Re: [Haskell-cafe] New slogan for haskell.org

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On 10/4/07, Don Stewart wrote:

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It was raised at CUFP today that while Python has:

Python is a dynamic object-oriented programming language that can be used for many kinds of software development. It offers strong support for integration with other languages and tools, comes with extensive standard libraries, and can be learned in a few days. Many Python programmers report substantial productivity gains and feel the language encourages the development of higher quality, more maintainable code.

I think that this description is very unspecific and I guess everyone claims that for his favourite language.

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Here's some quick points:

General purpose: applications from OS kernels to compilers to web dev to ... Strong integration with other languages: FFI, and FFI binding tools Many developer tools: debugger, profiler, code coverage, QuickCheck Extensive libraries: central library repository, central repo hosting

Until here people will say: "Ah nice, like C++ I use for many years now."

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Productivity, robustness, maintainability: purity, type system, etc. Parallelism!

'type system' is something where C derivatives and scripting languages are weak - but their users count this as advantage. I want to raise the question again, whether it is reasonable to move convinced C and Perl programmers to Haskell - They will want to write C and Perl style programs using Haskell. I think it is better to attract the people who find 'filter' and 'map' good in Python and want to get to know the original language. On Thu, 4 Oct 2007, Don Stewart wrote:

Yep, its similar to the elevator pitch, but a little shorter, and mentions why as a programmer this is worth your time.

I'm not sure "monadic effects" is terribly motivating for someone who's heard about Haskell, and just wants to get things done faster, and more reliably -- which is really what Haskell can be about.

My experience is, that 'purely functional' made me curious because I wanted a nice, elegant language which is not cluttered with much patches. 'Monadic effects' sounded strange and made me even more curious.