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Brand new Scala-lang.org

scala-lang.org

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Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#31

Post by eranation »

RyanZAG wrote: post #28
rtpg wrote: post #2

Nice to see the language page be as easy on the eyes as the language itself. There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. On a related note, does anyone else see the Scala logo and confuse it for a symbol representing databases or hard disks? It just doesn't click with me

"There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. " There is one incredibly good reason - possibly the most important reason. How easy is it to find a Scala developer if you need to expand your team compared to a Java developer? I'd put it the other way around: what excuse do you have for spending more per developer? (There are some excuses here, but they're far from clear cut.) In addition,…

Someone had this argument (can't find the link) - for every ace Java developer out there you have hundreds of companies with a relevant position to compete over her / him. For a Scala developer position, you are competing with less companies, so you might as well be able to fill the Scala developer position faster than the Java one.

Regarding speed, I don't mind about the runtime speed as much as compile speed, runtime speed is getting very close to Java, and is much faster than popular dynamic languages, I think it's a great alternative to JRuby, Jython or Clojure in that aspect.

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#32

Post by bronxbomber92 »

justinmk wrote: post #25

The sbt site ( http://www.scala-sbt.org/ )is still impenetrable to anyone trying to understand wtf it does in under 15 minutes. (Why do I need this? How is it different than the scala compiler? Is it a package management system? Is it a REPL?)

The first words of the website: "sbt is a build tool". I couldn't understand not grasping the benefits/differences of sbt in comparison to other build tools, especially if you're new to the JVM world, but I don't think the website leaves any doubt to what it is.

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#33

Post by bru »

z0r wrote: post #6

The page loads quite slowly on my macbook air. I wonder how many 'reactive' Scala web technologies went into the creation of it! Scala is wonderful and all the hard work put into it is greatly appreciated. However, every Typesafe product targeting the web that I've tried has given my browser indigestion.

> The page loads quite slowly on my macbook air

The 3771 DOM elements composing the front page may be the cause.

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#34

Post by happy_dino »

RyanZAG wrote: post #28
rtpg wrote: post #2

Nice to see the language page be as easy on the eyes as the language itself. There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. On a related note, does anyone else see the Scala logo and confuse it for a symbol representing databases or hard disks? It just doesn't click with me

"There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. " There is one incredibly good reason - possibly the most important reason. How easy is it to find a Scala developer if you need to expand your team compared to a Java developer? I'd put it the other way around: what excuse do you have for spending more per developer? (There are some excuses here, but they're far from clear cut.) In addition,…

> How easy is it to find a Scala developer if you need to expand your team compared to a Java developer?

How easy is it to find a GOOD developer? Much easier with Scala. It's not like wading through hundreds of Java resumes and interviewing them is free.

> In addition, Scala tends to run slower than Java which can have a further cost if you're scaling to many servers.

This depends on so much different factors in both Java and Scala that I'm happy to dismiss this claim as “not true”.

> Porting Java code to Android is also far easier than porting Scala code.

Really? Is there anything more to do than ProGuarding and dexing the existing code, both in Java and Scala?

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#35

Post by felipehummel »

z0r wrote: post #6

The page loads quite slowly on my macbook air. I wonder how many 'reactive' Scala web technologies went into the creation of it! Scala is wonderful and all the hard work put into it is greatly appreciated. However, every Typesafe product targeting the web that I've tried has given my browser indigestion.

Chrome in OS X here and it all seems fine.

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#36

Post by trailfox »

RyanZAG wrote: post #28
rtpg wrote: post #2

Nice to see the language page be as easy on the eyes as the language itself. There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. On a related note, does anyone else see the Scala logo and confuse it for a symbol representing databases or hard disks? It just doesn't click with me

"There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. " There is one incredibly good reason - possibly the most important reason. How easy is it to find a Scala developer if you need to expand your team compared to a Java developer? I'd put it the other way around: what excuse do you have for spending more per developer? (There are some excuses here, but they're far from clear cut.) In addition,…

I guess it depends on your team. We didn't have much trouble with Java guys picking up Scala very quickly.

Scala performance is on par with Java if you keep your wits about you, but you do have to be mindful of the code you write. Scala collections (esp. maps, doubly so for immutable.Map, but also mutable.Map) are (currently) slower than the standard Java collections, but it's easy to use an implicit conversion wrapping a Java HashMap with little to no overhead in the very small number of situations where this type of thing is a bottleneck. For comprehensions can also cause some overhead, so if you're really pressed for performance a while loops is always an option.

If anyone from typesafe/Scala is reading this: please bring the performance of mutable.Map on par with java.util.HashMap

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#37

Post by mark242 »

RyanZAG wrote: post #28
rtpg wrote: post #2

Nice to see the language page be as easy on the eyes as the language itself. There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. On a related note, does anyone else see the Scala logo and confuse it for a symbol representing databases or hard disks? It just doesn't click with me

"There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. " There is one incredibly good reason - possibly the most important reason. How easy is it to find a Scala developer if you need to expand your team compared to a Java developer? I'd put it the other way around: what excuse do you have for spending more per developer? (There are some excuses here, but they're far from clear cut.) In addition,…

It's incredibly difficult to find good Scala developers today, no doubt. However, it is incredibly easy to find Java developers who are curious about expanding their skillset. Those are the guys and gals who I hire, simply because it's faster for a Java dev to go through the ramp-up time on Scala than it is to wait for a pure-Scala dev to come onto the market.

Scala does not run slower than Java. Period. Additionally, the very nature of Scala and Akka allow you to be much, much more efficient on the hardware you're using; if you're writing Java code that requires, say, 100 application servers, often times you can get away with half of that if you're writing good Scala/Akka code (and because of the nature of Scala, it's much easier to write good, solid code than it is in Java).

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#38

Post by anonymoushn »

RyanZAG wrote: post #28
rtpg wrote: post #2

Nice to see the language page be as easy on the eyes as the language itself. There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. On a related note, does anyone else see the Scala logo and confuse it for a symbol representing databases or hard disks? It just doesn't click with me

"There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. " There is one incredibly good reason - possibly the most important reason. How easy is it to find a Scala developer if you need to expand your team compared to a Java developer? I'd put it the other way around: what excuse do you have for spending more per developer? (There are some excuses here, but they're far from clear cut.) In addition,…

Do companies actually restrict themselves to people who already have experience in a certain language when hiring? I've never encountered this practice.

It is fairly hard to find a good developer, but once you find one you can tell him or her to write Scala or Java or OCaml or whatever you like.

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#39

Post by mark242 »

eropple wrote: post #26
rtpg wrote: post #2

Nice to see the language page be as easy on the eyes as the language itself. There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. On a related note, does anyone else see the Scala logo and confuse it for a symbol representing databases or hard disks? It just doesn't click with me

There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. Lots of garbage generation. I like Scala a lot, but the space where I can really use it is smaller than I'd like. I do really like it and Play for one-offs, though.

Wha?

In practice, we have seen much much _less_ garbage created by our Scala code. The use of objects in Scala encourages static method creation, and there's so much boilerplate Java junk that your Scala code just doesn't need.

Re: Brand new Scala-lang.org

#40

Post by wheaties »

happy_dino wrote: post #34
RyanZAG wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There's almost no excuse not to use Scala if you're deploying on the JVM. " There is one incredibly good reason - possibly the most important reason. How easy is it to find a Scala developer if you need to expand your team compared to a Java developer? I'd put it the other way around: what excuse do you have for spending more per developer? (There are some excuses here, but they're far from clear cut.) In addition,…

> How easy is it to find a Scala developer if you need to expand your team compared to a Java developer? How easy is it to find a GOOD developer? Much easier with Scala. It's not like wading through hundreds of Java resumes and interviewing them is free. > In addition, Scala tends to run slower than Java which can have a further cost if you're scaling to many servers. This depends on so much different factors in both…

Yes, Android's Garbage Collector is a one legged mule. Slow, crippled and needy. Scala, on the other hand, generates a ton of little objects. I'm a full time Scala dev but if I were doing Android I'd probably for the foreseeable future work in... dare I say it? Java.
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