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Python, PHP, and Ruby are not great languages. Google, Facebook, and Twitter are successful inspite of them. I'm not saying open source is bad, I'm saying Dev

by ggame 10y ago

Python, PHP, and Ruby are not great languages. Google, Facebook, and Twitter are successful inspite of them. I'm not saying open source is bad, I'm saying Dev culture in not paying for tools is bad. I agree that ideally it would be different. I speak from decades of experience doing Dev tools inc open source. All of my friends are practitioners in the space. We're all obsessed on how to get people to use better tools. It is something I've put a lot of thought into. I've personally spent over $200K on salaries for people to build open source tooling. If I could make a business out of it I would spend more. But I can't. I had to build an entirely separate company to make money. Edit (addendum): People who have paid $1500 for my software are grateful that I'll even talk to them; whereas open source freeloaders constantly demand I do more free work for them.

realharo 10y ago
>I'm saying Dev culture in not paying for tools is bad. I don't know, JetBrains seems really popular to me. Off the top of my head, I know of a few commercial tools that seem to be doing ok? (judging by their continued existence), e.g. https://blackfire.io https://blackfire.io, http://undo.io http://undo.io, https://scrutinizer-ci.com https://scrutinizer-ci.com, etc. Of course, a non-open-source programming language doesn't stand a chance today because of the massive network effects required for success, but that seems natural (people want to use what they already know, what they know is often what they learned in school or on their side projects).
- ggame 10y ago
  I think the point I was alluding to is that the market should be much bigger than it is. And it would be great if open source contributors could make money from their work.
hueving 10y ago
If you need that much tooling for a python project, you are overengineering or writing really poor code. I've never found a case where someone is using tons of 'better tooling' for a well engineered project. 'better tools' are crutches to support a 500,000 line spaghetti code base.
- ggame 10y ago
  I personally use Vim and Tmux for my IDE. But I build tools for people who aren't me and they need tools specialized for their job. Even general purpose devs can benefit from better compilers and code completion.
- chii 10y ago
  The reality is that there are lots of spaghetti code bases, and better tooling is a godsend for those. There is no situation where better tooling isn't better!
  - wolfgke 10y ago
    > There is no situation where better tooling isn't better! This is trivially a tautology. The non-trivial part is that what is better or worse depends a lot on the circumstances.
astrodust 10y ago
> Python, PHP, and Ruby are not great languages. What high horse did you fall off of? They may not be perfect languages, but they get the job done, and for many people they've made their career possible. Greatness doesn't come from beauty, PHP is the ugly bastard-child produced when Perl and C got drunk one night and had a baby, it comes from utility. > I'm saying Dev culture in not paying for tools is bad. Maybe that's bad, but you know what's worse? Back when you had to spend huge amounts of cash to get a barely working compiler because there were no viable open-source alternatives. This was on top of the huge amounts of cash you had to fork out for an operating system from a vendor like Sun or SGI. Oh, and you also had to drop thousands more on a proprietary system that could run it. So, yeah, good times back when nobody could afford to do anything but at least the people at Sun and SGI had jobs. Then Linux happened, then scripting languages like Perl, Python and PHP proved themselves capable of getting the job done, and the modern web came about. This would never, ever have happened without those tools. The single greatest thing to happen in the last twenty years is that you can get a computer that you can develop on using free languages, resources, and tools for under $10. That price is $0 if they use someone else's computer, or borrow time at a library. That, and that alone is enough to make these languages great.
- ggame 10y ago
  As you point out, sufficiently good. But not great. I agree that the world is a better place with open source. I simply wish there was a culture were developers opened their wallet and supported it. That way we would have even more of it.
  - astrodust 10y ago
    Then instead of bitching about the tools or the attitude of developers, which does nothing, why not work to encourage people to support it properly? For example: I think personal donations can only go so far. I'd rather see an easier sell for simple "support packages" that developers can recommend to their organization that helps further development. "We're really invested in package X and it'd be great to be listed as a supporter on their page, it's cheap marketing and they'll help us with technical support issues! We could try a $50/mo. subscription..." Compared to $50K annual server licences that's an easy sell if it can be phrased in a culturally compatible way.
aoeu345 10y ago
For what it's worth, I used to live with a guy who used the Magic Lantern firmware add-on for certain Canon cameras, which was very powerful free software that had a community forum. He would tell me about how he'd shit talk the devs for not including some feature or when something wasn't working. It's pretty terrible.
- fsloth 10y ago
  People think the interface layer they see is all there is and all developers need to do is add some goodwill to make the software function.
- astrodust 10y ago
  Having a community leader who isn't afraid to crack some heads to keep people in line is always important. People like this poison any community. Make a Code of Conduct and use it to control your community rather than let your community control you. It's like parents complaining their kids are "out of control" and "there's nothing I can do". Seriously? We've been raising kids for a hundred thousand years. This shit isn't new.
  - aoeu345 10y ago
    This is good advice. Don't be afraid to wield the ban hammer.
  - pbhjpbhj 10y ago
    >Seriously? We've been raising kids for a hundred thousand years. // I wonder what proportion of that has been done with only a couple of hours of parental/family contact per day (and those when the parents are most tired). Also probably, for better or worse, corporal punishment has been a mainstay up until the last few decades. In short, I don't think modern Western parenting can rely much on the methods of the past. It's totally OT but I'm interested in thoughts/responses.
  - ggame 10y ago
    People will complain about the code of conduct and again about their banning upon breaking a code of conduct. Managing a community takes a lot of time for something you're not getting paid for.

by ggame 10y ago

realharo 10y ago

>I'm saying Dev culture in not paying for tools is bad. I don't know, JetBrains seems really popular to me. Off the top of my head, I know of a few commercial tools that seem to be doing ok? (judging by their continued existence), e.g. https://blackfire.io https://blackfire.io, http://undo.io http://undo.io, https://scrutinizer-ci.com https://scrutinizer-ci.com, etc. Of course, a non-open-source programming language doesn't stand a chance today because of the massive network effects required for success, but that seems natural (people want to use what they already know, what they know is often what they learned in school or on their side projects).

ggame 10y ago
I think the point I was alluding to is that the market should be much bigger than it is. And it would be great if open source contributors could make money from their work.

hueving 10y ago

If you need that much tooling for a python project, you are overengineering or writing really poor code. I've never found a case where someone is using tons of 'better tooling' for a well engineered project. 'better tools' are crutches to support a 500,000 line spaghetti code base.

ggame 10y ago
I personally use Vim and Tmux for my IDE. But I build tools for people who aren't me and they need tools specialized for their job. Even general purpose devs can benefit from better compilers and code completion.
chii 10y ago
The reality is that there are lots of spaghetti code bases, and better tooling is a godsend for those. There is no situation where better tooling isn't better!
- wolfgke 10y ago
  > There is no situation where better tooling isn't better! This is trivially a tautology. The non-trivial part is that what is better or worse depends a lot on the circumstances.

astrodust 10y ago

> Python, PHP, and Ruby are not great languages. What high horse did you fall off of? They may not be perfect languages, but they get the job done, and for many people they've made their career possible. Greatness doesn't come from beauty, PHP is the ugly bastard-child produced when Perl and C got drunk one night and had a baby, it comes from utility. > I'm saying Dev culture in not paying for tools is bad. Maybe that's bad, but you know what's worse? Back when you had to spend huge amounts of cash to get a barely working compiler because there were no viable open-source alternatives. This was on top of the huge amounts of cash you had to fork out for an operating system from a vendor like Sun or SGI. Oh, and you also had to drop thousands more on a proprietary system that could run it. So, yeah, good times back when nobody could afford to do anything but at least the people at Sun and SGI had jobs. Then Linux happened, then scripting languages like Perl, Python and PHP proved themselves capable of getting the job done, and the modern web came about. This would never, ever have happened without those tools. The single greatest thing to happen in the last twenty years is that you can get a computer that you can develop on using free languages, resources, and tools for under $10. That price is $0 if they use someone else's computer, or borrow time at a library. That, and that alone is enough to make these languages great.

ggame 10y ago
As you point out, sufficiently good. But not great. I agree that the world is a better place with open source. I simply wish there was a culture were developers opened their wallet and supported it. That way we would have even more of it.
- astrodust 10y ago
  Then instead of bitching about the tools or the attitude of developers, which does nothing, why not work to encourage people to support it properly? For example: I think personal donations can only go so far. I'd rather see an easier sell for simple "support packages" that developers can recommend to their organization that helps further development. "We're really invested in package X and it'd be great to be listed as a supporter on their page, it's cheap marketing and they'll help us with technical support issues! We could try a $50/mo. subscription..." Compared to $50K annual server licences that's an easy sell if it can be phrased in a culturally compatible way.

aoeu345 10y ago

For what it's worth, I used to live with a guy who used the Magic Lantern firmware add-on for certain Canon cameras, which was very powerful free software that had a community forum. He would tell me about how he'd shit talk the devs for not including some feature or when something wasn't working. It's pretty terrible.

fsloth 10y ago
People think the interface layer they see is all there is and all developers need to do is add some goodwill to make the software function.
astrodust 10y ago
Having a community leader who isn't afraid to crack some heads to keep people in line is always important. People like this poison any community. Make a Code of Conduct and use it to control your community rather than let your community control you. It's like parents complaining their kids are "out of control" and "there's nothing I can do". Seriously? We've been raising kids for a hundred thousand years. This shit isn't new.
- aoeu345 10y ago
  This is good advice. Don't be afraid to wield the ban hammer.
- pbhjpbhj 10y ago
  >Seriously? We've been raising kids for a hundred thousand years. // I wonder what proportion of that has been done with only a couple of hours of parental/family contact per day (and those when the parents are most tired). Also probably, for better or worse, corporal punishment has been a mainstay up until the last few decades. In short, I don't think modern Western parenting can rely much on the methods of the past. It's totally OT but I'm interested in thoughts/responses.
- ggame 10y ago
  People will complain about the code of conduct and again about their banning upon breaking a code of conduct. Managing a community takes a lot of time for something you're not getting paid for.