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RE: What design is: 911 vs. Fleetwood



> > Yes, but who says that you have to have only one target prototypical
> > programmer in mind?  Designing anything with only one person in mind is
> > usually stupid, whatever the product.
>
> Actually, it isn't.  It's the perfect way to design a product.
> ...
> Detroit re-learned this lesson again recently with the Dodge Ram (IIRC).

I think your truck example is a good example of where this might be
appropriate.  You have failed to show that this is *always* the right way to
design a product.

> > If you design a language for yourself, you are least guaranteed that you
> > will like it, and presumably others like you, but it would be foolish to
> > assume that everyone will like it.
>
> It would be foolish to assume that it's possible to design a language
> that everyone will like.  [*]

Agreed.  I also believe that it is impossible to design a language that even
all very talented programmers will like.

I believe that languages should be designed with a target market in mind.
If that market is well represented by your own personal tastes, that makes
life much easier, but if not you just have to try to do your best to gauge
what the market demands.

In the case of the Curl language, the target market is not adequetly
represented by a small group of people.  We simply do not have the luxury of
just designing for ourselves.

- Christopher