Rexx
Basic is not set up to be an interprocess communication language and cannot so
wath ARexx/Rexx do in that regard. Although some people have actually written
programs in Rexx/Arexx, it was not designed for that, as was Basic. They are
two totally different animals designed to do tow totally different jobs.
Eliminating Arexx from the Amiga and forcing people to use AmigaBasic for the
things Arexx does would never have worked, and would not allow the wonderful
multi application scripts that can save gobs of time if a process is repeated
by an operator directing data through a multituded of apps to get it in the
final form.
Likewise, now that PCs have finally discovered multi-tasking (and of course
will claim credit for inventing same on the desktop, I'm sure) they need
inerprocess control scripts to string apps together to do special jobs. The
overhead to do this in basic is prohibitive, and to change basic to handle such
a role is a fundamental change to the entire concept of an application
development language. IOTW, it wouldn't be basic anymore.
This incredible resistance to Rexx is irrational when you consider that to do
what Rexx does, Basic would have to assimilate an incredible array of new
function calls. SInce the structure of a basic program and Rexx script are so
similar, the process of learning all the new basic structures ends up being no
different than just learning Rexx in the first place. And having self-taught
myself on both languages I can tell you it ain't no big deal. Spend an hour
with the Rexx docs and a machine with the Rexx host and you'll be writing
fairly useful scripts. The hardest part about Rexx is finding documents on it.
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