tneff@bfmny0.BFM.COM (Tom Neff) (01/18/91)
>Larry Wall: The Jenny Holzer of Computing
Hmm, I was thinking Barbara Kruger :-)
You want heresy? etc etc...
-----
Fortran II will never be surpassed.
-----
Real programmers don't optimize.
-----
Clean desk, bad code.
-----
Home computing is an oxymoron.
-----
Real programmers are the problem.lwall@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV (Larry Wall) (01/19/91)
In article <1991Jan18.032416.27559@decuac.dec.com> mjr@hussar.dco.dec.com (Marcus J. Ranum) writes: : ttw@lanl.gov (Tony Warnock) writes: : : > It's good to see that some people recognize that : >UNIX is a religion (rather than an operating system.) : : : And here I thought it was a dessert topping... : -- : The finer things in life never change. Good code stays small, fast, : lean and mean. There's not much good code around. : [From the programming notebooks of a heretic, 1990] Speaking of the UNIX mindset, I have yet to see a note from this "heretic" that I would consider heretical. Some oversimplifications, perhaps. All in all, pretty much right down the party line. You want heresy, I'll give you heresy. :-) How 'bout this: Decomposition does you no good if you can't compose. Shell syntax is similar to (and almost as useless as) transformational grammar. A language that overly encourages coining suffers rapid dialectical divergence. There's too much good code around. If someone claims to be avoiding complexity, check under his rug. Using a simple language on a complex problem doesn't result in a simple solution. Languages don't differ in what you can say--they differ in what you must say. People don't mind context-dependency very much. Lean and mean code can bully you. A religion based solely on either hedonism or stoicism is wrong. Programming should be a fun discipline. Sometimes you want everything to look like a nail. There's More Than One Way To Do It. That should do for starters... Larry Wall lwall@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov
de5@ornl.gov (Dave Sill) (01/19/91)
Larry Wall: The Jenny Holzer of Computing In article <11107@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV>, lwall@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV (Larry Wall) writes: > >A language that overly encourages coining suffers rapid dialectical divergence. What's `coining'? >There's too much good code around. Too much in some areas, not enough in others. And lots of poorly intergrated good code. >There's More Than One Way To Do It. Not heresy according to the UNIX "plumbing" philosophy. -- Dave Sill (de5@ornl.gov) It will be a great day when our schools have Martin Marietta Energy Systems all the money they need and the Air Force Workstation Support has to hold a bake sale to buy a new bomber.
oz@yunexus.yorku.ca (Ozan Yigit) (01/19/91)
In article <11107@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> lwall@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV (Larry Wall) writes: >You want heresy, I'll give you heresy. :-) How about this one? | In 1982, some UN*X gurus claimed that Darth Vader uses Fortran | under VMS operating system. They simply couldn't have foreseen 1990. | Having survived VMS, Darth nowadays enjoys Perl and X-Windows under | System V release 4. ... oz
guy@auspex.auspex.com (Guy Harris) (01/21/91)
>>There's More Than One Way To Do It. > >Not heresy according to the UNIX "plumbing" philosophy. Except for the version of that philosophy that says "the only way to do it is by gluing a bunch of filters together in a pipeline...."