While I'm not a big fan of Tcl/Tk, I'm quite familiar with it and find I this statement confused or misleading in at least two ways:
First, GWL once told me the bulk of the code is actually rather mundane GUI form definitions (the sort of crap that is trivial to generate with high level interface tools). There's only a small amount of actual "logic" at that level that ever needs to be maintained (the real control isn't done in Tcl).
Second, even if there are 50,000 lines of Tcl (actually I think the actual number is closer to 300,000), it doesn't mean it's one big script. It's probably more fair to compare it to a unix system with hundreds or thousands of separate smaller write-once scripts.
Ironically I think the real fault here lies with GWL and other Tcl enthusiasts for quoting a true but misleading "number of lines" in the first place. The number of separate scripts and average script length would be more meaningful and representative of the system's real complexity.
First, GWL once told me the bulk of the code is actually rather mundane GUI form definitions (the sort of crap that is trivial to generate with high level interface tools). There's only a small amount of actual "logic" at that level that ever needs to be maintained (the real control isn't done in Tcl).
Second, even if there are 50,000 lines of Tcl (actually I think the actual number is closer to 300,000), it doesn't mean it's one big script. It's probably more fair to compare it to a unix system with hundreds or thousands of separate smaller write-once scripts.
Ironically I think the real fault here lies with GWL and other Tcl enthusiasts for quoting a true but misleading "number of lines" in the first place. The number of separate scripts and average script length would be more meaningful and representative of the system's real complexity.