Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!rutgers!njin!princeton!udel!burdvax!ubbpc!wgh From: wgh@ubbpc.UUCP (William G. Hutchison) Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc Subject: Tearing down the tower of Babel. Keywords: Babel programming languages Message-ID: <418@ubbpc.UUCP> Date: 2 Dec 88 23:01:29 GMT Organization: UNISYS CS, Blue Bell, PA Lines: 49 There are too many programming languages. Anybody who disagrees with that statement violently can now skip this article; let's avoid unnecessary gastric distress. There are too many programming languages. My job is helping software vendors convert their products onto my company's UNIX systems. That job would be considerably easier if there were fewer languages in use. Others would benefit as well: if vendors did not have to waste time and money converting their software, prices could be lower. My objective is to persuade people that programming in "minority language" (those not widely used) is bad in many ways. (1) It reduces reusability of software (2) It fragments the software community (3) It necessitates wheel reinvention (4) it wastes programmer's time in learning the same concept in lots of different languages (5) it is a misuse of the language designers' time: they could be solving useful problems. I do not wish to retard progress in language development. I think that every computer science graduate student should have a constitutional right to design 3 new languages in his/her lifetime. Designing computer programming languages is like using narcotics: people do it whether you want them to or not, so why not legalize it? :-) I also think that if a programming language has not proven itself in 10-15 years by being widely used throughout the world, it should be taken out and shot [ the language, not the designer :-) ] ! To avoid further agitation, I will not here claim that anybody's favorite language falls into this category. I think that a language is like a paradigm as in Kuhn's book on scientific revolutions: It should be criticized until it has proven itself, then it should be adopted widely. My image is that of a classical physicist waking up one morning in the 1920's and saying "By Jove, the Copenhagen interpretation is correct!" or "Eureka! I am certain that Heisenberg has it right!" (pun intended). Remember, though, if I seem to be flaming your favorite language, I am not really doing so: I am performing a useful public service, out of pure, selfless altruism! -- Bill Hutchison, DP Consultant rutgers!liberty!burdvax!ubbpc!wgh Unisys UNIX Portation Center "What one fool can do, another can!" P.O. Box 500, M.S. B121 Ancient Simian Proverb, quoted by Blue Bell, PA 19424 Sylvanus P. Thompson, in _Calculus Made Easy_