Ousterhout's Dichotomy Isn't (Part 2 of the Simplicity/Power/Focus Series)
Stuart Halloway at Clojure Conj 2011
Ousterhout's Dichotomy attempts to split the language world into system and scripting languages. This split isn't simple, and doesn't work. But understanding where it fails is a great way to approach the concept of power in programming languages. In this talk we will cover - what it means to be powerful - how Clojure's design gives you power - the relation between power and stratification - why the numerics changed in 1.3 - a post-Ousterhout classification scheme that is more useful - some predictions for Clojure's future.