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> But every attempt to create a completely general purpose language that anyone can use to do anything has failed Excel is used by millions of people and power

by jamii 12y ago

> But every attempt to create a completely general purpose language that anyone can use to do anything has failed Excel is used by millions of people and powers large swathes of the worlds economy. VB6 is still in use today and powers multi-million dollar companies (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/jj133828.aspx http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/jj133828.aspx). COBOL still lurks in the heart of many banks. These systems have problems that cause untold economic damage. Instead of improving the tools to help people avoid these problems we sit around being smug about our uber-programming skills and declaring that programming is too complex for those people anyway. What many people here don't seem to realise is that the choice is not between the crappy VB6 app and a nicely architected system built by a 'real' programmer, the choice is between the crappy VB6 app and the same people doing the job manually. Empirically speaking, given tools with an approachable learning curve many people are capable of producing simple programs that make them more effective at their jobs. Rather than lamenting that these people produce bad code we should be improving the tools to lead them down the correct path.

the_af 12y ago
I agree with some of what you say about the damage these tools have done (but please note Excel is not a general purpose language, which the parent post was talking about, though it can be used to make pretty cool and surprising things). However, I don't think anyone is arguing that nothing should be done about it. Some of us would argue that something must be done, but that the answer is not necessarily simplification, especially simplification of the "make it easy" kind. Especially since, for many programmers, "simple" & "easy to learn" are actually synonyms for "similar to something I'm already familiar with".
- jamii 12y ago
  What most people seem to be arguing is either that the people currently using Excel and VB6 should suck it up and learn a real language or that they shouldn't be programming at all (I'm not saying you are, but this is the general sentiment I encounter in eg http://developers.slashdot.org/story/14/07/09/131243/normal-humans-effectively-excluded-from-developing-software http://developers.slashdot.org/story/14/07/09/131243/normal-...). There are number of different spheres of programming with different requirements. For the sphere of end-user programming (which Jonathan Edwards explicitly calls out in this post) there are a huge number of people who have to choose between simple tools which don't work well or complex tools that they don't have the time to learn. This sphere has seen little change since the start of the millennium (Excel is still the best option by far, for all its limitations). The OP is arguing for efforts to close the gap and produce simple tools for their simple needs.
  - sheepmullet 12y ago
    "What most people seem to be arguing is either that the people currently using Excel and VB6 should suck it up and learn a real language or that they shouldn't be programming at all" And why is that such a problem? If you can handle excel and vba you can learn to program. A lot of existing languages are easier to learn than excel+vba. Excel is not easy to use if you want to do anything moderately complex. Even after years of training all through school and in the workplace the average user can't do much programmatically with it. Excel solved the input/output problem, the availability problem, and the business acceptability problem. By that I mean business users were doing a massive amount of data entry and data manipulation mainly in order to do simple calculations and view data logically in tables. They did this without thought to automate but it made automation 10x easier. As a business grunt I can't just install python and start cutting code. If I said "Hey boss I can automate this with python. It will only take me 2 weeks" I've got no hope. For starters corporate IT wouldn't even let me install python. But I can spend a month fiddling around in a spreadsheet to automate the same task and my manager will be happy.
    - jamii 12y ago
      I made a long list of some of the difficulties one encounters in trying to use industrial-grade tools to solve home-repair-grade problems: http://www.lighttable.com/2014/05/16/pain-we-forgot/ http://www.lighttable.com/2014/05/16/pain-we-forgot/ It's not just programming that is hard, it's editing, debugging, compiling, version control, packaging, deploying, upgrading etc. Existing tools give you a huge amount of flexibility and power (that most end-user tasks don't need) at the expense of a brutal learning curve. They make complex things possible but easy things tiresome. Consider how long it takes for the average CS undergrad to reach a point where they could build, deploy and maintain the simple webapp I described in that post. There is definitely room for a simplified set of tools that lets end-users build simple applications with a pay-as-you-go approach to complexity and learning curve.
      - SomeCallMeTim 12y ago
        >There is definitely room for a simplified set of tools that lets end-users build simple applications with a pay-as-you-go approach to complexity and learning curve. You want this to succeed, then pick a domain and solve that problem for people. It's not the source control that is the primary problem. You can do Excel-like things on Google Drive, which has integrated revision control, shared editing, and a dozen other features to help the average user or team get things done. No, the primary problem is that most people don't know what they want. They don't even know what's possible, much less how to accomplish it. Ask any consultant and they'll agree with me: The first thing you need to do is figure out what the users actually can use based on their needs. It's like Henry Ford said: If you asked users what they wanted, they'd have told him they wanted a faster horse. [1] The problems exist because they aren't easy to solve unless you have the expertise. I'm not poo-pooing Excel or any other domain-specific solution. If you can create a general solution to a problem (say, for example, WordPress), then users can plug together the pieces they need and create an app. But there is no "language" that will solve the "average person can't program" problem in the general case any more than there's a paintbrush that will solve the "average person can't paint" problem. [1] http://blog.cauvin.org/2010/07/henry-fords-faster-horse-quote.html http://blog.cauvin.org/2010/07/henry-fords-faster-horse-quot...
SomeCallMeTim 12y ago
Excel==Domain-Specific. I already said that Domain-Specific systems can be successful, and I have nothing against improving domain specific systems. The original article implied that they were going to fix All The Programming. I'm saying it's been tried, and Every Single Time it fails utterly (or produces a domain specific solution).

by jamii 12y ago

the_af 12y ago

I agree with some of what you say about the damage these tools have done (but please note Excel is not a general purpose language, which the parent post was talking about, though it can be used to make pretty cool and surprising things). However, I don't think anyone is arguing that nothing should be done about it. Some of us would argue that something must be done, but that the answer is not necessarily simplification, especially simplification of the "make it easy" kind. Especially since, for many programmers, "simple" & "easy to learn" are actually synonyms for "similar to something I'm already familiar with".

jamii 12y ago
What most people seem to be arguing is either that the people currently using Excel and VB6 should suck it up and learn a real language or that they shouldn't be programming at all (I'm not saying you are, but this is the general sentiment I encounter in eg http://developers.slashdot.org/story/14/07/09/131243/normal-humans-effectively-excluded-from-developing-software http://developers.slashdot.org/story/14/07/09/131243/normal-...). There are number of different spheres of programming with different requirements. For the sphere of end-user programming (which Jonathan Edwards explicitly calls out in this post) there are a huge number of people who have to choose between simple tools which don't work well or complex tools that they don't have the time to learn. This sphere has seen little change since the start of the millennium (Excel is still the best option by far, for all its limitations). The OP is arguing for efforts to close the gap and produce simple tools for their simple needs.
- sheepmullet 12y ago
  "What most people seem to be arguing is either that the people currently using Excel and VB6 should suck it up and learn a real language or that they shouldn't be programming at all" And why is that such a problem? If you can handle excel and vba you can learn to program. A lot of existing languages are easier to learn than excel+vba. Excel is not easy to use if you want to do anything moderately complex. Even after years of training all through school and in the workplace the average user can't do much programmatically with it. Excel solved the input/output problem, the availability problem, and the business acceptability problem. By that I mean business users were doing a massive amount of data entry and data manipulation mainly in order to do simple calculations and view data logically in tables. They did this without thought to automate but it made automation 10x easier. As a business grunt I can't just install python and start cutting code. If I said "Hey boss I can automate this with python. It will only take me 2 weeks" I've got no hope. For starters corporate IT wouldn't even let me install python. But I can spend a month fiddling around in a spreadsheet to automate the same task and my manager will be happy.
  - jamii 12y ago
    I made a long list of some of the difficulties one encounters in trying to use industrial-grade tools to solve home-repair-grade problems: http://www.lighttable.com/2014/05/16/pain-we-forgot/ http://www.lighttable.com/2014/05/16/pain-we-forgot/ It's not just programming that is hard, it's editing, debugging, compiling, version control, packaging, deploying, upgrading etc. Existing tools give you a huge amount of flexibility and power (that most end-user tasks don't need) at the expense of a brutal learning curve. They make complex things possible but easy things tiresome. Consider how long it takes for the average CS undergrad to reach a point where they could build, deploy and maintain the simple webapp I described in that post. There is definitely room for a simplified set of tools that lets end-users build simple applications with a pay-as-you-go approach to complexity and learning curve.
    - SomeCallMeTim 12y ago
      >There is definitely room for a simplified set of tools that lets end-users build simple applications with a pay-as-you-go approach to complexity and learning curve. You want this to succeed, then pick a domain and solve that problem for people. It's not the source control that is the primary problem. You can do Excel-like things on Google Drive, which has integrated revision control, shared editing, and a dozen other features to help the average user or team get things done. No, the primary problem is that most people don't know what they want. They don't even know what's possible, much less how to accomplish it. Ask any consultant and they'll agree with me: The first thing you need to do is figure out what the users actually can use based on their needs. It's like Henry Ford said: If you asked users what they wanted, they'd have told him they wanted a faster horse. [1] The problems exist because they aren't easy to solve unless you have the expertise. I'm not poo-pooing Excel or any other domain-specific solution. If you can create a general solution to a problem (say, for example, WordPress), then users can plug together the pieces they need and create an app. But there is no "language" that will solve the "average person can't program" problem in the general case any more than there's a paintbrush that will solve the "average person can't paint" problem. [1] http://blog.cauvin.org/2010/07/henry-fords-faster-horse-quote.html http://blog.cauvin.org/2010/07/henry-fords-faster-horse-quot...

SomeCallMeTim 12y ago

Excel==Domain-Specific. I already said that Domain-Specific systems can be successful, and I have nothing against improving domain specific systems. The original article implied that they were going to fix All The Programming. I'm saying it's been tried, and Every Single Time it fails utterly (or produces a domain specific solution).