about main()

[MRAB]

On 2018-07-05 21:43, Jim Lee wrote:
> 
> 
> 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.
> 
Fortunately the berry-sorter is open-source!