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Again, I am not trying to justify my decision, I think if you asked most developers to give advice to a kid learning programming 3 years ago how to get started(

Again, I am not trying to justify my decision, I think if you asked most developers to give advice to a kid learning programming 3 years ago how to get started(with the benefit of 3 years glance into the future) they would probably lean towards node if it was between nodejs v ruby. However, I totally agree that the longer life of a product exposes the weaknesses of any language/framework. and there are multiple paths. Just that, if you want to get good at writing software you probably need to pick a starter language with a versatile community. People still write cobol, and wherever there is code in production, there will be demand for a language, but .NET and PHP are probably not growing in demand. I actually don't know about .NET tbh. However, there is such thing as choosing a path as, without extensive time investment, skill and knowledgebase, it would be difficult to be a truly capable python, .NET, javascript and rails dev. It would be wise to be capable in those languages, but to be a master or attempt mastery of the one most likely to embody your interests/career would likely be a better move than being able to be less than mediocre in numerous languages. I think we are largely in agreement, and I hope I didn;t mischarachterize you. I think rails is cool, and I now regret not learning it as I do like the scaffolding nature and I am sure I could pick it back up quickly, I just do not have a need to right now. Elixir looks super cool though and if I do learn a new language that is markedly different it is a toss up between Go and Elixir. I am messing around with python right now, but javascript and ruby are pretty similar, and pyton seems fairly similar. A functional language or a compiled language will be a radical departure from what I am used to.

pjmlp 10y ago
.NET is alive and well. Enterprise only cares about Java and .NET as standard backend stacks, regardless of the technology of the day HN posts how everyone is doing Go and node.js.
- vonklaus 10y ago
  i actually have been interested in Java because apache has open sourced what seems to be the best collection of resources on the internet and they are almost entirely written in java for the java ecosystem. I also think I would learn a massive amount. I also am strongly considering Java and less strongly C. What are your thoughts on Java in terms of: * How much it would teach me about programming/software design, e.g. just as a general learning excercise? * What does Java lend itself best to/is a typical set of programs a beginner could build after say 1 month? * Is google planning on phasing Java out and using Go?
  - nikdaheratik 10y ago
    1. My beginners class in Uni taught Java for the 101/102 sequence, so as far as that goes you can use it to implement most beginners projects just fine. It even compiles to something if you want to deal with that experience. 2. I'd say the set of programs can be pretty sparse in that it doesn't tend to play well with its native computer environments (partially be design), so it's more work to generate stuff with a GUI, somewhat more work to handle CLI programs (but not that much more), and it has an interesting set of web tools that have hopefully been updated in the 8+ years since I played with them. 3. I have no idea what Google is doing, but it doesn't matter as Java will live a very long life in Enterprise land if nothing else.
  - pjmlp 10y ago
    Java might have its issues, but it is one of the languages with best tools available. For example, most languages eco-systems lack tooling like VisualVM, Mission Control, JITWatch on their canonical implementations. https://visualvm.java.net/ https://visualvm.java.net/ http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javaseproducts/mission-control/java-mission-control-1998576.html http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javaseproducts/missio... https://github.com/AdoptOpenJDK/jitwatch https://github.com/AdoptOpenJDK/jitwatch Also note that although many seem to be focused on Java being Oracle JVM or OpenJDK, there is a pleothora of JDKs both open source and commercial to choose from. With many other features. For example, most commercial JDKs support AOT compilation to native code. Or targeting micro-controllers with a few hundred KBs. Also Java gets bashed by being all about a specific OO model, but VB.NET, C#, Eiffel, Smalltalk follow exactly the same model. > Is google planning on phasing Java out and using Go? Until they embrace Go in Android, ChromeOS, their Google Developer SDKs and Google IO sessions, I would say no.
  - reitanqild 10y ago
    1. Java has had huge amounts of open source code for years. (Case in point: course provider sales representative telling my colleague somewhat annoyed that Java people are the worst because "they are used to get everything for free.) 2. Im going to read that as "... 1 month after finishing studies". I will recommend starting somewhere where you get good colleagues. When I finished school I was sure I could never work with Java: it was hard and unforgiving compared to VB and PHP that I had picked up on my own. After getting introduced to ides and working build systems however I was starting to get work done within a week and within a year I was confident enough to make a real difference. Also I picked up a feel for just how annoying it is to be left with maintaining code based on abandoned commercial tools (old Delphi code). 3. No idea, but IMO no way banks are leaving it anytime soon so plenty of jobs and momentum for the next few years:-)
scient 10y ago
So when you tell people that 3 years down the road the package ecosystem mess is going to be so bad that a package containing a one-line function broke half of the internet, they would go ahead and pick that technology to learn? Oh buddy.... say it aint so.

pjmlp 10y ago

.NET is alive and well. Enterprise only cares about Java and .NET as standard backend stacks, regardless of the technology of the day HN posts how everyone is doing Go and node.js.

vonklaus 10y ago
i actually have been interested in Java because apache has open sourced what seems to be the best collection of resources on the internet and they are almost entirely written in java for the java ecosystem. I also think I would learn a massive amount. I also am strongly considering Java and less strongly C. What are your thoughts on Java in terms of: * How much it would teach me about programming/software design, e.g. just as a general learning excercise? * What does Java lend itself best to/is a typical set of programs a beginner could build after say 1 month? * Is google planning on phasing Java out and using Go?
- nikdaheratik 10y ago
  1. My beginners class in Uni taught Java for the 101/102 sequence, so as far as that goes you can use it to implement most beginners projects just fine. It even compiles to something if you want to deal with that experience. 2. I'd say the set of programs can be pretty sparse in that it doesn't tend to play well with its native computer environments (partially be design), so it's more work to generate stuff with a GUI, somewhat more work to handle CLI programs (but not that much more), and it has an interesting set of web tools that have hopefully been updated in the 8+ years since I played with them. 3. I have no idea what Google is doing, but it doesn't matter as Java will live a very long life in Enterprise land if nothing else.
- pjmlp 10y ago
  Java might have its issues, but it is one of the languages with best tools available. For example, most languages eco-systems lack tooling like VisualVM, Mission Control, JITWatch on their canonical implementations. https://visualvm.java.net/ https://visualvm.java.net/ http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javaseproducts/mission-control/java-mission-control-1998576.html http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javaseproducts/missio... https://github.com/AdoptOpenJDK/jitwatch https://github.com/AdoptOpenJDK/jitwatch Also note that although many seem to be focused on Java being Oracle JVM or OpenJDK, there is a pleothora of JDKs both open source and commercial to choose from. With many other features. For example, most commercial JDKs support AOT compilation to native code. Or targeting micro-controllers with a few hundred KBs. Also Java gets bashed by being all about a specific OO model, but VB.NET, C#, Eiffel, Smalltalk follow exactly the same model. > Is google planning on phasing Java out and using Go? Until they embrace Go in Android, ChromeOS, their Google Developer SDKs and Google IO sessions, I would say no.
- reitanqild 10y ago
  1. Java has had huge amounts of open source code for years. (Case in point: course provider sales representative telling my colleague somewhat annoyed that Java people are the worst because "they are used to get everything for free.) 2. Im going to read that as "... 1 month after finishing studies". I will recommend starting somewhere where you get good colleagues. When I finished school I was sure I could never work with Java: it was hard and unforgiving compared to VB and PHP that I had picked up on my own. After getting introduced to ides and working build systems however I was starting to get work done within a week and within a year I was confident enough to make a real difference. Also I picked up a feel for just how annoying it is to be left with maintaining code based on abandoned commercial tools (old Delphi code). 3. No idea, but IMO no way banks are leaving it anytime soon so plenty of jobs and momentum for the next few years:-)

scient 10y ago

So when you tell people that 3 years down the road the package ecosystem mess is going to be so bad that a package containing a one-line function broke half of the internet, they would go ahead and pick that technology to learn? Oh buddy.... say it aint so.