> If you aren't smart enough [to safely code a website in C...] the first clue that you aren't is that you think that you are
Gee, isn't that epistemology at its finest. Personally I've never met anyone who programmed in C because they were too dumb to learn anything else, but who knows. You may however be aware that, before an HTTP packet even makes it to your shiny, scripty web page, it's often processed by a succession of "segfault-y" and "arbitrary-code-running" software such as Apache and Linux.
I've never met anyone who programmed in C because they were too dumb to learn anything else
I have.
They were too dumb to understand that they were writing unsafe C code because they weren't skilled enough to write safe C code. So it never occurred to them that they had a problem that would be solved by writing part of their system in Python or Ruby or Java.
it's often processed by a succession of "segfault-y" and "arbitrary-code-running" software such w Apache and Linux
The vast majority of C programmers are much less skilled than Apache and Linux developers.
>They were too dumb to understand that they were writing unsafe C code
"Too dumb to catch vulnerabilities in their code" is a much wider category than "too dumb to learn anything else [besides C]". You're not really providing an example of the second.
>The vast majority of C programmers are much less skilled than Apache and Linux developers
So we agree that at least some C developers can write consistently safe code. So a person is not necessarily "not smart" just because of this language choice.
> it's often processed by a succession of "segfault-y" and "arbitrary-code-running" software such as Apache and Linux.
If your web code has ~20 years of security audits and fixes it's probably perfectly safe to use it. If you're adding large new features under tight deadlines I don't recommend it.
Gee, isn't that epistemology at its finest. Personally I've never met anyone who programmed in C because they were too dumb to learn anything else, but who knows. You may however be aware that, before an HTTP packet even makes it to your shiny, scripty web page, it's often processed by a succession of "segfault-y" and "arbitrary-code-running" software such as Apache and Linux.