> But for something aiming to fill the role of systems programming, it's just so incredibly different from everything else. It almost feels like they are going out of their way to make it as different as possible.
Different compared to: most programming languages? Systems programming languages? Just C/++?
> I mean, you see how Haskell is doing, and a lot of people blame that on the absolutely alien syntax to anything programmers are used to.
Its syntax fits how it operates. Should Haskell have -() at the end of functions, like C-like and ML? No, since Haskell uses partial application and currying - the ()-stuff would likely end up as cruft. A function of three arguments in Haskell is not passing in three values as a tuple: it is a function that takes one argument and returns a function - that function is a function that takes one argument and returns a function... how is that clear when you write it as `f(x,y,z)? Not to mention if you partially apply it.
Can you write Haskell code as a sequence of declarations and expressions? Arguably no, since it has non-strict evaluation; having a list of declarations and expressions would be misleading, since they can really be evaluated in any order.
What can be contested is the significant layout (though it is optional) and user-definable operators. Though I think Haskell code would become really crufty without operators, since they sometimes make expressions more clear than a series of prefix-oriented functions.
Different compared to: most programming languages? Systems programming languages? Just C/++?
> I mean, you see how Haskell is doing, and a lot of people blame that on the absolutely alien syntax to anything programmers are used to.
Its syntax fits how it operates. Should Haskell have -() at the end of functions, like C-like and ML? No, since Haskell uses partial application and currying - the ()-stuff would likely end up as cruft. A function of three arguments in Haskell is not passing in three values as a tuple: it is a function that takes one argument and returns a function - that function is a function that takes one argument and returns a function... how is that clear when you write it as `f(x,y,z)? Not to mention if you partially apply it.
Can you write Haskell code as a sequence of declarations and expressions? Arguably no, since it has non-strict evaluation; having a list of declarations and expressions would be misleading, since they can really be evaluated in any order.
What can be contested is the significant layout (though it is optional) and user-definable operators. Though I think Haskell code would become really crufty without operators, since they sometimes make expressions more clear than a series of prefix-oriented functions.