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Ask HN: What are the new ideas of the last 10 (or 5) years?

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Re: Ask HN: What are the new ideas of the last 10 (or 5) years?

#31

Post by eru »

IsaacL wrote: post #30
eru wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excel is a close contender. It's still the world's most popular programming language. It incorporates a zeroth order functional language (the spreadsheet).

Off-topic, but what's a zeroth order functional language? What are the other orders (something reqiring lambdas, closures, etc)? Google and Wikipedia didn't help.

This is a quote from a talk at the International Conference on Function Programming (or more specifically the Workshop for Commercial Users of Functional Programming http://cufp.galois.com/2009/abstracts.html). But Lee Benfield who said it, attributed the saying to Simon Peyton-Jones.

A higher-order functional language allows higher order functions like map, filter and foldl (functions on functions). A first order language allows to define functions, but not on other functions. And a zeroth order language does not allow you to define functions (or name anything) as far as I figure.

Re: Ask HN: What are the new ideas of the last 10 (or 5) years?

#32

Post by eru »

tgdavies wrote: post #23
SwellJoe wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And JavaScript will be the most popular language, by far, for most types of applications.

Or will Javascript just be the machine language of the internet, with software written in more expressive languages such as Java via GWT?

Interesting thought. (Though I doubt that Java is more expressive than Javascript. I'd replace Java with something like F#, clojure, Arc, Haskell or so.)

Re: Ask HN: What are the new ideas of the last 10 (or 5) years?

#34

Post by flashgordon »

ianbishop wrote: post #28
BobCat wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The time you waste instructing the 3d printer to recreate your broken widget is better spent carving it out with the methods at hand. That little steel thingy that wore out I can drill, file and bend by hand faster than you can CAD/CAM it up. You'll beat me if you're making many of something. But your home shop 3d printer still won't print steel.

You raise a good point - but consider: * It is very possible that 3D printers may be able to craft some sort of metal in the future. * You will have massive CAD sharing websites if 3D Printers were to ever become a home standard. You would be able to simply grab and print anything you need - quickly. Your comment overlooks the fact that most people cannot drill, file or bend by hand. The unfortunate reality is that m…

funny you mention the "cannot drill, file or bend" comment... i love using my drills and angle grinders... but never thought they were a big deal... felt they were common and easy until i met a whole bunch of family friends who found such work "beneath them" and/or were simply found it too "tricky"!

Re: Ask HN: What are the new ideas of the last 10 (or 5) years?

#35

Post by herval »

augmented reality on contact lenses (or anything as intimate as them) - no more clunky cellphones with screens: everything right there in front of your eyes (and the voices inside your head). Introducing the iYou.

edit: that's my take for something for the NEXT 5-10 years - re-reading the question, it makes me wonder if it was about things that were created on the PAST 5-10 years... doh!

Re: Ask HN: What are the new ideas of the last 10 (or 5) years?

#36

Post by herval »

Funny to notice that the Internet is already "an extremely important business" - but it's still NOT profitable for the vast majority of people (quite the contrary, if you analyze how many businesses/industries are getting dismantled as technology spreads its wings and everything goes digital)...
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