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Why Lisp? (2015)

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Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#131

Post by anthk »

dunefox wrote: post #130
anthk wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

C's succesor is either Go or Plan9/9front's C. Outside of "Unix 2.0", you have Go. Please, do not compare Java and C++ against C, C++ is a monster it should never have born, and Java it's a shitty TCL "alternative" from its era.

If anything zig or rust are the successor, Go is a language from the 90s. We can agree on C++ and java, though.

Go is a rehash of Alef/Limbo. Is not from the 90's.

If you say so, we could say the same on Zig.

BTW, UTF-8 dates back to the 90's, good luck finding a better alternative. And TCP/IP it's even older, but it works.

Something being newer doesn't make it better.

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#132

Post by anthk »

hasmanean wrote: post #8

Lisp probably was invented in the age of the typewriter. If you look at mathematical notation, written with quill pens and paper…it’s even more concise. Functions are like lisp, f(x). Vectors are laid out on the page in an array and surrounded by two strokes. Matrices are a 2d array surrounded by two straight lines. This whole approach seems as archaic as Roman numerals is for representing numbers (they were based on…

Lips dates back to Lambda calculus and the Church notation.

Far from a typewriter.

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#133

Post by throw10920 »

codr7 wrote: post #29
mbil wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Finding solid libraries is tricky since it's not very popular professionally. If we're considering Clojure, then I would argue this point isn't true. Java interoperability in Clojure is really well supported and easy to accomplish, so leaning on the massive Java library ecosystem is possible. Also, anecdotally, a lot of Clojure libraries appear to be defunct, but just actually haven't been updated in so long becaus…

Well, if we're going to venture that far into excuse land Common Lisp has access to every C library in the world through CFFI. Look, I love Lisp, but reality isn't going anywhere.

This is a variant of the "Turing tarpit" fallacy - that is, saying that all things that are technically possible are equivalent.

Calling Java code in Clojure is completely seamless[1] - there's a world of difference from the CL FFI (which isn't that bad to use), which is turn easier to use than the CPython FFI.

You might as well say that C is just as powerful as Common Lisp, because you can implement Common Lisp in it. Ergonomics matter.

The point of a library is that you're supposed to be able to use its interface without worrying about the code underneath - so, Clojure does have access to the entire Java ecosystem.

My comment about lack of libraries was mostly referring to non-Clojures - CL in particular, but my argument also applies to Scheme and Racket and others.

[1] http://xahlee.info/clojure/clojure_calling_java.html

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#134

Post by bmitc »

brabel wrote: post #86
bmitc wrote: post #80

I love Lisp and Scheme and all their relatives (Clojure, Logo, Racket, etc.). However, the fact of the matter is, Common Lisp has not kept up with modern developments in terms of presenting a cohesive ecosystem with forward momentum. Everybody is off on their own doing their own thing with no shared goals or cohesion. Clojure seems to have this (I have not used Clojure much, so I don't really know). Elixir definitely…

> ... it goes well beyond any Lisp/Scheme (and many modern languages) in terms of having a practical but expansive ecosystem with a strong set of idiomatic conventions. Does it, really?? Common Lisp is an ANSI Standard, I don't know how you get a more "strong set of idiomatic conventions" than that. And it's been "done" for 20 years now! People continue to use it just as it is, and there's very little pressure to cha…

This type of response is also why Common Lisp isn’t more popular. :)

Having a standard has little to do with how people write code, which is what I meant by idiomatic conventions.

Elixir is not a “cool, hyped” language in the sense that you mean. Elixir is basically a wrapper around Erlang and OTP, which is an old technology (much older than ANSI Common Lisp), that provides several improvements in terms of developer tools and frameworks. It’s not just the next “cool” thing. It’s an incremental improvement on an old and tested technology to bring that technology to more developers. It has also been embraced by the Erlang community.

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#135

Post by vindarel »

aviatorspoon wrote: post #121
bumbada wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is because it is a little secret. It is a secret hidden in the open. We program in C#, we program in swift, C and C++, but we continue using so much Lisp as I did 20 years ago or way more. With Lisp you don't need to write only Lisp, you can write swift or any other language in Lisp, as we do. When people ask what programming languages we use, even competitors, we just tell them. They don't listen. They just can…

> Lisp guys have nothing to sell you but probably the software they create. And if they have a powerful tool, they are not that interested on you knowing their secret. This level of claim is indistinguishable from fiction.

and yet we have a company that kind of said that recently (https://lisp-journey.gitlab.io/blog/lisp-interview-kina/):

> I really like the Common Lisp world. *I would like it to be more popular, but at the same time, it is a differentiator for us*.

they reached to us so we add Kina on awesome-lisp-companies. But how many more think the same? And still, they evidently put little effort in making CL more "popular", because they have no interest. They found enough open-source libraries, they work on a hard problem, they form their developers and operators in-house, they develop their own Lisp-like language for the browser… and they silently use the power of SBCL.

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#136

Post by IshKebab »

Zababa wrote: post #30

That article partially validates my idea on why some people think that Lisp is such a force multiplier. The idea would be that compilers are one of the most important tool productivity-wise, and that Lisp allows you write your compilers yourself. That would also explain why not Lisp: First, libaries are the new important tool for productivity, and any language can have that. Second, a shared understanding is very imp…

Coffeescript, Babel and Typescript are not macros.

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#137

Post by lisper »

medo-bear wrote: post #93
lisper wrote: post #84

I guess I'm a little late to the party, but... author here. AMA. :-)

do you still use lisp ? i noticed a while ago you were working on a cryptographic project and i am sure you considered common lisp for this, but didn't pick it. is there a reason for this ?

Yes. In fact, I do almost all of my coding in Common Lisp. I'm even getting paid for some of it :-) I'm working part time for Intel helping them maintain an internal design tool written in CL. I run my own email server that runs a spam filter that I wrote in CL, and the e-commerce system that processes orders for my crypto dongle is written in CL. As an exercise I wrote a sudoku solver in CL a while back.

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#138

Post by jimbob45 »

Lisp seems a lot like Linq to me where it's an undeniably cool part of a language but crucially, just a part. If you plop Linq down on someone's lap, they're not going to know what to do with it. If you give someone Linq in the context of C#, suddenly it's the greatest thing you've ever laid eyes on.

Likewise, if you're using Lisp within the context of some other language for scripting, it's fucking phenomenal. If you try to use it on its own to build a whole project from 0 to 100, you're going to be confused as to why you're not using a different language.

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#139

Post by bmitc »

medo-bear wrote: post #98
bmitc wrote: post #80

I love Lisp and Scheme and all their relatives (Clojure, Logo, Racket, etc.). However, the fact of the matter is, Common Lisp has not kept up with modern developments in terms of presenting a cohesive ecosystem with forward momentum. Everybody is off on their own doing their own thing with no shared goals or cohesion. Clojure seems to have this (I have not used Clojure much, so I don't really know). Elixir definitely…

can you write compilers in elixir ? how does its interactive programming compare to that of Lisp ?

I don't claim that Elixir is the language to end all languages. My comment was more about the holistic ecosystem that keeps improving. There's one common development and project management tool (Mix). There's one package manager (Hex). There's OTP, Ecto, Phoenix, Liveview, etc. There's the Elixir Forum for questions.

I'd use F# for writing compilers.

Interactive programming is probably better in Common Lisp and also Smalltalk descendants like Pharo. But Elixir has some great interactive tooling. I think this is an excellent presentation that summarizes the capability (not necessarily saying other languages don't) in terms of real world applications: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvBT4XBdoUE

Re: Why Lisp? (2015)

#140

Post by bmitc »

hajile wrote: post #72
gaze wrote: post #69

Why does it feel like there’s more prose about lisp being written than lisp code? I swear there’s like 15 people writing Common Lisp — Nikodemus, Shirakumo, Stylewarning, Christian Schafmeister, Borodust, the ITA folks, and maybe 2 startups.

There are three commercial lisp companies that continue to exist selling CL platforms. They exist despite SBCL being faster. They even make stuff like tools to build iOS and Android apps in CL. They didn't invest the money building that that out for no reason. The companies that use lisp don't tend to talk about it. For example, a company I worked for only talked about their Ruby/rails and javascript stuff publicly.…

What are the three companies? I know of Allegro CL and LispWorks.
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