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I'm not sure why choice of programming language is such a heated topic. "Want to use Java? Over my dead body", said a ex-Uber employee. "Let's rewrite Kafka in

I'm not sure why choice of programming language is such a heated topic. "Want to use Java? Over my dead body", said a ex-Uber employee. "Let's rewrite Kafka in Rust to avoid using Java in our team", said an employee in a $10B+ unicorn. "Go is a plague. Let's use Rust", said an employee in another $5B+ unicorn. Doesn't language itself contribute just a small portion to our productivity? The platforms and ecosystems of programming languages usually matter more? And it's simply childish to argue that GC sucks when your services handle merely 100s of QPS (even if millions of QPS, so what? It really depends on what you try to achieve), or to argue that language X sucks because it does not have feature Y. I hate to break the news to language fanatics: your program is slow most likely because you didn't choose the right data structures or algorithms instead of using the wrong language. You productivity sucks most likely because you didn't write simple, correct, or operable software.

palmtree3000 5y ago
> I'm not sure why choice of programming language is such a heated topic. I think there are two reasons. First, languages live or die by their ecosystems. If you love a language, it's very much in your interest for other people to use it, so they write code that you can use. Second, most programming happens at work. Most people don't get to choose what programming language they write at work: they're locked into whatever choice somebody else made. The more popular your language is, the more likely that choice is to be made in your favor (or alternatively, the easier it'll be to find a job where that choice has been made in your favor). If I want to write Idris at work, well, tough luck. Both of these are largely zero-sum, which makes things worse. It's not 100% zero-sum, in that if you manage to light a passion for <language> in somebody they might write code (in that language) that might not have been written at all. But mostly language evangelism won't change the total number of programming hours per year (or the number of available programming jobs), so all that's left is to fight over who gets how much. So if you care a lot about which programming language you write, I don't think it's odd to come at it from combative angle: it's a fight! Some will lose and some will win, so you better try and be one of the winners.
dragonwriter 5y ago
> I'm not sure why choice of programming language is such a heated topic. Because the market identifies job suitability by years of experience with a particular tool, so the popularity (in the market) of tooling a programmer has experience with is intimately tied to their job opportunities and financial prospects. If you are an “X programmer“, attacks on X are attacks on your livelihood. Conversely, if there is an abundance of Y programmers, convincing people that X, which far fewer are proficient in but where you are one of them, is superior for some high-value domain, is enhancing your livelihood. You’ve seen informercials exaggerating the negatives of alternatives while hyping a product in order to sell it? Well, while it's framed as being about tooling that's one step removed, that's basically what programmers are doing in language flamewars.

palmtree3000 5y ago

> I'm not sure why choice of programming language is such a heated topic. I think there are two reasons. First, languages live or die by their ecosystems. If you love a language, it's very much in your interest for other people to use it, so they write code that you can use. Second, most programming happens at work. Most people don't get to choose what programming language they write at work: they're locked into whatever choice somebody else made. The more popular your language is, the more likely that choice is to be made in your favor (or alternatively, the easier it'll be to find a job where that choice has been made in your favor). If I want to write Idris at work, well, tough luck. Both of these are largely zero-sum, which makes things worse. It's not 100% zero-sum, in that if you manage to light a passion for <language> in somebody they might write code (in that language) that might not have been written at all. But mostly language evangelism won't change the total number of programming hours per year (or the number of available programming jobs), so all that's left is to fight over who gets how much. So if you care a lot about which programming language you write, I don't think it's odd to come at it from combative angle: it's a fight! Some will lose and some will win, so you better try and be one of the winners.

dragonwriter 5y ago

> I'm not sure why choice of programming language is such a heated topic. Because the market identifies job suitability by years of experience with a particular tool, so the popularity (in the market) of tooling a programmer has experience with is intimately tied to their job opportunities and financial prospects. If you are an “X programmer“, attacks on X are attacks on your livelihood. Conversely, if there is an abundance of Y programmers, convincing people that X, which far fewer are proficient in but where you are one of them, is superior for some high-value domain, is enhancing your livelihood. You’ve seen informercials exaggerating the negatives of alternatives while hyping a product in order to sell it? Well, while it's framed as being about tooling that's one step removed, that's basically what programmers are doing in language flamewars.