Everyone who is responded to me has done so as if I said that Garbage Collection is always bad. Of course it's not. Languages such as Python are great places for GC, as is Javascript, and Java, when it's used at the application level.

It's just a very bad idea for systems programming.

You don't know what you are talking about. Enterprise systems are the very opposite of systems software. Systems languages are for writing kernels, drivers etc.

I think they will open source Swift. But I doubt it'll get much use outside of iOS and OSX programming. So many of the implementation decisions are about being compatible with Objective-C and the Apple frameworks. It *could* be used for other things, but I think the bias there will be enough to keep others away.

Which is exactly the same thing as I said. Java's shortfalls were mitigated by hardware upgrades, not by actually fixing it. It can't be fixed. Whilst the GC stalls can be comped with for higher level software, it's a showstopper for lots of systems level programming.

I nearly went into this with my post, but decided it was better to make a simple clear point without dealing with the obvious avenues for counter-argument in advance.

Android got smooth by throwing hardware at it. The reason for a while Androiders were bragging that their phones had more cores or higher clock speeds was that Android needed it.

Then there was the NDK, whose justification was explicitly things for which Java and Garbage Collection were unsuitable.

I don't know anyone who thinks C++ isn't a systems language. For the simple reason that C++ is C when you want it to be. Such people may exist, on the internet there are all views represented. But they don't know what they are talking about if so.

And I don't really care who's behind the language. And I certainly wouldn't any extra weight to an idea just because some people at Google think it.

You must be a Java programmer. Garbage collection is generally a very bad idea for a systems language, because of the periodic stalls whilst it does the cleanup. Especially if it's shunting blocks around memory to defragment. It's one of the big reasons why Android underperforms iOS, why it's never been so smooth in operation. And the only thing a developer can do about it is switch to a different language or develop for a more powerful machine.

Memory fragmentation can be a problem - but the success of C and C++ in most domains over the decades has shown it's just one more aspect a programmer has to deal with, it's not a showstopper. It's fixable, on the same machine, with the same language.

Your opinion of scumbag is presumably down to your belief that someone making a business to enable recreational drug transactions between people is a bad thing. Not everyone holds the same opinion.

It was certainly illegal. But not all laws are just.

You're probably right. In which case he impersonated the typical Android blowhard extremely well. :-)

There's also the matter of choosing the watch size and the strap, which will involve trying the watches on. Just handing them over on demand would probably lead to a lot of requests for exchanges.

Thanks, I did so enjoy the unintended irony of your post.

I'm pretty much as feminist as a man can be. But that doesn't extend to pretending that the majority of men are not stronger than the majority of women. If your feminism enables you to believe something that is contrary to scientific fact, then you have a problem.

And no, I don't believe in arming anyone. Least of all on a plane.

I dare say that a flight attendant (mostly women) is not going to stop a (co)pilot (mostly men) with a plan for murderous suicide.

I know several of your friends and they all pointed out you're a habitual liar.

How long do you spend considering it?
How long do you spend considering buying a coffee from a cafe you haven't been to before?
How long do you spend considering a sandwich?
A new chocolate bar?

And I'm sure you'd like them to get off your lawn too.

Generally speaking when people think young people have changed, what they're not realising is they themselves have changed. Young people aren't different, and neither are older people. You've just moved from one set to the other, and so your outlook on others has changed.