Does functional programming work?

[Mike James]

Ary Borenszweig Wrote:

> retard wrote:
> > Fri, 01 Jan 2010 12:19:25 -0800, Walter Bright wrote:
> > 
> >> Nick Sabalausky wrote:
> >>> "Walter Bright" <newshound1 at digitalmars.com> wrote in message
> >>> news:hhgvqk$8cj$2 at digitalmars.com...
> >>>> An interesting counterpoint to the usual FP hype:
> >>>>
> >>>> http://prog21.dadgum.com/55.html
> >>> Didn't read the original article, but the one being linked to is
> >>> completely in line with how I feel about not just FP, but all
> >>> programming paradigms, for example, OO: It's great as long as you don't
> >>> pull a Java or (worse yet) a Smalltalk and try to cram *everything*
> >>> into the paradigm.
> >> I agree, the old programming-language-as-religion problem. I first ran
> >> into this when I read the original Pascal book, and became enamored with
> >> it. I tried doing a modest project in Pascal using a pure Pascal
> >> compiler.
> >>
> >> 80% went smoothly, the other 20% spent wrestling with the nanny language
> >> tsk-tsking consumed nearly 100% of the time spend on the project. I just
> >> couldn't get things that had to be done, done, as the language would
> >> shut off all the avenues.
> >>
> >> When I then picked up K+R C, I never wrote another line of Pascal. It so
> >> soured me on Pascal that I never got on the later bandwagons of Modula
> >> II, Delphi, TurboPascal, etc. Never even looked at them.
> > 
> > The programming-language-as-religion problem exists only in your 
> > imagination.
> 
> You don't have an idea how many times I heard the phrase "Please, 
> please, let this work" out of a programmer's mouth in front of a computer.

But thats not to the God of Languages, thats to the God of Demonstrations...