Well your other post said basically Lisp is for interesting people, all the other who cares about syntax doesn't matter, what do you expect me to answer to this??
Lisp is probably very good for research as it free the researcher from syntax, but for the other 99% of developpers who don't do language research but who maintain existing programs in C, C++ or Java, I doubt that you would convince them that syntax doesn't matter.. That's why the next big programming language may be one of those: D, Scala, Ruby or Python but not Lisp.
As for AOP, personnaly I've never liked it (seems like a mess for anything but logging), I think you can mostly solve the same issue in more advanced language with mixins with less crosscutting concerns. I've seen less and less articles in favor of AOP and more and more against it, so I'm not convinced that it won't join 'push' and the like in the big rubbish bin of the failed ideas in computing..
While I agree that no syntax is natural, it still remains that programmers like some syntax better than others, and even if it's only fashions they're quite strong: currently Lisp has no chance to become a widespread PL again due to its syntax (too bad though that it wasn't used for documents as XML's syntax is even worse).
Uh, why would this *particular metric* be embarrassing?
If you look at boot time or responsiveness Linux and Windows are significanty worst than BeOS was (yes, I've read about Arjan de Van Jen work on Linux's boot time, but until it's part of distribution and works with the majority of PC it's not very useful), in terms of desktop market share Linux is tiny compared to Windows, etc.
Face it, each OS has its strong point and its weak point..
Not true: for a short period of time, you can repeat the experiments, so that's not a 'rock bottom' assertion.
For longest period of time, that's harder but you can look at the universe as we're seeing the past, and the proof is for example the 'expansion hypothesis': current scientist in fact think that a certain time the universe had an accelerated expansion as it explains certain parameters of the universe that we observe: so scientists *don't* assume that laws of physics haven't changed with time.
> For some people there is sufficient evidence to allow them to believe in God
Uh? I don't see why you're talking about religion now: we were discussing about Science, those 'evidence' which allow them to believe in gods are not scientific at all..
>>Actually, the trick is knowing that you _aren't_ a great programmer (honestly what are the odds that you are a great programmer?), and thus choosing to reuse code from better (and hopefully great) programmers.
Uh, the code you reuse isn't necessarily from great programmers, nearly all the Perl code I've had to maintain was a POS: either it was created by beginners making lots of mistake or it was created by experienced coders who think that TWTOWTDI is a great way to get job security and creates unmaintainable code: I remember one case when a colleague of mine call me because he was trying to understand a Perl script written by an "expert" and he was stuck with two lines of code: it took me 30 minutes and 2 books (and lots of swearing) to rewrite those 'magical' two lines with... two lines(!) that a beginner in Perl could understand..
Well, I do: it's not so much about the line noise which I dislike but because I consider Perl to have a poor design which makes everything that should be simple convoluted, so it's a time waster compared to "sane" scripting language such as Ruby or Python(*) and I'm stuck at work having to maintain or write new Perl scripts as Ruby&Python aren't allowed.
*:though I'd prefer that Ruby&Python provide a 'use strict' mode as Perl do, except that it should be on by default.
>Everything from disk I/O performance, networking, graphics was miserably slow.
In benchmark perhaps, but responsiveness (which is hard to measure unfortunately) and in boot time, BeOS was the fastest OS I've ever used..
>its a portability nightmare. So what? It was still the best *desktop* OS ever (and I say this even if I never used an Amiga: BeOS ran on standard PC hardware and had memory protection..).
I find very funny your criticisms, the fact is: BeOS provided a very responsive desktop OS, better than everything we have even now with much more powerful hardware, whether their solution was technically elegant or not, I don't *care* about it!
Linux could probably replicate the experience for responsiveness, but it would require a lot of recoding of many applications, so I'm not holding my breath..
Let me say that your experiment is very different of a very big number of people, including me, either there was something very strange in your configuration either you're lying : on my old computer (Celeron 333 + 128Mo of RAM), BeOS booted from GRUB to a responsive desktop in about 14s, Linux booted from GRUB to KDE took more than 1min (1min40s if memory serves). Without *any* tweaks I would add: why should users have to tweak their OS to get decent startup time??
>>I spit on Perl and so does everybody else I know. >You apparently don't know a lot of people who actually understand Perl.
Of course, everyone who know and dislike Perl are just those who don't "understand it". *Sigh*, will you stop making excuse?? You free to like Perl, but me the more I know Perl, the more I dislike it!
But it's not about preventing the user doing something stupid, because nothing can really do it, it's about *error recovery*.
An OS which provide system wide file versioning and a journal of events to allow easy recovery of misplaced file doesn't prevent the user from making mistakes, it allow them to recover from them which is much better! Same thing for system wide undelete, crash-only computing (here it's about allowing users recovering from developers mistake)..
Unix is really lacking here compared to VMS as someone else said (system wide file versioning), this allowed a simpler implementation, but as the cost of lost user-friendliness..
Weird, this is may be an US-only thing as in France AFAIK BMW drivers are not treated differently that other drivers (except the a... who think that going >180km/h on a motorway is okay, but since speedtrap have multiplied, they're a rare breed), 4*4 on the other hand, there the one I associate with poor drivers that I'm extra-careful with.
>1. femtosecond laser pulses aren't exactly easy to make
I wouldn't say easy, but not too hard either: many years ago I remember visiting a school about optical where they had a 'tabletop' femtosecond laser. So it depends on the properties needed for the pulse: some femtosecond laser are tabletop materials, others are definitely more involved..
>>They do not exist to help children learn. That is simply not the reason the union exists. >This is true, but it's beside the point. The idea that unions exist to serve the interests of teachers isn't particularly problematic, because teacher satisfaction hardly precludes student success, in fact, it's rather dependent on it.
This remain to be seen: 'too strong' teacher's union is hardly a US only problem: in France we have the same issue and these unions defends teacher wether those teachers are good for the kids *or not*.
>And, there are some great reasons to use it: >1. I already know it. I learned it before Ruby was "cool".
I know Perl also, and for me that's a reason *not to* use Perl. The more I used Perl, the more convinced I was that this is a poor language because a) beginners create unmaintainable code, but that's not the big issue here as it's the same in any language. b) experienced programmers create unmaintainable code(!) as the TMTOWTDI philosophy of Perl is directly opposed to maintainability..
I haven't had the luxury of truly using Ruby yet, but learning this language didn't trigger my feeling "what a mess" as learning Perl did, so it should be better..
Well from a generic point of view, the 'portable' part of.Net implemented by Mono has nothing special over the Java platform, which can be used by Scala.
Sure.Net provides Windows programming, but in this case you lose portability..
Thanks for both your work and replying on Slashdot: quite often as discussion are with second hand knowledge the resulting discussions are low quality.
Well any distribution which manage to generalise those change will gain many users (at least temporarily until the other distributions catch up) so this would be a gain for them, but of course the investment to generalize those change and ensuring that the result is sturdy isn't trivial..
Slashdot Mirror
Well your other post said basically Lisp is for interesting people, all the other who cares about syntax doesn't matter, what do you expect me to answer to this??
Lisp is probably very good for research as it free the researcher from syntax, but for the other 99% of developpers who don't do language research but who maintain existing programs in C, C++ or Java, I doubt that you would convince them that syntax doesn't matter..
That's why the next big programming language may be one of those: D, Scala, Ruby or Python but not Lisp.
As for AOP, personnaly I've never liked it (seems like a mess for anything but logging), I think you can mostly solve the same issue in more advanced language with mixins with less crosscutting concerns. I've seen less and less articles in favor of AOP and more and more against it, so I'm not convinced that it won't join 'push' and the like in the big rubbish bin of the failed ideas in computing..
I was going to reply but I changed my mind: your post is so full of itself, that it really doesn't deserve a reply..
While I agree that no syntax is natural, it still remains that programmers like some syntax better than others, and even if it's only fashions they're quite strong: currently Lisp has no chance to become a widespread PL again due to its syntax (too bad though that it wasn't used for documents as XML's syntax is even worse).
In AI maybe, but trust me in normal program the less you have self-modifying code/generated code, the better: when there's a bug how do you debug it?
Your debugger doesn't undestand all these generated thing, so you have to undo 'manually' the transformation to be able to find what is wrong..
Uh, why would this *particular metric* be embarrassing?
If you look at boot time or responsiveness Linux and Windows are significanty worst than BeOS was (yes, I've read about Arjan de Van Jen work on Linux's boot time, but until it's part of distribution and works with the majority of PC it's not very useful), in terms of desktop market share Linux is tiny compared to Windows, etc.
Face it, each OS has its strong point and its weak point..
grep . *
grep . file1 file2..
When you want to read a series of files with the name of the file prefixed before the lines.
Not true: for a short period of time, you can repeat the experiments, so that's not a 'rock bottom' assertion.
For longest period of time, that's harder but you can look at the universe as we're seeing the past, and the proof is for example the 'expansion hypothesis': current scientist in fact think that a certain time the universe had an accelerated expansion as it explains certain parameters of the universe that we observe: so scientists *don't* assume that laws of physics haven't changed with time.
> For some people there is sufficient evidence to allow them to believe in God
Uh? I don't see why you're talking about religion now: we were discussing about Science, those 'evidence' which allow them to believe in gods are not scientific at all..
>Science is based on faith that the laws of nature are omnipresent and universal
No, not faith: this is an assumption yes, but there are experience which are done to check this assumption.
Very different from faith..
Bah, that's just nitpicking, they lost the right to marry their loved one which the heterosexuals still have.
Polygamist or polyandrist cannot marry all their loved ones, true, so yes from a legal point of view they are also second citizen..
>>Actually, the trick is knowing that you _aren't_ a great programmer (honestly what are the odds that you are a great programmer?), and thus choosing to reuse code from better (and hopefully great) programmers.
Uh, the code you reuse isn't necessarily from great programmers, nearly all the Perl code I've had to maintain was a POS: either it was created by beginners making lots of mistake or it was created by experienced coders who think that TWTOWTDI is a great way to get job security and creates unmaintainable code: I remember one case when a colleague of mine call me because he was trying to understand a Perl script written by an "expert" and he was stuck with two lines of code: it took me 30 minutes and 2 books (and lots of swearing) to rewrite those 'magical' two lines with ... two lines(!) that a beginner in Perl could understand..
While I agree about the no glossy screen, how do you define a 'proper' aspect ratio?
It very much depends on what you're doing with your laptop..
>I don't actually know people who hate Perl
Well, I do: it's not so much about the line noise which I dislike but because I consider Perl to have a poor design which makes everything that should be simple convoluted, so it's a time waster compared to "sane" scripting language such as Ruby or Python(*) and I'm stuck at work having to maintain or write new Perl scripts as Ruby&Python aren't allowed.
*:though I'd prefer that Ruby&Python provide a 'use strict' mode as Perl do, except that it should be on by default.
>Everything from disk I/O performance, networking, graphics was miserably slow.
In benchmark perhaps, but responsiveness (which is hard to measure unfortunately) and in boot time, BeOS was the fastest OS I've ever used..
>its a portability nightmare.
So what? It was still the best *desktop* OS ever (and I say this even if I never used an Amiga: BeOS ran on standard PC hardware and had memory protection..).
I find very funny your criticisms, the fact is: BeOS provided a very responsive desktop OS, better than everything we have even now with much more powerful hardware, whether their solution was technically elegant or not, I don't *care* about it!
Linux could probably replicate the experience for responsiveness, but it would require a lot of recoding of many applications, so I'm not holding my breath..
Let me say that your experiment is very different of a very big number of people, including me, either there was something very strange in your configuration either you're lying : on my old computer (Celeron 333 + 128Mo of RAM), BeOS booted from GRUB to a responsive desktop in about 14s, Linux booted from GRUB to KDE took more than 1min (1min40s if memory serves).
Without *any* tweaks I would add: why should users have to tweak their OS to get decent startup time??
So what were your numbers?
>>I spit on Perl and so does everybody else I know.
>You apparently don't know a lot of people who actually understand Perl.
Of course, everyone who know and dislike Perl are just those who don't "understand it".
*Sigh*, will you stop making excuse??
You free to like Perl, but me the more I know Perl, the more I dislike it!
But it's not about preventing the user doing something stupid, because nothing can really do it, it's about *error recovery*.
An OS which provide system wide file versioning and a journal of events to allow easy recovery of misplaced file doesn't prevent the user from making mistakes, it allow them to recover from them which is much better!
Same thing for system wide undelete, crash-only computing (here it's about allowing users recovering from developers mistake)..
Unix is really lacking here compared to VMS as someone else said (system wide file versioning), this allowed a simpler implementation, but as the cost of lost user-friendliness..
Weird, this is may be an US-only thing as in France AFAIK BMW drivers are not treated differently that other drivers (except the a... who think that going >180km/h on a motorway is okay, but since speedtrap have multiplied, they're a rare breed), 4*4 on the other hand, there the one I associate with poor drivers that I'm extra-careful with.
>1. femtosecond laser pulses aren't exactly easy to make
I wouldn't say easy, but not too hard either: many years ago I remember visiting a school about optical where they had a 'tabletop' femtosecond laser.
So it depends on the properties needed for the pulse: some femtosecond laser are tabletop materials, others are definitely more involved..
>>They do not exist to help children learn. That is simply not the reason the union exists.
>This is true, but it's beside the point. The idea that unions exist to serve the interests of teachers isn't particularly problematic, because teacher satisfaction hardly precludes student success, in fact, it's rather dependent on it.
This remain to be seen: 'too strong' teacher's union is hardly a US only problem: in France we have the same issue and these unions defends teacher wether those teachers are good for the kids *or not*.
>And, there are some great reasons to use it:
>1. I already know it. I learned it before Ruby was "cool".
I know Perl also, and for me that's a reason *not to* use Perl.
The more I used Perl, the more convinced I was that this is a poor language because
a) beginners create unmaintainable code, but that's not the big issue here as it's the same in any language.
b) experienced programmers create unmaintainable code(!) as the TMTOWTDI philosophy of Perl is directly opposed to maintainability..
I haven't had the luxury of truly using Ruby yet, but learning this language didn't trigger my feeling "what a mess" as learning Perl did, so it should be better..
Well from a generic point of view, the 'portable' part of .Net implemented by Mono has nothing special over the Java platform, which can be used by Scala.
Sure .Net provides Windows programming, but in this case you lose portability..
So what? Decent languages are a dime a dozen: Scala, D, Ada..
They are alternatives which don't tie you to Windows.
RTFA, Arjan himself say that with an HDD, the boot takes about 10s which is still *way better* than what we have currently..
Thanks for both your work and replying on Slashdot: quite often as discussion are with second hand knowledge the resulting discussions are low quality.
Well any distribution which manage to generalise those change will gain many users (at least temporarily until the other distributions catch up) so this would be a gain for them, but of course the investment to generalize those change and ensuring that the result is sturdy isn't trivial..