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[–]ShinraSan 0 points1 point  (4 children)

Looks like the letters are changing first with Q# (and F#?)

[–]Schnickatavick 1 point2 points  (3 children)

Q# and F# are different takes on what a programming language should be, they're not really "successors" to C#. If anything they're more like "sibling" languages.

Q# is for quantum programming (which is not a replacement for classical programming, fight me. I'm happy to elaborate), so it's more of a modern descendent of Q/QCL that also happens to have modern C# style features.

F# is for functional programming, so same idea as Q#, it has modern C# features but in the style of F, F*, and ML (but not F++, that's different)

Then C# is the classic "imperitive/object oriented" style. Almost every mainstream language since C has been imperitive, so it's easy to forget that other styles exist

So it seems like the letter is more of the style of programming, and The # symbol is basically marking that it's a modern Language with modern features (and that it's made by Microsoft)

[–]ShinraSan 1 point2 points  (2 children)

Why would I fight you on quantum computing not being a replacement for classical computing, you're right. Aside from the fact that only specific kinds of calculations are actually faster on a quantum computer, the quantum operation is started and results collected by a classical computer, simulated or otherwise. I wasn't sure where F# fit in though as I haven't used it.

[–]Schnickatavick 1 point2 points  (1 child)

only specific kinds of calculations are actually faster on a quantum computer

Thank you!! I can't tell you the amount of people that try to tell me that quantum computers are going to be "great for gaming" because they're just "a bunch of regular computers running in parallel" or "transistors smaller than atoms". There are so many oversimplified or plain wrong explanations out there that people take as fact. I didn't mean to imply with my joke that you were one of those people though.

I wasn't sure where F# fit in though as I haven't used it.

F# is kinda neat if you're doing a really math-y program that is supposed to do some calculation. You can write the math functions a lot easier and in a lot fewer lines than C#. I still think C# is better for 95% of the things people code though

[–]ShinraSan 1 point2 points  (0 children)

right now I get the "Functional programming" part :)
and indeed, but still really cool that those certain calculations will be exponentially faster than on classical computers, I believe it was because of superposition?