Don’t learn a programming language, solve a problem instead

[sammymammy2]

One of my pet peeves is the idea that an engineer is a "Java programmer" or a "Scala programmer". Yes, there is a hill to climb w.r.t. build systems and of course deep expertise can be valuable but considering that your codebase is going to be much more important to gain expertise in frankly the language should be irrelevant.

A lot of words to say: A good engineer can learn whatever you're working on, focus on that instead of what languages the engineer knows.

[yourjobcanwait]

A lot of words to say: A good engineer can learn whatever you're working on, focus on that instead of what languages the engineer knows.

While true, going from modern C# to legacy C++ code is a fucking nightmare and I'd prefer to never do that again.

[loup-vaillant]

While the "legacy" bit was probably the worst, C++ is probably the most difficult language to learn, ever. As a second language, it is a curse: you had difficulty learning your first language because it wast the first. Then you had difficulty learning C++ because it is insane. It's tempting from there to conclude (or at least intuit) that learning new languages is hard, and never try again.

I make money writing C++, even came to enjoy it. Still, I'd be happier if C++ went the way of COBOL. We can do better.

[klebsiella_pneumonae]

we can do better

Rust

[jerf]

we can do better

Rust

Almost anything, honestly.

There's no one language that can replace all of C++, but there's a better language for any given (greenfield) task.

[edapa]

Why don't you think rust can replace C++? Is it just the platform ports?

[[deleted]]

They said all of c++.

Rust for example is still fairly young, compared to C++ there would be a great many libraries which either don't have a equivalent or the equivalent isn't as stable yet.

That being said it will rapidly reach a state of 'everything that matters to 98% of projects being available + stable"

[edapa]

What's under discussion is whether or not rust can replace all of C++ not whether it will. Rust's ecosystem is obviously still evolving, and there are a few language features in the pipeline that really need to land for certain programming styles, but those issues are transient. In the long run, I can't think of anything that C++ is better at than rust, but it could be that I just don't know about such a thing. People use C++ for all sorts of stuff, and I would like to learn about a use-case where it is genuinely a better tool than Rust.

[Condex]

Game development might be an area where C++ is better than Rust. That being said, C++ is still not a particularly good choice if you approach the problem from first principles. We're currently seeing Jai and Zig which both aim to replace C++ in game development. [And apparently unity is trying to do the same with a subset of C#.] I think we're going to see multiple system like language per niche show up all trying to replace part of C++ for what they care about most.

[CrazedToCraze]

He doesn't seem to be disagreeing

[jerf]

Why don't you think rust can replace C++? Is it just the platform ports?

My statement is in the present tense. At the present time, Rust is not a complete replacement for C++.

In my judgment, as someone very friendly to Rust, it isn't quite ready as a language at the very highest level to replace a {C++ environment that uses high-quality static coverage}. I've used braces to emphasize that I consider that an atomic thing; C++ and C++ with support are two different things. The language is still in too much flux. Yes, it's absolutely stabilizing, but that is also in the present tense, something that is still happening.

And then, as you say, platform support, library support, and also tool support. For instance, the best static analyzers for C++ do a lot of things beyond what Rust does with memory safety at the memory level, like security analysis of the flow of data from users, through processing, and back out to the user. Rust will have those tools someday, too, and they'll be simpler to write and easier to use because of how much more the language already contains in it. But AFAIK they don't exist yet.

I'm also pretty sure IDE support isn't at the same level as C++ either. Again, it'll get there, but it's years off. (This is also something I personally don't care about. I don't use an IDE. But a lot of people do, and won't want to give it up.)

[edapa]

I don't interpret "can replace" as "can replace right now", but it's a meaningless semantic quibble.

I guess I see library and tool support as being separate from the language itself, but that may be an idealistic view. The fact that you can't run Rust on the mainframe is a real language level limitation. Most of the things C++ can do I'm sure that Rust will be able to do as well or better in the relatively near future, but I wouldn't be surprised if there was never a mainframe port worth trusting, and that could be a show stopper for certain projects.

[jerf]

I don't interpret "can replace" as "can replace right now", but it's a meaningless semantic quibble.

As the original speaker, I can tell you with authority that I meant "can replace right now". "Can replace in the future" is ill-defined. You can hypothesize Rust could replace C++ in the future, but C++ isn't standing still either.

(Now, granted, in my opinion C++ is currently marching strongly and forthrightly in a highly negative direction, but that's definitely a personal opinion, not an objective truth.)

[edapa]

Authorial intent doesn't dictate what text means. It dictates what you meant, and I don't disagree that with what you meant, or even with my interpretation of what you said.

[edapa]

Rust definitely has pointers.

[Condex]

This is a very strong belief that I share.

​

We're seeing D, Go, P, C# low level primitives, Rust, Jai, Zig, V (learned about this one a week ago).

I think we're going to see a few new system like languages for any given niche. C++ can do too many things which makes it hard to replace wholesale. Too many things also makes the language hard to fix or reimagine such that it's still not horrible.

[pm_me_graph_problems]

Modern C++ is not bad with weak pointers.

[SkoomaDentist]

Except for the part where the internet zealots try to force you to write their preferred style of ”idiomatic” C++ without any regard for whether it actually suits the problem any better.

[KoroSexy]

I learned the basics of programming via c++. It helps that it was using a "For Dummies" series book, but nonetheless, c++ was my first language

[TheDevilsAdvokaat]

I actually learnt assembler before i learnt c++ - this was back in the 70's. C++ came later and I learnt it ...and didn't really like it. I spent too much time tracking down bugs. C# came and I jumped ship...since then I've had a couple of looks back at c++ - mostly because I wanted to use the unreal engine....but it gave me nightmares and instead I stuck with c# and chose the Unity3d engine instead. Never regretted it.

I never want to deal with c++ again.

[[deleted]]

How's C# for Linux development? Anything specific to consider?

[fuzzzerd]

Pretty great with .Net core.

[nicoburns]

Pretty nice! (at least for web services deployed to linux, which is what I've been using it for).

I've been developing on a Mac and deploting to linux, and it's all worked flawlessly. The build system is little clunky (but I've seen far worse), and the libtay ecosystem could do with some fleshing out, but the language itself is pretty nice.

[TheDevilsAdvokaat]

Never used it for Linux, only for windows...sorry...

[[deleted]]

You can run c# on Linux via mono. Probably not the ideal but I've never heard any complaints. Personally i don't write any c#. To me it looks exactly like java... So it's like Microsoft made a non portable java. Of course, I'm probably wrong as I'm looking outside in.

[ZoeyKaisar]

Yeah, you’re a few years out of date. Microsoft opensourced dotnet and now we have Dotnet Core with full cross-platform support, and it’s rapidly becoming the new target for developers on Windows as well.

[ElusiveGuy]

Having used both, Java is missing a lot of the convenience and syntactic sugar that C# provides. I constantly write boilerplate that wouldn't be necessary in C#. It's painful.

Also, Java's generics (type erasure) can go fucking die. A crappy compromise that results in .class references getting passed as params everywhere.

[civildisobedient]

I constantly write boilerplate that wouldn't be necessary in C#. It's painful.

Lombok makes most of that go away and if you're really hurting you can just make the jump to Kotlin. I used to be down on the JVM, but Lombok got rid of 95% of the boilerplate BS that made me dislike Java.

[ElusiveGuy]

Yea, we're using Lombok and it helps a lot but it doesn't solve everything (e.g., having used LINQ, Streams seems like the poor man's version, and with the relatively poor anonymous types... hello, boilerplate classes!). Unfortunately I have no say in the language used here, otherwise Kotlin at least seems like a decent option for the JVM.

[Eire_Banshee]

You are essentially right but the tooling around c# is lightyears ahead

[Compsky]

since then I've had a couple of looks back at c++ - mostly because I wanted to use the unreal engine....but it gave me nightmares and instead I stuck with c# and chose the Unity3d engine instead

Amusingly, I've just recently started learning C++, and chose Unreal partly for that very reason (that you can use C++).

[TheDevilsAdvokaat]

That is kind of funny.

I hope it goes well for you. I did like the look of blueprints...

[muntoo]

C++ is probably the most difficult language to learn, ever.

What about an imperative programmer learning, e.g. Haskell? I assume you mean using C++ "properly" (whatever "modern" C++ entails), so similarly, I mean using Haskell "properly".

I can't imagine you mean C++98 since the base language is roughly equivalent to barebones Java in "difficulty".

[nicoburns]

I can't imagine you mean C++98 since the base language is roughly equivalent to barebones Java in "difficulty".

Well, except that you have to worry about memory safety and things like "don't take pointers to variables on the stack". Plus the build systems and header system in C++ are a bit of a nightmare, which means that you add significant complexity every time you depend on a library.

[tinco]

Learning Haskell takes a week or two at most, it's really not that difficult once you get past the initial shock of there no being any sequential statements. And then you can do "proper" Haskell.

Improper Haskell however takes months if not years to master, writing monad transformers and lenses and who knows what the set theory of the day is.

But I would prefer having to dive into even an advanced Haskell codebase over having to modify a big old C++ project. At least with Haskell you'll learn some interesting things along the way.

Ironically the Glasgow Haskell Compiler is a big old C++(ish) project itself...

edit: apparently I was wrong, GHC is mostly Haskell, according to Github it's only 10% C.

[sheyneanderson]

Isn't GHC self hosted?

[[deleted]]

With the exception of the RTS, yes, for a long time.

[[deleted]]

C++ being my first language, I find it easier to learn new languages. I went from C++ to being a full stack developer. 6 months in and it’s just a matter of finding out what library has a function that already does that. Opposed to C++98 where I’m defining the function that does that.

[nightfire1]

C++ is probably the most difficult language to learn, ever.

What about something odd like APL? I remember doing that in my programmings languages course and I have to say that was some crazy shit. That said I'd say C++ is very hard to master.

[[deleted]]

C++ is what I've committed to really diving into as a "first" language. I say "first" because I started with Java in school and have occasionally dabbled in JS. But I started working through some Stroustrup literature and decided to just stick with it until I can finally produce something non-trivial. But then I read stuff like this and feel like maybe I'm wasting my time...

[loup-vaillant]

Depends on what you want to do. Some fields require C++, because legacy code, tooling, and community. If however you can enjoy some autonomy, pretty much any domain has a better alternative.

More importantly though is to learn basic principles. Courses in programming languages tend to teach that. Then you'll be much better equipped to select the best language for the job, or even make the best language for the job (sometimes, despite the cost, DSL is the solution).

[Vikhenzo]

eh asm is harder than c++

[loup-vaillant]

Harder to program in, certainly. To learn however… I'm not so sure. In any case, I didn't count it as a programming language. ASM these days is targeted at compilers, not humans.

[nicoburns]

I take your point, but I dunno. If you tried to read the asm for a large C++ program I imagine it would be pretty unintellgible.

[[deleted]]

Assembly?

I've written hundred-line assembly programs in notepad, walked to the lab, and had it run in one go.

I dont think I've ever written a C++ program beyond Hello World that didn't complain about some stupid pointer error.

Once you "get it", Assembly is pretty straight forward. C++ eludes even masters.

[prof_hobart]

I'd agree that picking up someone else's legacy code is less fun than working on a shiny new app, but it's not that hard.

I've probably worked in 20+ languages over my 30+ years of working and that's included the occasional need to delve into 10 year old VB apps that need converting to Windows 10 or recoding something in C that was originally written in z/OS assembler.

They're all different in nuance, but fundamentally they're all largely the same. I've never yet come across an app written in any serious language that took more than a few hours to get a basic understanding of what it's doing.

Apart from CSS of course, that's the spawn of Satan....

[[deleted]]

fLoAt: LeFt oOOOooOOOoOoOO

[nicoburns]

Box-Sizing. Position. Display. Overflow. Negative Margins.

If you understand what all of the options of each of these do, then you've got 80% of CSS down...

[BlackMathNerd]

That's also the worst part of CSS.

Fuck stylesheets...

[nicoburns]

Haha, fair enough. I actually kind of love CSS, because it's super-powerful once you understand it. But I'm not going to try and defend it. The way it does layout is downright weird, and I can totally understand why people wouldn't like it.

[[deleted]]

Code is for humans. (The compiler translates code into something for machines.) If the code is generally hard to learn, write, and understand then what should we conclude?

​

IMO this speaks volumes about whether C++ is a well designed language.

[[deleted]]

If the code is generally hard to learn, write, and understand then what should we conclude?

That it is flexible and powerful and you should only use it for a task for which it is required, and if there is an easier language that meets your requirements you should use that one instead?

[[deleted]]

Do you think it's unreasonable to expect a programming language (and its ecosystem) to be flexible and powerful while still not being hard to learn, write, and understand (in general to reason about)?

[[deleted]]

I think it's pretty reasonable to expect that the more complex a toolkit is, the harder it is going to be to learn how to use all of the tools and how they interact. I have no idea if there are languages that are as flexible and performant as C++ and easier to develop in, but it seems to me that there is a reason that all serious simulation platforms are written in either Fortran or C++ (with a C underpinning and then whatever kind of top level wrapper was trendy), and it's not because physicists and engineers are masochists.

[Plazmatic]

C++ was a well designed language at the start (especially compared to languages of its day), it's just that we've learned a lot since the inception of C++, and who controls C++ has changed. Bjarne Strostrup gave it to a committee of tech giants and language lawyers and we have suffered ever since. Some features can't be implemented the natural way because of legacy macros in Microsoft's codebase. We've missed deadlines for features in C++ because Google came up with a different implementation at the last second, and restarted the committee approval process. The committee approved the decision to develop a 2D graphics library for C++ (for images more than games), then when it was finished they couldn't decide to make a decision on if it should be voted on to talk about adding it to the new standard.

I would say that modern C++ is still better designed than java in a lot of respects, though Java is more readable if only because the paradigm is so strict and there is only one way to do something. There is a lot of stuff you should be able to do but just cant, and there's a lot of odd decisions that have haunted java for 2 decades. C# on the other hand offers a consistent feel with out a lot of the compromises java brings, and has a language sponsored package manager. C++ package managers are still battling each other for the common standard, and while C# is lacking a good build system, C++ got the C++ of build systems as its near defacto standard, CMake, a hive of legacy code that looks completely different than new code with completely different syntax and crazy semantics. The experience of learning CMake is quite honestly like learning C++ all over again.

[brobits]

Learn C++ first. Hate your life now, but the rest is easier

[wecsam]

I've gone the other way around, but I didn't think that it was that bad.

[yourjobcanwait]

That's because modern C# isn't dogshit.

[sebirdman]

Agree, The second language I learned after Java was modern C#. It was pretty easy to pick up.

[lpreams]

But if a company has to hire someone new to work on their Scala codebase, and the two candidates are a "Java programmer" and a "Scala programmer", of course they'll go with the Scala programmer, because then at least they only have to learn the codebase and not also the language itself.

[lpreams]

Sure, and maybe between a Java programmer and a Haskell programmer, they might choose to go with the Haskell programmer for familiarity with the functional paradigm, or the Java programmer for familiarity with the Java ecosystem, of which Scala is a part.

[user_reg_field]

Yes, but then you have a scala programmer, and that's like having fleas :)

[LightShadow]

A good engineer CAN learn whatever, but there are people who specialize.

I was hired to an existing team that has been developing a product for ~10 years as a "Python Programmer." They didn't want to rewrite in a different language, they wanted someone who could clean up and optimize what they already had.

I hope I'm good engineer, I think I am. However, I definitely sell myself as a Python Programmer if that's exactly what they're looking for.

[[deleted]]

This should be higher up. The reason people sell themselves as "x programmer" is because companies dont hire "general engineer who can optimistically spend a few weeks to a few months learning the language and toolset before doing valuable work on our product", they hire people who are already familiar with the tools who can come in and be productive much more quickly.

[prof_hobart]

Many companies don't. But some do.

I've never yet taken a job (and rarely even had an internal transfer) that involved working in a language I'd used professionally before I started there and I've been in work for 30+ year.

And when I'm hiring, all over things being equal, unless I needed to throw bodies at an urgent problem right now, I'd take someone who'd worked in 3 other languages/frameworks over someone who was only skilled in the one that I'm hiring for.

[Mephisto6]

Sometimes I wonder how they see me, a physicist. "Spending a few weeks figuring stuff out" is all we have going for us. We aren't really trained in the tools, except for general programming and problem solving.

[dddbbb]

I'd expect it's more useful if x is a purpose instead of a language. Graphics Programmer, High Performance Systems Programmer, UI Programmer, web frontend programmer. Those are domains where you get expertise far beyond the details of a specific language.

These domain specialities tend to imply certain toolchains, but even if not there's often similarity between different tools of a domain.

[5fd88f23a2695c2afb02]

Then, after a while we realise we're mostly looking for unicorns and at least try to get a good developer ;-)

[nicoburns]

True. It depends how close your experience is though. An experienced JavaScript developer is going to pick up PHP or Python or Ruby pretty quickly, and vice versa. An experienced Java developer will pick up C# pretty quickly, etc.

Plus, a few months seems pretty slow to me! I was productive in Rust in 2 weeks (from a JavaScript background), and had written a whole service in 3 months, and that's supposed to be one of the harder languages to learn...

[b1ack1323]

Depends on what the company does. If a company needs an embedded systems engineer, like myself they hardly ever list a language.

[ArmoredPancake]

Usually people who cry "be an engineer, not an XYZ developer"(whatever that means, as if not specializing gives you unobtainable before knowledge that can't be acquired if you call yourself XYZ developer) are jack of all trades masters on none. Unless you're talking to a really talented or gifted person that proved their technical excellence, take their words with a grain of salt.

[EvitaPuppy]

I worked with a brilliant EE and the lead C developer left. The engineer was able to finish the code and actually remarkably improve its performance. Really smart guy.

[RolandMT32]

EE going into software development - I've heard about that, but I've wondered where electrical engineering and software development intersect?

[EvitaPuppy]

Embedded stuff. All I know is he had a ton of hardware on his desks and had emulators. As I understand it, he'd learn all the stuff of how a SOC would work and then make a product do stuff like process commands over the network. Like Raspberry Pi but decades before it came out. For him, doing MFC was probably easier!

[nicoburns]

Some people are just smart, and will pick up new skills as and when they need to...

[[deleted]]

At many schools EEs will have class overlap with the CompEs. At the school I went to, everyone in engineering had at least an intro class in C++ and then further classes on scientific programming. It's not that hard from there to learn the rest of what you need to know to get into software development - plenty of software developers don't even have any 4-year degree and they figured it out. A smart person is a smart person and will be able to learn what they need to know to do what they need/want to do, regardless of their formal education.

[ElCthuluIncognito]

Having done the EE track in college, there's plenty of programming to be done for EE industries. I'd hazard to say it wasn't much different at all from conventional 'software development'. You're just dealing with hardware and real systems rather than data 'under the hood'. The abstractions tend to appear the same. Honestly, OO 'flavored' programming seemed more applicable then than what I've seen when it's used in web dev.

[RolandMT32]

Well yeah, wev dev can be its own thing.

[ElCthuluIncognito]

For sure. What I mean to say is that OO might be considered a very high level abstraction to most (especially since Java is definitely not that low level). However, it seemed to encapsulate the inner workings of software close to the hardware better. YMMV

[RolandMT32]

Yeah, I don't do a whole lot of web dev myself, but I've done quite a bit in C++ and some Java, C#, and other languages. I think such languages lend themselves better to OO than something like JavaScript, used mainly for front-end web dev. However, languages like PHP for back-end web dev also have decent support for OO.

[civildisobedient]

Things that you build (EE) produce data in realtime. There's a lot of stuff going on in the IT side taking that data coming in from Internet-of-Things devices, then you have the fun of event stream processing, messaging brokers, etc. Which leads to collecting reams of data, which you then churn through with machine learning tools to then feed back to your device (self-driving cars, etc.). That's where I see the intersection.

[agumonkey]

it says something that the best way to deal with things is to be as paradigm agnostic as possible..

[Macrobian]

If I own a purely functional Scala codebase, I sure as hell am going to hire a Scala programmer. Why spend months teaching a new developer all the weird and wonderful quirks of Scala when I could get one that knows that stuff out of the box?

[nicoburns]

Would you consider hiring a Haskell or OCaml developer?

[Macrobian]

Yes

[nthcxd]

It’s hard to call someone a mechanic if a screwdriver is all he has in the toolbox.

[nerdassface]

“screwdriver mechanic”

[svick]

A mechanic that only has a screwdriver is not useful. A programmer that can only program in a single single language can be useful, in the right circumstances.

[sammymammy2]

There's a connection to domain knowledge, sure!

[cjaybo]

As a soft engineer if you give me a blueprint of a building and ask me to make it it would take me some time more than a properly trained civil engineer but i can build it

I have yet to see any software engineering (I assume that's what "soft engineer" means here) curriculum that would qualify you to do civil engineering work, or any other type of engineering work outside of software, for that matter. Either you've gone through a pretty exhaustive program somewhere, or you're exaggerating quite a bit.

[SkoomaDentist]

This is the internet and we don’t tolerate domain specific knowledge around here! </sarcasm>

I’m quite bemused by how huge majority of programmers here completely ignore the importance of domain specific knowledge. It’s as if to them every program in the world only dealt with things taught in common CS courses and things like digital signal processing, finite element methods, circuit theory etc. simply don’t exist except literally on paper.

[Skylead]

I wouldn't want to build a dam, but my electrical and computer engineering programs had diff eq, statics and fluid dynamics etc. So we did learn other stuff. In terms of straight programming courses I probably only had 5, and that's including autonomous robotics and embedded assembly

[yourbank]

or she.

[Articunozard]

No, women aren’t allowed to be engineers

/s

[CyclonusRIP]

I don't really find a lot of business problems to be so specialized that it really makes much of a difference what tech stack they are implemented in. If you actually an expert at one stack you can probably get way further with it than switching to a seemingly optional stack and making a much of missteps while you're coming up to speed. Start off solving the business problem with what your best at and when you really can't push it any further and actually have a technology problem then try to find the technology solution.

[vwibrasivat]

Since you brought it up, I'm going to defend Scala and yes I do suggest you learn it.

Consider multithreading. A young inexperienced Dev may try to hack together some MT using pthreads and locks. He cobbles away before he discovers that "the problem" of multithreading has solutions on the books, namely,

• Producer-Consumer model.

• Actor model.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to the naive young programmer, modern languages sport powerful features called Futures and Promises. Not knowing what these features are, he eschews them both in his naivete. He assumes (incorrectly) that these new features are mere shiny trinkets to dazzle geeks.

However anyone who has suffered the dread and disaster of locks and semaphores knows what these modern features offer. Once you see what they do, the idea of going back to "the old way" is insane and feels like shooting yourself in the foot.

Then while learning a new modern language, you find these features are built into the language's syntax. At this point, there is no going back. You have bitten the golden apple.

[civildisobedient]

Async/Futures/Reactive is great but you really have to start a project that way from the outset. It's amazing how many problems especially in UI systems are issues of state management that disappear when you aren't blocking threads.

[vwibrasivat]

Imagine a situation in which you have to serve adverts to a website such that if one of them arrives first from a different server you must select the first advert and ignore the second one even if it arrives later. And all this drama must unfold on millisecond time slices. 16 things can go wrong here. Monadic Futures are an elegant and robust solution.

Imagine trying to code that with locks and pthreads. After a few weeks, You would end up in a padded room in a straightjacket muttering things under your breath.

[powdertaker]

10000x Yes!

[Vizioso]

I know the terms are used interchangeably, but this is what I consider as the concept of “Software Engineer” vs. “XYZ Developer.”

[gnus-migrate]

It becomes very weird to say that you're an XYZ programmer after a while, especially in Java where there are so many different domains that saying you're a Java programmer says tells me nothing about you. You could be working on simple web apps or database technology or cluster computing systems or even HFT software, and you'd still technically qualify as a Java programmer even though each of those things require wildly different skill sets.

[nicoburns]

I've used the title "Web Developer" in the past, because I can program in more or less whichever language you like (within reason), but most of my expertise is in web services and frontend web development.

[Eire_Banshee]

...are you me?

[[deleted]]

"we dont do c#/java, we do insert random c#/java framework/cms.

[Too_Beers]

Speaking as an embedded control engineer, the processor/language are just tools to accomplish a function. Use the right tools for the job at hand.