[Oberon] [EXT] Re: Question about Oakwood guidelines and design choices

[Skulski, Wojciech]

Robert:

thank you for the great thread. Since you said Text, please be aware that there are multiple Text flavors out there. 

1) The original Oberon System Text.
2) FPGA Oberon Text, which may or may not be the same as (1). I hope it is the same, but I am not sure.
3) ETH V4 System, later renamed Linz V4 Oberon. This Text supports live Elements. 
4) ETH System 3 Text, which supports live Gadgets. If I am not mistaken, Gadgets and Elements are not compatible.
5) More Text formats may be out there, but I am not sure.

 It would help if the community moved towards one universal Text. I am pondering this question because I would like to port some V4 Elements to FPGA Oberon. Elements need the support of the Text format.

Ideally, all 1+2+3 could be merged into one Text format. The first three should be doable in a couple megs. I am afraid that (4+Gadgets) is unlikely to fit into a small memory footprint.

My biggest dream is that Extended Oberon would adopt 1+2+3 and then just start using it from the next official release. This would clear the waters from thinking "what will happen to my effort after the next major release". Knowing the developer's  roadmap would help with making strategic decisions like the one concerning text format, whether or not it is safe to put work into Elements, etc.

Thanks,
W

PS: Which way of commenting is now official on the list? There were some strong opinions whether top or bottom. I do not remember the verdict.


________________________________________
From: Oberon [oberon-bounces at lists.inf.ethz.ch] on behalf of R. S. Doiel [rsdoiel at gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, June 7, 2021 11:49 AM
To: ETH Oberon and related systems; Joerg
Subject: [EXT] Re: [Oberon] Question about Oakwood guidelines and design choices

Good Morning Jörg (and everyone else),

This is becoming clearer. Between evolution (originating in Texts of the
Oberon system) and making a distinction of writing binary files versus
plain text (versus Oberon's Texts) this makes sense. Where I am using
"Out" in POSIX Oberon-7 code I'll stick with Oakwood.  Now I need to
figure out which set of compilers I want to be compatible with in the
POSIX setting.  I should probably implement similar modules in FGPA
Oberon so that I can easily move between the two environments as well as
POSIX systems. It's be a good exercise for me to understand the design
choices.

I've really enjoyed Oberon language and increasingly the system. It's
helped inspire new thinking for me in my day job.

All the best,

Robert