From: Phillip Gawlowski Date: 2011-04-04T14:55:04+09:00 Subject: Re: Lambda Shambda On Mon, Apr 4, 2011 at 1:30 AM, Chad Perrin wrote: > > I don't really give a crap what's popular, nor who has said it was > popular, when choosing something for merit.  I'm also not entirely > convinced he thinks popularity is any kind of sign of quality (given his > involvement in GHC development, which is nothing at all like Excel), nor > that his statement of popularity of Excel as a functional "language" is > unbiased, given his employment at Microsoft employee for a dozen years or > so. Though, Microsoft Research is a different beast than MS proper (as much as a "MS proper" can exist with such a corporation), and doesn't have to toe the party line as much as the Office Business Unit would have to, for example. > Excel is a *spreadsheet* -- which happens to have a programming language > embedded in it (and not a very good one, at that). That's a bit harsh. After all, Excel doesn't have to *be* a language VM. Thus, it only needs a DSL, and Excel's DSL is a damned good one, and thorough in tackling its problem space. Further, Excel doesn't need to be Turing-complete: Spreadsheets have many areas that they can be used in, and in pretty much all of them the business rules are too complex, or too much of a moving target, to make programming in the more traditional sense feasible. And that's why MS provides OLE Automation, and makes it relatively easy to develop Office add-ins for specific needs. -- Phillip Gawlowski Though the folk I have met, (Ah, how soon!) they forget When I've moved on to some other place, There may be one or two, When I've played and passed through, Who'll remember my song or my face.