thingoid

Part Two: Things 6 -8

In part two we continue to look at what programming languages have in common. (more…)

Five languages were used to demonstrate the eight things programming languages do - Java, Perl, Python, REBOL, and Scheme. (more…)

Part One: Things 1 - 5

When learning computer programming it can be difficult to separate general programming principles from the specific details of one particular language. In some languages the underlying general principles of programming may remain obscured by the sheer volume of information needed just to make a program work. General principles may not emerge until the new programmer has learned two or three other languages.

This article illustrates eight basic programming concepts with examples in five programming languages - Java, Perl, Python, REBOL, and Scheme - which will allow the reader to make comparisons and generalisations. Part one addresses the first five ideas: output, variables, expressions, input, and selection. Part two covers lists, subroutines, and repetition. (more…)

The World Wide Reb is the tongue-in-cheek name given to the network of distributed REBOL applications accessible from the REBOL/View desktop - more formally it is known as the REBOL Distributed Desktop. Once you’ve setup a rebsite you can add it to distributed desktop and make it available to all REBOL/View users.

The REBOL folks reckon that setting up a rebsite is easier than setting up an ordinary HTML web page. Let’s put that claim to the test. (more…)

In my overview of REBOL, I skimmed across the capabilities of the REBOL/Core package. In this article I will give you a quick tour of the graphical version: REBOL/View. (more…)

REBOL. I first heard of this new programming language several years ago. The name sent shudders down my spine - was it the “REturn of coBOL”? Visions of endless pages of data declarations crawled out of a dark place in my memory and I moved on to another web site while I still had the will to live.

What a shame - I should have had a closer look, because I couldn’t have been more wrong. I don’t know if REBOL (the purists insist it’s pronounced “reb-el”, but I just can’t seem to get past “re-bol”) is ever going to set the programming world on fire, but it is easy to learn, surprisingly powerful and a lot of fun to code. (more…)