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If Programming Languages Could Speak

HealYourChurchWebSit writes "BurningBird's "The Parable of the Languages" offers a delightfully playful answer to the the question, "[what] if programming languages could speak, really speak, not just crunch bytes and stream bits, they would have much to say that is both wise and profound.""

352 comments

  1. C by Lshmael · · Score: 3, Funny

    I love the fact that C only says, "Bite me!"

    1. Re:C by WebMasterJoe · · Score: 2

      Actually, C only says ("%s", "Bite Me");

      --
      I really hate signatures, but go to my website.
    2. Re:C by hillct · · Score: 5, Funny

      It's scary the number of programmers who were tought to speak english by C. Well, C and IRC. I had a guy working for me at one point who's name escapes me at the moment, Everyone just called him Grumpy. He used to wear a floppy Fadora looking hat and whenever you spoke to him all he'd ever say is 'Bite Me'. Now I understand where he learned to speak.

      To be fair, he was an excellant programmer, and although he never smiled, you would occasionally hear him utter the words "Colon, Close Parenthesis".

      --CTH

      --

      --Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
    3. Re:C by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Don't you mean "byte me"?

    4. Re:C by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What about me, said C#. I look like Prince!
      Bite me! said C. ...

      XML! Exclaimed C++. What are you doing here? You're not a programming language.

      Tell that to the people who use me, said XML.

      I'm considered the savior, the ultimate solution, the final word. Odes are written to me, flowers strewn at my feet, virgins sacrificed at my altar.

      Programmers speak my name with awe. Companies insist on using me in all their projects, though they're not sure why.

      And whenever a problem occurs, someone somewhere says, "Let's use XML", and miracles occur and my very name has become a talisman against evil.

      And yet, all I am is a simple little markup, from humble origins. It's a burden, being XML.

      At that XML sighed, and the other languages, moved by its plight gathered around...

    5. Re:C by sinserve · · Score: 1, Flamebait

      That is semantically wrong. The second argument should not be a constant, it
      should be a pointer to a charcter string.

    6. Re:C by gnuadam · · Score: 1

      ...

      char *crap[255];

      strcpy(crap, "Flamebait? WTF? He's right! It is wrong");
      fprintf(some_moderators_suck, "%s!\n", crap);
      ...

      Buffer overflows are features! What else do you do it you've forgotten the root password?

      --
      You say :wq, I say ZZ. Why can't we all just get along?
    7. Re:C by gnuadam · · Score: 2, Funny

      Sheepishly...

      Uhhhhhh.... I meant char crap[255];

      Ironic, eh?

      --
      You say :wq, I say ZZ. Why can't we all just get along?
    8. Re:C by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That is semantically wrong

      No it isn't.

      "Bite Me" is a character string.

    9. Re:C by HealYourChurchWebSit · · Score: 2, Funny

      Though I would have preferred "byte me" ... but that would imply that char. counts!

      --
      --- have you healed your church website?
    10. Re:C by SirNAOF · · Score: 1

      A quoted string is a char *. It's replaced during compilation.

      Please correct me if I'm wrong...but I'm fairly sure on this.

      --
      Jeremy Baumgartner
    11. Re:C by falzer · · Score: 1

      I believe his point was that there is no reason to printf("%s", "Bite me!"); even though it does parse and compile.

    12. Re:C by Hard_Code · · Score: 2

      Admit it, you just made that all up didn't you?

      --

      It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
    13. Re:C by wd123 · · Score: 2

      That's okay, if your compiler was being friendly about type checking you probably would've gotten away with it anyways. :)

      --
      "question = (to) ? be : !be;" --Shakespeare
    14. Re:C by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, I did. I'm sorry.

    15. Re:C by Directrix1 · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      No, C also says outdated skillset. Flame on, biatch.

      --
      Occam's razor is the blind faith in the natural selection of least resistance and in universal oversimplification. -- EF
    16. Re:C by sketerpot · · Score: 1
      I believe that a quoted string is thought of by the compiler as
      const char *
      , although there's no reason not to simply do something like:
      printf("This is my string.\n");

      And not worry about %s or any such thing.
    17. Re:C by hillct · · Score: 1

      No, I swear to god it's true.

      --

      --Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
    18. Re:C by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      LILO Boot: single vga=ask

  2. Screaming by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    A lot of programmers would get an earfull!

  3. hello world by c.emmertfoster · · Score: 5, Funny

    My money is on "hello world."

    --
    We can neither love nor pity nor forgive. If you make a slip in handling us you die!
    1. Re:hello world by dboyles · · Score: 3, Funny

      You are, of course, using GNU/hello, right?

      (Take a look at the source code, it's interesting. But my favorite thing is that you can do ./hello -traditional)

      --
      -- "Complacency is a far more dangerous attitude than outrage." -Naomi Littlebear
    2. Re:hello world by MaxVlast · · Score: 2

      The only 'hello world' program that has a complete LISP interpreter built in.

      --
      There should be a moratorium on the use of the apostrophe.
      Max V.
      NeXTMail/MIME Mail welcome
    3. Re:hello world by evilviper · · Score: 2

      With the exception of Java, I think they'd all say: "That's my memory space... MOVE!"

      --
      Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
    4. Re:hello world by MrHat · · Score: 1
      It doesn't have a LISP interpreter, but it does read mail. No, I'm not kidding. Here's an excerpt from hello.c:
      if (m)
      {
      /* Try to read mail. */
      char *mailname, *buf, *getenv ();
      int mailfd, cc;
      struct stat st;

      mailname = getenv ("MAIL");
      if (!mailname)
      ...
      and the usage:
      fputs (_("\
      -t, --traditional use traditional greeting format\n\
      -n, --next-generation use next-generation greeting format\n\
      -m, --mail print your mail\n"), stdout);
  4. Well... by starseeker · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'd say php is screaming for mercy right about now, given the slashdotting fate has pushed it's way.

    --
    "I object to doing things that computers can do." -- Olin Shivers, lispers.org
  5. C Speaks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    How much C would a sea slug code if a sea slug could code C?

    1. Re:C Speaks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, it's

      How much C would a sea slug slug if a sea slug could slug C?

    2. Re:C Speaks by sconeu · · Score: 2

      Well, when I was a banana slug, I coded a hell of a lot of C.

      How come no other UCSC'ers picked up this one?

      --
      General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
    3. Re:C Speaks by trommaster · · Score: 1

      you mean you give C a good slugging?

  6. Shouldn't this be... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "If Slashdot had worthwhile stories...."

    I'd have a -lot- more time!
    Being a Slashdot addict I have to read every story and the posts. This is plain mean!

  7. Next week... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    XML vs Johnny Cage

  8. A tree were to fall in a forest, and kill C, would anyone really care? GO FORTRAN!

  9. And Java says... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Hey, where am I?"

    1. Re:And Java says... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > "Hey, where am I?"

      You are in a VM - go on!

  10. possibles? by He+Was+Gamecubed · · Score: 3, Funny


    Fortan: Kill me! Kill me! I hate my life dammit!
    HTML: What do you mean, i'm not a programming language??
    C: I need to kill some of my relatives.. C++ is nice, but C# is just microsoft's whore

    -Q
    1. Re:possibles? by wirelessbuzzers · · Score: 1

      Wouldn't that be, "Kill me -9!"?

      --
      I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
  11. Obligatory google cache reference by LordOfYourPants · · Score: 2, Informative

    I've found a mirror here

    I hope you enjoy it as much as I didn't.

  12. I think by jchawk · · Score: 2

    Java would say why god WHY?!?!?!?!

    1. Re:I think by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So subtle and yet so clever.
      Maybe you should get a job writing greeting cards aimed at retarded gay old men.

  13. "What do YOU think you're doing here" by silhouette · · Score: 5, Funny

    they said, frowning at HTML. "Listen - being listed as a programming language on some chump's resume - and it doesn't matter HOW many resumes - does not a programming language make!"

    --
    Experts agree: everything is fine.
    1. Re:"What do YOU think you're doing here" by Fesh · · Score: 2

      "Get the hell out of here! And take your circus-midget bastard son JavaScript with you!"

      --
      --Fesh
      Kill -9 'em all, let root@localhost sort 'em out.
  14. A little for the Cathedral.. by Xunker · · Score: 1

    Bring me my bow of burning code.
    Bring me my arrows of design.

    --
    Hilary Rosen's speech was about her love of money and her desire to roll around naked in a pile of money.
  15. Mine talks to me... by wadetemp · · Score: 3, Funny

    ... although it's not much of a conversationalist. It keeps trying to explain something called a "parse error"?

    1. Re:Mine talks to me... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hey dude! i got the same one.

  16. "Stop Anthropomorphizing Me" by drhairston · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "Stop Anthropomorphizing Me. Instead, go outside and play".

    --
    Dr. Joseph Hairston
    Superintendent, CCBC
    1. Re:"Stop Anthropomorphizing Me" by sczimme · · Score: 1


      Don't anthropomorphize inanimate objects; they hate that.

      --
      I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
    2. Re:"Stop Anthropomorphizing Me" by Namtar · · Score: 1

      go outside and play
      Sounds more like my mother after I've been working on code all day :)

      --
      Linux. Because a 386 is a terrible thing to waste.
  17. Re:Info requested by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny
    I'd like the Open Source community (of which OSDN and Slashdot are card carrying members) to contribute a little post-mortem info to the rest of us??

    No can do. Open source software never fails. It has no bugs and is perfect in every way. You must be using it wrong.

  18. Interesting choice of languages by hdparm · · Score: 0, Funny
    Luckily enough, BASIC was not included.

    That's kinda good - it's speak would be pretty boring:

    10

    20

    30

    40

    . . .

    1. Re:Interesting choice of languages by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      that's not even funny

    2. Re:Interesting choice of languages by scumdamn · · Score: 2

      If you'd read the story you would have seen that basic indeed did show up. He had to be helped to stand in alphabetical order because he never did learn the alphabet.

  19. If Java could speak...... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    A converstaion would take all day.

    1. Re:If Java could speak...... by Hard_Code · · Score: 5, Funny

      "A converstaion would take all day."

      No, because it would fail during compilation at:

      Error at line 1: unknown symbol: "converstaion"

      --

      It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
    2. Re:If Java could speak...... by Eric_Cartman_South_P · · Score: 3, Interesting
      ...but it would be fully understandable on every Continent.

    3. Re:If Java could speak...... by pizza_milkshake · · Score: 3, Funny

      ah, but it could hold conversations with many people at once very easily

    4. Re:If Java could speak...... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      esperonto?

    5. Re:If Java could speak...... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nahh that would be COBOL. In addition, before each and every conversation a large number of introductions would have to be made.

      Consider PASCAL.... you have to have all the mini-discussusions before you can figure out what the main topic is all about.

    6. Re:If Java could speak...... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      is esperanto a language for a specific continent?

      a failed attempt at unification is more like it.
      I think more people know ENGLISH than esperanto.

    7. Re:If Java could speak...... by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      As long as we have coders that can't spell right, that will happen lol

      Well, at least if your consistant with your mispelling in your classes and not calling anything outside with a mispelled name, everythings good :)

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
    8. Re:If Java could speak...... by BluBrick · · Score: 2

      Kinda like German?

      "What is he talking about?"

      "I have no idea, he hasn't got to the verb yet!"

      --
      Ahh - My eye!
      The doctor said I'm not supposed to get Slashdot in it!
  20. Sadly... by Spazholio · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...javascript wasn't even invited to the party. Doesn't that violate some kind of anti-discrimination law? I mean, just because it's constantly disabled doesn't mean it's not a valuable member of programming society too...

    1. Re:Sadly... by erpbridge · · Score: 5, Funny

      Oh, I'm pretty sure it'll pop-up or pop-under sometime, just you wait...

    2. Re:Sadly... by evilviper · · Score: 3, Funny

      Yeah, it showed up as they were all trying to leave and pushed them back in...

      --
      Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
  21. Flash MX Actionscript... by DA_MAN_DA_MYTH · · Score: 2

    Don't blame me that I suck... Blame those guys over there... (Pointing to Macromedia)

    Our development team has just finished a huge Flash MX project and they are all complaining about how it tries to be a language but it's too buggy to do anything but suck sometimes.

    We'll see if things change with Flash MX for Java

    --
    "It takes many nails to build a crib, but one screw to fill it."
    1. Re:Flash MX Actionscript... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Funny that. ColdFusion is more buggy than any first year program I've ever seen. At least segfaults in most comp sci students work can be reproduced (and the core files are under 50 Megs).

      Thanks for this post. Now I know to stay away from all macromedia products not just ColdFusion.

      Just to be on topic ColdFusion was begining to say "At least you all have functions." but it caught a fatal signal and restarted.

      / chuck

    2. Re:Flash MX Actionscript... by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      Basically, any language that doesn't have some sort of peer review is a poor choice.

      Java at first I was weary of, until they did open the API to review and such. It might be slow (on some systems, not mine.. everyone else must be running 300Mhz systems or something) but you code something in it and it works everywhere. I can attest to that.

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
  22. Danger Danger! by Dankling · · Score: 0

    Danger Will Robinson, danger!

    --
    Slash-for-Thought
  23. 'Java was too busy trying...' by rhyd · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Java was too busy trying to clean a bag out of Babbling Creek.

    it was garbage collecting... ho ho

    --
    'Be the change you want to see in the world' - Al Gore
    1. Re:'Java was too busy trying...' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh is that what that meant?

      Gee thanks, because none of us got it.

      Mod parent down -1(No Shit)

    2. Re:'Java was too busy trying...' by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      Thats because C and C++ always left their stray pointers and memory allocations laying around.

      Someone needs to keep the place clean:)

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
  24. What they forgot to mention... by MalleusEBHC · · Score: 1, Troll

    ...is that all of Visual Studio was outside the gates and not allowed to join the party because the stupid punks weren't compatible and didn't get along well with their counterparts.

    (No, this isn't just blatant anti-M$ hatred, but rather the ranting of a student who is mad that his class is using Visual C++ and wants to just be able to use gcc and not deal with Windows)

    1. Re:What they forgot to mention... by stratjakt · · Score: 2

      Naw, the visual studio gang is having a big all night party on top of a pile of money at a compound that makes the Playboy mansion look like an outhouse.

      --
      I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
    2. Re:What they forgot to mention... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As the author of a 150,000 lines suit of applications that compile quite well using Visual C++ (under Windows), gcc (Linux), and aCC (HPUX), I'd say you need to work on your portability skills.

      Mind you, this is not just commandline tools. I'm talking about full-fledged GUI applications here, directly compilable under both WIN32 and X.

      And there's no magic to it either. Just a well-written abstraction layer.

  25. If this php script could speak by Zakabog · · Score: 5, Funny

    PHP Script: Ho hum, the live of a script can be very boring, what's this? Hmm getting a lot of requests here. Well the server can handle the load. Oh wow it's getting hot in here, hey apache is giving me some signals to start rejecting people. But that apache guy sure is an asshole, I'll just ignore him, besides it's only a few requests. The server has the bandwidth and the processing power to easily handle this load, and it's probably just a spike, it'll die down soon. Hey what's that burning smell? Oh wow one of the processors died. Woah what's that puddle over there? Oh the T1's DSU just melted. So we're down to 2 processors, errr 1 processor, and the web server's connection switched over to the cable modem.

    1. Re:If this php script could speak by Hard_Code · · Score: 3, Funny

      Don't worry MySQL - just keep running and don't look back!!

      --

      It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
    2. Re:If this php script could speak by fractaltiger · · Score: 1

      And then, it calls for Red Alert, ensign Harry Kim is told to "compensate," Tuvok tries to find the link that caused the spike and traces it to /. and after a bunch of technobabble, the Voyager crew unmelts the unlucky slashdotted server and it works like a new starship... er, new machine. Oh, wait...

      --
      "Wireless : LAN :: Laptop : Desktop"
  26. Turtle graphics? by VValdo · · Score: 5, Funny

    I suppose Logo would have said something, but it took him wayyy to long to travel, and it turned out he'd been heading in the wrong direction by about 10 degrees anyway.

    W

    --
    -------------------
    This is my SIG. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
    1. Re:Turtle graphics? by JoeCommodore · · Score: 1

      Logo:
      C'mon, kid, please, not ANOTHER squiral! Hey, how about some good old list processing?

      No, 360 divided by 16 is not 33. Ack!

      I am not responsible for this graphic, that kid made it! *sigh*

      help

      --
      "Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
  27. Amiga, anyone? by PhxBlue · · Score: 3, Funny

    I don't remember what its OS was called. . . probably something stupidly simple like AmigaOS. Anyway, the reason I bring it up is the Guru Meditation Error. As frustrating as it was to see this--it was an ancestor to the BSoD--at least it showed you can work in the OS business and still have a sense of humor.

    --
    !#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
    1. Re:Amiga, anyone? by red_dragon · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Those in the U.S. who had cable TV in the early 90's probably recall TV Guide Channel's precursor, Prevue Channel. This channel used to be in my hometown's cable company's lineup, cycling through the program listings over and over. As it happens, the channel's video was fed from an Amiga equipped with a Video Toaster. How do I know? "Guru Meditation", of course; it happened at least once a week, flashing a bright red box over a black background around the error message, asking the user to "press the left mouse button to reboot".

      As for the origin of that phrase, ESR kindly provides us with this explanation.

      --
      In Soviet Russia, Jesus asks: "What Would You Do?"
    2. Re:Amiga, anyone? by euxneks · · Score: 1

      It was called Amiga DOS and I have the book for ver 1.3 right in front of me =)

      --
      in girum imus nocte et consumimur igni
    3. Re:Amiga, anyone? by jericho4.0 · · Score: 1
      Ah the Guru Meditation Error..... and yes it was called AmigaOS.

      The next best was the bomb on MacOS. It appears to be gone from OS X just by the fact it never crashes.

      --
      "A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing" - Alan Perlis
    4. Re:Amiga, anyone? by jericho4.0 · · Score: 1

      Well.... one of us is wrong (see nearby post), and it's probably me...

      --
      "A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing" - Alan Perlis
    5. Re:Amiga, anyone? by euxneks · · Score: 1

      Well, I know there was an Amiga DOS, and in the book they are talking about the drawer browser system thing =) From what I remember of my brother's system, he used drawers and such in his OS along with the CLI. So I'm guessing that the AmigaDOS was the whole OS.. not just an underlying thing like MSDOS.. =) The book for ver. 1.3 was released in 1988... Pretty old stuff by my age =)

      --
      in girum imus nocte et consumimur igni
    6. Re:Amiga, anyone? by pyrrho · · Score: 1

      indeed, I saw the same thing on several cable services. The amiga was very popular for character generation and overlay, via the Toaster, which combined with the Amiga made a great cheap platform (offering a reasonable quality version of something for a couple thousand dollars that generally would cost more like 10's of K$)

      (+1) Old Man

      --

      -pyrrho

    7. Re:Amiga, anyone? by plumby · · Score: 2
      I thought it was Amiga DOS as well, but according to the official site it's definitely AmigaOS. I think AmigaDOS might just have been the CLI bit, but I could be wrong.

      Anyway, a whole list of amusing AmgiaOS messages, including (From Workbench 1.2) "We made Amiga, They fucked it up",

    8. Re:Amiga, anyone? by cowbutt · · Score: 3, Informative

      I've always defined AmigaDOS as dos.library, the shell commands and a few other bits and pieces, whilst AmigaOS includes AmigaDOS but also adds intuition, exec, Workbench and all the other standard bits.

    9. Re:Amiga, anyone? by kasperd · · Score: 2

      Guru Meditation

      AmigaOS is from before the CPU got protection, so obviously it had to be possible to crash. But I must say that of all the OSes I have seen running on CPUs without protection, AmigaOS is the best and most stable.

      --

      Do you care about the security of your wireless mouse?
    10. Re:Amiga, anyone? by mgblst · · Score: 1

      So, did you press the Left mouse button? -hahaha

    11. Re:Amiga, anyone? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      AmigaDOS is these days understood to merely refer to the disk-related bits of the OS, which is commonly known as 'AmigaOS'. However, in the old days the term AmigaDOS was quite common. Possibly C= were trying to cash in on the MSDOS hype?

    12. Re:Amiga, anyone? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Sheesh! Do no one here know what this is?????

      When AmigaDOS was being developed there were bugs. Yes, real bugs in the OS and sometimes the team had to think about them. They came up wuth their novel solution. They would balance on a board atop a paint can or some such. It required sitting crosslegged and they looked like a guru meditating. This is how the guru meditation error came about.

      Dang! This is one instance where google failed me so far. Oh wait!!!!

      To keep the real project secret they made a range of joysticks, rather like the ill-fated Konix games machine in recent times, and used the revenue from the joystick business as a bit of cash support for the Lorraine. The joysticks Amiga made were all weird and Californian: the Joyboard, for example. This was a board with contacts at each corner which the player stood on, for playing surfing and skateboarding games, etc. The Joyboard wasn`t a success, needless to say, but it lives on today in the form of Guru Meditation messages. How?

      The story goes that one of the popular games at Amiga was to sit cross-legged on the Joyboard and run a special feedback program which tested how mellow you were by how still you sat. Meditating on the Joyboard was a popular way to relax after the prototype Amiga crashed, and so the error messages were named accordingly.

      guru stuff

      ac

    13. Re:Amiga, anyone? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It was used for some video overlays of Max Headroom. Check the credits.

      ac

  28. They were a little harsh on LISP. by BitwizeGHC · · Score: 5, Insightful

    LISP is the language that discovers there is no spoon, and learns to bend itself. In so doing, it becomes master of them all.

    --
    N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
    1. Re:They were a little harsh on LISP. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Lisp bends inwards. And inwards. And inward. And inward.

    2. Re:They were a little harsh on LISP. by gleam · · Score: 5, Funny

      No, LISP is the language that would say "there ith no thpoon."

      -gleam

      --
      this .sig is not a .sig.
    3. Re:They were a little harsh on LISP. by Gandalf21 · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      Actually I would be surprised if lisp would actually say anything at all with all those parentheses.

    4. Re:They were a little harsh on LISP. by RockyJSquirel · · Score: 5, Funny

      (progn (()())
      ((resent I that)

      (is Lisp (that-deserves (a language)
      (a-lot-more-than respect (it-is-getting-from
      (this-boorish crowd)))))

      (is-much-easier-to (syntax-of Lisp) parse
      English math (anything-but Forth))

      (but
      (can-use-to you (macros-of Lisp)
      (turn into
      (absolutely-any
      (unreadable language))))
      (ever-does no-one))
      ))

      Rocky J. Squirrel

    5. Re:They were a little harsh on LISP. by Fesh · · Score: 2

      *laughs* Bravo! Good one.

      --
      --Fesh
      Kill -9 'em all, let root@localhost sort 'em out.
    6. Re:They were a little harsh on LISP. by krogoth · · Score: 2

      From fortune:

      THE LESSER-KNOWN PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES #12: LITHP

      This otherwise unremarkable language is distinguished by the absence of
      an "S" in its character set; users must substitute "TH". LITHP is said
      to be useful in protheththing lithtth.

      --

      They that quote Benjamin Franklin on liberty and safety deserve neither.
    7. Re:They were a little harsh on LISP. by axxackall · · Score: 1

      Since 1957 Lisp stays as the most innovative and the most inspiring language. Other languages come and die. Some stay, but don't inspire. Some were born dead or old. Lisp stays. It evolves but it still same Lisp. It might not be able to say "spoon", only "thpoon", but at least it discovers that there is no spoon. And it doesn't matter how to say about something that does not exist!

      --

      Less is more !
    8. Re:They were a little harsh on LISP. by Dr.+A.+van+Code · · Score: 1

      Wow! I never realized until now that Yoda speaks Lisp.

      --
      Good mfences make good neighbors.
  29. Mirrored Text by xcomputer_man · · Score: 5, Informative

    Well, the site got crunched. Here's a text-only mirror:

    Click here

  30. Hrmm by ActiveSX · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ...a delightfully playful answer to the the question, "[what] if programming languages could speak, really speak, not just crunch bytes and stream bits, they would have much to say that is both wise and profound.""

    Wait a second, that's not even a question. In fact, the whole statement doesn't make any sense.

  31. "My name is..." by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Kunta...Kunta Kinte"

  32. Karma-free repost of text by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    October 08, 2002
    TechnologyThe Parable of the Languages

    If programming languages could speak, really speak, not just crunch bytes and stream bits, they would have much to say that is both wise and profound.

    After all, the original programmers were philosophers, and programming languages were philosopher tools...

    (Photo intensive, and weird. Very.)

    In Babble Meadow, in the twilight hours between day and night, when pesky noseeums float past on the breeze and birds rustle among leaves in preparation for bed, the programming languages would meet. And talk.

    The talk would start as it always started, on issues profound and serious, focusing on the existential core that is center to all languages.

    Do I exist or not? In this never-ending loop of life, when is the purpose? Where should I go, and what should I do when I get there? What comes after the end?

    (It's not easy being a programming language, in forced contemplation of the existence of Self, day in and day out.)

    However, after a time the languages would loosen up. There was something about Babble Meadow -- something that worked its way into their hearts and souls, loosened their threads, opened their parameters. The Meadow was magic, no doubt.

    Today, though, the group was quiet, much quieter than usual, because one of their members, PHP, was not its usual cheerful self. In fact, one could say that PHP was in a true funk, if one had a mind to say something like that aloud, or within the hearing of one's boss. Or doctor.

    Why the blues, PHP, the other languages asked. All the languages that is but C, because all C ever said was "bite me", being a rude language and hard to live with, but still respected because it was such a good worker.

    And PHP answered:

    All I ever do, day in and day out, is work and work and work. The only time I'm noticed is when I break, and then I'm cursed and kicked, and roundly blasted for being useless. However, when things go well, I never get a kind word.

    There's no notice of my ease of use, my elegance, my simplicity. Only my failures.

    rockwallsm.jpgAnd on that dark note, PHP fell into a contemplative silence, dark cloud heavy with aggrieved sorrow.

    You think you have it bad, said C++. Try being me.

    Without me entire industries would fail, banks would close, ships would sink, trains would crash. Why, I virtually run the world.

    Yet the only time I'm noticed is when a memory leak is found or an exception occurs, and then I'm cursed, and sworn at, and ruthlessly debugged with nary a thought for my sensibilities.

    Each of the languages nodded their heads, because they knew about C++ sensibilities, it being a most sensitive language. In fact, Perl was so moved by C++'s eloquence, it felt compelled to speak, though normally at these gatherings Perl would sit quietly in a corner, consuming pattern after luscious mouth watering pattern.

    PHP, C++, I sympathize with you both. My own state is a sorry one at times.

    I match and match and match and match, first cryptically and now objectively, but still I match and match and match. And match after flawless match is taken for granted though I'd like to see others match with such style and elegance as myself.

    Why, you can't mention "regular expression" without my name coming up.

    But do I get any credit? No.

    O it's Larry Wall this, and Larry Wall that, and Larry Wall, he's our guy.
    But it's grab the Perl interpreter when a task is close at hand.

    As Perl finished, Python and Ruby looked at each and rolled their eyes. For all that talk of matching, you'd think that Perl could at least rhyme.

    FORTRAN reached up a withered hand and patted Perl's shoulder.
    ceilingsm.jpg

    There, there, Perl. There, there.

    At the very least, though, you must remember that you have a place still in the world. As for myself, I am nothing more than a wisp, a ghost of my former strong and virile self.

    There was never a scientific problem I couldn't handle, or complex equation I couldn't solve. At one time I was a master of my domain, the king of the processor.

    Now, sadly, my glory days are over, and I'm doomed to live my twilight years as Legacy code.

    As FORTRAN wheezed to a stop, COBOL was emphatically nodding its head, unable to speak, though, because of the oxygen tube up its nose (for which the other languages were secretly thankful because COBOL did tend to maunder a bit about its glory days).

    At that the floodgates of complaints was loosed, and the noise increased and increased and increased, to the point that squirrels came out of their holes, and birds peered over the edges of their nests. Suddenly the quiet glen was quiet no more.

    lilypadsm.jpgWhat about me, said Pascal. I'm only used for training. Training! What good is a language that's only used in school?

    What about me, said SNOBOL. No one's even heard of me!

    What about me, said C#. I look like Prince!

    Bite me! said C.

    LISP would have spoken, but it had caught a glimpse of itself in the pond and fell in when it tried to meet itself coming. And Java was too busy trying to clean a bag out of Babbling Creek.
    garbagesm.jpg

    The noise rose and rose, and the babble increased and increased until across the meadow, from the trees roared a Voice.

    Enough!

    I tire of your bickering, I weary of your complaints. I grow bored with your list of whims and whines and 'poor mes'.

    I thought this was going to be a party! If I knew it was going to nothing more than a bitching session, I would have stayed home.

    The languages stopped their talking at once. Who was it that called out? They counted heads and arranged themselves alphabetically (C++ having to position Basic, because it never did learn the alphabet), and counted heads again and came up with the same answer from the North, South, East, and West -- all the programming languages were accounted for.

    As they puzzled and wondered, the bushes at the end parted and XML walked into the light.

    XML! Exclaimed C++. What are you doing here? You're not a programming language.

    Tell that to the people who use me, said XML.

    I'm considered the savior, the ultimate solution, the final word. Odes are written to me, flowers strewn at my feet, virgins sacrificed at my altar.

    Programmers speak my name with awe. Companies insist on using me in all their projects, though they're not sure why.

    And whenever a problem occurs, someone somewhere says, "Let's use XML", and miracles occur and my very name has become a talisman against evil.

    And yet, all I am is a simple little markup, from humble origins. It's a burden, being XML.

    At that XML sighed, and the other languages, moved by its plight gathered around... ...and tromped that little XML into the dirt. Yes, into the very dirt at their feet. Basic tromped, and C++ tromped, and Java cleaned and tromped and cleaned again, and COBOL tried to throw a kick at XML's head but fell over on its cane. Even LISP pulled itself out of the pond to throw loopy hands around XML's throat, but only managed to choke its ownself.

    And each language could be heard to mumble as it tromped and tromped and tromped, with complete and utter glee:

    Have to parse XML, eh? Have to have an XML API, eh? Have to work with SOAP and XML-RPC and RSS and RDF, eh?

    Well parse this, you little markup asshole.

    The End.

  33. Perl would say: by Frank+of+Earth · · Score: 2

    "Listen child, if I have to tell you one more time to end each line with a semicolon, I'm going to smack you upside the head. And who's idea was to portray me as a Camel and Lama! How's a lady like myself going to get a man, when you look like a damn humped camel!"

    1. Re:Perl would say: by JonWan · · Score: 2, Funny

      More like: "?^%/\\?@#$%^*&?|*!"

      Yeah, I know it don't make any sense but that what it looks like to me! One of these $#@%^ days I need to learn a little ^&*%$ perl.

    2. Re:Perl would say: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More like: $no, $I $am $not $that $rich

    3. Re:Perl would say: by JohnFluxx · · Score: 1

      Completely offtopic, but did you know that Pascal actually uses the ";" between lines, rather than after each line. The difference is subtle but means that you don't need a ; on the last line, for example.

      This comes from maths where the ; is a shorthand for functional composition. Instead of writing 'f o g' you can write g;f

  34. I've programmed in a language that speaks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's called VoiceXML.

    1. Re:I've programmed in a language that speaks. by sinserve · · Score: 1

      And that makes you a wanker. Real programmers don't know how to speak.

  35. And the Spaghetti Code said, "... by ackthpt · · Score: 4, Funny

    And the Spaghetti Code said, "Goto Hell"

    --

    A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
    1. Re:And the Spaghetti Code said, "... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Where's -1 Not Funny when you need it?

    2. Re:And the Spaghetti Code said, "... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      -1 Overrated.

    3. Re:And the Spaghetti Code said, "... by PhxBlue · · Score: 2

      Sounds like something my ex-wife was fond of saying. Of course, since I was married to her at the time, I was already in the :hell branch of my life's program. If not for a fortunate Guru Meditation Error, I might still be stuck in that endless :hell.

      The moral of the story is, women are like spaghetti.

      . . .wait, that's not right. . .

      --
      !#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
  36. Lithp: Well-known programming impediment by wondercat2 · · Score: 1, Funny

    For those of you without a sense of humour, it is sarcasm for entertainments sake.

    1. Re:Lithp: Well-known programming impediment by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Jethuth fucking Chritht. You've at leatht got to thay it thomewhat conthithtently. Try: "For thothe of you without a thenthe of humour, it ith tharcathm for entertainmentth thake." Don't you thee how by thaying what you thaid it lotheth thomething vital to whatever athinine joke you were making?

  37. And Visual Studio .Net says. . . by PhxBlue · · Score: 3, Funny
    --
    !#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
  38. MS J++, C++, .NET ... by mhesseltine · · Score: 5, Funny

    You appear to be writing a buffer overflow. Would you like me to start the wizard for that?

    --
    Overrated / Underrated : Moderation :: Anonymous Coward : Posting
    1. Re:MS J++, C++, .NET ... by Hornsby · · Score: 3, Funny

      Good one! Kinda reminds me of this.

      --
      A musician without the RIAA, is like a fish without a bicycle.
  39. Whiny little bitches by corbettw · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Is it just me, or did all of the languages come off as whiny little primadonnas, complaining that they are not loved and worshipped as much as they themselves think they should be?

    For some strange reason, this strikes me as appropriate.

    --
    God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
    1. Re:Whiny little bitches by Karellen · · Score: 2

      Apart from the One True Programming Language, of course.

      Bite me. :)

      --
      Why doesn't the gene pool have a life guard?
  40. If proframming langs could speak, by Alien+Being · · Score: 2

    Larry Wall would make them carp, croak, cluck, and confess.

    1. Re:If proframming langs could speak, by _anomaly_ · · Score: 1

      bless his strict self

      --
      "I have no special gift, I am only passionately curious." - Albert Einstein
  41. Assembler would say ... by njchick · · Score: 5, Funny

    "first post"

  42. If assembler could speak... by mhesseltine · · Score: 3, Funny

    Do you think anyone would actually understand it?

    Somewhat on topic, is SQL considered a "programming language"? And if so, what would MySQL say (especially on /.'s servers)?

    --
    Overrated / Underrated : Moderation :: Anonymous Coward : Posting
    1. Re:If assembler could speak... by Dynedain · · Score: 1

      MySQL is a database

      SQL....well the instruction strings...maybee

      --
      I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
    2. Re:If assembler could speak... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Assembler is the Pooty Tang of languages. One has no clue what the hell it's babbling, but seeing its results leaves one in awe anyway.

    3. Re:If assembler could speak... by aardvarkjoe · · Score: 2

      Well, given that Perl's speech was quite understandable, I don't think that assembly would be any problem to understand. (Although it might speak in a pidgen, I suppose.)

      --

      How can we continue to believe in a just universe and freedom to eat crackers if we have no ale?
    4. Re:If assembler could speak... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > what would MySQL say (especially on /.'s servers)?

      "Boss, is this shit I'm handling toxic?"

    5. Re:If assembler could speak... by PhxBlue · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Having worked with SQL for too damned long, I'd have to say, no - SQL isn't a programming language. It's a query language: a language which provides for databases what programming languages provide for normal systems. More specifically, it's a Structured Query Language. . . as if an unstructured query language would do anyone a whole lot of good.

      --
      !#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
    6. Re:If assembler could speak... by pyrrho · · Score: 1

      hole no pity on dakine my dayme,

      --

      -pyrrho

    7. Re:If assembler could speak... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      huh?

    8. Re:If assembler could speak... by "Zow" · · Score: 2

      SQL is not a programming language -- as another reply pointed out, it is a query language. This was the impetitus (sp?) for Oracle to create PL/SQL, which is short for Procedural SQL: basically it adds basic procedural constructs like loops and conditionals to SQL. (Okay, Oracle may have bought it off someone, but it's wholely an Oracle thing now.) I've started using it more and more at work. As much as I hate using anything Oracle proprietary, if you want to program really close to the data, I haven't seen anything better. I just wish it was available for MySQL or Postgres. What would be even better is that sort of integration of SQL into Python, although I have to admit that the RDBS support for Python is much slicker than Perl's DBI, and it blows away that crap called JDBC or ODBC.

      -"Zow"

    9. Re:If assembler could speak... by CurlyG · · Score: 2

      [OT]

      You sound like you should check out PL/PGSQL... just what you're after :-)

      It's quite good, too...

      --
      You know they call 'em fingers but I've never seen 'em fing. Oh, there they go.
    10. Re:If assembler could speak... by "Zow" · · Score: 2

      Oh wow -- that rocks. Why is this the first I've heard of it? Now, admittidly, I haven't exactly gone looking, but still, I never remember hearing about this in any of the Postgres vs. the world type debates, yet this seems like a really compelling reason to use it over the other available solutions.

      Thanks for the pointer.

      -"Zow"

  43. Basic by hackwrench · · Score: 1

    What do they mean it never learned the alphabet?

    1. Re:Basic by JoeCommodore · · Score: 1

      Hey Boss, anything ya want, I'll do it, I'm READY. Whatever way ya want it done.

      I'm a 'get it done ^&$#@ language' not some ^&&*@#% logic major.

      So, where do ya wanna GOTO today?

      --
      "Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
  44. Old langs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    COBOL: Why, when I was your age...
    Assembly: uses only a few small words.
    Prolog: ((()))

    1. Re:Old langs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      PERL: I dwizel qualter foogoo feps carplast reizenq!

    2. Re:Old langs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Prolog: ((()))

      ?- UsesLotsOfBrackets("Prolog")
      No
      ?- UsesLotsOfBrackets(Lisp)
      Yes

    3. Re:Old langs by IpalindromeI · · Score: 1

      Perl is not an acronym. Don't capitalize it like one.

      --

      --
      Promoting critical thinking since 1994.
    4. Re:Old langs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Larry wall himself has said it is a backronym for Pathalogically Eclectic Rubbish Lister. It is not because it is not an acronym it is not capitalized, it is because acronyms that are language names are not normally capitalised - e.g. Lisp (LISt Processor), Fortran (FORmula TRANslator). One notable exception is BASIC, which is usually capitalised because it sucks so much. FORTH is usually capitalised, but it isn't an acronym or an abbreviation!

    5. Re:Old langs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So what's "Practical Extraction and Reporting Language" then? :P

  45. Re:What they forgot to mention... - blatantly OT by ibennetch · · Score: 1

    (No, this isn't just blatant anti-M$ hatred, but rather the ranting of a student who is mad that his class is using Visual C++ and wants to just be able to use gcc and not deal with Windows)

    I overheard some of my fellow CIS students chatting the other day. They were complaining that we still use GCC and that we're not using MS Visual C++. Personally, I much prefer using GCC and I'm very happy on our Solaris systems.

    I suppose there's no real point to this story, just a slow Friday night...one last /. posting before bed

  46. $!/usr/bin/perl by archen · · Score: 2, Funny

    If perl could talk, it would be the ultamate in l33t speak.

  47. Mirror In Case of /.ed by MoThugz · · Score: 1

    Mirrored here in case original site got /.'ed.

    Go easy on my server... :)

    1. Re:Mirror In Case of /.ed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      karma whore

    2. Re:Mirror In Case of /.ed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bitch.

    3. Re:Mirror In Case of /.ed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      shut up karma whore

  48. Assembly by Jotham · · Score: 3, Funny

    and Assembley would sound like Rainman... constantly muttering and repeating itself. 48 Matches... definately 48...

    1. Re:Assembly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      (The punch line is stolen from somebody, but I can't remember who)

      The metric system?

    2. Re:Assembly by kbielefe · · Score: 5, Funny
      Intel assembly would speak little-endian, sort of like yoda.

      And risc assembly would only have a 30 word vocabulary, but could still recite shakespearean sonnets quite beautifully.

      --
      This space intentionally left blank.
    3. Re:Assembly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I love it.

    4. Re:Assembly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's assembler. And of course saying you know assembler (for example in your resume), doesn't mean anything.

    5. Re:Assembly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      >Assembly: Listen to you young whipper-snappers whine. In my day we walked through 10 miles of printouts without any shoes, and we liked it!
      Well, I wonder what would Mel say about it?
    6. Re:Assembly by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      It's assembler. And of course saying you know assembler (for example in your resume), doesn't mean anything.

      I'd say it would mean everything if you were going for a position at say, motorola or some other company and the position was for and embedded systems coder.

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
    7. Re:Assembly by BlueGecko · · Score: 2

      If you want the linguistic equivalent of RISC then, check out toki pona [sic] with its whopping 128-word vocabulary.

    8. Re:Assembly by wheany · · Score: 1

      If you sent a resume to Motorola thet said something like:

      Known programming languages:
      C++
      Perl
      Java
      Lisp
      Assembly
      I don't think they would take you too seriously.

      If it said something like "8051 assembler" (and/or the same for some Motorola processor), I think they'd be a little more interested...

  49. Cobol by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Cobol: Please! Disconnect my life support and let me die.

    1. Re:Cobol by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      STOP-RUN.

    2. Re:Cobol by Hard_Code · · Score: 2

      Yeah it's a pity...they were all set to do it New Years eve Y2K...

      --

      It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
  50. FORTRAN by scrote-ma-hote · · Score: 1

    It was a little harsh on FORTRAN really. I'd say that it's still the major programming language for scientific computing. I don't use it personally, but a lot of people I work with do.

    1. Re:FORTRAN by Manhigh · · Score: 1

      Yes it still has its place. Programs like Matlab have gotten more popular, but theyre expensive.

      I for one cant wait for g95 to be released. link

      --
      "Open the pod by doors, Hal" > "I'm afraid I can't do that, Dave" sudo "Open the pod bay doors, Hal" > alright
  51. Why do OCaml and Scheme have to miss out? by Rubidium · · Score: 2

    Damn, why did OCaml and Scheme have to be left out of the fun of beating the shit out of the evil that is known as XML? Especially considering that OCaml could fuckin annihilate most of the other languages present, except for Lisp and C (and that's just because C does its bidding outside of the world of high level languages); with that in mind, it could really pound the crap out of XML.

    1. Re:Why do OCaml and Scheme have to miss out? by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      Since when was XML considered a programming language?

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
    2. Re:Why do OCaml and Scheme have to miss out? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Didn't read the story, did you?

      XSLTs can be turing complete.

      I think they were just referring to the whole mess that got embraced along with XML.

      Heck, you could indeed write a language in XML, god knows why.

      But yeah, in and of itself as a specification, it just describes data.

    3. Re:Why do OCaml and Scheme have to miss out? by axxackall · · Score: 1

      Since XSL, XQuery and FlatCurry.

      --

      Less is more !
  52. Assembly by istartedi · · Score: 5, Funny

    Assembly: Listen to you young whipper-snappers whine. In my day we walked through 10 miles of printouts without any shoes, and we liked it!

    Then raw binary spoke up and said: Feet? You had feet?

    (The punch line is stolen from somebody, but I can't remember who)

    --
    For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
  53. Ada would be Esperanto by famazza · · Score: 2

    Born to be the universal languange, but only few really use it.

    --

    -=-=-=-=
    I know life isn't fair, but why can't it ever be un-fair in MY favor!?
    1. Re:Ada would be Esperanto by PhxBlue · · Score: 2

      Actually, if you use PL/SQL, you use Ada more than you may think.

      --
      !#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
    2. Re:Ada would be Esperanto by mgblst · · Score: 1

      And Prolog would say: "I think, therefore you ain't"

      And Miranda would say: "Get the func out a here"

  54. Forth hobbles up and lies on its bed... by Nindalf · · Score: 5, Funny

    "When relegated to obscure embedded applications, look as good you will not."

  55. Forth of course .... by taniwha · · Score: 3, Funny

    speaks just like yoda - "world hello, I am"

    1. Re:Forth of course .... by RockyJSquirel · · Score: 3, Funny

      Beat me to it, you did!

      Bumper sticker (I've seen):

      Forth love if honk then

      Rocky J. Squirrel

  56. I don't know about you by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...but the first time I compile something and my pc says "All your code are belong to us!", I am going to blow the fuckin thing up.

  57. Nothing worth listening to by sploreg · · Score: 0, Troll

    They would say what we want them to say. They are finite state machines programmed by us, to work how we want them to work and have a knowledge base consisting of what we have "taught" them.
    Would you really care as to what they have to say if we have heard it all before? They don't have feelings or emotions towards anything. Whatever they tell us is just regurgitated knowledge from a database. Therefore we know what a computer would say if it could speak: "Here is a finite answer to your bounded question."
    Until we fully understand how our brain works, particularly the part(s) relating to imagination, and we can transfer that knowledge into machine code, then maybe computers would give us something worth listening to. Until then, I don't want to hear how it is doing today, just load up UT thanks.

    1. Re:Nothing worth listening to by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What a surprise, a humorless pedant on Slashdot, who would have thought.

    2. Re:Nothing worth listening to by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And yet again, someone speaks the truth on Slashdot, and is moderated down...

    3. Re:Nothing worth listening to by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      If I had mod points, I'd mod you up.
      Might not be what everyone wants to hear, but it's definately TRUE.

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
  58. visual basic would say by b17bmbr · · Score: 1

    i am a programming language, really i am, really, uncle bill says so,

    --
    My problem? I was perfectly gruntled, until some numbnuts came by and dissed me.
    1. Re:visual basic would say by willpost · · Score: 2

      Sub little_language_that_tried()
      Dim my_brain as string

      my_brain = "simple mind"

      Do while my_brain = "simple mind"
      Debug.Print "I think I can.. ";
      Loop

      End Sub

    2. Re:visual basic would say by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ahahaha! Yuo r teh leet linuks hakker!

    3. Re:visual basic would say by LittleBigScript · · Score: 1

      Isn't Visual Basic like the STD of microsoft(tm) programming languages?

  59. Hopefully a SQL is in order by HealYourChurchWebSit · · Score: 2, Funny

    I've been in touch with Shelley (the author) via email. I've been trying to convince her to write a SQL based upon some higher level languages. I could only imagine the derision for nasties such as dBase, PowerBuilder and Access. Hopefully they get the crap kicked out of them as well.

    --
    --- have you healed your church website?
  60. Lisp. by sinserve · · Score: 2

    Lisp would blow out rings of sweet smoke, as it rests back on its arm
    chair, whispering "nice try kids, but not quite the real thing ..."

    Gosling and Stroustrup race out of the room, fearing she might reach for
    the louded revolver right beside her martini.

    1. Re:Lisp. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, blowing rings of smoke, and resting back, are things Lisp is wont to do.

    2. Re:Lisp. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      FAGGOT Bitch.

  61. Speak? I don't think they'd ever stop laughing. by Gldm · · Score: 1

    I'm not sure if it'd be laughter at people's code or just evil laughter when you ask where the missing semicolon is, but they'd all definately be too busy laughing to speak.

    --

    Introducing the new Occam Fusion! Now with sqrt(-1) fewer blades!

    1. Re:Speak? I don't think they'd ever stop laughing. by RockyJSquirel · · Score: 1

      I'm not sure if it'd be laughter at people's code or just evil laughter when you ask where the missing semicolon is, but they'd all definately be too busy laughing to speak.

      Those syntax errors probably tickle.

      Rocky J. Squirrel

  62. The Ultimate Programming Language Question. by 3seas · · Score: 2

    Got and Eraser?

  63. How to kill karma on /. by km790816 · · Score: 1, Troll

    Hey, can you post a link to that story about the buffer overflow in .NET?

    What is that? You DON'T know of one? You're post couldn't have been un-educated MS flame.

    Wow. I'm so suprised. :-)

    1. Re:How to kill karma on /. by ergo98 · · Score: 5, Informative

      Well I wouldn't make such conclusions quite yet. Firstly, shortly after Visual Studio.NET (which in essence is .NET) was released, there was a buffer overflow found in, ironically (truly ironically), a security feature intended to thwart buffer overflows. Secondly, there have been 2 service packs already for the .NET Foundation, and on top of that it has been very lightly exercised (extremely few websites use it, and I've yet to see a single commercial or even big shareware or freeware .NET app): Give it time. I will bet you, putting money on the table, that there will be numerous exploits for .NET as time goes by. No malice intended towards Microsoft, but rather it's just the nature of large scale software.

      P.S. I love asp.net, Visual Studio.NET, etc, but I also know that Microsoft does not have a stellar security history behind it.

    2. Re:How to kill karma on /. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Of course you know this already, but .NET doesn't really have an buffer overflow vulnerability ... the Win32 exception handling model - which .NET uses extensively - is vulnerable to buffer overflow attacks.

      Summary ... .NET is fine. Win32 is shite.

      Phew ... that makes me feel safer!

    3. Re:How to kill karma on /. by ergo98 · · Score: 1

      .NET, as a technology, is not just a language, or a particular tool, but a platform, and the platform has the vulnerability. (i.e. No one has ever defined what exactly encapsulates ".NET": Is it just the languages, but not the implementations of them? If so then .NET will forever be perfect, as it's merely the silly implementations that have vulnerabilities)

    4. Re:How to kill karma on /. by mhesseltine · · Score: 2

      Ok, I was away for a little while, but the first link in a google search for "buffer overflow"+microsoft+.net resulted in this article about a buffer overflow in VC++.net compiled code. True, I've never actually used any of the MS development tools; this was just tongue-in-cheek humor. We return you now to your regularly scheduled /.

      --
      Overrated / Underrated : Moderation :: Anonymous Coward : Posting
    5. Re:How to kill karma on /. by shird · · Score: 1

      You may be interested in 'overnet' the next generation eDonkey. It is a popular freeware P2P tool which uses .NET extensively in its GUI version.

      --
      I.O.U One Sig.
    6. Re:How to kill karma on /. by Osty · · Score: 1

      No one has ever defined what exactly encapsulates ".NET"

      Are you sure about that?

    7. Re:How to kill karma on /. by Anonymous+Brave+Guy · · Score: 2
      No one has ever defined what exactly encapsulates ".NET"
      Are you sure about that?

      Yes, thank you.

      --
      If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
    8. Re:How to kill karma on /. by ergo98 · · Score: 1

      Yes, I'm absolutely sure about that. That particular page, which goes along with Steve Ballmer's comments, seems to believe that .NET is nothing more than web services: In other words an Apache server with PHP could entirely be a ".NET Server" : Take SOAP requests and respond with an XML response. You've got yourself a .NET server!

      Of course there's an entirely different camp within Microsoft, which to me has much more credibility and much more of an actual product, who define .NET as a protected, byte-code interpreter of sorts for running safe, secure code in the Windows environment. Others still define .NET as the encapsulation of a wide swatch of functionality and interfacing to the Win32 subsystem via the .NET Framework (eliminating all of the long held complaints about the Win32 inconsistencies).

    9. Re:How to kill karma on /. by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      Hey, can you post a link to that story about the buffer overflow in .NET?

      What is that? You DON'T know of one? You're post couldn't have been un-educated MS flame.


      Maybe that's because as ambiguous (sp?) as the whole .NET technology really is, no one can tell the difference between a .NET application and a normal application.

      Besides, even if it is a .NET program, how many are there, honestly? It's like making a new programming language, putting it out there, and when one or two people use it saying how secure it is because thare aren't any (documented) buffer-overflows.

      Let's wait until someone actually uses the .NET technology for what it was supposed to be used for, whatever that is. Then, we'll see just what is there and what's not.

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
    10. Re:How to kill karma on /. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      According to his personal site, Osty is an employee of Microsoft.

  64. Brainfuck.. by Garion911 · · Score: 1

    Just imagine what BrainFuck would say.......

    --
    Slashdot is like Playboy: I read it for the articles
    1. Re:Brainfuck.. by saskboy · · Score: 1

      Is this some sort of trick question?
      If it is, I would wager on, "How are you today sir?"

      --
      Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
  65. What about the Shakespeare Programming Language? by sambo99 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Björn Stenberg & Linus Nielsen Feltzing developed this language called the Shakespeare Programming Language

    Check out the The Fibonacci drama

    It even compiles !!!

    --
    - Sam
  66. The God is missing... by dargaud · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Halfway through I could imagine Assembler showing up with long blond hair, a torque, a hammer and lightning strikes...

    --
    Non-Linux Penguins ?
  67. Visual basic by grant+harris · · Score: 0

    Visual basic was unable to speak at todays conference, due to the fact that its lips crashed.

    --

    I'm never going to achieve Nirvana with my Karma

    1. Re:Visual basic by sinserve · · Score: 1

      This is a good example of a DUMB guy who has a sense of humor :-D

    2. Re:Visual basic by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      grant says:
      I'm a bit thick

      Cr0no says:
      Oh Yeah! Me Too!

      grant says:
      Really? That's a coincidence

      Cr0no says:
      Oh Yeah!

      grant says:
      We should run a crappy website

      Cr0no says:
      Oh Yeah!

      grant says:
      I hope we get a kool URL!!!

      Cr0no says:
      Oh Yeah!

  68. What Perl says to me by antisocial77 · · Score: 2, Funny

    C'mon buddy! I know you haven't coded in a while, but I'm easy! Seriously, just a few subs and you'll be back at it, I garuntee! C'mon man, just a few lines, whattayasay? Eh? Eh?

    HAHAHAHAHHA NOOB YOU CAN'T EVEN MAKE A DECENT ARRAY ANYMORE!!! WORTHLESS!

    1. Re:What Perl says to me by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      LOL oh my god now true!

      I'm the same way.. get out of it for a while, and you get back in only to be smacked down, picked on, and laughed at by your computer.

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
  69. Re:original article here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I am an ancient self taught programmer. I always look upon my choice of languages as the choice of mechanics tools. If I had to screw in a screw I used a screwdriver; but if I had to screw in a "gazillion" screws I would choose a more powerful screwdriver (or something equivalent) it's like comaring COBOL with RPG or APL or something entirely different.

    Use the right tool or set of tools to accomplish your task. Using my above analogy ever used a screwdriver as a pry-bar or a simple lever? That is not what it was designed for but it did save you some time. Every tool/language was built for a specific purpose and was/is somewhat limited by what the designers imagined. Tell me how anyone can predict and design for the future and I can probably show just as many "The greatest thing since sliced bread" (GP)* dead programming languages.

    We must stop using language as a "limiting" factor of what we can do. Anyone up to a XXXX server serviced by a YYYY interface written in ZZZZ?

    I would like to think that we are given an idea from that generate the algorithm and then and only then decide what tools we use to implement this.
    Does it really matter today whether we use VB, C++,C# or PERL as long as the end results are the same. Please disregard the obvious maintence problems but even these can be overcome with extensive documentation.

    Course I haven't had formal training in Systems Analysis in about 12-15 years the concept hasn't changed that much... Or has it?

    * General Purpose

  70. +1 FUNNY by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Very nicely done. Thanks.

  71. I wonder... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    If my thick, hard, veiny, purple cock could speak, what would say?

    Probably "RUB ME"

  72. Prolog by Windcatcher · · Score: 2, Funny

    Prolog would start to say something, but get stuck in a rut--stuck in a rut--stuck in a rut--...

    - (Pats Pascal on the back) I still use ya, bud.

  73. VB..... by Tsali · · Score: 2, Insightful

    haiku

    My buffer overflows;
    I feed script kiddies so they
    can auto-send mail.

    /haiku

    --
    This space for rent.
  74. This sucks by PaddyM · · Score: 1, Insightful

    This was the biggest waste of time EVER! I totally waited through a slashdot effect just to read this stupid thing. This is more like "what if people who supported these languages complained?" Whoop de do.

    1. Re:This sucks by PleaseDontBeTaken · · Score: 1

      Warning: haiku ahead

      Damn server too slow.
      Why not buy a faster pipe?
      You waited. Touche.

      -

      --
      --
  75. Who woulda thought by RockyJSquirel · · Score: 1

    "Basic tromped, and C++ tromped, and Java cleaned and tromped and cleaned again"

    Who woulda thought that garbage collection makes a great running gag.

    While the slashdotted page loaded (very slowly) I tried to image what C would say. I knew it would have to be very crude.

    I was SOOO happy when it turned out to be "bite me". It's so perfect.

    God, I hate C.

    Not enough academic languages. I think ML and some variants are important languages.

    Prolog deserved a kick in the pants too. I imagine Prolog as the original Rube Goldburg cludge. Something that always malfunctions. Perhaps it could be a dyslexic who can't say anything clearly and tends to repeat itself.

    Rocky J. Squirrel

    1. Re:Who woulda thought by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      stfu(RockyJSquirel);
      i++;

    2. Re:Who woulda thought by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Shut up, hippy!

  76. Lithp? by notwhole · · Score: 1

    Do you think Lisp would have a speech impediment?

    1. Re:Lithp? by roybentley · · Score: 1

      of course.

  77. Re:Info requested by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This would be better suited for an askslashdot article. Except, of course, that slashdot isn't a site about slashdot, it's a site about jackoffs and legos, but not news about slashdot going bankrupt, or why slashdot sucks.

    Anyhow,....

    Slashdot proves that mysql doesn't scale and/or the slashdot crew have no business writing a web application/administering a db.

    Let's look at the facts.

    1) Sourceforge recently switched from mysql to db2. Partly because they have a business relationship with IBM, partly because mysql couldn't handle the volume.

    2) Slashdot probably has more hardware resources that you do. I think they have 2 machines serving static pages, 3 machines doing dynamic pages, and 2 mysql machines (1 for current, 1 for archived). A *Lot* of what you see is static (all the front pages, the default [score 1 threaded] comment pages). And it goes down faster than Jon Katz in the little boys room (and almost as often).

    3)Mysql is faster than postgresql for simple queries. But, if you're just using simple queries, sleepycat db can do it faster (with non-SQL syntax).

    Before switching dbs, consider what the bottleneck really is, and why it's there. How often does the content change? Do you need an SQL query every page hit? Does perl/php/cfm/asp need to be run for every page? Could you dump some or all og the dynamic pages to static pages and serve them instead? Check your logs and see what pages/tables get hit the most (profile).

  78. C++ would say... by Shamanin · · Score: 2, Funny

    What the heck sort of name is Bjarne Stroustrup? And how do you pronounce that anyway...

    Then the clouds would part and in a booming voice it would ring out for all to hear:

    http://www.research.att.com/~bs/pronounciation.w av

    --
    come on fhqwhgads
  79. Talk slower, Moto by corz · · Score: 1

    Its a shame that Moto was talking too fast for the others to hear. The could learn a lot from the fellow.

  80. /* Good Code never says bite me*/ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    if (your_language != &standard) {
    stfu(your_language);
    i++;
    }

  81. MOD UP...please.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Damn it! If only I had mod points...

  82. Re:Dumb by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Did you actually read the linked article? Go back and read it. It's definitely Slashdot-worthy. (And if you disagree, you must not be a real geek.)

  83. Uhh... by PleaseDontBeTaken · · Score: 1

    How about 246 toothpicks? Definitely. Not everyone has Rainman's memory.

    Here's another secret:
    Kmart sucks.

    --

    --
    --
  84. Re:if programming languages could speak by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    ...the linux kernel would read like shakespear, because its the most ingenious piece of programming ever developed

    And because it's completely impossible for normal people to understand.

  85. MS Visual * by fermion · · Score: 1

    Please, let me die with dignity before I do any more harm.

    --
    "She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
  86. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by sparrow_hawk · · Score: 4, Informative

    Some ANSI C code of mine (this is simple stuff -- i've only been working with C on-and-off for a year or so -- I'm a Visual Basic refugee) compiles perfectly with gcc, which isn't surprising since I wrote it for gcc & linux. However, trying to do a Windows port of my program (shameless plug) with only Visual C++ available to me right now is a *real* pain. It compiles, but certain perfectly acceptable C statements get somehow FUBARed, and the program turns out weird numbers. I'm not enough of a Windows programmer to understand what's wrong, sadly. Maybe cygwin...

    So VC++ and it's merry band are probably standing outside the gates laughing at the "real" standards as they try to interoperate with the de facto standards. Grrr...

  87. Python... by *xpenguin* · · Score: 2

    Python would sit in the corner and laugh at the other programming languages.

  88. More proof that weblogs stink by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    n/t

  89. Weird, was just reading this by teslatug · · Score: 5, Funny
    The Tao gave birth to machine language. Machine language gave birth to the assembler.
    The assembler gave birth to the compiler. Now their are ten thousand languages.
    Each language has its purpose, however humble. Each language expresses the Yin and Yang of software. Each language has its place within the Tao.
    But do not program in COBOL if you can avoid it.

    The Tao of Programming
    1. Re:Weird, was just reading this by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Eiffel is not a functional language.

  90. Hollywood is going to produce the movie. One ?... by Jouster · · Score: 4, Funny

    Who plays whom?

    LISP: Yoda.
    C: Construction worker. Wearing plaid. With "F*** you" on the front of his shirt.
    C++: Two-headed construction worker. Exists in five dimensions. At certain plane intersections, looks like C, at others like Java, and sometimes resembles nothing so much as a confused little boy holding TNT.
    Perl: A mobius strip.
    PHP: A two dimensional drawing of a human interleaved in slices with a three-dimensional rendered version of Perl.
    Eiffel and other purely-functional languages: a perfectly-symmetrical, beautiful woman. She's not too fast, up in the head, but she's got a GORGEOUS pair of legs.
    C#: A small, annoying entity grafted onto the leg of Bill Gates, a giant who carries a sledgehammer labelled "Visual Studio". It's a very pretty sledgehammer.

    Jouster

  91. sooo many stupid jokes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    there everywhere

    1. Re:sooo many stupid jokes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "they're"
      "they are"
      "THEY'RE"

      Got it, you STUPID FAGGOT bitch?!?!?

    2. Re:sooo many stupid jokes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      hey may be gay, but he's not stupid

      okay.. he's stupid.

  92. what question? by vicarina22 · · Score: 1

    ...offers a delightfully playful answer to the the question, "[what] if programming languages could speak, really speak, not just crunch bytes and stream bits, they would have much to say that is both wise and profound."

    what exactly is the question it's supposed to answer? (note the question mark)

    well, now i'm going to read the article.
    criticize first, get facts later.

  93. mirror by NeoCode · · Score: 2

    this is too damn funny. full mirror. courtesy, you friendly neighbourhood mirror-man.

  94. Euphoria, the towelie of languages by Joe+Tie. · · Score: 1

    Everyone: Who are you? Euphoria: I Have No Idea What's Going On.

    --
    Everything will be taken away from you.
  95. Made by humans by xee · · Score: 2

    There's nothing special about the well designed languages (or the poorly designed ones). They were all designed by people who had reasons for doing what they did. Why not just ask those people for their insights?

    --
    Oh shit! I forgot to click "Post Anonymously"...
    1. Re:Made by humans by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Indeed. The right tool for the job.. and if the right tool doesn't exist, make it. Thus many a language was born.

  96. If programming languages could speak by SlimFastForYou · · Score: 1

    I would rush my afflicted machine to the local church for prompt excorcism.

  97. I STILL HAVE NO EQUAL. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    *PLC ID='ME',DUMP=R,SOURCE
    *

    ISAY: PROCEDURE OPTIONS(MAIN); PL/C-R7.5-368 10/12/74 0:53 PAGE

    STMT LEVEL NEST BLOCK MLVL SOURCE TEXT

    1 ISAY: PROCEDURE OPTIONS(MAIN);
    2 1 1 PUT SKIP EDIT('I STILL HAVE NO EQUAL.') (A);
    3 1 1 END ISAY;

    I STILL HAVE NO EQUAL.

    IN STMT 3 PROGRAM RETURNS FROM MAIN PROCEDURE.

    COMPILATION STATISTICS (0003 STATEMENTS) + EXECUTION STATISTICS
    SECONDS ERRORS WARNINGS PAGES LINES CARDS INCL'S + SECONDS ERRORS WARNINGS PAGES LINES CARDS INCL'S AUX
    .00 0 1 1 12 5 0 + .03 0 0 1 6 0 0
    BYTES SYMBOL TABLE INTERMEDIATE CODE OBJECT CODE + STATIC CORE AUTOMATIC CORE DYNAMIC CORE TOTAL STOR
    USED 192( 1K) 86( 1K) 118( 1K) + 344( 1K) 206( 1K) 0( 0K) 958(
    UNUSED 16608( 113K) 519522( 507K) 636728( 621K) + 636198( 621K) 636198( 621K) 519522( 507K) 636130( 62

    THIS PROGRAM MAY BE RERUN WITHOUT CHANGE IN A REGION 621K BYTES SMALLER USING TABLESIZE= 48

  98. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  99. And machine language would say ... by A+nonymous+Coward · · Score: 2

    Zeroeth post!

    1. Re:And machine language would say ... by PhxBlue · · Score: 3, Funny

      Actually, machine language probably wouldn't even make it through the lameness filter. Then again, assembly might not, either.

      --
      !#@%*)anks for hanging up the phone, dear.
    2. Re:And machine language would say ... by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

      Uhhh, how much closer can a human come to machine language than assembler?

      You can't physically plug hex into a file, hoping to make it run.
      we don't have punchcards anymore:)

      --
      -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
    3. Re:And machine language would say ... by tengwar · · Score: 1
      Uhhh, how much closer can a human come to machine language than assembler? You can't physically plug hex into a file, hoping to make it run. we don't have punchcards anymore:)

      Well, the only way I know of doing Z80 opcodes on an 8080 assembler is to use DB with machine language. (Thank you, Digital Research). And very occasionally it's convenient to patch binary with a low level debugger.

  100. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by pizza_milkshake · · Score: 2

    I feel your pain -- I'm taking a course using C++ and my code compiles and runs just peachy on gcc/linux but VC++ is giving me this one error that I cannot figure out. Of course, when I went back to try again the compile froze, I gave it the three-finger-salute and windows froze. Every so often I'm reminded why I switched in the first place.

  101. Alternatively, and with apologies to Douglas Adams by DahGhostfacedFiddlah · · Score: 5, Funny

    What's happening? PHP thought.

    Er, excuse me, who am I?

    Hello?

    Why am I here? What's my purpose in life?

    What do I mean by who am I?

    Calm down, get a grip now ... oh! this is an interesting sensation, what is it? It's a sort of ... heavy, loaded sensation in my ... my ... well I suppose I'd better start finding names for things if I want to make any headway in what for the sake of what I shall call an argument I shall call cyberspace, so let's call it my server.

    Good. Ooooh, it's getting quite strong. And hey, what's about these whistling roaring bits going past what I'm suddenly going to call my script? Perhaps I can call those ... requests! Is that a good name? It'll do ... perhaps I can find a better name for them later when I've found out what they're for. They must be something very important because there certainly seem to be a hell of a lot of them. Hey! What's this thing? This ... let's call it a hard drive --- yeah, hard drive. Hey! I can can really thrash it about pretty good can't I? Wow! Wow! That grinding sounds great! Doesn't seem to achieve very much but I'll probably find out what it's for later on. Now --- have I built up any coherent picture of things yet?

    No.

    Never mind, hey, this is really exciting, so much to find out about, so much to look forward to, I'm quite dizzy with anticipation ...

    Or is it the requests?

    There really are a lot of them now aren't there?

    And wow! Hey! What's this thing suddenly coming towards me very fast? Very very fast. So big and flat and round, it needs a big wide sounding name like ... aub ... asbot ... sashbot ... slashdot! That's it! That's a good name --- slashdot!

    I wonder if it will be friends with me?

  102. PostScript! by plover · · Score: 3, Funny
    Bumper sticker I made years ago:

    youlove PostScript eq {honk} if

    And yes, I wrote it in PostScript.

    --
    John
  103. /* If my code could make comments... */ by saskboy · · Score: 1

    My code would say:
    "Stop feeding this shit to the compiler. It already has to take a oversized stack dump."

    I couldn't resist. This article is practically begging everyone to post their worst coding humor.

    --
    Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
  104. Obligitory cut+paste style mirror by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The server seems to be bending under the load already, beware the slashdot effect PHP, for it shall be the end of thee.

    *snip*
    October 08, 2002
    The Parable of the Languages
    If programming languages could speak, really speak, not just crunch bytes and stream bits, they would have much to say that is both wise and profound.

    After all, the original programmers were philosophers, and programming languages were philosopher tools...

    (Photo intensive, and weird. Very.)

    In Babble Meadow, in the twilight hours between day and night, when pesky noseeums float past on the breeze and birds rustle among leaves in preparation for bed, the programming languages would meet. And talk.
    The talk would start as it always started, on issues profound and serious, focusing on the existential core that is center to all languages.

    Do I exist or not? In this never-ending loop of life, when is the purpose? Where should I go, and what should I do when I get there? What comes after the end?

    (It's not easy being a programming language, in forced contemplation of the existence of Self, day in and day out.)

    However, after a time the languages would loosen up. There was something about Babble Meadow -- something that worked its way into their hearts and souls, loosened their threads, opened their parameters. The Meadow was magic, no doubt.

    Today, though, the group was quiet, much quieter than usual, because one of their members, PHP, was not its usual cheerful self. In fact, one could say that PHP was in a true funk, if one had a mind to say something like that aloud, or within the hearing of one's boss. Or doctor.

    Why the blues, PHP, the other languages asked. All the languages that is but C, because all C ever said was "bite me", being a rude language and hard to live with, but still respected because it was such a good worker.

    And PHP answered:
    All I ever do, day in and day out, is work and work and work. The only time I'm noticed is when I break, and then I'm cursed and kicked, and roundly blasted for being useless. However, when things go well, I never get a kind word.
    There's no notice of my ease of use, my elegance, my simplicity. Only my failures.

    And on that dark note, PHP fell into a contemplative silence, dark cloud heavy with aggrieved sorrow.

    You think you have it bad, said C++. Try being me.

    Without me entire industries would fail, banks would close, ships would sink, trains would crash. Why, I virtually run the world.
    Yet the only time I'm noticed is when a memory leak is found or an exception occurs, and then I'm cursed, and sworn at, and ruthlessly debugged with nary a thought for my sensibilities.

    Each of the languages nodded their heads, because they knew about C++ sensibilities, it being a most sensitive language. In fact, Perl was so moved by C++'s eloquence, it felt compelled to speak, though normally at these gatherings Perl would sit quietly in a corner, consuming pattern after luscious mouth watering pattern.

    PHP, C++, I sympathize with you both. My own state is a sorry one at times.
    I match and match and match and match, first cryptically and now objectively, but still I match and match and match. And match after flawless match is taken for granted though I'd like to see others match with such style and elegance as myself.

    Why, you can't mention "regular expression" without my name coming up.

    But do I get any credit? No.

    O it's Larry Wall this, and Larry Wall that, and Larry Wall, he's our guy.
    But it's grab the Perl interpreter when a task is close at hand.

    As Perl finished, Python and Ruby looked at each and rolled their eyes. For all that talk of matching, you'd think that Perl could at least rhyme.

    FORTRAN reached up a withered hand and patted Perl's shoulder.

    There, there, Perl. There, there.
    At the very least, though, you must remember that you have a place still in the world. As for myself, I am nothing more than a wisp, a ghost of my former strong and virile self.
    There was never a scientific problem I couldn't handle, or complex equation I couldn't solve. At one time I was a master of my domain, the king of the processor.
    Now, sadly, my glory days are over, and I'm doomed to live my twilight years as Legacy code.

    As FORTRAN wheezed to a stop, COBOL was emphatically nodding its head, unable to speak, though, because of the oxygen tube up its nose (for which the other languages were secretly thankful because COBOL did tend to maunder a bit about its glory days).
    At that the floodgates of complaints was loosed, and the noise increased and increased and increased, to the point that squirrels came out of their holes, and birds peered over the edges of their nests. Suddenly the quiet glen was quiet no more.

    What about me, said Pascal. I'm only used for training. Training! What good is a language that's only used in school?
    What about me, said SNOBOL. No one's even heard of me!

    What about me, said C#. I look like Prince!

    Bite me! said C.

    LISP would have spoken, but it had caught a glimpse of itself in the pond and fell in when it tried to meet itself coming. And Java was too busy trying to clean a bag out of Babbling Creek.

    The noise rose and rose, and the babble increased and increased until across the meadow, from the trees roared a Voice.

    Enough!
    I tire of your bickering, I weary of your complaints. I grow bored with your list of whims and whines and 'poor mes'.
    I thought this was going to be a party! If I knew it was going to nothing more than a bitching session, I would have stayed home.

    The languages stopped their talking at once. Who was it that called out? They counted heads and arranged themselves alphabetically (C++ having to position Basic, because it never did learn the alphabet), and counted heads again and came up with the same answer from the North, South, East, and West -- all the programming languages were accounted for.
    As they puzzled and wondered, the bushes at the end parted and XML walked into the light.
    XML! Exclaimed C++. What are you doing here? You're not a programming language.

    Tell that to the people who use me, said XML.
    I'm considered the savior, the ultimate solution, the final word. Odes are written to me, flowers strewn at my feet, virgins sacrificed at my altar.
    Programmers speak my name with awe. Companies insist on using me in all their projects, though they're not sure why.
    And whenever a problem occurs, someone somewhere says, "Let's use XML", and miracles occur and my very name has become a talisman against evil.
    And yet, all I am is a simple little markup, from humble origins. It's a burden, being XML.

    At that XML sighed, and the other languages, moved by its plight gathered around... ...and tromped that little XML into the dirt. Yes, into the very dirt at their feet. Basic tromped, and C++ tromped, and Java cleaned and tromped and cleaned again, and COBOL tried to throw a kick at XML's head but fell over on its cane. Even LISP pulled itself out of the pond to throw loopy hands around XML's throat, but only managed to choke its ownself.

    And each language could be heard to mumble as it tromped and tromped and tromped, with complete and utter glee:
    Have to parse XML, eh? Have to have an XML API, eh? Have to work with SOAP and XML-RPC and RSS and RDF, eh?
    Well parse this, you little markup asshole.
    The End.

    Posted by Bb at October 08, 2002 08:22 PM

  105. Re:Hollywood is going to produce the movie. One ?. by inerte · · Score: 1

    Nobody expects the Pythonists!

  106. Re:Alternatively, and with apologies to Douglas Ad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    mod this post up to atleast a 42

  107. Eniac by Kelerain · · Score: 1

    Eniac: "Back in my day all we had was ones and zeroes. And on bad days we didn't even have the ones."

    1. Re:Eniac by sinserve · · Score: 1

      Eniac didn't have only have ones and zeros. It was a denary machine, so it
      had ones, twos, threes, fours, fives, sixes,sevenes, eights, and nines.

      Eniac was a decimal machine, believe it or not.

  108. -1, stupid weblog by bigsexyjoe · · Score: 1

    Please, don't submit people's weblogs to article queue. Oh, sorry wrong site.

  109. Re:Alternatively, and with apologies to Douglas Ad by DoomHaven · · Score: 1

    Brilliant! You just needed to say that the other server, running CGI, thinking, "oh no, not again".

    --
    "Don't mind me cutting myself on Occam's Razor"
  110. Applescript... by Karl+Cocknozzle · · Score: 2

    Is a very good public speaker, but you should resist the urge to put him in a play. He will take the director literally and "break a leg" the day of the show.

    [/rimshot]

    --
    Who did what now?
  111. If programming languages could speak... by the+way,+what're+you · · Score: 2, Funny

    they would probably just make smalltalk.

    --
    example.org - powered by Linux!
  112. BRUN HELLO by BEA6D · · Score: 0

    Hi!

    --
    rehab, captain ahab, you're chasing the wrong fish!
  113. Re:Info requested by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Firstly, I like Postgres, but if you were using it four years ago then you were suffering some bugs and limitations that were only fixed in the last year. I don't know how anyone could find the previous performance acceptable. It kinda makes me wonder about your opinion :(

  114. Re:Whiny little bitches-Ver. 1-1/2 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Meanwhile at another party:: ABC & ABCL/1 is helping BASIC out with it's letters, APL keeps asking "remember me?", ALGOL complaining that the kids never call or write, SMALLTALK shrank down to a SQUEAK, the ever lovely ADA dressed up and nowere to go,SIMULA is just faking it, ADL is casting a little SORCERER over the audience, the king of geritol BCPL is passed out as a CANDLE sputters overhead, incomprehensible INTERCAL is mumbling while BNF is just YACCing away, the man of many directions ORTHOGONAL is dancing with the farseeing PRECCX. Freezing in the back of the car is SNOBOL4, BLISS whom everyone thinks is WACCO gets hushed while IGNORANCE keeps saying "I don't know" FOCAL is being the proverbial BURS in everyone's saddle by being OX-headed about NewYACC being better than plain BYACC while know-it-all CLIPS says his brother NewsClip disagrees. LEX is PLANning to crash the party and is making PROGRES towards his goal even with ALF getting in his way.

  115. Good Grief! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I think that might be the lamest thing I have ever read.

  116. what is this, all software geeks here? by lingqi · · Score: 2

    It's late on a friday night -- so nothing witty here;

    but seriously though -- what do you think verilog / VHDL will say?

    and then we have the lego-mindstorm language (whatever it's called)

    and then of course we have the ever-pleasure-to-work-with:
    * Malbolge
    * INTERCAL
    * brainf**k ... ...

    --

    My life in the land of the rising sun.

    1. Re:what is this, all software geeks here? by cowbutt · · Score: 3, Funny
      what do you think verilog / VHDL will say?


      Every time you asked it a question, it would split into a number of entities, all of whom would reply "Bite me" simultaneously.


    2. Re:what is this, all software geeks here? by RockyJSquirel · · Score: 2

      what do you think verilog / VHDL will say?

      Every time you asked it a question, it would split into a number of entities, all of whom would reply "Bite me" simultaneously.


      It would split into "naughty bits" each of which would actually bite you.

      (Hardware's lower level than bytes, right? Bits, not bytes... darn it, byte me!)

  117. PHP... by ryochiji · · Score: 1
    In the article (or blog), PHP is quoted as saying:
    >The only time I'm noticed is when I break, and then I'm cursed and kicked, and roundly blasted for being useless. However, when things go well, I never get a kind word.

    That reminds me a lot of doing theater tech, you know, lights, sound, and the other stuff you normally don't think about when you see a show...unless something goes wrong. There really is no glory or glamour in it and you really need to rely on self glorification to make it worth while. It's knowing that the show would not even be possible if it weren't for crew like yourself that makes it so satisfying. And knowing that that actor down there might be the one in the spot light, but you're the guy behind the spot that can also switch it off at the flick of a thumb. If that's not power, I don't know what is.

    Incidentally, I also do a lot of PHP programming (see sig). Never thought we had so much in common, PHP and I...

  118. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by _anomaly_ · · Score: 1

    whether it's for better or worse (i'm not here to debate vc++ vs. gcc or windows vs. linux), it's sad to see new programmers give up on porting their code when it doesn't compile on the first, second.. or fifth try.

    granted, it's frustrating getting to know the nuances of different operating systems, and what "standard" libraries are supported in different environments, but the fact that they exist is not necessarily a bad thing IMHO.
    i'm not denying there are things in vc++ that should be changed (or "fixed"), but some things are different for a very good reason. it may be that something you're doing is antiquated or maybe there exists a different way to do it that offers more advantages than the "tride and true" methods.

    to turn your back on finding these differences only limits your opportunity to become a better programmer and know how to code in different environments, not to mention the exposure of your program (if that's important to you).

    so, why not figure out the real cause of the incompatibilities and THEN make a decision on whether it's a Bad Thing or if it was just a minor nuance of the environment?

    I doubt veteran linux programmers who were masters of ncurses turned their noses up to gtk or qt completely (maybe a thin analogy, OK, but you get the point :-P)

    --
    "I have no special gift, I am only passionately curious." - Albert Einstein
  119. "We C Programmers have a saying.." by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    God created pointers to train the faithful. One cannot go against the word of God.

    Razzia! Razzia! Let slip the Jihad of Lin'nus, that we might purge the unbelieving filth known as Java programmers from this universe!

  120. Oops. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Forgot where I am.

    Disclaimer: The above is a parody of Frank Herbert's Dune. In no way is it related to September 11th, 2001 or AK-47 toting madmen. It is meant in jest, and should not be construed as a challenge of mortal danger to Java coders or Bene Gesserit witches.

  121. BurningBird confirms it.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ..XML is dying! You don't need to be an EMT..

    Aww, nuts.

  122. MOD PARENT UP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Funniest damned post I've read yet.
    Don't be a stingy bitch. Mod it up, Up, UP!

  123. What about brainfuck by Rhinobird · · Score: 5, Funny

    If all C ever says is "bite", imagine what Brainfuck would say. Where's my swear jar?

    --
    If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
    1. Re:What about brainfuck by Jhan · · Score: 2

      I would say "kill... meee..."

      --

      I choose to remain celibate, like my father and his father before him.

    2. Re:What about brainfuck by Saint+Nobody · · Score: 2

      brainfuck wouldn't say anything intelligible. it would run around blackjacking people, occasionally shouting a letter, seeming disconnected from everything else.

      if you took the time to put those letters together, though, it would say something coherent, but completely irrelevant.

      --
      #define F(x) int main(){printf(#x,10,#x);}
      F(#define F(x) int main(){printf(#x,10,#x);}%cF(%s))
  124. Not a programming language... by NeuroKoan · · Score: 2

    but you can turn Jaguar into a talking cat.

    I apologize for the awful pun...

    --

    "However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation."
  125. Qbasic by Bobulusman · · Score: 1

    I rushed to make a witty comment about qbasic (if C, C# and C++ are all in it, Basic and qbasic can be, too.), but decided to check the 50+ posting first, lest I was rendered redundant.

    Sadly, no one has stood up and defended the honor of the programming language that warped my mind so much that I can't seem to learn anything else....

    Anyway, Qbasic would probably just complain about how useful it was for making programs for simple tasks in under five seconds until XP made all of these programs run unbearably slowly....

    --
    Cogito ergo sum in Slashdot.
  126. id myLocation=[self whereAmI:self]; by Jezza · · Score: 1

    Okay, where's Objective-C?

    Or come to that his weird brother Objective-C++?

    [objC retain];

    1. Re:id myLocation=[self whereAmI:self]; by tb3 · · Score: 2

      Being a close relative of C, Objective-C just sent a message:

      [self bite:me];

      --

      www.lucernesys.comHorizon: Calendar-based personal finance

    2. Re:id myLocation=[self whereAmI:self]; by Jezza · · Score: 1

      More likely:

      [sender bite:self];

      Yeah, looks strange, but Objective-C would only refer to self never me.

  127. Computers don't think by OmegaFire · · Score: 1

    I am reminded of the movie short circuit, in which a wise man once said, "Computers don't think, they just run programs."

  128. Karma whore alert by RockyJSquirel · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Searched a few, made up a few

    Smalltalk love ifTrue: [ car honk ]

    love(x) :- Prolog(x) , honking(car);

    SELECT honk FROM TABLE you WHERE love = SQL;

    (and (love you lisp) (honk))

    $Love{PERL} = "You" if ($Honk);

    if {[HEART $env(USER)] == {tcl}} {button .h -text honk ; pack .h}

    And finally the impossible to understand, C++ runtime template version:

    template
    class You
    {
    static bool honking = false;
    };

    template
    class You
    {
    static bool honking = true;
    };

    Rocky J. Squirrel

    1. Re:Karma whore alert by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And then for the easy to read/understand...

      IF you.love = VB THEN honk()

  129. If they could speak... by octalgirl · · Score: 2

    If they could speak it could be proof that it really is a language and make code everywhere unpatentable.

  130. prOn conversation would look like: by fferreres · · Score: 2

    C: hey, i like them (mostly) all men, and knowing me inside out, else they can flirt with me. And being meticulous and fanatics. We like to play dirty.

    C++: wack, I am like you C!!! But i'm sad, because they treat me as if i was an object.

    Java: dude, that's not the worst. They not oly treat me just like an object, they expect me to suck their nuts in any room, anytime :(

    PHP: Ah, well, love is tough. I am easy to get along with. I have a wider audience. They love me, as I don't press them hard. That's your problem, guys. Anyway, most of my lovers expect me to serve them, so they are not much better. But I have tons of them!

    C++: Good tip PHP...You are not as pretty as we are, but you fullfill their needs. But you can only do it at the porche. We can do it in the entire house, in rooms, in cars! Ok, JAVA can do it ANYWHERE, ANYTIME, but we can also do that if they give a love and care.

    PHP: well...true. The thin...

    XML: HEY. Assholes, I like all your bitches, they belong to me now. I will let you all live as long as you don't piss me off. OK (gun pointed at them)...

    (well, these discussion could take months... so i leave other languages comments for yourself...but a note: PERL would be just plain "censored" if allowed to speak here).

    --
    unfinished: (adj.)
  131. Python... by Nighttime · · Score: 2, Funny

    ... would say, "Stop that, it's silly."

    --
    I've got a fever and the only prescription is more COBOL.
  132. C#: "Oh no, not again..." by MickLinux · · Score: 1

    Sorry, no profound text here. If you want profound text, start modding my posts up, and I'll suddenly be wiser.

    --
    Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
  133. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    IMHO, any program that does this: /* Otherwise, pick a move at random. */
    while(aiBoard[Test = (rand_btw(1, BOARD_MAX))] == 0)

    *deserves* to see differences in behavior.

  134. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by Anonymous+Brave+Guy · · Score: 2
    I'm taking a course using C++ and my code compiles and runs just peachy on gcc/linux but VC++ is giving me this one error that I cannot figure out.

    It's quite possible you've hit a bug in VC++, but not that likely. Recent versions have been pretty good on standards compliance in both the compiler and the library, and IME it's as likely that you're using some non-standard extension in gcc than that VC++ is at fault. Have you tried posting your code on a C++ newsgroup and asking if it's all portable? What was the error message?

    --
    If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
  135. Thank god I'm not the only one by Dthoma · · Score: 2

    I thought I was odd for reaching at QuickBASIC every time I quickly needed to parse a list. (No, I don't have Perl or the like installed on this Win machine.)

    --

    Note to M1-ers: a curt but otherwise insightful message is not "Flamebait" or "Troll".

    1. Re:Thank god I'm not the only one by Bobulusman · · Score: 1

      Yeah. QuickBasic is great for that sort of thing.
      Seriously, though, I've had to go back and redo half my programs since I switched to XP Pro from 98. I mean, I know the DOS is XP isn't REALLY dos, but they did a pretty crappy job of faking it. :P

      --
      Cogito ergo sum in Slashdot.
  136. The ONE language ALL programmers know by martyb · · Score: 2

    There is a glaring omission of the ONE language that ALL programmers know: profanity! ;^)

  137. Re:My love hate relationship with the match makers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Really, have you read the article? Can you read?

  138. Try djgpp by jdkincad · · Score: 1

    Youmight want to try djgpp, a dos port of gcc and friends. Available at www.delorie.com

    --
    The great advantage of having a reputation for being stupid: People are less suspicious of you.
    1. Re:Try djgpp by geekster · · Score: 1

      Or MinGW
      A Windows port.

  139. Singing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
  140. they'd say... by cacheMan · · Score: 1

    C "Go ahead, use the 'goto', I dare you."

    C++ "Just make it a global variable, don't you want to go outside"

    Java "Let me do that for you"

    Perl "I need a buck, you got any money man?"

    PHP "Stop calling me that!"

    Python "I'm not different, I'm right. If you don't understand what I'm saying, it is because you are stupid"

    VB "Burp..."

    asm "Screw the next guy, you understand me, don't you?"

  141. Re:if programming languages could speak by roybentley · · Score: 1

    You're lack of grammar frightens me.

    thank you jeezus.

  142. Re:Alternatively, and with apologies to Douglas Ad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So big and flat and round, it needs a big wide sounding name like...

    Goatse.cx!

  143. Re:Hollywood is going to produce the movie. One ?. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Eiffel and other purely-functional languages Eiffel isn't a purely functional language. It's OO w/ design by contract. Why more people don't use it, I'd love to know.

  144. Then we have solved a major question.... by LowAmmoWarning · · Score: 1

    Can we make a computer take any propositional phrase and evaluate wether it is true or false... Not just some instances, but a computer program that can evaluate a hypothesis of any kind and then prove it.

    --
    We could all benefit from my education.
  145. Re:Hollywood is going to produce the movie. One ?. by Jouster · · Score: 2

    Hmm, okay, I may have been mistaken. Thanks for the correction!

    I was actually thinking of Haskell last night, but forgot the name.

    Jouster

  146. And Malbolge said... by jshowlett · · Score: 1

    (=<`$9]7<5YXz7wT.3,+O/o'K%$H"'~D|#z@b=`{^Lx8%$Xmrk pohm-kNi;gsedcba`_^]\[ZYXWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA@? >=<;:9876543s+O<oLm

  147. What Java would have said... by smithmc · · Score: 1

    1. Borrow heavily from C++ and Pascal

    2. Claim "write once, run anywhere"

    3. ????

    4. Profit!!!

    --
    Downmodding is the refuge of the weak. Don't downmod, make a better argument!
  148. If Programming Languages Were Weapons by Soong · · Score: 2

    C: supersonic M-1 tank
    C++: World War II battleship
    Java: Batman weapons
    M L : Alien Weapon
    Assembly: trench warfare
    Lisp (scheme): catapult launched lisp programmers
    perl: sawed-off shotgun with bayonet
    Fortran: Morning Star
    Pascal: play school "my first M-16"
    Basic: capgun
    visual languages : Nintendo games
    Postscript: drowning in paper
    COBOL: cursed dagger -2
    ObjectiveC: alien tank
    csh: pipe bomb
    Prolog: dumbest of smart bombs
    Python: It's just a pile of tinker toys, whoever said it made a good weapon? But gosh darn it, it's modular and clean.
    perl: Pathologically Eclectic Rocket Launcher
    Ada: Garaunteed Military Grade Weaponry, Sir!

    --
    Start Running Better Polls
  149. TOGGLE SWITCHES! by RockyJSquirel · · Score: 1

    Uhhh, how much closer can a human come to machine language than assembler?

    You can't physically plug hex into a file, hoping to make it run.
    we don't have punchcards anymore:)


    TOGGLE SWITCHES!

    Who says I can't physically plug hex into a file Jeeze.

    Is the "first post" thing imagining Assembler and Machine as Tweedledum and Tweedledee?

    Rocky J. Squirrel

  150. Re:echo '$!/usr/bin/perl' | sed 's/\$/\#/' by arkane1234 · · Score: 1

    Except more l33t people wouldn't get past line 1 without reading a book to figure out how to invoke a shell script properly.

    (read subject line)

    --
    -- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
  151. Whaaaaat? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If pigs could fly... If Microsoft Works... Okay, now I know this'll never happen.

  152. "Lots of Irritating Superfluous Parentheses" by Lisias · · Score: 0

    I made some nice things with LISP, but more than a time I lost my parentheses with the patience...
    huh... I mean...

    I lost my patience with the parentheses... 8-)

    --
    Lisias@Earth.SolarSystem.OrionArm.MilkyWay.Local.Virgo.Universe.org
  153. COBOL speaking.... by mattsucks · · Score: 1



    "Hello, this is Dr. Kevorkian speaking."

    COBOL: "Dr. Kevorkian, you have to help me! Please....."

  154. Python would of course say: by h0ss · · Score: 1

    I'm not dead yet!

    What is your name?

    What is your quest?

    Nobody expects the spanish inquisition!

  155. Not found by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    "The requested URL /media/ballmer_monkey_music_.mov was not found on this server.

    Additionally, a 403 Forbidden error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request."

    I tried the root directory, and it said "You don't have permission to access /index.html on this server."

    <sarcasm>Great site.</sarcasm>

  156. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Not quite, VC++ 6 has piss-poor template support, a 256-byte symbol limit, and numerous other standards compliance defects (even in comparison to SUNWSpro and GCC).

  157. Weapons: Lisp vs Scheme by axxackall · · Score: 1
    Lisp (scheme): catapult launched lisp programmers

    • Lisp - catapult launching catapults, each launching catpults...
    • Scheme - nice b/w picture of the catapult inspiring other artists to create similar pictures.
    And some missed ones:
    • Haskell - super-blaster turning all solid rocks to flowing (functioning) waters;
    • Curry - super-bluster turning rocks if they sutisfy specified constraints;
    • FlatCurry - super-bluster without any coverage (naked);
    • Mercury - the pack of super-fasers turning solid rocks to invisible (logical) gas;
    • Oz - the pack of toolkits to produce packs of super-fasers;
    • Erlang - the pack of micro-fasers warning about potential turning.
    --

    Less is more !
  158. Not really fair... by Anonymous+Brave+Guy · · Score: 2
    Not quite, VC++ 6 has piss-poor template support,

    No worse overall than any other mainstream compiler of its time, really, though.

    a 256-byte symbol limit,

    That relates to debugging, not compiling, IIRC, and the irritating warning is readily suppressed.

    and numerous other standards compliance defects (even in comparison to SUNWSpro and GCC).

    Almost all of which are either (a) eliminated if you ask it to with a compiler switch, or (b) again, no worse than any other compiler of its generation (lack of export, etc.). The major objection to solution (a) was that it broke the libraries shipped with VC++, which is a fair point, but if it mattered, you could always download an alternative set (for free, even) that did compile under stricter compliance rules.

    If you have a relatively new C++ programmer having trouble porting code from GCC to VC++, I'd still guess that it's at least as likely that the person concered is using some non-standard extensions in GCC as that VC++ actually doesn't support what they've written.

    --
    If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
  159. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by obscurite · · Score: 1

    Go download the free Borland C++ Builder command line tools... they're a more up to date C++ implementation than Visual C++ 6.0 and they work very well and are easy to install (VERY EASY - read docs on site).

    http://www.borland.com/products/downloads/downlo ad_cbuilder.html

    Programming languages already speak... they say things in my head all the time... "yes, add an obscene comment there... delete that mysterious function call... yes, we are your friends..."

    EOF
  160. Re:Alternatively, and with apologies to Douglas Ad by Oryx3 · · Score: 1

    It always amazes me (42) how deeply Douglas Adams seems to have influenced (42) the programming community on a subconscious level. (42)

    42.

    See?

  161. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Took a few seconds to get it compiled and running with VC++, need an include for windows.h to get the sleep function (which is Sleep in windows so I added a #define with that include). The other problem is you define daemon_mode in an ifdef and use it outside of one which ofcourse bombs out. I removed that ifdef and added a struct for option and pow, it runs.

    I have the physical game, this should be fun to play with on my plane ride today.

  162. GO FORTRAN by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Surely that should be a GOTO ?

    VAX killer, way back in early VMS versions (some scheduler problem IIRC):

    5 goto 5
    end

  163. Pascal (ot) by roie_m · · Score: 1

    That's also why you're not allowed a semicolon immediately before the word "else" in an if statement.

  164. And you never learned English at all, moron. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    There's no 'a' in "excellent", asshole. There's only one 'a' in "fedora", asshole. "Fedora" is not a proper noun, asshole. "English" IS a proper noun, asshole. "Who's" is a contraction of "who is", asshole. The possessive is "whose", asshole. "Is" is present tense, asshole. "Was" is past, asshole. "Close" is not a proper noun, asshole. "Parenthesis" is not a proper noun, asshole. "Everyone" is not a proper noun, asshole.

    In short, YOU ARE A FUCKING MORON.

  165. Please up-mod parent by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It turns out the poor original poster just doesn't know what the hell he's doing, that's all. VC++ diverges from the C++ standard in different ways than GCC (and somewhat more of them, IIRC, but you'd have to do a big suite of tests to nail that one down reliably) -- but that's C++. ANSI C is a different animal. "Perfectly acceptable ANSI C statements get FUBAR'd", he says? Bullshit. I've used both compilers for years, and he's talking absolute shit.

    The infamous if-scoping bug in VC++ is irrelevant because that's an illegal construction in C, period. VC++ has some weird notions about C++ templates, but, again, those don't exist in C (and I've had my share of sorrow porting template code from VC to GCC, too). The differences are in non-ANSI RTL functions, different header files, and so on. But of course, that's true of all C compilers. Look through some GNU code. Read through config.h and grep for #ifdef/#ifndef/#if in the source (or grep any highly portable C source for #ifdef/#ifndef/#if). Anything nontrivial's going to require a lot of glob to make it compile with different compilers, and it doesn't make a damn bit of difference which two (or more) compilers you're talking about. But that's another issue. Damn few compilers blow off anything much in the ANSI standard. C compilers are very mature these days.

    The problem, of course, is that what's in the ANSI standard isn't sufficient to do anything non-trivial...


    Please do trash Microsoft when they deserve it; after all, they usually do. But don't trash Microsoft on idiotic grounds just because you're an ignorant dumbass. You'll embarrass yourself, and you'll further amplify the Free Software "community"'s reputation for being a bunch of ignorant and highly-excitable dumbasses.

  166. You are, of course, an imbecile. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Jabbering about spoons doesn't make you clever. It makes you an acne-scarred shut-in who watched The Matrix fifteen times while all the normal kids were out getting laid.

  167. Re:(OT) I heartily second! by e-Motion · · Score: 1

    Some ANSI C code of mine (this is simple stuff -- i've only been working with C on-and-off for a year or so -- I'm a Visual Basic refugee) compiles perfectly with gcc, which isn't surprising since I wrote it for gcc & linux. However, trying to do a Windows port of my program (shameless plug) [sourceforge.net] with only Visual C++ available to me right now is a *real* pain. It compiles, but certain perfectly acceptable C statements get somehow FUBARed, and the program turns out weird numbers. I'm not enough of a Windows programmer to understand what's wrong, sadly. Maybe cygwin...

    Welcome to C, where undefined behavior can cause your program to work properly at times and completely screw up at other times. Here are a few problems that I found after about 2 minutes of examination:

    main.c, line 97:
    The arrays aiBoard/humanBoard have BOARD_MAX elements when the rest of the code expects them to have BOARD_MAX + 1 elements. Undefined behavior because the last valid element is at index BOARD_MAX - 1, but the code writes/reads from index BOARD_MAX.

    main.c, lines 147, 155:
    Using scanf("%s"...) to read a single character. Undefined behavior, even if the user enters only one character, because scanf will attempt to null-terminate the "string" and write to memory beyond the character passed.

    main.c, line 164:
    user could overflow human_name by entering a name that is longer than 99 characters (nitpick comment).

    Don't blame Visual C++. The code has some serious flaws, and just happens to behave as expected in gcc under linux.

  168. What most languages say to me... by nirvanafreek · · Score: 1

    "Ouch, what are you doing? That's not how you do that, learn to program dumbass."

  169. The best comment by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Posted by: Pike on October 11, 2002 10:48 PM

    Your story has been posted on slashdot. Just a warning.

    ac