about main()

[Jim Lee]

On 07/05/18 12:58, Chris Angelico wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 6, 2018 at 4:27 AM, Jim Lee <jlee54 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> On 07/05/18 10:47, Calvin Spealman wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> You say "pitfall", but I say "allow developers to focus on higher-level
>>> problems and enable developers to specialize among tasks so every single one
>>> of us doesn't have to be a jack of all trades just to build a todo list
>>> app".
>>>
>>>
>> Sure, that's the *benefit*, but the benefit doesn't erase the *pitfall*.
>>
>> It's the same as with any other convenience.  When a convenience becomes a
>> necessity, skill is lost.
>>
>> Take a village of people.  They live mostly on wild berries.  One day, a man
>> invents an automated way to sort good berries from poisonous berries.  Soon,
>> all the villagers take their berries to him to be sorted.  The man dies, but
>> passes the secret on to his son before doing so.  This continues for a few
>> generations.  Eventually, the final descendant dies with no children, and
>> the secret vanishes.  Now, the entire village is clueless when it comes to
>> identifying the poisonous berries.
>>
> I would respect your analogy more if every compiler used today were
> forty years old and not being developed by anyone other than its
> original creator(s).
>
> ChrisA

It's not about compilers - it's about skills.  As programming becomes 
more and more specialized, it becomes harder and harder to find 
programmers with a skill set broad enough to be adaptable to a different 
task.

-Jim