[exprla-devel] RE: [XPL] strengths and weaknesses
Status: Pre-Alpha
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From: reid_spencer <ras...@re...> - 2002-01-31 09:21:03
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--- In xpl-dev@y..., "Richard Anthony Hein" <935551@i...> wrote: Thanks Kurt, for the kind words ... too kind I think! My organizational skills don't seem so good to me; my bedroom is a clear indicator of that! :-) In any case, thank you. I study chaos too! Actually, that's a large claim ... I should say, I have read some material on chaos, including a very interesting book called Chaos: Making of a New Science, by James Gleick, and various internet essays and papers. Hey, I have to look up syntax for things all the time. I remember my COBOL days ... ugh, I wish I didn't ... I had to double check the order of the divisions - Identification Division, Procedural Division ... ?? What the hell else?? Sheesh. See? I am not even sure if those first two are right! Only practice makes a difference, and if I am doing mostly maintenance, I don't get used to the whole syntax and structure enough to do it without references when it's time to write a program from scratch. I've got VB pretty well down, but when you consider all the objects ... well, I have to check references for them a lot. Thank goodness for autocompletion! Then again, I probably know the syntax of XML and XSL better than any other language I have used so far, because there isn't the rich tools available to provide the help I have become used to, and lean on, in Visual Studio. I am still not entirely used to the structure and syntax of ASP. I tend to mix up VBScript and VB syntax, get an error message, and sit there like a dummy, saying, "WHY!? WHY!?", before I clue in. I CAN'T WAIT until ASP+ and VB7!! By then I will know Java too, and C++, I keep promising myself. And hey, MS is supposed to be announcing C# (C-Sharp), a new language soon, which will be not unlike Java from the sounds of it, in a lot of ways, but intended to allow web services to be built more easily, around a distributed computing model. Sounds not unlike XPL in some ways too, which may be very interesting. Bill Gates gave a speech about "data clouds" using XML at the .NET (formally Next Generation Windows Services) announcement yesterday, which harkens to our discussions about XPL-fog in an uncanny way. You probably know all of this already. Obviously this idea (data clouds, data fog, XML fog, whatever) has reached critical mass in the consciousness of the IT world, and is springing from the minds of many people at once. Just like my idea of a question and answer web site where you offer people money for information (how do I blah blah blah - I'll pay you $2.00) ... all of a sudden there was a whole bunch of sites starting up that did just that, in multiple variations and business models. Boy I was dissapointed, especially since I had asked for a loan to get it started months before I ever saw one of these sites (and I searched for it) and was refused - "I don't see how that would work ... why wouldn't someone just use a search engine? That gets you answers for free ...." Grrr.... I know I am way off topic, so I'll shut up now. We actually have a lot in common - I have always been interested in language, and had an overview of linguistics in the context of neuroscience at university, plus I too can draw a pretty sexy mermaid! :-) LOL! Richard A. Hein -----Original Message----- From: Kurt Cagle [mailto:cagle@o...] Sent: June 21, 2000 8:12 PM To: xpl@e... Subject: Re: [XPL] strengths and weaknesses Richard, I'd dare say that simply keeping things organized around here is a better strength than many of us bring to this table -- you're doing good with it, and you're insight will carry you far. For myself, Strengths -- working with most scripting technologies since the early 1980s, both client and server, a multimedia background, grounding in systems theory, complex analysis and chaos, and in general a fairly broad overview of programming principles and practices. Interest in both human and computer based languages, semantics, and philosophy. Writes pretty good science fiction and draws a sexy mermaid. Weaknesses -- not well organized (what do you expect, I study chaos!), database skills at the basic SQL level (I could tell you what a trigger was, but would have to look up its syntax to write one), no formal training as a computer programmer (which may or may not be a weakness), tendency to overcommit to projects. Kurt Cagle --- End forwarded message --- |