Pro tip: Google the name of the person before responding to them, it can help avoid the taste of foot in your mouth which you are currently experiencing.
I’m new here, so this seems like a valid criticism to me — but judging by the number of downvotes, it may not be. Can someone explain why this comment is incorrect?
Perhaps because so many of know Walter from his work and his history here on HN? Sometimes you have to just trust that someone is who we all say they are.
What argument from authority is being made by anyone?
The GP decided, out of the blue, to accuse the author of never having written a line of C code in his life. That's kind of inappropriate in any context, IMO, but just downright laughable when the author is well-known for singlehandedly writing several compilers and a whole new language.
He never said explicitly, he was just making a general statement. Not that it matters whether he did or didn't, there's a lot of things wrong with C, it will most likely eventually disappear, but not for reasons outlined in this article. That's what he was saying.
Well, he dismissed Bright’s argument as a random pet peeve from people who haven’t written a line of code in C before, so yes, I do think he said it explicitly.
> Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.
This is one of HN's comment guidelines. If you're not sure that someone is who you think they are, you can just ask, e.g.: "Hey, are you Walter Bright who did X and Y?"
What's the implication here? I only know one COBOL developer but they seem to be doing quite well for themselves, making over $400k a year for something like 15 hours of work a week.
