Comment by nathanwallace | Hacker News Reader

Comment by nathanwallace | Hacker News Reader

Fun fact ... "VisualAge for Java was implemented in Smalltalk and the Team facility used ENVY/Developer under the hood" [1]. Of course eventually that product and team morphed into Eclipse.

I was lucky enough to play as small part as a college-age intern working at an Object Technology International [2] Lab in Sydney.

I soaked in the pair programming, watching the screen flash by. I read every book they gave me (e.g. The Toyota Way, this was before XP / Agile books existed). I was amazed they actually paid me to work on these problems. I was so proud to make contributions and still remember fondly the hand-drawn diagram of the architecture passed down like a relic through the team. I am still inspired by their passion and commitment to delivery.

I definitely would not be the person I am today without the career defining experience working for Adrian Cho [3] and Dave Thomas [4] during that time. Periods like that are rare in a career - grab them if you can!

1 - https://paulhammant.com/2017/09/01/smalltalk-envy/ 2 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_Technology_Internationa... 3 - https://www.adriancho.com/ 4 - https://www.davethomas.net/

Erich Gamma worked for Object Technology when VisualAge was being developed so using XP/Agile before the XP book does not surprise me.

I worked with Erich before Visual Age when he developed the Presentation Framework. He came up with a process identical to XP. When XP came out I realized that Erich and Kent Beck were friends.

Erich is so prolific that he doesn't remember everything he invented. He is also generous.

Envy (Smaltalk versioning system for objects) cost an arm and a leg, I was fortunate enough to have a license - it was a fantastic system and the missing key bit to use Smalltalk for serious applications in larger teams and not just for prototyping. Key reasons why Smalltalk lost so quickly:

IBM buying and redirecting OTI to Java yielding eventually Eclipse at the same time boosted Java and pulled the rug from under Smalltalk.

IBM starting to hire Smalltalk programmers from universities and redirecting them to Java.

IBM providing networking stack parts to Java to interoperate in the banking industry.

It all happened over a relatively short period of time. Java was not just cheaper but thanks to IBM the tooling and networking - still way behind the combo of Smalltalk/Envy - was starting to be good enough.

I interned at an IBM satellite, whenever I mentioned smalltalk the old guys started to frown mumbling '#doesNotUnderstand... #doesNotUnderstand and #doesNotUnderstand'

Apparently something was wrong between ST usage at IBM and devs there.

I'm so jealous! I interned for IBM's OTI-derived lab in Raleigh in the early-mid 2000s. I learned a ton, but missed out on the glory years.

Eclipse used the same "running man" icon for the "run" command until version 2.0, IIRC.

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