Why aren't these Disney Python jobs for Squeak?

Lex Spoon lex at cc.gatech.edu
Thu Sep 21 17:48:35 UTC 2000


To be generous, it could well be because of sound management.  New tools
should be introduced gradually, not switched to whole hog.  (Although it
sounds like a lot of companies jumped whole hog into using Java, even
though it's *still* kinda hard to get practical running programs in a
Java environment).  It's much more interesting to find people of a
technical bent and see why they are picking different languages.

Although in the end, we'll still have to figure out what Squeak's real
weaknesses are ourselves.  Outside opinions are best for seeing new
ideas.  What techie would have thought to reconsider the default color
scheme, for example?


An outside expert opinion shouldn't make us move automatically, though. 
Here are some complaints many of us have heard from people who consider
themselves experts in software engineering:


	1. It's too slow, so I'll use JDK instead.

	2. I can't find the source code.  (So learn how!)

	3. It's too wierd that an integer is a regular object.  (Should we add
some arbitrary rules and exceptions?!)

	4. All my friends say Smalltalk is beneath consideration as a "real"
language.


It's frustrating when arguments like these come from people who think
they are professional software engineers.  If these are our
professionals, just what kind of a profession do we have?  I wish for
once, someone would stay back and say something like "I don't know how
well Smalltalk would do; I don't know much about it".  Unfamiliarity is
a fine reason not to use a tool, but so many people take it further and
rationalize that their ignorance is fine.


-Lex





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