Given the huge number of libraries/projects available these days and the diverse profile of library maintainers, a totally automated/transparent dependency manager is not for today. It would require a crystal ball to cope with a number of situations.
That "garbage" has to be dealt with in day to day use by most of us. You should get used to it or live as an hermit on some far away mountain. Which I am tempted to do from time to time but for real bureaucratic issues like income tax reports :) Life can be hard... Luc On Sun, 27 Mar 2011 21:30:54 -0700 (PDT) ultranewb <pineapple.l...@yahoo.com> wrote: > On Mar 28, 7:51 am, Lee Spector <lspec...@hampshire.edu> wrote: > > > Dependency management and other garbage are definitely garbage, > > > but I know of no nontrivial programming language that doesn't > > > have its share of it. If you know of any magical environments > > > that eliminate such administrivia, do share. > > > > A lot of the programming I've done in a variety of languages hasn't > > required me to deal with dependency management but that was mostly > > because there weren't any dependencies except the language itself > > (e.g. in Common Lisp), the language's own libraries which it knows > > how to find (e.g. standard C libraries), or my own code (which > > would be in the same file or the same directory). So the issue > > didn't arise. > > This. > > I am not an expert in the term "dependency management" because I don't > want to be an expert in it. So for these purposes I will define the > term as "a bunch of bureaucratic crap I have to do that actually has > nothing to do with programming." Anyway, the only place I ever > experienced it before was a job I took once where they had Microsoft > Visual C++ Studio or something like that. This thing sure was > ridiculous, and after two days of trying to figure out how to get it > to use it's OWN libraries (never once writing a single line of code), > I threw it out the window, told the boss "I'm using something else," > and that was that. I've worked at large operations (IBM, AT&T) but > never had to do any of this "dependency management" crap (I don't > doubt that somebody, somewhere, might have had to do it - probably a > full time employee PAID to do it - but I didn't have to do it). > > But with any other language I've ever used, at most I include a > library I need in a directive at the top, or I include my own code in > a similar directive. For instance, with Erlang you just say > "module(whatever)" at the top. I mean, that's ALL you do. And the > documentation for the function you are using tells you the "whatever" > to put in. And to tell you the truth, I thought THAT was a load of > B.S... until I dealt with Java, heh. With J I either say "load > 'whatever'" or "require 'whatever'" and that's it. It knows where to > go and find the 'whatever'. With APL and Prolog, I don't think I had > to ever declare anything. I've used dozens of languages, and this is > the pattern with any language I've chosen to use of my own volition. > The one exception was the Visual C++ crap (something I wasn't using of > my own volition), but I threw it out the window. Another exception > WOULD have been Java, except that I decided I wouldn't even do it for > money. > > One pattern I've noticed is that the more a language requires you to > do "dependency management" garbage OUTSIDE the code, before you even > get to the code, the more it also requires cruft INSIDE the code. For > instance, look at a Java program sometime, with REAMS and REAMS of > declarations like "public.static.void.main.blah.blah...." First time > I saw that, my jaw just hit the floor, and I said "you mean people > actually sit there and code in this garbage?" I guess more than 50% > of the code in a language like this is cruft? > > At any rate, I will give Shantanu Kumar's recommendation a try, and > report back to here if it works or not (my idea for this thread was to > compile a list of things that worked or didn't work for future > reference for newbs). > -- Luc P. ================ The rabid Muppet -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Clojure" group. To post to this group, send email to clojure@googlegroups.com Note that posts from new members are moderated - please be patient with your first post. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to clojure+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/clojure?hl=en
