Mondo Knows Facts
Smalltalk made every value an object receiving messages
Alan Kay's group at Xerox PARC built a language where computation happens by passing messages between objects Smalltalk grew through the 1970s at Xerox PARC and replaced procedure calls with messages that each object handles in its own way. It ran in a live environment where programmers could inspect and change code while it executed, an early form of the integrated development environment. Its ideas reached the mainstream through Objective-C, Java and later languages. It sits in Mondo's technology collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.
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Tags: programming-languages, smalltalk, objects
Smalltalk made every value an object receiving messages: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- Alan Kay's group at Xerox PARC built a language where computation happens by passing messages between objects. The figure is taken from Computer History Museum, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a technology fact?
- Yes. It sits on the Technology shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
- What else can I read about it?
- The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.