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Starting FORTH
For beginners and professionals, this popular and complete introduction to FORTH syntax has been expanded to include the new FORTH-83 Standard. It is suitable for all FORTH-83 Standard systems and is a complete guide to learning FORTH with special footnotes that address FORTH-79, MVP-FORTH and FIG-FORTH versions.
348 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1981
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 9, 2007
forth love if honk then
I read this back in college for a class and really enjoyed working with the language. I've never used it since but I remember enjoying the simple elegance of FORTH.
I read this back in college for a class and really enjoyed working with the language. I've never used it since but I remember enjoying the simple elegance of FORTH.
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January 22, 2011Leo Brodie is the master of suspense and irony as he rolls through what might otherwise be a geeky subject. Leo's style of writing keeps the reader amused while educating on the benefits of this stack oriented language. There are chapters that cover topics such as the built-in editor, variables, constants, and arrays, and other things necessary to master FORTH.
The FORTH language, of which I was an aficionado for many years (it was the 80's, okay? ) has never been given the credit due itself. FORTH uses 'Reverse Polish Notation' which is the foundation of all stack oriented CPUs since time began. While most software developers today cannot think in Reverse Polish Notation, I ended up acquiring a reverse way of looking at every problem in general after that. Later it helped me to conquer the difficulties of foreign languages, as I had to apply reverse thinking to the overcome the basic grammatical challenges of languages such as Spanish, Chinese, and French.
I utilized these writings of Brodie in this book and his follow on hit, Thinking FORTH, to motivate me to port FORTH to at least two different platforms ( MC6811 and 8086 ) in the 80's. His comical style always cheered me on as I spent countless hours at night pouring over the original FORTH source code for the runtime engine that I had to purchase via mail order from Mountain View Press. Just think, there was no Internet available to download from or place online orders at that time; how convenient that would have been.
Leo's books were occasionally available at local bookstores in my area, stocked dutifully alongside those about C, Assembler, MS-DOS, and other titans of 80's software technology. But eventually languages like C, then C++, then Java won the hearts and minds of developers. FORTH became a distant thing of the past for many companies. I re-visited FORTH in 1999 when I attempted to help my company to port a FORTH application to C++, and I got my Brodie books out again.
Today you can read Starting FORTH online via the www.forth.com website. Follow this link:
http://www.forth.com/starting-forth/
If you want to read more about the FORTH Master himself, go to his website at:
http://punchandbrodie.com/leo/
FORTH rocks! Long live FORTH!
The FORTH language, of which I was an aficionado for many years (it was the 80's, okay? ) has never been given the credit due itself. FORTH uses 'Reverse Polish Notation' which is the foundation of all stack oriented CPUs since time began. While most software developers today cannot think in Reverse Polish Notation, I ended up acquiring a reverse way of looking at every problem in general after that. Later it helped me to conquer the difficulties of foreign languages, as I had to apply reverse thinking to the overcome the basic grammatical challenges of languages such as Spanish, Chinese, and French.
I utilized these writings of Brodie in this book and his follow on hit, Thinking FORTH, to motivate me to port FORTH to at least two different platforms ( MC6811 and 8086 ) in the 80's. His comical style always cheered me on as I spent countless hours at night pouring over the original FORTH source code for the runtime engine that I had to purchase via mail order from Mountain View Press. Just think, there was no Internet available to download from or place online orders at that time; how convenient that would have been.
Leo's books were occasionally available at local bookstores in my area, stocked dutifully alongside those about C, Assembler, MS-DOS, and other titans of 80's software technology. But eventually languages like C, then C++, then Java won the hearts and minds of developers. FORTH became a distant thing of the past for many companies. I re-visited FORTH in 1999 when I attempted to help my company to port a FORTH application to C++, and I got my Brodie books out again.
Today you can read Starting FORTH online via the www.forth.com website. Follow this link:
http://www.forth.com/starting-forth/
If you want to read more about the FORTH Master himself, go to his website at:
http://punchandbrodie.com/leo/
FORTH rocks! Long live FORTH!
October 10, 2022
A fantastic language introduction for beginners and fascinating artifact in its own right.
The writing is friendly and conversational. The illustrations help make it memorable.
The book takes you from the simplest concepts to the hardcore metaprogramming internals
of Forth itself. I don't think you could ask for more than this from an introductory
programming book.
I'm currently reading the "sequel", _Thinking Forth_, and I'm enjoying it. Review to come.
The writing is friendly and conversational. The illustrations help make it memorable.
The book takes you from the simplest concepts to the hardcore metaprogramming internals
of Forth itself. I don't think you could ask for more than this from an introductory
programming book.
I'm currently reading the "sequel", _Thinking Forth_, and I'm enjoying it. Review to come.
July 11, 2016
It took me almost 3 years to finish this… but mostly because I put it aside for ages.
The book is pretty good. It's unusual and engaging, but I think it could explain many things more clearly with even more pictures, especially in the later chapters dealing with action-taking in the compilation phase.
Despite that, this book was very, very important to me, because it helped me understand parts of computing I hadn't thought deeply about before, and because it helped me think about certain problems in new ways. When I was only halfway through this book, I was urging everyone to read it and to teach Forth to more programmers. I stand by that, even more now that I've finished it.
The book is pretty good. It's unusual and engaging, but I think it could explain many things more clearly with even more pictures, especially in the later chapters dealing with action-taking in the compilation phase.
Despite that, this book was very, very important to me, because it helped me understand parts of computing I hadn't thought deeply about before, and because it helped me think about certain problems in new ways. When I was only halfway through this book, I was urging everyone to read it and to teach Forth to more programmers. I stand by that, even more now that I've finished it.
April 4, 2017
This was the firth book I read on Forth...and it was really cool :) Forth was my first experience with Stack based programming and this book was a fundamental piece in getting from total newbie...to newbie :)
It's explained in a very nicely matter and the examples are pretty useful. Even when is dead old...it's still a great reference for anyone interested in learning Forth...
If you haven't tried Forth before...go ahead and read this book...and BTW...use pForth...
It's explained in a very nicely matter and the examples are pretty useful. Even when is dead old...it's still a great reference for anyone interested in learning Forth...
If you haven't tried Forth before...go ahead and read this book...and BTW...use pForth...
July 17, 2015
Useful in motivating a project*.
* https://github.com/fogus/russforth
* https://github.com/fogus/russforth
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews