On the Humane Interfaces flap

A curt note in passing on the flap about Martin Fowler’s article on Humane Interfaces, which was kicked up (and stirred some more and more) by Elliotte Rusty Harold:

Does anyone else get the impression that Harold is decrying the stuff in Ruby’s Array class purely on the basis of “I can’t think of any reason why I’d ever need this, therefore no one does”?

That’s only the oldest fallacy in the book.

His arguments against various methods sound as if he simply has too little experience with dynamic languages to appreciate their utility.

(Check the end of Fowler’s article for a list of notable responses, or see this summary with excerpts.)