undefined | Better HN

0 pointsvortico9y ago0 comments

Name a language and someone will point out WTFs and subtle issues you might have never considered. The problem is the same when designing a language: computers think best with a large set of simple rules, humans think best with a small set of complicated rules, each having exceptions and different tiers of complexity for different levels of each developer's understanding.

I find C somewhat logical, but it has an easy-to-learn simplified version of itself that can be learned before re-reading the spec to complete your understanding of the language.

0 comments

shmerl9y ago

Sure, any language can have hard to understand parts or things that aren't designed the best way. But C is pretty old language. Creators of programming languages learned quite a lot since it was made, so they can avoid repeating known mistakes and can use newer design ideas. I.e. the quality of new languages can improve since they stand on the shoulders of giants.

nercht129y ago

>> humans think best with a small set of complicated rules

? I'd reword that to say humans are more entertained by a small set of complicated rules. Simple rules are easy for humans, but they can be boring.

However, in reality here, we're comparing apples to oranges. The instruction set for a computer is it's language. Asking a computer to speak English - that's our (humans') language, and with the tables turned, one could ask whether the computer thought better in English or Chinese, and the answer may be different but still meaningless.

pshc9y ago

Not all languages have equal wartiness. PHP and JavaScript are built on a swamp of inconsistencies whereas Haskell has a core axiomatic language. Scheme is fairly clean.

C evolved in a different age and is fraught with undefined behavior.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse