Hi all!
Well, I finally got around to dusting off the old Christmas lights for the web site so it must be time for a blog update too!
I was hoping to have SOMETHING out re: monkey by Christmas, but it became apparent a few weeks ago that that just wasn't gonna happen so the new target is now for a mid January release.
The software is IMO mostly finished, if a bit rough around the edges (still fixing little things on a daily basis) although the docs currently suck. I plan on spending my Christmas 'break' mostly on docs, hopefully with a hangover much of the time - just kidding!
The whole 'production' side of things is something I think BRL products are missing a a bit these days compared with the old Guildhall/Idigicon days. Despite our, erm, 'creative' differences, Guildhall/Idigicon did I think take a lot of the weight off my shoulders when it came to the docs and general production side of things, and I do kind of miss that.
I don't really enjoy being responsible for EVERYTHING - and there are aspects of what I do that I know I could be doing a lot better (or at least someone else could be doing a lot better!) - but I have somehow managed to end up existing in this weird kind of 'bubble' down here in Auckland, New Zealand!
So at some point next year I intend to make an honest attempt at getting someone with some kind of business sense involved in the BRL experiment, quite possibly with the initial aim of producing a 'physical' version of monkey.
And there's that 'monkey' reference again - what can it mean?!?
Well, after surprisingly little thought and consultation (although I DID check with the 'Mono' guy...) I have settled on a name for the next programming language from BRL: 'monkey'.
In addition, the lightwight 2d app module that I am working on will be called 'mojo'.
Note that the two are separate: monkey will be 'just' a programming language, with the only IO related function probably being 'Print', while mojo will be an optional extension module.
The plan at this point is to make monkey free and open (in all respects), while charging for mojo (possibly with a free html5 version, or maybe a dual license GPL release - haven't decided on the 'demo' yet).
So stay tuned - interesting days ahead!
Peace out,
Mark
