8 ms·

The list of BREAKING CHANGES still keeps me away from doing more in Julia right now. https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/blob/release-0.6/NEWS.md#breaking-chang

The list of BREAKING CHANGES still keeps me away from doing more in Julia right now. https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/blob/release-0.6/NEWS.md#breaking-changes https://github.com/JuliaLang/julia/blob/release-0.6/NEWS.md#...

digitalzombie 9y ago
Yep, they stated version 1.0 will be the one where they stabilized. Likewise Rust is like this for the language. Their standard library iirc were still developing? So it suck in term of wanting something stable but at the same time they need people using their language. I think the upside is there are tons of stuff you can contributes including the small stuff.
- rspeer 9y ago
  No, Rust went 1.0 a while ago. They will not make breaking changes to the language until a hypothetical 2.0 release, which at the moment they are not considering. Of course the standard library changes; it's not a dead language. New features, including new functions in the standard library, are marked 'unstable' when they are introduced. Unstable features have to be explicitly requested, indicating that the programmer is aware that their functionality may change before they're stabilized.
  - steveklabnik 9y ago
    There is an important point here, which is that even if you've been stable for a while (two years for Rust) and even if you try to get that message out (some people on HN think there are too many posts about Rust), it can take a very long time for broad perception to catch up with reality. That's not a value judgement on those who didn't know; cache invalidation is a hard problem. But it's an interesting facet of languages that plays out in a number of ways. See the link to Dan Luu's post from forever ago, posted numerous times in this thread as another example.
  - notthemessiah 9y ago
    I'm not sure if Rust is a proper comparison, as the standard library for a language for scientific and technical computing is much larger than a language for systems programming: you want a vast vocabulary to deal with matrices as opposed to a minimalist set of orthogonal features for systems programming. Another consideration: with Julia, it aims to be both a full-featured programming language (with a type system and support for metaprogramming for library developers), as well as approachable enough for a scientist to pick up.
dbcurtis 9y ago
Well, yes, so maybe 0.x language specifications are not for you. That's not a problem. Pick your battles.
- jswny 9y ago
  Not sure why this is being downvoted. As far as I was aware, the point of 0.x language specs was to allow for breaking changes and rapid language development before stable 1.0+ releases. Is there something that I am missing here? I'm not very familiar with Julia, maybe they are handling it differently?
  - dbcurtis 9y ago
    Yes, I'm kind of curious about the down votes. Not voting at all, sure I get that. But hey, 0.x language spec is communicating up front that there is turbulence ahead, it's just good expectations setting. And as a user, there are times to avoid turbulence, and times to recognize when turbulence is simply the price you pay in return for the benefits of a tool that brings new capabilities. But then it is an ROI question. I totally get that 0.6 Julia may not have ROI for some people. But complaining about a 0.6 language spec having breaking changes.... that's like saying: "Hey, you advertised this candy bar as tasting like chocolate, but I prefer peanuts. I don't like it." Ummmm, yeah....
    - baldfat 9y ago
      Perhaps because all I said was that there are still long list of breaking changes is keeping me from doing more with Julia. I don't find that meaning I am battling anything, just I'm waiting till 1.0
ellisv 9y ago
Surprisingly all of my v0.5 code runs on v0.6.

digitalzombie 9y ago

Yep, they stated version 1.0 will be the one where they stabilized. Likewise Rust is like this for the language. Their standard library iirc were still developing? So it suck in term of wanting something stable but at the same time they need people using their language. I think the upside is there are tons of stuff you can contributes including the small stuff.

rspeer 9y ago
No, Rust went 1.0 a while ago. They will not make breaking changes to the language until a hypothetical 2.0 release, which at the moment they are not considering. Of course the standard library changes; it's not a dead language. New features, including new functions in the standard library, are marked 'unstable' when they are introduced. Unstable features have to be explicitly requested, indicating that the programmer is aware that their functionality may change before they're stabilized.
- steveklabnik 9y ago
  There is an important point here, which is that even if you've been stable for a while (two years for Rust) and even if you try to get that message out (some people on HN think there are too many posts about Rust), it can take a very long time for broad perception to catch up with reality. That's not a value judgement on those who didn't know; cache invalidation is a hard problem. But it's an interesting facet of languages that plays out in a number of ways. See the link to Dan Luu's post from forever ago, posted numerous times in this thread as another example.
- notthemessiah 9y ago
  I'm not sure if Rust is a proper comparison, as the standard library for a language for scientific and technical computing is much larger than a language for systems programming: you want a vast vocabulary to deal with matrices as opposed to a minimalist set of orthogonal features for systems programming. Another consideration: with Julia, it aims to be both a full-featured programming language (with a type system and support for metaprogramming for library developers), as well as approachable enough for a scientist to pick up.

dbcurtis 9y ago

Well, yes, so maybe 0.x language specifications are not for you. That's not a problem. Pick your battles.

jswny 9y ago
Not sure why this is being downvoted. As far as I was aware, the point of 0.x language specs was to allow for breaking changes and rapid language development before stable 1.0+ releases. Is there something that I am missing here? I'm not very familiar with Julia, maybe they are handling it differently?
- dbcurtis 9y ago
  Yes, I'm kind of curious about the down votes. Not voting at all, sure I get that. But hey, 0.x language spec is communicating up front that there is turbulence ahead, it's just good expectations setting. And as a user, there are times to avoid turbulence, and times to recognize when turbulence is simply the price you pay in return for the benefits of a tool that brings new capabilities. But then it is an ROI question. I totally get that 0.6 Julia may not have ROI for some people. But complaining about a 0.6 language spec having breaking changes.... that's like saying: "Hey, you advertised this candy bar as tasting like chocolate, but I prefer peanuts. I don't like it." Ummmm, yeah....
  - baldfat 9y ago
    Perhaps because all I said was that there are still long list of breaking changes is keeping me from doing more with Julia. I don't find that meaning I am battling anything, just I'm waiting till 1.0

ellisv 9y ago

Surprisingly all of my v0.5 code runs on v0.6.