4 ms·

I think it’s just that people have strong opinions about the tools they use, and that network effects in programming make people fear that other people’s choice

by enneff 7y ago

I think it’s just that people have strong opinions about the tools they use, and that network effects in programming make people fear that other people’s choices will be foisted upon them. Programmers have a strong desire to make things as ideally correct as possible, and that extends to technology choices (perhaps such choices are foundational) and so it can be an affront to one’s sensibilities to see the “wrong” choices being made. But ultimately we all have different value systems and experiences. What works for us, and more importantly what appears important to us, may be different to others. But that is okay. My take is that there’s a lot of space for experimentation with different ideas in languages and general approaches to building software. It’s still a very young field. We should keep pursuing lots of different ideas, old and new.

eeZah7Ux 7y ago
> network effects in programming make people fear that other people’s choices will be foisted upon them. The hype is the main problem with Go. It's a practical language but it's mediocre and in no way pushing the boundaries of language theory. Yet it's being sold as a huge leap forward in computer science. People who are forced to use it by network effect resent the decision is hype-based and not evidence driven.
- chewxy 7y ago
  > it's being sold as a huge leap forward in computer science. I don't think anyone is selling Go as a huge leap forwards in computer science. It is a huge leap forwards in software engineering though.
  - LanceH 7y ago
    It always seemed to be a leap forward in practicality to me. I need to read a queue, process something, and send a message of the results somewhere else. To do that I need a package for that specific queue, maybe something I'm sending to unless it is plain json, and the standard library. Installation is scp and a HUP. Where I'm using it, I don't need language theory, I just need to get my work done so I can move on to something interesting.
- enneff 7y ago
  I did a lot of selling of Go, for years, and my position was that it’s about building an ecosystem that’s a solid basis for software engineering. Not a quantum leap, just sound proven ideas that yield predictable and reliable results.
  - jessaustin 7y ago
    You use the past tense here. Why did you stop selling?

by enneff 7y ago

eeZah7Ux 7y ago

> network effects in programming make people fear that other people’s choices will be foisted upon them. The hype is the main problem with Go. It's a practical language but it's mediocre and in no way pushing the boundaries of language theory. Yet it's being sold as a huge leap forward in computer science. People who are forced to use it by network effect resent the decision is hype-based and not evidence driven.

chewxy 7y ago
> it's being sold as a huge leap forward in computer science. I don't think anyone is selling Go as a huge leap forwards in computer science. It is a huge leap forwards in software engineering though.
- LanceH 7y ago
  It always seemed to be a leap forward in practicality to me. I need to read a queue, process something, and send a message of the results somewhere else. To do that I need a package for that specific queue, maybe something I'm sending to unless it is plain json, and the standard library. Installation is scp and a HUP. Where I'm using it, I don't need language theory, I just need to get my work done so I can move on to something interesting.
enneff 7y ago
I did a lot of selling of Go, for years, and my position was that it’s about building an ecosystem that’s a solid basis for software engineering. Not a quantum leap, just sound proven ideas that yield predictable and reliable results.
- jessaustin 7y ago
  You use the past tense here. Why did you stop selling?