[HN Gopher] Kyle Explains "Legacy Software" to the Aliens
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       Kyle Explains "Legacy Software" to the Aliens
        
       Author : surprisetalk
       Score  : 38 points
       Date   : 2024-05-20 12:30 UTC (23 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (taylor.town)
 (TXT) w3m dump (taylor.town)
        
       | MR4D wrote:
       | This was funny until I realized how depressing it is....sigh.
        
         | skyyler wrote:
         | >No, the people without internet generally have no money, so
         | it's too unprofitable to think about them.
         | 
         | Hit me like a punch to the gut.
        
       | hiatus wrote:
       | > No, the old languages are not slow. It's the old hardware
       | that's slow. But the old languages don't run on the new
       | computers.
       | 
       | Which languages is this referring to?
        
         | santoshalper wrote:
         | Probably COBOL and Fortran, which can run on modern
         | architectures, but in practice mostly don't.
        
           | olliej wrote:
           | People don't write application code in those languages but as
           | I understand it cobol is still underpinning large swathes of
           | the financial system, and similar applies to fortran in
           | engineering and scientific computing.
        
       | RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote:
       | Meanwhile Alien:
       | 
       | Even our most modern military motherships are able to perfectly
       | run code that works on the 1950's models. We have truly achieved
       | write once, run everywhere.
       | 
       | (Independence Day 1996)
        
         | beezlewax wrote:
         | Then Will Smith made one change to their left-pad dependency..
         | and the rest? History
        
       | horeszko wrote:
       | > Humanity is deprecating TypeScript next year, so we're
       | migrating our proxy server to HypeScript.
       | 
       | "HypeScript". This captures contemporary commercial software
       | development and business in a nutshell. In a few short years it
       | went from cryptocurrency/blockchain, to metaverse (for about 6
       | months lol, gotta be a new record) to now AI (but somehow only if
       | its a chatbot?).
        
       | ozim wrote:
       | Let's just skip that most used operating systems are corporation
       | owned.
       | 
       | Corporations were fighting long and hard to make their dev tools
       | win and not allowing competition to make advances. Office on
       | macOS was win by Microsoft because Apple needed it more. Apple
       | iTunes on windows ugh that was terrible.
       | 
       | Browsers now are accepted middle ground - well Apple is not
       | really happy about it - but SaaS, cloud and browsers made OS less
       | of a problem. If OS would be still relevant MS would not become
       | so "open" with new .Net and else.
       | 
       | Let's also think how capital intensive is writing a maintaining
       | operating system or a browser. Let's skip over all the patents
       | and IP rights, like if you won't make your own language you are
       | owned by some corporation.
       | 
       | If there would be no churn in tech we would be all nowadays
       | drones owned by IBM having crappy devices they never ever iterate
       | on because they like steady stream of income not new things.
       | 
       | Microsoft happened because Bill wanted to make his own compiler
       | it would not happen if he would accept status quo. The same with
       | Apple - Woz and Steve wanted to make new computer and it was not
       | compatible with whatever IBM had because they would sue and take
       | them over.
       | 
       | Node.js, electron and JS ecosystem also started because some
       | people were expressing their freedom which is more important than
       | having "single programming language for everything". (Yes Linus
       | with Linux as well just to throw him in).
        
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       (page generated 2024-05-21 12:02 UTC)