I mentioned publicly that I had spent part of last evening listening to a presentation on the LISP programming language, and someone who's a PHP (language) cowboy snarkily remarked, "I didn't think that people still programmed with a LISP."
Sigh. Language snobs. Just because a language is older than you are doesn't make it obsolete.
But what popped into my head immediately after that was the idea that the programming world is like Skull Island in the 1933 version of "King Kong." A place where time stood stone-still for dinosaurs like T-Rex and other museum celebrities. Yet, somehow, later reptiles (such as snakes) and even mammals (like our leading man) could evolve in chronological tandem with the rest of the world...although evolution was clearly prejudiced in favor of the "too darned big to eat" gene. (Presumably, Skull Island's human population were parvenus, although that doesn't explain why a culture technologically advanced enough to build a wall high enough to keep the critters out couldn't just as easily build a fleet of boats and get the heck out of there.)
So, from now on, I think that will be my stock explanation for the young-uns who can't grok how 50 year-old languages like COBOL can power back-end accounting systems in an age when every month seems to find a new language wriggling in the primordial goo of the internet. Or, more aptly, in the gooey "building blocks of life" that the internet provides: Code repositories, free editing tools, mirror servers. And, of course, a ready supply of fierce competition. Yep, Skull Island. Definitely.
