Comments on: LOTY Time Again: Scala or Clojure?!?!

By: Steve

Steve — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 13:40:21 +0000

@Kanwa
Please at least do a little bit of Google leg work before commenting on these languages. You state that:

”
Stick to Java as you will face problems related to data type.

Eg: Can you tell me what types are passed here in the function argument

public void runMyFunc(dob, favy)
{

}
”

While your argument is one that I would agree with (loss of legibility due to lack of types) Scala does not suffer from this problem - your example would have to look something like the following:

def runMyFunc(dob: Date, favy: Int) {}

Looks pretty statically typed to me!

Later you make this comment:

”
What is this type-safe way they mentioned? you know better
”

Exactly *what* are you talking about? Do you have a different definition of type safety than everybody else? Perhaps it would interest you to know that Scala is *more* strict about types than is Java.

Next time use The Google. It is your friend.

By: mawdo

mawdo — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 16:59:44 +0000

I’m at a similar stage and have taken a look a detailed clojure [and an inital squint at scala and erlang] and have been pretty impressed - clojure feels my natural next step having work a long time with traditional OO and more recently with ruby and DSLs - I’ve been describing my ruby based DSLs a kind of macros that inflate my ruby env - a principle you’ll see embedded in clojure - the other shift clojure brings for me is functional programming and I’m trying real hard by practicing thinking in this way - its kinda of like the way you had to force yourself to think set-level RDBMS or the XSLT processing model in the past

ruby reignited my programming fire - clojure have added another boost

By: kanwa

kanwa — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 04:19:44 +0000

Oh Telo!

Sorry if I sounded wrong. I did not mean to say that Scala is a scripting language.
I just meant that don’t learn scala (or) scripting languages.

For the quote you mentioned “Scala is a static typed language” part, I beg to differ
as I found this in the home page of scala under Introduction:

“Scala is a general purpose programming language designed to express common
programming patterns in a concise, elegant, and type-safe way.”

What is this type-safe way they mentioned? you know better

Thanks
Kanwa

By: tek

tek — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 15:42:11 +0000

@Kanwa: Scala is a static typed language, no “scripting lang” or dynamic lang.

By: Kanwa

Kanwa — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 11:48:35 +0000

Please don’t attempt Scala or Clojure. Neither any scripting lang.

Stick to Java as you will face problems related to data type.

Eg: Can you tell me what types are passed here in the function argument

public void runMyFunc(dob, favy)
{

}

If long code(> 500 lines) like the above one is written, we never will understand
what’s happening in the code and worst if you check your code after say two
months, you will weep to understand the code because you don’t know what is
dob or favy is.

You will break your head on try to figure out what “dob” is —
an object or int or what?

Your LOTY shud be FOTY (F- Framework of the year)

Cheers,
Kanwa

By: Anthony

Anthony — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:36:35 +0000

If your goal is to learn and expand your mind, definitely Clojure.
Nothing like a Lisp to show you how powerful a programming language can really be.
If you go the Scala route, you’ll just end up using the same constructs you are comfortable with, so where’s the learning?

By: Greg

Greg — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 16:53:55 +0000

As much as I’m interested in scala, and am looking at how to “sneak it in” to my current project, I say go in deep for clojure. Why/how?

I stumbled across a fantastic online book “Practical Common Lisp” http://gigamonkeys.com/book. It shows real-world samples of using Lisp, including writing a unit test framework in less than 50 lines of code, along with an MP3 database and HTML generation library. At least the introduction chapter. It hooked me.

Now for the kicker, another guy wrote a corresponding blog, showing the equivalent solutions in Clojure! http://blog.thinkrelevance.com/2008/9/16/pcl-clojure.

By: LOTY…Part Deux by Matt Stine’s Blog

LOTY…Part Deux by Matt Stine’s Blog — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 03:32:01 +0000

[...] A few days ago I pontificated on my need to choose a new “Language of the Year.” Right now I’m attempting to choose between Scala and Clojure. If nothing else, I’ve learned from this exercise that asking the community for feedback is a GOOD thing. Your comments have been very helpful. [...]

By: Tim Dysinger

Tim Dysinger — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 21:36:28 +0000

+1 Clojure but by all means learn both and choose.

I choose Clojure after 5 years C/C++, 10 years of Java, 4 on Ruby and 1 yr each Erlang & Lisp. I like Dynamic and Functional.

If you like Static and AOT Compile then Scala. Both languages have really neat features.

One word of caution is that you can program imperative Java easy in Scala and it would be easy to fall back into old Java habits (not learning anything).

By: Matt

Matt — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 23:52:41 +0000

Hmmmm….so currently it looks like:

Scala 4
Clojure 1

Yet the argument for learning Clojure is extremely compelling….I worked with Scheme while in college and it was quite a bit of fun toying around with a Lisp, and it would be interesting to try again. That being said, I hear a whole lot more about Scala and am intrigued by the buzz. This is a hard call regardless of the wide-margin in the voting….