What is the best programming language FOR

[Arndt]

Don't know about you, but computer time is real cheap but my time is expensive, so a fast language is one that lets me get the job done as fast as possible.

I was a machine code freak until the mid-90's though - times change!

Presumably the users' time is worth something too.

[grayrainbow]

Don't know about you, but computer time is real cheap but my time is expensive, so a fast language is one that lets me get the job done as fast as possible.

I was a machine code freak until the mid-90's though - times change!

Times changed, people don't
Btw, if you do code for a living what Arndt sad take preference.

Anyway, fast typing...when is more likely to make mistake in your code, when you try "speed" writing or when you put more effort in understanding what you actually type(assuming you don't do something trivial)? Otherwise I'm really fan of GUI tools, especially for code organization, in the same time I don't underestimate bash.

[maximinus_uk]

Presumably the users' time is worth something too.

Exactly! They can't run my code until I've written it, so the faster I get it written the sooner they can use it and solve their problem!

While I understand that 'it must be fast' could a technical specification, almost all the bottlenecks today are in I/O of some sort, or - if they are complex - dependent on the library you are using (unless you REALLY suck at programming and adopt a 'not coded here' approach).

[CptPicard]

I too have written and maintain precisely this (less Comet) and have done so for the last ten years. ... It is so beautifully generic that we can slap any old front end onto it with little to no effort.

Nice. I was suspecting that you could get close to SymbolicWeb using some kind of J2EE-ORM-whatever-flexible-clientside-solution. However, you can't integrate it as nicely to an "application writing language" as Lisp can, unfortunately -- J2EE thingies are very very verbose as you well know.

@akvino, I don't want this to be a ******* contest either. I just am sometimes a bit annoyed by the attitude of the low-level crowd that automatically assumes that my (or other high-level-language programmers') preferences are due incompetence, while it is not apparent to me that they actually understand what non-C-languages actually do, and why, and why that is interesting. For example the coder of SymbolicWeb beats pants off, on low level too, of any programmer I know, and he's a fanatical Lisper exactly because of that. And most of Lisp critics would totally suck at "formulating programs" against him in any language...