[responding to chat forum only.] I think that there's a fundamental mistake here - asking person A why person B made a decision. The right person to ask would be person B.
Then again, the concept of "superiority" in the context of any tool (including computer languages) is kind of meaningless without also identifying what the tool is being used for. (For example, which is better: a screwdriver or a hammer? why?) Also, computer programming languages do not "go away". Even COBOL still has a significant following (and there are steps that could be taken to grow its community - but I'll leave those steps for members of that community to take, or not take -- it's not my community, and COBOL has not really done anything useful for me). People use a language because they find it useful, or appealing, or available, and usually not because they've carefully reviewed all of the 1400 other alternatives and decided that only alternative #1337 is really the only valid answer. It's a social phenomena, as much as anything else. (Albeit, with practical elements and motives.) In other words, you have people that enjoy something, other people that see them enjoying themselves and a gradual accretion over time. The accretion continues if there's people that can solve the problems that arise and make things better. This can sometimes be good and sometimes be bad, depending on the perspectives of the individuals involved. Hopefully that addresses the "philosophical" aspects of what you are asking? Short form: why should someone using APL change what they are doing if they don't feel like it? Thanks, -- Raul On Thu, Jul 31, 2014 at 11:19 AM, Jon Hough <[email protected]> wrote: > Thanks for replying. > I have checked out Dyalog's website and another company called MicroAPL > (IIRC).That was actually what spawned my question (point taken, maybe wrong > forum).It seems there are some companies doing a lot with APL variants, and > what my question was edging towards was why haven't these guys switched to > J, legacy code maintenance aside? (I tried to phrase it more > diplomatically, for fear of being labeled a troll). > > > From: [email protected] > > Date: Thu, 31 Jul 2014 01:57:01 -0400 > > To: [email protected] > > Subject: Re: [Jprogramming] J and APL > > > > This is probably the wrong forum for this conversation, so I'll just > > recommend you spend a few minutes over at http://dyalog.com/ > > > > Thanks, > > > > -- > > Raul > > > > > > > > On Thu, Jul 31, 2014 at 1:53 AM, Jon Hough <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > Although I no zero APL, I understand that J was born from APL with an > > > ASCII character set and some ideas from Backus' languages. > > > And I am aware many J programmers are also APL programmers. > > > So do modern APL dialects provide any functionality not included in J? > > > For example, or counterexample, I do not think APL has forks and hooks, > > > Which add a lot of flexibility to J. > > > The point of the question, being blunt but not wanting to offend > anyone, > > > is there any technical reason one might choose to write a new app in > APL > > > rather than J? > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
