Re: Some Laws

"Laconic2" <laconic2_at_comcast.net> wrote in message news:c7OdnW_jhfckVc_cRVn-iw_at_comcast.com...
>
> "Marshall Spight" <mspight_at_dnai.com> wrote in message
> news:I5k4d.91137$D%.72678_at_attbi_s51...
> > "robert" <gnuoytr_at_rcn.com> wrote in message
> news:da3c2186.0409211922.21e7ea7f_at_posting.google.com...
> > >
> > > the java twinks are a herd of lemmings. who happen to be convinced
> > > that any thought they have must be profound and original.
> >
> > That's just rude and uncalled for, and dead wrong to boot.
>
> It's not dead wrong, in my experience. If you include people whose cultural
> memory extends back only about 6 years, there are a great many of them who
> claim originality in Java for language features that data back as far as
> Smalltalk, Simula, or Lisp.
>
> There are a lot of 25 year olds whose cultural memory only goes back that
> far.

Sure. 25 year olds say stupid things because they have just enough of a smidgeon of experience to actually be getting some confidence, but not enough actual experience to really know anything. But to generalize from 25 year old Java programmers to all Java programmers is not a valid thing to do.

25 year old linux programmers will tell you that Linus invented the monolithic kernel, which everyone now agrees is the superior design, and that marketplace success has proven the microkernel approach to be tecnically inferior. That this is a profoundly ignorant statement to make doesn't extend to proof of the idea that all linux programmers are idiots.

I also note that while a number of people have disputed my labelling the original argument as "wrong" no one has disputed the "rude and uncalled for" part. Ahem.

> As long as to consider Java to be mostly the consolidation of ideas that
> have been around for a while, and not a radical departure, I have to
> agree.

The vast majority of the process of design is picking and choosing from preexisting ideas, and trying to put them together in a useful and coherent way. Often the interesting or original part is the particular combination of ideas chosen.

I assert Java is well-designed; I do not assert that it is original, nor have I ever heard anyone over 27 assert that it is. :-)

Marshall Received on Fri Sep 24 2004 - 07:51:45 CEST