🚀 go-pugleaf

Chris Marston <cmarston@ls.barrhead.ab.ca> writes:

|Erik P. DeBenedictis wrote:
|> 
|> Andrew Koenig wrote:
|>
|> I believe there are better comparisons than C/C++ and Java. There is precedent
|> for applying marketing to computer languges, however. Prolog (or the Japanese
|> 5th generation computing initiative) and PL/1 got very expensive marketing campaigns
|> as well. These were all bombs.
|> 
|> Is it possible that Java will become the Prolog or PL/1 of the 90's?

|When was the last time you saw ProLog featured in Time magasine? ;^) I 
|think it already has too much inertia & dev community support behind 
|it to meet that kind of grisly end. Besides, Java is actually 
|_useful_....

When are people going to stop making these facile historical comparisons
with other languages (Prolog, PL/1, etc) in order to predict what's going
to happen to Java. Judge Java on its own technical merits.

How does Java differ from Prolog, PL/1, [insert historically analogous 
language]? 
- It's got a very small learning curve for a huge pool of programmers 
  (true of Prolog or PL/1?).
- It solves real software engineering problems with current dominant
  languages (C, C++). 
- It already has a critical mass of support. (Compare the number of postings
  on comp.lang.{c,c++,java}. How big is comp.lang.prolog?)
- Bean-counters like the productivity gains over C++ (and rightly so).

Bert
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Bert Thompson                                               aet@cs.mu.oz.au
"This sentence is true." 
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