Are Extensible Programming Languages Coming?

gManZboy writes "Programming writer and instructor Greg Wilson is proposing that the next generation of programming languages will use XML to store not only such things as formatting (so you can see indentation your way, and I can see it my way, via XSLT) but even programmatic entities -- like: <invoke-expr method="myMethod"><evaluate>record</evaluate></invoke-expr>. Wacky, but perhaps wacky enough to be possible?"

Comments

Damn...

[ackthpt]

They should have put the < and > keys in the middle of the keyboard.

Short answer, no

[Anonymous Coward]

<content="N0!!!!!!!!!!!!!">
</answer>

Re:Short answer, no

[shogun]

You left the DTD off, we'll unfortunantly have to ignore your reponse.

Re:Is this guy serious?

[lukewarmfusion]

No, don't you prefer this:

<invoke-expr method="myMethod"><evaluate>record</evaluate></inv oke-expr>

over this:

someObj.myMethod(record);

? I, for one, welcome the obscuring verbosity. It's a challenge. It's exciting. It's job security.

Re:Holy mother of all that is good, NO!

[Piquan]

At a guess, it segfaults when printf tries to read its formatting string and gets (on most platforms) a null pointer instead.

Re:Is this guy serious?

[Curtman]

If the tools are inconvenient to use or not suitable to the problem at hand, they don't get used.

Tell that to the Internet Explorer development team.

<comment><type="funny">

[ZiZ]

<do-in-order type="step">
<step order="1"><pontificate subject="programming languages"/></step>
<step order="2"><ellipsis/></step>
<step order="3"><invoke-slashdot cliche="list-of-steps">profit!</invoke-slashdot></ step>
</do-in-order>
<forget-formatting/>
<welc ome-overlords type="needlessly complicated, obfuscated, and wordy"/>
</invoke-slashdot>
</rant>
<remark type="obligatory-attempt-at-wit">But it could be worthwhile.</remark>
</type>
</comment>
<sig>

Re:Is this guy serious?

[interiot]

In the begining (1954, according to my O'Reilly poster) was Cobol. People moaned and complained.

Next came Lisp (1958). They had to literally invent garbage collection simply to be able to create the language. In 2005, garbage collection is finally starting to be found in almost every non-embedded language.

1982 brought us Postscript. It's new! Exciting new syntax. Well, okay, Lisp thought of it first.

1996 brought the world XML. Exciting new syntax! Again!

Re:Is this guy serious?

[Frank T. Lofaro Jr.]

And if it fails to help you keep your job, you have yet another XML item to add to your resume. :)

Yay for <xml>.

[Anonymous Coward]

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