Kerry Thompson wrote:
>Instead, we're stuck with 1980s technology--the same clunky, slow
>interpreter that was used in old-style BASIC, like I was writing in 1982.
I started with Basica in 1982, too. When I think of my long travel through
the programming languages that I learned more or less deeply, I realize that
the most productive ones have been for me interpreted and p-code languages
like Basic, QuickSilver, Clipper and, since 1996, Lingo for multimedia apps.
Though this is quite obvious.
But whenever I also realize how may efforts and time I have spent trying
to optimize my code only to get some tenth of microseconds per frame saved,
that in a number of circumstances are precious, I would like too that Lingo
were not so slow compared with C++, and so I start again to think of it as an
alternative. But it can't be so in the reality.
>I don't understand why this isn't at the top of Macromedia's list of
>upgrades--there is no other single thing they could do to increase
>performance more, at least for Lingo-heavy apps.
A compiler like Visual C++ would not only mean rebuilding the whole Director
environment for Macromedia but also imply a completely different way of
working and thinking for Lingo programmers.
I can't see how something like this could ever get a place in Macromedia's mind.
Expecially nowaday that they seem so entirely devoted to develop tools
for the net, where the lack of speed of sw Lingo is easily submerged, and so
concealed, by a lot of other things that lack of speed.
As an alternative, I found very interesting the observations and proposals
of Brennan Young in his answer to your question.
I never knew LISP, but his description convinced me that a thing like the
one he wrote about should really have a good chance to be integrated in
Director, more or less progressively in time, in case Macromedia wanted.
>At the beginning of a project, the Powers That Be make a decision--do we
>need performance, or quick development time. If performance is the sine qua
>non, they use C++. If they can put up with slower performance, they use
>Director.
Yes. But in so far as Powers That Be they can put in existence a number of
people who write apps in C++ for them :)
It's a diffused opinion here that even using the whole set of DirectX APIs,
speacking of the Windows platform, a team should be composed by not less than
five programmers. Freelances and stand-alone developers have no choice, must
be content with slower performance.
>Sigh. I have to get back to work. If you understand what I'm talking about,
>though, make some noise at Macromedia--the more people who put this on the
>wish list, the more likely they are to pay attention.
I don't know if really the noise will serve much the purpose. I got quite
convinced that the general trend is, and not only by Macromedia, (i.e. see
the speed^-1 of Access apps written in VBA, p-compiled to .mde and running on
a 233 MHZ): "2 GHZ CPUs are coming, why are you concerned with the speed of the
language?". But I can't see a lot of people around relieved once and for all
by such increased power of CPUs. In facts, this issue arises on all the lists
along the years despite the rise of power, maybe due to a bigger rise of load.
I believe that this matter is very important. So I hope that people will keep
it alive, and Macromedia will listen the noise, in the end.
Cordially,
Franco
IFC Programming Consultant
http://www.chnexus.com/main.htm
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