The Next Big Language • Hacker News Board

Re: The Next Big Language

#11

Post by StavrosK » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 7:47 PM UTC

nickolai wrote: post #10

I read throught it full of hope and expectations, Then saw the date. 2007. the NBL was said to show up within two years. Another lesson to a) check the sources. b) remember to be wary of the "I see the future" types of article.

It's pretty spot-on for JS...

Re: The Next Big Language

#12

Post by nagnatron » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 7:47 PM UTC

wheaties wrote: post #4

Yeah, I was reading that going "Scala, Scala, Scala, dynamic typing? #$(^(*@)#$" I'm pretty sure that the NBL will continue to be whatever large and influential organization wants it to be.

Scala would be a fucking awesome mainstream language.

Re: The Next Big Language

#13

Post by StavrosK » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 7:53 PM UTC

patrickas wrote: post #8

I am really hesitating to mention this but maybe the discussion could help find a solution. The submitter clearly pasted the correct URL and got a link to the original submission (1311 days ago) but went ahead and added "?" to the end of the url to fool the dup filter and submitted again. It is not even a case of two different urls to the same dynamically generated page! I don't want to rush to accusation of karma wh…

I see no problem with this, the original submission is 3.5 years old. That's quite a long time to be complaining of reposts.

Re: The Next Big Language

#14

Post by kotrin » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 8:03 PM UTC

twism wrote: post #9

rryyan wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you're already aware of this, but a few months ago he started occasionally posting again -- here's his "I'm back" post: http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2010/07/blogger-finger.html . That said, I miss his longer-form and more frequent posts too.

I wonder how he feels about clojure after ~6 months.

If he still believes in what he said in this article, he probably likes it but does not think it will be the "Next Big Language".

Re: The Next Big Language

#15

Post by oemera » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 8:14 PM UTC

I'm really asking myself when ECMA Script will take over the world. Everyone is talking about that it will be the NBL. It's not that I don't like ECMA Script but there is a shit lot to do to implement all those language features into ECMA Script.

All those stuff and sure much more have to be done:

- performance of eval() (yes, I even don't know if this is ever possible)

- tools (great-eclipse-visual-studio-like IDE)

- Destructuring bind (e.g. x, y = returnTwoValues())

- Standard OOP with classes, instances, interfaces, polymorphism, etc.

- Visibility quantifiers (public/private/protected)

- Iterators and generators

- Namespaces and packages

- Operator overloading

- Static typing and duck typing

- Solid string and collection libraries

Does anyone know if ECMA Script is going to implement half of the stuff?

Re: The Next Big Language

#16

Post by bokchoi » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 8:21 PM UTC

presidentender wrote: post #3

I seem to recall an interview he gave in which he stated that NBL was Javascript 2.

I think this is the interview you're looking for: http://almaer.com/blog/my-interview-with-steve-yegge-on-rhin...

As an aside, RingoJS (successor to Helma) is a nice server-side Rhino JavaScript framework.

Re: The Next Big Language

#17

Post by bguthrie » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 8:23 PM UTC

KirinDave wrote: post #7

wheaties wrote: post #4

Yeah, I was reading that going "Scala, Scala, Scala, dynamic typing? #$(^(*@)#$" I'm pretty sure that the NBL will continue to be whatever large and influential organization wants it to be.

While I'm not sure Scala is the Language of the Future™, it's relevant to this discussion to point out that the method_missing hacks that make ruby's dynamic typing so attractive are being actively prototyped in Scala. An example snippet: https://gist.github.com/783394 The implementation: http://lampsvn.epfl.ch/trac/scala/changeset/23993

For what it's worth, and a bit OT, I find method_missing to be the least appealing part of Ruby's runtime dynamism. What _is_ helpful is to be able to add methods on the fly (e.g., through define_method); on the other hand, being able to handle arbitrary messages (which is what method_missing does) is occasionally interesting (as with Rails' dynamic finders) but generally considered bad form given that there are clearer and more performant alternatives.

Re: The Next Big Language

#18

Post by terhechte » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 8:26 PM UTC

>>"If you want to spare yourself a lot of angst in deciding which programming language to use, then I recommend this simple rule: Go ugly early. C++ will go out with you in a heartbeat."

What's Perl to do, then?

Re: The Next Big Language

#19

Post by shimon » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 8:30 PM UTC

terhechte wrote: post #18

>>"If you want to spare yourself a lot of angst in deciding which programming language to use, then I recommend this simple rule: Go ugly early. C++ will go out with you in a heartbeat." What's Perl to do, then?

Perl was beautiful once, but could never raise the funds to keep up with the numerous plastic surgeries required to maintain her grotesque attractiveness. Over time, the suitors who weren't afraid of change just got bored, and while there are still a few people who believe Perl's renaissance is just around the corner, the rest of us just hope she can afford a nice condo in Florida to take it easy in her old age.

Re: The Next Big Language

#20

Post by harryh » Wed, Jan 26, 2011, 8:39 PM UTC

david927 wrote: post #2

Ahh... I think we all miss Big Stevey. He role was never replaced and it's a shame for our entire community. I'm glad this was posted. It was written four years ago (Feb. 2007), and his quote is, "[The NBL] is going to arrive very soon (timeline: 18-24 months ...)" He later gave away that he was thinking the NBL was to be server-side Javascript. You have to hand it to him; that was a great guess, even if the timeline…

How was that a great guess? Certainly things could change, but very very very few people are doing server side JS right now. That could change, but I'm still pretty skeptical. Node.js (if that's what you're thinking of) is still very much in the experimental stage.