On Tuesday, 26 October 2021 at 09:33:51 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

When keep using terms like elitist, fashionista, wanabee, to describe people who make choices you disagree with it makes you look like you have a chip on your shoulder.

Its not ad hominem to point that out IMO.

Labelling whole groups of people with derogatory (implied by context) terms is probably more of an ad hominem (or hominems i guess).

On Tuesday, 26 October 2021 at 11:06:55 UTC, ClapTrap wrote:

Good grief. What people? I am making up arbitrary examples describing common traits of most human beings, it describes nobody in particular and everybody in general.

I wrote machine language in my teens, not because it was practical, but because I wanted to master the hardware. That is a clear identity motif.

There is no reason to be offended by the obvious: humans are strongly affected by culture, identity and emotional aspects. Programmers included.

On Tuesday, 26 October 2021 at 11:27:50 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

You literally said there's no rational reason to choose "&&" over "and" so those people who do so must be elitist blowhards.

Err ok, you did something because you wanted to.

I don't dispute that, what I dispute is that it's relevant when people are choosing tools. People arn't thinking about how cool they will look holding it when they go shopping for a chainsaw, they are thinking about whether it will make the job faster, better or easier.

I think the idea that fashion or wanting to appear cool or whatever has anything more than a negligible effect on language adoption is pure BS to be honest.

On Tuesday, 26 October 2021 at 21:44:33 UTC, ClapTrap wrote:

No. Stop making up stuff.

Uhm. I most certainly enjoyed how cool my Husqvarna 242G was when I reved it up to 15000 RPM and sliced trunks like butter. I still feel pretty darn cool when I use it, far more so than when using the electric saw. There is plenty of coolness factors in marketing and design of forestry and agriculture equipment. Especially tractors. Just take a look at the visual appearance of modern Valtra and Ferrari tractors.

Were you around when C++ and Java lauched commercially? People navigate socially. Hype works.

I never mentioned anything about appearance. I mentioned identity and culture. Basically: who do you want to be and which group do feel that you belong to?

On Monday, 25 October 2021 at 22:06:25 UTC, ClapTrap wrote:

Er sorry. I was just meaning that Pascal did have good ideas that have suffered from its demise.

On Tuesday, 26 October 2021 at 22:11:29 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

"It us equally puzzeling why prople want "&&" instead of "and" or "||" instead of "or". There is no rational explanation, I think people like to feel that they are using something advanced and that a syntax that that is associated with advanced usage makes them feel more skilled? Kinda like fashion"

Is that why you bought it? So you can feel cool?

I have a bunch of Stihl gear, a Kombi tool, couple of chainsaws. I bought them simply because they are exceptionally good are the job they are designed to do, and they are extremely reliable.

Fashion, or thinking how they tie into my ego, didn't factor into the decision to buy them.

Farmers will still look at whether the tractor actually has the features they need before considering whether it looks cool or not.

Hype works, but I dont see the hype used used to push programming languages as being of the kind you think it is. It's hype about features, about how it'll make your programs faster, safer, easier. It's not hype plays into peoples ideas about themselves. It's not "Learn Java and be cool", its "Write once run anywhere".

On Tuesday, 26 October 2021 at 23:59:34 UTC, ClapTrap wrote:

Yes, nothing about "elitist blowhard". Why are you obsessing over this point?

What do you mean? Stihl and Husqvarna are technically comparable, but I prefer Husqvarna, which is nordic and looks and feels better. Basically an identity issue.

Nobody thinks about identity issues, but they are there for sure. How can you know that one tool is better than any other tool, or what is good enough? You dont know until it breaks. So you navigate by some external source.

You cannot learn all languages and make a rational choice, you have to make a choice based on some limited information. Or go with what you are used to or comfortable with (ties into identity).

I dont agree. Programmers often put more emphasis on performance than is rational for the software they are going to write. That ties into identity. Same thing with cars, when people feel that they need a more powerful engine or faster car than you can make good use of in a city. People like to feel empowered beyond what they need. End users want the full edition of software even when the lite edition covers their needs and is less confusing to use. I would prefer the pro line Husqvarna saw even though the hobby saw works just as well, meaning I might pay double price for getting a heated handle that has a more sturdy feel. That makes me feel ready for professional work, which is a good feeling. What makes us feel empowered isnt entirely rational, but that feeling is something we seek.

I am fully aware that PhP is sufficient for webwork, but I don't feel empowered when using it. It does not feel like a professional tool, and that has a lot to do with syntax. From a rational point of view, you might argue that PhP is just as good as any other tool. But it does not fit with my identity.

On Monday, 25 October 2021 at 12:00:09 UTC, ClapTrap wrote:

The line is simply the style consistency.

• and and or are named operators
• && and || are symbolic operators

Named operators cause problems for the sustainability of a language over time. A language should be consistent, so when new operators have to be added, pascal-like languages must stick to the tradition.

A few years back there was a discussion on the freepascal forums about the conditional expressions. To keep the language coherant (i.e dont start to use symbolic operators) the final proposition was an intrinsic IfThen.

It's easier to create new operators if the symbolic style is used.

To go back to && and ||...

There are just the shortcut versions of & and | ...

Pascal can use and and or for both logical and bitwise arithmetic expressions for the sole and unique reason that there is no implicit conversion from Boolean to the integer types and and no implicit boolean evalation of integer types.

So... in if e1 and e2 then ..., to compile and has to be a shortcut logical and. dot. (e3 := e1 and e2; if e3 then... is not rewritten if e3 <> 0 then....)

You see that finally this has nothing to do with the hype or whatever. In both case the style and the semantic are perfectly coherant.

On Wednesday, 27 October 2021 at 01:18:47 UTC, Basile B. wrote:

No, to be consistent with other infix operators for integers +*/- you would use symbols for bit manipulation.

If you resuse integer operators for booleans, then conditional expressions get more difficult to read when they contain both. Which is bad for usability.

Side note: Simula had or, or else, and, and then. So, both with and without short circuit.

On Wednesday, 27 October 2021 at 06:58:13 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

Please note that the original Pascal did not have bit operations IIRC. The p-code machine had only 5 math operators. It was a simplified expression of ideas from Algol.