Squeak

Squeak is a high-level language developed by Alan Kay, Dan Ingalls, and Adele Goldberg at Xerox PARC and later at Apple Inc., with influences from Smalltalk, Lisp, and Simula. It was designed to be a platform-independent language, allowing it to run on various operating systems, including Windows, macOS, and Linux, with the help of virtual machines like JVM and CLR. Squeak's development was also influenced by the work of Douglas Engelbart and his team at Stanford Research Institute, who developed the NLS/Augment system. The language has been used in various projects, including the development of Etoys, a media-rich authoring environment created by Alan Kay and his team at Viewpoints Research Institute.

Introduction

Squeak is an object-oriented programming language that is based on the concept of message passing and late binding, similar to Smalltalk and Java. It was designed to be a general-purpose language, suitable for a wide range of applications, from desktop applications to web development, with the help of frameworks like Seaside and AIDA/Web. Squeak's syntax is similar to that of Smalltalk, with a focus on block-based programming and closures, which are also found in languages like Ruby and Python. The language has been used in various projects, including the development of Croquet, a collaborative software platform created by Julian Lombardi and his team at University of Wisconsin–Madison.

History

The development of Squeak began in the 1990s at Apple Inc., where Alan Kay and his team were working on a project called Dylan, a dynamic language that was intended to be a successor to Smalltalk. However, the project was cancelled, and the team decided to continue working on the language, which eventually became Squeak. The language was first released in 1996, and it has since been maintained by a community of developers, including Douglas Holmes, Andreas Raab, and Torsten Bergmann. Squeak's development was also influenced by the work of Ivan Sutherland and his team at University of Utah, who developed the Sketchpad system. The language has been used in various projects, including the development of OpenCroquet, a open-source version of Croquet, created by Julian Lombardi and his team at University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Features

Squeak has a number of features that make it a unique and powerful language, including its image-based persistence model, which allows for the creation of persistent objects that can be stored and retrieved from a database or file system, similar to Gemstone. The language also has a strong focus on concurrency and parallelism, with built-in support for threads and processes, similar to Erlang and Go. Squeak's syntax is also highly expressive, with a focus on block-based programming and closures, which are also found in languages like Ruby and Python. The language has been used in various projects, including the development of Etoys, a media-rich authoring environment created by Alan Kay and his team at Viewpoints Research Institute, with the help of MIT Media Lab and NASA.

Applications

Squeak has been used in a wide range of applications, including desktop applications, web development, and embedded systems, with the help of frameworks like Seaside and AIDA/Web. The language has been used to develop games, simulations, and educational software, including Etoys, a media-rich authoring environment created by Alan Kay and his team at Viewpoints Research Institute. Squeak has also been used in research and development projects, including the development of Croquet, a collaborative software platform created by Julian Lombardi and his team at University of Wisconsin–Madison, with the help of NSF and DARPA. The language has been used in various projects, including the development of OpenCroquet, a open-source version of Croquet, created by Julian Lombardi and his team at University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Community

The Squeak community is a vibrant and active group of developers, with a strong focus on collaboration and knowledge sharing, similar to the Ruby on Rails and Python communities. The language has a number of mailing lists and forums, including the Squeak mailing list and the Squeak forum, where developers can ask questions and share their experiences, with the help of Stack Overflow and GitHub. Squeak also has a number of conferences and workshops, including the Squeak conference and the Smalltalk industry conference, where developers can meet and share their knowledge, with the help of ACM and IEEE. The language has been used in various projects, including the development of Etoys, a media-rich authoring environment created by Alan Kay and his team at Viewpoints Research Institute, with the help of MIT Media Lab and NASA. Category:Programming languages