Factor: an extensible interactive language
Factor: an extensible interactive language

Factor: an extensible interactive language, Google Tech Talk by Slava Pestov.

Factor is a general-purpose programming language which has been in development for a little over five years and is influenced by Forth, Lisp, and Smalltalk. Factor takes the best ideas from Forth -- simplicity, succinct code, emphasis on interactive testing, meta-programming -- and brings modern high-level language features such as garbage collection, object orientation, and functional programming familiar to users of languages such as Python and JavaScript. Recognizing that no programming language is an island, Factor is portable, ships with a full-featured standard library, deploys stand-alone binaries, and interoperates with C and Objective-C.
In this talk, I will give the rationale for Factor's creation, present an overview of the language, and show how Factor can be used to solve real-world problems with a minimum of fuss. At the same time, I will emphasize Factor's extensible syntax, meta-programming and reflection capabilities, and show that these features, which are unheard of in the world of mainstream programming languages, make programs easier to write, more robust, and fun.
 