Comment by chimeracoder | Hacker News Reader

Comment by chimeracoder | Hacker News Reader

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Yeah, I know 100x is a huge multiplier, but I've actually tracked myself to the extent possible, and that really is the right order of magnitude for me.

There are a number of reasons. I find refactoring is way, way simpler. Refactoring in Python feels painful enough that I always put it off until it gets absolutely necessary. With Go, I find it takes way less time, and also less mental energy.

The static typing and strict compiler (enforcement of imports and lvalues, etc.) works well for my writing style. I write what's in my head, without worrying about the small details (only the high level logic), and I can be confident that it'll be easy to fix the small details (syntax, typos) afterwards.

It's kind of like how writers often work - they dump words on a page, focusing on getting the main points across, and it's the editor's job to make sure they fix the grammar and style. I end up having a conversation with the compiler and when it stops telling me anything, the code usually does what I want it to.

YMMV.

I agree that static typing at least for me gives massive reduction in time in medium to large projects. And despite what many think about Java I am able to be a multiplier faster than Python with it (I would say as much as 4x at times).

What I don't understand is all these people claiming that the language is slowing them down by massive factors. I guess I'm either incredibly stupid or people on HN are incredibly smart (probably both) but I just can't even think fast enough for the syntax of the modern languages to really slow me down (ignoring copy n' paste exceptions and build time issues). For example to create the mental model of a dumb video game I'm making is taking more time than the actual coding.

In fact I would say if anything slows me down its bugs and/or features missing in immature open source libraries, crappy tooling, and lack of documentation and most importantly not fully understanding the problem (or what to create in terms of video game). And I can say this definitively about Rust... the language is awesome but I'm slow as crap in the language because of random stuff breaking and lack of good libraries.

I'm not saying Go has the above issues (on the contrary it now is rather mature) but I have hard time believing the 100x (and that is my opinion :) ) of going from problem to fully coded solution.

The static typing and strict compiler (enforcement of imports and lvalues, etc.) works well for my writing style.

It seems you more enjoy just "Not Python" than Go itself.

Go is still pretty awful and designed without really consulting what would help users. It's just designed for what the creators want, but now millions of people are trying to use it—not just 8 people inside the Nation of Google. It's getting worse for the average developer as time goes on. But, one thing developers love doing is understanding broken things, so in a away, the more difficult a system, the more nerds like it because it gives them accomplishment and the ability to exclude non-understanders. (Plus, Tabs? Tabs? In 2015? Is the Go development process run by monkeys living in Antarctica?)

Good review: http://www.evanmiller.org/four-days-of-go.html

> It seems you more enjoy just "Not Python" than Go itself.

No, I have experience with lots of languages. I'm comparing to Python here because that's what OP asked for.

I don't think Go is "just designed for what the creators want", but even if it were, I don't care, because that's what I want as well.

I'm talking about my personal experience of Go based on my own experience writing Go full-time for over three years, which is as long as the language has had a stable release. With all due respect, it's highly unlikely that a review from someone using it for four days is somehow going to change how productive I've already found the language makes me.

With all due respect, it's highly unlikely that a review from someone using it for four days

But, the review goes into a rant about how the Go community just thinks it's the greatest and refuses to listen to outside opinions due to a sense of inbred and ungrounded superiority... kinda like what you just did there.

> the Go community just thinks it's the greatest and refuses to listen to outside opinions due to a sense of inbred and ungrounded superiority... kinda like what you just did there.

It's not 'inbred superiority' to think that my own experience is a better predictor of what works for me than what someone else thinks. I never said "Go is the greatest". I said that, based on my experience with a wide range of languages, Go is the best for me. OP asked "why might someone decide to use Go", and I answered by explaining why I decided to use Go.

From your comments throughout this thread, it seems that you really dislike Go. That's fine, don't use it. But why try and pick fights with those of us who do use it?

my own experience is a better predictor of what works for me

blub paradox. We only know what we know. Outside opinions are very valuable to show us better things exist.

But why try and pick fights with those of us who do use it?

Because the language is bad. It's not conducive to reading code or writing code. It's code for code's sake. It's a bad platform. The more it grows the more programmer minds it corrupts. The more it grows the less easy it becomes to avoid in general.

Programming is important. Our programs will outlive us. We can't afford to have the entire system run on what a small group of isolated people feel is right. Systems have to be powerfully expressive and powerfully legible without succumbing to failure-to-understand errors due to typography or mass indirection ("magic") in too many places.

Programming isn't H&M fast fashion. It's The Golden Gate Bridge. If you screw it up in 2015, you're at risk of killing people, ongoing, in the future, in perpetuity. (also see: flash, android, java, the unmaintained openssl debacle, ...)

Thanks for the link. I'm not a professional programmer but I laughed out loud at The Autistic Gopher Hypothesis.

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