Path: csiph.com!v102.xanadu-bbs.net!xanadu-bbs.net!news.glorb.com!npeer02.iad.highwinds-media.com!news.highwinds-media.com!feed-me.highwinds-media.com!border3.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!news.iecc.com!nerds-end From: thomas.mertes@gmx.at Newsgroups: comp.compilers Subject: Re: Have we reached the asymptotic plateau of innovation in programming language design? Date: Sun, 11 Mar 2012 07:33:21 -0700 (PDT) Organization: Compilers Central Lines: 57 Sender: news@iecc.com Approved: comp.compilers@iecc.com Message-ID: <12-03-025@comp.compilers> References: <12-03-012@comp.compilers> <12-03-017@comp.compilers> <12-03-018@comp.compilers> NNTP-Posting-Host: news.iecc.com X-Trace: leila.iecc.com 1331519431 35490 64.57.183.58 (12 Mar 2012 02:30:31 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@iecc.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2012 02:30:31 +0000 (UTC) Keywords: history, design, practice Posted-Date: 11 Mar 2012 22:30:31 EDT X-submission-address: compilers@iecc.com X-moderator-address: compilers-request@iecc.com X-FAQ-and-archives: http://compilers.iecc.com X-Received-Bytes: 4071 Xref: csiph.com comp.compilers:492 On Friday, March 9, 2012 5:40:18 AM UTC+1, Cameron McInally wrote: > On Thu, Mar 8, 2012 at 8:02 PM, Ian Lance Taylor wrote: > > Rui Maciel writes: > > > >> - And here's the first itchy point: there appears to be no correlation > >> between the success of a programming language and its emergence in the > form > >> of someone's doctoral or post-doctoral work. This bothers me a lot, as an > >> academic. It appears that deep thoughts, consistency, rigor and all other > >> things we value as scientists aren't that important for mass adoption of > >> programming languages. > > > > As a non-academic, I agree. None of those things matter very much to me > > when it comes to actually getting stuff done. They are not bad things > > to have, but they are not the things that matter. When somebody writes about my project I can easily tell, if he/she is from the academic or not-academic area. People who obviously only read the FAQ and tell me that I do not understand the stuff, which is already implemented, often turn out to be from the academic area. Nitpicking from the FAQ, comparing egos and knowledge seems to be easier than downloading and trying. Don't get me wrong, I have a lot of respect for the academic area, since I studied myself and got a Ph.D in computer science. People from the non-academic area often already tried my project and ask for specific functionality like unlimited precision integers, select for sockets, font support or how to write a web application. Funny: People from the non-academic area seem to explore new stuff, while academic people criticize me, because I do not jump on an existing computer science fashion. > This summarizes my empirical experiences well. Programming languages > appear to grow organically, as if they were species. There are many > dialects, from many tribes. Sometimes, a new language feature is > created out of utility. If that feature is very useful, it spreads to > different dialects. Later, theorists study the phenomena and define it > formally. Sometimes, out of utility, a language feature is created by > a tribe. Other tribes may not find this feature particularly useful. > It becomes a regional colloquialism or dies off. Totally agree. This is also my view. I see extensible programming languages as part of the picture. Language evolution is supported by extensible programming languages, because it is not necessary to improve a compiler, just to get a feature from another language. The problem is: Extensibility is not a feature which can be added afterwards. A language must be designed from ground up to be extensible. Greetings Thomas Mertes -- Seed7 Homepage: http://seed7.sourceforge.net Seed7 - The extensible programming language: User defined statements and operators, abstract data types, templates without special syntax, OO with interfaces and multiple dispatch, statically typed, interpreted or compiled, portable, runs under linux/unix/windows.