dmd platform support - poll

[John Reimer]

Hello Nick,

> "John Reimer" <terminal.node at gmail.com> wrote in message
> news:28b70f8c104198cb3624a1d43670 at news.digitalmars.com...
> 
>> Hello Nick,
>> 
>>> "Walter Bright" <newshound1 at digitalmars.com> wrote in message
>>> news:gj519n$1ckg$1 at digitalmars.com...
>>> 
>>>> I've run into a lot of programmers lately who, if a language isn't
>>>> on .NET, will not look at it.
>>>> 
>>> This right here is absolute proof of how appallingly pathetic the
>>> average quality of programmers is, and just how firmly up their
>>> asses their heads are planted. As much of a need as we have for
>>> better languages, I'm convinced that need is completely dwarfed by
>>> the need for better programmers.
>>> 
>>> And frankly, I'm not so sure that such clearly incompetent fools
>>> should be encouraged in such tenancies. I say, if someone is so
>>> bone-headed as to refuse to look at a language for such a stupid
>>> reason, they *should* be forced to stick with increasingly subpar
>>> languages. They's the only thing that will lead to their demise. We
>>> need to save our field from these f****** morons, not encourage
>>> them.
>>> 
>>> (And no, I'm not complaining about .NET itself, or .NET languages.)
>>> 
>> Hey, Nick, you just snubbed a whole bunch of people and severed all
>> hope of demonstrating D's usefulness to anyone. ;)  I'm guessing a
>> lot of us here have acted the "morons" in various similar ways when
>> we make a weak attempt at argument when things are pushed at us.
>> 
>> Putting it bluntly, that's also the exact attitude that will distance
>> people from the language.  Show disdain for them, and you are
>> guaranteed to alienate people no matter how strong your argument is.
>> That, and such disdain is usually not warranted because it is
>> reactive to a shallow response and fails to recognize the deeper
>> social issues hinted by such a response.
>> 
>> Incidentally, labelling them "incompetant fools" isn't a very strong
>> argument anyway, but you know that. ;D
>> 
>>> I say, if someone is so
>>> bone-headed as to refuse to look at a language for such a stupid
>>> reason, they *should* be forced to stick with increasingly subpar
>>> languages.
>> You probably realize this, but it's rarely so simple as that.
>> Sometimes people make weak silly arguments in response to people
>> pushing things on them.  Their reasons for holding onto a technology
>> rather than exploring other possibilities may be more related to
>> survival and livelihood than sound reason (well, then again, survival
>> and livelihood may be very good "reason" :-) ).  Their argument for
>> rejection may be just a weak form of saying "go away... life is
>> hard... don't bother me with this stuff."  Even so, there is a sort
>> of logic contained in their response:  make D viable on the platform
>> they know brings in the money, and you may just get their attention.
>> 
>> There are a whole lot of people that aren't risk-takers for very good
>> reason; the D community just seems to have attracted the more
>> maverick adventurous personalities: we probably look like a bunch of
>> extreme sports fanatics from their perspective  :).  Just because
>> others give lame responses to why they won't explore a new language,
>> doesn't mean they are all losers.  I expect that others might
>> consider us to be morons for wasting so much time on D.
>> 
> I was a bit unclear. Walter's observation just triggered a certain
> nerve. I'll attempt to clarify:
> 
> I've personally come across a lot of truly terrible "programmers".
> Refusing to touch a language because it isn't .NET, or because it *is*
> .NET and thus related to MS, or because it isn't Java (and no I don't
> mean JVM), etc. is just one of many classes of fallacies I've seen
> over and over and over among these people. No, that in and of itself
> doesn't make them "incompetant fools" (go figure, the one time I
> decide to skip the spell check ;)), and there may very well be a few
> people who actually do have a rare good reason to stick with .NET.
> But, such "fanboyism" is often fairly indicative of a "fool".
> 
> And yes, I really do think it would be best for everyone, developers,
> consumers, and even the fools themselves, if these people were weeded
> out of the field. Thus, the idea of bowing to a fallacy merely because
> it's a popular one truly disgusts me. It should be classified as a
> "reason not to", not a "reason to". (But overall, I would count adding
> .NET as a target for D as a "good thing" (although not a personal
> priority) because one of the "pie in the sky" things I've been
> dreaming to see in the programming world (besides overall better
> programmers) is a complete divorce of language and platform.)
> 


Fair enough.  And it may be that you get to see some trully nauseating stuff 
that I'm not in contact with, in which case I have no argument. :)

Thanks for clarifying.

-JJR