> Why such an emphasis on what language stuff is written in? Why does it even matter?
polyglot programmers are the exception, not the rule, and even for people who have mastered >5 languages, there's still no one who's mastered the top 50, let alone all the languages out there.
Language impacts both codebase contributor pool size and codebase reviewer pool size. In large, conservative orgs, the latter can matter a lot - good luck getting an insurance megaco's security review board to approve the cool new tool you found that's written in Eiffel - none of them know it, so none of them can review it intelligently.
Language diversity is a good thing, IMO, and there are many different factors impacting what you choose, and that makes your choice more important, not less.
> megaco's security review board to approve the cool new tool you found that's written in Eiffel - none of them know it, so none of them can review it intelligently.
This suggests the frequent existence of a megacorp’s security review board that could intelligently review a tool written in a more mainstream language. That doesn’t exactly match my experience.
Forward unreviewed log output from a scanner they bought and ask you to respond with whether that’s a problem? Yes, they can do that.
Taking up a new language that shares some roots with one you are a master at is/should be trivial to any good programmer, and can be done in weeks/a few months tops.
Yeah, fair, I re-read that part after I made my comment and you're right. Though it's a bit weird with Clojure with it being a JVM-based language, it's got this hybrid world which is both Lispy and Java-ish.
Reaching the kind of mastery where you see extremely subtle mistakes instantly - well, no, I think that really does take years to reach, even if you're an expert in a similar language.
I've picked up TypeScript for $DAYJOB in the past year, and there are definitely still deep aspects of the type system I only half-understand.
Granted, my decades of JS experience didn't really prepare me for static type systems, nor did the years of Python's strong-but-dynamic typing.
Still, I'm reminded of the quote "A language that doesn't change how you think about programming isn't worth knowing."
Most languages have some corners that are genuinely unlike most other languages, and without knowing those bits you don't count as a master, IMO.
> "A language that doesn't change how you think about programming isn't worth knowing
I don’t think it’s a good quote with such a bold claim, but I agree with the core of it: you should try to learn languages that have different paradigms. There is still value in knowing two quite similar languages.
polyglot programmers are the exception, not the rule, and even for people who have mastered >5 languages, there's still no one who's mastered the top 50, let alone all the languages out there.
Language impacts both codebase contributor pool size and codebase reviewer pool size. In large, conservative orgs, the latter can matter a lot - good luck getting an insurance megaco's security review board to approve the cool new tool you found that's written in Eiffel - none of them know it, so none of them can review it intelligently.
Language diversity is a good thing, IMO, and there are many different factors impacting what you choose, and that makes your choice more important, not less.