Programming

Think about this: Why are there so many automobiles? And why are so many new models still being made? I would think you would try to perfect what you have instead of making new ones all the time. I understand you need new automobiles sometimes, like construction equipment trucks or some treaded military tanks. But for average daily driver you would think there would be some kind of universal automobile. I drive a Corolla btw. I like automobiles. But was just wondering.

I’m not here to mock you, just providing an analogy. You can deliver just about anything in one language that you can with another. However, like the car, you might need a different type if you want more performance. Maybe you want a fast car. High performance cars often need a lot of attention, they need that premium gas, the mechanics demand higher pay! What if you only care about getting from point A to point B, and you’re more concerned with driving a car that’s cheaper to maintain, maybe there are just more car mechanics for that type of car, and the cost to pay them is cheaper.

A C application that is very well tuned to manage memory and threads in the name of perfect performance will require more time and computer science knowledge to create when compared to a Python script that does the same thing, but in the most basic possible way running on a single CPU, running hundreds of time slower.

Sometimes you need the performance, and often you don’t. Sometimes you need a treaded tank, sometimes you need a NASCAR, and most days the Corolla does just fine, it’ll even let you miss a few oil changes before things get bad.

As to why we don’t perfect what we have now instead of creating more: technology changes, easier to work with abstractions come about, some people enjoy the hobby of creating a language, or maybe a niche language comes about with very specific trade offs for a very specific purpose, no one wants to break backwards compatibility by adding new features and syntax to their language - I’m sure there’s tons more reasons to list.