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Smalltalk's Remarkable Small Size
- Smalltalk 76 was remarkably small with only 50 classes across 180 pages of source code.
- It included everything from GUI to sound synthesis, unlike much larger software systems today.
Rewrites Key to Elegance
- Smalltalk was rewritten multiple times by the same team, building on lessons learned.
- These rewrites every two years contributed significantly to its elegance and small size.
Poetry's Many Revisions
- Eric recounts seeing a poet's manuscript with ten revisions full of changes and suggestions.
- This challenged his belief that great works come fully formed without iteration.