Today's post is short because I just want to rant about how different programming languages have different syntax for the equals sign. For some reason I've been running into this particular issue a lot the past week, and it's starting to drive me crazy.
What I'm talking about is the syntax for how a language uses the equals sign. For example, in PL/SQL we use := for assignment:
x := 7;
And then we can use the plain old equals sign for doing the logical equals:
if (x = 7) then...
Of course the PL/SQL editor doesn't know that's a syntax problem because it's treating the stuff inside the single quotes as a string in the PL/SQL syntax. So I get no help from my IDE -- it's only when I compile and try to run my code in a browser that I see the problem.
It would make my life so much easier if all those big-brained people who create these programming languages would think about the poor lowly programmers like me. They should standardize key parts of language syntax, and they need to start with the equals sign. Imagine how much it would increase your productivity if you didn't have to think about which language you're in before typing out the appropriate variation of an equals sign.
Sorry about this rant. I'm just feeling grumpy from all the time I've wasted on these silly little syntax issues this week. But I'd love to hear what other cross-language syntax wackiness drives you crazy.