An interesting text about Scala

Scala is an interesting language that is built upon the Java virtual machine (JVM) and intended to be "a better Java". Being a fan of functional languages, I am drawn to Scala, but I am also weary of the 'tool du jour' syndrome.

Reading up on Scala around the web, I happened across an interesting text by Coda Hale from Yammer in which he talks about some of the issues that they have faced using Scala (and why they are slowly switching back to Java). The blog article is here and the text is there. A lot of Coda's arguments sound right, even though they were not meant to be widely published.

Anyway, this doesn't detract from the fact that Scala is interesting, but it explains why one is careful about adopting new tools: the availability and maturity of the environment is often as important as the 'appropriateness' of a given tool or language in developing real-world applications.

/software | Posted at 01:26 | permanent link