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Re: The Lisp Curse

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On Tue, 16 Aug 2011 05:10:44 -0400, Rod Pemberton wrote:

> "John Passaniti" <john.passaniti@gmail.com> wrote in message
> news:29eb2f52-2186-4d2e-83d9-
ed6edb6766a1@a27g2000yqc.googlegroups.com...
>> On Aug 15, 3:46 am, "Rod Pemberton" <do_not_h...@noavailemail.cmm>
>> wrote:
>> > You probably have to keep a minimal amount of low-level code, e.g.,
>> > in C or assembly, but beyond that you should only need one HLL
>> > language. So, why would you split the codebase between two different
>> > languages? Won't that require *two* groups of programmers?
>>
>> We'll split the codebase between two different languages because each
>> language has different strengths.
> 
> I know how powerful and flexible C is, so there is no point for me to
> consider that response as logical ...
> 
>> And no, it doesn't require two
>> groups of programmers, unless for some reason you believe that
>> programmers can only be proficient in a single language.
> 
> No, I was proficient in a bunch.  After some years, I doubt I still am.
> However, corporate programmers usually only program in one language, and
> maybe a few script or batch languages.  That's been my experience and
> apparently "Nomen Nescio's" too.
> 
This "corporate" programmer primarily stares at Java all day, yes, but 
being a corporate coder has also forced me to expand my expertise beyond 
Java or even other computer languages. The nature of enterprise 
development insists on being able to grok a wide variety of acronyms and 
technologies.

Java is a primary technology, but no one in today's world expects you to 
specialize so heavily that you forget how to do anything else. It is a 
big ecosystem out there, and one language does not fit all.  After all, 
no one wants to expect their field engineers to hack on Java all day, so 
access to plug-ins and scripting is often done with a scripting language 
like Lua or ECMAScript.

Heck, my company asked me to learn COBOL for a project. I did 
(bootstrapped myself in "21 Days", no less), and I'm glad for the 
opportunity.

I have no doubt that the amount of variety a shop expects from its coders 
changes depending on the shop. And even if a shop does most of their work 
in Jorba on the Brou-ha-ha 6000, they will still expect a little 
flexibility from their assets.

When you hire a coder, you hire their brain. More elastic the brain, the 
more valuable an asset.

-- c

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Re: The Lisp Curse clvrmnky <spamtrap@clevermonkey.org> - 2011-10-23 12:54 +0000

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