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From: "Gregory A. Haverkamp"
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Forth FAQ: General [Part 1 of 3]
Date: Sun, 10 Apr 1994 22:58:11 -0400
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Welcome to the general portion of the Frequently Asked Questions' (FAQ)
Answers message for comp.lang.forth. This message is designed to
provide the answers to commonly asked questions about Forth.
This is the first message of three. Message one contains answers to the
Forth-related questions listed below in the contents. The second
message contains information pertaining to the availability of Forth
systems and contact lists for Forth-product vendors. The third contains
miscellaneous pieces of information regarding forth, taken mostly from
bboard posts.
Disclaimer(s):
The organization of this FAQ message is by no means final. If you
have any additions, comments, complaints, corrections, suggestions,
or ..., please send them to one of the addresses at the end of this
message. This message was created by editing the previous
version of the FAQ messages, with additional material culled from
the ForthNet. Please let me know if I have failed to attribute,
or have incorrectly used or attributted, any material.
This message is archived at the anonymous FTP site:
rtfm.mit.edu
in the directory:
/pub/usenet/comp.lang.forth
In addition, if you have AFS access, you can find the files in:
/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/gh1w/ForthFAQ/FAQ.*
On those occasions when the FAQ posted has changed since the previous
version, a diff of the old and the new will be posted to comp.lang.forth.
For answers to general questions about the Internet or Usenet,
consult the messages that are periodicly posted to the newsgroups:
news.announce.newusers
news.newusers.questions
news.announce.important
(The FAQs posted to those groups are also archived at rtfm.mit.edu)
FAQ Messages Section and Question Lists:
----------------------------------------
Section I: The language.
What is Forth?
Section II: Forth-related organizations.
What organizations are dedicated to Forth? (and how to contact them)
What other publications carry information, etc. about Forth?
What other Internet/UseNet Forth mailing lists are there?
Section III: ForthNet
What is ForthNet?
What are the restrictions and guidelines for ForthNet messages?
How do I send email to some one who has posted a message on ForthNet?
How do I access ForthNet?
Section IV: Forth libraries.
Getting Forth files directly from The Forth Interest Group:
Getting Forth files via FTP:
How can I locate Forth files for FTP'ing?
Getting Forth files via EMail:
Getting Forth files via an EMail interface to FTP:
Getting Forth files via EMail to FNEAS:
Forth information via WWW:
Section V: Forth Books
"Starting FORTH" - Leo Brodie
"Thinking FORTH" - Leo Brodie
"FORTH: A TEXT AND REFERENCE" - Mahlon G. Kelly and N. Spies
"Stack Computers: The New Wave" - Phillip Koopman
"Threaded Interpretive Languages" - R.G. Loeliger
"Scientific FORTH: a modern language for scientific computing"
- Julian V. Noble
"Object-oriented Forth - Implementation of Data Structures"
- Dick Pountain
"Write Your Own Programming Language Using C++" - Norman Smith
"The Complete Forth" - A. Winfield
"Forth: The New Model - A Programmer's Handbook" - Jack Woehr
Forth books online
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Section I: What is Forth?
------------------------------------------------------------
Philip J. Koopman Jr.
United Technologies Research Center, East Hartford, CT
This description is copyright 1993 by ACM, and was developed
for the Second History of Programming Languages Conference
(HOPL-II), Boston MA.
Permission to copy without fee all or part of this material
is granted, provided that the copies are not made or
distributed for direct commercial advantage, the ACM
copyright notice and the title of the publication and its
data appear, and notice is given that copying is by
permission of the Association for Computing Machinery. To
copy otherwise, or to republish, requires a fee and/or
specific permission.
------------------------------------------------------------
A BRIEF INTRODUCTION TO FORTH
-----------------------------
Forth is both an extensible language and an interactive
program development methodology. Originally developed for
small embedded control mini- and micro-computers, Forth
seems to have been implemented on every major processor
manufactured. It has been used in a wide variety of
applications, including spreadsheets, expert systems, and
multi-user databases.
TWO-STACK ABSTRACT MACHINE
At the most superficial level, Forth is a directly
executable language for a stack-based abstract machine. In
its essential form, the Forth abstract machine has a program
counter, memory, ALU, data evaluation pushdown stack, and
subroutine return address pushdown stack.
Data evaluation in Forth is accomplished on the Data
Stack using Reverse Polish Notation (RPN), also called
postfix notation. For example, the following sequence typed
from the keyboard:
3 4 + 5 * . __35 ok__
interactively pushes the value 3 on the stack, pushes the
value 4 on top of the 3, destructively adds 3 and 4 to get
7, then multiplies by 5. The . operation displays the
single resultant top value on the stack, 35 (computer output
is underlined). "ok" is the Forth command prompt.
Operations such as SWAP and DUP (duplicate) reorder and
replicate the top few Data Stack elements.
FACTORING
At a deeper level, Forth programs use RPN not as an end
in itself, but rather as a means to achieve simple syntax
and flexible modularity. Small, simple programs to perform
complex functions are written by reusing common code
sequences through a programming practice known as factoring.
Subroutine calls and returns are an important part of
Forth programs and the factoring process. As an example,
consider the following function (called a word in Forth)
which computes the sum of squares of two integers on top of
the Data Stack and returns the result on the Data Stack:
: SUM-OF-SQUARES ( a b -- c ) DUP * SWAP DUP * + ;
The Data Stack inputs to the word at run-time are two
integers a and b. The Data Stack output is a single integer
c. The : denotes a function definition with the name SUM-
OF-SQUARES. The ; terminates the definition. Comments are
enclosed in parentheses. This example follows the Forth
convention of including a stack-effect comment showing that
a (the second stack element) and b (the top stack element)
are consumed as stack inputs, with c produced as the stack
output.
By the process of factoring, the example program would
be re-written in Forth using a new definition (a factor)
called SQUARED to allow sharing the common function of
duplicating and multiplying a number on the Data Stack. The
separation of the Return Stack from the Data Stack in the
abstract machine allows the values on the Data Stack to be
cleanly passed down through multiple levels of subroutine
calls without run-time overhead. In this new version, Data
Stack elements are implicitly passed as parameters from SUM-
OF-SQUARES to SQUARED:
: SQUARED ( n -- n**2 ) DUP * ;
: SUM-OF-SQUARES ( a b -- c ) SQUARED SWAP SQUARED + ;
Good Forth programmers strive to write programs
containing very short (often one-line), well-named word
definitions and reused factored code segments. The ability
to pick just the right name for a word is a prized talent.
Factoring is so important that it is common for a Forth
program to have more subroutine calls than stack operations.
Factoring also simplifies speed optimization via replacing
commonly used factors with assembly language definitions.
In the preceding example, SQUARED could be re-written in
assembly language for speed while maintaining the same stack
effects.
Writing a Forth program is equivalent to extending the
language to include all functions needed to implement an
application. Therefore, programming in Forth may be thought
of as creating an application-specific language extension.
This paradigm, when coupled with a very quick
edit/compile/test cycle, seems to significantly increase
productivity. As each Forth word is written, it can be
tested from the keyboard for immediate programmer feedback.
For example, the definitions above could be summarily tested
with:
3 SQUARED . __9 ok__
3 4 SUM-OF-SQUARES . __25 ok__
INTERPRETATION, COMPILATION AND EXECUTION
Forth systems use two levels of interpretation: a text
interpreter and an address interpreter. When accepting
keyboard or file-based input, the text interpreter extracts
whitespace-separated character strings. In interpretation
mode it attempts to execute the corresponding words (numeric
input is trapped and converted as a special case). : is a
word like any other, but creates a new dictionary entry
containing the word name (symbol) and places the text
interpreter into compilation mode. While in compilation
mode, most words extracted from the input stream are
compiled to a pointer to the word's definition in the
dictionary instead of being executed.
A compiled Forth program is a collection of words, each
of which contains a statically allocated list of pointers to
other words. Ultimately the pointers lead to assembly
language primitives, some of which are typically user-
written. The Forth address interpreter is used to execute
compiled words, classically using threaded code techniques.
The Forth text interpreter, while not used in executing
compiled programs, is often included in applications as the
basis of a command-line user interface.
Forth systems use one-pass compilation. There is no
explicit Forth parser (and, for practical purposes, no
formal grammar). Control flow words have a special
immediate attribute, and are executed immediately even when
the text interpreter is in compilation mode. Immediate
words, when executed, typically cause compilation of special
structures. For example, IF compiles a branch conditional
upon the top runtime Data Stack value, and the matching THEN
(the "endif" word) back-patches the branch target address.
Users can readily create their own immediate words, thus
extending the compiler by adding new control flow structures
or other language features.
Data structures are created by another special class of
words: defining words. Defining words have two parts: the
CREATE clause creates the dictionary entry for the data
structure instance, while the DOES> clause is a definition
shared by all data structures created by that defining word.
For example, an array defining word creates a named array
and reserves storage with its CREATE clause, and computes an
address (given indices) in its DOES> clause. Defining words
are commonly used to hide data structure implementations and
to create families of similar words.
Forth programmers traditionally value complete
understanding and control over the machine and their
programming environment. Therefore, what Forth compilers
don't do reveals something about the language and its use.
Type checking, macro preprocessing, common subexpression
elimination, and other traditional compiler services are
feasible, but not included in production Forth compilers.
This simplicity allows Forth development systems to be small
enough to fit in the on-chip ROM of an 8-bit
microcontroller. On the other hand, Forth's extensibility
allows "full-featured" systems to consume over 100K bytes
and provide comprehensive window-based programming
environments. Forth also allows (and often encourages)
programmers to completely understand the entire compiler and
run-time system. Forth supports extremely flexible and
productive application development while making ultimate
control of both the language and hardware easily attainable.
Philip J. Koopman Jr.
United Technologies Research Center, East Hartford, CT
This description is copyright 1993 by ACM, and was developed
for the Second History of Programming Languages Conference
(HOPL-II), Boston MA.
Permission to copy without fee all or part of this material
is granted, provided that the copies are not made or
distributed for direct commercial advantage, the ACM
copyright notice and the title of the publication and its
data appear, and notice is given that copying is by
permission of the Association for Computing Machinery. To
copy otherwise, or to republish, requires a fee and/or
specific permission.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Section II: Forth/Forth-related organzations and publications
What organizations are dedicated to Forth? (and how to contact them)
Forth Interest Group
P.O Box 2154
Oakland, CA 94621
(510) 89FORTH
(510) 535-1295 FAX
[Information supplied by John Hall on 4 Sept 92]
Association for Computing Machinery
Special Interest Group on Forth (SIGForth)
11 West 42nd St.
New York, NY 10036 USA
(212)869-7440
ISSN #1047-4544
[ACM info supplied by Alan T. Furman]
The Journal of Forth Application and Research [JFAR]
The Institute for Applied Forth Research, Inc.
70 Elmwood Avenue
Rochester, NY 14611 USA
ISSN #0738-2022
[JFAR info is from 1989, please correct me if it has
changed. -dwp]
What other publications carry information, etc. about Forth?
The Computer Journal
P. O. Box 12
S. Plainfield, NJ 07080-0012
- U. S. A. -
Phone: (US access) 908-755-6186
ISSN # ????
Mountain View Press
Box 429 Route 2
La Honda, CA 94020 USA
voice/fax/modem (via menu) (415) 747-0760
[ MVP info curtesy of Phil Koopman]
Dr. Dobb's Journal has the occasional article or two.
PO Box 56188
Boulder, CO 80322-6188 USA
800-456-1215 (USA and Canada)
303-447-9330 (All other countries)
ISSN #1044-789X
Embedded Systems Programming has the occasional article.
Miller Freeman Publications
600 Harrison St.
San Francisco, CA 94107
(415) 905-2200
ISSN #1040-3272
controlled distribution, but available @ $45 for 12 issues
[E.S.P. info courtesy of Jack Woehr and Paul Zander]
Midnight Engineering has the occasional article.
111 E. Drake Road, Suite 7041
Fort Collins, CO 80525
Voice: 303-225-1410
Fax: 303-225-1075
ISSN #1050-0324
What other Internet/UseNet Forth mailing lists are there?
From: [email protected] (Nick Solntseff)
Subject: Forth Education List
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: Thu, 4 Jul 1991 20:12:59 GMT
The annual Working Group on Forth Education was held at the 1991 Rochester
Forth Conference. As chairman of the group, I pointed out that apart from
some activity resulting from the 1990 Working Group, notably on the part
of Jack Brown of BCIT, there was very little carry over from one year to
the next. So, I volunteered to start and administer a Forth Education List
on Internet. I have now decided to publish an electronic newsletter--more
or less regularly--and this is it!
This issue is being sent to some of the people who attended the 1991 FEWG,
namely, those who gave me their electronic addresses. You can subscribe to
the list by sending an e-mail request to
[email protected]
Contributions to the newsletter can be sent (for editing) to
[email protected]
Submissions to the list can be sent to
[email protected]
Topics for both types of submissions that have been suggested at the WG
include
* Forth textbooks
* Educational Forth boards
* Forth teaching resources
* Teaching the ANSI Standard Version of Forth
* How to increase programming productivity through education
* Boot Prom educational materials
* anything else impinging on education and Forth
Nicholas Solntseff
Department of Computer Science and Systems
McMaster University
Hamilton, Ontario
Canada
L8S 4K1
1-416-525-9140 xtn 3443
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Section III: ForthNet
What is ForthNet?
ForthNet is a virtual Forth network that links designated message bases
of several Bulletin Boards and Information Services in an attempt to
provide greater distribution of Forth related information.
ForthNet is provided through the courtesy of the SysOps of its various
links who shunt appropriate messages in a manual or semi-manual manner.
An _incomplete_ list of the branches of ForthNet includes:
UseNet's comp.lang.forth
BitNet's FIGI-L
the BBoard systems RCFB, ACFB, LMI BBS, FORTH-BBS Munich
Interface BBS, Grapevine
FIG's RoundTable on GEnie.
Note: ForthNet is not a static configuration of actual networks, but
rather a dynamicly changing entity -- updates to this section of the FAQ
are especially appreciated.
What are the restrictions and guidelines for ForthNet messages?
The various branches of ForthNet do not all have the same rules for
appropriate postings or ettiquette. Many BBoard posts are very chatty
and contain some personal information, and some also contain blatant
commercial advertising. Most comp.lang.forth posts are not like that.
Because ForthNet messages are routed beyound the system from which they
originate, we, the manual and semi-manual linkers of ForthNet, ask that
you try to keep the lines in your messages to under 77 characters in
length. You do not have to do that. If you do use long lines, be aware
that your message will end up formatted differently on the various
branches of ForthNet.
How do I send email to some one who has posted a message on ForthNet?
There is NO e-mail link between the various branches of ForthNet.
If you need to get a message through to someone on another branch,
please either make your message general enough to be of interest to
the whole net, or contact said person by phone, USMail, or some
other means.
Thoughtful message authors place *a few* lines at the end of their
messages describing how to contact them (electronically or otherwise).
How do I access ForthNet?
From UseNet: comp.lang.forth
ForthNet messages that are ported into comp.lang.forth from the rest of
the ForthNet all pass through GEnie. All such messages are ported into
comp.lang.forth with a from line of the form:
From: [email protected] ...
Messages ported to comp.lang.forth may _or_ may not contain some trailer
information as to where they actually originated, if it was not on
GEnie.
From BITNET: FIGI-L
For those who have access to BITNET/CSNet, but not Usenet
comp.lang.forth is echoed in FIGI-L.
From a modem:
RCFB (Real-Time Control Forth Board) 303-278-0364
SysOp: Jack Woehr
Location: Golden, Colorado -USA-
ACFB (Australia Connection Forth Board) 03-809-1787 in Australia
61-3-809-1787 International
SysOp: Lance Collins
Location: Melbourne, Victoria -AUSTRALIA-
LMI BBS (Laboratory Microsystems, Inc.) 310-306-3530
SysOp: Ray Duncan
Location: Marina del Ray, California -USA-
Interface BBS 707-544-9661
Sysop: b0b (Bob Lee)
Location: Santa Rosa, California -USA-
Grapevine (Grapevine RIME hub) 501-753-8121 to register
501-753-6859 thereafter
SysOp: Jim Wenzel
Location: Little Rock, Arkansas -USA-
Forth Systeme GmbH BBS (Country Code 49) 7667-556
SysOp: Klaus Flesch
Location: Breisach, Germany
FORTH-BBS Munich 089-8714548 in Germany
(Forth Gesellschaft e.V.) 49-89-8714548 International
SysOp: Jens Wilke (JAW)
EMail: [email protected]
Location: Munich, Bavaria -GERMANY-
GEnie 800-638-9636 for information
(General Electric Network for Information Exchange)
SysOps: Dennis Ruffer(D.RUFFER)
Leonard Morgenstern(NMORGENSTER)
Elliott Chapin(ELLIOTT.C)
b0b (Bob Lee)
Location: Forth RoundTable - type M710 or FORTH
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Section IV: Forth Libraries
What Forth libraries are available, and how can I access them?
There are several repositories of Forth programs, sources, executables,
and so on. These various repositories are NOT indentical copies of the
same things. Material is available on an AS-IS basis due to the charity
of the people involved in maintaining the libraries. In addition to
the sources listed below, many of the ForthNet branches also have
libraries available. See "Section IV: Forth libraries" for
information on accessing ForthNet.
Getting Forth files directly from The Forth Interest Group:
The Forth Interest Group maintains a library of Forth files
available on disk. You can write them for an order form, their
address is in "Section II: Forth-related organizations". They
also have a very extensive library on line on GEnie. For GEnie
access information, see "Section III: ForthNet".
Getting Forth files via FTP:
There is an FTP site in Portugal devoted to Forth, which contains a
mirror of the FIG library on GEnie, plus whatever anyone has donated.
The archive is run by Paulo A. D. Ferreira who has donated the resources
for it. The archive machine name/address is:
asterix.inescn.pt 192.35.246.17
and the files are in the directory:
/pub/forth
Please note: There are several other FTP sites on the network that
have Forth directories. However, this is the only FTP site
that has a respository specificly for Forth files of any
and all kinds. SIMTEL20 has some MSDOS only files, but
those are very old. A few other sites are the primary
distribution points for particular Forth systems. If you
are the maintainer of such a site, please email some text
that can be added to the FAQ messages.
Here is a copy of the pub/forth/README file.
*Especially note the time restriction for accessing the archive.*
Thanks to Mr. Ferreira for providing this information and this service.
--- Start of README ---
This archive contains a copy of the FIG archives on GENIE.
To get the list of files avaliable get ls-lR.Z
To get the list of files from Genie, with descriptions get the file
pub/forth/filedocs/files.arc
To get unarchivers see the pub/PC/archivers/directory
As this archive is physically in Portugal ( GMT timezone ) please
use this archive by night if you are in Europe, or in the afternoon if
you are in America.
For complaints, suggestions, flames send email to: [email protected]
Thanks to the Forth Interest Group's library on GEnie, these files exist
to be distributed. Thanks to the Forth Interest Group for allowing these
files to be distributed from other than their GEnie library. The files in
this archive that originated in FIG's library on GEnie were sent to this
archive via Doug Philips' FNEAS server. If you find that any of the files
are damaged, please send mail to the above address so that the damaged
files can be replaced.
--- End of README ---
How can I find Forth files for FTP'ing?
[ Taken/edited from messages posted by Mitch Bradley and Bruce Oneel ]
There is a nice database listing Internet archives called "archie";
you can access it via Telnet. Here's how:
telnet quiche.cs.mcgill.ca
login% archie
(Lots of introductory messages; use "help" to learn more)
archie> prog forth
The "prog forth" query lists over 100 Forth things available on various
FTP sites. I searched the listing for "atari", and found 2 places where
Forthmacs is available:
watserv1.waterloo.edu /micro/atari-st/forthmac.arc
terminator.cc.umich.edu /atari/languages/forth.arc
Obviously, you can look for other things besides Forth; I have used archie
to find all sorts of things.
Another way to do the search is to send mail to [email protected]
with the word help in the message body or the request prog
Getting Forth files via EMail:
There are two options for getting Forth files via EMail. First, you
can use an EMail interface to an FTP server. Second, you can use
FNEAS. Details on how to use each of those follow.
Please NOTE: Email is the **most** resource intensive way to get files.
If you have access to other methods, please use those instead.
Getting Forth files via an EMail interface to FTP:
Date: Tue, 2 Apr 91 09:13:41 CST
From: pitt!sifvs9.SINet.SLB.COM!fisher
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: F.O.R/T.H. Letter
[...] all FTP sites are accessable from Internet using a
program at Princeton Uni. called BITFTP. This allows you to send
whatis basically an FTP batch job to [email protected], which
will execute the job and mail any files back to you in UUENCODED
format.
Mail a message containing 'help' in the body of the message to :-
[email protected]
Getting Forth files via EMail to FNEAS:
FNEAS -- ForthNet Email Archive Server.
FNEAS is a service that allows people without FTP or other methods to
accesss Forth libraries via email. (Note that you may also be able to
use the EMail interface to FTP.) To access FNEAS, send email to:
[email protected]
and in the body of your message, put the lines:
help
path X
where X is your Internet relative EMail address. Despite
appearances, neither: [email protected] NOR [email protected] are
Internet relative addresses. If you need help determining how to
construct your Internet relative EMail address, please consult your
system administrator.
Forth information via WWW:
From: [email protected] (Penio Penev)
Subject: WWW FORTH page
Date: 27 Feb 1994 06:55:54 GMT
This reminded me, that I have started to collect information on the
distributed FORTH resources. For the Web Surfers -- the URL is:
http://pisa.rockefeller.edu:8080/FORTH.html
Any suggestions are most welcome.
--
Penio Penev x7423 (212)327-7423 (w)
Internet: [email protected]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Section V: Forth books.
[Thanks go to Stephen J Bevan
for taking the time/effort to reorganize this part of the FAQ. -dwp]
This section of the Forth FAQ describes various books that are either
about Forth or that use Forth. If you know of a book that isn't
mentioned or if you don't agree with some of the comments in the
capsule reviews, then send in the relevant information!
Recent Changes:
1.X
1993-08-XX bevan Created list out of old FAQ on books.
1993-08-XX bevan Added some new entries.
1.X+1
1993-10-12 bevan Reordered entries alphabetically by author and
added some new entries.
1993-11-07 dwp Minor reformatting for FAQ script pre-processing.
Thanks to the following for contributing :- Stephen J. Bevan
Julian V. Noble
"Starting FORTH" - Leo Brodie
Prentice Hall 1981
An introduction, from first principles, to Forth.
"Thinking FORTH" - Leo Brodie
Prentice Hall 1984
[There was a recent message about this book being reprinted. I, however,
did not seem to copy it. If someone could pass along the information
so that I might include it, I'd appreciate it. -GAH]
Dick Miller
It is a top-notch book on strategy, and always was our [MMS] top
recommendation for the SECOND book, after you bought a textbook to
learn the Forth words. This one teaches you which ones to select
when, how to hone your habits for better Forth (and other)
programming, etc. You can't buy it new anymore, but DO ask at your
library, etc.
"FORTH: A TEXT AND REFERENCE" - Mahlon G. Kelly and N. Spies
Prentice Hall 1986
Dick Miller
Very readable, covers beginner level through relatively advanced,
including Assembler and 8087 math coprocessor details, particularly
appropriate to IBM PC and MMSFORTH, but very strong for general use
as well. The only college-level textbook, complete with exercises
and answers.
Stephen J. Bevan
As someone who doesn't think of himself as either a beginner or
relatively advanced at Forth (i.e. somewhere in between), I found
the book rather dull and obvious. It does seem to be better than
some of the other books that are aimed at beginners though (I'll try
and name names when I can remember the titles). So if you are a
complete novice, it is probably worth a look, but if not, I'd give
it a miss and try something that aims a bit higher.
"Stack Computers: The New Wave" - Phillip Koopman
Ellis Horwood 1989
Stephen J. Bevan
This isn't a book about Forth, rather it is about computers that
potentially execute Forth very efficiently. The book contains a
detailed overview of a number of Forth chips as well as potted
history of what seems to be every stack based computer ever
designed.
"Threaded Interpretive Languages" - R.G. Loeliger
BYTE BOOKS, 1981, ISBN:0-07-038360-X
General consensus seems to be that this book is out of print, but
sometimes available from booksellers or used book places.
"Scientific FORTH: a modern language for scientific computing"
- Julian V. Noble
ISBN: 0-9632775-0-2
The books is available from FIG in the USA as well as directly from the
publisher: Mechum Banks Publishing, P.O. Box 335, Ivy, Virginia 22945, USA.
for $49.95 + $3.00 s/h (continental USA). In Europe it may be purchased
from MPE.
Julian V. Noble
While not intended for the Forth novice, Scientific FORTH contains a
good many serious examples of Forth programming style, useful programs,
as well as innovations intended to simplify number crunching in Forth.
It can now be found in the libraries of several major universities (e.g.
Yale, U. of Chicago and Rockefeller U.) and government and industrial
laboratories (e.g. Fermilab and Motorola). It comes with a disk containing
all the programs discussed in the book. An update file has recently
been posted to GEnie/FIG.
"Object-oriented Forth - Implementation of Data Structures"
- Dick Pountain
Academic Press 1987
Stephen J. Bevan
This book is not for beginners, it assumes you are already happy with
CREATE/DOES>. If you aren't, don't even attempt reading this, you'll
only get mightily confused. The book discusses various ways of
introducing abstract data types and object oriented programming into
Forth. In the majority of the cases, code is given which implements
the desired feature, but beware, it assumes a certain linked
structure for the dictionary, so you might not be able to get the
code to work right away with your system. I recommend it.
"Write Your Own Programming Language Using C++" - Norman Smith
Wordware Publishing, Plano, Texas.
ISBN: 1-55622-264-5
Norman E. Smith
This book presents a minimal Forth implementation called Until, for
UNconventional Threaded Interpretive Language. Until is designed
to be used as a macro language embedded in other applications. It
can both call and be called by other C functions.
"The Complete Forth" - A. Winfield
Wiley Books, 1983
Stephen J. Bevan
Another introductory book.
"Forth: The New Model - A Programmer's Handbook" - Jack Woehr
M&T Publishing 1992 isbn: 0-13-036328-6
Some blurb that comes with it states that the audience for the book is :-
"+ An experienced Forth programmer who wishes to become
familiar with the draft-proposed standard for Forth
+ A Forth programmer who needs to know how to convert
existing programs to the new proposed standard
+ A programmer, experienced in other languages, who is
using Forth for an embedded control project
+ A beginning Forth programmer who wishes to learn the
language"
Ong Hian Leong
The author is (as at time of print) VP of Forth Interest Group and
member of X3J14, so he presumably knows what he's talking about. 😎
I haven't really gone through the book, but judging from the year of
publication, I'd read this side-by-side with dpANS6...
Unless otherwise stated, most books should be available at all good
bookstores. A number of Forth vendors also sell books (sometimes at a
cheaper rate than bookstores). The Forth Interest Group also has a
wide selection of Forth books and other printed materials. See
"Section II: Forth-related organizations" for information on how to
contact the FIG.
Forth Books online
[I've just included the text of the messages in which this information
appeared. -GAH]
From: [email protected] (Julian V. Noble)
Subject: FORTH primer available via ftp
Message-ID:
Sender: [email protected]
Organization: University of Virginia
Date: Wed, 30 Mar 1994 15:17:58 GMT
Lines: 11
Following Jack Woehr's kind invitation, I have just uploaded the file
fprimer.zip to the ftp site ftp.cygnus.com . I expect that it will
shortly be placed in the directory /pub/forth/ there (or some such),
and that Jack will make an announcement to that effect, with the
particulars.
The file contains all kinds of useful stuff. Remember to say binary
before you say GET, since it is a .zipped file.
--
Julian V. Noble
[email protected]
From: [email protected] (Tim Hendtlass)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Forth Book available via FTP(correct this time!)
Date: 13 Dec 1993 06:39:20 GMT
Organization: Swinburne University of Technology
Lines: 68
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
NNTP-Posting-Host: brain.physics.swin.oz.au
Greetings to all Forthers.
[... Some material deleted. -GAH]
The main aim of the book is to be used and a large part of the
target audience does not have access to FTP. So the book is to
be available via FTP AND on disk AND Glen Haydon has agreed to
make it available in printed form at low cost. In time I hope
other printed sources will become available, especially outside
the USA. (If you have access to small volume printing and would
like a licence to distribute the book at a price slightly over
cost please contact me). However, the main way this book will
get around will be because it is shareware, anyone can GIVE
copies away, on disk or in hard copy. (Yes, I will accept
donations to my sanity restoration fund but that is not a
requirement). So why not provide it as just ascii? To make
the book readable it uses different fonts for text and examples,
diagrams etc. In plain ascii it would lose a lot. Machine
readable 'books', in hypertext or whatever, of this size I
don't believe are really practical, even on a 486 scrolling
around once diagrams are included is slow enough to be a pain.
Anyway I don't have the time to convert it from its current form
into anything like that. So it is distributed as a file ready
to send to a Laserjet 2 (or higher or equivalent) which means
that a vast number of printers around the world can generate
real copies. The aim is to get it as widely distributed as
possible.
[... More material deleted. -GAH]
OK, enough blather from me. How do you get a copy?
It is available by anonymous FTP from brain.physics.swin.oz.au
(136.186.27.10) in directory /pub/forth.
It is a zipped file (PKZIP1) so that tools to unzip it are
easily available but it is big, it unzips to over 3 megs.
There is a readme file to tell you how to print it. It also has
a copy of the contents (just the same as I posted here a few
weeks ago) so you can decide if you want it before you haul
600K+ bytes down.
Grab it, print it, copy it, spread it around. Enjoy it.
Oh yes, and compliments of the season.
*********************************************************
Tim Hendtlass,
Physics Department, Swinburne University of Technology,
P.O.Box 218 Hawthorn 3122 Australia.
Email [email protected]
fax (61) 3 819 0856.
voice (61) 3 819 8863.
"I use Forth because it makes more productive".
*********************************************************
---
If you have anything you would like to see added, removed, or corrected
in this FAQ, or if you would like to make comments on its format and/or
content, please contact Greg Haverkamp at [email protected].
Xref: netcom.com comp.lang.forth:14679
Path: netcom.com!csus.edu!csulb.edu!library.ucla.edu!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!math.ohio-state.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!cis.ohio-state.edu!news.sei.cmu.edu!bb3.andrew.cmu.edu!andrew.cmu.edu!gh1w+
From: "Gregory A. Haverkamp"
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Forth FAQ: Products/Vendors [Part 2 of 3]
Date: Sun, 10 Apr 1994 22:59:23 -0400
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Lines: 828
Sender: "Gregory A. Haverkamp"
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
NNTP-Posting-Host: andrew.cmu.edu
Welcome to the product/vendor portion of the Frequently Asked Questions' (FAQ)
Answers message for comp.lang.forth. This message is designed to provide the
answers to commonly asked questions concerning the availability of Forth
products and means of contact for Forth-product vendors.
This is the second message of three. Message one contains answers to the
Forth-related questions listed below in the contents. The second
message contains information pertaining to the availability of Forth
systems and contact lists for Forth-product vendors. The third contains
miscellaneous pieces of information regarding forth, taken mostly from
bboard posts.
Disclaimer(s):
The organization of this FAQ message is by no means final. If you
have any additions, comments, complaints, corrections, suggestions,
or ..., please send them to one of the addresses at the end of this
message. This message was created by editing the previous
version of the FAQ messages, with additional material culled from
the ForthNet. Please let me know if I have failed to attribute,
or have incorrectly used or attributted, any material.
This message is archived at the anonymous FTP site:
rtfm.mit.edu
in the directory:
/pub/usenet/comp.lang.forth
In addition, if you have AFS access, you can find the files in:
/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/gh1w/ForthFAQ/FAQ.*
On those occasions when the FAQ posted has changed since the previous
version, a diff of the old and the new will be posted to comp.lang.forth.
For answers to general questions about the Internet or Usenet,
consult the messages that are periodicly posted to the newsgroups:
news.announce.newusers
news.newusers.questions
news.announce.important
(The FAQs posted to those groups are also archived at rtfm.mit.edu)
[Thanks go to Stephen J Bevan
for taking the time/effort to reorganize this part of the FAQ. -dwp]
This section of the Forth FAQ describes the Forth systems that are
currently available and/or have been asked about in the group.
Topics Covered:
[1] Forth for the 8051/8031
[2] Forth for a PC
[3] 32-bit protected-mode PC Forth
[4] Forth for Windows (3.1/NT)
[5] Forth for OS/2
[6] Forth for the 68HC16
[7] Forth written in C
[8] Forth for UNIX
[9] Forth for a Sun
[10] Forth for a MAC
[11] Forth for an Amiga
[12] Forth for an Atari ST
[13] Forth for a Transputer
[14] Forth for a Tandy TRS-80
[15] Forth for the Apple II
[16] Forth for 68000 boards (including cross development from PCs)
[17] Forth for (miscellaneous) DSP chips
[18] Forth for VMS
[19] Forth for playing with Music
[20] PD/ShareWare Forth for the BrouHaHa-7245
[21] Forth that isn't necessarily Forth
[22] Forth Vendors/Authors
Search for [#] to get to question number # quickly. Note the
sections are in "digest" form so cooperating NEWS/MAIL readers can
step through the sections easily.
Recent Changes:
1.6
1993-06-XX bevan Reformatted the contents of version 1.5
1.7
1993-07-XX bevan Added VMS and SGI entries
1.8
1993-08-21 bevan Major format change (again).
1993-08-21 bevan Created new category for Amiga
1993-08-23 bevan Added new (free) 8051 entry,
1993-08-23 bevan Added new (free) PC entry,
1993-08-23 bevan Created new category for 32-bit protected-mode PC Forths
1993-08-23 bevan Created new category for Windows (3.1/NT)
1993-08-23 bevan Created new category for 68HC16
1993-08-23 bevan Created new category for UNIX (rationalising SGI entry)
1993-08-23 bevan Created new category for Atari-ST
1993-08-23 bevan Created new category for 68K
1993-08-23 bevan Updated entry for C-Forth
1993-08-23 bevan Created Kevo entry
1993-08-23 bevan Added Harvard Softworks entries. (PC)
1993-08-23 bevan Updated MMS entries (PC & Tandy)
1993-08-24 bevan Minor fixes to MMS entries (PC & Tandy)
1993-08-24 bevan Deleted MISOSYS entry (PC & Tandy) -- no longer available
1993-08-25 bevan Added Delta Research address
1993-08-26 bevan Updated Joerg Plewe's 68K entries
1993-08-27 bevan Created OS/2 category
1993-08-27 bevan Added Golden Porcupine entry (PC)
1993-08-28 bevan Updated the HiSoft entry (Atari ST)
1993-08-29 bevan Created Jax4th entry (Windows NT)
1993-09-01 bevan Created Gehmlich's 8051 entry
1993-09-05 bevan Updated all Bradley Forthware entries.
1993-09-06 bevan Moved any system mentioned more than once to
vendor/author section to avoid duplication.
1993-09-17 bevan Updated all MPE entries.
1993-09-18 bevan Added MicroMotion (Apple II) entry.
1993-09-27 bevan Added Bernd Paysan's bigFORTH entries (Atari/PC)
1993-11-07 dwp Minor reformatting for FAQ script pre-processing.
Note:
1. In the following a number of Forth systems are listed as being
available from particular anonymous ftp addresses or from "good
archives". In the case of the latter, wherever possible try and
find as close a site as possible to pick up the source from.
Instructions on how to do this and also to find sources where no
address is given can be found in the separate FAQ section
"Libraries: Where and how?".
2. Most of the vendors mentioned below can supply a Forth system for
a wide variety of platforms. If you can't find a Forth system
for your platform explicitly listed, try any/all the vendors
listed.
3. If an entry is short it is probably because the system is
available on more than one machine. A complete descripion should
be available in the appropriate part of the vendors/authors section.
Thanks to the following for providing the information that makes up
this section of the FAQ: Dave Beckett
Bevan
Brooks
Coughlin
Merlin Friesen
Hore
Nan-Hung (Carl) Lin
Julian V. Noble
GEnie), Brad Rodriguez
on GEnie), Christopher John Rolfe
Secrist
Scott Squires
----------------------------------------------------------------
[1] Forth for the 8051/8031
Commercial:
AM Research: Sells a Forth cross-development for the 8051 that
features a kernel of less than 700 bytes.
FORTH Inc.: A cross-development product for the 8051 family
which includes a board and extensive documentation.
MPE: Cross compiler. The 8031 cross compiler contains expanded
ROM/RAM and single chip targets. Also supports 8055x variants.
Offete: 8051 eForth, C. H. Ting -- $25.00
"A small ROM based Forth system ... Source code is in MASM
... IBM 5.25 disk ... With 8051 eForth Implementation Note."
Mikrap and Forth Systeme (they sell a product called SwissForth
which is different than the LMI cross-compiler, although they
also sell LMI products) [ Mikrap address? - bevan ]
LMI?
Free:
William H. Payne, the author of "Embedded Controller Forth for the
8051 Family", has made all the code for the system
described in his book available. See the file
[email protected]:pub/forth/8051/read51.txt for more
information.
EFORTH51.ZIP may be downloaded free of charge from the RealTime
Control and Forth Board (RCFB), phone: (303) 278-0364
or from the GEnie Forth Interest Group RoundTable (page 711).
51forth is a subroutine threaded Forth by Scott Gehmlich.
Available as [email protected]:giovanni/51forth.zip [this FTP
site is in Massey University in New Zeland - bevan ]
----------------------------------------------------------------
[2] Forth for a PC
Commercial:
Harvard Softworks sells HS/FORTH. Can link with .obj files
[ more details? - bevan ]
MMS: MMSFORTH V2.5.
MPE: PC PowerForth+ and Modular Forth.
LMI and FORTH Inc. sell PC based Forths [ details? - bevan ]
Free:
Golden Porcupine Forth, ver.92.5 by Alexandr Larionov.
Distributed as FREEWARE (To sell programs for it you must pay
some fee, for details you should contact author phone: 7 095 288-2660)
Includes interpreter, compiler, libraries (graphics, sound, file
system, windows and menus in text mode, random generator, mouse
support) and documentation (in Russian!). The whole system is about
120k. It follows Forth-83 standard. An interesting feature is that
it doesn't have a Forth assembler, it can use standard assembler
(like MASM) instead. This version has good compiler. It generates
small .com files. Typical size is 3k.
F-PC, [email protected]:pub/forth/ibm/fpc/fpc-3.56
[ anyone have a bit of blurb about it? - bevan ]
Various in [email protected]:pub/forth/ibm
[ anyone care to classify them? - bevan ]
----------------------------------------------------------------
[3] 32-bit protected-mode PC Forth
Commercial:
Bernd Paysan: bigFORTH is currently in beta test.
Bradley Forthware sells Forthmacs for $250. Price includes source
and DOS extender.
Forth Inc. has a 32-bit protected-mode Forth for 386. It runs
under DOS with QEMM memory manager (compatible with DESQview).
Supports up to 24 Mb of "flat" memory space. Many options,
including VGA graphics, FP math, data base, GUI toolkit, much
more. Includes a very extensive documentation set and complete
source.
Harvard Softworks has a version of HS/FORTH that provides access
to full (flat) 4Gb memory [ more details? - bevan ]
LMI sells a 32-bit protected-mode Forth called 80386 UR/FORTH.
It runs on DOS and is based on the Phar Lap DOS Extender; it
is fully compatible with XMS, EMS, and DPMI memory managers.
MPE: PowerForth/386
Offete has a 386 protected-mode 32 bit eForth. It comes with
source code and a public domain dos extender. eForth is a minimal
forth with only about 30 words coded in assembler, so it is very
easy to understand
----------------------------------------------------------------
[4] Forth for Windows (3.1/NT)
Commercial:
Bradley Forthware: Forthmacs is available for Windows 3.1 and
costs $250. It includes an EMACS editor and comes with full source.
LMI: WinForth is a 16-bit Forth for Windows 3.1.
It is available for downloading from their BBS for $100 US
MPE: ProForth for Windows 3.1 and/or NT.
Free:
September (1993) issue of Windows NT Developer will feature a
Jax4th, a freeware 32-bit Forth for Windows NT complete with
source code (on disk accompanying magazine). After December,
1993, Jax4th will be freely redistributable: until then, as a
courtesy to Windows NT Developer magazine, it is not to be
uploaded. The current version features complete access to NT
DLL's and BLOCK loading facility. Written in MASM by Jack
Woehr, SYSOP RCFB (303) 278-0364
----------------------------------------------------------------
[5] Forth for OS/2
Commercial:
Forth/2 by Michael A. Warot and Brian Mathewson can be licensed
for commercial work.
Free:
Forth/2 by Michael A. Warot and Brian Mathewson is available by
ftp for non-commercial work.
----------------------------------------------------------------
[6] Forth for the 68HC16
Commercial:
MPE has a 68HC16 Forth cross-compiler for the PC, which includes a
resident Forth for the 68HC16. This is a 16-bit Harvard model (64K
code & 64K data). The MPE Forth includes "long address" fetch and
store operators for the full megabyte of 68HC16 memory. Multiple
data pages are also supported, if your hardware will do it.
New Micros: Have a Forth available for the 68HC16 [ details? - bevan]
Free:
Check out [email protected]:pub/forth/68hc11
[ anyone care to give a breakdown of what is a available? - bevan ]
----------------------------------------------------------------
[7] Forth written in C
Commercial:
Bradley Forthware: C Forth, it costs $100.
MPE: PinC
Free:
HENCE4TH - A figForth written in C that currently runs under V7 Unix,
Personal C Compiler, and Mix Power C. Porting to other platforms
should be trivial (considering the vast differences of these three
platforms!). It can be found on Genie and wuarchive.wustl.edu in
the /pub directory (it might have been moved to the msdos/forth
area by now). Make sure to get version 1.2, not 1.1. Kevin
Haddock
interested parties.
C-Forth available from comp.sources.unix and also
[email protected]:pub/forth/unix/c-forth.tar.z
The book "Write Your Own Programming Language Using C++" by Norman
Smith describes how a Forth can be written in C(++). The associated
C(++) code can be ordered from the publisher (phone: 800/229-4949),
from the Forth Interest Group with a VISA card (phone:
408/277-0668) or from the author (but you'd have to write him and
ask how much they are together, or inquire about foreign
deliveries, etc.). Once you have the book a photocopy of the
title page and $5 gets you an MS-DOS disk with the source if you
write to him (full address in vendor section).
----------------------------------------------------------------
[8] Forth for UNIX
Commercial:
Bradley Forthware: Forthmacs $200 runs on a number of UNIX
platforms (SGI, Sun, NeXT, SGI ... etc.)
MPE: PinC. MPE also do cross compilers for UNIX boxes using PinC
as a core.
Free:
TILE (32 bit Forth 83) - shareware, $50 suggested contribution to
Mikael Patel. Written in C, runs on Suns (most UNIX boxes?).
Available from the from all good archive sites.
Dirk Zoller has implemented an dpANS-5 compatible Forth in ANSI-C.
All the code is under the GNU General Public Licence.
It has been tested on IBM-PC running Linux, IBM RS6000 running AIX
3.x and HP 9000 series 700 running HP-UX. Should be portable to
any machine with a true ANSI-C compiler having a straight 32-bit
architecture (i.e. may work under OS/2, Windows, Atari, Amiga, but
definitely not MS-DOS). At time of writing [1993-08-21], the
system is still an early release, so the author would appreciate
bug reports and suggestions by email to
The system can be obtained by anonymous ftp from
least weekly in the file /pub/unix/languages/pfe-?.?.?.tar.Z
For 68K systems only: An indirect threaded 32-bit Forth based on
the 83 standard written in 68K assembly (Motorola format) by Andy
Valencia
[email protected]:pub/forth/68000/forth-68000.tar.Z
----------------------------------------------------------------
[9] Forth for a Sun
Commercial:
Bradley Forthware: Forthmacs costs $200. It comes with source
code, assembly debugger and floating point.
MPE: PinC
Free:
Open Boot PROM - built-in to the SPARCstation PROMs. Inaccessible from
the Unix environment; you have to interrupt the boot process and
then type "n" to get to Forth.
See also: [7] & [8]
----------------------------------------------------------------
[10] Forth for a MAC
Commercial:
Bradley Forthware: Forthmacs is available for $50. Optional
extras: source code, assembly debugger and floating point.
MacForth by Creative Solutions [ more details? - bevan ]
Free:
Yerk is an object oriented language based on Forth for the
Macintosh and was originally a product marketed as Neon. Yerk runs
on all macs and all systems > 6.0. Yerk (3.64) is available as
anonymous@pub/Yerk:oddjob.uchicago.edu
Mops is also available from the same ftp site.
Yerk and Mops are derived from a former commercial product (Neon),
and so are large, and capable of full-scale development. They are
being kept fully up to date with the latest Macs and systems.
Mops has an ANSI prologue, intended to give ANSI compliance.
Pocket Forth is also worth a mention, as a very good quality
small-scale PD Forth [ more details? - bevan ]
Also try [email protected]:pub/forth/mac which contains
some of the above and also some other implementations [ anyone
care to catalogue them? - bevan ]
Compare/contrast of Mops/Yerk by Bob Loewenstein:
Yerk and Mops are both derived from Neon, a Forth-like Object
Oriented language that was a product back in the early days of
the Mac (see Kurt Schmucker's book - Object Oriented Languages
for the Macintosh [something like that title]...also there was a
review in Dr Dobbs Journal ~1985 or 86).
Yerk is very close to the original Neon as far as
compatibility is concerned. I have kept it alive because we
have a number of large applications written in it, and because I
happen to like it.
Michael Hore took Neon and rewrote it essentially from
scratch. Instead of interpretive threading, he used subtroutine
threading and as a result, Mops is faster than Yerk. Michael
has taken Mops farther than I have had time to take Yerk,
including multiple inheritance and other nice things.
Both are robust, usable languages for quickly developing
applications. Their syntax is very similar, and I wouldn't
hesitate to say that if you know one, you can pick up the other
very fast.
The manuals are very similar. I had some older software
copies of the original Neon manual, spent some time upgrading it
to Yerk, and sent it along to Mike Hore to use to generate a
Mops Manual.
Last March [1993? -dwp], Mike and I spent several days
together talking about the similiarities, support, and future of
Mops and Yerk. We agreed to try to bring the two languages
closer to each other so that better compatibility will exist.
----------------------------------------------------------------
[11] Forth for an Amiga
Commercial:
Delta Research: JForth Professional 3.x for $179.95. It's three disks
contain Forth, a tutorial, libraries, and examples. The
environment includes an editor with ARexx, and a standard "block"
editor. Although it behaves as an interpreter, JForth is a true
compiler. Each word is compiled into 68000 assembly as entered.
JForth can also handle pre-compiled modules and includes, and comes
with a utility to translate includes from C to Forth. JForth
provides words for handling C-style data structures, easy graphics
and menus, IFF, and ARexx. It also has an object-oriented programming
system suitable for building data types for large projects.
Free:
Joerg Plewe's F83 Forth. Also check out the directory
[email protected]:pub/forth/amiga which appears to
contain at least 3 different Forths [ anyone want to classify what
is in there? - bevan ]
----------------------------------------------------------------
[12] Forth for an Atari ST
Commercial:
Bradley Forthware: Forthmacs is available for $50. Optional
extras: source code, floating point, GEM interface, aplications
stripper and spread sheet.
Bernd Paysan: bigFORTH is available for 200 DM. Extras: Source
code, floating point, GEM interface, object oriented FORTH, native
code Compiler.
F68KANS by Joerg Plewe. As per the free version below, but you
can use it commercially. Contact Joerg for pricing details.
HiSoft FORTH is a 32 bit Forth for the Atari ST, with full support
for GEM. It can uses blocks or files as source. It is subroutine
threaded. A Motorola 68000 assembler is also included. The price
in the UK is about 39 pounds.
Free:
F68K and F68KANS by Joerg Plewe.
Also try the directory [email protected]:pub/forth/atari_st,
it seems to contain at least a couple of Forths [ anyone care to
catalogue them? - bevan ]
----------------------------------------------------------------
[13] Forth for a Transputer
Commercial:
MPE have a Forth system for Transputers based on PinC. The package
consists of a PC-hosted (Unix if required) cross compiler (with
source code), and the target code (all source). The code will
run on all T2xx, T4xx, and T8xx CPUs. When the T9000 exists ...
Offete: eFORTH has been ported to the Transputer by Bob Barr
Free:
There is a free/public-domain transputer forth available as
[email protected]:/parallel/software/forth
It is an implementation of Forth for 16 and 32 bit
transputers including source, written by Laurie Pegrum. It
requires the D705 occam development system and a 32 bit transputer
board with 1M of memory to recompile. To run requires 1M. It uses
iserver interface to host
----------------------------------------------------------------
[14] Forth for a Tandy TRS-80
Commercial:
MMS: MMSFORTH V2.4.
MVP has an MVP-Forth for the TRS80 Model4 called Model4th,
written by Art Wetmore. [ details? - bevan ]
----------------------------------------------------------------
[15] Forth for the Apple II
Free:
GraFORTH(+) (DOS 3.3 only) (freely distributable, available on GEnie)
Mad Apple Forth(+) ftp from wuarchive.wustl.edu:/system/apple2/Lang/Forth/*
Purple Forth(+) ftp from cco.caltech.edu:/pub/apple2/8bit/source
Q Forth(+) version 2.0 Alpha 1.0, is a small integer Forth written by
by Toshiyasu Morita
ftp from ftp.uu.net:/systems/apple2/languages/forth
GS 16 FORTH II, Version II (+) - A 16 bit Forth implementation
able to make use of the GS Toolbox. Includes assembler, full
screen editor. ftp from cco.caltech.edu:/pub/apple2/source/GS16Forth.shk
Also available on GEnie.
Commercial:
Apple Forth 1.6 - Cap'n Software - Used a unique disk format.
6502 Forth 1.2 - Programma International.
FORTH II - Softape published this one. Ran on Apple II+, //e, etc.
C. K. Haun supposedly has written a shareware version of Forth
for the Apple IIgs. Someone reports that this is available on GEnie.
MicroMotion: FORTH-79, MasterFORTH.
MVP-FORTH - [ more info? - bevan ]
----------------------------------------------------------------
[16] Forth for 68000 boards (including cross development from PCs)
Commercial:
Bradley Forthware: ForthMon is available for $500.
Forth Inc. sells chipFORTH system for 68000's that supports fully
interactive development from a PC. It includes the fast pF/x
multitasking exec and many libraries as well.
MPE: Cross compiler. Also have a protected mode variant (built on
PowerForth/386) which runs distinctly faster than the Non/386
version (built on PinC). Both produce 32 bit Forths.
Free:
There is a version of Laxen and Perry's F83 which will generate
68000 code on a PC. It is available on GEnie M16PC.ARC
[ A README is available as
[email protected]:pub/forth/68000/m16what.txt lists the
files that make up the system, but they don't match those in the
directory. Anyone care to investigate? - bevan ] It fixes the
code from Laxen and Perry's F83 (which is written for both
MS-DOS/8088 and CP/M-68k) so you can change the 68000 code with
the MS-DOS version. You then can take the Forth source for the
typical 68000 machine supplied (possibly the Atari ST) and change
it for any other 68k computer board. The L&P metacompilier will
then create 68000 code on the IBM-PC and the resulting binary
output used to burn ROM's for the new board. Or you can load it
through the serial ports with S records or whatever.
bot-Forth: The source code is comprised of 3 parts: the
metacompiler, the mini-assembler and of course, the kernel.
The kernel will metacompile itself. The easiest thing to compile
68k-Forth on is another port of bot-Forth (bot-Forth was
originally metacompiled on LMI's PCForth but the metacompiler
needs to be modified to do that) The metacompiler was presented
at the 1989 Rochester Forth conference. That one was more general to
convey its basic concepts. The one in the source code is specific
for the 68k and works in conjunction with the Mini-assembler. See
[email protected]:pub/forth/68000/botfth68.arc and
botforth.txt in the same directory.
Joerg Plewe: F68K
----------------------------------------------------------------
[17] Forth for (miscellaneous) DSP chips
Commercial:
TCOM FORTH Target Compiler by Tom Zimmer and Andrew McKewen
has been extended for the TMS320. It also supports 808X, 80196
and SuperZ8 [ more details? - bevan ]
Computer Continum is developing a XT/AT board for the ADSP-2101
running Forth. [ is it ready yet? - bevan ]
Offete: A port of eFORTH to ADSP2100 is being contemplated [ is
the contemplation over yet? - bevan ]
Micro-K Systems produce complete AT&T DSP32 boards running Forth.
Includes the AT&T DSP library!
MPE: Cross compiler for TMS320C31 is available. Ask for details
regarding TMS320C3x
----------------------------------------------------------------
[18] Forth for VMS
Klaus Flesch wrote a VAX VMS Forth some years ago. It is believed
to be derived from FIG-FORTH. Availability is uncertain, try
contacting the author c/o Forth Systeme.
See also: [7] & [8] as some C and UNIX based systems -may- port
without too much effort.
----------------------------------------------------------------
[19] Forth for playing with Music
Commercial:
HMSL (Hieracrchical Music Specification Language)
Phil Burk, Center for Contemporary Music at Mills College
Frog Peak Music, and Delta Research
PO Box 151051, San Rafael, CA 94915-1051
Email: [email protected]
-----------------------------------------------------------------
[20] PD/ShareWare Forth for the BrouHaHa-7245
There used to be a list of stuff here, compiled by Gary Smith.
Most of it was old, and didn't have any "how do I find it" info.
See "Forth FAQ: Libraries: Where and how?" for info on how to access
various Forth libraries. Most libraries have a directory or keyword
search function available.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
[21] Forth that isn't necessarily Forth
Commercial:
FIFTH by Software Construction Co. Available for Amiga + PC +
maybe others?
Free:
Kevo by Antero Taivalsaari
prototypical object-oriented language which has a somewhat Forth
feel to it. It runs on Macs (apparently well integrated into Mac
environment) and is available as [email protected]:/pub/kevo/*
-----------------------------------------------------------------
[22] Forth Vendors/Authors
AM Research, Loomis, CA. phone: (916) 652-7472 or 1-800-949-8051
Bernd Paysan, Stockmannstr. 14, D-81477 Munchen, Germany.
email:
Products:
bigFORTH is a 32 bit FORTH, compiles optimized native code, has lots of
libraries and currently runs on Atari ST/TT/Falcon 030. A port for
386 works and is in beta test. bigFORTH will be ANS FORTH conformant,
as soon as I this claim can be officially made.
Bradley Forthware Inc. P.O. Box 4444 Mountain View, CA 94040
voice: (415) 961-1302 fax: (415) 962-0927 email:
Products:
Forthmacs: Forth 83 dialect, portable OS text file
interface, structured decompiler, assembler&dissasembler,
assembly&symbolic debugger, optional floating point and platform
specific extensions. Available for Atari ST, Mcintosh, Sun
(3&4), SGI, 386-PC, OS-9/68K.
ForthMon: Forth ROMs for board-level computers. Includes source
and development system. Available for 680x0, SPARC, 386, 486.
C Forth: Runs on nearly any machine (PC, Unix, VAX, mainframe).
Source code is included.
All systems have 32-bit stacks, texts files (not blocks), programmer
tools and complete documentation.
Computer Continum, Specialists in Motion Control and Data Acquisition.
Eric Reiter, Engineer, Owner, 75 Southgate Ave.,
Suite 6 Daly City, CA 94015 phone: (415) 755-1978
Creative Solutions, 4701 Randolph Road, Suite 12, Rockville,
Maryland 20852. phone: (301) 984-0262 or 1-800-FORTH-OK
On CompuServe 'GO FORTH' at prompt to Forth SIG sponsored by
Creative Solutions.
Delta Research, P.O. Box 151051, San Rafael, CA. 94915-1051
phone: (415) 453-4320
FORTH Inc.: phone: 1-800-55FORTH
Forth Systeme, P.O. Box 1103, Breisach, Germany. phone: 7767-551
Harvard Softworks, P.O. Box 69, Springboro, OH 45066 phone: 513-748-0390
HiSoft: email:
Joerg Plewe, Haarzopfer Str. 32, D-45472 Muelheim an der Ruhr, GERMANY
phone: (+49)-(0)208-497068 email:
Products:
F68K: a portable, subroutine threaded, Forth 83 system for 680x0
computers. It should run on every Motorola 680x0 computer without
recompiling the binaries. F68K is connected to the surrounding
system via a small loader program, some kind of a BIOS. The
distribution includes loader programs for Atari ST/TT (Joerg's
development platform), Commodore Amiga, OS9 and Sinclair QL.
Available as [email protected]:pub/forth/68000/f68k.tar.Z
F68KANS: This is a dpANS compatible and hence not compatible with
the above F83 Forth. It is available for PRIVATE use directly
from the author by email but -support- is freely given. It is a
32bit (non-optimizing) native code, ROMable, position independent
system. It is independent from the surrounding machine by using a
loader program which connects Forth to the OS/hardware. The
loader can be as small or large as necessary i.e. you can link in
OS libraries to extend the functionallity of the system. So far
the following dpANS wordsets have been implemented: CORE (EXT),
FLOAT (EXT), FILE (EXT), BLOCK (EXT), MEMORY (EXT), EXCEPTION, SEARCH.
At present it only runs on Atari ST/TT, and comes with
two graphics packages using BGI and special one drawing in GEM windows,
a full, very comfortable (really) GEM environment for development,
SAVE-SYSTEM, full source, unfull doc (for now) and support.
Any people developing tools, applications or ports are welcomed
and supported.
LMI: Laboratory Microsystems Inc.
voice: (310) 306-7412 fax: (310) 301-0761 BBS (310) 306-3530
email: [email protected]
MMS: Miller Microcomputer Services
61 Lake Shore Road, Natick, MA 01760-2099, USA.
phone: 617/653-6136, 9am-9pm Eastern TZ email:
Products:
MMSFORTH V2.5. MMS offers two different versions of MMSFORTH for
the IBM PC. For $179.95 plus S/H, MMS offers a personal license
for MMSFORTH/nonDOS for IBM-PC, a traditional, stand-alone (and
virus-proof) Forth with many extensions, sample programs, about
400 pages of manual, and continuing phone tips. (MMSFORTH is
described in the college-level textbook, "Forth: A Text and
Reference", which lists for $30.95 but is available from MMS for
$18.95 plus S/H.) MMSFORTH/MS-DOS can be added for 50% ($90)
additional. MMS also offers an unusual collection of MMSFORTH
extensions and applications, including the following: the XREF
source cross-referencer, n-length arithmetic, TGRAPH fast vector
graphics, 8087 support, DATAHANDLER and DATAHANDLER-PLUS flat-file
databases with variable-length fields, the FORTHWRITE word-processor
supporting popular printers and EXPERT-2 FOR MMSFORTH, an expert
system which can squeeze into 32K. Almost all modules come with
with source code.
MMSFORTH V2.4: Details as above but for Radio Shack TRS-80 Models
1, 3, or 4/4P. Note, it is nonDOS only.
MPE: MicroProcessor Engineering Ltd., 133 Hill Lane, Shirley,
Southampton SO1 5AF U.K. phone: (+44) 703-631441,
fax: (+44) 703-339691, email:
U.S. dealer is AMICS Enterprises. phone: 716-461-9187
Canadian dealer is Universal Cross-Assemblers phone: 506-847-0681.
Free catalogue available on request.
Products:
Cross compiler. PC based cross compiler based around PowerForth+.
Development environment includes on-line glossary. Extensive
documentation. Source included. Multi-tasker & High-Level
Interrupt handlers provided. Target list includes: 80196,
RTX2000/1/10, Z80/64180, 8031/51/55x, Z8/Super8, 68HC11,
68HC16, M37700, 6502/740/7450, 680x0/68332/9xC1xx, H8/5xx.
PC PowerForth+ for MS-DOS, comes with examples and extensions.
Modular Forth for MS-DOS, comes with Multitasker and Graphics Pack.
PowerForth/386 is a protected mode 32 bit Forth for MS-DOS. Royalty free
DOS extender provided. Likely to change name soon to ProForth for
DOS. (The Windows product is built on the same kernel). It is
fully DPMI compliant and will run under Windows quite happily.
Requires 80386 or above. Comes with Multitasker, Graphics Pack
and source.
ProForth for Windows is a 32 bit Forth running under Windows/NT
and under 3.1 via WIN32S. Requires 80386 or above. Fully
integrated with Windows (i.e. GUI programming, calling modules
in other languages ... etc.).
PinC (PowerForth in C) will compile on any K&R compatible C compiler
Known to run on Suns, PCs and Archimedes, to name a few.
MicroMotion, 12077 Wilshire Boulevard, #506, Los Angeles, CA 90025
phone: (213) 821-4340
Products:
MicroMotion FORTH-79. A 79-standard Forth, with extensions. It
is a standalone system and only requires Apple II, 48k, 1 5.25" drive.
There appears to have been a second disk available at an extra
cost containing floating-point arithmetic and hi-res graphics commands.
Apparently isn't GS-compatible, works fine on a IIe though.
MasterFORTH is follows the Forth-83 standard but has extensions.
Runs on Apple II, 48K, 1 5.25" drive under DOS 3.3
MasterFORTH also had additional disks containing
floating-point and hi-res commands, which appear to
have been sold separately.
MVP: Mountain View Press, Box 429 Star Route 2 La Honda, CA 94020
New Micros Inc. Chalk Hill Rd. Dallas, Texas
Offete Enterprises, Inc. 1306 South B Street, San Mateo,
CA 94402 phone: (415) 574-8250
Norman Smith; 114 Claremont Rd.; Oak Ridge, Tenn. 37830.
Software Construction Co., INC. 2900B Longmire College Station,
Texas 77845 phone: (409) 696-5432
Michael A. Warot, PO BOX 4043, Hammond, Indiana 46324
email:
Brian Mathewson, 21576 Kenwood Avenue, Rocky River, OH 44116-1232
email:
Product:
Forth/2 is a fully 32-bit, native Forth for OS/2 2.0. It requires an
80386SX or compatible microprocessor, and OS/2 2.0 or subsequent
versions. Forth/2 was created specifically for OS/2 using MASM
6.0. Currently it is a text-mode application which can be run
either in a full screen or in a window. It presently does not
conform to any single Forth standard. Most of the major Forth
functions are included. You can get executable + docs from:
[email protected]:pub/os2/2_x/program/forth025.zip
[email protected] :os2/2_x/program/forth025.zip
Contact Brian if you'd like something adding or you have any
suggestions regarding Forth/2. Contact Michael if you want to
obtain a commercial license and the source.
----------------------------------------------------------------
---
If you have anything you would like to see added, removed, or corrected
in this FAQ, or if you would like to make comments on its format and/or
content, please contact Greg Haverkamp at [email protected].
Xref: netcom.com comp.lang.forth:14680
Path: netcom.com!csus.edu!csulb.edu!library.ucla.edu!agate!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu!cis.ohio-state.edu!news.sei.cmu.edu!bb3.andrew.cmu.edu!andrew.cmu.edu!gh1w+
From: "Gregory A. Haverkamp"
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Forth FAQ: Miscellaney [Part 3 of 3]
Date: Sun, 10 Apr 1994 23:00:25 -0400
Organization: Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Lines: 384
Sender: "Gregory A. Haverkamp"
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
NNTP-Posting-Host: andrew.cmu.edu
Welcome to the miscellany portion of the Frequently Asked Questions' (FAQ)
Answers message for comp.lang.forth. This message is designed to provide
a space for forth odds and ends and the odd bit of interesting information
concerning the language.
This is the third message of three. Message one contains answers to the
Forth-related questions listed below in the contents. The second
message contains information pertaining to the availability of Forth
systems and contact lists for Forth-product vendors. The third contains
miscellaneous pieces of information regarding forth, taken mostly from
bboard posts.
Disclaimer(s):
The organization of this FAQ message is by no means final. If you
have any additions, comments, complaints, corrections, suggestions,
or ..., please send them to one of the addresses at the end of this
message. This message was created by editing the previous
version of the FAQ messages, with additional material culled from
the ForthNet. Please let me know if I have failed to attribute,
or have incorrectly used or attributted, any material.
This message is archived at the anonymous FTP site:
rtfm.mit.edu
in the directory:
/pub/usenet/comp.lang.forth
In addition, if you have AFS access, you can find the files in:
/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/gh1w/ForthFAQ/FAQ.*
On those occasions when the FAQ posted has changed since the previous
version, a diff of the old and the new will be posted to comp.lang.forth.
For answers to general questions about the Internet or Usenet,
consult the messages that are periodicly posted to the newsgroups:
news.announce.newusers
news.newusers.questions
news.announce.important
(The FAQs posted to those groups are also archived at rtfm.mit.edu)
FAQ Messages Section and Question Lists:
----------------------------------------
Section I: Forth Odds and Ends
What is the status of ANS Forth?
Information on the Programmable BBS.
Section II:
If Forth has been around for 20+ years, what has it been used for?
---------------------------------------------------------------
Section I: Forth Odds and Ends
What is the status of ANS Forth?
MICRO-FAQ on ANS FORTH availability 3 Feb 1994
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Many people continue to ask where to get copies of the forthcoming
Forth standard and/or test suites. The following information originates
with Elizabeth Rather, TC chair, and Greg Bailey, TSC chair. Please
send corrections for this document to [email protected]
Copyright (C) 1994 ATHENA Programming Inc Unlimited distribution as
long as nothing deleted or changed, and additions are clearly marked.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
REAL THING:
--------------
The standard is now in final processing, and we expect it to be published
officially in Mar/Apr 1994. It will be available from:
Global Engineering Documents
15 Inverness Way East
Englewood, CO 80112-5704
800-854-7179, FAX 303-843-9880
as Document ANSI/IEEE X3.215-1994. I believe the cost will be $50-60.
We will investigate electronic publication as soon as the document is
officially published; at this time no one will give us a definitive answer.
INTERPRETATION REQUESTS:
-----------------------
Questions regarding interpretation of the standard may be addressed
informally to [email protected]. If a formal reply is necessary,
please submit your inquiry to X3J14 c/o X3 Secretariat, 1250 Eye St. NW
Suite 200, Washington, DC, 20005-3922, 202-628-2829 or FAX 202-638-4922.
Informal queries will probably be handled promptly and at length by
knowledgable people, although their responses as individuals have no
legal standing. Formal questions will be answered in a legal, binding
fashion after a delay of months (at least), because formal approvals must
be obtained to the responses.
THE UNREAL THING:
----------------
For those desiring access to the technical information sooner than
that, the draft DPANS-6 is available in several places via FTP.
This draft was posted for proofreading last Summer and the TC does
not believe that it differs technically from the document currently
on its way toward ANSI approval. Anyone who retrieves the document
is urgently requested to report any observed typos or inconsistencies
to [email protected].
The document, along with relevant README's, may be found posted at
ftp.uu.net:/vendor/minerva/x3j14
A Veronica search of Gopherspace yields at least one mirror:
nutmeg.ukc.ac.uk
/pub/uunet/vendor/minerva/x3j14
If you know of other mirrors, please advise [email protected]
TEST SUITES:
-----------
John Hayes at Johns Hopkins has written an unofficial but very good
test suite for most of the Core wordset. This test suite is posted
on ftp.uu.net as above.
It is informal in the sense that it is not a product of X3J14 nor is
it "blessed" by the TC. However it is very useful. If John releases
new versions of his suite they will be posted in the above archive.
Anyone with bugs or improvements for John's test suite is encouraged
to email them to [email protected] which will get them to John.
Others with test suites that have the ring of authority are welcome
to upload them to ftp.minerva.com:\incoming (anonymous/e-mail) and
discuss their posting with [email protected] . Only send material
that may be freely distributed legally with any necessary boilerplate
embedded in the source; we can zip & authenticate here if you wish.
OTHER FILES ON FTP.UU.NET:
-------------------------
Any processable interpretations that emerge from the TC, whether
formal or informal, will be posted to ftp.uu.net as time and space
permit.
[ The following has been added based upon information from the net --GAH ]
ANS FORTH MAILING LIST:
----------------------
A mailing list exists to distribute information concerning ANS Forth.
Subscribe by mailing:
[email protected]
---------
Information on the Programmable BBS.
[This is a message that I thought deserved to be preserved.
I invite Mr. Peters or other principles to provide updates to
replace this message.
-dwp]
[I have made some minor formatting changes. -dwp]
Notes and thoughts
by
John A. Peters
Having sat back and passively read and enjoyed the net for a
while, I thought I might as well write in and report and some odd
thoughts before dialing in for the news this time.
THE PROGRAMMABLE BBS has retired at it's old location in Novato
CA. Many thanks to our system operator Levi who provided the
hardware and his time and efforts. Thanks also to the North Bay
Forth Interest Group for funding the cost of installation of the
phone line and the first two or so months of phone charges. To
all those who called in, please stay tuned for a new phone number.
Tomorrow, Sunday I have an appointment with a long time Forth
Programmer named John Cassady and his son, here at my home. I
will demonstrate the use of EZY.COM a share ware BBS system that
offers QWK mail packets and doors. John has volunteered his
interest in running the system on his hard ware in Oakland CA.
Switching to EZY.COM, from the Wild Cat System, will finally allow
the "Programmable BBS" to be somewhat programmable. The new
program has source for the menus and the command structure of the
menus. These items can be put on line. Also on line will be a
menu program called ANSI DRAW which builds menus and another
program called DOORWAY which some how sets up a door. Both
doorway and ezy.com use a Fossil driver. Our next step(s) will be
to get the door system to be operational and on line.
The purpose of the DOOR program is to allow a DOS program to be
run remotely. For example there is a Forth Language BBS that is
called F-BBS. It is compiled on F-PC and includes source. With
the door in operation F-PC could be one of the choices on the
menu. Other programs have been submitted.
They are "Baby" from B0b Lee and "The Fig Tree BBS" from Mary Bell
aka Lady Bacardi. "Ariel BBS" from Al Mitchell (not the author?)
Mail readers using the QWK mail packet format:
"SLMR" Silly Little Mail Reader
"King Qwk" mail reader
Now we are getting programmable! (What do you think?)
[Remainder deleted - GAH]
Mr. Peters is an Electrical Contractor who wrote and uses an
estimating system every day which is written and compiled in
Forth. He has been using and enjoying Forth since 1981 and was
the F83 disk librarian in 1983. He can be reached at (415)
239-5393 voice and Fax at 585-1245 or as
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Section III:
If Forth has been around for 20+ years, what has it been used for?
[Thanks to everyone who has contributed information for this
message. I have left the header and/or .signature lines in for
attribution. Missing or incorrect attributions are a mistake...
please help me correct any that are wrong. -dwp]
If Forth has been around for 20+ years, what has it been used for?
**********************************************************************
Date: 16 Jun 1993 16:15:25 -0400 (EDT)
From: [email protected] (Philip Koopman)
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
Elizabeth Rather's HOPL paper contains a number
of examples (I don't have time to type them all
in). SIGPLAN Notices vol. 28 no. 3, March 1993.
CMU and Pitt probably both have copies.
[I haven't had the time to look this up yet. If anyone has a copy
handy and wants to send me the info, I would appreciate it. -dwp]
**********************************************************************
Date: Wed, 9 Jun 93 14:34:28 bst
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
From: Merlin
A few years ago, I used a homebrew (well, I did it at the
office...) FORTH on the Atari ST to produce a conversion of a C64
game called OOPS - a kind of real-time logic puzzle based around
symmetrical grids, designed by a guy called Jason Kendall from
Salisbury, England. This received very good reviews in the C64
version. Unfortunately, shortly after we delivered the 16 bit
versions (PC, ST and Amiga - only the ST in FORTH, the rest in
Assembler), the publisher, The Big Apple Entertainment Co Ltd (who
despite their name were based in London) was closed down by its
parent company, so the ST version was never released. A little
while after, I left CygnusSoft to go and run a pub for a couple of
years, so my ST FORTH never got used again - although I've still
got a copy, if only I can find someone with an ST...
In addition to all this boring reminiscence, In 1984-85 I worked
for a digital systems engineering company called Jasmin
Electronics, then based in Leicester, England, who used FORTH for
all their software at that time. Their speciality was in Teletext
systems. There's at least one Cable TV station in California who
provided a Teletext service using Jasmin kit - one of the first
things I worked on for them was a FORTH system that took news
straight off the AP wire and formatted it into pages that were
included directly into the Teletext magazine. The railway
stations and airports of (at least) Europe are also littered with
Jasmin Teletext information display systems, which were all,
originally at least, written in FORTH. They also did a water
pumping control system for the Rickmansworth area of England - it
used a WAN of proprietary 68000-based kit, was grossly
underpowered for the job, and was delivered massively late and
over budget, which must have been why their salaries were so
lousy... 🙂
[Email address from .signature: [email protected] -dwp]
**********************************************************************
Date: Wed, 9 Jun 1993 00:17:39 -0500 (CDT)
From: "Christopher A. Bongaarts"
Message-Id:
Adventure Construction Set, by Stuart Smith. Published by
Electronic Arts. The Commodore 64 version was written in forth,
and this game featured incredible music and very good graphics (if
you don't mind 160x200x4 graphics!)
=-=-=-=-=-= Chris Bongaarts =-=-=-= Sir Taxi of the Wild Crew =-=-=-=-=-=
Internet: [email protected] FidoNet 1:282/54 "Chris Bongaarts"
[email protected] Call the Game Center (612)942-7531
From: [email protected] (ForthNet articles from GEnie)
Subject: Southern Wisconsin FIG Chapter News
Message-ID: <4638.UUL1.3#[email protected]>
Date: 9 Jul 93 10:53:26 GMT
[Message has been editted for relevant excerpts. -dwp]
Message 2 Thu Jul 08, 1993
D.RUSKE1 [Dave] at 11:52 EDT
After about half an hour of conversation amongst the group, Dave
Ruske gave a talk about the use of Forth in two embedded
applications done for ICOM, Inc. The first was an 8031-based
operator access panel for an Allen-Bradley PLC-2; the second was a
driver which loads onto the Allen-Bradley KT card (a Z80- based
network card for PLC communications). LMI Metacompilers were used
on both projects.
Dr. Bob Lowenstein of Yerkes Observatory told the group about
Yerk and how it is applied to telescope control and data
acquisition. Yerk is an object-oriented Forth variant for the
Mac, and is a public-domain product derived from Neon. One of
the things Dr. Lowenstein uses this for is remotely controlling
a telescope in New Mexico via the Internet. Yerk software will
also be used to control two new telescopes being built at the
South Pole.
Matt Mercaldo showed and talked about the Modular Microprocessor
Trainer being developed for use at Johns-Hopkins University.
The unit uses two Motorola MC68HC11A8s with New Micros'
Max-Forth on chip. The student can prototype projects on the
unit and communicate with it using a terminal, or a keyboard and
built-in LCD display. Matt provided the group with copies of a
paper describing his work.
Glenn Szejna described his use of Forth at Nicolet Instruments.
Several people in the group had used Nicolet oscilloscopes,
unaware that Glenn's Forth code was running under the hood.
Scott Woods discussed his use of Forth, including his current
project, firmware for an industrial metal detector. This device
will be used for such things as preventing machine screws from
showing up in your breakfast cereal.
Olaf Meding described Amtelco's use of polyForth in programming
their systems for telephone answering services [see Olaf's
article "Forth-Based Message Service" in the January/February
1993 Forth Dimensions]. The Amtelco EVE (Electronic Video
Exchange] system is the largest and most sophisicated system of
its kind, and has gained 70% of the answering service market.
James Heichek demonstrated VORCOMP, a public-domain directory
and file compare utility written in his own version of Forth.
James talked about why he believed the stack manipulation words
in Forth became a hindrance to his work, and how he added local
variables to clean up his code. He is currently developing
educational software.
Olaf Meding gave a brief tour of the "Introduction to Forth" disk
and demonstrated the loading of C. H. Ting's tutorial in F-PC.
Along the way, the F-PC single-step debugger was also
demonstrated. According to Julian V. Noble, the "Introduction to
Forth" disk "was prepared and disseminated by Prof. Julian V.
Noble of the University of Virginia, with the kind permission of
the authors of the tutorials and files thereon (C.H. Ting, Jack
Brown, Phil Koopman and me), as a public service, under the
auspices of FIG, ACM/SIGForth and Mechum Banks Publishing."
By this time it was past 10 pm and the meeting began to break up,
but Dr. Lowenstein took some time to demonstrate Yerk and impart
some insider knowledge to Paul Anderson. Paul is new to Forth and
plans on building a system to monitor and control model railroads
via a Mac.
[Any inaccuracies in this report are solely my fault. -DR]
---
If you have anything you would like to see added, removed, or corrected
in this FAQ, or if you would like to make comments on its format and/or
content, please contact Greg Haverkamp at [email protected].
Very nice! Thank you for this wonderful archive. I wonder why I found it only now. Long live the BBS file archives!
This is so awesome! 😀 I’d be cool if you could download an entire archive of this at once, though.
But one thing that puzzles me is the “mtswslnkmcjklsdlsbdmMICROSOFT” string. There is an article about it here. It is definitely worth a read: http://www.os2museum.com/wp/mtswslnk/