Chris Lattner on Swift • Hacker News Board

Re: Chris Lattner on Swift

#161

Post by pjmlp » Wed, Jun 04, 2014, 11:57 AM UTC

superzamp wrote: post #141

gw wrote: post #11

It is nice that he mentioned Light Table. I would not be surprised if Swift ends up really benefitting Clojure adoption indirectly. I think one of the big hangups for newcomers is that, if you don't have experience with a Lisp, it's often difficult to understand the benefits of interactive development. If a large amount of new programmers become exposed to it, they'll be more open to other options that provide simila…

> if you don't have experience with a Lisp, it's often difficult to understand the benefits of interactive development Also with Javascript and browsers' built in consoles you can have good times developing interactively

Yes, although I am not a big fan of web apps, modern browser developer tools brings me back a familiar feel of Lisp and Smalltalk development experience.

Re: Chris Lattner on Swift

#162

Post by gte910h » Wed, Jun 04, 2014, 1:01 PM UTC

TillE wrote: post #90

duaneb wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

C++ would be absolutely terrible for social media applications. There, the barrier isn't usually the speed but correctness and maintenance overhead.

Is Objective C really that much better? If you have decent APIs/libraries, C++ would be just fine.

Objective C is head and shoulders better to program in than C++.

It's still got the same C warts that C++ does in a lot of place, but it is far simpler and less leaky than C++.

C++ is still faster and more cross platform, than objective-c

  --Have done both professionally

Re: Chris Lattner on Swift

#163

Post by gte910h » Wed, Jun 04, 2014, 1:03 PM UTC

epsylon wrote: post #134

duaneb wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

C++ would be absolutely terrible for social media applications. There, the barrier isn't usually the speed but correctness and maintenance overhead.

And Swift would be equally terrible for a high performance 3D game. (It's not because the guy from Apple said it that it's true.) There's a reason why every single AAA studio uses C++ for their engines and titles. And that's the same reason why it is terrible for social media applications.

Every single AAA studio uses C++ to write the smallest portion of their game they can in C++.

Then they put a sane, modern language on top of it many places, Actionscript at EA, Python at many other places, LUA at others, C# at others, and write in a high level language that doesn't leak abstractions like a nut milk bag.

Re: Chris Lattner on Swift

#164

Post by gte910h » Wed, Jun 04, 2014, 1:05 PM UTC

axman6 wrote: post #124

Cookingboy wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not trying to be rude, but if you've tried and actually FAILED to learn Objective-C multiple times, then you will have a much bigger problem with actually learning the Cocoa framework yourself. Objective-C does have a non-standard syntax, but its barrier of entry for actual learning is purely psychological and not technical.

My problem with "learning Objective-C" was always the frameworks, not so much the language itself.

I suggest http://www.raywenderlich.com/ and his fantastic books with examples. While I actually think I've been doing Objective-C longer than most of his writers, when there is some area I haven't worked in yet they usually have a high quality, simple to follow example on how do do a thing that's a great jumping off point to getting going and then understanding further once you get the main thing in front of you.

Re: Chris Lattner on Swift

#165

Post by gte910h » Wed, Jun 04, 2014, 1:07 PM UTC

niix wrote: post #9

Really excited for Swift. I've tried and failed many times to learn Objective C and felt that the barrier to entry was a bit to high for myself. As a someone who writes JavaScript for a living, Swift is very inviting.

Cocoa, the API behind iOS and Mac Objective-C, is the hardest part, and is still there.

I suggest going through some detailed tutorials on building an X, so you get the feel for how views, view controllers, objects and everything all interact.

The new playgrounds look EXCELLENT for doing that! Best of luck

Re: Chris Lattner on Swift

#166

Post by sriku » Wed, Jun 04, 2014, 1:08 PM UTC

leorocky wrote: post #123

niix wrote: post #9

Really excited for Swift. I've tried and failed many times to learn Objective C and felt that the barrier to entry was a bit to high for myself. As a someone who writes JavaScript for a living, Swift is very inviting.

Programming languages are like vehicles. If you can drive one, you mostly know how to drive the other. JavaScript has a lot more gotchas than Objective-C. If you feel comfortable with the weird "this", closures, and prototypes, Objective C shouldn't be hard. Pick up a copy of K&R to get familiar with C and then read the Objective-C docs.