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>>This is why after 50 years it is still a niche language, and will remain so. The bigger problem here is the number of programmers have increased disproportio
by kamaal 8y ago
>>This is why after 50 years it is still a niche language, and will remain so.
The bigger problem here is the number of programmers have increased disproportionately over the years. For that alone reason technologies had to be dumbed down to a point where anybody could use it.
If programming kept its original ethos, it would suffer the same problems one suffers taking a subject like Math mainstream.
But the real problem here is just starting now. You now have a whole generation full of masses of programmers who only do XML/JSON parsing, talking to HTTP interfaces and doing HTML and doing nothing more. This is like people doing basic algebra whole life. Eventually you won't get much out of this sort of practice.
At some point in time, to not max out the value generated by a system you have to up the level of the game, and that would come at a painful task of having to retrain entire generations of programmers which neither will be easy, and in many people's case it won't be possible.
Already languages like Java have shown their limits. To build anything meaningful you need large frameworks, with crazy dependency graphs, to manage which you need one another framework(DI). And with all that you barely get to do the ordinary stuff.
So eventually you would have only delayed the use of something like FP, not entirely eliminated it.
>>There is little demand for programming languages that are hard to maintain.
Java applications with 100 classes to post to REST interfaces will eventually suffer the same fate.
'Maintainability' is a very subjective term.
>>A working program lasts decades
Not true anymore. This was true pre dot com days. Thanks to all this agile processes and 'fail fast' culture. Code bases have very little life these days.
>>LISP is dead-end technology that will forever keep being brought up as its temptations are irresistible to some.
The success of Clojure means this is totally false.
- sametmax 8y agoIt's true and is why apple succedeed so much : make things easier for the mass. The lisp community refused, and has a serious elitist taste that you can even feel in the comments. I'm ok with it, but you must accept the price of this is peopme leaving, or not comming in the first place. To me it seems an acceptable deal. Plus you can't have your cake eat it.
- kamaal 8y agoProgramming is not easy. Its at-least as difficult as things you try to do with it. A bit like Math. You can't get simpler because you have to work with the reality it models. The thing with languages like Python. They will lower the bar for entry, but they will keep you at the beginner stage all along the stay. That's OK. Programming isn't a monolith, we already have several layers of programmers based on the complexity of the task they solve. So Lisp will have its own place, so will languages like Haskell and F#. Its also upto the programmer to decide at which layers they like to work.
- sametmax 8y agoYou can still learn python after 10 years of it. It's a language with a gentle learning curve, yes, but a long one. Don't confuse the fact it gives you quick productivity with being shallow. Lisp is espacially deep, so i won't dare to compare the 2, but python has way more under the belt that it's reputation. Which is great : only learn what you need at the moment you need it. Then curioisity can take you ahead if you wish.
- oblio 8y agoYour comment assumes that all programming is high tech. As a commenter from Reddit said: all programmers dream of painting the Mona Lisa yet most of programming is painting houses. A humongous percentage of developers are paid a lot to paint houses reliably: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/05/06/five-worlds/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/05/06/five-worlds/ (internal software, consultingware) In the software world, you either level up your tech skills or you level up your domain knowledge skills. Both are lucrative career paths. The second one can be easily covered with Java and it will continue to be so for the foreseeable future.
- kamaal 8y agoWhich is why I said, one must decide their own calling. But If learned programming, using C based languages, and that journey was done, I might as well go an extra mile and explore further. Nothing bad ever happened by gaining more knowledge.