4 ms·

I don't understand, are you saying that writing a language parser is a litmus test that that only real programmers can pass? What makes it so special compared

I don't understand, are you saying that writing a language parser is a litmus test that that only real programmers can pass? What makes it so special compared to other tasks of similar difficulty?

zeth___ 8y ago
Parsing is the fundamental task of programming: taking information, performing a transformation on it, passing it along. If you can't do it you might use computers but you're not programming. Tuning DE solvers might take as much skill, or more, than getting context free string parsed, but it's not a skill that is used outside of numerical computing. DBAs aren't called programmers for a reason, but they are no less valuable for it. The same applies for every niche skill that takes years to develop.
- athesyn 8y ago
  >The same applies for every niche skill that takes years to develop. so you just defeated your own argument, instead of hyper-focusing on writing parser why not just say "years of experience" if that is what really matters? no wonder you got shit on.
  - zeth___ 8y ago
    If you spend decades being a better juggler you won't be a better programmer, the same is true for all the meta-programming jobs.
- dmurray 8y ago
  What's the fundamental task of a DBA if not "taking information, performing a transformation on it, passing it along"?
Retra 8y ago
Parsing is a fairly simple and common activity with a huge background of research. Anything for which that is true in your field is something you should understand. Parsing, databases, concurrency, floating point numbers, optimization, common data structures, regular expressions, networking, operating systems, recursion, complexity theory, etc., are all things you should understand to be considered a competent programmer.
- zeth___ 8y ago
  The difference between parsing and everything else there is that every single program longer than 200 lines will need to take a string from somewhere and change it somehow. If you don't know how to parse a context free language you will write a a thing that accepts a recursively enumerable one and someone will make full use of every corner case you can't even imagine. It's pretty funny that next to no one here will even understand what I'm saying.
  - dang 8y ago
    Would you please stop doing this sort of flamewar on HN? It's off topic and tedious.
  - mkl 8y ago
    Probably because what you're saying isn't true. I have written programs with thousands of lines that do nothing with strings at all, as have a great many other people. Parsing is simply not the universal requirement you claim it to be, and declaring that only real programmers can do it just makes you look arrogant and ignorant.
    - sedachv 8y ago
      Did your programs take input? If you had studied parsing theory, you would know that "strings" do not mean ASCII/Unicode text strings, they mean sequences of symbols from a set. All communication protocols, any kind of input, can be described in terms of grammars, and that is important: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kEfedtQVOY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kEfedtQVOY
      - zeth___ 8y ago
        It's hilarious when people are so wrong they don't even realize they are wrong. We have a whole generation of people who work as coders but don't understand the first thing about computers. And there are so many of them that they even manage to convince themselves they are right.
      - 8y ago

I don't understand, are you saying that writing a language parser is a litmus test that that only real programmers can pass? What makes it so special compared to other tasks of similar difficulty?

zeth___ 8y ago

Parsing is the fundamental task of programming: taking information, performing a transformation on it, passing it along. If you can't do it you might use computers but you're not programming. Tuning DE solvers might take as much skill, or more, than getting context free string parsed, but it's not a skill that is used outside of numerical computing. DBAs aren't called programmers for a reason, but they are no less valuable for it. The same applies for every niche skill that takes years to develop.

athesyn 8y ago
>The same applies for every niche skill that takes years to develop. so you just defeated your own argument, instead of hyper-focusing on writing parser why not just say "years of experience" if that is what really matters? no wonder you got shit on.
- zeth___ 8y ago
  If you spend decades being a better juggler you won't be a better programmer, the same is true for all the meta-programming jobs.
dmurray 8y ago
What's the fundamental task of a DBA if not "taking information, performing a transformation on it, passing it along"?

Retra 8y ago

Parsing is a fairly simple and common activity with a huge background of research. Anything for which that is true in your field is something you should understand. Parsing, databases, concurrency, floating point numbers, optimization, common data structures, regular expressions, networking, operating systems, recursion, complexity theory, etc., are all things you should understand to be considered a competent programmer.

zeth___ 8y ago
The difference between parsing and everything else there is that every single program longer than 200 lines will need to take a string from somewhere and change it somehow. If you don't know how to parse a context free language you will write a a thing that accepts a recursively enumerable one and someone will make full use of every corner case you can't even imagine. It's pretty funny that next to no one here will even understand what I'm saying.
- dang 8y ago
  Would you please stop doing this sort of flamewar on HN? It's off topic and tedious.
- mkl 8y ago
  Probably because what you're saying isn't true. I have written programs with thousands of lines that do nothing with strings at all, as have a great many other people. Parsing is simply not the universal requirement you claim it to be, and declaring that only real programmers can do it just makes you look arrogant and ignorant.
  - sedachv 8y ago
    Did your programs take input? If you had studied parsing theory, you would know that "strings" do not mean ASCII/Unicode text strings, they mean sequences of symbols from a set. All communication protocols, any kind of input, can be described in terms of grammars, and that is important: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kEfedtQVOY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kEfedtQVOY
    - zeth___ 8y ago
      It's hilarious when people are so wrong they don't even realize they are wrong. We have a whole generation of people who work as coders but don't understand the first thing about computers. And there are so many of them that they even manage to convince themselves they are right.
    - 8y ago