4 ms·

Definitely true for natural languages. English is very pragmatic and "dry" to my ear, perfect for engineering. But I feel like all mainstream programming langu

by tx 18y ago

Definitely true for natural languages. English is very pragmatic and "dry" to my ear, perfect for engineering. But I feel like all mainstream programming languages aren't truly "languages", they're mostly dialects of X, where "X" is a fusion of Lisp and C, i.e. same old ideas repackaged in different syntactic packaging. This is why I am always skeptical about dramatic increases in productivity due to a language switch. Good editor and decent chair produce similar boosts: noticeable? Sometimes. Dramatic? No. In my opinion two most important characteristics of programming languages are recruiting and maintainability. The former is important because certain languages attract better quality engineers and some are impossible to find experts for. Maintainability speaks for itself: the code should be easy to transform indefinitely, beat into shape, keep improving upon, etc.

technoguyrob 18y ago
But I feel like all mainstream programming languages aren't truly "languages", they're mostly dialects of X, where "X" is a fusion of Lisp and C, i.e. same old ideas repackaged in different syntactic packaging. How are "normal" languages not the same old ideas repackaged in different syntactic packaging? I'd say "dog" and "hond" aren't different ideas even though one is in English and the other in Dutch. They're just the same old ideas repackaged in different syntactic packages. Isn't that practically the definition of a language? Some things that take me a sentence to say in English can are only a few phonemes in Japanese, but does that mean Japanese isn't a real language because it's the same idea in a different syntax? I'd say syntactic difference is possibly the defining characteristic of a language. Perhaps this is simply indicative that the term "language" is innapropriate to apply to a programming grammar.

by tx 18y ago

technoguyrob 18y ago

But I feel like all mainstream programming languages aren't truly "languages", they're mostly dialects of X, where "X" is a fusion of Lisp and C, i.e. same old ideas repackaged in different syntactic packaging. How are "normal" languages not the same old ideas repackaged in different syntactic packaging? I'd say "dog" and "hond" aren't different ideas even though one is in English and the other in Dutch. They're just the same old ideas repackaged in different syntactic packages. Isn't that practically the definition of a language? Some things that take me a sentence to say in English can are only a few phonemes in Japanese, but does that mean Japanese isn't a real language because it's the same idea in a different syntax? I'd say syntactic difference is possibly the defining characteristic of a language. Perhaps this is simply indicative that the term "language" is innapropriate to apply to a programming grammar.