From: dmiller@im.lcs.mit.edu (Dick and Jill Miller)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Forth books
Date: 8 Nov 1992 14:18:08 -0600
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway

Since my September 26th ForthNet listing of Forth Books in stock at MMS, 
we've sold off our last copies of THINKING FORTH.  I was pleased to see 
that they went to people who cared, but the feeling was bittersweet because 
this is the cream of those Forth books which should remain available.  All 
the other books remain in stock for now, but too many of these also will 
disappear once the present stock is exhausted.
 
Other ForthNet articles in the past week have bemoaned this loss, but only 
John Wavrik's seems to have touched the fundamental problem.  Forth is now 
migrating too far beyond the model these books successfully address.  Solid 
Forths of the conventional type still exist (my company's MMSFORTH being 
only one), but they AND the books have weathered increasing competition 
from versions which sound better (and occasionally are, in certain 
applications) but increase the perception that Forth is arcane, amateur, 
ill-supported, and a constantly- shifting terrain.  The proposed ANSI 
standard, which MIGHT have saved the day, instead flunks John Wavrik's 
teaching requirements, and my requirements for maintaining Forth 
performance and literature continuity, and the long-stated Boston FIG 
position, and those of many other respected members of the Forth community.
 
Although I do oppose the current draft ANSI standard, that's not my point; 
only that IT won't keep these excellent books current, either.  Trust me, 
NO book publisher will touch Forth -- because it's a bad investment from 
their standpoint.  Do YOU think the new standard will solve these problems?  
I don't.  Do YOU think more than one new Forth book in four will be worth 
buying?  That would be most unusual in any field, let alone this one which 
seldom combines talented programmers, authors and editors.  Do YOU think 
many small-volume, slow-selling Forth books are apt to be financed, in view 
of the enthusiastic, changeable Forth community's compulsion to render it 
obsolete before any production run can fully sell?
 
Personally, I am choosing to support conventional and commercially-
supportable Forth, conventional Forth books, and Boston FIG's plan to 
continue its draft of the (conventional) Compatible Forth Standard once 
there is an approved ANSI Forth Standard with which it can relate.  But 
much of the damage already has been done, and most of the elements which 
create it will continue to operate.  New Forth books will have the same 
obstacles, and new Forth books won't replace the quality of the best of the 
past two dozen or so Forth titles for, at best, many years to come.
 
This is a tragedy -- one of classic Greek proportions, starring our Forth 
community as the worm Ouroboros, constantly eating its own tail in a 
painful and futile attempt to grow.
 
--Dick Miller
 
A. Richard & Jill A. Miller            | Miller Microcomputer Services |
InterNet: dmiller@im.lcs.mit.edu       | 61 Lake Shore Road            |
Voice: 508/653-6136, 9am-9pm EasternTZ | Natick, MA 01760-2099, USA    | 
                 MMSFORTH: The cure for the common code.