Le 04/10/2010 11:03, Invisible a écrit :
> 2. Some programming languages definitely *are* "better" than others, in
> an objective way.

You forgot a significant part: "for a given purpose."

That does not stop some implementation of a language to be really worse
than another language. But the purpose should always be keep in mind.

In fact, the issue is that as soon as it is a bit more complex than a
hammer, the evaluation of a tool (OS, filesystem, editor, language, ...)
is a multidimensional vector. Defining "the best" is projecting all the
dimensions onto a single line (whose directional vector might be any
composition of value in the evaluation base).

And there is no chance that MY line (the True One) will ever be the same
as Your lines (you're just heretics).

What is the biggest number: 2+i or 1-2i ? what about (1+e)^i.pi ?
And what about the roots of polynomial equation on the Quaternions ?
(where the roots of negative square are continuous spheres of the i,j,k
space, which of the value is better on the sphere ?)

The issue is that sorting tools required a single metric, and
multidimensional evaluations have really a lot of dimensions when things
become interesting. When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like
nails and life is simple.

The best OS ? what is the given purpose for choosing the OS... if it
must fit a 16k eprom and have 16 bits pointers, I'm afraid neither
Windows nor Linux would qualify. But that should not stop them to have
good scores for other purposes.

Now, despite the previous lines, I must tell you the truth: the best ice
cream is raspberry. Or pear. No, it's raspberry... on saturday. Pear on
sunday. Excepted in February where it's reversed, or in public... and
there is that blackcurrant too.


-- 
A good Manager will take you
through the forest, no mater what.
A Leader will take time to climb on a
Tree and say 'This is the wrong forest'.

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