An Intuition for Lisp Syntax

Post by wtetzner » Mon, Oct 26, 2020, 1:41 PM UTC

username90 wrote: post #96

capableweb wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is or isn't readable can be judged by two qualities. The first one is if it's being familiar to what you're used to and the second one how long it takes to learn if you're not familiar with it. Now I learned C-like language before I learned Lisp-like languages, so that might be the reason I felt I understood Lisp way faster than I felt I understand C-like languages. There is simply less to learn about the langua…

> What is or isn't readable can be judged by two qualities. The first one is if it's being familiar to what you're used to and the second one how long it takes to learn if you're not familiar with it. So your argument is that all code is as easy to read as long as you have done the work to get familiar with it? I hope you understand that it is bullshit. Brainfuck isn't easier to understand than python no matter how m…

Post by stopachka » Mon, Oct 26, 2020, 1:43 PM UTC

masukomi wrote: post #116

a) great article b) "It can help you move with the speed of a sculptor"... This person has obviously never watched a sculptor. They are so slow compared to basically every other form of artistic visual representation.

Post by stopachka » Mon, Oct 26, 2020, 1:49 PM UTC

dualscyther wrote: post #108

I couldn't figure out how to email the author and I don't have twitter, but I found a few mistakes in the "More power" section that tripped me up a bit as I followed along, so just posting here in case it helps anyone else: The end of the second last code block should be: `data.instructions.forEach(...args.map(parseInstruction));` And the full definition of `data.instructions` that demonstrates the use of this modifi…

Post by eMSF » Mon, Oct 26, 2020, 1:58 PM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #99

jFriedensreich wrote: post #34

This is maybe the best introductions to Lisp i have seen, especially for a js dev like me it could hardly get more approachable and convincing. I could not help but thinking at the end, this is really awesome but s-expressions are kind of hard to read and reason about for my brain, it would be cool if we could generate them from more readable syntax, maybe something like javascript :D . Unfortunately the standard js…

> I could not help but thinking at the end, this is really awesome but s-expressions are kind of hard to read and reason about for my brain is (map foo '(1 2 3)) that more difficult than: [1, 2, 3].map(foo) ? Or: (let ((array #(1 2 3 4 5))) (vector-set! array 0 3) (vector-ref array 0)) that more difficult than: let array = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]; array[0]=3 array[0]

  (* (f (+ 2 x)) 5)

  5 * f(x+2)

Post by Joker_vD » Mon, Oct 26, 2020, 1:59 PM UTC

wtetzner wrote: post #117

Joker_vD wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. It's all personal, of course, but I find that the typographical variety of "traditional" languages with syntax makes it way easier to me to read/parse them than LISP. Parens, parens, everywhere, nor a drop of structure. And when it comes to macros and (pseudo)-quoting, the LISP is hands down more obnoxious (again, for me) than, say, Python's f"{}".

> It's all personal, of course, but I find that the typographical variety of "traditional" languages with syntax makes it way easier to me to read/parse them than LISP. I wonder how much of that has to do with your familiarity with "traditional" language syntax. For example, when I started writing Lisp, I had a similar opinion. But I write Clojure professionally for a while, and that disappeared. Now I haven't writte…