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I personally enjoy the new & fancy. Infact, I try the new stuff because I enjoy trying it out, and the "gotcha" moment with that happens when you understand the

I personally enjoy the new & fancy. Infact, I try the new stuff because I enjoy trying it out, and the "gotcha" moment with that happens when you understand the stuff. That said, If I had to choose a tech stack for work, I'd choose something that I am comfortable with and something that I know a lot about (compared to the rest of the stuff available) - because in the end, it's not about having new and shiny so I can blog about, but to solve the problem that my company is facing/trying to solve.

nine_k 10y ago
There's an important difference: the new and shiny may be something that increases your productivity. The increase may be so big that it outweighs the risks of it not being mature or well-known enough. See Paul Graham's essay on Lisp as a secret weapon. There were a number of now-popular "secret weapons", most way less elegant than Lisp (e.g. Rails), used exactly because they made your product's time to market much shorter. Getting to the market quickly, while an opportunity still exists, is one of the most important problems any company is going to solve. Operational excellence may take a back seat compared to it.
- ohstopitu 10y ago
  I totally agree! That's why I check out the new stuff in the first place. It's not just "keeping up with hype" as most people say. Generally, new tech comes up with it's own way of doing stuff (which may be exactly what you need to solve your problem).
- bbcbasic 10y ago
  My counterargument is when rails came out PHP was just as capable of letting you knock stuff up quickly and meeting the business goals for a startup. Where rails excels I think is at shops that need to pump out different websites for different clients so that continually starting over cost is minimised. And Lisp is old tech.
  - nine_k 10y ago
    Rails, like all opinionated frameworks, gives you a great head start for a new project, as long as you follow the prescribed project structure. (It starts to feel worse as you grow and hit the restrictions of the baked-in assumptions.) Lisp is not "old tech"; Lisp is timeless tech. Like, well, math. BTW, Unix is also rather old, but still does remarkably well, and gave a distinct edge to its users since ~1990s when Linux and FreeBSD became viable server platforms.
    - bbcbasic 10y ago
      I meant old in a nice way :-). As in been around a long time. And timeless sure, although I have never written any lisp, maybe I should.

nine_k 10y ago

There's an important difference: the new and shiny may be something that increases your productivity. The increase may be so big that it outweighs the risks of it not being mature or well-known enough. See Paul Graham's essay on Lisp as a secret weapon. There were a number of now-popular "secret weapons", most way less elegant than Lisp (e.g. Rails), used exactly because they made your product's time to market much shorter. Getting to the market quickly, while an opportunity still exists, is one of the most important problems any company is going to solve. Operational excellence may take a back seat compared to it.

ohstopitu 10y ago
I totally agree! That's why I check out the new stuff in the first place. It's not just "keeping up with hype" as most people say. Generally, new tech comes up with it's own way of doing stuff (which may be exactly what you need to solve your problem).
bbcbasic 10y ago
My counterargument is when rails came out PHP was just as capable of letting you knock stuff up quickly and meeting the business goals for a startup. Where rails excels I think is at shops that need to pump out different websites for different clients so that continually starting over cost is minimised. And Lisp is old tech.
- nine_k 10y ago
  Rails, like all opinionated frameworks, gives you a great head start for a new project, as long as you follow the prescribed project structure. (It starts to feel worse as you grow and hit the restrictions of the baked-in assumptions.) Lisp is not "old tech"; Lisp is timeless tech. Like, well, math. BTW, Unix is also rather old, but still does remarkably well, and gave a distinct edge to its users since ~1990s when Linux and FreeBSD became viable server platforms.
  - bbcbasic 10y ago
    I meant old in a nice way :-). As in been around a long time. And timeless sure, although I have never written any lisp, maybe I should.