Which programming language do you want to learn next?
21–30 of 87 posts
Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#22Next: PHP because 94% of all CMSs, particularly WordPress, are written in it.* I kinda know it but want to learn to do things the right way.
Most: Clojure because of its lispness and concurrency/mutability model.
* made up statistic
Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#23There's a difference between "next" and "most". Next: PHP because 94% of all CMSs, particularly WordPress, are written in it.* I kinda know it but want to learn to do things the right way. Most: Clojure because of its lispness and concurrency/mutability model. * made up statistic
Only small, single-paradigm languages can ever do things "right". With PHP you can do almost anything, in ways that are almost not wrong. ;)
Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#24Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#25So, why Haskell if I already know lots of other functional languages (both statically and dynamically typed ones)? Due to type classes and lazyness/purity by default. I still find myself thinking imperatively, or thinking at a lower functional level (e.g., just tail recursion and folds/map). I'd like to learn to think in a a lazy and purely functional way and Haskell seems to be a way to get there. Additionally, both Scala (with implicits and higher kindred types) and OCaml (since 3.12 with first class modules) do support type classes, but Haskell seems to be a good way to learn to use them. I've been thinking a great deal about type systems and type safe DSLs, presently working my way through TAPL. One particular field that interests me is the intersection of programming languages and systems: can we do user level systems programing in languages other than C; how can we safely "hint" a garbage collector to avoid memory pressure issues that happen frequently in memory intensive applications written in high level languages; can we use the type systems to ensure application-level code can sustain loss of consistency or availability (Google for CALM Conjecture for a dynamically typed Ruby DSL approach to this)?
Finally, Haskell is a great language in terms of forcing myself to think before I code (Yes, I should already be doing that): you may have a solution that may be short in terms of lines of code but takes hours to come up with. Why is this important? That's a great way of improving myself in other areas of programming: seeing which classes of algorithms solve a particular program, finding the simplest solution vs. one that comes to mind first.
[EDIT: Forgot to say that fun also plays a huge part of it. It's the reason I chose on the site (was the best one of those listed there: Haskell won't get you a job nor is there always a guarantee you'll be more productive with it, especially right away) and a perfectly legitimate one].
Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#26the thing is I've spent most of my time reading up on the languages rather than doing it, I' think I'm suffering from language-analysis paralysis
My current language skillset is Java, Objective-C and a bit of Ruby although I wouldn't call myself an expert in any of them
Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#27Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#28Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#29Having settled on Common Lisp a good few years ago I haven't explored a new programming language for a looong time (having gone through the phase of trying out a lot of them before that). However, recently I've felt the need to broaden my horizons again and did dabble a little in Haskell.
Re: Which programming language do you want to learn next?
#30There's a difference between "next" and "most". Next: PHP because 94% of all CMSs, particularly WordPress, are written in it.* I kinda know it but want to learn to do things the right way. Most: Clojure because of its lispness and concurrency/mutability model. * made up statistic
I'm boggling at the concept of doing PHP "the wrong way". Only small, single-paradigm languages can ever do things "right". With PHP you can do almost anything, in ways that are almost not wrong. ;)
Basically, the way php application were written 10 years ago. I consider that the 'wrong' way to use php, but it's how it's (necessarily) taught so many people write their first couple of apps this way (and others never rise above this stage).