Newsgroups: comp.lang.beta,comp.lang.lisp
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From: simon@rheged.dircon.co.uk (Simon Brooke)
Subject: Re: Comparison: Beta - Lisp
In-Reply-To: monnier@di.epfl.ch's message of 16 Sep 1994 14:15:25 GMT
Message-ID: <CwFyD2.2nC@rheged.dircon.co.uk>
Organization: none. Disorganization: total.
References: <34n2qe$d74@nz12.rz.uni-karlsruhe.de> <34pfea$6ee@belfort.daimi.aau.dk> <354q47$60i@belfort.daimi.aau.dk> <MAFM.94Sep16133030@wambenger.cs.uwa.edu.au> <35c99t$lc6@info.epfl.ch>
Date: Tue, 20 Sep 1994 18:36:37 GMT
Lines: 33
Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu comp.lang.beta:90 comp.lang.lisp:14751

In article <35c99t$lc6@info.epfl.ch> monnier@di.epfl.ch (Stefan Monnier) writes:

   In article <MAFM.94Sep16133030@wambenger.cs.uwa.edu.au>,
   Matthew McDonald <mafm@cs.uwa.edu.au> wrote:
   > Unless you have competitive ports to x86, Sparc, Alpha, DEC & SG Mips,
   > PA-RISC, and RS6k, few people are going to use a language. Not many
   > people are going to bother explaining that performance matters to
   > them, they're just going to ignore you when you try to tell them
   > otherwise.

   So true !
   The best example is probably Visual Basic, right ?

Out there in the real world, there are n (where n > 20, probably)
people sitting in front of a Windows box for every one person sitting
in front of a real computer. So if you write a program in Visual
BASIC, you'll be able to sell it. You won't be able to maintain it, of
course, but that's the customer's problem.

If you write a program in a real language for a real computer, *unless
you can port it to Windows (or windows NT, or Windows 95, or whatever
other dreck Bill Gates decides to unload on the uneducated next)* you
are not going to sell it. I know. I set up a company in 1988 to
develop knowledge engineering tools. I said to myself 'the PC isn't
powerful enough to do what I want to do, so I'll develop tools for
real computers'. There were other mistakes I made, but I think it was
that one that cost me the company...
-- 
    .::;====r==\              simon@rheged.dircon.co.uk (Simon Brooke)
   /  /____||___\____         
  //==\-   ||-  |  /__\(      MS Windows IS an operating environment.
 //____\___||___|_//  \|:     C++ IS an object oriented programming language. 
   \__/ ~~~~~~~~~~ \__/       Citroen 2cv6 IS a four door family saloon.
