The International Newsletter for Smalltalk Programmers June 1993 Volume 2 Number B hen Smalltalk emerged from the Xerox PARC labs in the early SMALLTALK 1980s, performance was a major issue. CPU speeds and memosy densities were both nearly two orders of magnitude lower than in ❑ today’s machines. The 1983 “green book,” SMALLTALK-80,BITS OF BENCHMARKING HISTORY, WORDS OF ADVICE, included many articles with detailed performance analysis.1 One chapter even studied the feasibility of implementing Smalltalk in hardware, namely in the Intel 432 chip. The Xerox Dorado worksta- REVISITED tion was the fastest Smalltalk machine, and implementations on chips such as the DEC VAX and Motorola 68000 did well to run at a small fraction of a Dorado. As the decade progressed, hardware got faster at a factor of nearly 10 every five By Bruce Samuelson years. Efficient techniques were employed for method look- up caches and for gen- eration-scavenging garbage collectors. By mid 1992, a midrange machine running ParcPlace Smslltalk performed several times faster than a Dorado, and a fast ma- chine a dozen times faster. One could buy a cheap PC running either ParcPlace or Digitalk Smalltalk faster than a Dorado. These developments raise the question of whether Smalltalk is now fast enough. Shouldn’t vendors concentrate on features rather than performance? Won’t hardware advances take care of any lingering problems with speed? This Contents: was, in fact, the position taken by a senior representative of one of the major Smalltalk vendors in a conversation with me last year. If Smalltalk were the only Features/Articles language, and if there were only one vendor, the answer might be yes. But 1 Smalltalk benchmarking revisited Smalltalk implementations are not only vying with one another for prominence, by Bruce Sarnueimn they are also competing with other languages. 4 Using Windowa resource DLLs from SmalltafldV PERFORMANCE OPTIMIZATION IN OTHER LANGUAGES by Wayne Beeton One reason C++ has become so popular is that it adds object extensions to C with- Columns out sacrificing much of C’s efficiency. This is a frequent theme in USENET news groups such as comp.lang.c++ and is commonly cited as a reason for using C++ 0 Smalltalk dioms: instead of Small talk. Smalltalk users cite Smalltalk’s consistent use of the object To accesaor or not to aocesaor? paradigm, productive development environment, rich class library, flexibility, and by Kmt Beok portability (for ParcPlace’s products) as reasons to choose it over C++. A language 9 GU/s: Using MS Hetp from with Smalltalk’s features that approaches C++’s speed would attract a larger com- within ViaualWOrks by Greg Hedy & Eric Smith munity of users. It this possible or only a dream? Perhaps the researchers who are most aggressively trying to demonstrate its pos- 10 T!ra beat ofconrp.hng.smalltalk: sibility is the Self group at Stanford University. Like Smalkalk, Self is a fully dynami- Setaandd~tionaries by Alan Knight cally typed language. It uses prototypes and delegation in place of classes and inheri- tance. Whereas other researchers have tried to achieve performance gains (and 13 Sneak prevkw: WindowBuilder Pro: new horizons perhaps other benefits) by adding strong typing to Smalltalk, the Self group is seeing by Eric C\ayberg & S. Sni5har how far they can push the performance envelope by using various compiler opti- Departments mization techniques without sacrificing type flexibility. They have pushed the envelope quite far. An example of their results is de- 23 Roduct Announcements scribed in an article by Craig Chambers and David Ungar in the 00PSLA 91 con- mminud on page 16... TheSmalltalkReport I EDITORS’ Editors John Pugh and Paul White CORNER Carleton University & The Object Peopte John Pugh Paul White SIGS PUBUCAnONS Advisory Board Tom Atwod, O~ecl Design ver the past 24 months, we have often discussed Smalltalk’s move into the business world. GAy hch, Rational Both Digitalk and ParcPlace have spent a significant effort to not simply improve their ex- Gaorge Bosworth, Digilalk isting products, but instead to change their products to position Smalltalk as the best de- Brad Cox, Information Age Consulting Chuck Duff, Symantec Ovelopment tool for large organizations across all industries, To this end, both PARTS and Adele Goldberg, Parc~am Systems VisualWorks represent the next generation of products for their respective vendors, which Tom Love, Consultant attempt to make Smalltalk more accessible to the mass development market—and newer Bertrand Meyer, ISE Meilir Page-Jones, Waylmd Systems Smalltalk vendors are sure to arrive, Easel’s Enfin product is already having an impact on %sha Pratap, CenteLine Software the object-oriented market that is likely to grow as time goes on Bjama Strouetrup, AT&T SS11t-ah Recently, we have noted that Smalltalk is being talked about in arenas that would not Dave Thomaa, Objsct Technology Intwmatimal have been dreamed of before, One such place was a recent column in the April 19th issue rHE SMALLTALK RSPORT of Business Week in which Smalltalk is described as being an extremely successful devel- Edtirial Ward opment tool for many corporations including American Airlines, JP Morgan, and Citi- Iim Anderson, Digitalk Adele Goldberg, ParcPtace Sys(ems corp, and the list of these companies keeps growing. Reports such as these can be used as ?eed %Ilfips, Knowledge Syslems Corp, fodder for those of you who are still fighting to justify Smalltalk to your management. Mike Taylor, Digitalk In our feature article this month, Bruce Samuelson offers some benchmarks he has per- live Thomas, Object Technology Internadnnd formed for the various dialects of Smalltalk, This is a new arena for THE SMALLTALKRE- Columnists PORT,and we believe efficiency is an issue that many of you face “in the trenches.” Bruce <enf Sack, %st f3aM %ttware has been very active in recent months on Internet discussing this topic, and has invested a Iuanits Ewing, Diiialk 3eg Hendley, Know16dge Systems Corp. great deal of time in preparing this study, More important than the raw numbers he pre- =d Klimaa, h- Engineering In.. sents, he has many insightful comments concerning the implementation strategies of both 41an Knight, The Otjeci People ParcPlace and Digitalk. While not endorsing the numbers presented by Bruce, we strongly Eric Smith, Knmdedga Systems Corp. Rebecca Wrfs-Brock, Digikdk believe these types of studies are crucial to the further mainstreaming of Smalltalk. The debate over whether to use accessor methods has raged in the Smalltalk commu- SIGS Publidons Group, Inc. Richard P. Friedman nity since “the beginning of time. ” As Kent Beck points out in his column this month, this Founder & Group Publisher one question has probably been debated more vehemently in Smablk labs than any Art/Production other style issue. In our own shop, the question of the appropriate use of accessors has Kristina Joukhader, Managing Editor been argued so much that it is now considered a taboo subject. We believe Kent has put Susan Culliin, Pilgrim Rasd, Ltd., Creatiw oimc6m Ksren Tongieh, Production Editor this debate in the right context, especially the comment that programmers will “do any- Gwen .%nchirico, Production Coordinator thing, given enough stress,” and suggest anyone responsible for the integrity of their cor- Robert Stewart, Computer System Cmmdinator porate libraries give these arguments attention. Circulation Stephen W. .Smde, Cititian Mmager This month we have two columns that address the issue of GUI development using Ken Mard, FuhillmentManager Smalltalk. First, Greg Hendley and Eric Smith return this month with their GUI column, Marketing/Advertising getting you started with integrating VisualWorks with Microsofi’s Help facility. Second, James O. Spencer, Dirdor of Business Devetcpmmt Eric Clayberg and S. Sridhar take a first look at WindowBuilder Pro, the next generation Jason Weiskopf, AdverSsii Mgr-+ast CaastKanada Holly Meintzer, Admrdsing Mgr—West CeasUEumpe of the well-known WindowBuilder product originally released by Cooper and Peters. Helen Newling, Recruitment Sates Manager Alan Knight’s look at comp.lang.smalltalk takes him into a review of the implementa- Sarah Hamitton, Promotions Manager-Publidions tion of sets and dictionaries. In doing so, he studies how well (or not well) abstracted the @en Polner, promotionsGaqhc ,4&t Administration implementation of these reusable data types is and some suggestions for improving them, David Chatterpaul, Accounting Manager Also this month, Wayne Beaten describes an implementation of a mechanism for storing Jsmes Amenuvor, Bookke+er and managing DLLs for Smalltalk/V for windows. Dylan Smith, Special Assistant to the Publisher Claire Johnstcm, Cmkreme Manager Enjoy the issue! Cindy Baird, Conference Technical Manager Margherita R. Monck General Managw ■ SIGS The SmaUkdkRc o.-1(lSSN# 1056-7976] is published 9 Iimcs a year. every momh exccpl fur the MarlApr, July/Aug. and NOVIDCCcomhimd 1,(, Hll[:,\llll?d# issues.Publisbed\- y SItJS Publications C;roup, 588 ffroadw-ay,,New York, NY 10012 (2 12)274-LIMO, 0 Copyright 1993 hy SIGS Publicaliom, — — ————.—— Inc. All ri~ht, rcwrved. Reproduction of this nmtmial by electronic tmnsmisicm, Xernx m my mber rnctbod will bc Ircatcd asa willful vi.la- tinn .f [bc US Copyright faw and is flady prohibited. Makrial maybe reproduced with express~rmission from ~h.spubli~bcrs.Mailed First Class.Subscription rats I year, (9 is.mcs)dmnmtic, $65, Foreign and Canada, W), Single copy rice, 58.00. POSTMASTER Send .ddrtw %btishers 0[ JOURNALOF OBJECT-ORIENTEDPROGRAM. changesand suhs,criplion orders N,: I’111S,UALI.IAIK NFPONr, S“bscribcr Swviccs, OcpI. S,ML, P.Cl. L ,x 3000, Oenvil]c, NJ 07834. Submil m-ti- uING, OSIECT MAGAZINE, HOTLINE ON OBJECT.ORIENTED clc~ to the.f3d,t.rs at ?I Second Avenw OItawa, Ontario K] S 2H4, Cmada, For service on currem subscriptions call 800.783.4903. rECHNOLOGY,THE C++ REPOuI, THE SMALL1fiK RE!=URT, Printed m the Umted States.