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The Subjective Charms of Objective-C
The verbose programming language felt like a universal form of communication—until it didn't.
Computer scientists brave or crazy enough to build new languages chase their own characteristica universalis, a system that could allow developers to write code so expressive that it leaves no dark corners for bugs to hide and so self-evident that comments, documentation, and unit tests become unnecessary. The pair started a short-lived company to license the language and sell libraries of objects, and before it went belly up, they landed the client that would save their creation from falling into obscurity: NeXT, the computer firm Steve Jobs founded after his ouster from Apple. He reimagined the idea of an “alphabet of human thought” countless times, taking inspiration from mathematics, symbolic logic, hieroglyphics, musical notes, astronomical signs, and the four elements (earth, air, fire, and water).
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