11
It looks like a fun language, but the official site is down and the EsoLangs page doesn't explain it quite well and looks like it's missing stuff. Is there anywhere that the language is documented?
phase
Posted 2015-06-22T21:12:55.863
Reputation: 2 540
7
A cached copy of the offical site is available on the Internet Archive's Way Back Machine.
Mitch Schwartz
Posted 2015-06-22T21:12:55.863
Reputation: 4 899
4
GolfScript is a nice language, but, as you already said, the official webpage is down. While I don't claim to know the future, this probably means that no bugs will be fixed and no new features will be implemented. In fact, the latest version of the Ruby interpreter was released in 2013.
GolfScript also has a few annoying quirks (e.g., no character type), is very slow and bound to lose in contests where you'd need to use commands such as base or print, which are simply too long for a golfing language.
Where am I going with this? Learn CJam instead!
CJam is inspired by GolfScript, so almost everything you can do in GolfScript, you can do in CJam as well.
But:
Dennis
Posted 2015-06-22T21:12:55.863
Reputation: 196 637
7I don't think "Don't learn GolfScript" is a good answer for somebody expressing an interest to learn GolfScript. – Mitch Schwartz – 2015-06-23T00:15:22.310
5@MitchSchwartz: I disagree. It might not be the answer the OP was expecting, but I still think it's good advice. – Dennis – 2015-06-23T00:43:25.083
2@Dennis I agree with your disagree, I'll be sure to learn CJam! – phase – 2015-06-23T01:02:14.900
Aren't some GolfScript answers still shorter than the CJam equivalents? – kirbyfan64sos – 2015-06-23T01:34:05.857
Also, the SourceForge repo shows the latest commit 2 months ago. – kirbyfan64sos – 2015-06-23T01:35:02.070
@kirbyfan64sos: It's true, a GolfScript answer can be one or two bytes shorter than its CJam counterpart. But it's much more common to find a CJam answer that is 50% shorter. Regarding SF, as far as I know, the official interpreter was never hosted there. – Dennis – 2015-06-23T02:00:42.807
@Dennis Ack, you're right about SF. I feel smart. :/ – kirbyfan64sos – 2015-06-23T02:06:04.620
10
Try https://web.archive.org/web/20150325040649/http://www.golfscript.com/golfscript/
– Mitch Schwartz – 2015-06-22T21:19:21.1706
We welcome questions for tips on golfing, but I'm not sure if tips on learning a golfing language (rather than golfing it down) are on topic. They'd certainly be useful, so I've raised a meta question to see how the community feels about this.
– trichoplax – 2015-06-22T21:19:49.383@MitchSchwartz Sweet! Works great! – phase – 2015-06-22T21:28:56.617
9
Feel free to join us in chat; there are plenty of helpful people that would be willing to assist you in real-time if you have any other more specific questions. :)
– Doorknob – 2015-06-22T21:30:03.380@trichoplax I wasn't quite sure where to put it, this seemed like the best place. – phase – 2015-06-22T21:30:27.790
4@Phase At this point I don't think we're really sure where you should put it either, but regardless, welcome to PPCG and I wish you luck in learning GolfScript! – Alex A. – 2015-06-22T21:35:45.540
@AlexA. Thanks! I can't wait to get some birdies! I'll grab my 7 iron. – phase – 2015-06-22T21:36:45.677
@Doorknob I'll be sure to ask all my questions there! – phase – 2015-06-22T21:37:15.303
1@MitchSchwartz Post as answer? – xnor – 2015-06-22T21:44:15.680