[Ocaml-biz] limits, libraries, technical markets

[Brian Hurt]

On Thu, 9 Sep 2004, Brandon J. Van Every wrote:

> > "RTFM".
> 
> That's a kewl thing to say in the UNIX open source hacker world, but
> businesses do not accept this attitude / stance about the usability of
> languages in production environments.  Businesses don't wish to RTFM all
> day long, they wish to get their products to market faster with fewer
> headaches.

I find this humorous.  Or maybe depressing, depending.  First, RTFM is,
more often than not, the corporation's response when you call their tech
support (phrased more politely, granted, but the same idea- "We have an
extensive and well documented customer support site- have you tried
searching the site for the solution to your problem?").

More depressing, there is a general trend in the industry away from having 
to learn anything.  "I'm too busy working to learn anything" comes the 
wail from the programmers.  We can debate until the cows come home wether 
this is actually true or not (IMHO, not), but consider for a moment- if 
the programmers are unwilling to read a book to learn Ocaml, they won't 
learn Ocaml.  Period.  Because you pretty much need to read a book to do 
so.  Actually, you generally need to read 2-3 books to get really good at 
a language.

-- 
"Usenet is like a herd of performing elephants with diarrhea -- massive,
difficult to redirect, awe-inspiring, entertaining, and a source of
mind-boggling amounts of excrement when you least expect it."
                                - Gene Spafford 
Brian