What has your newest language, kdb+, added to the evolution of Kx language technology?
Another jump in performance and productivity. With kdb+ we’ve merged the k and ksql languages into a single language for queries, time-series analysis and general programming. This means that customer programs will be smaller and faster to write. And the programmer has to learn only one language. In kdb+, which is the 4th generation of the k language, we’ve got a powerful algebra of lists and dictionaries (associative lists). The combination of lists and dictionaries makes up the relational tables. If you’re, say, a C++ programmer, what’s the best way to learn a vector language such as ksql? The only hard part is learning to manipulate tables — even if they have 100 billion rows — as if they were single objects. That’s a jump in abstract thinking for many people trained in languages that work with one item at a time. Kdb+ has no loops, which can take some getting used to. You like short programs and simple languages, some might say your languages are cryptic. Terse, yes. Cryptic, no.
