Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

blog.realkinetic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 321 posts

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#241

Post by anonytrary »

dragonwriter wrote: post #240
anonytrary wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is a community. The community tends to have smarter on average people in it. Simply because all the less smart people are put off. A community shouldn't be judged based on how smart everyone is (quite a difficult measure), a more useful metric would be how many useful community libraries there are. For example, if I can choose between 50 carousels implemented in React vs. 2 in Elm, and I'm an average develope…

> A community shouldn't be judged based on how smart everyone is (quite a difficult measure), a more useful metric would be how many useful community libraries there are That seems more of a metric for an ecosystem than a community.

It's presumptuous to assume "community A is smarter than community B". It's just not even the right question to ask. Better questions to ask are "what are third party libs like?", "how active are people in this community?", "how active is the SO and other forums?". These are actionable questions.

"People who use Elm are smarter" is simply not actionable information. What does it even mean? It's meaningless.

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#242

Post by merlinsbrain »

rtfeldman wrote: post #33
mooreds wrote: post #2

My question is, how will he feel about this three years from now? When he is trying to hire someone? Or when the folks behind Elm don't update it as often as they should? The problem with unpopular languages is twofold: * lack of talent that can step right in and be effective * lack of resources to push the language forward The first can be remediated by planning to bring new hires up to speed, and just making that i…

Worth noting that in our experience, hiring has gotten way easier for us since we became an Elm shop. We really struggled to hire React engineers (who have a zillion positions to choose among - why would they pick ours?), whereas there seem to be a lot more great programmers who want to use Elm than there are companies hiring for Elm positions. Here's a verbatim quote from a cover letter (one I happened to be reading…

Specifically with respect to the hiring advantage it’s a little disingenuous to not explicitly state that the creator/designer of the language works there.

That’s a significant enough reason to pick one shop over another and also a reason to opportunistically apply.

“You get to work with Evan/Guido/dhh/Gosling” is a different sell than “we use Elm/etc”.

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#243

Post by mnm1 »

b0rsuk wrote: post #226

I wonder how to become a good functional programmer. I think I'm already decent at procedural/OO. Do I need to have a strong maths background? I didn't learn it very well at university and this worries me. Many functional language fans seem to have degrees in maths.

Pick a project. Pick a functional language. Code the project. That's it. It's not that different that, given enough willingness, you wouldn't be able to learn it yourself if you are decent at procedural / OO. You don't need any advanced math whatsoever.

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#244

Post by sidlls »

yawaramin wrote: post #213
sidlls wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That isn't static typing.

- You can specify types - Types are checked before run time - Type errors are reported If that's not static typing, what is?

This argument isn't convincing. These artifacts are hints that can be ignored, not constraints to the python interpreter. It seems to me a bit like arguing that the existence of Coverity (and other static analysis tools) means C is as safe as Rust.

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#245

Post by sriku »

rtfeldman wrote: post #33
mooreds wrote: post #2

My question is, how will he feel about this three years from now? When he is trying to hire someone? Or when the folks behind Elm don't update it as often as they should? The problem with unpopular languages is twofold: * lack of talent that can step right in and be effective * lack of resources to push the language forward The first can be remediated by planning to bring new hires up to speed, and just making that i…

Worth noting that in our experience, hiring has gotten way easier for us since we became an Elm shop. We really struggled to hire React engineers (who have a zillion positions to choose among - why would they pick ours?), whereas there seem to be a lot more great programmers who want to use Elm than there are companies hiring for Elm positions. Here's a verbatim quote from a cover letter (one I happened to be reading…

> there seem to be a lot more great programmers who want to use Elm than there are companies hiring for Elm positions.

While I understand that, I find it quite paradoxical given that Elm purportedly targets normal programmers. (Elmer here.)

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#246

Post by latch »

PaulStatezny wrote: post #234

We use(d) Elm at the company I work at. (A start-up.) Elm is great. All of the positive rumors about it are true. The issue we've had with Elm isn't typically discussed in these conversations: My CTO doesn't seem to see the value of it+. So we recently replaced our Elm code with JavaScript. I wonder if anyone else finds themselves in a similar situation. +It's a bit more nuanced. We're in a very "MVP" stage; the line…

I wouldn't write off an entire company on this abbreviated description, but damn, I'd be worried about this. It does not speak highly of your CTO.

I'm not saying Elm is objectively better than JavaScript (I don't do either). But, can't these things sit side by side. And, if so, how is rewriting code aligned with moving faster? At worst, keep what you have in Elm, and write new code in JS? Also, there's plenty of "ugghh" with JavaScript that I'm skeptical of anyone throwing away existing code in order to rewrite it in javascript.

This is all doubly true for a early-stage MVP, where I'd expect a CTO to be technically minded and enthusiastic. Sounds more like "I know JS so we'll do JS."

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#247

Post by dasil003 »

jasonlotito wrote: post #128
stctgion wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a little confused. React isn't a language, or at least I thought it wasn't a language. When I hire people I'm not the least bit interested in which JavaScript framework they have already used. I kind of assume that if you can learn one you can learn them all. The idea of labelling yourself a react engineer seems really limiting to me

> I kind of assume that if you can learn one you can learn them all. Knowing C doesn't mean you can't learn React, but if you've only ever done C and low level systems programming means you have a lot to learn to get to the level of someone who has specialized in knowing React and it's environment. It's not just React. It's everything around it that also matters. Such as browsers, HTML, CSS, and all the best practice…

I would look askance at someone who calls themselves a "C Developer" in much the same way I would at someone who calls themselves a "React Developer". The reason being that it just smells wrong, like they read a "C for Dummies" book and are trying to fake it til they make it or something. The correct label is something more general about the domain (eg. systems developer, front-end developer, etc), although I realize these labels are imperfect and subject to their own anti-patterns (eg. devops engineer), they at least signal you understand something about the broader landscape.

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#248

Post by Fiahil »

Cyph0n wrote: post #133
Fiahil wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strangely, if you switch Elm for Scala, you get the exact opposite result (at least where I work). We got mostly inexperienced candidates and the ones able to understand the codebase can get more interesting offers elsewhere.

So you know that experienced Scala devs won't like your offers, but you aren't interested in the less experienced devs who apply. What are you looking for, exactly? As an "inexperienced" Scala dev, I'm genuinely interested.

Scala has a steep learning curve, so we're looking for devs having at least one or two real production projects (that aren't using spark) on their belt. It turns out to be quite a challenge to find someone who have experience in the ecosystem and the language, AND who _like_ working with it.

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#249

Post by erokar »

Rapzid wrote: post #180
collyw wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have noticed a lot of language / framework collectors where every new project is in a new framework or language on their CV. While it will expose you to a lot of different ideas I doubt you will code very well in any of them if you are swapping every year. I have seen plenty of Python written like its Java and its just less elegant code. And Django code that doesn't follow best practices seems to be the norm. If yo…

Python written like Java would be a huge improvement over what most people produce.

I don't think so. I've seen Java written like Java.

Re: Elm changed my mind about unpopular languages

#250

Post by scns »

b0rsuk wrote: post #226

I wonder how to become a good functional programmer. I think I'm already decent at procedural/OO. Do I need to have a strong maths background? I didn't learn it very well at university and this worries me. Many functional language fans seem to have degrees in maths.

Check out the humble functional bundle, two of the books in there are about the transition from imperative to fp.
Post reply on HN