VisualWorks is a dialect of
SmalltalkLanguage sold by Cincom as part of Cincom Smalltalk.
It started in
XeroxParc back in the '70s and was first released as Smalltalk-80. A startup was spun out of Xerox called
ParcPlace to commercialize Smalltalk, and they called their product Objectworks, then renaming it to
VisualWorks in 1994.
ParcPlace changed its name a few times (
ParcPlace-Digitalk,
ObjectShare), and then sold it's Smalltalk business including
VisualWorks to Cincom.
You can download
VisualWorksNonCommercial for free.
If you are learning Smalltalk with
VisualWorks,
RalphJohnson recommends
Smalltalk: An Introduction to Application Development Using VisualWorks
by
TrevorHopkins and
BernardHoran ISBN 0133183874.
There are a wide range of free books available for Smalltalk thanks to the efforts of Stephane Ducasse.
See other
SmalltalkImplementations.
The newsgroup is
news:comp.lang.smalltalk
The home page for
VisualWorks is
http://www.cincomsmalltalk.com
There is a number of blogs at
http://www.cincomsmalltalk.com/userblogs . The blog is
VisualWorks powered.
In addition
http://planet.smalltalk.org/ aggregates most Smalltalk blogs.
As stated near the bottom, VW 7 and up have the Refactoring Browser as the core browser.
RalphJohnson says at
http://wiki.cs.uiuc.edu/VisualWorks/Get+and+unzip
I prefer 3.0 to 5i because the browsers work better. The 5i browser had to be completely redone and still has some problems. Moreover, the Refactoring Browser doesn't work yet for 5i. 5i has a lot of neat features, but I get the feeling that it is still beta software when I use it.
[re: VWNC5i] Does anyone else find the namespaces unintuitive? I spent 20 minutes today trying to find a class I had just added. I couldn't take it. Now I'm looking at Squeak. --
SunirShah
Just switch to 3.0. And download the
RefactoringBrowser. All will be well. --
AnthonyLander
Um, did you try "Find...". Finds any class in any namespace quite nicely. For that matter, use "Browse All Classes" and get a list by category irrespective of namespace. --
AlanKnight
JoyOfSmalltalk is a
VisualWorks-based textbook available online from the
VisualWorks wiki.
RefactoringBrowser works good with
VisualWorks 7.0, which also has non-commercial version. The whole environment was also improved and now looks better. Connectivity tools in
VisualWorks 7.0 shine. Notable addition is full support of
WebServices.
OpenTalk framework seems very promising to me --
PavelPerikov
VisualWorks 7.2 is out
has preview of Pollock - the new GUI framework (currently beta3), GLORP -
GenericLightweightObjectRelationalPersistence, .NET Connect etc. Many minor tools improvements.
VisualWorks 7.1 is out
Note:
VisualWorks 7.1 is out now... NC CDs and all. It's very nice.. several big & small improvements. --
DaveAstels
"Now on
VisualWorks 7.6 with 7.7 due Oct/Nov 09"
See
VisualWorksWiki
Are there any quickstart guides to VW? I'm playing with
OpenTalk at the moment and there is a total of
ONE useful example on the whole bloody damned web about it. The only guide I found was for 5i and starts by telling you to click on the
OpenTalk Launcher, which doesn't exist as far as I can tell. And the PDF only works as an intro to the subject in general and reference, not a guide per se. This is endemic to all serious frameworks and tools near as I can tell. (Oh, and I know Cincom's
planning to make quickstart guides but I'm not long on patience.) -- RK
CategorySmalltalk CategoryLanguageImplementation