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Humans have been writing language as text for thousands of years. You're going to have a hard time changing it. What would be worse is something like mathemati
by alextgordon 16y ago
Humans have been writing language as text for thousands of years. You're going to have a hard time changing it.
What would be worse is something like mathematical or musical notation, with non-trivial layout rules and endless ambiguities. Or a complex binary format that only a computer can decode. Text files are actually pretty damn perfect as a simple mapping from computer (raw data) to human (language).
- david927 16y agoWhy in the world would we want to make raw data to language? You use a spreadsheet for your budget. You use an accounting system at work. Yet you use a text file to describe the mission critical rules your business runs on. This is the misconception we've run into: that we think we need to move programming languages to human languages, when human languages are bereft of concision and determinant qualities. We need to move in the opposite direction.
- alextgordon 16y agoSo let's assume we manage to tackle all the problems associated with non-textual formats (merging, compatibility, opacity, etc). What does this new way of programming do better?
- david927 16y agoI would say it the other way. When we can really free ourselves from text, we'll have made the main core changes that have been needed to make programming better.