Mike Loukides on "scripting" languages:

So I really have to ask: what's the "scripting language mystique" all about? You don't have to run javac? Rubbish--I don't believe that's a big issue. You don't have to write declarations? Bull--writing declarations means (to me) that it's easier to debug misspelled variable names. That's a HUGE time saver. As Brett McLaughlin has often said, "whenever you can get the compiler to do the debugging, it's a win." Is it that scripting languages are better "glue" languages for calling UNIX utilities and other external programs? Well, I don't see why it's so difficult to call Runtime.exec(). The fact is--if you have some documentation, you can use Java to call into the guts of other Java programs, not just their external command-line interfaces. That's some pretty powerful glue. If you understand reflection or have been watching what's going on with lightweight containers like Spring, you've got real computation superglue.

He goes on to say that he can do various tasks easier in Java because he knows Java. That's fine - I can do things easier in Smalltalk for that reason as well. However, I've done C, C++, and some Java - so I think I have some grounds to do comparative criticism. Loukides though?

"I don't know (insert language here), so it must be harder than Java"

That's right Mike - stay in your cave. It's probably safer there.