[OT] Is there a relationship between Xtalk languages and smalltalk?

[Dan Shafer]

On May 19, 2005, at 5:12 PM, Mark Schonewille wrote:

> Hi Jonathan,
>
> Since your questions are related to HyperCard, I cross-post my  
> reply to the HyperCard list.
>
> As to your question about SmallTalk, there certainly is a  
> relationship, which isn't revealed by the nature of the languages.  
> Ted Kaehler was on the original HyperCard team and also  
> participated in the original Squeak team at Alan Kay's Viewpoints  
> Research Institute (see: <http://www.squeak.org/us/ted/> and  
> <http://squeakland.org/community/biography/kaehler.html>). I have  
> also read that SmallTalk was originally invented at Apple, which  
> makes the relationship even closer. Despite personal and other  
> connections, it cannot be said that SmallTalk is based on or  
> strongly influenced by HyperTalk.
>
Smalltalk was definitely NOT invented at Apple. Smalltalk was  
developed by Xerox PARC. The team was headed by Adele Goldberg. Alan  
Kay was part of that team and later showed up as a star at Apple.  
Apple DID work heavily on Smalltalk for a few years, including  
forking a version of the standard ST-80 project for quite some time.  
But ultimately it never did anything with the language in anything  
resembling an official way.

Alan continues to be active in Smalltalk through the Squeak project  
you mention. Dan Winkler was also active in Squeak for a while but  
seems to have dropped out of that effort.

> The above is directly related to you other question, about the  
> creators of HyperCard. I have been able to find information about  
> most of the original team that worked on HyperCard 1.0/1.0.1,  
> except for Adam Paal, Marge Boots, Mary Sinclitico, Bob Goodenough,  
> and Dan Winkler. I am really surprised that I can't find info on  
> Dan Winkler. If anyone can help me with this, I'll be able to  
> publish a (very) brief biography of the entire original team. If  
> you have any facts or rumours about one of these persons, please  
> write me, preferably off-list.
>
I sent a quick note to Dan Winkler. He is living outside Boston, and  
says he is mostly resting, reading and playing but doing the  
occasional IT consulting gig.




~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dan Shafer, Co-Chair
RevConWest '05
June 17-18, 2005, Monterey, California
http://www.altuit.com/webs/altuit/RevConWest