From Philip Robinson
Michael Brooks describes many of the problems with modern software but decries the tribalism that is endemic to programmers. Choosing a computer language is a religious choice (8 June, p 36).
Languages fall into a small number of groups, but within groups there is very little to choose between them. Choice is arbitrary but once made requires a huge investment. It is completely natural to construct a tribe of like-minded individuals to help you believe that you made the right choice (especially if you made the wrong one) and to defend that choice.
I use mainly Java, my son uses mainly C# and naturally thinks it better (faster, cleaner, easier). I naturally know he is wrong.
Brooks rightly points out that commercial pressures lead to the inclusion of pointless features in software requiring lots of code. When an Intel executive was told his new processor architecture would make for voluminous code, he replied: “Yes, I know. We make memory chips too.”
Advertisement
Settle, North Yorkshire, UK
Stalybridge, Cheshire, UK
