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A comment on Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it do what Java does? (work offline, write files, networking etc.).

Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by jaggederest on Saturday April 28, 2007 @04:46PM (#17756)
Why would you want to compare it to java? Ye gods man, java/c/c++/c# aren't exactly the kind of languages I'd want a new language to compare with.

Python, Ruby, Haskell98, ocaml, etc. Consider those your languages that set the bar right now. Java is 'the new' C.

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by juwo on Saturday April 28, 2007 @09:19PM (#17801)
Never heard of them. (heard of ruby only here, in YC).

old wine in new bottles.

if-then-else by any other name... is just as tedious.

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by jaggederest on Sunday April 29, 2007 @12:03AM (#17813)
heh, that's what you think. Try building anything substantial in one of the languages I named and then going back to java.

Ruby programs are maybe a tenth the size, give or take,

Python similarly small.

Haskell will blow your mind because you basically never use control structures or type declarations.

Continuation-passing scheme, smalltalk, erlang...

Any of these things will change the way you develop, probably immensely for the better.

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by juwo on Sunday April 29, 2007 @09:45AM (#17872)
can I write a standalone desktop program in Ruby? (I dont know).

BTW my feedback on your work http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=17871

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by omouse on Sunday April 29, 2007 @10:45AM (#17884)
Yes: http://www.erikveen.dds.nl/rubyscript2exe/index.html

Next time just Google for "Ruby standalone". Saves me the trouble of doing it for you ;)

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by juwo on Sunday April 29, 2007 @11:45PM (#18022)
You proved my point - for me - better than I could have done so myself :)

If I have to google for it and come up with a 3rd party tool, then it isnt part of the language!

And FYI, I wasnt writing my comment in complete ignorance nor laziness. I did go to the ror site when I first heard of it here on YC. When I realized it seemed to be a scripting language with a web server, I lost interest. Offline is very important for me/juwo.

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by jaggederest on Monday April 30, 2007 @03:54AM (#18059)
try python. well supported windowing toolkits. and it doesn't suck.
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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by dpapathanasiou on Wednesday May 02, 2007 @12:39PM (#18748)
old wine in new bottles

No, it's the difference between Turing imperative (e.g. C++, Java, etc.) and Lamdba calculus (lisp, erlang, ocaml, etc.) which is significant.

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by juwo on Wednesday May 02, 2007 @02:25PM (#18792)
but underlying it is a turing machine, right?
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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by dpapathanasiou on Wednesday May 02, 2007 @03:18PM (#18807)
No, Turing and Lambda are different ways of representing the same underlying assembly code.

You're correct in that there is a direct line from the Turing imperative to the underlying assembly code, but given the choice between writing Lambda expressions or Turing expressions, why would you pick the latter?

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by juwo on Wednesday May 02, 2007 @10:43PM (#18897)
Even the lambda expression when running on the computer, is acting out a Turing machine; head travels over symbols on a tape, reads a symbol, changes state, stops or moves...

that is what I meant by old wine in new bottles.

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by dpapathanasiou on Thursday May 03, 2007 @09:44AM (#18976)
You're correct, unless your hardware is specifically designed for lambda calculus (like one of those old lisp machines), lambda code gets compiled into Turing instructions.

But why code in a Turing style (whether it's Java or assembly) when lambda programming is more efficient?

That's the point all the lambda folks are making.

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by juwo on Thursday May 03, 2007 @06:21PM (#19126)
"unless your hardware is specifically designed for lambda calculus (like one of those old lisp machines)"

No, I am talking about - at a deeper level, all computing can be reduced to a Turing machine. (Unless you are reading Roger Penrose on consciousness).

Maybe I am mistaken, I am out of touch.

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Re:Is Flex/Actionscript a real programming language? Can it ... by juwo on Friday May 04, 2007 @01:22PM (#19442)
to clarify:

A Turing machine can simulate a deterministic finite automaton and a non-deterministic finite automaton.

All systems are arguably either of these two. Perhaps that's why we can simulate weather, and lots of other things.

Unless you look at human consciousness - Nobelist Roger Penrose has a theory that the mind is not a computer. That it has quantum states. (his book: The Emperor's New Mind - I didnt finish it - long and hard).

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