5 ms·

this sounds exciting, but I wonder. How closely linked is Elmish to Elm? In theory Elm is just such a fascinating project... if it was not held back by the peo

this sounds exciting, but I wonder. How closely linked is Elmish to Elm? In theory Elm is just such a fascinating project... if it was not held back by the people developing it.

arrow7000 3y ago
It's not linked at all, it just uses "The Elm Architecture" as inspiration to recreate the same architecture in F#
carapace 3y ago
Please PLEASE enough with the character assassination of the Elm guy. He wants to run his own project his own way. There's a small but dedicated residue of people who just can't stand being told "no" and go around crapping on the kid whenever they get a chance. I get it. You don't like Evan's project management style. Move on already. - - - - The fact of the matter is that he's a person who took his thesis, made it into a product, and got traction in the real world. People have used Elm to make things. Things that go. How many of us can say the same? And that's before you get to all the fascinating and as yet still-too-obscure things that the OP talks about. Things that are in part a little more widely known and understood thanks to Elm project.
- _svoh 3y ago
  Eh, it doesn't seem like character assassination. Dude chose his management style. That makes his project unfit for purpose for certain people. Those people are allowed to make that determination and state as such. I remember when the Elm team first decided to lock down the Elm compiler, so that only the team in charge had special privileged access to modify it. I thought, "wow, this looks like a bunch of people who don't want to collaborate, who want to take their ball and tell others how to play with it, really putting the 'dictator' in BDFL." and you know what? that's fine. I don't harbor anything against them as people. But that left a permanently bad taste in my mouth and I'm unlikely to ever trust that group or a project they're managing.
  - carapace 3y ago
    FWIW my comment was along the lines of allergic reaction. I'm not an Elm fanatic, I'm just sick of seeing people snipe on the dude. You're entitled to your opinion, of course, and you articulated it well. But again I see it as another example of someone not liking being told "no", no?
    - ObscureScience 3y ago
      My understanding of this is that he managed to hype the language with certain killer features. A lot of people were enthusiastic and invested alot of time in learning and building in it. Evan than "suddenly" said they wanted to take the language in another direction and dropped some of the core features and pricipals that drew people in. While perhaps a mischaracterization, it comes a cross as a kind of "bait and switch" or at least undependable.
    - _svoh 3y ago
      That's really reductive and biased against us, the potential user base of Elm that decided not to engage. Why is it that we don't like being told "no," as opposed to the Elm leadership and Elm community not liking being told "this isn't a 100% solution for me so I'd like to modify it"? Obviously Elm is his passion project, that's fine. But nobody who locks down their compiler on a supposedly "open source" project can actually seriously expect others to engage with that in good faith. Furthermore, the absolute state of just trying to modify Elm to be more fit for purpose is horrendous. Every time I see a parallel implementation or a fork, the author has to bend over backward with platitudes to placate the Elm masses and ensure them that this project isn't trying to "split the community," which is a nonsense idea to start with imo. It feels cultish, on top of a project that is actively hostile to people who want to use it any way other than how the BDFL has mandated its usage. If you want to say the problem is with the users, that's fine, but that's exactly the attitude keeping me from ever engaging. I personally think the problem is with the people who want such fine control over their technology and community, as opposed to understanding that they can really only shepherd their implementation. That's about as far as their reach rightfully extends. EDIT: also, the fact that they aggressively lock down their compiler and have such hostility to anyone working in parallel is imo the definition of "holding it back"
- wavemode 3y ago
  "Character assassination" ...? Not sure where the comment said anything about the project owner as a person. He is free to manage his project in whatever way he sees fit. And the public is free to criticize that management.
  - bee_rider 3y ago
    People criticizing the project management style are free to do so. But other members of the discussion are free to criticize that criticism.
    - threatofrain 3y ago
      But the trail never ended at "one ought not critique my critique", so who are you responding to? If anything, saying that something is character assassination is a statement on what's off-limits for debate.
    - wavemode 3y ago
      Never said that they weren't. I agree with you that they are also free. But that doesn't change the fact that calling it "character assassination" is hyperbolic.
- threatofrain 3y ago
  We should be open & honest in our discussions about whether we genuinely recommend a platform or project to others, including the details which underlies our thoughts. As I go through rewrites and greenfield projects and so forth, I begin to realize that for any particular technology you are not simply having a relationship with a static list of pros and cons, but you're also having a living relationship with the team behind the work. In other words, a bet on TypeScript is also a bet on the TypeScript team, and in my experience the TS team is very fast at their work. This makes me more forgiving of bugs. Similarly, a bet on Terraform is also a bet on Hashicorp. Here we have someone recommending a choice of F# over Elm because betting on the leadership is allegedly not good. This is not character assassination. The commentator is not criticizing Evan on irrelevant private affairs and by extension saying that you shouldn't use Elm. Evan has created a company and is advocating for his product; he is a public figure and is being criticized on the grounds of project management.
  - G4BB3R 3y ago
    This is not only about leadership style, but also founding. I don't know the current TS team, but I know its dozens of full time workers backed by microsoft, not only core devs, but community organizers, evangelists, etc. There is no comparison to an independent project. Evan recently gave a talk about it on strange loop. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ3w_jec1v8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ3w_jec1v8
- SantalBlush 3y ago
  Totally agree. Even the mention of Elmish, which has nothing to do with the creator of Elm, is derailed into yet another discussion of why some people hate the creator of Elm. It is the deadest of beaten horses on HN.
- DarkNova6 3y ago
  He's absolutely entitled in running his project his own way. As such, it is obvious that adoption outside of his own circle is to remain minimal. I would love Elm to be in a position where I could advocate for it at work (aside from it being a "neat hobby"). However, the simple fact is that the way Elm is run has lead to disillusionment among advocates of the first hour. And there is nothing to indicate that this will change. And if the guy has inspired a new generation to create something to his own achievement, kudos to him. As far as I'm concerned Elm is not the enemy, JavaScript is the enemy.
- catlover76 3y ago
  It's not "character assassination" to criticize someone.
  - carapace 3y ago
    No, it's not. But making the same criticism over and over again every time the subject comes up even tangentially is.
obeavs 3y ago
Some references if helpful: * Elmish (F#) repo - https://github.com/elmish/elmish https://github.com/elmish/elmish * The Elmish Book (... remarkably good) - https://zaid-ajaj.github.io/the-elmish-book/#/ https://zaid-ajaj.github.io/the-elmish-book/#/ * Fable compiler - https://fable.io/ https://fable.io/ The F# community is very friendly (sub-communities as well), and there are plenty of good opportunities to contribute OSS work across any skill level. Phosphor isn't hiring right now, but we will begin a search for FE/interface engineers soon. oliver@phosphor.co for anyone interested.
aranchelk 3y ago
> In theory Elm is just such a fascinating project... if it was not held back by the people developing it. PureScript may be worth a look, it’s got several features that were rejected by Elm devs: typeclasses, ability to publish modules that use FFI to JS, runs server-side, etc.

this sounds exciting, but I wonder. How closely linked is Elmish to Elm? In theory Elm is just such a fascinating project... if it was not held back by the people developing it.

arrow7000 3y ago

It's not linked at all, it just uses "The Elm Architecture" as inspiration to recreate the same architecture in F#

carapace 3y ago

Please PLEASE enough with the character assassination of the Elm guy. He wants to run his own project his own way. There's a small but dedicated residue of people who just can't stand being told "no" and go around crapping on the kid whenever they get a chance. I get it. You don't like Evan's project management style. Move on already. - - - - The fact of the matter is that he's a person who took his thesis, made it into a product, and got traction in the real world. People have used Elm to make things. Things that go. How many of us can say the same? And that's before you get to all the fascinating and as yet still-too-obscure things that the OP talks about. Things that are in part a little more widely known and understood thanks to Elm project.

_svoh 3y ago
Eh, it doesn't seem like character assassination. Dude chose his management style. That makes his project unfit for purpose for certain people. Those people are allowed to make that determination and state as such. I remember when the Elm team first decided to lock down the Elm compiler, so that only the team in charge had special privileged access to modify it. I thought, "wow, this looks like a bunch of people who don't want to collaborate, who want to take their ball and tell others how to play with it, really putting the 'dictator' in BDFL." and you know what? that's fine. I don't harbor anything against them as people. But that left a permanently bad taste in my mouth and I'm unlikely to ever trust that group or a project they're managing.
- carapace 3y ago
  FWIW my comment was along the lines of allergic reaction. I'm not an Elm fanatic, I'm just sick of seeing people snipe on the dude. You're entitled to your opinion, of course, and you articulated it well. But again I see it as another example of someone not liking being told "no", no?
  - ObscureScience 3y ago
    My understanding of this is that he managed to hype the language with certain killer features. A lot of people were enthusiastic and invested alot of time in learning and building in it. Evan than "suddenly" said they wanted to take the language in another direction and dropped some of the core features and pricipals that drew people in. While perhaps a mischaracterization, it comes a cross as a kind of "bait and switch" or at least undependable.
  - _svoh 3y ago
    That's really reductive and biased against us, the potential user base of Elm that decided not to engage. Why is it that we don't like being told "no," as opposed to the Elm leadership and Elm community not liking being told "this isn't a 100% solution for me so I'd like to modify it"? Obviously Elm is his passion project, that's fine. But nobody who locks down their compiler on a supposedly "open source" project can actually seriously expect others to engage with that in good faith. Furthermore, the absolute state of just trying to modify Elm to be more fit for purpose is horrendous. Every time I see a parallel implementation or a fork, the author has to bend over backward with platitudes to placate the Elm masses and ensure them that this project isn't trying to "split the community," which is a nonsense idea to start with imo. It feels cultish, on top of a project that is actively hostile to people who want to use it any way other than how the BDFL has mandated its usage. If you want to say the problem is with the users, that's fine, but that's exactly the attitude keeping me from ever engaging. I personally think the problem is with the people who want such fine control over their technology and community, as opposed to understanding that they can really only shepherd their implementation. That's about as far as their reach rightfully extends. EDIT: also, the fact that they aggressively lock down their compiler and have such hostility to anyone working in parallel is imo the definition of "holding it back"
wavemode 3y ago
"Character assassination" ...? Not sure where the comment said anything about the project owner as a person. He is free to manage his project in whatever way he sees fit. And the public is free to criticize that management.
- bee_rider 3y ago
  People criticizing the project management style are free to do so. But other members of the discussion are free to criticize that criticism.
  - threatofrain 3y ago
    But the trail never ended at "one ought not critique my critique", so who are you responding to? If anything, saying that something is character assassination is a statement on what's off-limits for debate.
  - wavemode 3y ago
    Never said that they weren't. I agree with you that they are also free. But that doesn't change the fact that calling it "character assassination" is hyperbolic.
threatofrain 3y ago
We should be open & honest in our discussions about whether we genuinely recommend a platform or project to others, including the details which underlies our thoughts. As I go through rewrites and greenfield projects and so forth, I begin to realize that for any particular technology you are not simply having a relationship with a static list of pros and cons, but you're also having a living relationship with the team behind the work. In other words, a bet on TypeScript is also a bet on the TypeScript team, and in my experience the TS team is very fast at their work. This makes me more forgiving of bugs. Similarly, a bet on Terraform is also a bet on Hashicorp. Here we have someone recommending a choice of F# over Elm because betting on the leadership is allegedly not good. This is not character assassination. The commentator is not criticizing Evan on irrelevant private affairs and by extension saying that you shouldn't use Elm. Evan has created a company and is advocating for his product; he is a public figure and is being criticized on the grounds of project management.
- G4BB3R 3y ago
  This is not only about leadership style, but also founding. I don't know the current TS team, but I know its dozens of full time workers backed by microsoft, not only core devs, but community organizers, evangelists, etc. There is no comparison to an independent project. Evan recently gave a talk about it on strange loop. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ3w_jec1v8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ3w_jec1v8
SantalBlush 3y ago
Totally agree. Even the mention of Elmish, which has nothing to do with the creator of Elm, is derailed into yet another discussion of why some people hate the creator of Elm. It is the deadest of beaten horses on HN.
DarkNova6 3y ago
He's absolutely entitled in running his project his own way. As such, it is obvious that adoption outside of his own circle is to remain minimal. I would love Elm to be in a position where I could advocate for it at work (aside from it being a "neat hobby"). However, the simple fact is that the way Elm is run has lead to disillusionment among advocates of the first hour. And there is nothing to indicate that this will change. And if the guy has inspired a new generation to create something to his own achievement, kudos to him. As far as I'm concerned Elm is not the enemy, JavaScript is the enemy.
catlover76 3y ago
It's not "character assassination" to criticize someone.
- carapace 3y ago
  No, it's not. But making the same criticism over and over again every time the subject comes up even tangentially is.

obeavs 3y ago

Some references if helpful: * Elmish (F#) repo - https://github.com/elmish/elmish https://github.com/elmish/elmish * The Elmish Book (... remarkably good) - https://zaid-ajaj.github.io/the-elmish-book/#/ https://zaid-ajaj.github.io/the-elmish-book/#/ * Fable compiler - https://fable.io/ https://fable.io/ The F# community is very friendly (sub-communities as well), and there are plenty of good opportunities to contribute OSS work across any skill level. Phosphor isn't hiring right now, but we will begin a search for FE/interface engineers soon. oliver@phosphor.co for anyone interested.

aranchelk 3y ago

> In theory Elm is just such a fascinating project... if it was not held back by the people developing it. PureScript may be worth a look, it’s got several features that were rejected by Elm devs: typeclasses, ability to publish modules that use FFI to JS, runs server-side, etc.