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> this is a Google led project This doesn't give me much confidence if its Corporate governance rather than open governance.

by epage 4y ago

vitno 4y ago
The governance of the project is not immediately clear to me, and I have to assume that the Google team is working in good faith. That team cares a lot about C++ and its future. They are obviously aware of this stigma. I also think that Google is pretty bad at open source governance though :/ Disclosure: Former Google engineer who worked sorta adjacent to some of those people.
- chandlerc1024 4y ago
  FWIW, our governance structure is here: https://github.com/carbon-language/carbon-lang/blob/trunk/docs/project/evolution.md#governance-structure https://github.com/carbon-language/carbon-lang/blob/trunk/do...
  - vitno 4y ago
    Hahaha, I really like the "painter" terminology. A+
  - runevault 4y ago
    Huh looking at that page and saw Kate Gregory is involved. She's someone who, as a mostly outsider who dabbles in C++ occasionally, seemed incredibly dedicated to seeing C++ thrive and people come to understand the language. Her involvement here seems like a huge positive to me, but maybe that's coming from a place of ignorance.
dleslie 4y ago
Nor does it convey any confidence that Google will support it.
- DashAnimal 4y ago
  Can we not with this tired joke. Yes we're talking about the company with hundreds of chat apps, but we're also talking about the 100,000+ employee company that developed and support Golang, Dart and Flutter. But ignoring all this, the GitHub page is pretty clear: "Carbon is currently an experimental project." You shouldn't have confidence that it will be supported but they are pretty clear about it, they're trying to find the right fit.
  - dleslie 4y ago
    I wasn't joking. But yes, I agree, we should have no expectation of support for experimental or beta products.
  - thesuperbigfrog 4y ago
    >> Can we not with this tired joke. . . . You shouldn't have confidence that it will be supported . . . It is not a joke. It is a reputation that Google has earned through its actions and inactions. As shown by https://killedbygoogle.com/ https://killedbygoogle.com/ and numerous desperate posts for help [1][2][3] on this and other web sites, Google's "must launch a new shiny thing" promotion culture and abysmal customer service have eroded public trust in the long-term viability of anything that Google creates. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5523992 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5523992 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13145927 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13145927 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31837795 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31837795
    - TJSomething 4y ago
      The only comparable thing to an open source programming language on that list is AngularJS, and I wouldn't say that was killed but superceded by Angular 2 (which is also a lot better).
      - riku_iki 4y ago
        there was GWT.
foonathan 4y ago
Based on what they've told me the long term governance plan is to establish an independent foundation, with development controlled by three equal lead developers from different companies. It may have been started by mostly Googlers but they want other companies and individuals to participate
- vitno 4y ago
  Official governance vs the effective governance is the real crux of this issue. Immediately starting from the lead developers separated by companies already puts a deep corporate interest spin on the project. Choosing to do a lot of the initial work in secret and then disclosing is also a pretty big data point. I think this is going to be an uphill battle for them and I hope they win it but I'll be skeptical unless if I start seeing radical (for google) transparency basically immediately. Also worth pointing out that the language is not immediately worthless even if they fail or only partially succeed in this endeavor!!
  - ovao 4y ago
    This is an odd line to take considering the language spec is unfinished and there’s no implementation. Anything less than or earlier than this phase of initial work would be akin to “let’s make a new C++; anyone have ideas?” Also, for what it’s worth: despite being an ISO-standard language, C++ is still heavily swayed by corporate interests, with most committee members being tied to BigCos. This has the effect of somewhat-necessarily aligning language progress with its most significant users. Without this alignment, the language might be “better” in some respects, but less useful.
rvz 4y ago
So you had no problem with Golang being led by Google for more than 10 years and now this new language is somehow a problem because that one is also led by Google?
- epage 4y ago
  This is assuming a lot about me when in fact - I don't use golang - As an outsider, the governance has seemed unhealthy like with how dependency management was dropped out of no where However, it has been relatively successful. Dart's success has been more mixed. I am also looking more broadly at projects like Bazel.
chakkepolja 4y ago
Go is governed very well for all practical purposes. If you disagree with their opinions on language design (I do, too) that's another thing.

> this is a Google led project This doesn't give me much confidence if its Corporate governance rather than open governance.

by epage 4y ago

> this is a Google led project This doesn't give me much confidence if its Corporate governance rather than open governance.

vitno 4y ago

The governance of the project is not immediately clear to me, and I have to assume that the Google team is working in good faith. That team cares a lot about C++ and its future. They are obviously aware of this stigma. I also think that Google is pretty bad at open source governance though :/ Disclosure: Former Google engineer who worked sorta adjacent to some of those people.

chandlerc1024 4y ago
FWIW, our governance structure is here: https://github.com/carbon-language/carbon-lang/blob/trunk/docs/project/evolution.md#governance-structure https://github.com/carbon-language/carbon-lang/blob/trunk/do...
- vitno 4y ago
  Hahaha, I really like the "painter" terminology. A+
- runevault 4y ago
  Huh looking at that page and saw Kate Gregory is involved. She's someone who, as a mostly outsider who dabbles in C++ occasionally, seemed incredibly dedicated to seeing C++ thrive and people come to understand the language. Her involvement here seems like a huge positive to me, but maybe that's coming from a place of ignorance.

dleslie 4y ago

Nor does it convey any confidence that Google will support it.

DashAnimal 4y ago
Can we not with this tired joke. Yes we're talking about the company with hundreds of chat apps, but we're also talking about the 100,000+ employee company that developed and support Golang, Dart and Flutter. But ignoring all this, the GitHub page is pretty clear: "Carbon is currently an experimental project." You shouldn't have confidence that it will be supported but they are pretty clear about it, they're trying to find the right fit.
- dleslie 4y ago
  I wasn't joking. But yes, I agree, we should have no expectation of support for experimental or beta products.
- thesuperbigfrog 4y ago
  >> Can we not with this tired joke. . . . You shouldn't have confidence that it will be supported . . . It is not a joke. It is a reputation that Google has earned through its actions and inactions. As shown by https://killedbygoogle.com/ https://killedbygoogle.com/ and numerous desperate posts for help [1][2][3] on this and other web sites, Google's "must launch a new shiny thing" promotion culture and abysmal customer service have eroded public trust in the long-term viability of anything that Google creates. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5523992 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5523992 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13145927 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13145927 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31837795 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31837795
  - TJSomething 4y ago
    The only comparable thing to an open source programming language on that list is AngularJS, and I wouldn't say that was killed but superceded by Angular 2 (which is also a lot better).
    - riku_iki 4y ago
      there was GWT.

foonathan 4y ago

Based on what they've told me the long term governance plan is to establish an independent foundation, with development controlled by three equal lead developers from different companies. It may have been started by mostly Googlers but they want other companies and individuals to participate

vitno 4y ago
Official governance vs the effective governance is the real crux of this issue. Immediately starting from the lead developers separated by companies already puts a deep corporate interest spin on the project. Choosing to do a lot of the initial work in secret and then disclosing is also a pretty big data point. I think this is going to be an uphill battle for them and I hope they win it but I'll be skeptical unless if I start seeing radical (for google) transparency basically immediately. Also worth pointing out that the language is not immediately worthless even if they fail or only partially succeed in this endeavor!!
- ovao 4y ago
  This is an odd line to take considering the language spec is unfinished and there’s no implementation. Anything less than or earlier than this phase of initial work would be akin to “let’s make a new C++; anyone have ideas?” Also, for what it’s worth: despite being an ISO-standard language, C++ is still heavily swayed by corporate interests, with most committee members being tied to BigCos. This has the effect of somewhat-necessarily aligning language progress with its most significant users. Without this alignment, the language might be “better” in some respects, but less useful.

rvz 4y ago

So you had no problem with Golang being led by Google for more than 10 years and now this new language is somehow a problem because that one is also led by Google?

epage 4y ago
This is assuming a lot about me when in fact - I don't use golang - As an outsider, the governance has seemed unhealthy like with how dependency management was dropped out of no where However, it has been relatively successful. Dart's success has been more mixed. I am also looking more broadly at projects like Bazel.

chakkepolja 4y ago

Go is governed very well for all practical purposes. If you disagree with their opinions on language design (I do, too) that's another thing.