RE: [Axiom-developer] NOWEB

[Page, Bill]

Gaby,

On Thursday, May 04, 2006 2:17 PM you wrote:
> ... 
> Bill Page writes:
> | 
> | I have installed Icon on the axiom-developer.org server and it
> | seems like a nice neat little language ... but I am sure Tim
> | will say: "Oh horrors, yet another programming language!" :)
> 
> And I will second him!
> 
> [Note: I have written small programs in Icon, and enjoyed 
> "Graphics Programming in Icon" which you can get almost for
> free if you in academia.]
> 

Sometimes I wonder how someone who does not really appreciate
diverse programming languages would ever be motivated to
become an Axiom developer ... although I would not expect
Axiom *users* to necessarily be so multilingual. ;)

I think Icon was a worthy predecessor of the currently very
popular web scripting languages like perl and python that came
later but did a lot of the same things (not necessarily as
well ):

http://www.cs.arizona.edu/icon/index.htm

Icon has venerable history rather similar to Axiom's, beginning
in 1977:

http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?doid=155360.155363

But it certainly is not a "dead" language yet:

http://www.cs.arizona.edu/icon/status.htm

The Icon books are now in fact free for all and I can highly
recommend both of them. You can download them here:

http://www.cs.arizona.edu/icon/gb

Regards,
Bill Page.