Programming's Future

my magic 8-ball says "difficult to forsee - ask again later"...

--- krez (krezisback@aol.com)

Well, my thoughts are:

1) We''re approaching another boundry for processor technology. In other words, we''re about to cap out how fast we can make chips unless they come up with a new technology. We can only make the wires in the chips so small before they can no longer carry an electrical signal. We''re getting close apparently. Some say in the next 4-6 years we might hit that mathematical minimum size, unless we get a new paradigm in processor tech!

2) There''s another shift to centralized computing in a lot of industries since support and maintenance is becoming a nightmare of costs for most companies.

So, I believe that C and C++ still have quite a foothold. No matter how much computing power you have, someone wants to get more out of less to save a buck. So, languages with strong memory management and use fewer CPU cycles (which a well written C program does better than most any language besides ASM) will continue to be prevalent.

But, I also believe that as interpreted languages become more common place, you''ll see more and more of their use. Why write a C program to do a simple task when the same task can be done with about the same speed in a language that has looser data types and hides most of the memory handling? Perl, Python, Ruby, JScript, VBScript are quickly doing tasks that usually were reserved for C++ programs. They''re easier to develop, quicker to hit results and fill in the gaps when a fully developed, compiled language is needed.

I also think programming will have two sects so to speak. Blue collar and white collar. Meaning that there will be Engineers/Scientists who write modular code bits (ActiveX, CORBA, Window Script Components or just code groups that can be accessed by Perl/Python and others) and then distributed to the blue collar programmers to actually use. Don''t get caught up on my blue/white collar. Both will be very valuable to a company, but the focus will be different. White collars will be pumping out the reuseable code that is as pure as can be, while the blue collars will be pumping out the final programs that will be the bread and butter for companies.

Or, programming will just become less popular and we''ll all be rich.

Take your pick =)

R.

If you had 200 Ghz to play with would you still remain loyal to C/C++ when you could use another language that could shave significant time off your development?

Sure would. I''d just be using more libraries and so on if I didn''t have to worry about how well implemented they were

[ MSVC Fixes | STL | SDL | Game AI | Sockets | C++ Faq Lite | Boost ]

This topic was similarly brought up not too long ago in the General Programming forum. The full thread is available here, but I thought the most interesting was the post by Chris Hargrove on the second page regarding Aspect-Oriented Programming and Intentional Programming. I had a brief discussion with him in the chat room about these topics that are currently being researched, and it could be the way of the programming future in 20 years. Worth taking a look at.

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Kevin "Khawk" Hawkins
News Director and CEO, GameDev.net
Author, OpenGL Game Programming

Don''t WE the programmers detrmin the future of what the language will be? I mean...the future is what WE make it.

quote:

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The Future is what you make it

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Don''t get me wrong. I''m in no rush for something to replace C/C++. And perhaps for hobby programming C++ will be used 30 years from now. But most game programming is a business, which means that the programmers will use the most cost-effective tool for the job, regardless of whether it''s the most powerful. If something can be done in programming language x in a month and it takes two months in C/C++ then they''ll go with x, even if it runs slightly slower. In the future the speed difference could be so small as to be completely impossible for the human eye to detect.

I''m not saying C/C++ isn''t the best available game programming language out there now. But when processors become really powerfully, speed won''t be as much of an issue. Saving the programmer time will be very, very important.

quote:

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1) We're approaching another boundry for processor technology. In other words, we're about to cap out how fast we can make chips unless they come up with a new technology. We can only make the wires in the chips so small before they can no longer carry an electrical signal. We're getting close apparently. Some say in the next 4-6 years we might hit that mathematical minimum size, unless we get a new paradigm in processor tech!

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That's where carbon based computing comes in...
ZDNet: IBM builds single molecule circuit

Edited by - Xorcist on December 18, 2001 1:32:05 AM

BAH.. coders are depending more on processor speed instead of optimizing their code... YIKES... what''s the world coming to?

Hmmm... I''ve always advocated clear logical understandable code, even if somewhat bloated, over harsh banged out optimizations (which may be hardware/language dependant). Could it be all these years... I''ve been wrong? Just something to think about.