On Sat, 26 Oct 2002, Michael Lazzaro wrote:
> So lets have _lots_ of operators, and _lots_ of two-to-four-letter
> barewords, so long as they each do something Big, or something
> Universal. And let's locale-ize them, so that non-english-speakers can
> use 'umu' to mean 'bool', etc. Hey, why the heck not?
Why not? Here is my opinion about localized programming languages.
As a non-native English speaker, I like it very much that I *don't* have
the possibility to write:
afficher pour @tableau; # note I used functions that map
mon @uaelbat = retourner @tableau; # to single words in French ;-)
And I suspect my non-native French speaker readers like it very much too.
I suppose it's very doable to have a FrenchPerl6 editor/parser/whatever
that makes most of this transparent, but the thing I like the most about
programming languages it that their are foreign languages.
And since most of them are based on English, they are just twice as
foreign to me. So when I program, I can concentrate on what the syntax of
the programming langage accepts, rather than on the sentences I could
write if I were using a subset of French.
And imagine the pain for all those programmer that do not speak very well
their own mother tongue... Should I use "effacer", "efacer", "éfasser"
when I want to remove a file? With programming languages as there are
today, I just have to learn a new word (unlink), and this won't mess my
already messy understanding of my own language (pity the one who will read
the comments and documentation, though).
I admit that knowing a little English can be helpful to guess a function
name here and there, though. ;-)
Also, remember Microsoft moved back specifically on that topic with the
Excel and Word macro-language some years ago.
Naturally, this has nothing to do with naming your variables as you like
(even Unicode and stuff); variables are another matter entirely.
Don't misunderstand me, I love the fact that Perl works like a natural
language. It's just that I also understand the fact that it's its own
natural (English-looking) language, and not a subset of English.
-- BooK
PS: I have troubles explaining this view in French as well; please forgive
me if I didn't make much sense in English either.
--
Philippe "BooK" Bruhat
When you run from your problem, you make it that much harder for good
fortune to catch you, as well. (Moral from Groo The Wanderer #14 (Epic))
