[sklipo]

I agree, but I think that with a great IDE for stack languages which would track the stack and the stack effects of functions, and display it all in a convenient way, most of the problem would be solved. It would be hard to read code without it, but I'll argue that the same could be said about syntax highlighting. And honestly, I think reading this kind of code can become natural with practice.

[ashleyf]

Indeed, I think great tooling can really help keep track of stack effects (I'd also say that combinators, rather than dup, swap, drop, ..., make you generally think less about the stack). You should check out the Brief editor as a prototype idea. Just having immediate feedback with step forward/back as you edit makes a huge difference. http://trybrief.com

[RodgerTheGreat]

I agree, but even without IDE assistance, many concatenative languages either suggest annotating your code with stack effect diagrams[1] or refuse to compile without them. (StrongForth, Factor)

[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stack-oriented_programming_lang...