a painfully large number of orphaned products in
the last 15 years. I'm sick and tired of it and I *don't* want it to
happen again. And that's why *I'm* so excited by and am putting my time
and effort into improving Gwydion Dylan. It's the language I want to
use for my own projects for the forseeable future, and neither Apple nor
MicroSoft nor Functional-Objects nor anyone else can take it away from
me.
Despite the cover-our-arse disclaimers on the web site, btw, it is
actually more than mature and stable enough to do real work with. It's
imcomplete in some areas, and could do with a whole lot more libraries
and tools, but it fundamentally *works* and works well.
I saw my first ever "produces incorrect code" [1] bug from it this week
-- a bug report was sent to the mailing list at 29 Oct 2000 17:07:12
+0100 and the bug was investigated, fixed, and the changes checked into
CVS and the bug reporter personally notified by 30 Oct 2000 20:57:40
+1300. That's less than sixteen hours.
-- Bruce
[1] most d2c bugs are failures to accept valid code, or failure to take
full advantage of optomization opportunities.
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