RE: Midrange Knowledge test

[Jim Damato <jdamato@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> Mark:
>The standard things that the language does for you are 
>the *strengths*, not the weaknesses of the language.

I don't really think of the cycle as a strength for RPG.  It's cool built-in
functionality which, in its most common usages, can be duplicated with some
straightforward code.  My experience has been that once you have an intimate
knowledge of the language the cycle does not seem terribly powerful.  It
seems to me that the cycle's power is in making things a lot easier for
less-skilled programmers.

>The same argument that you've made against RPG can be made
>against SQL...

I'm not making an argument against RPG.

>The "novice can figure out what's doing in language X" 
>argument is not a valid reason to make a technique 
>decision, IMHO.

For novices in general I agree.  For novices to RPG I don't.  The ability to
throw an experienced COBOL programmer at a readable RPG program is a a valid
reason to use common techniques among languages, where possible.  It's also
true that for skilled RPG programmer can learn some versatility by writing
his or her own i/o logic instead of leaning on the cycle.

>When you're interviewing or assigning
>a programmer for a task, I'm assuming that you 
>pick the best one for the task, not just a warm 
>body that might or might not be able to figure out 
>what's going on.  That requires an intimate 
>knowledge of the language.

This is a terrific ideal.  I'm a firm believer, however, in Weinberg's
Second Law.  I also believe that for every one programmer with an intimate
knowledge of a language there are about ninety nine poor to mediocre
programmers.  Projects usually can't wait for the best one for the task.
Coding the inherent unreadablility of the cycle out of the program opens a
manager's options to by suiting more programmers to the task.

If this were 1990 and I were part of an old-world RPG shop I'd love to build
a team of power-RPG programmers who knew subfiles, AS/400 i/o, and the cycle
cold.  In 2003 I think it's smarter to keep easy languages such as RPG as
simple as they already are, and save the specialists for SQL, C, Java, and
other technologies which really do require power programmers.

-Jim