On Nov 21, 11:20 am, John Roth <johnro...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Nov 21, 8:40 am, Duncan Booth <duncan.bo...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>
> > a...@pythoncraft.com (Aahz) wrote:
> > > Comparing Go to another computer language -- do you recognize it?
>
> > >http://www.cowlark.com/2009-11-15-go/
>
> > Yes, spotted it at the first 'fi'.
>
> This isn't the first time anyone has criticized Go. The interesting,
> and somewhat sad, thing is that the entire mess can be explained
> very easily by looking at the beginning of the language design
> FAQ on the Go web site. See if you recognize the names of the
> principle people who designed it.
>
> Yep. Go is simply C with most (but not all) of the warts
> removed and some more modern features added. Brought to you
> by the same people who brought you C and Unix all those years ago.
> The use of the Plan 9 toolchain is not a coincidence.
>
The assertion that Go is simply C with warts removed and modern
features added is not surprising.
If you read the Go FAQ, you will see that there is no claim anywhere
that they are trying to solve the problem that 40 years of language
development since Algol has not produced super-sexy quantum leaps of
improvement. Instead, they are trying to solve the problem that in
the last ten years, there haven not seen ANY improvement in systems
programming languages ("No major systems language has emerged in over
a decade"). The critics of Go probably fall into four categories:
1) Some do not understand the goals of the Go project itself, so
they are criticizing Go for not solving problems that were never in
Go's bailiwick to begin with.
2) Some believe that Go does not deliver on its goal to modernize
systems programming languages.
3) Some do not accept the premise that there has been no progress
outside of Go in the last ten years with regards to systems
programming languages, and they are wondering why Google invented Go
instead of embracing other technologies.
4) Some people do not even believe that the problem is important--do
we actually need a modern systems programming language, or do we just
need modern programming languages to perform well under all
circumstances, or at least be adaptable?
My list probably isn't even nearly exhaustive.
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