[cies]

Interesting you refer to C++. Both languages, IMHO, became too big to be practical. You need to, as a team, choose a subset of C++ (or Scala) and a style for it to become manageable.

I dont think this looks good on a language, I prefer a language that comes with a small, concise set of features that are broadly understood and applied. But different folks different strokes.

[AzzieElbab]

I would disagree here. Scala's language spec is smaller than javas, it's problems are akin to Lisps. Too many dsls, extensions and so on. It really opened the doors for FP concepts to go mainstream. Unfortunately, some people went way too far with it.

[hota_mazi]

Brainfuck's spec fits in one page. As does Whitespace's spec.

These two languages are impossible to write code in because of their complexity.

It's completely mystifying to me that even today, Martin still uses the "spec size" argument in his keynotes to attempt to demonstrate that Scala is a simple language, and it demonstrates a complete ignorance of what language design actually is, or a troubling disingenuity meant to deceive.

[AzzieElbab]

The intention should matter. Brainfuck's is self descripted. I can come up with a few things that are genually confusing about scala, like implicits resolution rules and quirks of the type system, but I cannot claim they are intentional, and they are getting fixed. On the other hand, having things like functional collections futures years before Java made life easier for the whole lot of us

[cies]

Creator of Scala believes, and advocates, Scala is simpler than Java?

Wow.

[pkolaczk]

Because it is simpler than Java, in particular when you limit it to the subset of features covered by Java only. Many Scala features that do exist in Java are more complicated in Java. And some do not exist at all, which means you have to emulate them by writing more boilerplate code.

[AzzieElbab]

So does creator of spring who sat on lightbends board for a while

[AdieuToLogic]

To me, the question is who is allowed to make the choice?

Is it the language designer's place to say what can or cannot be done with it or the person/team who chooses what they do with it?

Personally, I would rather work with programming languages which allow me/the team to choose. YMMV.