5 ms·

That is so sad, he was in his late 60s and it seemed like he had a lot of life left in him, talking about how software can get better and having a great (and s

by dpeck 8y ago

That is so sad, he was in his late 60s and it seemed like he had a lot of life left in him, talking about how software can get better and having a great (and sometimes snarky) outlook on the profession. Highly recommend his thesis (2003) and a few of his great interviews/presentations for anyone who isn’t familiar with Joe, it captures a lot of what he thought about and pushed for in his professional life. http://erlang.org/download/armstrong_thesis_2003.pdf http://erlang.org/download/armstrong_thesis_2003.pdf https://youtu.be/fhOHn9TClXY https://youtu.be/fhOHn9TClXY https://youtu.be/lKXe3HUG2l4 https://youtu.be/lKXe3HUG2l4 https://youtu.be/rmueBVrLKcY https://youtu.be/rmueBVrLKcY I hope his family and friends can find some comfort in how much he was appreciated and admired in the development community.

nextos 8y ago
I came here to say the same thing. His thesis is extremely readable and illuminating on the topic of reliable distributed systems.
- jacquesm 8y ago
  It goes much further than that, it shows how to tackle reliability even in systems that are not distributed. The primary insight is that all software will be buggy so you need to bake reliability in from day one by assuming your work product will contain faults.
  - nextos 8y ago
    Yes, I know. Erlang was not distributed till 1991, roughly 5 years after it was born. It's also really illuminating how they implemented the first versions of Erlang as a reified Prolog [1]. But that is not explained in the thesis, just in his 1992 paper which he briefly cites. [1] https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download;jsessionid=F47FE951F0EE95C02E755CF55F15033F?doi=10.1.1.34.3972&rep=rep1&type=pdf https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download;jsessionid=F4...
masklinn 8y ago
> That is so sad, he seemed like he had a lot of life left in him talking about how software can get better and having a great (and sometimes snarky) outlook on the profession. I'm in actual shock, he was tweeting about pretty much that (also brexit and playing with his phone's voice recognition) just 2 weeks ago… He wasn't even 70…
- pera 8y ago
  Yeah me too, he was also very active in the Elixir forum. RIP
  - mercer 8y ago
    He was even made admin just over a week ago :-/. https://elixirforum.com/t/introducing-our-new-moderators-and-a-new-admin-joe-armstrong/ https://elixirforum.com/t/introducing-our-new-moderators-and...
pklee 8y ago
I came in thinking.. god it better not be him.. it better not be him.. so sad to hear this.. I loved his book on erlang. Just an amazing mind

by dpeck 8y ago

nextos 8y ago

I came here to say the same thing. His thesis is extremely readable and illuminating on the topic of reliable distributed systems.

jacquesm 8y ago
It goes much further than that, it shows how to tackle reliability even in systems that are not distributed. The primary insight is that all software will be buggy so you need to bake reliability in from day one by assuming your work product will contain faults.
- nextos 8y ago
  Yes, I know. Erlang was not distributed till 1991, roughly 5 years after it was born. It's also really illuminating how they implemented the first versions of Erlang as a reified Prolog [1]. But that is not explained in the thesis, just in his 1992 paper which he briefly cites. [1] https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download;jsessionid=F47FE951F0EE95C02E755CF55F15033F?doi=10.1.1.34.3972&rep=rep1&type=pdf https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download;jsessionid=F4...

masklinn 8y ago

> That is so sad, he seemed like he had a lot of life left in him talking about how software can get better and having a great (and sometimes snarky) outlook on the profession. I'm in actual shock, he was tweeting about pretty much that (also brexit and playing with his phone's voice recognition) just 2 weeks ago… He wasn't even 70…

pera 8y ago
Yeah me too, he was also very active in the Elixir forum. RIP
- mercer 8y ago
  He was even made admin just over a week ago :-/. https://elixirforum.com/t/introducing-our-new-moderators-and-a-new-admin-joe-armstrong/ https://elixirforum.com/t/introducing-our-new-moderators-and...

pklee 8y ago

I came in thinking.. god it better not be him.. it better not be him.. so sad to hear this.. I loved his book on erlang. Just an amazing mind