[Oberon] Just Starting With Oberon2

[jan verhoeven]

Op Friday 24 March 2006 01:05 schreef Rory Starkweather:
 >  I've been looking at Oberon for a couple of months but didn't find a
 > version that fit my needs until I found the Oxford version. 

Oxford Oberon is semi compiled. It is similar to Oberon0 that runs on the 
virtual CPU that was invented for this single purpose by Niklaus.

 > I wasn't able to figure out how to do anything useful with the ETH 
 > Windows plugin version, 

Can't help you with that one. But Zonnon might be interesting for you.

 > 1. Is Oberon still being actively developed?

It might. Some effort is taken lately to bring it to sourceforge.

 > 2. How widespread is Oberon use in Europe? I haven't found any Americans
 > who have heard of it yet.

Not very much. Some very demanding software was written in Oberon, but most 
of the companies (I know off) demand their programmers to use C++. For some 
silly reason.

 > 3. Most of the programming I do involves a Visual Basic GUI with DLLs
 > written in either C or D doing the actual work when I need power or
 > speed. As I understand it, the 'virtual machine' interface between
 > compiled Oberon code and the CPU is relatively slow. I don't really care
 > about that, but I'm wondering if there is ever going to be a version of
 > the compiler that produces machine code? Or does Native mode make that
 > unneccessary?

The Oxford Oberon compiler is made by Mike Spivey in (you probably guessed 
it by now) Oxford, UK. It's a language intended for teaching.
AFAIK, the XDS and Modulaware Oberon compilers produce machinecode. Just 
like Jacob. The ETHZ compilers also produce machinecode. Only your Oxford 
compiler doesn't...

Did you come across this page: http://www.oberon.ethz.ch/ ?

It lists all you ever need to know.

 > 4. Considering item 3, has anyone done any work on a DLLcapability for
 > Oberon that works above the assembly language level?

Check out on the word 'blackbox' on Google and http://www.oberon.ethz.ch/

-- 
Met vriendelijke groeten

Jan Verhoeven
http://fruttenboel.verhoeven272.nl