Newsgroups: comp.lang.smalltalk
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From: rapp@lmr.mv.com (L. M. Rappaport)
Subject: Re: Smalltalk terminology - Object, Class, and Instance
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Date: Sat, 1 Jul 1995 19:26:29 GMT
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jim.fleming@bytes.com (Jim Fleming) wrote:

>What about the Factory Factory Outlet Store...???
>	...that is where you can buy discounted factories...:)

Then you could logically have a Factory Factory Factory Outlet Store,
whose job it would be to produce a factory which can turn out
factories which, in turn, produce discounted factories...  Umm, or
something like that.  The point being, that at some point in time you
have to stop recursing.  It has been my understanding that that place
in the chain is the metaclass.  That there is exactly one class
metaclass whose sole instance is the object metaclass which in turn is
the class that produces classes.  I.e.:

     METACLASS CLASS 
                        |
     METACLASS OBJECT
                        |
                 CLASS
                        |
                OBJECT

where the character "|" indicates instantiation.  Have I got that
correct?  :)  

Larry
--


