[Semi OT] The programming language wars

[Paulo Pinto via Digitalmars-d]

On Saturday, 21 March 2015 at 14:07:28 UTC, FG wrote:
> On 2015-03-21 at 06:30, H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d wrote:
>> On Sat, Mar 21, 2015 at 04:17:00AM +0000, Joakim via 
>> Digitalmars-d wrote:
>> [...]
>>> What I was going to say too, neither CLI or GUI will win, 
>>> speech
>>> recognition will replace them both, by providing the best of 
>>> both.
>>> Rather than writing a script to scrape several shopping 
>>> websites for
>>> the price of a Galaxy S6, I'll simply tell the intelligent 
>>> agent on my
>>> computer "Find me the best deal on a S6" and it will go find 
>>> it.
>>
>> I dunno, I find that I can express myself far more precisely 
>> and
>> concisely on the keyboard than I can verbally. Maybe for 
>> everyday tasks
>> like shopping for the best deals voice recognition is Good 
>> Enough(tm),
>> but for more complex tasks, I have yet to find something more 
>> expressive
>> than the keyboard.
>
> "Find me the best deal on a S6" is only a little more complex 
> than "make me a cup of coffee." Fine for doing predefined tasks 
> but questionable as an ubiquitous input method. It's hard 
> enough for mathematicians to dictate a theorem without using 
> any symbolic notation. There is too much ambiguity and room for 
> interpretation in speech to make it a reliable and easy input 
> method for all tasks. Even in your example:
>
> You say: "Find me the best deal on a S6."
> I hear: "Fine me the best teal on A.S. six."
> Computer: "Are you looking for steel?"
>
> Now imagine the extra trouble if you mix languages. Also, how 
> do you include meta-text control sequences in a message? By 
> raising your voice or tilting your head when you say the magic 
> words? Cf.:
>
> "There was this famous quote QUOTE to be or not to be END QUOTE 
> on page six END PARAGRAPH..."
>
> Very awkward, if talking to oneself wasn't awkward already. 
> Therefore I just cannot imagine voice being used anywhere where 
> exact representation is required, especially in programming:
>
> "Define M1 as a function that takes in two arguments. The state 
> of the machine labelled ES and an integer number in range 
> between two and six inclusive labelled X. The result of M1 is a 
> boolean. M1 shall return true if and only if the ES member 
> labelled squat THATS SQUAT WITH A T AT THE END is equal to zero 
> modulo B. OH SHIT IT WAS NOT B BUT X. SCRATCH EVERYTHING."


I don't expect programming will remain so low level in the 
future. We are at the infancy of our skills, when comparing with 
engineerings with a fee centuries of progress.

For me the future lyes in something like Wolfram/Mathematic with 
natural voice processing.