Diff of opinion on dynamic stuff - comp.lang.ruby

Message from discussion Diff of opinion on dynamic stuff

Chad Perrin

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More options Dec 22 2005, 8:46 pm

Newsgroups: comp.lang.ruby

From: Chad Perrin <per...@apotheon.com>

Date: Fri, 23 Dec 2005 10:46:06 +0900

Local: Thurs, Dec 22 2005 8:46 pm

Subject: Re: Diff of opinion on dynamic stuff

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On Fri, Dec 23, 2005 at 07:36:48AM +0900, why the lucky stiff wrote:

> Yukihiro Matsumoto wrote:
> >"open class" is so strong (often too strong), we can break things
> >easily. In other word, Ruby trust you to give you sharp knives, where
> >Python don't. From the Python point of view, it's wrong, I guess.

I understood that 100%, and agree with it similarly. Keep in mind, I'm
mostly coming to Ruby from the direction of Perl -- the Swiss Army
Chainsaw to some -- and have no problem with being handed a sharp tool
and being told to be careful with it.

Perhaps more imporantly than how this relates to my agreement, though,
is the fact that I think you have hit on a fundamental point of
divergence between the Python community and most of the rest of the
"very powerful and succinct scripting language" communities out there
(particularly Lisp, Perl, and Ruby come to mind). Python is,
essentially, to this family of languages as Pascal is to the family of
languages that includes stuff like C++, Objective C, and so on.

Some languages are designed primarily to empower the programmer,
trusting that the programmer will be smart enough to avoid doing
something suicidal with that power. Python strikes me, on reflection,
as a language designed primarily to protect the programmer, trusting
that the programmer will be smart enough to use it effectively despite
limitations.

. . and thus, I have more explanation and understanding of why Python
just "feels wrong" to me. One of the reasons I like Perl is that it
doesn't limit me "for my own good". I guess I prefer a swiss army
chainsaw over a plastic scalpel. [1]

> Matz has put us in great danger. But Rubyist are okay with it I guess.
> I am strangely at peace with this perilous language in my home!

> Superman does dangerous things to solve problems, too. He'll bend a
> street pole around a villianous guy. People, stop cheering.

Nice to know your emails are as entertaining as your excellent Ruby
tutorial.

[1] No offense intended to the "plastic scalpel" contingent. There's
nothing objectively wrong with precision wedded to safety limitations.
I simply find it to be subjectively distasteful.

--
Chad Perrin [ CCD CopyWrite | http://ccd.apotheon.org ]

unix virus: If you're using a unixlike OS, please forward
this to 20 others and erase your system partition.

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