bigFORTH is a native code Forth. It is available for Linux and Windows 2000/XP under GPL. The most striking feature is the graphical user interface MINOS (GUI in Forth) and the form editor Theseus (Theseus is still beta). These are the other features of bigFORTH:
bigFORTH was originally developed on the Atari ST for the Motorola 68k processor. Later, I ported it to the Intel 386, running under a DOS extender (GO32). These products are commercial; they have extensive documentation. For historical reasons, you can download the latest bigFORTH-ST (442k) version and the Atari ST Documentation (1177k) here.
MINOS is a graphic user interface (GUI) for X, written for bigFORTH-Linux and bigFORTH-Win32. It includes a rapid GUI developement editor (Theseus).
MINOS is available under the GPL, not the LGPL. I want to stress that this means you cannot develop applications with it that are not either under the GPL, or distributed seperately as sources, just as with other GPLed libraries (for example, readline). For people wanting to develop applications with it that are under different licencing conditions, a commercial licence is available at request so that MINOS can be a choice for proprietary systems, too. I'll certainly give major contributors a fair share.
You find more information in the paper (157k) I presented at the EuroForth '97 conference. More recent informations are in the second paper (122k) presented on EuroForth '98. There's also a paper in describing the DragonGraphics (187k), also available in German (181k).
Current version is bigFORTH 2.4.0, Minos 1.4.0, from 22mar2010.
The version 2.4.0 from 22mar2010 contains more ports, more Forth 200x features:
~~
, helps emacs find the location
See further changes in the Changelog file.
The release policy is now a pretty fixed and reliable schedule: A new minor release comes out once per year, usually in the window between new year and Forth Tagung, and is followed by urgend fixes if necessary. The development activity is released early and often in the subversion repository.
Download the current bigFORTH+MINOS (pre-beta on Windows) release now (includes bigFORTH for Linux or Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000). The packages are signed with my PGP key.
The package is split up into five parts. You need source and
documentation for start, the other packets are either optional or for
convenience. To unpack it, unpack all the files from the same
directory. They all unpack into the subdirectory bigforth
. cd there
and type make
, to create the rest. Type make install
if you want a
system-wide installation. You can use the configure script
( ./configure --prefix=
your path) to let it install in another
path. Note that bigFORTH now is for glibc based systems only, because
I want to force you to upgrade. You might be able to compile for libc5
using an old version, but I don't encourage you to do so.
make
to compile the new things. Last change: 22mar2010, rev. 2.4.0.
svn co http://www.forth-ev.de/repos/bigforth
.
I packed these tar archives with
bzip2, to save you download time
(except that you need to install bzip2 - if you don't have it
already). The signature fires allow you to check the integrity of the
files with gpg --verify
signature.
Big Red Warning Label: This is beta code. It still may crash. It is not supposed to do this, but bugs happen. If you find one, please report it. The Windows version is still looking for a maintainer who helps to get the bugs out.
Windows Package (1962k) (sig): An autoinstalling package for those who don't have decided to switch to Linux yet. Includes everything you want on Windows. Unpack with a doubleclick. Uninstall before installing the next verion, please. Don't even try it on Windows 9x/ME. Last change: 22mar2010, rev 2.4.0.
There are two mailing lists around bigFORTH and MINOS-related topics: bigforth-devel@lists.sourceforge.net and bigforth-minos@lists.sourceforge.net.
Read old postings in the list archive of the bigFORTH and MINOS list.
Subscribe by filling in the form for the bigFORTH list, or the MINOS list. Subscriptions will be pending until I confirm, to avoid SPAM.