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I think it is perfectly valid to heavily simplify things for a less-technical audience. The scientific models we teach kids in schools are simplified to the poi
by JonnieCache 16y ago
I think it is perfectly valid to heavily simplify things for a less-technical audience. The scientific models we teach kids in schools are simplified to the point of sometimes appearing outright wrong, however we don't go accusing science teachers of lying to or misleading our children.
As long as there are no deliberate deceptions, and links are provided to resources that give a fuller picture, there is no problem. If all the resources surrounding a technology are written at the lowest possible level of understanding, that technology will never be able to gain traction outside the world of hackers.
to the OP: maybe add a disclaimer to the effect of "Some of these points are simplifications, please read on elsewhere if interested to find out more"
- axod 16y agoThere's simplifying, and misleading. The only thing node.js does that other frameworks don't, is uses javascript as a language syntax.
- JonnieCache 16y agoIt also has a standard library that includes absolutely no blocking code, and contains no language structures that can block. I was under the impression that this was it's key feature, and also largely unique?
- axod 16y agoI don't think any stretch of the imagination would say it's unique. Good design choice, but exists many places.
- jerf 16y agoNot even close to unique. As I've said elsewhere, I haven't really got a problem with Node.js, but the hype is toxic. It has some nifty features but the standard hype-pack contains several lies about how unique Node.js is, or how performant it is. For the most part Erlang dominates it on all straight-up feature points, for instance, but it isn't Javascript. It very, very isn't Javascript, for both better and worse. But there are several languages that actually fail to block much better than Node.js. In fact, Node.js isn't what I personally would call "non-blocking", as it only has the weakest form of it. Node.js has cooperative multitasking; writing an infinite loop still takes everything down. Erlang, Haskell, and a growing number of other languages have preemptive multitasking, while still having sane concurrency compared to lock-based threading; infinite loops are still bad but will only lock up that local-running-unit (thread, process, whatever). That's non-blocking; within reason (modulo bugs, deliberate hostile attempts, etc), nothing you do in one thread will block another. If you need to shuffle various things around, Node.js is OK, but if you actually need to compute something that may take significant fractions of a second, you're going to have some sort of problem. Maybe that problem is bad latency on your other requests, maybe your problem is a sudden and bizarre need to chop up an otherwise-straightforward computation into many little pieces so other things get a chance to run which is easier said than done (chop too fine, lose performance, chop too coarse, lose latency on other responses, getting this right is very tricky), maybe you're going to have to manage worker OS processes, but it's going to poke out somewhere. Again, I don't really have a problem with Node.js, but the hype needs to be taken out back and shot.
- axod 16y agoIt'd be great to kill the hype, unfortunately though it seems to have always been there, it just moves around... Java -> Ruby on rails -> node.js etc etc
- JonnieCache 16y agoIf that is the path the hype has taken it certainly seems to leave a trail of thriving, highly productive industries and communities in its wake.
- axod 16y agoI disagree. The companies chasing the hype are bubble companies. The companies providing value, creating profits are using old boring tried and tested unfashionable technology.
- JonnieCache 16y agoThankyou for setting me straight.
- kmccarth 16y agogreat call, Jonnie. will add that disclaimer