this post was submitted on 27 Sep 2024
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@[email protected] It's time to return to the roots, to the C programming language.

Why am I writing this post? Not because I hope for something or believe in change. These are just words. I could write this at the end, but then you would be looking for answers for me while reading, and I don’t need them. They won’t change anything.
So here it is. I don’t claim to be a software development guru or a C language expert. I’m just a simple developer.

- Why are we looking for new technologies? Why do we want to be part of a community that is buzzing with new projects? Why do we think that this new programming language will definitely help us create something amazing and truly great and, of course, will make us rich and provide us with a comfortable old age?

- Why are we offered so many courses in so many programming languages and frameworks? Why do we teach what is required for companies that make money from us?

- Why are there a lot of conferences on banal simple things, such as *** framework or ### technology (so as not to offend anyone), and there, with a smart look, newly minted gurus tell us how important it is to be able to transfer the value to the client and how to use certain templates?

- Why do computers become more and more powerful, but programs continue to lag?

- Why, when applying for a job, do we look for a vacancy based on knowledge of a programming language, but find it only based on knowledge of certain frameworks? Is it really difficult for a professional programmer to learn a framework in a week?

- Why do we go into software development with the enthusiasm to create something great, but end up in a situation where we are developing some other catalog or some other digital yo-yo to make money?

Reason: because we want our passion for programming, our interest, to also bring us income.
Result: we do not earn this money for ourselves, but for companies whose main goal is to quickly receive income from the software they sell.

I look at how programming has changed over the course of 25 years, what they teach at universities, and where they start. And I came to the conclusion that on a large scale, it was all for the benefit of giant companies or the government.

We must protect the “intimate” knowledge of the foundations and water the roots ourselves. Because they don’t realize, they don’t see that if the roots are not watered, the branches on which they sit will dry out. Therefore, who, if not us?!

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[–] ZILtoid1991 2 points 1 day ago

It's time to return to the roots, the times when you used goto instead of function calls! Fortran and COBOL all the way! /s

Once you look beyond the "git gud" and "we must gatekeep programming from the normies" aspects of coding, you might want a language that is either way more productive than C (D), a language that offers memory safety and functional programming paradigms (Rust), or even a language that has relatively good portability even at the cost of performance (Javascript).

If you're only grumpy about Electron apps, then be mad at the corporations that:

  • forced colleges and universities to teach Javascript and nothing else to students, so now we have programmers afraid of type declarations,
  • jumped on the "Big Data" and "software as a service" train, so every app needed to be a "website", because "it's so convenient, pops no longer need to install wordprocessor dot exe, just type wordprocessor dot com into a browser".
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago

This is some fine trolling

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Why do you keep posting this exact same rant? I see that some posts are in different Lemmy communities and you've posted it at least once on hacker news, but you also posted it to this same community already (https://snac.bsd.cafe/modev/p/1727338529.193499) and, although I can't find it now, I remember you posting it months ago, too.

Several of your posts that aren't about how C is being "suppressed" (which the responses to your post have repeatedly demonstrated isn't true) are about how you, personally, are still learning C and want more resources to learn it. And now you're also posting about Nelua and Nim. This is wild to me! Why do you have such strong opinions about a language that you're still learning? If you're that passionate about C and believe that people should use it instead of newer languages, why do you care about Nim or Nelua? If you're just trolling, why do you engage relatively patiently in the comments? And whatever your goal is, why do you keep reposting the same rants, especially this one that's now quite old?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You are very attentive, deserves respect.
Consider to join my cafe, please.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Whats wrong? If you want for sure.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Why don't you answer any of my questions instead of telling me to join your club?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I do not make a cult from any language, just curiosity to back to handmade and crafted software instead of commercial SaaS garbage and low quality generated code... No idols... I have learned several modern languages and working with modern full stack, but prefer save myself from total burnout by following C philosophy, rust was before if smth. So I know what is rust, zig, odin and so on. C is my hidden gold, just path of my prefer. But at the same time lang is just a tool for sure.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)
  • Why do you keep posting the same rant about "going back to the roots", especially after multiple people have pointed out that C is not "the roots" of programming?
  • Why do you have such strong opinions about a language that you're still learning?
  • If you're that passionate about C and believe that people should use it instead of newer languages, why do you care about Nim or Nelua?
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Why you are so strongly recommended me keep calm? Why I can't learn or talk about other languages? Why I can't have strong opinions about C, I have learned it 25 years ago also, and from my perspective learning never end, you can't be completely professional in something.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I haven't told you to keep calm. I'm just confused about you repeating the same points, in the same words, over and over, even after being told that you don't have your facts correct.

I'm not saying you can't learn or talk about other languages; I'm confused by the mismatch between your posts criticizing people for promoting newer tech stacks and the ones where you seem to be promoting newer tech stacks yourself.

25 years of experience is certainly enough to have strong opinions, but until your last comment I had the impression that you had a year or less of experience in C, hence my question.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I understand that my topics are disgusting to you and only a few can agree with me. And that's normal, such a reaction is quite predictable.
I wanted to apologize, just so you understand, I do not deny the existence of other languages ​​and technologies, evolution, etc.

I just want to draw attention to the fact that much of the programming world is built on hype and on the needs of companies that do not pursue the goal of creating effective programs, do not think about the energy and resource intensity of their products. They only think about making money. This is crap. And newcomers to the field are raised in this crap.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 hours ago

Rust feels like entirely the wrong target for that sort of criticism, especially regarding "energy and resource intensity". Rust is well-known to be comparable to C in its efficiency.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

why do we need this fancy 'C' language, when we could just write everything in assembly?

by god, you've solved all of the world's problems! give this man a novel peace prize!

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 days ago (1 children)

why do we need this fancy 'C' language, when we could just write everything in assembly?

No, only pure machine code. Anything else is rude. If we're going to get help from computers, then the least we can do is speak their language

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Code is for losers. If it’s not plugboards and punchcards, you’re a noob.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 days ago

If you're not spending half your day testing vacuum tubes one at a time, are you even a real engineer?

[–] solrize 4 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Back in my day, we only had ones and zeros, and sometimes we ran out of ones!!! (From old song, https://youtu.be/p1fBd7UbQPA?t=60 )

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

Binary deficit is a huge industry issue.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 3 days ago

The biggest benefits of different programming languages, frameworks and technologies is to reduce code complexity. Sure, it's possible to write all the code in C or even Assembly; but at some point it doesnt become practical.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 days ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I don’t even know what that means.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 3 days ago

Specifically ANSI C. All those new hipster features will never catch on.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 days ago

As much as I don't like framework spam, especially when a lot of them are bloated and insecure or need bloated and insecure plugins/extentsions/whatever to do basic things, I have less desire than that to go to C.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

My school taught me C and Python for what that's worth. It was not for software development per se though. It was for physical simulation. I don't know if that was a departmental decision or a coincidence based on my professors.

[–] eager_eagle 4 points 3 days ago

that's one way to swing the pendulum all the way back to the 1970s