Cuis is an environment derived from Squeak as I understand it with all the "clutter" removed. So it is really a cut-down Squeak. Just as Pharo was a cut-down Squeak originally.
For me it was easier and quicker to get something done in Cuis than in any other Smalltalk (Squeak, Pharo, VA, Dolphin).
The history link gives details, but if you want a quick analogy:
Pharo & Cuis both forked from squeak at roughly the same time
Squeak = Debian
Pharo = Arch
Cuis = Alpine
Cuis has rigorously simplified, so its much easier to explore & understand the system - because there's less of it
Cuis's re-engineering of morphic is really quite brilliant. Everything is hardware accelerated vector graphics. EVEN THE FONTS are drawn that way. And they remain crisp even when zoomed (in or out) & rotated.
Pharo does have some cool stuff though. I'd love to see fuel (object serialization) & soil (a fully oo database) ported to cuis. And the big one - seaside
But its not an either-or situation. 99% 9f what you learn & do in one is applicable to the other. But if you're starting out, I would definitely recommend cuis (not implying that you wouldn't necessarily stick with it)
Is the development experience compatible with modern AI-assisted workflows? Coding agents have drastically reduced the entry barrier for playing with software projects, and I can think of some fun ideas for Smalltalk things I've been curious about.
What most people do not know is that Smalltalk was originally a childrens' teaching language, a peer of Logo, which (I have learned in previous comments) preceded it.
"Smalltalk is a purely object-oriented programming language that was originally created in the 1970s for educational use, specifically for constructionist learning, but later found use in business."
When using so called OOP languages I specifically avoid inheritance, and in fact I think it's the worst aspect of it. In any case, I tend not to include inheritance into the definition of object orientation.
I hadn’t heard anything about Smalltalk since seeing it used in version 1.4 of Scratch, so it’s a pleasant surprise to come across it again after all this time.
Same VM as Squeak and Pharo so just as fast but a bit lacking in libs but this is an opportunity to contribute to open source for me.
Currently using it to build a mostly static website (with Pocketbase & lighttpd). A good experience all round.
I haven't used these in a long while.
Is this a fork? What's Cuis' main selling point compared Squeak and Pharo?
It looks like it is a fork started quite a long time ago.
https://cuis.st/documentation/explanation/history
Cuis is an environment derived from Squeak as I understand it with all the "clutter" removed. So it is really a cut-down Squeak. Just as Pharo was a cut-down Squeak originally.
For me it was easier and quicker to get something done in Cuis than in any other Smalltalk (Squeak, Pharo, VA, Dolphin).
The history link gives details, but if you want a quick analogy:
Pharo & Cuis both forked from squeak at roughly the same time
Squeak = Debian
Pharo = Arch
Cuis = Alpine
Cuis has rigorously simplified, so its much easier to explore & understand the system - because there's less of it
Cuis's re-engineering of morphic is really quite brilliant. Everything is hardware accelerated vector graphics. EVEN THE FONTS are drawn that way. And they remain crisp even when zoomed (in or out) & rotated.
Pharo does have some cool stuff though. I'd love to see fuel (object serialization) & soil (a fully oo database) ported to cuis. And the big one - seaside
But its not an either-or situation. 99% 9f what you learn & do in one is applicable to the other. But if you're starting out, I would definitely recommend cuis (not implying that you wouldn't necessarily stick with it)
Is the development experience compatible with modern AI-assisted workflows? Coding agents have drastically reduced the entry barrier for playing with software projects, and I can think of some fun ideas for Smalltalk things I've been curious about.
What most people do not know is that Smalltalk was originally a childrens' teaching language, a peer of Logo, which (I have learned in previous comments) preceded it.
"Smalltalk is a purely object-oriented programming language that was originally created in the 1970s for educational use, specifically for constructionist learning, but later found use in business."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smalltalk
Also, even though it called itself purely object-oriented, the earlier versions lacked inheritance.
Nowadays object oriented programming is almost entirely associated with inheritance hierarchies.
Perhaps inheritance isn't as central to object oriented programming as initially envisioned.
When using so called OOP languages I specifically avoid inheritance, and in fact I think it's the worst aspect of it. In any case, I tend not to include inheritance into the definition of object orientation.
I hadn’t heard anything about Smalltalk since seeing it used in version 1.4 of Scratch, so it’s a pleasant surprise to come across it again after all this time.
This looks cool and beautiful! Ive looked at other Smalltalks and been pretty intimidated. This feels cool and welcoming.