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Because the average Erlang developer is probably a better developer than the average in those languages and still quite capable of writing in any of those langu

Because the average Erlang developer is probably a better developer than the average in those languages and still quite capable of writing in any of those languages, at least with a little study and practice. Are we really to believe that the average Javascript developer is going to be able to be dropped in an Erlang shop (or any of the other "weird" languages) and be productive any time soon?

scarface74 4y ago
The “language” is the easy part. Every language has an ecosystem around it and foot guns and best practices and frameworks. Take C# for instance, sure the language is decently easy. But, the first and third party frameworks around it are huge. I’m sure I could (re)learn Java that I haven’t touched since shortly after it was first introduced in the 90s in a few weeks. That doesn’t mean I would be a competent Android developer. The average JavaScript developer would be an idiot to ever step foot in Erlang shop if he knew what was good for his career. My resume was sacrosanct when I was in the enterprise dev world until mid 2020. Why would I reduce my optionality by not using the most marketable technologies?
- wiseowise 4y ago
  > That doesn’t mean I would be a competent Android developer. Sure you will. There’s no “Android developer”, there’s Java/Kotlin developer who uses Android SDK.
  - scarface74 4y ago
    And I assure you that someone who needs an Android app written wouldn’t care about your distinction or are you claiming that a Java developer who never wrote an application for Android would be just as effective as one who had? Who would you rather lead the development of your Android app? Someone with no experience with Android or someone with previous experience.
    - wiseowise 4y ago
      I’ll absolutely pick competent Java developer who never touched a line of Android over mediocre “Android” developer.
      - scarface74 4y ago
        And how do you think that would work out if you’re hiring a lead developer to oversee a team who is trying to release an Android app?
        brigandish 4y ago
        That depends on the team leader and how well they can take suggestions. It's a team, not everyone will have the same background and, probably, nor would it be best that they did.
        scarface74 4y ago
        So if the team lead that I’m hiring to be the subject matter expert can’t be the go to person for technical solutions based on relevant experience in the domain, who should it be?
        brigandish 4y ago
        A team lead does not need to be: a) the most experienced amongst the team in any particular language b) the most experienced amongst the team in any particular domain c) the go-to person for any particular problem The whole point of a team is to cover several different sets of knowledge and experience because no one person can know it all or do it all. A leader does their best to enable this collective to produce the best it can. Leaders know this.
- bruce511 4y ago
  It seems like a case of different incentives for different people. If the incentive is to ship product then choosing the language you already have a team for makes the most sense. If you are choosing based on hiring a new team, then the current flavors work. 20 years ago that was Java. Today it's C#. 20 years from now it'll be something else. If you are a developer looking to grow a resume for the next job, then it's a double-edged sword. Sure it's easier to get a C# gig. But it pays less because you're in a bigger pool. It's harder to stand out. Conversely it's harder to get say a Cobol gig. But it's easier to build a profile in the Cobol community (simply by being under 80 years old) and there is a Lot of work around, and is very well paid. Equally something that's marginally popular now will have a long tail and can be very lucrative. Erlang might be obscure, but there are plenty of shops who would love to pick up another experienced, capable, erlang developer. You're a bigger fish in a smaller pond. So yeah, language is like most things, dependant on your point of view. That's why we gave so many of them.
  - scarface74 4y ago
    20 years ago, Java was already becoming pretty big in the enterprise. Today there are plenty of Java jobs from your bog standard banks and insurance companies all the way up to the BigTech companies. The biggest ponds don’t have fish using Erlang. BTW, what languages do you think all of those BigTech companies that pay well are using? I just keep bringing up C# because that’s the language I have the most experience with. But substitute $any popular language.
    - wiseowise 4y ago
      Certainly not C#, lol. Even OCamls share would be bigger within big tech, thanks to Meta.
      - scarface74 4y ago
        I work in BigTech now. In the last two years I’ve done projects in C#, Java, Go, Python and Typescript…
      - 4y ago
- sterlind 4y ago
  I don't think it's always easy. it's been quite a struggle becoming proficient in Haskell, just drinking from the firehose of type theory you need to get things done. also note that Jane Street does everything in OCaml. I can't believe it's bad for their employees' careers. probably because they're not looking for the same jobs as the average JavaScript pleb.
- rowanG077 4y ago
  The language is only easy if you have basically learned the language already. Java, C#, C++, Python, Go etc. all differ but fundamentally they are all the same language with different amounts of window dressing. So yeah if you know one of them it's easy to "learn" the others. But I wouldn't really call this learning a new language. It's a fundamentally different ask to learn Haskell, datalog, SaC. You are actually learning a new language instead of just the flavour of the week imperative programming.
  - AstralStorm 4y ago
    If the language is the hard part, something is wrong with it. Usually. I've seen and user a whole slew of opinionated languages, and they almost always have a big chunk of problems they will be awkward to use for, or even almost insoluble. Every succesful one supports multiple programming paradigms, better or worse, usually decently. Now the real stuff that can cause problems is bad tooling and lack of support. You cannot code your things when you're trying to fix the compiler, build tools or the debugger.
  - scarface74 4y ago
    The last time I had a job where I only had to learn “the language” to be effective was 1999 programming in C and FORTRAN on VAX and Stratus mainframes. By 2000, “knowing C or C++” didn’t do any good without knowing MFC, COM, etc. What good is a language in 2022 without a complete ecosystem of frameworks for most jobs?
    - rowanG077 4y ago
      Even esoteric languages have a relative complete ecosystem of frameworks. I use Haskell in my day job and I never had issues finding a library.
      - AstralStorm 4y ago
        Haskell is not particularly esoteric, but heavily opinionated. Libraries cannot change that basic fact - there are just problems it will be extremely unsuited for. Java has some of the same problem by the way in reverse. (Package handling, forced garbage collection and unknown real time and memory usage characteristics.) The difference being that Java's core has much less important opinions about algorithms, while Haskell tries to make everything functional or it is awkward. So, while Haskell will be hard to use for problems best described in an imperative way (in addition to other issues say Java has), Java will only have serious problems where memory and runtime determinism are paramount. It so happens that a lot of the programming is done in imperative way. Including the libraries.
- pharmakom 4y ago
  I would be more likely to hire a JS dev if they have Elixir experience not less, but I am not in the enterprise world. Work is not only about money for me. My best work environments have been a small team of skilled people tackling a big problem. For this we would use whatever is the best tool for the job, regardless of its outside popularity.

scarface74 4y ago

The “language” is the easy part. Every language has an ecosystem around it and foot guns and best practices and frameworks. Take C# for instance, sure the language is decently easy. But, the first and third party frameworks around it are huge. I’m sure I could (re)learn Java that I haven’t touched since shortly after it was first introduced in the 90s in a few weeks. That doesn’t mean I would be a competent Android developer. The average JavaScript developer would be an idiot to ever step foot in Erlang shop if he knew what was good for his career. My resume was sacrosanct when I was in the enterprise dev world until mid 2020. Why would I reduce my optionality by not using the most marketable technologies?

wiseowise 4y ago
> That doesn’t mean I would be a competent Android developer. Sure you will. There’s no “Android developer”, there’s Java/Kotlin developer who uses Android SDK.
- scarface74 4y ago
  And I assure you that someone who needs an Android app written wouldn’t care about your distinction or are you claiming that a Java developer who never wrote an application for Android would be just as effective as one who had? Who would you rather lead the development of your Android app? Someone with no experience with Android or someone with previous experience.
  - wiseowise 4y ago
    I’ll absolutely pick competent Java developer who never touched a line of Android over mediocre “Android” developer.
    - scarface74 4y ago
      And how do you think that would work out if you’re hiring a lead developer to oversee a team who is trying to release an Android app?
      - brigandish 4y ago
        That depends on the team leader and how well they can take suggestions. It's a team, not everyone will have the same background and, probably, nor would it be best that they did.
        scarface74 4y ago
        So if the team lead that I’m hiring to be the subject matter expert can’t be the go to person for technical solutions based on relevant experience in the domain, who should it be?
        brigandish 4y ago
        A team lead does not need to be: a) the most experienced amongst the team in any particular language b) the most experienced amongst the team in any particular domain c) the go-to person for any particular problem The whole point of a team is to cover several different sets of knowledge and experience because no one person can know it all or do it all. A leader does their best to enable this collective to produce the best it can. Leaders know this.
bruce511 4y ago
It seems like a case of different incentives for different people. If the incentive is to ship product then choosing the language you already have a team for makes the most sense. If you are choosing based on hiring a new team, then the current flavors work. 20 years ago that was Java. Today it's C#. 20 years from now it'll be something else. If you are a developer looking to grow a resume for the next job, then it's a double-edged sword. Sure it's easier to get a C# gig. But it pays less because you're in a bigger pool. It's harder to stand out. Conversely it's harder to get say a Cobol gig. But it's easier to build a profile in the Cobol community (simply by being under 80 years old) and there is a Lot of work around, and is very well paid. Equally something that's marginally popular now will have a long tail and can be very lucrative. Erlang might be obscure, but there are plenty of shops who would love to pick up another experienced, capable, erlang developer. You're a bigger fish in a smaller pond. So yeah, language is like most things, dependant on your point of view. That's why we gave so many of them.
- scarface74 4y ago
  20 years ago, Java was already becoming pretty big in the enterprise. Today there are plenty of Java jobs from your bog standard banks and insurance companies all the way up to the BigTech companies. The biggest ponds don’t have fish using Erlang. BTW, what languages do you think all of those BigTech companies that pay well are using? I just keep bringing up C# because that’s the language I have the most experience with. But substitute $any popular language.
  - wiseowise 4y ago
    Certainly not C#, lol. Even OCamls share would be bigger within big tech, thanks to Meta.
    - scarface74 4y ago
      I work in BigTech now. In the last two years I’ve done projects in C#, Java, Go, Python and Typescript…
    - 4y ago
sterlind 4y ago
I don't think it's always easy. it's been quite a struggle becoming proficient in Haskell, just drinking from the firehose of type theory you need to get things done. also note that Jane Street does everything in OCaml. I can't believe it's bad for their employees' careers. probably because they're not looking for the same jobs as the average JavaScript pleb.
rowanG077 4y ago
The language is only easy if you have basically learned the language already. Java, C#, C++, Python, Go etc. all differ but fundamentally they are all the same language with different amounts of window dressing. So yeah if you know one of them it's easy to "learn" the others. But I wouldn't really call this learning a new language. It's a fundamentally different ask to learn Haskell, datalog, SaC. You are actually learning a new language instead of just the flavour of the week imperative programming.
- AstralStorm 4y ago
  If the language is the hard part, something is wrong with it. Usually. I've seen and user a whole slew of opinionated languages, and they almost always have a big chunk of problems they will be awkward to use for, or even almost insoluble. Every succesful one supports multiple programming paradigms, better or worse, usually decently. Now the real stuff that can cause problems is bad tooling and lack of support. You cannot code your things when you're trying to fix the compiler, build tools or the debugger.
- scarface74 4y ago
  The last time I had a job where I only had to learn “the language” to be effective was 1999 programming in C and FORTRAN on VAX and Stratus mainframes. By 2000, “knowing C or C++” didn’t do any good without knowing MFC, COM, etc. What good is a language in 2022 without a complete ecosystem of frameworks for most jobs?
  - rowanG077 4y ago
    Even esoteric languages have a relative complete ecosystem of frameworks. I use Haskell in my day job and I never had issues finding a library.
    - AstralStorm 4y ago
      Haskell is not particularly esoteric, but heavily opinionated. Libraries cannot change that basic fact - there are just problems it will be extremely unsuited for. Java has some of the same problem by the way in reverse. (Package handling, forced garbage collection and unknown real time and memory usage characteristics.) The difference being that Java's core has much less important opinions about algorithms, while Haskell tries to make everything functional or it is awkward. So, while Haskell will be hard to use for problems best described in an imperative way (in addition to other issues say Java has), Java will only have serious problems where memory and runtime determinism are paramount. It so happens that a lot of the programming is done in imperative way. Including the libraries.
pharmakom 4y ago
I would be more likely to hire a JS dev if they have Elixir experience not less, but I am not in the enterprise world. Work is not only about money for me. My best work environments have been a small team of skilled people tackling a big problem. For this we would use whatever is the best tool for the job, regardless of its outside popularity.