Re:Shoestring Budget? Starting to feel growth issues on you...
by silentbicycle on Wednesday September 10, 2008 @07:34AM
(#300280)
Fully agreed. I'm posting for the archives and other readers at least as much as him, trying to add in a reminder that "rewrite the whole shebang in C" isn't necessary for good performance.
I dabble in languages for fun, but find that I ultimately end up using the new techniques I learn in a few practical multiparadigm languages, e.g. OCaml, Lisp, and Python* . If you want to learn about types/powerful type systems, try Haskell or one of the MLs. If you want to see a brilliantly designed module system, look at the MLs. If you want to see well-designed syntactic sugar, look at Python and Lua (among others). If you want to understand OO better, look at Smalltalk. Etc. Spending a week (or weekend) now and then exploring the ideas and mindsets in unfamiliar languages, particularly those influential on what you do your real work in, can really expand your toolkit. (Also, read code.)
* Python is not fully multiparadigm, e.g. it's awkward for functional programming, but it's fairly flexible, and its giant standard library makes up for several weaknesses IMO.
Really knowing any one of the several languages I listed in the initial comment would probably be enough, and some approaches (e.g. Lua in C) could probably be learned relatively quickly. I suspect it would probably take much more time to learn to use C++ really well than OCaml or Lisp, though.
I dabble in languages for fun, but find that I ultimately end up using the new techniques I learn in a few practical multiparadigm languages, e.g. OCaml, Lisp, and Python* . If you want to learn about types/powerful type systems, try Haskell or one of the MLs. If you want to see a brilliantly designed module system, look at the MLs. If you want to see well-designed syntactic sugar, look at Python and Lua (among others). If you want to understand OO better, look at Smalltalk. Etc. Spending a week (or weekend) now and then exploring the ideas and mindsets in unfamiliar languages, particularly those influential on what you do your real work in, can really expand your toolkit. (Also, read code.)
* Python is not fully multiparadigm, e.g. it's awkward for functional programming, but it's fairly flexible, and its giant standard library makes up for several weaknesses IMO.
Really knowing any one of the several languages I listed in the initial comment would probably be enough, and some approaches (e.g. Lua in C) could probably be learned relatively quickly. I suspect it would probably take much more time to learn to use C++ really well than OCaml or Lisp, though.