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The legendary Castle of Scalability, wherein is reputedly housed the Holy Grail of Website Performability, awaits you! Will you accept the challenge? Will you take up this noble Quest?
Recently, we have heard that the castle may be reached by scaling the high cliffs of Scala, one of the newest Object-Functional languages. Scala, like Fan, another new "scalability-oriented" language, has mutated significantly from Java, one of its prototypical influences. From what I've seen through my binoculars, Scala code can sometimes seem pretty obfuscated, so make sure you are equipped for a certain cryptic mysticism as you begin your ascent.
Take A Tour of Scala and then have a look at what Sony Imageworks intends to do with it, reported in Sony Imageworks and Scala.
Scala is indeed a serious language, and this is a serious Quest! Personally, I have already started along the path, but I must admit I'm taking the Fan with me to cool me down during the long climb!
Good luck, Noble Coder! May you reach the Castle of Scalability and claim the Coveted Prize! I hear there is enough Performability up there for all of us!
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Today, I had reason to update an old article of mine, Resume Dream Catchers, and figured I should remind my readers of this resource. Please feel free to offer your additions,corrections, and thoughts as comments, either to the article directly, or to this post. I will be happy to update the article with better information! This started out as just a quick post, back in 2004, but some people seem to like it!
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The most exciting new programming language I have seen in quite some time is the new Fan language. I recommend reading Why Fan and taking the Tour to have get a quick grasp of what Fan offers. Then Download Fan and StartHere!
Why am I so enthusiastic about Fan? It's Object Oriented, but also supports functions as first class objects. That makes Fan one of the new "Object-Functional" languages (see Scala for another example, although I am finding Scala a bit overly-complex for my taste). Fan is easily approachable from a C/C++/C#, Java, Python, Ruby or Smalltalk background.
Fan interoperates on the Java VM, the .NET Framework's CLR, and also supports compiling JavaScript for use in browsers. Fan's design should make it portable to Parrot and other run-time targets in future.
More than anything else, though, I like Fan's clean, and I must say rather beautiful, design. Look at this quote about the development team's approach to the Fan API's: "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder - but we are obsessed with making the Fan APIs beautiful." Brian and Andy Frank, Fan's two main developers, are quick to state that Fan is a practical, rather than academic language. However, I assure you a *lot* of thought and deep knowledge about the evolution of programming languages has gone into Fan's design. I consider Fan quite elegant and am very much enjoying cooling my code with Fan!
To help spread the Fan meme, I have started FanFans, a LinkedIn Group for those who want to "fan the Fan!" If you're on LinkedIn, search for "FanFans" or "Fan language" and join the group!
So, let's all Fan out and spread some cool code!