HN Explorer

Why do programming languages bike shed syntax

1 points by zaphirplane ↗ HN
why does each language feel the need to swap around the type and variable order, sometime int x other times x int. Switch statement isn’t called switch when and case are other alternatives. Method return type at the front at the end with a : or arrow. Why why these are so minor details when designing a language. <Rant aborted>

1 comment

[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 12.3 ms ] thread
oldandtired
Is it purely a matter of taste? or does the languages in question has some specific qualities that, in part, dictate the order?

I think you will find that for each language developed there is a historical reason for the choices made. Different people have different aesthetics about such matters.

Such matters will never be fully decided for one way or the other.

What really matters is how complete the semantics of a language are. I can live with varying syntax, but undefined, unspecified or implementation defined semantics means that one can never know if any program written in a language with these kinds of semantics will run across varying machines and operating systems.