What Makes A Programming Language Good

[Jesse Phillips]

Adam Ruppe Wrote:

> Jesse Phillips wrote:
> > But if they haven't done any development on it for the last year, but
> > the library it depends on has...
> 
> Unless you give library authors write access to your hard drive,
> it doesn't matter. They can't make your old, saved version
> magically disappear. If you then distribute that saved version
> with the rest of your app or library, it Just Works for the customer.

You can have the author release packaged libraries for developers to use and the author should do this. So this begs the question of what is the repository for? Why is the tool going out to different URLs and downloading files when you are supposed to use the pre-built lib?

I believe the reason for pushing a system like rubygems is not so that the original author can compile their program, it is already setup for them. The purpose is to make it easier on those that want to start contributing to the project, those that are using the library and need to fix a bug, and those that want to take over the project long after it has died.

Having a standard way for which things are built, having easy access to all relevant libraries, and knowing you can find most of what you need in one place. Those are the reasons.

> I think I'm now at the point where I've spent more time
> posting to this thread than I've ever spent maintaining makefiles!
> 
> If I have a different perspective on this from everyone else, there's
> really no point talking about it further. We might as well just
> go our separate ways.