[Haskell-cafe] Re: "O LANGUAGE DESIGNER, REMEMBER THE POOR USER""

[Benjamin L.Russell]

On Thu, 16 Apr 2009 19:04:43 -0500, Matt Morrow <moonpatio at gmail.com>
wrote:

>This is interesting (and from 1990):
>
>http://groups.google.co.uk/group/comp.lang.functional/msg/655bb7bbd0fd8586
>
>(Not sure if this is well-known. It seems like it either is, or it should
>be. Either way, I just stumbled across it.)

Regarding the following quoted portion:

>USERS OF FUNCTIONAL LANGUAGES WILL HAVE SOME STRONG PRECONCEPTIONS ABOUT HOW
>COMPUTATIONS ARE EXPRESSED.
>
>... Since, if a functional language is to be successful, the great
>body of its users can be expected to be drawn from the millions who have some
>expierience of Ada, C or Pascal, the conventions pertaining in those languages
>should have weight in the forms chosen for any functional language where they
>do not conflict with the essential attributes of the functional language.

Sorry, but I do not agree with this view.

Essentially, this means that new functional languages should in some
way syntactically resemble Ada, C or Pascal.  However, many newcomers
to such functional languages as Haskell come from other languages (I
myself come from Scheme and T), and requiring Haskell to resemble Ada,
C or Pascal would risk alienating such other users.

Besides, regarding the premise of "if a functional language is to be
succesful," why is it so important that "a functional language ... be
successful" in the first place?  Both Simon Peyton Jones and Alan
Perlis have disagreed on this issue.

According to [2] (see
http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/simonpj/papers/history-of-haskell/history.pdf)
(see page 10), there are definite reasons for striving to "avoid
success at all costs," as follows:

>The fact that Haskell has, thus far, managed the tension between
>these two strands of development [as a mature language, and as a 
>laboratory in which to explore advanced language design ideas] is 
>perhaps due to an accidental virtue: Haskell has not become too 
>successful. The trouble with runaway success, such as that of Java, 
>is that you get too many users, and the language becomes bogged 
>down in standards, user groups, and legacy issues. In contrast, the 
>Haskell community is small enough, and agile enough, that it usually 
>not only absorbs language changes but positively welcomes them: 
>it’s like throwing red meat to hyenas.

Furthermore, to quote [1] below (see the dedication of SICP at
http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/full-text/book/book-Z-H-3.html), isn't
our role supposed to be to "keep fun in computing?"

>``I think that it's extraordinarily important that we in computer science 
>keep fun in computing. When it started out, it was an awful lot of fun. Of 
>course, the paying customers got shafted every now and then, and after 
>a while we began to take their complaints seriously. We began to feel as if 
>we really were responsible for the successful, error-free perfect use of 
>these machines. I don't think we are. I think we're responsible for stretching 
>them, setting them off in new directions, and keeping fun in the house. I 
>hope the field of computer science never loses its sense of fun. Above all, I 
>hope we don't become missionaries. Don't feel as if you're Bible salesmen. 
>The world has too many of those already. What you know about computing 
>other people will learn. Don't feel as if the key to successful computing is only 
>in your hands. What's in your hands, I think and hope, is intelligence: the 
>ability to see the machine as more than when you were first led up to it, that 
>you can make it more.''
>
>Alan J. Perlis (April 1, 1922-February 7, 1990)

I had always thought that part of the advantage of Haskell was the
ability of being agile enough to experiment.  Robbing Haskell of that
advantage would seem to kick the fun out of the house.

-- Benjamin L. Russell

References

[1] Abelson, Harold and Sussman, Gerald Jay with Sussman, Julie.
_Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, Second Edition._
Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press and New York: McGraw-Hill, 1996.
<http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/full-text/book/book-Z-H-3.html>

[2] Hudak, Paul, Hughes, John, Peyton Jones, Simon, and Wadler,
Philip. "A History of Haskell: Being Lazy With Class." San Diego,
California: _The Third ACM SIGPLAN History of Programming Languages
Conference (HOPL-III)_ (2007): 12-1 - 12-55, 2007.
<http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/simonpj/papers/history-of-haskell/history.pdf>
-- 
Benjamin L. Russell  /   DekuDekuplex at Yahoo dot com
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