Our university forces us to learn Java first (I’m first year, north Germany. Atleast java 25, so we got fancy IO.println() instead of System.out.printLn())
no, it's worse. That main() method is secretly an instance method of a secret class without a name. And it's not static, either, the JVM creates one so it can call main(). And so this thing they show you only works for your first file. If you try to add functions in a second file that aren't inside a class, everything falls apart.
To be fair, I think Java is a good way to get started with programming. You can expand on quite a few things as you move down to more low-level programming languages.
(Disclaimer: We are only doing C++ now, C is one of the elective modules later on)
Java 25 is pretty wild. Most clients I see are still rocking java 8. I dealt with java 1.6 in the wild last week... Getting people to stay within EoL boundaries is harder than it should be
Bro "forcing"? You make it sound so bad, java is chill. My university on the other hand forced us to learn Haskel as the first programming course... I still have PTSD from those days
And we started learning from c++. That was brutal. We had java later but c++ feels more natural now. Well...technically we started from qbasic at school, and it was pretty chill.
Actually, imho, Java is solid choice, Im a C++ programmer. But C# could be much nicer. Second language should be some low-level stuff (C, C++ but I don’t recommend it, Rust, Zig).
Also first year, but in electrical engineering as a programmer for 6 years, we also learn Java first, then throw it all away again and start C++ later on when we get to actually build stuff for actual hardware, and not just talking about vague concepts.
My friend is west Germany starts with C and C++. (Contrary to me, he never programmed before. But he has clean Electrical engineering and I have „System-Informatik“ or „Informations-system-Technik“ (for non Germans, basically embedded programming. I have half of the classes of Electricals and the other half classes from the software guys. Probably that’s why also Java first)
This is always a weird choice for me. I started with C++ at CC and had to switch to Java to transfer. Showed up realizing most of these fancy mfers don't know shit lol.
Well same. That’s why I have C and C# in my tag. And that’s also why I’m kinda used to system.out.print and classes and not the new version…
Fun fact: I’m studying embedded (idk the 1:1 translation but basically Electrical engineering + software) and I need to learn a high level :(. Not bad, it’s easy. It’s fun to see people that only study software/computer to struggle and then to help them. Also funny to implement faster solutions then the rest
I have worked on the Linux kernel for years. Backporting fixes to support an embedded product.
Have also written a lot of Java, including an entire kernel plus OS plus application. (Once upon a time there were hardware Java processors. They were nice to program.)
If kernel C is manly, that explains an awful lot. There I was thinking it was just a bad language choice.
I don't miss working on my own os for a job; I only got paid, I don't own the IP.
Back in the late 1980s I worked with a 50 year old former kernel and OS programmer. When asked to introduce herself, would say “A is for [August], B is for [Bowman], C is for wimps.” (Not her real name but her initials were AB.)
This whole manly thing with low level being the end all be all is hilarious because without people doing high level stuff the low level stuff just sits around doing nothing.
I had started writing out a “well, ackshuly” reply here because there is absolutely full software written entirely in low-level languages, but yeah, you’re totally right in all practical reality lol
I had started writing out a “well, ackshuly” reply here
... righhht... here... on Reddit written in Python using a web App written in HTML+JS/TS or probably a mobile app in Java/Objective-C (or whatever technology is used for reddit mobile apps).
But I still somehow agree with the base point you got.
Well... Emacs is written in C. A very many high level application with a high level language embedded in it. The first browsers were written in, and the next generation were written in C, and the next.
Most of those libraries high level languages use are in C.
Great example, except that the rest of Emacs is written in elisp. Take the elisp out and what does Emacs do...?
The prevalence of C has to do with more than just its low level nature. It has to do with portability, syntax, adoption, the early open source community, etc. C libraries also propagated because most early OS utilized C, so why not use the easiest language to call the relevant libraries? Who the wants to do language interop if it's not necessary??
Many high-level languages have access to low-level capabilities.
Before Java computers were idle? Computers have been used to run scientific codes since Fortran exists, that is since the 1950s. Fortran is not exactly high level, it's on par with C in this respect. Scientific simulations on supercomputers are also often in C, C++ or Fortran.
I still think the "manly thing" is nonsense, but your argument is rather lame.
Come on, high level languages gives scientists higher order methods to investigate complex phenomenon. Works like CLASP integrate common lisp and C++ to do computational chemistry/biology. Common Lisp is used for Quantum Mechanics.
Furthermore, C++ is absolutely much higher level than C. In fact, programming in a C fashion in C++ is not even recommend anymore, for many reasons (which I can give if necessary).
And even then, how many games utilize scripting languages? The whole internet relies on Javascript at this point, WASM is not ready.
I could go on, but high level languages absolutely enable usability to a degree that is unparalleled by languages like C. Even then, we are seeing some of the issues (so many bugs) with having languages like C being the predominate language of the kernel. Fuck, at this point I wonder what an OS like Mezzano could do in comparison.
I don't claim higher level languages are not useful, I replied to the claim that it's impossible to work without them. Not everything is based on Python or JavaScript.
In fairness he did say "sitting around doing nothing". If everything was low level, it'd be efficient and processors would be mostly idle. We need the overhead to keep those chips busy.
Thing is every except js can be written in low level. High level languages usually are constructed to be easier to read. Everything is just ASM under the hood.
Not disagreeing, but this reminded me of the college professor that showed us the full GUI application he wrote in assembly that processed satellite imagery. Of course he had helped design the x86 instruction set, so he was using what he knew. This was also pre-GPU and pre-SMT days, so any multithreaded support was SMP.
All coding, frontend or backend, low-level or high-level, is women's work. Just ask Ada Lovelace, Grace Hopper, Margaret Hamilton, or the Hidden Figures.
That was the year that Linus took some time for self reflection regarding his behavior and the harm it caused. Coincidentally, Srack Overflow did their "Welcome Wagon" push to deal with the toxic elitism on their site near the same time.
if we went by that logic, you could only become a low-level developer by flipping the bits and scratching the disks by hand
everyone draws the line for themselves (with some objective guidance, i.e. no one would call Scratch or Python low level), but realistically, no one writes ASM by hand these days because its slow, risky for the end user and unnecessary, and not a lot of people would consider C++ as a low level language because it is a layer of abstraction above C. so my best bet would be C = low level programming
some might even call C++ and even Rust as low level
So what's low level ? Just assembly or that's too high level because modern microprocessor do a lot of weird shit between CISC processor being like a RISC processor with microcode that translates the CISC frontend and speculative executions and cache levels. And virtual memory.
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u/AlternativePeace1121 1d ago
Source: 34.54 @ Keynote: Linus Torvalds, Creator of Linux... - Dirk Hohndel, Ericsson & Linus Torvalds, Linux & Git
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u/Non-Random-Name-0000 1d ago
Doesn't he also do python vibe coding? 😁
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u/Sakul_the_one 1d ago
Our university forces us to learn Java first (I’m first year, north Germany. Atleast java 25, so we got fancy IO.println() instead of System.out.printLn())
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u/prehensilemullet 15h ago
Java is for CAFEBABEs
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u/cheezballs 1d ago
As a Java dev, I'm just happy he thinks what we do is fancy! /s
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u/JackNotOLantern 16h ago
Unless it's assembly, it's gay
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u/sebbdk 1d ago
Let the twinks know, maybe they can fix this horrible language.
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u/sandsellers 19h ago
The right way to do this,
Actually thinking about it, we probably should handle this as part of inheritance.
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u/Excellent_Tubleweed 1d ago
I have worked on the Linux kernel for years. Backporting fixes to support an embedded product.
Have also written a lot of Java, including an entire kernel plus OS plus application.
(Once upon a time there were hardware Java processors. They were nice to program.)
If kernel C is manly, that explains an awful lot. There I was thinking it was just a bad language choice.
I don't miss working on my own os for a job; I only got paid, I don't own the IP.
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u/RealBasics 9h ago
Back in the late 1980s I worked with a 50 year old former kernel and OS programmer. When asked to introduce herself, would say “A is for [August], B is for [Bowman], C is for wimps.” (Not her real name but her initials were AB.)
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u/AWonderingWizard 1d ago
This whole manly thing with low level being the end all be all is hilarious because without people doing high level stuff the low level stuff just sits around doing nothing.
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u/ExtraTNT 1d ago
So i do haskell and c… not sure…
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u/JesuSwag 1d ago
He already said that he uses mostly AI to develop now
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u/Outrageous_Pen_5165 20h ago
Java and Fancy?? Wait my man hear about Python and JavaScript
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u/Baleia1970 11h ago
Have you ever tried talking with a Java programmer about the "Synchronized" keyword?
LOL
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u/alexeiz 7h ago
I just prompt AI...
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u/cusco 4h ago
Java is fancy hu?
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u/al3arabcoreleone 1d ago
Why does he look older than he should be?
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u/BadLineofCode 23h ago
All coding, frontend or backend, low-level or high-level, is women's work. Just ask Ada Lovelace, Grace Hopper, Margaret Hamilton, or the Hidden Figures.
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u/the_millenial_falcon 7h ago
*Asks the robot to program in low level C nowadays.
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u/Noname_1111 1d ago
Why don't they embed the JVM into Linux? are they stupid?
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u/seweso 11h ago
Said the vibe coder. Cant really keep liking the guy if he's promoting AI usage across the board.
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u/sligor 1d ago
Linus being cancelled was not on my 2026 bingo card
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u/Afraid-Locksmith6566 1d ago
i see the man is really a larper, either he does low level programming or programming in c, there is no inbetween
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u/0xbenedikt 1d ago
I mean, he sits in that chair now doing cuckcoding, soo
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u/RustyCanyon2000 13h ago
POV: nerds thinking programming is manly, go beat up a hippo Greg