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* Dismissing newer technologies as "shiny" instead of evaluating their merits * Language hipsterism * Being disturbed by modular code * Dismissing high-level

by pshc 15y ago

* Dismissing newer technologies as "shiny" instead of evaluating their merits * Language hipsterism * Being disturbed by modular code * Dismissing high-level code that might have leaky abstractions * Plain CGI * Being turned off by callbacks and reinventing the wheel instead * The usual silliness about all tools being capable and therefore equal (they're all Turing complete, yes, but we still want to know which ones are more productive for some use case.) This is grumpy posturing and C++ is now blub. Am I being trolled?

Rusky 15y ago
Dismissing newer technologies as "shiny" instead of evaluating their merits I would think it's more about trying not to dismiss older technologies just because of the merits of something newer. Being disturbed by modular code The C++ code described in the article sounded pretty modular to me...
baddox 15y ago
I think the point about reliance on and obsession with modular code is a valid one, even though it's so entrenched in programming culture now. Donald Knuthe makes a similar (much less inflammatory) argument here (Ctrl-F "black box"): http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1193856 http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1193856
uiri 15y ago
Just wondering, what exactly is wrong with plain CGI?
- javadyan 15y ago
  I assume he's implying that CGI is slow.
- iso8859-1 15y ago
  With CGI, you do your own data persistence. It leads to gigantic blobs. Also, you spawn a process for each request. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/424839/what-were-the-main-disadvantages-of-cgi-bin-based-web-development http://stackoverflow.com/questions/424839/what-were-the-main... As I see it, it's the old low-level vs high-level discussion all over again. I'm sure you have seen it before. Low-level programmers argue that they have control and know how everything is working. High-level programmers argue security, problem isolation, modularity (i.e. not only using your own code!), readability, maintainability.
mvgoogler 15y ago
Am I being trolled? It feels more to me like you're the one that's doing the trolling, but maybe I'm just mis-reading your post. Disclaimer: I worked with the OP and she is a ferociously productive engineer. Dismissing newer technologies as "shiny" instead of evaluating their merits* Or, evaluating technologies based on how useful hey are rather than the amount of hype they are generating Language hipsterism* Huh? I don't even know what this means. Being disturbed by modular code* The OP was disturbed at the thought of building a program by gluing together "modules". In this sense she is using "module" to mean (essentially) black-boxes of unknown origin and quality. If you had ever seen her code you would have a hard time convincing anyone that it wasn't modular. * Being turned off by callbacks and reinventing the wheel instead The OP says she hates the design of cgic, not that she's against callbacks. She made a practical decision that cgic didn't do enough for her to warrant the pain of using it, and discovered that creating something that she actually liked using wasn't that much work. To put it more generally, she is saying that - given the choice between using some existing code that isn't quite right (or outright sucks for some reason or another) and taking some time to roll her own, she has found that it is often worthwhile to spend a little time to create something that she knows works and that she enjoys using. * The usual silliness about all tools being capable and therefore equal (they're all Turing complete, yes, but we still want to know which ones are more productive for some use case.) The OP said no such thing. She said that she has found a language she is highly productive in (C++) and she hasn't yet seen a newer "shinier" language that would make enough of a difference to warrant switching to it.
- pshc 15y ago
  > At some point, you just have to shut up and make stuff. It does sound like she's ferociously productive. It's also possible that she could be ten times as productive and that C++ is holding her back. The programmer credo is to work hard and work smart. > I guess the current "shiny" thing is still more-or-less Ruby [with] Rails. Oh, I suppose there's also the whole node thing, in which you write things in Javascript and run them server-side with v8. She dismissed node right away (with no argument from me) > I have no practical experience with them Casual dismissal without evaluation of merits. > it's all been linked to frothy people clamoring for the latest shiny thing. I've seen that pattern plenty of times before, and it's always annoying. This is what I mean by hipsterism: Dismissal based on an excited fanbase. > that somehow you would need to abdicate almost all of your code to modules where you just hope they work. I had a problem with this sweeping generalization. If cgic isn't great, that's fine. Certainly you still have to evaluate your dependencies' merits. > that creates an awful design where you give up main() to that program's code and then just wake up when it decides to call back to you This did read like an indictment of callbacks as a whole, but I see now that she's not happy about libraries that hijack main() and have some secondary entry point. I concede that. > It might not be wonderful, but you could build something relatively quickly, at least in theory. High-level languages have proven productivity gains and known pitfalls. Here, she is hand-waving them away without giving them a chance. > Better still, since I"m not chasing the shininess in that realm, I can spend those cycles on other things. Trollish fallacy. > she hasn't yet seen a newer "shinier" language that would make enough of a difference to warrant switching to it. As far as I can tell she didn't even give them a fair chance. She dismissed them based on supposed hype and blubbiness.
blangblang 15y ago
It just distills down to "Don't let people tell you that you can't frame with your trusty roofing hammer. Just get to work and switch tools when you must."

by pshc 15y ago

Rusky 15y ago

Dismissing newer technologies as "shiny" instead of evaluating their merits I would think it's more about trying not to dismiss older technologies just because of the merits of something newer. Being disturbed by modular code The C++ code described in the article sounded pretty modular to me...

baddox 15y ago

I think the point about reliance on and obsession with modular code is a valid one, even though it's so entrenched in programming culture now. Donald Knuthe makes a similar (much less inflammatory) argument here (Ctrl-F "black box"): http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1193856 http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1193856

uiri 15y ago

Just wondering, what exactly is wrong with plain CGI?

javadyan 15y ago
I assume he's implying that CGI is slow.
iso8859-1 15y ago
With CGI, you do your own data persistence. It leads to gigantic blobs. Also, you spawn a process for each request. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/424839/what-were-the-main-disadvantages-of-cgi-bin-based-web-development http://stackoverflow.com/questions/424839/what-were-the-main... As I see it, it's the old low-level vs high-level discussion all over again. I'm sure you have seen it before. Low-level programmers argue that they have control and know how everything is working. High-level programmers argue security, problem isolation, modularity (i.e. not only using your own code!), readability, maintainability.

mvgoogler 15y ago

Am I being trolled? It feels more to me like you're the one that's doing the trolling, but maybe I'm just mis-reading your post. Disclaimer: I worked with the OP and she is a ferociously productive engineer. Dismissing newer technologies as "shiny" instead of evaluating their merits* Or, evaluating technologies based on how useful hey are rather than the amount of hype they are generating Language hipsterism* Huh? I don't even know what this means. Being disturbed by modular code* The OP was disturbed at the thought of building a program by gluing together "modules". In this sense she is using "module" to mean (essentially) black-boxes of unknown origin and quality. If you had ever seen her code you would have a hard time convincing anyone that it wasn't modular. * Being turned off by callbacks and reinventing the wheel instead The OP says she hates the design of cgic, not that she's against callbacks. She made a practical decision that cgic didn't do enough for her to warrant the pain of using it, and discovered that creating something that she actually liked using wasn't that much work. To put it more generally, she is saying that - given the choice between using some existing code that isn't quite right (or outright sucks for some reason or another) and taking some time to roll her own, she has found that it is often worthwhile to spend a little time to create something that she knows works and that she enjoys using. * The usual silliness about all tools being capable and therefore equal (they're all Turing complete, yes, but we still want to know which ones are more productive for some use case.) The OP said no such thing. She said that she has found a language she is highly productive in (C++) and she hasn't yet seen a newer "shinier" language that would make enough of a difference to warrant switching to it.

pshc 15y ago
> At some point, you just have to shut up and make stuff. It does sound like she's ferociously productive. It's also possible that she could be ten times as productive and that C++ is holding her back. The programmer credo is to work hard and work smart. > I guess the current "shiny" thing is still more-or-less Ruby [with] Rails. Oh, I suppose there's also the whole node thing, in which you write things in Javascript and run them server-side with v8. She dismissed node right away (with no argument from me) > I have no practical experience with them Casual dismissal without evaluation of merits. > it's all been linked to frothy people clamoring for the latest shiny thing. I've seen that pattern plenty of times before, and it's always annoying. This is what I mean by hipsterism: Dismissal based on an excited fanbase. > that somehow you would need to abdicate almost all of your code to modules where you just hope they work. I had a problem with this sweeping generalization. If cgic isn't great, that's fine. Certainly you still have to evaluate your dependencies' merits. > that creates an awful design where you give up main() to that program's code and then just wake up when it decides to call back to you This did read like an indictment of callbacks as a whole, but I see now that she's not happy about libraries that hijack main() and have some secondary entry point. I concede that. > It might not be wonderful, but you could build something relatively quickly, at least in theory. High-level languages have proven productivity gains and known pitfalls. Here, she is hand-waving them away without giving them a chance. > Better still, since I"m not chasing the shininess in that realm, I can spend those cycles on other things. Trollish fallacy. > she hasn't yet seen a newer "shinier" language that would make enough of a difference to warrant switching to it. As far as I can tell she didn't even give them a fair chance. She dismissed them based on supposed hype and blubbiness.

blangblang 15y ago

It just distills down to "Don't let people tell you that you can't frame with your trusty roofing hammer. Just get to work and switch tools when you must."