An Ode To My Two Loves
Jamey Cribbs
jcribbs at twmi.rr.com
Sat Feb 5 12:33:47 EST 2005
At the risk of calling my manhood into question, I humbly submit the
following little diddy (which is a blatant rip-off of a heart wrenching
melody of the '70s by that international superstar, Mary Macgregor):
To the tune of "Torn Between Two Lovers":
Torn between two languages, both of which are awesome tools
Lovin' both of you is breakin' all the rules
Torn between two incredibly awesome scripting languages, I'm
startin' to drool
Using you both is breakin' all the rules
Is freedom of choice wonderful or a curse? I do a lot of scripting at
my day job. Through the years, I've gone through what will probably
seem a somewhat familiar progression of scripting languages. Started
out with Tcl, moved to Perl when I began to do some serious text
munging, moved back to Tcl/Tk when I needed to do some gui stuff, jumped
to Python as I began to learn object oriented programming, told Python I
needed more space and moved in with Ruby when I needed to do more gui
stuff and wanted to use FXRuby.
And that's where I stand now, Torn Between Two Scripting Languages.
Python and Ruby are both so damn attractive that I can't commit to one
of them. I don't want to settle down into a monogamous programming
relationship. I mean, if you have Grace Kelly on one arm and Maureen
O'Hara on the other (I'm old school), should you really have to give one
of them up?
Why can't my boss understand this? But no, he has to lecture me about
the dangers of "foolin' around" with too many languages. "Oh sure", he
says, "you're having fun now juggling two beautiful languages in the
air. But how long can you keep living two lives? Sooner or later you
are going to slip up and make a mistake. My god, man, what if you start
leaving off the 'end' in your if statements? What if you forget that
indentation DOES matter?! For the love of all that is sacred and holy,
think of the programs!"
My boss was always a little melodramatic.
Anyway, I don't know why I'm typing this up. I just finished a major
update to KirbyBase and I think I'm a little punch drunk. I have been
spending a lot of time with Ruby lately and working on KirbyBase caused
me to dive back into Python. Why do these two languages have to be so
freakin' good! I know a lot of people see big differences in the
languages, but I'm not one of them. I don't think I am a smart enough
programmer to understand or ever be bothered by some of the more subtle
or deeper differences that some people have pointed out. Ah, ignorance
is bliss.
Well, as long as I can keep my boss from finding out that I am in this
programming love triangle, I think I will probably stay happily enmeshed
in my little soap opera.
Well, I think I will go now and listen to my Captain & Tenille
records...why are you looking at me like that. I'm a happily married
man with four kids. I like football and guns...really, I do!
Under the influence of some kind of strange force and will probably be
embarrassed when he snaps out of it,
Jamey Cribbs
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