Well, sounds like a good match

Post #71,369 by tonytib 12/29/02 7:37:00 PM Reply	Well, sounds like a good match After all, I've heard that both APL & FORTH are "write-once" languages. What I'd like right now would be a real time high level scripting language (interpreter) that could fit in ~8K/8K (code/data -- with no libraries, of course). The real time / high level part could be accomplished with care (especially in regards to garbage collection, if used), but the size part won't happen. The smallest scripting language I'd consider using, Lua, is still something like 100K and Ficl (FORTH-inspired command language) is about the same. Tony
Post #71,373 by deSitter 12/29/02 8:52:49 PM Reply	Re: Well, sounds like a good match [link\|http://www.tinyboot.com/\|http://www.tinyboot.com/] Here is a general purpose firmware system based in FORTH. Links to other resources (of course you probably know these). I can't imagine a scripting system simpler than FORTH, in terms of necessary resources. -drl
Post #71,375 by static 12/29/02 8:57:06 PM Reply	I remember reading lots about FORTH. On a TI-99/4a. The user group had some FORTH enthusiasts. It required a disk system, alas (I couldn't afford one), as it was disk-sector-oriented; each sector being a page of code. It effectively was it's own OS, but then that wasn't unusual on home computers of that era. Wade. Microsoft are clearly boiling the frogs.
Post #71,381 by deSitter 12/29/02 9:16:30 PM Reply	Re: I remember reading lots about FORTH. Right - FORTH code came in fixed block sizes that corresponded to physical disk sectors :). A block was called a "screen". If the blocksize is 1024, that's just 16 lines of 64 columns. The editor loaded a screen at a time. Now this is great for embedded systems - your ROM is just a bunch of screens. It's so simple it's stupid. -drl
Post #71,419 by Andrew Grygus 12/30/02 1:35:43 AM Reply	FORTH & embedded systems FORTH was originally created as a language for controlling astronomical telescopes, and is still used for that purpose (and for a while after the high profile QX-10 fiasco, not for much else), so it should work well for embedded systems. [link\|http://www.aaxnet.com\|AAx]
Post #71,404 by tonytib 12/29/02 11:26:49 PM Reply	Thanks, it looks interesting I'm really looking for a system for a Analog Devices 2181 DSP, so I'd have to look at porting issues, although someone has already done a FORTH implementation for the 2181. I'm not a big fan of the FORTH syntax, but right now it does look like the only option for a truly tiny interpreter (well, I suppose I could do a TinyBASIC....but I think I'd rather program in FORTH). Another issue is that I would want the language to be able to call compiled C routines; scripting languages such as Lua, Ficl, Python, Tk, etc excel at this. I'm not sure how easy it is in standard FORTH. So at a first glance it looks promising; I'll have to dig into the details to see if I would really make sense for my current device. Tony
Post #71,422 by deSitter 12/30/02 2:33:44 AM Reply	Re: Thanks, it looks interesting Calling C is trivial if you understand the calling convention, can do your own fixups, etc. etc. You prepare the stack and go. You can hand link but most FORTHs of any richness do all this for you - see for example [link\|http://www.tinyboot.com/appc.html\|http://www.tinyboot.com/appc.html]. Also in general: [link\|http://www.equi4.com/minotaur/minotaur.html\|http://www.equi4.com...aur/minotaur.html] -drl

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