Yes, good point distinguishing “playthings” from general purpose languages.

But to defend some of the languages you didn’t list. HyperCard was extremely popular and was used for commercial applications, the most notable was the game Myst. HyperCard was essentially the web before there was the web so its importance can’t be understated.

You didn’t mention Dylan. Dylan is important because it was Apple’s future general purpose language. There was a preview release (which I used at the time), but the timing was bad as Steve Jobs returned before its final release and canned it. It was a general purpose language, it was Apple’s future language, and Apple was committed to it, until Jobs returned. So it definitely belongs on the list.

Even though NewtonScript may not seem that important, remember that the Newton was the iPhone of the 1990s and the only way to write code for the Newton was in NewtonScript. It would be like trying to write an app for the iPhone in the 2000s, you need to know Objective-C. The only reason Objective-C is so popular is because of the iPhone. And the same was true with the Newton. However the Newton was far less popular as a product, and NewtonScript was intended as a stopgap for Dylan. So it’s borderline, but I think it still belongs on the list as many commercial applications were developed for it and it was the only way to develop apps for the Newton, and Dylan never did get released for the Newton before it was dropped.

I don’t think you can underestimate Apple’s focus on Java either. Remember that Steve Jobs cancelled OpenDoc and replaced it with … Java. That was the first thing he did. Apple had a large focus on Java, it was the intended language instead of Objective-C. But at some point Apple decided to focus on Objective-C instead, I’m not sure why, the iPhone and it’s low power/memory requirements may have had something to do with it.

I’m not sure if you accidentally left out C++? The majority of commercial applications in the 90s were written in C++. There may have been some still written in Object Pascal but it would be relatively small.

Looking back now it may look like the only languages that were important are the ones you mentioned but at the time I think HyperCard, Dylan and Java safely fit on the list.

So that’s 9 significant languages in 45 years, about once every 5 years.

You need to remember that as people were settling into Object Pascal, they switched to C++. As people were settling into C++ they switched to Java. People never really settled into Java, and dropped it, so the only option was Objective-C. As people were becoming comfortable with Objective-C they switched to Swift. Apple starting to get a language where they want it is generally when they switch :)

Having said that I agree that it may be doubtful Apple will switch anytime soon. My guess is that they should at least be investigating it, but it could be 5+ years before anything sees the light of day. The alternative would be to continue to transform Swift into a more functional language.