3 ms·

There was a good discussion just yesterday, "Why did Visual Basic die?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37470318 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3747

There was a good discussion just yesterday, "Why did Visual Basic die?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37470318 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37470318 That might be a place to start looking. It basically comes down to:b they could take development in any direction and the community of users is powerless.

jodrellblank 3y ago
But why can't you fork it and take it in the direction you want? The situation is literally no different from Python or Node or Ruby, the people running the most popular distribution could take it in a direction you don't like and the power you have (or the only option you have) is forking.
- AlecSchueler 3y ago
  The development for a language like python happens entirely in public though, and is driven by consensus.
  - jodrellblank 3y ago
    https://github.com/dotnet/csharplang https://github.com/dotnet/csharplang - "The official repo for the design of the C# programming language" that's in public.
    - AlecSchueler 3y ago
      Infront of the public, yes, but it says you need to be invited by someone from their team to participate yourself, compare that with the python process. There's a distinction to be made between doing something in public and something being done by the public.
HelloNurse 3y ago
For .Net, there's an established pattern of careless deprecation that produced enough frameworks to date codebases like tree rings: - this year's correct way to access your database is... - this year's correct way to serve dynamic web pages is... - this year's correct way to make a Windows GUI is...
- eddythompson80 3y ago
  This pattern exists in all languages. I’d argue more so in fragmented community driven projects/languages/tools. Except in the case of languages/tools like python, node, neovim etc. Everytime I touch one of these there is always a new better way of accessing DBs, making a web server, making a client side render, no a server side render, async library, configuration system, build system, runtime, GUI patterns etc.
  - HelloNurse 3y ago
    There is a marked difference between a third party releasing some new library and obtaining (to some extent, demanding) community mindshare, without taking away anything, and the official platform maintainer suddenly replacing practically mandatory parts of what is perceived as the standard library. Javascript churn is fast, .Net churn is deep.
    - eddythompson80 3y ago
      That's not really true. .NET Framework is still around. Even .NET core 3.x which is EOL a while ago, is still widely used with active stackoverflow and if you're loud enough with the .NET team at Microsoft they will help you there too. The only difference I see between both is that there is an authoritative opinion when it comes to .NET (Microsoft) while there is no authority figure when it comes to node/Javascript. Even the actual runtime, package manager, module resolution, build tools etc get forked and replaced but since there is no authority, everyone is like "lets wait and see who wins". While with a language like .NET (or Go for that matter) you know that whatever comes from Microsoft (or Google) is the authoritative answer and people are more likely to jump to it right away.
      - HelloNurse 3y ago
        The "authoritative opinion" is indecisive. Microsoft frameworks tend to be high quality, but there are too many. ASP? ASP.Net? ASP.Net Core? ASP.Net MVC? Razor? Blazor?

jodrellblank 3y ago

But why can't you fork it and take it in the direction you want? The situation is literally no different from Python or Node or Ruby, the people running the most popular distribution could take it in a direction you don't like and the power you have (or the only option you have) is forking.

AlecSchueler 3y ago
The development for a language like python happens entirely in public though, and is driven by consensus.
- jodrellblank 3y ago
  https://github.com/dotnet/csharplang https://github.com/dotnet/csharplang - "The official repo for the design of the C# programming language" that's in public.
  - AlecSchueler 3y ago
    Infront of the public, yes, but it says you need to be invited by someone from their team to participate yourself, compare that with the python process. There's a distinction to be made between doing something in public and something being done by the public.

HelloNurse 3y ago

For .Net, there's an established pattern of careless deprecation that produced enough frameworks to date codebases like tree rings: - this year's correct way to access your database is... - this year's correct way to serve dynamic web pages is... - this year's correct way to make a Windows GUI is...

eddythompson80 3y ago
This pattern exists in all languages. I’d argue more so in fragmented community driven projects/languages/tools. Except in the case of languages/tools like python, node, neovim etc. Everytime I touch one of these there is always a new better way of accessing DBs, making a web server, making a client side render, no a server side render, async library, configuration system, build system, runtime, GUI patterns etc.
- HelloNurse 3y ago
  There is a marked difference between a third party releasing some new library and obtaining (to some extent, demanding) community mindshare, without taking away anything, and the official platform maintainer suddenly replacing practically mandatory parts of what is perceived as the standard library. Javascript churn is fast, .Net churn is deep.
  - eddythompson80 3y ago
    That's not really true. .NET Framework is still around. Even .NET core 3.x which is EOL a while ago, is still widely used with active stackoverflow and if you're loud enough with the .NET team at Microsoft they will help you there too. The only difference I see between both is that there is an authoritative opinion when it comes to .NET (Microsoft) while there is no authority figure when it comes to node/Javascript. Even the actual runtime, package manager, module resolution, build tools etc get forked and replaced but since there is no authority, everyone is like "lets wait and see who wins". While with a language like .NET (or Go for that matter) you know that whatever comes from Microsoft (or Google) is the authoritative answer and people are more likely to jump to it right away.
    - HelloNurse 3y ago
      The "authoritative opinion" is indecisive. Microsoft frameworks tend to be high quality, but there are too many. ASP? ASP.Net? ASP.Net Core? ASP.Net MVC? Razor? Blazor?