On Mon, Sep 14 2015, Daniel Carrera <[email protected]> wrote: > On 14 September 2015 at 08:16, Uwe Fechner <[email protected]> > wrote: > >> While I understand your point, the success of a new programming language >> depends on the availability of a good IDE. >> > > No it doesn't. > > C, C++, Perl, Python, Fortran, JavaScript, PHP, and arguably even Java > became successful long before they acquired an IDE. I think that there are > more languages that became successful without an IDE than with one, so > let's not overstate the issue. An IDE is *good* to have because *some* > people want them. Good documentation is more important. Having the right > features and being at the right place at the right time is even more > important.
You are of course right, but having a dedicated IDE is not the issue per se --- programmers need a work environment that makes it easy to write, compile/evaluate, run, test, load etc code (whichever is applicable), and look up documentation. I think that there are two cultures: (1) people who prefer to learn and use a single, very powerful editor for many tasks (vim, Emacs, Atom, ...), (2) people who are used to each language/task having a dedicated IDE (Matlab, Mathematica, etc, but it does not stop there, as they may use a dedicated IDE for LaTeX, etc). I would say that (1) is comparatively more prevalent among programmers, but (2) is relatively common in the scientific community. If one has always used an IDE, learning a new, powerful general editor and work environment can look intimidating and unnecessary; also, when people ask which one to use they can get conflicting advice. But IMO in the long run it is a good investment so perhaps explaining this would be useful. Best, Tamas
