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I learned a definition of power that seems pretty unambiguous, at least to me: how easy is to build big things combining small things. I've seen it very clearl

by narag 8y ago

I learned a definition of power that seems pretty unambiguous, at least to me: how easy is to build big things combining small things. I've seen it very clearly in languages with a severe lack of power. In VHDL there aer familiar structures, like "if" blocks. But then I found that you can't nest certain structures and expect them to work. I've seen it in more powerful languages. You can build functions, modules, but sometimes it's very difficult to abstract certain behaviours. They tried to fill that gap with AOP, annotations, but I find them patchy and unelegant. I won't say that one language is "superior" to all others, but "power" is not so vague that can't be measured.

ncmncm 8y ago
Yes, power can have objective meaning. You still can't order languages along an axis, but powerful features make a powerful language, and features that compose well are more than additively powerful. Overwhelmingly, the most important criterion for the power of a feature is the degree to which it enables wrapping important semantics in a library, without creating overhead that makes you worry about whether you can afford it. It's better when the user doesn't need to understand the feature to use the library, although some enable better library interfaces; some of those, used in the interface, still don't demand the user know why. That's power. Libraries are more powerful, and make their host language more powerful, when they (1) can themselves be composed, with one another, and with powerful language features, and (2) exist. This is why the libraries you want to use always seem to be in some other language.
InclinedPlane 8y ago
How about a more direct measure of "power", the ability to get things done? Take a group of developers and have them build something of value, then measure the value of that thing. How do you measure the value? Well, there are a couple easy ways to do that. Widespread adoption, especially people building other valuable stuff on top of what the team built. That's a strong endorsement. Also paying money for something represents an obvious signal of value, of course. So you ask yourself, what sorts of languages are the things of obvious value built out of out there in the world? When you look you find a wide panoply of answers: C/C++, javascript, python, php, even bash scripts (even, ugh, batch scripts). You see a few examples of purportedly "advanced" languages like erlang or lisp (and relatives) in actual, shipping, functional, highly used software, but not that many. The arguments that there aren't enough brave pioneers out there learning these languages and trying to build stuff with them (there are tons) or that they just need critical mass of tools support to take off or something are fundamentally not serious. Devs work in all sorts of niche stacks constantly, and they're shipping stuff in all sorts of crazy languages all the time as well. Ultimately, it turns out that the "power" of a language encompasses a lot more than expressiveness or "functionality". It may be really nice to have macros and higher-order functions and all that jazz but to some extent there's a law of diminishing returns. This is true in hand tools as well. Sometimes it's actually faster and easier to just put a workpiece in a vice and do some hand work on it with a file instead of trying to figure out all the right G-code to get the 6-axis CNC to do the work for you.
- narag 8y ago
  How about a more direct measure of "power", the ability to get things done? Honestly, I don't think that's a more direct measure, on the contrary, though it's a good measure of value. The question you ask is more of "is really power what we need?". I would say yes, we need power, but not only. I actually agree with AnimalMuppet: some factor (like battery life) can render useless an otherwise impressive device. My objection is that you can't call "power" to any factor that makes you more productive. It's not just nitpicking. If you redefine power to mean value in general, you lose a more precise definition and take real power out of the equation to create value. One of the little insights that I've found useful when thinking about all kind of problems is the often overlooked importance of negative factors. People usually look closely to power, acceleration and readiness, but fail to consider factors that are absent or that prevent a process to get traction. I believe that the problem with Lisp is not that power is not important, or that we should call other things power, but that power is not sufficient by itself and there are other factors that prevented it for becoming the dominant language.

by narag 8y ago

ncmncm 8y ago

Yes, power can have objective meaning. You still can't order languages along an axis, but powerful features make a powerful language, and features that compose well are more than additively powerful. Overwhelmingly, the most important criterion for the power of a feature is the degree to which it enables wrapping important semantics in a library, without creating overhead that makes you worry about whether you can afford it. It's better when the user doesn't need to understand the feature to use the library, although some enable better library interfaces; some of those, used in the interface, still don't demand the user know why. That's power. Libraries are more powerful, and make their host language more powerful, when they (1) can themselves be composed, with one another, and with powerful language features, and (2) exist. This is why the libraries you want to use always seem to be in some other language.

InclinedPlane 8y ago

How about a more direct measure of "power", the ability to get things done? Take a group of developers and have them build something of value, then measure the value of that thing. How do you measure the value? Well, there are a couple easy ways to do that. Widespread adoption, especially people building other valuable stuff on top of what the team built. That's a strong endorsement. Also paying money for something represents an obvious signal of value, of course. So you ask yourself, what sorts of languages are the things of obvious value built out of out there in the world? When you look you find a wide panoply of answers: C/C++, javascript, python, php, even bash scripts (even, ugh, batch scripts). You see a few examples of purportedly "advanced" languages like erlang or lisp (and relatives) in actual, shipping, functional, highly used software, but not that many. The arguments that there aren't enough brave pioneers out there learning these languages and trying to build stuff with them (there are tons) or that they just need critical mass of tools support to take off or something are fundamentally not serious. Devs work in all sorts of niche stacks constantly, and they're shipping stuff in all sorts of crazy languages all the time as well. Ultimately, it turns out that the "power" of a language encompasses a lot more than expressiveness or "functionality". It may be really nice to have macros and higher-order functions and all that jazz but to some extent there's a law of diminishing returns. This is true in hand tools as well. Sometimes it's actually faster and easier to just put a workpiece in a vice and do some hand work on it with a file instead of trying to figure out all the right G-code to get the 6-axis CNC to do the work for you.

narag 8y ago
How about a more direct measure of "power", the ability to get things done? Honestly, I don't think that's a more direct measure, on the contrary, though it's a good measure of value. The question you ask is more of "is really power what we need?". I would say yes, we need power, but not only. I actually agree with AnimalMuppet: some factor (like battery life) can render useless an otherwise impressive device. My objection is that you can't call "power" to any factor that makes you more productive. It's not just nitpicking. If you redefine power to mean value in general, you lose a more precise definition and take real power out of the equation to create value. One of the little insights that I've found useful when thinking about all kind of problems is the often overlooked importance of negative factors. People usually look closely to power, acceleration and readiness, but fail to consider factors that are absent or that prevent a process to get traction. I believe that the problem with Lisp is not that power is not important, or that we should call other things power, but that power is not sufficient by itself and there are other factors that prevented it for becoming the dominant language.