

First thoughts on Erlang - nkurz
http://www.byzantinereality.com/?p=868

======
chops
Disclaimer: I've been doing Erlang now for a handful of projects for a year
and a half, and I love it.

The syntax is a little jarring at first, more-so than most languages, but it's
really not that bad. And as long as you stick with OTP, generic servers, and
the like, you get to avoid some of issues that can make Erlang code harder to
follow (naked bang message passing, spawning processes directly, etc).

Frankly, I think the syntactical warts (ending line variations, record syntax,
if-statement construct, etc) are well worth it for the benefits of message
passing, lightweight process spawning, pattern matching, code hot-swap, and
particularly locational transparency.

At the very least, Erlang is an interestingly different enough language that I
recommend it for anyone to spend a few weeks to learn at least the basics.

------
al3x
This quote from the post says it all: "I actually haven’t finished the book
yet – I’m at the end of the first chapter".

It's great that the author is learning a new language, but maybe wait until
you've actually done something with it or at least finished the book to write
about it? First impressions don't mean much.

~~~
reiddraper
Actually, that's not what he said. Here's the full quote: "I’m at the end of
the first chapter that explains how Erlang’s concurrency features work"

A quick look shows that it's the sixth chapter. Either way, he's clear about
this disclaimer, and his post was enough to peak my interest in this specific
book.

For you, first impressions _do_ seem to mean much.

~~~
chops
That was also the first chapter in the book where suddenly Erlang seemed
freaking amazing. Up until then, it was just a functional language with an odd
syntax. After the introduction to message passing and concurrency, I was in
love.

------
bhickey

        Is it Erlang’s semantics that really rub people the wrong way? 
        ... after seeing O’Caml, Haskell, and Clojure before, Erlang feels 
        a bit easier to get the hang of. Erlang’s semantics indeed throw 
        people off, especially those who know a C-style language.
    

I write in Haskell, I knew OCaml, Racket is a friend of mine. Erlang is no
Clojure.

The problem with Erlang is not one of semantics, it's one of syntax. I find
the syntax of Erlang jarringly bad.

Try this for a longer rant:
<http://damienkatz.net/2008/03/what_sucks_abou.html>

~~~
yariv
If Erlang's syntax bothers you and like Clojure you should check out LFE (Lisp
Flavored Erlang). It's Erlang with a Lisp sytax.

