3 ms·

Ask HN: Haskell or Erlang?

87 points by moe 18y ago

critic 18y ago
Haskell for me.
- jrockway 18y ago
  Agreed. It's more modern, more expressive, runs faster (and supports parallelism better, amusingly), and can talk to Erlang apps anyway. http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Applications_and_libraries/Interfacing_other_languages/Erlang http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Applications_and_librarie...
  - critic 18y ago
    I don't know about "modern" and "expressive", but it's definitely faster, and I really like the fact that the compiler catches 95% of the silly errors I'd make in a dynamically typed language.
    - jrockway 18y ago
      I don't find Haskell to be less expressive than languages like Perl. I will admit that I haven't written enough Erlang to really get a feel for expressiveness.
biohacker42 18y ago
Obviously both. But if you're looking to make an exclusive commitment for professional reasons, then I suspect Erlang is more industry and Haskell more academia.
- igorgue 18y ago
  I wonder if you had the same opinion about Erlang a year ago... Erlang is trendy Haskell is not.
  - biohacker42 18y ago
    I was introduced to Erland several years ago because it was used in network switches. I heard about Haskell through academic connections.
  - hairsupply 18y ago
    "Erlang is trendy Haskell is not." What!? You must not visit reddit.
paulgb 18y ago
Haskell is more elegant, but erlang feels a bit more practical. In particular because of erlang's dynamic type system and symbols. If you are writing distributed software, erlang wins easily.
- jrockway 18y ago
  Haskell has (optional) dynamic typing now: http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/latest/html/libraries/base/Data-Dynamic.html http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/latest/html/libraries/base/D... I have played with it a bit, and haven't had the occasion to use it for anything important. Static typing is good enough for me. (And this is coming from someone who mostly programs Perl.)
  - paulgb 18y ago
    Thanks, I wasn't aware of that. I think baked-in dynamic typing is preferable, but I suppose there are cases where this could work just as well.
andreyf 18y ago
Root beer or apple juice? Baseball or candy? Kitten or voice mail? What?
- critic 18y ago
  Kitten. I hate voice mail.

87 points by moe 18y ago

critic 18y ago

Haskell for me.

jrockway 18y ago
Agreed. It's more modern, more expressive, runs faster (and supports parallelism better, amusingly), and can talk to Erlang apps anyway. http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Applications_and_libraries/Interfacing_other_languages/Erlang http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Applications_and_librarie...
- critic 18y ago
  I don't know about "modern" and "expressive", but it's definitely faster, and I really like the fact that the compiler catches 95% of the silly errors I'd make in a dynamically typed language.
  - jrockway 18y ago
    I don't find Haskell to be less expressive than languages like Perl. I will admit that I haven't written enough Erlang to really get a feel for expressiveness.

biohacker42 18y ago

Obviously both. But if you're looking to make an exclusive commitment for professional reasons, then I suspect Erlang is more industry and Haskell more academia.

igorgue 18y ago
I wonder if you had the same opinion about Erlang a year ago... Erlang is trendy Haskell is not.
- biohacker42 18y ago
  I was introduced to Erland several years ago because it was used in network switches. I heard about Haskell through academic connections.
- hairsupply 18y ago
  "Erlang is trendy Haskell is not." What!? You must not visit reddit.

paulgb 18y ago

Haskell is more elegant, but erlang feels a bit more practical. In particular because of erlang's dynamic type system and symbols. If you are writing distributed software, erlang wins easily.

jrockway 18y ago
Haskell has (optional) dynamic typing now: http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/latest/html/libraries/base/Data-Dynamic.html http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/latest/html/libraries/base/D... I have played with it a bit, and haven't had the occasion to use it for anything important. Static typing is good enough for me. (And this is coming from someone who mostly programs Perl.)
- paulgb 18y ago
  Thanks, I wasn't aware of that. I think baked-in dynamic typing is preferable, but I suppose there are cases where this could work just as well.

andreyf 18y ago

Root beer or apple juice? Baseball or candy? Kitten or voice mail? What?

critic 18y ago
Kitten. I hate voice mail.