I tried to learn lisp, and this may sound like a trite complaint, but I honestly just could not deal with all the parenthesis. Terrible ergonomics.
Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
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Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#12OTOH, I remember reading somewhere that Tanenbaum was happy when Linux came out so that people would stop asking him to make Minix into a real "usable" operating system. There may be something to be said for letting Lisp remain more conceptual/ideal than practical and allowing other functional languages take on the "warts" associated with being used by everybody.
Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#13It’s more of a toolbox to build languages than a language.
So every commonlisp codebase has a different flavor, and anachronistic semantics.
No matter how good you are, this is difficult to deal with.
Sure, for config files or writing extensions for your favorite piece of software, you’d make the effort. But most software development is not in that category.
Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#14Because most programming is done by people trying to do a job and it requires broad tooling support and familiarity, LISP is a language that has neither.
LISP, (similarly to Haskell) requires you to bend your mind and pay an upfront mental cost in order to access it's benefits, which are that everything is equally easy to describe. No construct in LISP feels like it requires you to bend the language in an awful way because LISP is a fantastically generic tool, some things that are common and easy in other languages are more difficult in LISP, but as you get into the weeds building more complex constructs it will never get in your way.
(and since i mentioned it, the benefit of Haskell is that you can make a LOT of statements about your code you know to be true)
Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#15If Racket has what they're looking for and CL doesn't, then that's proof that the assertion is wrong, because Racket is far less popular than CL.
The correct answer to the question is the obvious one: the parentheses. Visually, semantically, practically, expressibly, and legibly. And the typelessness, and the ecosystem, and in general the idiosyncrasies, almost none of which add value.
All the standard counterarguments have been done to death, none of them are any good, but more importantly, they're not how popularity works.
Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#16Essentially all the Lisp features except for s-expression syntax and attendant macros have been adopted by popular mainstream languages. CL has already given everything it had to give.
The Common Lisp condition system is far superior to any alternative in any other language.
Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#17I love programming in common lisp. It has made programming fun again. I don't know if that makes me a lisp person. I just know it makes programming fun for me.
I'm curious if you can put your finger on exactly why you find it fun? (While I've never used CL, I do use Clojure and similarly find it huge amounts of fun.)
Clojure is a different beast, not better or worse, just different.
CL doesn't have opinions, it's a toolbox.
Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#18Because most programming is done by people trying to do a job and it requires broad tooling support and familiarity, LISP is a language that has neither. LISP, (similarly to Haskell) requires you to bend your mind and pay an upfront mental cost in order to access it's benefits, which are that everything is equally easy to describe. No construct in LISP feels like it requires you to bend the language in an awful way b…
the upfront mental cost debate is still going, a few people tried teachings lisps as first languages and people didn't struggle
i personally cried a few tears when learning java, whereas the weird drscheme class made me all calm and happy
programming also blends a few layers into one, and some people are operating at one (line by line modification of data), some want generic infinite freedom[0], you can rapidly see who will enjoy what there
[0] one trauma i got during studies is failing an exam because after reviewing ada's manual twice, I couldn't find the page explaining the `object'field` syntax and failed not being able to split a string. i never liked ad-hoc syntax much...
Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#19Package management kind of sucks, the ecosystem sucks, other languages continually improve but nobody will ever advance the CL standard. There is nothing compelling about the language to people who aren't already Lisp people.
it's paradoxical since lisp people weren't born this way, surely there was some appeal (beyond being influenced by teachings) ;)
Re: Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming language?
#20Essentially all the Lisp features except for s-expression syntax and attendant macros have been adopted by popular mainstream languages. CL has already given everything it had to give.
The Common Lisp condition system is far superior to any alternative in any other language.
wait a few years and some web language will "rediscover" it :p