November 93 - Editor’s Notes: Overview
Editor’s Notes: Overview
Mary Elaine Califf
Welcome to the November/December issue. We have several interesting articles in
this issue, starting with a report on MADA's first trip to OOPSLA. Yes, we really are
broadening our horizons.
Those of you who were at MADACON last winter or who heard any of the information
about Bedrock presented there have probably been wanting some more information
about Booch Components. This month we have it. See Scott Taylor's article for a feel for
what the Booch Components are and how they work.
Another product we've been wanting an article on for a while is c-tree. Andy Dent
provides an article which gives a good feel for what c-tree is and gives an example of
how to use it with some sample code.
We have a couple of new series starting this issue. Bob Hablutzel, a name familiar to
many of you as a MADA board member and frequent question-answerer on
MACAPP3TECH$, has started a question and answer column in which he will answer
the question and then go on to discuss related programming topics (so experts may
learn something, too). The initial questions will be taken from the net, but he's looking
for questions to use from you. Kurt Schmucker is also starting a series of articles on
Prograph, starting with this issue's look at what's new in Prograph CPX.
In his article this month, Mikel Evins discusses another topic that will not be familiar
to many of you, this time prototype-based object oriented languages. Besides
describing them, he discusses NewtonScript as an example of such a language.
In our technical overview section, we have an article on Qd3d. Besides talking about
the product, Jonathon Hess discusses the architecture of interactive 3d applications
and gives some good advice.
Change
This is becoming to be a familiar theme; I seem to remember a similar heading in the
last issue. As you may have heard, MADA is going through changes as we speak. We're
adding a second publication, this one specifically designed for PIE developers, initially
focused on Newton technology. I would like to welcome Steve Wilson, of MicroGA and
QuickApp fame, to the club of MADA editors and to encourage any of you working with
Newtons to contact Steve about writing articles.
A second change in MADA that is significant to its publications is the board's recent
decision to change the name. The organization will now be called Software Frameworks
Association, which is easy to explain in light of our current charter and is clearly
associated with this publication.
Under this heading, as editor I would also like to thank Arvid Jedlicka for stepping in
to handle much of the publication chores of FrameWorks after Steve Mann's
resignation and to thank Patricia McCauley for going beyond her usual duties during
the past weeks. These are two people who seldom receive the recognition they deserve
from members of the association, and without their work this issue would not be in
your hands.
In the future
Some items of interest to look forward to in coming months include: further articles
from Mikel Evins, Kurt Schmucker, and Bob Hablutzel; a review of SmalltalkAgents; a
review of AAIS Full Control Prolog (an object-oriented Prolog); a review of Qd3d;
part 2 of Bo Klintberg's overview of his OSL Scripting Components; articles culled
from MADACON presentation, and much, much more.
And as always
FrameWorks is looking for articles that will be helpful to programmers using object
oriented technologies. If you have some classes that would be of interest to other
programmers, if you know of a useful tool, language, class library, or book that you
would like to write an overview or a review of, please contact me.