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Programming IT Technology

Parrot: For Real 101

Posted by Hemos from the and-you-thought-it-was-a-joke dept.
Thanks to Pudge of Slashteam for pointing out that very early version of Parrot has been released. You may recall Parrot from The April Fool's joke - but it's coming to life.
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Parrot: For Real More

Parrot: For Real

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  • Parrot-Script (Score:2, Funny)

    by ksb ( 517539 )
    I can almost feel someone contemplating a sever side module for apache using this as an embedded web page script.
    • heh. :-)

      I started on making a mod_parrot so that you can run .pbc (parrot byte code) files through Apache. I got distracted though, so I didn't finish (yet).

      - ask

  • This is just so wrong that it's bound to succeed. (Score:3, Funny)

    by plover ( 150551 ) on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @10:05AM (#2285847) Homepage Journal
    A language with the readability of Perl and the maintainability of Python. I hope they threw in the "significant filename" convention from Java while they were at it.



    Yikes. I think I just described C#.



    John

    • Wait a minute. I thought that Parrot (the package, not the April Fool's Joke) was supposed to be the common VM for Perl and Python, or at least that's what I gathered from the mailing list postings I read about it some time back.

      The joke was about merging the syntax from the languages, but the real Parrot is about the VM. I think. :-) The details are really sketchy, and I don't have time to look at the code today (esp. since I'm on Solaris and I doubt it'd even compile).

      • Wait a minute. I thought that Parrot (the package, not the April Fool's Joke) was supposed to be the common VM for Perl and Python, or at least that's what I gathered from the mailing list postings I read about it some time back.

        Good thing this is not the real language. Cause I just looked at the test?.pasm files, and thought for a second (despite the name *.?asm) "Hey! This looks like assembler. How the hell can this be a step forward!?" But it is just a VM, and indeed it is sort of assembler language, but this is not what the end programmer sees.

        The joke was about merging the syntax from the languages, but the real Parrot is about the VM. I think. :-) The details are really sketchy, and I don't have time to look at the code today (esp. since I'm on Solaris and I doubt it'd even compile).

        It's only perl - sure it should... "compile". Just did a quick runthrough myself....

        TimC.
  • Looks like the roster is coming home to rest. I still think it is going to take a long time to get either side to convert or give and inch, but at least someone is pushing forward.

    It will be interesting to see the beta scripts that get pumped out of this.

    • Looks like the roster is coming home to rest.

      The roster [dictionary.com]? Are you quite sure? ;)

      You mean, "the chickens are coming home to roost"? I hope not, because that expression doesn't really fit... it's more of a "reaping what you sow" sort of thing.

  • Dead Parrot (Score:3, Funny)

    by Root Down ( 208740 ) on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @10:07AM (#2285860) Homepage
    I am still not convinced that this Parrot would voom if you put 5000 volts through it.
  • The only reason it was standing before was because it had been nailed to the stick.

    I emediatly thought of Monty Pythons parrot scetch.

    Cracks me up just thinking about it. Its nice to think of something else for a while

  • Wha? (Score:1)

    by Ignacio ( 1465 )
    Why the hell would anyone want to clone Ruby?

  • well... not exactly (Score:5, Informative)

    by __aahlyu4518 ( 74832 ) on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @10:31AM (#2285915)
    Unlike the joke, it is not a combined language !!! It started as an idea as a 'shared bytecode/runtime environment that could be used by both Perl 6 and a future version of Python' [perl.org]
    Right now it is a interpreter that does assembly to bytecode only [perl.org] for now as far as I can tell...
  • Was this only inspired by the April fools joke, or was the 'joke' just a clever way of telling people something like that was in development but to confuse us, then surprise us?

    In other words, is larry wall and the python guy collaborating efforts to bring us a new language derived from both? or is this some hackers bringing an actual product out of the joke.
  • Art imitating life, or life imitating art?

  • I wasn't expecting Parrot (Score:4, Funny)

    by Ukab the Great ( 87152 ) on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @10:41AM (#2285948)
    Guido:I wasn't expecting Parrot...

    Larry: Nobody expects Parrot! Our chief trait is laziness...laziness and impatience...impatience and laziness...Our two traits are laziness and impatience...and hubris...Our *three* main traits are laziness, impatience, and hubris...and a ridiculous habit of quoting JR Tolkien...Our *four*..no... *Amongst* our traits...are such elements as laziness, impatience...I'll come in again.

  • 100% compression (Score:3, Funny)

    by tplayford ( 308405 ) <tomNO@SPAMsail-italy.com> on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @10:53AM (#2286002)
    When is someone going to implement that 100% data compression sysem I heard so much about around April time? I'm sure it would be very usefull! Just think about all the possibilities!

  • What's the world coming to? (Score:3, Funny)

    by quartz ( 64169 ) <shadowman@mylaptop.com> on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @10:56AM (#2286012) Homepage
    As a long time Perl zealot, I'd like to take this opportunity to vigorously protest this move. Posts on both Perl and Python mailing lists suggest that there *is* going to be some compromise at language syntax level to accomodate the common runtime. From the Perl perspective it's like "well, Perl 6 was going to be fully OO anyway, so what difference are going to make a few concession in syntax"? Well, I strongly object! I mean, I spent so much time learning Perl so I could be different and write cool obfuscated "Japh" sigs, and NOW they're going to make Perl look and feel just like every other C# on the planet? I've had it! If THAT's gonna get implemented, I vow to completely abandon my Monk robe and to only code in Visual Basic! Brother Monks, I urge you to join me in my protest so that the despicable traitor Larry Wall will see the error of his ways and will hopefully change his mind about this Frankensteinian abomination! United we will succeed!

    :-)
  • $ ./test_prog t/test3.pbc

    and i've got,

    I reg 1 is 0
    Segmentation fault (core dumped)

  • Someone didn't get the joke (Score:5, Funny)

    by digital_freedom ( 453387 ) on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @11:00AM (#2286032)
    Parrot was an April Fools' gag.

    This is what happens when jokes go bad. I hope the /. editors consider this carefully next April. Otherwise we might have a story about Bill Gates & Bill Joy collaborating to produce a new proprietary rock-solid server GUI.

    Windows + Sun = Greenhouse

    Sheesh... Then someone will implement it...
  • I believe this is the low-level "assembly language" of the proposed new perl VM.

  • Parrot for Palm (Score:2, Interesting)

    by iCharles ( 242580 )
    There is Pippy, Python for Palm, and rumors of a Perl for Palm (both are supported on CE).


    Perhaps, though, making a rock-solid Parrot-for-Palm would be a way to get a good implmentation of both languages for Palm. The developers could share with each other, and the OS-specific routines could be held in common (accessed via specific "header files" (modules, etc.)).


    Hmmmmm....

  • April fools becoming real? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Ed Avis ( 5917 ) <ed@membled.com> on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @11:23AM (#2286139) Homepage
    I believe there was an April Fool's joke many years ago about a 16-bit version of the ARM processor called THUMB. But then only a relatively short time later ARM Ltd announced they were indeed working on a 16-bit frontend to the ARM (basically a new instruction decoder), and now the 'Thumb instruction decoder' is a standard part of many ARM family CPUs.

    How many other things started out as an April Fool's day joke and then actually got implemented?
  • I think he called it Ruby.
    The power of perl, without the inconsistency of perl. And shorter source code(from the great language shootout)
  • First we had TCP/IP over carrier pigeon (suggested
    in an April fool's RFC). Now this... What next?
  • Sorry, but what's the difference between this and a random bytecode/assembly language ? What's the point if neither Python nor Perl implementation are alpha'ed, too ?
    I mean, how could we know if this is adequate for a python bytecode for example ?
    Why not use an existing (Scheme/Lisp/Java) bytecode then ?
    Besides, I'd be very happy if we could have a somewhat open, Free, standard bytecode. But why (I know there's a because) can't we use something existing ?
    • At least the Java byte code is very specific to Java; it doesn't map well into other languages and specifically not well into dynamically typed languages like Perl and Python.

      In CVS there's already a mini language (Jako) that can be compiled into Parrot assembler code.

      - ask
  • It's not dead yet. In fact, it's only just barely alive - so it's still barely capable of trying to gum you to death or to bleed all over you.
  • Some people just can't take a joke.
  • Just because someone started working on something intending to be a joke doesn't mean it's not a joke and that anything will come of it.

  • Visual Seasick (Score:5, Funny)

    by jdfox ( 74524 ) on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @04:22PM (#2288087)
    In a related development, Microsoft has announced the immediate availability, in Q2 2002, of their new .Net hybrid of Visual C++ and Visual Basic, to be known as Visual Seasick.

    Visual Seasick will offer all the elegance and ease-of-use of C++, fused with the raw power and scalability of Visual Basic.

    Analyst Larry Bribewell of the respected IT Research firm Rentrag Group, predicts big things for this de facto industry-standard language: "the first release, version 3.1, looks rock solid. We predict [0.8] it will overtake Parrot in quarterly revenue by Q1 2002."
    (c) 2001, ZDnot.

  • I forgot what day it was. They laughed at me for believing in Parrot. They called me mad, but WHO'S MAD NOW?!?!??! MWAHAHAHAHA
  • I was hoping one of the other April fools jokes would have come true: Slashdot on FreeBSD 5.0

    Hmm... I guess that would mean FreeBSD 5.0 would need to be released :)

  • Yes, Parrot. But not that parrot. (Score:3, Informative)

    by smallpaul ( 65919 ) <paul @ p r e s c o d . net> on Wednesday September 12, 2001 @07:05PM (#2289268)
    It is the intent of the Perl 6 folks that Perl 6's VM be usable as an engine for interpreting multiple languages. This was always their intent. In order to make that wish a little more public they've decided to call their VM "parrot" (after the April fools joke). But at this point nobody has seriously looked at porting Python to parrot because it is not very mature yet. Furthermore, many Python people are skeptical that Perl 6 will live up to its long feature set so nobody is putting eggs in that basket yet.

    There is no sense in which the languages will be merged. If moving to Parrot required a substantial change in Python it just wouldn't happen. If Python on Parrot was less efficient than the current Python interpreter, that would also be a major issue.

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