Name: Anonymous 2009-05-07 11:00
It doesn't seem too uncommon for new languages that wish to be compiled to native code to first get translated into C, and then let gcc do the rest. Perhaps the best alternative to that right now is LLVM.
But why not FORTH? It probably won't be quite as optimized as gcc or LLVM could make it, but in most cases it would be Good EnoughTM. FORTH runs very close to the native code (even closer than C) and I can't imagine it being that hard to port the basic commands to a variety of platforms. But I only know the basic premise of FORTH, so there could be real issues that would make it impractical.
But why not FORTH? It probably won't be quite as optimized as gcc or LLVM could make it, but in most cases it would be Good EnoughTM. FORTH runs very close to the native code (even closer than C) and I can't imagine it being that hard to port the basic commands to a variety of platforms. But I only know the basic premise of FORTH, so there could be real issues that would make it impractical.