4 ms·

> Nice way to put it! But I oppositely believe the world needs more tech that treats professionals as experts, not kids. That’s how it was until around the tur

by brabel 1y ago

> Nice way to put it! But I oppositely believe the world needs more tech that treats professionals as experts, not kids. That’s how it was until around the turn of the century. Who needs types, we’re adults after all. Memory safety and garbage collection? Oh please go back to kindergarten. But then some of us learned that no matter how smart we are, we can make mistakes that those things can actually prevent. And those mistakes can have catastrophic consequences. Professionals should go for tools that help them prevent those mistakes, right??

ModernMech 1y ago
> But then some of us learned that no matter how smart we are, we can make mistakes that those things can actually prevent. That's true but it's deeper than that -- no matter how much time goes by, there will always be people new to the language, and they will always make newbie mistakes if the language allows them to. So "just be an expert and don't write shoddy code" doesn't scale, no matter how hard you personally try.
- refulgentis 1y ago
  It's deeper to note people who know nothing will make the mistake, than "I, an expert, will make the mistake"? :)
  - ModernMech 11mo ago
    Okay broader then?
rvrb 1y ago
Zig is a tool that helps professionals prevent those mistakes. "Memory safe languages" are tools that prevent professionals from making those mistakes. It's a subtle but important difference. Zig attempts to leave some humanity to the developer. When someone says they are incapable of earning or deserving that, I feel sad.
- James_K 1y ago
  Creating a language which is difficult to use and dangerous is not “lending humanity to the developer”. Humans make mistakes, and a language that doesn't account for this is ignoring the humanity of its users.
  - rvrb 1y ago
    Zig is famously simple to pick up and write with, so I don't know what you mean by "difficult". Software is dangerous. Memory safety is one of a million ways it can be dangerous. A compiler barfing when it thinks you are doing something unsafe with pointers is one approach to dealing with one of the ways that code can be dangerous to execute. Zig does not ignore that particular danger, it just takes a different approach to dealing with it than some other modern languages. An approach that, I believe, leaves the developer with a little more humanity by allowing them the benefit of the doubt that they know what they are doing. Everyone that has not built a systems language, or has not built a real application with both Zig and a memory safe language, that is reacting emotionally to what I've said should put a lot of consideration into whether they are cargo culting or using critical thought. Consider that we still do not yet know what is best, and shutting down attempts to explore different ideas with things like "creating [and using] this language is ignoring the humanity of the end user" is, well.. dumb.
    - lerno 1y ago
      I have never heard anyone calling Zig "famously simple" before. In fact, people tend to say it has quite the learning curve. Of course, caveats apply: it is certainly simple compared to some languages, but certainly not compared to others. "Famously simple" seems to indicate it is one of the simplest languages to learn, which seems wrong unless there are some serious qualifications to that statement?
      - rvrb 11mo ago
        C, C++, Rust, Zig. Rust and C++ have an infamous learning curve. If you know anything about using any systems language other than Zig, Zig is incredibly simple to pick up, like C. Unlike C, it pushes you toward making less mistakes. If you don't know anything about using a systems language, Zig makes it easier for the people who do to review your code and make sure you didn't mess it up. It does this with very intentional design that makes it easier to understand the full impact of code quickly, reducing the cost of review, making review practical to catch the issues. It also has many other fail safes to catch these problems before they ever reach a production release. So, yeah, it's totally depending on where you are coming from -- but Zig is not a tool built for a web developer who doesn't know anything about memory to go and ship an application within their first week. It does make it easier for that person to learn the ropes at a steady pace. Meanwhile, everyone complaining that Zig is not memory safe doesn't seem to care that applications written in Zig do not have the vulnerabilities that memory safety solves on the scale that C does[0]. If you have not written a real application in Zig and evaluated it for vulnerabilities, but are claiming that creating Zig was irresponsible, and using it is too; you are cargo culting. If you have, you probably understand there is a niche that Zig fits in and that it isn't surprising it exists to fill it. Like all things in our industry, there is a cost/benefit analysis required for choosing the tools you build with. No one reasonable has claimed that memory safe languages should not exist, but there is a maddening number of people being disrespectful toward those who think there are other ways of addressing the same problems. [0]: https://mitchellh.com/writing/ghostty-gtk-rewrite https://mitchellh.com/writing/ghostty-gtk-rewrite
InsideOutSanta 1y ago
When I was much dumber, I thought I was much smarter. Now that I'm smarter, I realize that I'm often quite dumb.

by brabel 1y ago

ModernMech 1y ago

> But then some of us learned that no matter how smart we are, we can make mistakes that those things can actually prevent. That's true but it's deeper than that -- no matter how much time goes by, there will always be people new to the language, and they will always make newbie mistakes if the language allows them to. So "just be an expert and don't write shoddy code" doesn't scale, no matter how hard you personally try.

refulgentis 1y ago
It's deeper to note people who know nothing will make the mistake, than "I, an expert, will make the mistake"? :)
- ModernMech 11mo ago
  Okay broader then?

rvrb 1y ago

Zig is a tool that helps professionals prevent those mistakes. "Memory safe languages" are tools that prevent professionals from making those mistakes. It's a subtle but important difference. Zig attempts to leave some humanity to the developer. When someone says they are incapable of earning or deserving that, I feel sad.

James_K 1y ago
Creating a language which is difficult to use and dangerous is not “lending humanity to the developer”. Humans make mistakes, and a language that doesn't account for this is ignoring the humanity of its users.
- rvrb 1y ago
  Zig is famously simple to pick up and write with, so I don't know what you mean by "difficult". Software is dangerous. Memory safety is one of a million ways it can be dangerous. A compiler barfing when it thinks you are doing something unsafe with pointers is one approach to dealing with one of the ways that code can be dangerous to execute. Zig does not ignore that particular danger, it just takes a different approach to dealing with it than some other modern languages. An approach that, I believe, leaves the developer with a little more humanity by allowing them the benefit of the doubt that they know what they are doing. Everyone that has not built a systems language, or has not built a real application with both Zig and a memory safe language, that is reacting emotionally to what I've said should put a lot of consideration into whether they are cargo culting or using critical thought. Consider that we still do not yet know what is best, and shutting down attempts to explore different ideas with things like "creating [and using] this language is ignoring the humanity of the end user" is, well.. dumb.
  - lerno 1y ago
    I have never heard anyone calling Zig "famously simple" before. In fact, people tend to say it has quite the learning curve. Of course, caveats apply: it is certainly simple compared to some languages, but certainly not compared to others. "Famously simple" seems to indicate it is one of the simplest languages to learn, which seems wrong unless there are some serious qualifications to that statement?
    - rvrb 11mo ago
      C, C++, Rust, Zig. Rust and C++ have an infamous learning curve. If you know anything about using any systems language other than Zig, Zig is incredibly simple to pick up, like C. Unlike C, it pushes you toward making less mistakes. If you don't know anything about using a systems language, Zig makes it easier for the people who do to review your code and make sure you didn't mess it up. It does this with very intentional design that makes it easier to understand the full impact of code quickly, reducing the cost of review, making review practical to catch the issues. It also has many other fail safes to catch these problems before they ever reach a production release. So, yeah, it's totally depending on where you are coming from -- but Zig is not a tool built for a web developer who doesn't know anything about memory to go and ship an application within their first week. It does make it easier for that person to learn the ropes at a steady pace. Meanwhile, everyone complaining that Zig is not memory safe doesn't seem to care that applications written in Zig do not have the vulnerabilities that memory safety solves on the scale that C does[0]. If you have not written a real application in Zig and evaluated it for vulnerabilities, but are claiming that creating Zig was irresponsible, and using it is too; you are cargo culting. If you have, you probably understand there is a niche that Zig fits in and that it isn't surprising it exists to fill it. Like all things in our industry, there is a cost/benefit analysis required for choosing the tools you build with. No one reasonable has claimed that memory safe languages should not exist, but there is a maddening number of people being disrespectful toward those who think there are other ways of addressing the same problems. [0]: https://mitchellh.com/writing/ghostty-gtk-rewrite https://mitchellh.com/writing/ghostty-gtk-rewrite

InsideOutSanta 1y ago

When I was much dumber, I thought I was much smarter. Now that I'm smarter, I realize that I'm often quite dumb.