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"A company like Microsoft" writes production code in literally every language. The stakes are low and nobody cares if your little team writes code targeting a

"A company like Microsoft" writes production code in literally every language. The stakes are low and nobody cares if your little team writes code targeting a Brainfuck compiler. (Yes, this is a real thing; there's a Brainfuck compiler developed somewhere in the vast guts of Google. No, I don't have a link to share with you, sorry.)

nicoburns 6y ago
> "A company like Microsoft" writes production code in literally every language. Not in core parts of Windows they don't. It's C++, perhaps some C, and now Rust. It's a pretty big endorsement.
- otabdeveloper4 6y ago
  No. There's all sorts of hoary crap in the core parts of Windows - Pascal, C++, C, C# and various dialects thereof, JavaScript, Visual Basic, Prolog. This just off the top of my head. It's not really an endorsement because the bar to getting into a Google or Microsoft or Facebook codebase is as low as it gets in this industry.
  - int_19h 6y ago
    As someone who actually works at Microsoft, I can confidently say that a toy third-party language would have absolutely zero chance of getting approved for production code in any major shipping product. The first question that any manager will ask the developer pitching this is, "Where do I find the devs to maintain this codebase long term? And what happens if the language dies upstream?" - and you better have really good answers to those, or else a very convincing story explaining how the productivity boost is worth it. Even Rust isn't all that easy. That it cleared the hurdle at all on so many teams already (and Windows especially!) is extremely impressive for a piece of tech so new.
    - otabdeveloper4 6y ago
      > "Where do I find the devs to maintain this codebase long term? And what happens if the language dies upstream?" This is the lowest of the low bars w.r.t. technology choice. Compare, for example, to the vetting and QA the Linux kernel does.
      - int_19h 6y ago
        Again, low or not, that is the bar that distinguishes fads from mature tech.

nicoburns 6y ago

> "A company like Microsoft" writes production code in literally every language. Not in core parts of Windows they don't. It's C++, perhaps some C, and now Rust. It's a pretty big endorsement.

otabdeveloper4 6y ago
No. There's all sorts of hoary crap in the core parts of Windows - Pascal, C++, C, C# and various dialects thereof, JavaScript, Visual Basic, Prolog. This just off the top of my head. It's not really an endorsement because the bar to getting into a Google or Microsoft or Facebook codebase is as low as it gets in this industry.
- int_19h 6y ago
  As someone who actually works at Microsoft, I can confidently say that a toy third-party language would have absolutely zero chance of getting approved for production code in any major shipping product. The first question that any manager will ask the developer pitching this is, "Where do I find the devs to maintain this codebase long term? And what happens if the language dies upstream?" - and you better have really good answers to those, or else a very convincing story explaining how the productivity boost is worth it. Even Rust isn't all that easy. That it cleared the hurdle at all on so many teams already (and Windows especially!) is extremely impressive for a piece of tech so new.
  - otabdeveloper4 6y ago
    > "Where do I find the devs to maintain this codebase long term? And what happens if the language dies upstream?" This is the lowest of the low bars w.r.t. technology choice. Compare, for example, to the vetting and QA the Linux kernel does.
    - int_19h 6y ago
      Again, low or not, that is the bar that distinguishes fads from mature tech.