The Asciinema clients have now gone from Python to Golang back to Python now to Rust

https://docs.asciinema.org/history/

https://blog.asciinema.org/post/and-now-for-something-comple...

creatonez 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

It's one of those projects where it really doesn't matter what language it's in, all of them will accomplish the job roughly the same. I'm happy for the dev to rewrite in whatever language motivates them to work on it, because with such a small codebase the chance it will affect functionality is low enough for it to not matter.

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imiric 21 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

That's... interesting.

Most of the gripes about Go could've been apparent before a single line was written, with just some preliminary research. The packaging issues are valid for 2016, even though they are now resolved with Go modules.

Then the rewrites in ClojureScript, Elixir, and now Rust... Sheesh. All this tells me is that the authors are trend chasers rather than solid engineers, which erodes any trust I had in this project.

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nicoburns 21 hours ago | parent [-]

> All this tells me is that the authors are trend chasers rather than solid engineers, which erodes any trust I had in this project.

Eh. I think my takeaway would be more that this is the authors passion / side project that they use to test and learn new languages.

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ku1ik 20 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> I think my takeaway would be more that this is the authors passion / side project that they use to test and learn new languages.

That's precisely it :) I believe I’ve finally found the ones that work well both for me and the project.

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imiric 12 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

When a project has thousands of users it's irresponsible to use it as a testing playground. If there is a legitimate benefit from rewriting something in another language, which is rare to begin with, the decision should be researched thoroughly and committed to. Doing it this often signals that authors easily latch on to shiny new tech, and value their experience over their users'. When the next modern language comes along, will we see a similar post explaining why they chose to abandon Rust?

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ku1ik 11 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I value both my experience and the users, and every asciinema release was backward compatible with the earlier ones (with few exceptions, where language change was not a factor), changing nothing in terms of UI/UX/API. The language is an implementation detail.

What's your problem?

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justusthane 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Did asciinema hurt you? Because you seem to be on a vendetta here.

I’m not sure if you’re an asciinema user or not, but I am, and I’m happy to see the rewrite — it signals to me that the author is still passionate and invested in the project. And he added new features (live streaming) with the rewrite.

It’s people like you who make maintaining open source projects exhausting. Find a more worthwhile hill to die on.

	▲	imiric 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		There's so many things wrong with your comment that I'm not sure where to start. First of all, nobody is on a vendetta or "dying" on any "hills" here... I'm just pointing out shoddy engineering as I see it. Deciding to rewrite a project in another language rarely has any practical merits. If it's worth considering, then at the very least it should be thoroughly researched, and not done because the author "feels like it", as they've done multiple times already. If this was brought up in any technical meeting for a project with thousands of users, the person would be laughed out of the room, and for good reason. And, yet, because the project happens to be open source, it should be excused, or even celebrated? That is absurd. The idea that providing the software gratis and with the freedoms to use and modify it should protect the authors from any criticism with how the project is managed is also absurd. Software should be held at the same levels of scrutiny regardless of its license or business model. There's always a contract between developers and users whether it is made explicit or implicit. Using a project with an established user base as your personal technical playground is irresponsible no matter how you look at it. > And he added new features (live streaming) with the rewrite. Ah, yes, I'm sure that would be impossible with any other language but Rust. > It’s people like you who make maintaining open source projects exhausting. And it's people like you who don't understand open source and only use it because they get something for "free". See? It's easy to villify someone without engaging with any of their arguments.