Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
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Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
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Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#2Off topic, but if you’re going to justify body text, at least turn on hyphenation.
Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#3In case anyone isn't familiar with them, these two books[1][2] from the Pragmatic Programmer are great for doing just this. They offer a guided intro to 7 different languages each, and they're a whole lot of fun.
[1] https://pragprog.com/book/btlang/seven-languages-in-seven-we...
[2] https://pragprog.com/book/7lang/seven-more-languages-in-seve...
Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#4But also learn one or two languages that fit your domain of work, really really well. I have seen too many programmers that justify their lack of skills in their main language they are supposed to know by bragging about their knowledge of some hipster language they rarely use. "my code is way too slow, but hey I know the syntax of dependent types in Agda..."
Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#5I think there's a bit of a threshold with language learning. When you know a handful (or just theo necessary ones for your job), there is probably a bit of tendency to be religious about your "stack". When you know a few more than you need, then you're driven to pick between them for any given thing. Then, you start picking languages you don't know and learning them to do some thing you need done, and so on.
I wrote some data automations recently for a client. Here are the languages and DSLs that ended up in the mix: cron, Makefile, bash, sed, regex, jq query, python, R, sql, nginx conf.
I think especially if you're a vertically scaling kind of gal, and you have a fondness for conciseness, parsimony and efficiency; you'll just end up attracted to many language solutions. I just think there is no better way to write less code or keep the semantics of your language more relevant to the task in hand.
Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#6Don't bother, you'll forget it.
Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#7I’m getting tired of this. Yes I see the benefit of knowing multiple languages but let’s look at the other side of that coin. There’s the dev that is familiar with a dozen languages and writes terrible code in all of them.
When exactly are we supposed to be learning all these languages? Nights and weekends that effectively has you working 24/7? Or more likely some developer that has a personal relationship with the CEO and can do no wrong reads a blog post on language X and catches the fever. Well, he needs some practice and he’s not working nights and weekends so now we are rewriting things or working in a mixed environment. He knows just a smidge more than the rest of the team so he’s in charge but can’t be seen as anything less than an expert so they pretend they are. He leans on dogma and best practices as he bullies the team as they screw things up left and right.
Anyone who is stupid enough to say that we should have stayed with what they had been using will be labeled as not a team player and blamed for the failures.
Those failures will be used as proof that our hero is as amazing as he says he is as he becomes a 10x programmer by kneecapping the rest of the team and valiantly struggles to pull and incompetent team forward.
Next thing that happens is the good developers leave and the rest are forced out or fired assuring our hero developer a fresh crop of devs who don’t know the history of the project cementing the myth that our developer is a genius in our new language.
Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#8I’m getting tired of this. Yes I see the benefit of knowing multiple languages but let’s look at the other side of that coin. There’s the dev that is familiar with a dozen languages and writes terrible code in all of them. When exactly are we supposed to be learning all these languages? Nights and weekends that effectively has you working 24/7? Or more likely some developer that has a personal relationship with the C…
Also, it's boring.
Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#9I’m getting tired of this. Yes I see the benefit of knowing multiple languages but let’s look at the other side of that coin. There’s the dev that is familiar with a dozen languages and writes terrible code in all of them. When exactly are we supposed to be learning all these languages? Nights and weekends that effectively has you working 24/7? Or more likely some developer that has a personal relationship with the C…
I've learned to code methods in OO languages without using loops after I've learned Erlang. No loops means less bugs.
Re: Learn more programming languages, even if you won't use them
#10I think there's a bit of a threshold with language learning. When you know a handful (or just theo necessary ones for your job), there is probably a bit of tendency to be religious about your "stack". When you know a few more than you need, then you're driven to pick between them for any given thing. Then, you start picking languages you don't know and learning them to do some thing you need done, and so on. I wrote…
I agree. People try to analize logs by coding in Java for example. Just use an R package, you will probably write 2 or 3 lines of code in R.