1. Re: SPARC too expensive
Bernie, of course the workstations are too expensive, but I am not
addressing that factor at all. I am not talking about high-end
workstations and expensive computers; I am talking about anything that has
a Reduced Instruction Set Chip (RISC or SPARC or MIPS) and I explain that I
specifically mean towards the Playstation2, the Nintendo Dolphin, and the
Sega Dreamcast... all RISC and all 128-bit . The Sega box is retail $199
US. Is that expensive? None of the above mentioned consoles is going to
cost above $400 initially and will no doubt drop down to around $275 or
below after volume shipping gets underway. To be able to purchase the most
powerful 128-bit single cpu that is available today with its box and
goodies for under $300 is not expensive. As a matter of fact, ONE OUT OF
EVERY FIVE HOUSEHOLDS in America own a Playstation right now! Is that
enough of a customer-base to justify trying to do something for the future
that is upon shortly? Between Sony and Nintendo alone, the customer-base
in America exceeds ALL Personal Computers installed to date.
Now for something nicer (though I don't mean to sound mean, Bernie, just
stating facts. Thank you for telling me about the Pascal Compiler. I will
certainly go out now and try and find it. That is exactly the sort of
information I am looking for.
Raude, thank you too, for telling me about the Solaris situation. I didn't
intend to sound as if I were trying to hijack Euphoria via an unauthorized
port over to the RISC stuff (though I wish I could!), I merely intend to
draw attention to all of the other alternatives out there, and try to help
things so that the base for Euphoria gets extended as much as is possible.
To think that one is only good on a single solitary type of chip or
hardware is enslavement... and that is what Wintel is all about.
Haskell is very intriguing and also very powerful. It is possible to use
it to build a emulated platform to run Euphoria on with having to change
much. Though the ability to access 128-bit memory blocks and the extensive
graphics and sound binaries of the above mentioned chips are so tempting.
To put it bluntly, I think that the current x86 setup is going to be left
in the dust in terms of what is currently happening out there. As someone
just said here yesterday, 'Microsoft is Porting DirectX to Windows CE? How
sad!' And also so futile. The future is not going that way at all.
Feedback?
Norm
