Contributors to [the comp.lang.tcl newsgroup] frequently express concern that a decision to use Tcl is risky, because the language might ... well, something might happen. It's hard to answer unspecified fears rationally. The well-defined ones all turn out to be mistakes. Will Java be better-supported? Well, IBM and Sun have been supporting Java for all its worth, and its portability in particular, and Tcl remains available for a wider span of platforms. Is Tcl vulnerable because its creator might not support it? In fact, [John Ousterhout] has been away from technical leadership of the implementation since 1999 or so, and new versions continue to appear. Won't GNOME [themes], or .NET, or Ruby, or object-orientation, or ..., leave Tcl behind? Sure; in three to five years, each of these will catch up with features Tcl already enjoys. If that means, "leave Tcl behind" to you, then Tcl is probably not a language that will leave you comfortable. Maybe Tcl will decline in any of several objective senses. The evidence usually presented in support of such a prediction, though, is demonstrably ... inconclusive. ---- [LV] I would add to the above that when people say "Tcl doesn't have ..." followed by some function, what they ''seem'' to mean is "I want to do ..., but I don't want to code it myself, don't want to pay someone to code it, and don't want to have to download and build something other than the tcl.tar.gz or tcl.zip file." That is a rather unfortunate attitude to take towards open source. ---- [RS] Open source software lives as long at least one developer has the sources and can compile them. Tcl sure isn't a fashionable language, but you also often hear how people are surprised and ultimately converted. Yes, we are a minority - but we got The Cool Language! I'm not worried as long as [everything is a string]. ----- '''Tcl has many years in front of it''' [Robert Abitbol] Indeed, Rich! '''Nothing to worry about'''. No need to have a million programmers for a programming language to live and prosper. As the saying goes: ''too many cooks spoil the broth''. I think Tcl-TK has the right ingredients, the right wiki, the right chat, and ultimately the right people to live for a long long time. It improves slowly but steadily and this is what counts. I am sure it will still be strong and healthy when yours truly will become food for (gourmet I hope) worms 6 feet under the ground :-) and way beyond... Besides, good programming languages take a long time to die. We still hear about Cobol and Fortran which have been around for 50 years. But those who really want to ensure Tcl's longevity, those who really want to make a concrete gesture towards getting TCL known should do what * Will Duquette [Note book] * [JCW] [Tcl Kit] * Mark Roseman [Project Forum] * Brian Theado [TK outline] * The discrete programmer who wrote [Get Me Done] and a few others have done: write software for the general public. Everyone who, like me, will be able to open magically a new program with just a click of the mouse without any installation, will be curious about the language and will try to learn more. Will, Jean-Claude, Mark, Brian and the discrete programmer have given Tcl/Tk its visit cards and its credentials. But don't worry anyway about programming for programmers. There is a whole section of French literature which is called: literature for writers (le Nouveau Roman). They write experimental novels if you will (novels without a character, without a start, a turning point and an end). They don't sell a million copies of their books but still, a few thousand people are interested and this is what counts. Finally, a last point. Judging by the vitality of this site, Tcl will be around for a long long time. All in all I believe TCL's main strengths are this wiki, the chat, programmers mentioned above who write software for the general public, people like Mike Griffiths who make it a point of answering questions on the Ask and it shall be given pages and each and everyone who contributes to '''anything related to Tcl/Tk''' by bringing in their two cents worth. No. Really. There is nothing to worry about. I do worry about climate changes however. But that is another story for another day... ---- [Category Advocacy]