5 ms·

to be honest i'm tired of all this language talk. The fanboism surrounding lisp, haskell, arc, scheme, erlang, and other less popular languages is getting to b

by utnick 19y ago

to be honest i'm tired of all this language talk. The fanboism surrounding lisp, haskell, arc, scheme, erlang, and other less popular languages is getting to be a little too much Languages don't matter! When I first started programming, I was so impressed by superhackers who knew like 10 languages or were experts in obscure ones like Forth and whatnot. Then as I learned more languages, I realized that languages are just interfaces into the computer system. Thats it. Arc won't be able to do anything that binary code can't do. This is nothing against pg. If you want to create a language because that interests you. Great! I'm just tired of all the elitist fanboys mentally masturbating over how great their language is. maybe i just read programming.reddit too much tho ;)

Kaizyn 19y ago
Well said, spoken like a true Blub programmer!
- reitzensteinm 19y ago
  Right, and ad hominem attacks are OK if someone really doesn't get it?
  - Kaizyn 19y ago
    As a programmer who has a preferred Blub language myself, I saw it more as a flip comment than any sort of name calling. Until someone actually sits down and invents the "100 year language", it won't matter much if you're using a powerful language or one of the lesser blubs.
kirubakaran 19y ago
If you frequent programming.reddit, you must have read http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html ? Is your opinion still the same?
- utnick 19y ago
  I must admit I am curious about his statement that 25% of viaweb code would have been very difficult to do in other languages. I would like to hear examples of that. My feeling is that the success of viaweb development had much less to do with lisp than it had to with PG and friends being really good hackers.
  - pg 19y ago
    What a weird situation. I keep trying to tell people Lisp is great, and they say, no, no, you guys were just really good programmers. But if I'm such a good programmer, why don't they believe me?
    - whacked_new 19y ago
      To nitpick this remark, Suppose: 1, cperciva is a really good programmer, 2, writing a Viaweb is within his ability. Given: cperciva intends to write a Viaweb. Result: Viaweb in C. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=96431 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=96431 (I know, the logic is flawed. I'm being half-facetious)
      - pg 19y ago
        Viaweb manipulated s-expressions at runtime and called compile on them. One literally could not write it in C, short of writing a Lisp interpreter in C, which is what Yahoo had to do when they ported it to C++ after I left.
        mooneater 19y ago
        I believe it could be very ugly in C, but not that it could not be written in C.
        marcus 19y ago
        Ever heard of the concept of Turing Completeness, Google it...
mechanical_fish 19y ago
Aw, man, you fed the troll with an even larger troll. This is going to be messy. Maybe I can defuse the situation with the Premature Godwin Maneuver. Look! Over there! It's Hitler!
- eru 19y ago
  We just went from 19 to 20. (Or worse.)
Hexstream 19y ago
"Languages don't matter!" That's why I write raw machine code exclusively!
- eru 19y ago
  I use dice to decide in which language I write today.
  - noonespecial 19y ago
    Wuss. I use dice AS the input device. Yep. Has a random number generator built right in, it does.
  - Xichekolas 19y ago
    So what language do you use when you roll a 20?
    - eru 19y ago
      DO COME FROM (20) USE Intercal PLEASE GIVE UP P.S. Could somebody write a real piece of Intercal-code for language selection?
andreyf 19y ago
> I realized that languages are just interfaces into the computer system. Thats it. What do you mean... that's it? From where I stand, that's quite a lot...
eVizitei 19y ago
That is a really brash statement. Usually this kind of comment comes from someone who hasn't really explored the advantages of the different languages they've tried, they've just taken every language that's come to them and manhandled it until it felt like the language they like. I've seen that happen before a lot, somebody likes C very much, so when they're introduced to Lisp, they basically write C in lisp. what does that give you? well for one thing, you have basically a program that is no better than the C version, but with a strange syntax. However, it means that the coder also hasn't taken advantage of the things you can do in lisp that are different from the things you can do in C. You can't write closures in C, so if you've only ever written in C you probably won't use them when writing in Lisp, and thus it seems like a pretty useless transition. Languages ARE interfaces to the computer system, but that doesn't mean that some aren't more powerful than others. I could write a paper with a typewriter or a word processor, which are both viable ways to produce a document, but I can do things with a word processor that just aren't feasible on a typewriter. If you've never used a word processor, you won't miss things like "copy and paste" or being able to tweak your margins at any time, but if you HAVE used one before you will feel stifled without those abilities. Now, if you use a word processor, but you don't figure out how to use any of those handy features, than it's just an electronic typewriter to you and you'll say things like "tools don't matter! Typewriters and Word Processors are just two different ways to write a paper. That's it!" of course, you'll probably get a few odd looks for saying that.
mmp 19y ago
Languages don't matter, eh? A month ago I heard a couple of hackers talk about how they were able to complete a personnel scheduler in Scheme in 20'000 LOC and a few weeks time, when the previous C++ codebase was 200'000 LOC and was never going to be finished. Not always, but for certain endeavours, certain languages are just much better tools for the job than others, and by better, understand order of magnitude better. That's a very real fact, even if it doesn't make the languages zealots any less obnoxious.
edw519 19y ago
There are times when I just want to say, "Anything you can build, I can build in BASIC," but I chicken out. OK, here goes... Anything you can build, I can build in BASIC. Sure, I may have drop down a level and roll out some tools every once in a while, but my BASIC app will so whatever your <language du jour> app does. There. I feel better already.

by utnick 19y ago

Kaizyn 19y ago

Well said, spoken like a true Blub programmer!

reitzensteinm 19y ago
Right, and ad hominem attacks are OK if someone really doesn't get it?
- Kaizyn 19y ago
  As a programmer who has a preferred Blub language myself, I saw it more as a flip comment than any sort of name calling. Until someone actually sits down and invents the "100 year language", it won't matter much if you're using a powerful language or one of the lesser blubs.

kirubakaran 19y ago

If you frequent programming.reddit, you must have read http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html ? Is your opinion still the same?

utnick 19y ago
I must admit I am curious about his statement that 25% of viaweb code would have been very difficult to do in other languages. I would like to hear examples of that. My feeling is that the success of viaweb development had much less to do with lisp than it had to with PG and friends being really good hackers.
- pg 19y ago
  What a weird situation. I keep trying to tell people Lisp is great, and they say, no, no, you guys were just really good programmers. But if I'm such a good programmer, why don't they believe me?
  - whacked_new 19y ago
    To nitpick this remark, Suppose: 1, cperciva is a really good programmer, 2, writing a Viaweb is within his ability. Given: cperciva intends to write a Viaweb. Result: Viaweb in C. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=96431 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=96431 (I know, the logic is flawed. I'm being half-facetious)
    - pg 19y ago
      Viaweb manipulated s-expressions at runtime and called compile on them. One literally could not write it in C, short of writing a Lisp interpreter in C, which is what Yahoo had to do when they ported it to C++ after I left.
      - mooneater 19y ago
        I believe it could be very ugly in C, but not that it could not be written in C.
        marcus 19y ago
        Ever heard of the concept of Turing Completeness, Google it...

mechanical_fish 19y ago

Aw, man, you fed the troll with an even larger troll. This is going to be messy. Maybe I can defuse the situation with the Premature Godwin Maneuver. Look! Over there! It's Hitler!

eru 19y ago
We just went from 19 to 20. (Or worse.)

Hexstream 19y ago

"Languages don't matter!" That's why I write raw machine code exclusively!

eru 19y ago
I use dice to decide in which language I write today.
- noonespecial 19y ago
  Wuss. I use dice AS the input device. Yep. Has a random number generator built right in, it does.
- Xichekolas 19y ago
  So what language do you use when you roll a 20?
  - eru 19y ago
    DO COME FROM (20) USE Intercal PLEASE GIVE UP P.S. Could somebody write a real piece of Intercal-code for language selection?

andreyf 19y ago

> I realized that languages are just interfaces into the computer system. Thats it. What do you mean... that's it? From where I stand, that's quite a lot...

eVizitei 19y ago

That is a really brash statement. Usually this kind of comment comes from someone who hasn't really explored the advantages of the different languages they've tried, they've just taken every language that's come to them and manhandled it until it felt like the language they like. I've seen that happen before a lot, somebody likes C very much, so when they're introduced to Lisp, they basically write C in lisp. what does that give you? well for one thing, you have basically a program that is no better than the C version, but with a strange syntax. However, it means that the coder also hasn't taken advantage of the things you can do in lisp that are different from the things you can do in C. You can't write closures in C, so if you've only ever written in C you probably won't use them when writing in Lisp, and thus it seems like a pretty useless transition. Languages ARE interfaces to the computer system, but that doesn't mean that some aren't more powerful than others. I could write a paper with a typewriter or a word processor, which are both viable ways to produce a document, but I can do things with a word processor that just aren't feasible on a typewriter. If you've never used a word processor, you won't miss things like "copy and paste" or being able to tweak your margins at any time, but if you HAVE used one before you will feel stifled without those abilities. Now, if you use a word processor, but you don't figure out how to use any of those handy features, than it's just an electronic typewriter to you and you'll say things like "tools don't matter! Typewriters and Word Processors are just two different ways to write a paper. That's it!" of course, you'll probably get a few odd looks for saying that.

mmp 19y ago

Languages don't matter, eh? A month ago I heard a couple of hackers talk about how they were able to complete a personnel scheduler in Scheme in 20'000 LOC and a few weeks time, when the previous C++ codebase was 200'000 LOC and was never going to be finished. Not always, but for certain endeavours, certain languages are just much better tools for the job than others, and by better, understand order of magnitude better. That's a very real fact, even if it doesn't make the languages zealots any less obnoxious.

edw519 19y ago

There are times when I just want to say, "Anything you can build, I can build in BASIC," but I chicken out. OK, here goes... Anything you can build, I can build in BASIC. Sure, I may have drop down a level and roll out some tools every once in a while, but my BASIC app will so whatever your <language du jour> app does. There. I feel better already.