4 ms·

A fair bit of that can be easily explained as cargo cult - a fair number of developers simply believe, because it's how they've been taught and what's been stat

A fair bit of that can be easily explained as cargo cult - a fair number of developers simply believe, because it's how they've been taught and what's been stated as fact over and over and over, that OOP is just 'how you write code'.

discreteevent 8y ago
Ok but objects have been successful for a very long time. And this is in a field where there are more potential early adopters than most. Programmers like new stuff. I think they have been successful because in the end a lot of the world we deal with behaves like objects. Devices, processes, remote machines all accept messages and those messages have 'side effects' in that they change the future behaviour of that thing.
- Fellshard 8y ago
  My current understanding (sure to change!) is this: Objects and messaging are best at the boundaries of system components. The internals end up being far simpler to state in functional terms, where the side effects can be pushed to the edges with far less inherent complexity. By assuming that objects are successful everywhere and always, it's really ignoring the regions where objects are more or less useful, painting over the picture with broad strokes. By learning multiple paradigms, you're learning broad principles that map well across all languages, as well as principles that are stronger or weaker in some paradigms than others. This enables you to be much more versatile when creating systems than devoting yourself to the 'One Way To Code' mentality.
  - bklaasen 8y ago
    Credit where it's due; that sounds like Gary Bernhardt's "functional core, imperative shell": https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/screencasts/catalog/functional-core-imperative-shell https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/screencasts/catalog/funct... Previous HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18043058 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18043058
sisu2019 8y ago
is it really cargo cult if it works though?

discreteevent 8y ago

Ok but objects have been successful for a very long time. And this is in a field where there are more potential early adopters than most. Programmers like new stuff. I think they have been successful because in the end a lot of the world we deal with behaves like objects. Devices, processes, remote machines all accept messages and those messages have 'side effects' in that they change the future behaviour of that thing.

Fellshard 8y ago
My current understanding (sure to change!) is this: Objects and messaging are best at the boundaries of system components. The internals end up being far simpler to state in functional terms, where the side effects can be pushed to the edges with far less inherent complexity. By assuming that objects are successful everywhere and always, it's really ignoring the regions where objects are more or less useful, painting over the picture with broad strokes. By learning multiple paradigms, you're learning broad principles that map well across all languages, as well as principles that are stronger or weaker in some paradigms than others. This enables you to be much more versatile when creating systems than devoting yourself to the 'One Way To Code' mentality.
- bklaasen 8y ago
  Credit where it's due; that sounds like Gary Bernhardt's "functional core, imperative shell": https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/screencasts/catalog/functional-core-imperative-shell https://www.destroyallsoftware.com/screencasts/catalog/funct... Previous HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18043058 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18043058

sisu2019 8y ago

is it really cargo cult if it works though?