[E-Lang] Ordering

[Marc Stiegler]

> The reason I want to know this: I'm trying to convince a project to
> use Elib, and am getting "but promises are so complicated".  I want
> their defense to be as good as it can be.

Hmmm...from a practical perspective rather than a theoretical one, the
questions I would ask if this was the complaint are these:

--Were they planning to use threads? That leads to far more complicated
code.
--Have they ever built a system that could produce deadlock bugs? That
produces far more complicated problems, which are even worse than
complicated code. Indeed, as a selling point for the management team, a
knockout blow is that promises make it  possible to develop meaningful
software development schedules and cost estimates. Systems that enable
deadlock bugs are grave risks. As a person who has spent more time managing
software than writing it, I can tell them that, even if the usage of
promises increased initial development cost, I would choose it in a
heartbeat if deadlock bugs were a possibility in my system because the loss
of power to make accurate time/cost projections is even more expensive than
"mere" development time. The great news with E is that it not only preserves
the power to make projections, it doesn't cost any more either :-) Well, a
little bit at the very beginning when you are getting used to it :-)
Promises are not complicated, but they do require some getting used to.

--marcs