[erlang-questions] Erlang is touch of genius

[Loïc Hoguin]

On 06/22/2012 09:11 PM, Ingo Jaeckel wrote:
> What about tool support e.g. refactoring, (remote) debugging,
> deployment, monitoring, profiling, code analysis tools, etc. There are
> so many tools supporting the development process for more popular
> languages like Java and C#. Do you think that (due to the language
> itself?) those are not needed for Erlang? Compared to the
> free/commercial tools available for Java, the Erlang tool chain looks
> not mature enough to me.
>
> I *love* the language itself and achieving nine 9s is great, too [1].
> But don't you need so much more than great language concepts on a
> day-to-day basis when you are choosing the language for your next
> super-cool project?

Refactoring: third party projects like Wrangler, Refactorerl - I've 
never had the need for this myself though
(Remote) debugging: remote shells, dbg, sys, redbug, too many options there
Deployment: releases are half what we need, the other half is generally 
custom built
Monitoring: snmp
Profiling: eprof, fprof, cprof, and so on
Code analysis: dialyzer, typer, xref, and more

Erlang also has awesome tools like proper and quickcheck for writing 
solid test suites.

Erlang/OTP comes with the most impressive toolchain I've ever seen, you 
just need to take the time to learn the many tools. Plus it's very easy 
to build upon existing tools if you have specific needs.

I'm probably missing many tools, more experienced Erlang developers will 
surely give you more. Erlang/OTP has many gems to find for those who 
seek them.

-- 
Loïc Hoguin
Erlang Cowboy
Nine Nines