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Sorry, but I dont get point of using an Obscure language like Clojure. Also how are they different from directed edge a YC funded start up. If they are doing

by MADMEN 16y ago

Sorry, but I dont get point of using an Obscure language like Clojure. Also how are they different from directed edge a YC funded start up. If they are doing predictive analysis/machine learning stuff, It makes sense to use Java, Python and C in that order since Java is what Hadoop is written in, while python and C allow very low dev time and latter provides extremely fast execution. Using an unproven second class language like clojure shows that the team behind this project has a little experience in statistical modeling and related fields. No one case which lanugage you use if its FP or ruby or even worse fortran. In statistical modeling it finally boils down to fast execution of some sort of huge matrix multiplication. Really the only concern w.r.t language is readability/ compatibility with existing systems and low dev. time

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
dcotter 16y ago
Clojure is a Lisp for the JVM, so in a sense they are using Java. Besides, Clojure has been used in several high-throughput data analysis applications (FlightCaster for one), so it's not exactly an "unproven second-class language".
- MADMEN 16y ago
  see this is my exact problem,no one outside HN gives a fuck about grammar in real world or about which programming language ideals you love in real life. Flight Caster or the other company which google bought use huge data but with that they also use huge amount of rules. They are developing rule systems and engines and not Not a data mining system. The company in the post has a machine learning problem, what they require is fast matrix multiplication and great mathematical models and not some weird ass FP language ideals. Go to mloss.org and look for projects that use FP languages. in real life no one gives a fuck about lisp and other FP idiocacy, that why AI book by norvig has now code written in Python, thats why Google being one of the most leading AI companies uses C++ Python and Java. Thats why you wont find any one in any data mining/ mahcine learning department in any US university MIT/CMU/Stanford using some shit FP lanuages. Beacuse thats not their core business! nor spelling correctly is mine.
  - noarchy 16y ago
    You must be flamebaiting, as others have indicated. While it is undoubtedly true that Java, C++ and the like are favoured on a wide basis, you entered the lion's den by coming here to attack Clojure. HN is one of the rare spots where you are going to see devotees to more obscure languages like that.
  - plinkplonk 16y ago
    ",no one outside HN gives a fuck about.. which programming language ideals you love in real life." Good developers (who they are trying to hire) do. This is a recruitment pitch. In that context, "language ideals" are important.
    - icey 16y ago
      user: MADMEN created: 38 minutes ago Don't bother feeding the trolls.
      - plinkplonk 16y ago
        Good advice. My troll radar is mostly off on HN and I assume good faith and lack of English as a first language.
        strlen 16y ago
        Trolling must be the only explanation, because a) Doing data mining research and exploratory programming in a small company is probably the best use case for a Lisp. When you're Google you can afford to write this in C++ or Java (with layers of libraries taking the boiler plate out) as well waste research/prototype time on compile/link cycle (rather being able to program interactively). When you're Google, you can also afford to only hire machine learning people who know how to write production quality C++ (very rare combination of skills). Clojure is a more acceptable language: despite of what fanboys say, FP is not a black art reserved for 99.9th percentile programmers; the more C++ I write, the more convinced I get that C++ is. b) Clojure interop with Java makes it easy to use this sort of system with Hadoop, Mahout, Colt, etc... Sure there are more effective libraries available in C++, but they either proprietary to Google (MapReduce + GFS), not designed for fault tolerance (MPI) or more time consuming to use (LINPACK, LAPACK) c) Python is going to be 10-20 times slower, (perhaps 5x when you're using C interop).
sgrove 16y ago
I'm not sure you're quite familiar with Clojure - Java interop is pretty easy. There are problems, as with any lisp-dialect interacting with C/Java. My scheme-based 3d game engine has, at its lowest level, what essentially looks procedural opengl. But you build layers around these (quite quickly) in the lisp of your choice. That said, I spoke with this team a bit ago, and they seem like they definitely know that they're doing. The fact that they're writing in Clojure would make me think that 1) They're a team of capable hackers, and 2) They're a team of practical hackers. Really the only concern w.r.t language is readability/ compatibility with existing systems and low dev. time Did you just describe the main benefits of clojure to a T there? :)
- MADMEN 16y ago
  sorry but programming hacking/ data (not database) hacking are two different things. I have met proud programmers who think that Maths/stats are shit. Their aim as a company is to utilize the data collected by the website and build relevance models. Such models are mathematical models. thus its important which equations you come up with and now which language you use to write them. The reason I suggest Python / C++ / Java even R is that there is an extremely huge codebase in those languages. e.g. can you show me anything that matches capabilities of numpy scipy or R packages or the amazing code which is available on this website http://mloss.org/software/ http://mloss.org/software/. in clojure. When data is at heart of your startup your focus should the models and not some weird programming language ideals. infact it tell me that they are: 1: Bunch of programmers who have no expertise in Data Mining / Predictive Analytics. 2: Language nazi's and confused bunch who put up stuff like we love ruby, we adore clojure and you must play counter strike. A good example of a data based startup would be these people. http://www.cellixis.com/ http://www.cellixis.com/ By mentioning some stupid programming language in the whole discussion they have moved away from their core problem.
plinkplonk 16y ago
"Using an unproven second class language like clojure shows that the team behind this project has a little experience in statistical modeling and related fields." Flamebait like this detract from any points you intended to make. I am hardly the greatest fan of Clojure here, but the "second class" label is hardly justified.
- MADMEN 16y ago
  I consider it second class since very few people use it. IT makes harder for the developers who work there to market their skills. They stress way too much on the language, which worries me. Languages like Clojure or Mumps are second class due to their lack of use in other organizations. I have heard tales of people not getting jobs because of extensive experience with MSFT stack. using a little known language like Clojure just complicates your case, how is it different from someone going with Mumps experience?

by MADMEN 16y ago

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

dcotter 16y ago

Clojure is a Lisp for the JVM, so in a sense they are using Java. Besides, Clojure has been used in several high-throughput data analysis applications (FlightCaster for one), so it's not exactly an "unproven second-class language".

MADMEN 16y ago
see this is my exact problem,no one outside HN gives a fuck about grammar in real world or about which programming language ideals you love in real life. Flight Caster or the other company which google bought use huge data but with that they also use huge amount of rules. They are developing rule systems and engines and not Not a data mining system. The company in the post has a machine learning problem, what they require is fast matrix multiplication and great mathematical models and not some weird ass FP language ideals. Go to mloss.org and look for projects that use FP languages. in real life no one gives a fuck about lisp and other FP idiocacy, that why AI book by norvig has now code written in Python, thats why Google being one of the most leading AI companies uses C++ Python and Java. Thats why you wont find any one in any data mining/ mahcine learning department in any US university MIT/CMU/Stanford using some shit FP lanuages. Beacuse thats not their core business! nor spelling correctly is mine.
- noarchy 16y ago
  You must be flamebaiting, as others have indicated. While it is undoubtedly true that Java, C++ and the like are favoured on a wide basis, you entered the lion's den by coming here to attack Clojure. HN is one of the rare spots where you are going to see devotees to more obscure languages like that.
- plinkplonk 16y ago
  ",no one outside HN gives a fuck about.. which programming language ideals you love in real life." Good developers (who they are trying to hire) do. This is a recruitment pitch. In that context, "language ideals" are important.
  - icey 16y ago
    user: MADMEN created: 38 minutes ago Don't bother feeding the trolls.
    - plinkplonk 16y ago
      Good advice. My troll radar is mostly off on HN and I assume good faith and lack of English as a first language.
      - strlen 16y ago
        Trolling must be the only explanation, because a) Doing data mining research and exploratory programming in a small company is probably the best use case for a Lisp. When you're Google you can afford to write this in C++ or Java (with layers of libraries taking the boiler plate out) as well waste research/prototype time on compile/link cycle (rather being able to program interactively). When you're Google, you can also afford to only hire machine learning people who know how to write production quality C++ (very rare combination of skills). Clojure is a more acceptable language: despite of what fanboys say, FP is not a black art reserved for 99.9th percentile programmers; the more C++ I write, the more convinced I get that C++ is. b) Clojure interop with Java makes it easy to use this sort of system with Hadoop, Mahout, Colt, etc... Sure there are more effective libraries available in C++, but they either proprietary to Google (MapReduce + GFS), not designed for fault tolerance (MPI) or more time consuming to use (LINPACK, LAPACK) c) Python is going to be 10-20 times slower, (perhaps 5x when you're using C interop).

sgrove 16y ago

I'm not sure you're quite familiar with Clojure - Java interop is pretty easy. There are problems, as with any lisp-dialect interacting with C/Java. My scheme-based 3d game engine has, at its lowest level, what essentially looks procedural opengl. But you build layers around these (quite quickly) in the lisp of your choice. That said, I spoke with this team a bit ago, and they seem like they definitely know that they're doing. The fact that they're writing in Clojure would make me think that 1) They're a team of capable hackers, and 2) They're a team of practical hackers. Really the only concern w.r.t language is readability/ compatibility with existing systems and low dev. time Did you just describe the main benefits of clojure to a T there? :)

MADMEN 16y ago
sorry but programming hacking/ data (not database) hacking are two different things. I have met proud programmers who think that Maths/stats are shit. Their aim as a company is to utilize the data collected by the website and build relevance models. Such models are mathematical models. thus its important which equations you come up with and now which language you use to write them. The reason I suggest Python / C++ / Java even R is that there is an extremely huge codebase in those languages. e.g. can you show me anything that matches capabilities of numpy scipy or R packages or the amazing code which is available on this website http://mloss.org/software/ http://mloss.org/software/. in clojure. When data is at heart of your startup your focus should the models and not some weird programming language ideals. infact it tell me that they are: 1: Bunch of programmers who have no expertise in Data Mining / Predictive Analytics. 2: Language nazi's and confused bunch who put up stuff like we love ruby, we adore clojure and you must play counter strike. A good example of a data based startup would be these people. http://www.cellixis.com/ http://www.cellixis.com/ By mentioning some stupid programming language in the whole discussion they have moved away from their core problem.

plinkplonk 16y ago

"Using an unproven second class language like clojure shows that the team behind this project has a little experience in statistical modeling and related fields." Flamebait like this detract from any points you intended to make. I am hardly the greatest fan of Clojure here, but the "second class" label is hardly justified.

MADMEN 16y ago
I consider it second class since very few people use it. IT makes harder for the developers who work there to market their skills. They stress way too much on the language, which worries me. Languages like Clojure or Mumps are second class due to their lack of use in other organizations. I have heard tales of people not getting jobs because of extensive experience with MSFT stack. using a little known language like Clojure just complicates your case, how is it different from someone going with Mumps experience?