Re: Euphoria's identity/philosophy -- Where is the focus?
- Posted by jimcbrown (admin) Nov 17, 2014
- 2618 views
from my point of view:
1. Euphoria 3.1.1 was rapid from all aspects, it only needed a comprehensive and up to date standard library, to make the language even more rapid and standard.
Which is what 4.0.0 achieved....
2. What scares me in other languages, is that there are too many ways to do the same task
Not sure why this scares you. It's a plus for me. Nothing wrong with flexibility.
it makes it much harder to maintain and understand different coding styles.
I don't think it has much effect here. Different coders will always have wildly different coding styles regardless...
For example, Euphoria 3.1.1 forced me to declare variables at the beginning of a routine - which might be less efficient/safe, but had the great advantage of readability and simplicity; i.e.: I could read and understand the programs much faster.
So the balance between improving the scope of variables, and the ease of maintaining and understanding others codes, is not so obvious for me.
I find Euphoria 3.1.1 variable's scope easier to understand and maintain, de facto.
Actually, older versions of Euphoria were inconsistent here. At the module or file level, you could declare a variable immediately before use (which is the most readable form for me), but not in a routine. If one style is really better than the other, then why not enforce it universally?
I like 4.0.0 since it lets the coder pick the style which is most readable to them.
3. For me, Euphoria's sequence is incomparable to other programming structures.
Euphoria's sequence is not like an array in other language. Array in other language needs to be planned very well before it may be used. To decide which type of array to use it may take a long time, needs lots of headache pills, and eventually your decision might be wrong after all.
Euphoria sequences are dynamic storage container, much more flexible and powerful then arrays and structures in other languages. You can write a big program using only one sequence - for everything, without needing headache pills at all.
So, comparing Euphoria sequences to arrays in other languages, is misleading and ridiculous.
Atoms and Sequences are definitely the main identity/philosophy of Euphoria from my point of view. Without it - Euphoria is just another language, no matter how friendly it is.
True, but most other languages have other types that have the same advantages of a sequence. java.util.Vector for example......
I agree that a comparison to an array or a struct may not be the appropriate one. Perhaps it's better to compare to a List or Vector type.
In that case, functionally there is no difference. No headache pills in either. (Else David Cuny would not have been able to write his Eu2Java translator converting sequence objects to instances of java.util.Vector so easily...) It's definitely more of a philosophy thing. (Although most other languages have an equiv type, they don't necessarily have the same philosopy backing it...)
