Re^5: Functional Perl 6/PUGS

Thankyou for that last sentance! That is the first time in nearly 4 months of looking that I have seen, what appears to be--on the surface at least--a good reason for wanting to use "the style of programming which is free of both assignment statements and side effects".

Look into Erlang. It is a highly concurrent language which looks a lot like prolog, and is designed for soft-real-time applications (Erisson designed it for their phone switches). It has single assignment variables and uses recursion quite heavily. It is also pretty efficient, especially in highly concurrent and distributed situations.

I really do agree with you that most of the "purity of functional languages" talk tends to be overly acedemic and not very pragmatic from a "programmer in the trenches point of view". However, i do find it depressing to think that the style of programming we are all doing today is the best anyone can come up with. But that discussion is for another thread.

-stvn

Comment on Re^5: Functional Perl 6/PUGS

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Re^6: Functional Perl 6/PUGS by BrowserUk (Patriarch) on Feb 28, 2005 at 21:19 UTC
Thankyou once again. This time for the pointer to Erlang. I've seen reference to it before of course, but I looked it up and saw it was designed for writing phone software and it sounded a bit specialised for general use. Following your link and reading, I realise how wrong that conclusion was. It's downloading as I type. Perhaps the single most convincing thing that pursuaded me to look more closely was section 3 of their Programming Rules and Conventions document. The thing that struck me immediately, and came as a pleasent surprise as I was was expecting something completely different--which is why I started there--was the innate pragmatism, simplicity, and clarity of the advice offered. One or two of the pieces of that advice will take further thought, but most of it had me nodding in immediate agreement as I read it. Truely one the most concise and practical sets of programming guidelines I've ever read. However, i do find it depressing to think that the style of programming we are all doing today is the best anyone can come up with. But that discussion is for another thread. I agree. And that's a thread I'd very much like to see, and take part in. I'm not sure if it would be tolorated here, but I think it ought be, especially right now on the timeline of Perl. Examine what is said, not who speaks. Silence betokens consent. Love the truth but pardon error.	[reply]

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Re^6: Functional Perl 6/PUGS
by BrowserUk (Patriarch) on Feb 28, 2005 at 21:19 UTC

Thankyou once again. This time for the pointer to Erlang. I've seen reference to it before of course, but I looked it up and saw it was designed for writing phone software and it sounded a bit specialised for general use. Following your link and reading, I realise how wrong that conclusion was. It's downloading as I type.

Perhaps the single most convincing thing that pursuaded me to look more closely was section 3 of their Programming Rules and Conventions document. The thing that struck me immediately, and came as a pleasent surprise as I was was expecting something completely different--which is why I started there--was the innate pragmatism, simplicity, and clarity of the advice offered. One or two of the pieces of that advice will take further thought, but most of it had me nodding in immediate agreement as I read it. Truely one the most concise and practical sets of programming guidelines I've ever read.

However, i do find it depressing to think that the style of programming we are all doing today is the best anyone can come up with. But that discussion is for another thread.

I agree. And that's a thread I'd very much like to see, and take part in. I'm not sure if it would be tolorated here, but I think it ought be, especially right now on the timeline of Perl.

Examine what is said, not who speaks.

Silence betokens consent.

Love the truth but pardon error.

[reply]