[cap-talk] Can we stop discussing Butler Lampson's opinions now?

[David-Sarah Hopwood]

Tony Finch wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 9, 2008 at 8:00 AM, Winnie Cheng <wwcheng at mit.edu> wrote:
>> Other promising ideas have not worked out: capabilities, distributed
>> computing, RISC, and persistent objects. And the fate of some is still
>> in doubt: parallel computing, formal methods, and software reuse.
> 
> This baffles me. In what sense has distributed computing failed? All
> computing these days is distributed! The web is a distributed system,
> Microsoft Windows domains are distributed systems. In what sense has RISC
> failed? It informs all modern CPU design. How can the fate of parallel
> computing be in doubt when all computers are parallel? As for formal
> methods, perhaps he should take a look at some of the advanced type system
> features that are at last becoming popular. And finally software re-use:
> has he not heard of DLLs or shared objects? Has he not looked at CPAN?

Indeed. Frankly, I don't see what this cult of personality is around Lampson
and his opinions. "He's just zis guy, you know?"

-- 
David-Sarah Hopwood