beastie.4th language ?

[Mike Jeays]

On Tue, 2005-03-08 at 16:13, McCy Ron wrote:
> Starting Forth by Leo Brodie is a good book on Forth.
> http://www.forth.org/   will offer other tutorialsl.
> 
> Jerry McAllister wrote:
> 
> >>Hi,
> >>
> >>My question might seem basic. Nevertheless I didn't find the answer on
> >>the net. Excuse me in case I did look seriously enough, which might
> >>afterall, be the case.
> >>
> >>The files under the /boot directory on FreeBSD : beastie.4th and the
> >>included ones screen.4th and frames.4th are obviously written in a
> >>certain scripting language.
> >>
> >>What is this language ?
> >>Can I get a turorial for this scripting language ?
> >>Or even a reference manual ?
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >I believe the language is Forth.   It is a fairly esotheric language
> >that is used because it has a very small footprint and is still
> >quite flexible.   I don't know about tutorials, but I have seen 
> >an occasional book on it.  I had one and actually installed Forth
> >on a machine and tried to learn it once, several years ago but the 
> >rewards/effort ratio got to me and I haven't gone back to it.
> >
> >////jerry
> >
> >  
> >
> >>Any URL or suggestion would be appreciated.
> >>
> >>Thanks in advance.
> >>
> >>Michel
> >>
> >>    
> >>
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> >  
> >
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If you want to try out FORTH, there is a port available for FreeBSD.  

cd /usr/ports/lang/gforth
make
make install

But it is a bit of a lost art - scripting languages like Perl, Python,
Ruby and TCL are far more productive for most purposes.  FORTH,
nevertheless, is very different and quite fascinating.