Absurd opinion for an absurd time. Local optimas and stagnation is not how we solve the systemic problems on the internet and in the world.
Sure if your value add is content then go ahead and use mature tools within the paradigm, but if you want to cause a so called "paradigm shift" then you'll need to understand where the progress is happening and what kinds of opportunities it creates.
Ocaml for example is looking more and more enticing. Standard meta language is used by academics and programming language theory is developed in it. Meaning that it has a good long term trajectory (along with lisps I suppose).
Of course we are about to grow out of syntax, soon it'll just be another config param in your editor.. but I don't think these "obvious choices" you list will all be as well positioned w.r.t. that change.
Right now it may be harder to agree with me than with you, but that makes me think of a hn thread I was reading recently where people didn't want to admit to being programmers (in public / to strangers) because the perception is starting to be that what we do is immoral. Sufficient mastery of programming will make it a boring thing that everyone knows how to do but lowering the bar to that point won't happen within the web paradigm we currently inhabit. We'll see if wasm brings us closer but I think it will take more than that.
Anyway, I'd say your advice is good but not great. A CTO should be able to assess which tools fit the problem they have for the timescales they're considering. If they're swayed by your comment (or mine for that matter) then they're not fit for the role. The person you are actually talking to is someone who is building a company that suffers tech while the core business is something else or a company that is meant to be sold to some giant.
> but if you want to cause a so called "paradigm shift" then you'll need to understand where the progress is happening and what kinds of opportunities it creates.
This is the most Hacker News thing I read all year. What are you talking about? Where did he say anything about wanting to cause a paradigm shift?
And I remember when Python, React, Node were all fringe. Until they disrupted the industry. But the important take away is to choose for a specific reason, and expecting a traction in the future. While OCaml might be good for a research project, it is unrealistic it gives you some future advantage. On the other hand, you can see how Rust can give you an advantage right now for some cases. Or even arguable rescript.
Typically, you should not attempt multiple paradigm shifts simultaneously. In fact, I would argue, the more innovative your end user product is, the more boring your tech stack should be.
Facebook was PHP.
Google was C++.
Bitcoin was C++.
Netflix was Java.
Spend your innovation points on your product, not on programming language.
Google is mostly Java and C++, Go has more use outside than on internal projects.
Nokia Networks customers were using a mix of C++ and Perl running on HP-UX back in 2004, and nowadays it is mostly C++ and Java running on Linux distributions. Not every telco is using Siemens Erlang based switches.
Apple created Clascal and Object Pascal, migrated to C++, got Objective C via NeXT acquisition, which previously licensed it from StepStone. They also created Mac Lisp, Hypercard, Dylan and Newtonscript.
Microsoft used BASIC for a looong time, dabbled with Pascal, had one of the best macro assemblers in the market, was the last MS-DOS vendor to actually add C++ support to their C compiler, focused on VB and C++ until .NET came to be.
What systemic problems are there that have anything to do with the tech stack? Stuff is fast, featureful, and incredibly secure considering the attack surface is basically everything every person does. The content and applications are the main issues, the tech behind it all is pretty great and getting even better now that industry is finally learning to not tolerate unsafe languages and tools.
I've never in my life done anything that I feel standard languages aren't a good fit for.
I do think Dart deserves full best practices status, because the tooling and ecosystem around it is fantastic, and because it doesn't have a bunch of "Outside the paradigm" stuff, it's all things you can learn in a week coming from Py/JS/etc.
I've seen almost no horrific slowness aside from program switching on spinning disks recently. Stuff is pretty fast now, and that mostly useless premature optimization quote is out of fashion so it might even get faster.
I'm not exactly sure what the slowness people talk about is. Even the most bloated of websites are fast.
The one thing that still is an issue is Android load times. It gets a little excited about killing background apps on my phone and will take 10 seconds to open my notetaking app again.
a hn thread I was reading recently where people didn't want to admit to being programmers (in public / to strangers) because the perception is starting to be that what we do is immoral
any chance you could find and link to that thread?
I agree that the comment you replied to is most accurate for a business that doesn't have tech as a core product, but how many companies can realistically exist just to serve other tech companies? It's a simple fact that there are necessarily far more companies producing some specific product than companies making tools for companies making products
Sure if your value add is content then go ahead and use mature tools within the paradigm, but if you want to cause a so called "paradigm shift" then you'll need to understand where the progress is happening and what kinds of opportunities it creates.
Ocaml for example is looking more and more enticing. Standard meta language is used by academics and programming language theory is developed in it. Meaning that it has a good long term trajectory (along with lisps I suppose).
Of course we are about to grow out of syntax, soon it'll just be another config param in your editor.. but I don't think these "obvious choices" you list will all be as well positioned w.r.t. that change.
Right now it may be harder to agree with me than with you, but that makes me think of a hn thread I was reading recently where people didn't want to admit to being programmers (in public / to strangers) because the perception is starting to be that what we do is immoral. Sufficient mastery of programming will make it a boring thing that everyone knows how to do but lowering the bar to that point won't happen within the web paradigm we currently inhabit. We'll see if wasm brings us closer but I think it will take more than that.
Anyway, I'd say your advice is good but not great. A CTO should be able to assess which tools fit the problem they have for the timescales they're considering. If they're swayed by your comment (or mine for that matter) then they're not fit for the role. The person you are actually talking to is someone who is building a company that suffers tech while the core business is something else or a company that is meant to be sold to some giant.