The Joys Of Data-Driven Programming

[Marko Rauhamaa]

Rustom Mody <rustompmody at gmail.com>:
>> > All I can say is that I've encountered numerous bad cases of rule
>> > systems, eg:
>> > 
>> >  - iptables
>> > 
>> >  - selinux policies
>> > 
>> >  - systemd unit files
>> > 
>> >  - asterisk
>> > 
>> >  - sendmail
> [...]
> Some other examples:
> 1.
> Aren’t makefiles data-driven?

Yes, "make" should be added to my sin list.

> [Personally Ive always believed that jam is better than make and is
> less used for entirely historical reasons; something like half the
> world eoling with crlf and half with lf. But maybe make is really a
> better design because more imperative?]

Don't know jam, but can heartily recommend SCons.

> 3. Scheme — the language but also the informal culture around SICP —
> is where data-driven programming got installed as a sacred dictum.
> Scheme doesn't seem to be doing too well of late… Coincidence??

Lisp's "data is code and code is data" is a good principle. I have
successfully used it with Python as well.

However, Scheme's syntax-rules are infamous.


Marko