Re: Mainstreaming Prolog a Pragmatic Approach?

From: Benjamin Johnston (superhero_at_benjaminjohnston.com.au)
Date: 03/20/04 

Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2004 15:07:39 +1000

I have read Philip Wadler's paper, but not for a long time - and I can't
seem to find it online.

"Mainstreaming" may not have been the best word. I would say that Perl, PHP
and Python are mainstream. I want to see Prolog like that.

PHP is a language that is completely inappropriate for large scale
development, however its still got a large following because its a great way
to put together a simple dynamic website. I'd like to see Prolog have the
same kind of recognition and familiarity as PHP and Python. Sure, it will
probably never become more than niche, but I'd like to see the niche large
enough so that it gets consideration in those situations where it would be
the perfect fit (rather than missing out on showing its colors just because
nobody even considered it) and where there is an exciting user base that
isn't primarily dominated by research.

In this case i hope I'm talking about something outside of the control of
large organizations. Everybody's got their pet tools to get things done when
they need to do a little bit of coding outside of the core software
developments - prototyping, file transformation, quick web scripting, etc.
These are the things that I often find Prolog perfect for.

-Benjamin Johnston

"Andrzej Lewandowski" <alewando_tego_nie@oddpost_tego_tez_nie.com> wrote in
message news:tdkm50l60haeosuui5f7gduba5co9nn0mv@4ax.com...
> On Thu, 18 Mar 2004 22:25:01 +1000, "Benjamin Johnston"
> <superhero@benjaminjohnston.com.au> wrote:
>
> >
> >Hello Fellow Prologgers,
> >
> >I read with interest the recent discussion regarding mainstreaming
Prolog.
> >This has been something on my mind quite a bit lately. I, for one, would
> >love to see Prolog enter the mainstream. In fact, I'm optimistically
hoping
> >that one day I'll be able to read the job listings in the newspaper and
see
> >at least a handful of positions requiring Prolog or logic programming
skills
> >(okay, okay, at this stage it looks like it probably won't happen, but
I'm
> >hoping...).
> >
> >So, I'm wondering, are there things that could realistically be done to
help
> >"mainstream Prolog"?
> >
> >Let us, for the sake of argument, assume that this is something
desirable.
> >And also, that I'm not proposing that Prolog be the next Java, but just
that
> >it becomes considered an essential part of the programmer's toolkit -
like
> >shell/batch scripting, like GUI builders or like a nifty little graphing
> >library.
>
>
> This is not the issue. Programmers and their toolboxes don't decide
> what languages and technology is used. Prolog (or other language)
> becomes "mainstream" when large corporations start using this
> language. I don't see why large corporations should use Prolog.
> Introducing new language into production environment is very costly
> and must be economically justified. The argument that "X is better
> language than Y" is not sufficient justification. "Killer
> application" will also not help.
>
> Interesting discussion of this issue is in the article by Phillip
> Wadler "How Enterprises Use Functional Languages and Why They Don't"
> in "The Logic Programming Paradigm: A 25 Year Perspective", by
> Krzysztof Apt and others (this article was published, as I recall,
> in SIGPLAN, and is available on Wadler's web page).
>
> Yes, I am using Prolog in production environment, but this was more
> by accident than by making educated choice, and using Prolog creates
> more troubles than fun.
>
> In other words, I think that Prolog has no chance to be a
> "mainstream" language. It is a "niche language", sitting in the
> "niche" in good companion of Lisp, Ada, Eiffel, Smalltalk and such.
>
> A.L.

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