3 ms·

Especially the part around 2/3rds of the text, about how to improve XML. Also loved the jokes and metaphors. We need such people in tech discussions, most comm

by batista 15y ago

Especially the part around 2/3rds of the text, about how to improve XML. Also loved the jokes and metaphors. We need such people in tech discussions, most community leaders have turned teletubbies-nice to each other, to the detriment not only of a good flame-fight, but of the actual dismissal of brain dead ideas. Instead of violently ridiculing proponents of bad ideas/software/etc to shame and (hopefully) sepuku, we tip-toe around them, or at best, just make light fun of them, like in the "Mongo is webscale" video.

rollypolly 15y ago
My favorite: Remove the syntactic mess that is attributes. One of the many reasons I love json.
- jebblue 15y ago
  XML and HTML are derivatives of SGML. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML#Sources http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML#Sources http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/book4/ch02.html http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/book4/ch02.html I can't imagine HTML without attributes: http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/index/attributes.html http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/index/attributes.html
rpeden 15y ago
I agree with you, and don't mind someone being blunt when they believe they're right and mainstream views are wrong, even when I disagree with the argument the person is making. It often seems to result in a strong reaction in the opposite direction, however. I was amused when I read Ted Dziuba's "Node.js is Cancer" rant, and was able to separate the technical arguments from the invective and evaluate them on their merit. A lot of people, though, seemed to respond angrily with indignant forum or blog posts. So I suppose there's always the danger that being too blunt will result in your real message being lost in the resulting firestorm.
- frou_dh 15y ago
  Dziuba's post has ended up the 3rd result on Google for node.js. Mission accomplished, I'm sure!
olavk 15y ago
I think rants like these makes us more stupid. It turns a discussion about pros and cons of various technologies into pissing matches. His colorful metaphors does not actually illuminate the issue at hand, but only serves to set up "studid" versus "smart" and appeals to emotion by hoping to convince the reader to the side of the smart ones, without actually arguing the specific points of the thechnology. (E.g. why is backslash obviously better than ampersand-semicolon as character escapes? If he have a valid argument for this he certainly does't feel the need to disclose the reason for the reader. He would rather make an elaborate infantilization analogy about breasts.) I guess this kind of rant appeals to people who have a deep need to feel as part of small elite surrounded by a sea of stupidity, but doesn't have the capacity to understant how different tools may have various pros and cons in different specific situations.
- batista 15y ago
  >His colorful metaphors does not actually illuminate the issue at hand I think quite the opposite, he makes a very compelling case, and even gets into the details. Even in the part you mention, for example you missed some stuff that answers your question (without hand-holding): = = = Then, remove the obnoxious character entities and escape special characters with _a single character_, like \, and _name other entities with letters following the same character_. If you need a rich set of publishing symbols, _discover Unicode_. = = = >I guess this kind of rant appeals to people who have a deep need feel as part of small elite surrounded by a sea of stupidity, but doesn't have the capacity to understant how different tools have pros and cons in specific situations. It's not about "different tools have pros and cons in specific situations", it's about how some tools have defects that make them bad for EVERY SINGLE situation. CORBA comes to mind as another example. It's not that something XML-like cannot be good for certain situations. It's rather that XML as-it-was-designed has several flaws that don't NEED to be there, and don't benefit ANY use case. For example, goto has some use cases in C that it is good for. NULL terminated strings on the other hand are a bad idea, and have no place anywhere.
  - sixbrx 15y ago
    The parts you quoted between === from the article aren't at all a compelling case to me, that's nothing more than a prescription. If he has some argument here, he needs to make it.
cygx 15y ago
Also loved the jokes and metaphors. I did not: He tried to be clever, but only succeeded in looking like an asshole. The technical criticism may have merit, the presentation leaves a lot to be desired. We need such people in tech discussions I don't. Thankfully, it's easy to ignore people on the internet.

by batista 15y ago

rollypolly 15y ago

My favorite: Remove the syntactic mess that is attributes. One of the many reasons I love json.

jebblue 15y ago
XML and HTML are derivatives of SGML. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML#Sources http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML#Sources http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/book4/ch02.html http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/book4/ch02.html I can't imagine HTML without attributes: http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/index/attributes.html http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/index/attributes.html

rpeden 15y ago

I agree with you, and don't mind someone being blunt when they believe they're right and mainstream views are wrong, even when I disagree with the argument the person is making. It often seems to result in a strong reaction in the opposite direction, however. I was amused when I read Ted Dziuba's "Node.js is Cancer" rant, and was able to separate the technical arguments from the invective and evaluate them on their merit. A lot of people, though, seemed to respond angrily with indignant forum or blog posts. So I suppose there's always the danger that being too blunt will result in your real message being lost in the resulting firestorm.

frou_dh 15y ago
Dziuba's post has ended up the 3rd result on Google for node.js. Mission accomplished, I'm sure!

olavk 15y ago

I think rants like these makes us more stupid. It turns a discussion about pros and cons of various technologies into pissing matches. His colorful metaphors does not actually illuminate the issue at hand, but only serves to set up "studid" versus "smart" and appeals to emotion by hoping to convince the reader to the side of the smart ones, without actually arguing the specific points of the thechnology. (E.g. why is backslash obviously better than ampersand-semicolon as character escapes? If he have a valid argument for this he certainly does't feel the need to disclose the reason for the reader. He would rather make an elaborate infantilization analogy about breasts.) I guess this kind of rant appeals to people who have a deep need to feel as part of small elite surrounded by a sea of stupidity, but doesn't have the capacity to understant how different tools may have various pros and cons in different specific situations.

batista 15y ago
>His colorful metaphors does not actually illuminate the issue at hand I think quite the opposite, he makes a very compelling case, and even gets into the details. Even in the part you mention, for example you missed some stuff that answers your question (without hand-holding): = = = Then, remove the obnoxious character entities and escape special characters with _a single character_, like \, and _name other entities with letters following the same character_. If you need a rich set of publishing symbols, _discover Unicode_. = = = >I guess this kind of rant appeals to people who have a deep need feel as part of small elite surrounded by a sea of stupidity, but doesn't have the capacity to understant how different tools have pros and cons in specific situations. It's not about "different tools have pros and cons in specific situations", it's about how some tools have defects that make them bad for EVERY SINGLE situation. CORBA comes to mind as another example. It's not that something XML-like cannot be good for certain situations. It's rather that XML as-it-was-designed has several flaws that don't NEED to be there, and don't benefit ANY use case. For example, goto has some use cases in C that it is good for. NULL terminated strings on the other hand are a bad idea, and have no place anywhere.
- sixbrx 15y ago
  The parts you quoted between === from the article aren't at all a compelling case to me, that's nothing more than a prescription. If he has some argument here, he needs to make it.

cygx 15y ago

Also loved the jokes and metaphors. I did not: He tried to be clever, but only succeeded in looking like an asshole. The technical criticism may have merit, the presentation leaves a lot to be desired. We need such people in tech discussions I don't. Thankfully, it's easy to ignore people on the internet.