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> Major compilers used to not be free. Major IDEs used to not be free. There were and are a lot of non-free ones, but since the 1990s, GCC and interpreted lang
by randallsquared 1y ago
> Major compilers used to not be free. Major IDEs used to not be free.
There were and are a lot of non-free ones, but since the 1990s, GCC and interpreted languages and Linux and Emacs and Eclipse and a bunch of kinda-IDEs were all free, and now VS Code is one of the highest marketshare IDEs, and those are all free. Also, the most used and learned programming language is JS, which doesn't need compilers in the first place.
- jstummbillig 1y agoThere are free options and there continue to be non-free options. The same is true for LLMs.
- vorador 1y agoWhen's the last time you paid for a compiler?
- jstummbillig 1y agoThe original point was that there is some inherent tradition in programming being free, with a direct critique wrt LLMs, which apparently breaks that tradition. And my point is that's simply not the case. Different products have always been not free, and continue to be not free. Recent example would be something like Unity, that is not entirely free, but has competitors, which are entirely free and open source. JetBrain is something someone else brought up. Again: You have local LLMs and I have every expectation they will improve. What exactly are we complaining about? That people continue to build products that are not free and, gasp, other people will pay for them, as they always have?