Saturday, March 22, 2008

Which language should I learn next?

I had always looked at programming languages as means of achieving the ends. Probably that's why I was stuck with Java for the last four years. That was until the Ruby bug bit me and I was awed by its features. Really learning a new language can be both fun and a learning experience. This blog on Dobbs tell us which languages to focus on.
Learn as many languages as you can
Slashdot has some interesting comments on it:
What programming languages should you learn next?

-Ashish.

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

Scripting the future

Not until only some time back C, C++ and java pretty much ruled the realm of programming languages. Dynamic scripting languages like Perl, python raised their head at times, but were never so much of a buzz. My first tryst with a scripting language happened when I heard about Ruby and developed a web application on Rails. The ease and speed of development impressed me so much that I instantly fell in love with it. Ever since then, scripting languages have been on a rise. I used to always wonder Why. Why was the potential of dynamic languages nascent all this while? What has changed between then and now?
I found answers to these in these wonderful articles:
Why Scripting Languages Matter?
Scripting: Higher Level Programming for the 21st Century

The points look appealing. I had always been taught to do a low level design before getting on with writing code. I always found it disconcerting. I mean who has the patience to design to the lowest level! I was more comfortable with designing while coding and coding while designing. I ran into issues some times that required so much recoding that I used to momentarily regret not following the elders' advice! Scripting languages claim to be more dynamic and malleable. Am sure developers love them for what they have on offer, but do they match up with the static languages on performance and other fronts? Need to see...

-Ashish.

Monday, March 03, 2008

Who owns the Internet?

Bumped on this interesting blog on CIO. The author has created a color coded map of all the routers in North America. Curious to see if something similar exists for India/Asia or create one.

Who Owns the Internet? We have a Map that shows you.

-Ashish.