BlackBox Component Builder
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
BlackBox Framework Center[2]
BlackBox: 1999
| BlackBox Component Builder | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Developers | Oberon microsystems AG[1] BlackBox Framework Center[2] |
| Initial release | Oberon/F: 1993 BlackBox: 1999 |
| Stable release | 1.7.2
/ 3 November 2019[3] |
| Written in | Component Pascal |
| Operating system | Windows, Wine |
| Type | Integrated development environment (IDE) |
| License | BSD 2-clause[4] |
| Website | blackboxframework |
BlackBox Component Builder is an integrated development environment (IDE) optimized for component-based software development[5] developed by a small spin-off company of ETH Zurich, Oberon microsystems AG,[1] in Switzerland. The IDE consists of development tools, a library of reusable components, a framework that simplifies developing robust custom components and applications, and a run-time environment for components.
In BlackBox, developing applications and their components is done in the language Component Pascal, a descendant of Pascal, Modula-2, and Oberon. Component Pascal is a strongly typed, compiled language that supports modular and object-oriented programming and Eiffel-like pre- and post-condition testing using ASSERT statements. It provides full type safety, components (in the form of modules), dynamic linking of components, and automatic garbage collection to preserve memory integrity. The whole BlackBox system is written in Component Pascal and is available as source code: all library components, all development tools, including the Component Pascal compiler, and the low-level runtime system with its garbage collector.
Function and components
As its name implies, BlackBox Component Builder supports blackbox abstractions and reuse, in contrast to whitebox, as defined in the book Component Software by Szyperski.[6][7] In 1993, it was released as Oberon/F[8][9][10] (for Oberon Framework) and was renamed to BlackBox Component Builder with release 1.3 end of the 1990s. In December 2004, BlackBox went open source with the release of beta version 1.5. According to a posting[11] of Clemens Szyperski on Usenet news Oberon/F and in turn BlackBox Component Builder is a re-implementation of ETHOS, which was completely object-oriented version of the Oberon System, which he had implemented for his PhD thesis.[12]
As an IDE it is a quite puristic environment without syntax highlighting and code completion. Some of these tools can be integrated from the community platforms (see external links below, e.g. syntax highlighting can be found in subsystem Master). Similar to most BASIC dialects and Oberon implementations source code files are binary documents. They may contain embedded active elements (see below) and formatting.
