site: faq: history: today's cleanup/brighten-up

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Simon Michael 2016-02-19 19:55:37 -08:00
parent 176f27a884
commit 00656e62bf

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@ -10,10 +10,12 @@ I discovered John Wiegley's [Ledger](http://ledger-cli.org) in 2006,
and was very happy to find this efficient command-line reporting tool with a transparent data format.
Initially, I used it to generate time reports for my job.
Before long I wanted that to work a little differently - splitting the transaction at day boundaries, reporting in hours, etc.
John had got busy elsewhere and the Ledger project now entered a fairly long period of stagnation, with persistent bugs, documentation problems, and a confusing release situation.
I did what I could to help build momentum in the Ledger project, reporting bugs, supporting newcomers, and contributing a new domain and website.
But, I didn't want to spend time learning C++. I was learning Haskell, which I did want to spend time in.
Before long I wanted that to work differently - splitting sessions at day boundaries, reporting in hours, etc.
John had got busy elsewhere and the Ledger project now stalled, with unfixed bugs, wrong documentation and a confusing release situation persisting for a long time.
I did what I could to help build momentum, reporting bugs, supporting newcomers, and contributing a new domain and website.
But, I didn't want to spend time learning C++.
I was learning Haskell, which I did want to spend time in.
I felt Ledger could be implemented well and, in the long run, more efficiently in that language,
which has some compelling advantages such as lower maintenance costs.
<!-- ([eg](http://neilmitchell.blogspot.com/2016/02/selling-haskell-in-pub.html)). -->
@ -21,13 +23,14 @@ which has some compelling advantages such as lower maintenance costs.
<!-- allowing more bug-free, concise and maintainable software. It provides -->
<!-- a more abstracted, portable platform making installation easier. It is -->
<!-- attractive for contributors to work on.) -->
I urgently needed a reliable accounting tool that I enjoyed using.
I also wanted to see what I could do to reduce roadbumps and confusion for newcomers.
I couldn't expect John to start over - at that time he was not the Haskell fan he is now.
I couldn't expect John to start over - at that time he was not the Haskell fan he is now!
So in 2007 I began experimenting.
I built a toy parser in a few different languages, and it was easiest in Haskell.
I kept tinkering. Goals included:
I kept tinkering.
Goals included:
- to get better at Haskell by building something useful to me,
- to learn how well Haskell could work for real-world applications,