This is a genuine request for some feedback. Has anyone (especially developers) checked out Squeak? If not why not? If you did and then decided you didn't like it for some reason then what is/was the reason? I'm just curious why such a flexible programming environment that already contains masses of goodies and is progressing by leaps and bounds on an almost daily basis fails to gain any mind-share among developers.

I could create an endless list of advantages for using Squeak but would struggle to list any disadvantages (any that couldn't be overcome anyway). If there are any real practical reasons for not using Squeak then I would like to collect them and pass them on to the Squeak developers to get them addressed. Thanks for reading.

I noticed your "Heroes Needed" request for Squeak Smalltalk when you posted earlier, muki. Since several developers here started in Smalltalk prior to Python & C++, we were discussing development using it on the N800.

The "flexible programming environment with masses of goodies" is where Python is now. If we were to write in python, we can use the same code on my Solaris, Redhat, and IBM zSeries servers. Tailoring an interface with pyGTK and Hildon isn't a big deal. Python has a much larger development community and less overhead for the "write once, run anywhere" than Java (currently Nokia has no JVM for the N770/N800) or what little we saw of squeakvm.

I'd like to see Squeak take off... but in the short term, I know 3 datacenters in DC and Virginia that will be devoting efforts to Python on the N800.

It is odd - until I came to the 770, I hadn't heard of python being used for.. well, anything before, apart from on trendy blogs that didn't seem to be doing anything.

I guess it finds big gaps where the normal environment is hard to use.

Obviously advertising. As I said I have heard loads about python since I got here, hints at ruby, C and C++, the occasional mention of the possibility of java, but never even a .. umm.. squeak about squeak!

There may also be licensing restrictions with porting Squeek to another platform - as it is owned by Apple. Not sure if the Apple Public Source license is OSI compliant.
http://www.squeak.org/SqueakLicense/

When I was interviewing with Google for a Sr. Systems Engineer position, one of the first questions they asked was "Know Ruby?" followed by "Know Ruby on Rails?" I guess Google is using it enough to use it for screening candidates.

Python is being used in place of Perl on servers by T-Mobile and other telecoms. When you IM or SMS from your device, we were using Python to check the device timestamp, server timestamp, and sequence IDs to keep conversations in check. This makes alot more sense when you fire off 5 IMs in a row, the server received 2 but queued 3 when your phone reacquired a connection.

Thanks for the replies and excuse this brief response (battery running low).

Re Python/Ruby, I like both of these. My 'path' to Squeak went (roughly): python (blender), oberon, ruby, C#, squeak, where IMHO I found the best combo of features/speed/environment/maturity. Employment opportunities played no role in my choice but of course it would if I was looking for work. Outside of Blender I haven't done enough Python to comment on overhead except I think a small Sqeak vm and image can be less than 1meg (usefulness open to discussion). With Ruby I couldn't find a nice stable IDE to work in and Rails led me to Seaside, hence Squeak.

Re advertising: yes, very strange for something that's been around for years! Maybe it's so good they want to keep it to themselves ;-) In my case I think I overlooked it several times assuming it was some domain specific langage.

Re licence: new one in progress

I wish Squeak was available for the N800. I found it pretty intriguing.

Squeak runs on Linux; I don't see why there would be restrictions for it on an N800.

geneven, I have it running on the 770 so shouldn't it also run on the 800? However it doesn't play nicely with Hildon. Specifically, window ordering is a problem as is keyboard/mouse interaction. There is a gesture recognition package called Genie which can help and of course an image (ie, the file containing the "live" system) may be customised on the desktop before downloading. So I would say it is already usable in a general sense.

Why python instead of squeak ?

- Python was inspired from SmallTalk and is compatible with the GPL.
- Runs on unix, Mac, PC
- It is well documented.
- It tends to favor simplicity.
- There are binding for many GUI Framework (wxWidget, pygtk, pygame, tkinter ...)
- Nice function/method calling capabilities (positional parameters,
named parameters, defaults).
- And it has an impressive collection of features, and they are well
implemented. Classes, exception handling, name spaces, collections,
reflexive programming and networking are all built in and all cleanly
implemented.