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*Disclaimer I know nothing about German and very little about English Grammar*

In German there is a word called "Schadenfreude" whose literal translation into English is Schaden "damage" freude "joy". The actual meaning is roughly ...

  The experience of pleasure or joy, that comes from witnessing failures, or humiliation of another. 
Because of the "design" of the English language, it is difficult (but not impossible) to relate these complex emotions in the way it is done in German. Because of this we have to say "I am experiencing joy from seeing X person in pain" while the Germans get to say "I feel Schadenfreude". The German way is more succinct. Coincidentally in programming, there are problems which if you are just constrained to the syntax and semantics of your programming language, get solved by saying "I am experiencing joy from seeing X person in pain" instead of "Schadenfreude". By being able to create a new language with less friction than it has been in other programming langauges before, whose design allows you to solve your problem with the word "Schadenfreude" instead of "I am experiencing joy from seeing X person in pain", allows you to create programs that are more expressive, succinct, have less bugs, and be easier to maintain.


I'm imagining Marketing panicking when they hear us in Engineering:

Q: Can you explain the value proposition of DSLs?

A: Sadism.


You say that, but my (albeit weakly held, so CMV) theory is that any software engineering is just a form of creating a DSL, it just isn't generally explicit.

Given more expressive power, with appropriate training, it could be incredibly empowering, allowing for more expressive and maintainable systems.

It could also create an absolute mess, and some might argue that more power means more ways to shoot yourself in the foot, hence I think that kind of methodology requires the training up front and overall good software discipline.

I am a junior-mid developer so I know squat really.


>Q: Can you explain the value proposition of DSLs?

A: Cognitive Impedance Matching


Well, Schadenfreude is a loanword in English, albeit not common.


> Because of this we have to say "I am experiencing joy from seeing X person in pain" while the Germans get to say "I feel Schadenfreude". The German way is more succinct.

To be fair, in English we would just say schadenfreude today.

edit: I'm apparently blind and missed the same comment already made yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26134050

Guess I'm a day late and a buck short.




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