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Google has had a horrible track record in seeing things through. So there are two issues here. One, there are already too many programming languages out there.

Google has had a horrible track record in seeing things through. So there are two issues here. One, there are already too many programming languages out there. Two, you just can't trust google to make it into a mature and viable language that you would invest time in learning. As of now, I'm hoping javascript and Node.js become the dominate language of choice.

jurjenh 15y ago
Go seems to be doing alright. And that came from Google. And you can't get better languages without developing more...
- wanorris 15y ago
  I would classify Python and C# as languages that have improved considerably over time. So I would say that it is, in fact, possible to get better languages without developing more.
  - jurjenh 15y ago
    I don't disagree with that, as a language that is actively maintained should (hopefully) get better over time. The key thing is to develop new techniques for solving problems - think iterative versus recursive, or functional programming versus logic programming. A given language is most likely targeted (or has least resistance) towards one style of programming, which means that new abstractions are likely to work better in a new language, one that has been developed with these blocks as starting points rather than added later. It might be nice to focus development of specific key languages to avoid too much fragmentation by picking best-of-breed, but everyone's got their own itch... and for some that is developing new languages.
  - MartinCron 15y ago
    C# hasn't just improved itself considerably, C# put pressure on Java to improve as well. That's why I welcome the creation of any and all new languages. I don't need to be on the cutting edge and try to learn all of them, I can wait until the early adopters see value in them and then learn from the things that work.
shuzchen 15y ago
I think you don't understand what Google intends when they release a new product. Do you want a company to 1) only brew products (with a business model) internally until it is ready to ship, or 2) develop and release lots of things and see what works or not? Google leans towards #2. They don't really care if they can make money off of something, if one of their engineers is interested in something they're allowed to take that risk. They put lots of stuff in the wild and if it doesn't stick then they kill it (or in most cases leave the source to the public - see wave) - or try to make it profitable (look at gapps). Yes, a lot of things coming out of Google die, but that's only because they're putting out lots of things all the time. The day they stop putting out unproven stuff and only release v1.0 products is the day they lose their innovation edge.
- gzmask 15y ago
  so basically google's strategic is the genetic algorithm?

jurjenh 15y ago

Go seems to be doing alright. And that came from Google. And you can't get better languages without developing more...

wanorris 15y ago
I would classify Python and C# as languages that have improved considerably over time. So I would say that it is, in fact, possible to get better languages without developing more.
- jurjenh 15y ago
  I don't disagree with that, as a language that is actively maintained should (hopefully) get better over time. The key thing is to develop new techniques for solving problems - think iterative versus recursive, or functional programming versus logic programming. A given language is most likely targeted (or has least resistance) towards one style of programming, which means that new abstractions are likely to work better in a new language, one that has been developed with these blocks as starting points rather than added later. It might be nice to focus development of specific key languages to avoid too much fragmentation by picking best-of-breed, but everyone's got their own itch... and for some that is developing new languages.
- MartinCron 15y ago
  C# hasn't just improved itself considerably, C# put pressure on Java to improve as well. That's why I welcome the creation of any and all new languages. I don't need to be on the cutting edge and try to learn all of them, I can wait until the early adopters see value in them and then learn from the things that work.

shuzchen 15y ago

I think you don't understand what Google intends when they release a new product. Do you want a company to 1) only brew products (with a business model) internally until it is ready to ship, or 2) develop and release lots of things and see what works or not? Google leans towards #2. They don't really care if they can make money off of something, if one of their engineers is interested in something they're allowed to take that risk. They put lots of stuff in the wild and if it doesn't stick then they kill it (or in most cases leave the source to the public - see wave) - or try to make it profitable (look at gapps). Yes, a lot of things coming out of Google die, but that's only because they're putting out lots of things all the time. The day they stop putting out unproven stuff and only release v1.0 products is the day they lose their innovation edge.

gzmask 15y ago
so basically google's strategic is the genetic algorithm?