Neal Ford talks about Language-Oriented Programming, Domain Specific Languages, and Language Workbenches in this video interview after his presentation at JavaOne. Martin Fowler indicated that "every non-trivial human behavior has a domain-specific language." Neal's presentation introduces us to LOP and DSLs by tailoring Java, Ruby and Groovy classes, objects and methods to address specific classes of problems. The goal is to create a programming model that is less reliant on obscure API calls with multiple arguments. Instead, try to map the DSL constructs to human-readable actions. The ultimate goal is to create an editable representation of the object model's abstraction without leaving room for ambiguities. Neal's complete JavaOne presentation is available for download (PDF format).

The presenter did sound a little like Borat to me. Nice video though. Here in the UK I think people would have been a bit more camera-shy (first video on that page), or a bit more dismissive of their own roles. Neal Ford sounded clued-up. I'll look for more from him.

The presentation seems pretty thin on language workbenches. Which is a petty since I was hoping for an alternative to Jetbrains MPS. The Jetbrains MPS team seem to be very much internally oriented to the point of it being an inaccessable product at this stage.

Great! Failing the idea of writing programs in a language that some human beings familiar with -- English (remember COBOL?) now some will repackage the languages of aliens as "domain language" and market to the human beings, starting at niche of those who make a living writing computer programs. I wish they learn how to properly name their classes and methods before they attempt to do so.