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There is more to awesome software than typing.

(Note this point stands compatible with the entirely orthogonal point about expressiveness and concision of a language.)

For me (at least due to client demands ..) awesome software, in part, posits the requirement of economically maintainable artifact.

PG's writings on Blub languages is imo addressed to a narrow audience of readers as it does not in anyway address maintenance and extensions to systems by non-elite development teams. Even elite teams, if tasked with delivery of products to non-elite consumers, must factor in the economic equation of the cost proposal.

To wit:

Having a bench of solid OCaml/Scala developers is a viable economic proposition for Wall Street and rich hedge funds; starry start-ups; and possibly elite teams in major media; a hacker community project. It is insanely difficult enough to find competent help in Blub-land, much less competent Scala programmers.

And, of course, the majority of software is developed/internally-consumed precisely by shops that must staff from blub-land. And surely you are aware that a big chunk of "programmers" out there are just recent graduates of some web-app vocational CS education.

Software language economy is not simply about lines of code. The economic cost equation of a language is definitely a critical factor if positioned as a general use language.

Java is unsurpassed in terms of the balance it brings to the economic equation: it is effectively powerful enough to allow serious developers to create "awesome" software, and approachable enough for blubland coders to crank out (yes) meh code that gets the (business) job done.

This fact was recognized by all entities chasing development dollars out there, including IBM, Oracle, and in its own cute way, via Google (Android).

Tell me: why isn't Android dev done with Scala or Clojure? My answer: Because Google management is not stupid.




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