RE: Google, Python, and the future of AJAX applications

["Richard M. Smith" <rms () bsf-llc com>]

I'm not aware of any successful applications which were ever shipped using
the USCD P-code system. 

Javascript matters because it is integrated into Web browsers and allows
manipulation of the contents of Web pages.  Java failed in browsers because
it lacked DOM access.

Perl, Python, PHP, and Ruby seem to serve similar niches.  Much like the
Ford Explorer, the GM Envoy, the Lexus RX330, the Toyota Highlander, etc.
serve simlar niches.

Richard



-----Original Message-----
From: funsec-bounces () linuxbox org [mailto:funsec-bounces () linuxbox org] On
Behalf Of Paul Vixie
Sent: Sunday, March 12, 2006 7:09 PM
To: funsec () linuxbox org
Subject: Re: [funsec] Google, Python, and the future of AJAX applications

nobody has yet explained to me why we needed Java.  the ucsd p-system gave
us a workable virtual runtime which could easily have been tuned for
web-browser use.  additionally, p-code was source-language independent,
meaning that BASIC and FORTRAN and Pascal and Modula-2 and even LISP and
Scheme could target it, so we did not actually have to learn to live with
another C-like syntax.  Java and its syntax are painfully simpleminded, it's
like programming with your hands superglued together.  Gosling, of all
people, should be ashamed of this since he knew from M-Lisp what was
possible.  i suspect some sort of brain damage in the intervening years, or
perhaps Sun's corporate profit motive had something to do with the awfulness
of the Java design (including the stupid limitations in the virtual machine
model, the source language syntax, and the runtime library.)

nobody has yet explained to me why we needed JavaScript.  its only
similarity to Java is in its name and a few C-like curly braces.  there's no
purpose for JavaScript that could not have been met by Java.  my theory is,
programmers are even lazier than they should be, and can't be bothered to
compile stuff.
but if we needed an interpreted language to do what Java was supposed to do,
then in addition to torching Java and pushing it into the sea, we should
have given some serious consideration to Scheme, TCL, Perl, or even BASIC --
any of which would have been prettier than JavaScript, and all of which were
already far more mature than any self-incompatible version of JavaScript has
ever been.

nobody has yet explained to me why we needed PHP.  we had Perl already.
QED.

nobody has yet explained to me why we needed Python.  we had all kinds of
other languages at that time, and even though Perl wasn't object oriented as
of the year python came out, it became so shortly thereafter.

the lesson of all these languages, and the horrible regress known as C++
after C, as compared to failed languages like Modula-3, is that if you come
up with something that is a legitimate improvement over whatever it's
similar to or based on, and would actually push the state of computer
science and engineering forward, people will laugh at you.  but if you come
up with schlock that only its author could love, which has no real reason to
exist, no beauty or purpose or advantage, then the world will beat a pathway
to your door.

the only evidence at hand not explained by this theory is the success of
Perl.
perhaps Perl escapes the categories of this system by having borrowed from
virtually every pre-existing language.

to think that the world's browsing population could be bothered to download
a 5MByte python image but will never be offered the equivilent functionality
in the form of a 75KByte USCD P-system image, is so disheartening that it
almost HAS to be true.
--
Paul Vixie
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Note: funsec is a public and open mailing list.