Live data from Hacker News

Clean – A functional programming language

clean.cs.ru.nl

61–68 of 68 posts

Re: Clean – A functional programming language

#61

It's kind of a bummer to me that the one of the top comments here is about the syntax. I get that people have syntax preferences and that there's a certain level of "sniff" test that goes along with these things, but as a fan of programming languages I am always interested in the semantics. That is, I'm interested in what's different about this language and its combination of features and goals: http://clean.cs.ru.nl…

"It's kind of a bummer to me that the one of the top comments here is about the syntax. "I get that people have syntax preferences and that there's a certain level of "sniff" test that goes along with these things, but as a fan of programming languages I am always interested in the semantics." Well, as the syntax commenter, perhaps I'm a bit defensive but I feel like syntax is inherently an important part of what mak…

I agree with most of what you say, and I'm sorry I should have been clear that I don't think your comment is without merit. In truth, I am reacting more to the general direction I see in PL discussion on HN (which is what I should have said but was too lazy to find other examples).

> To take it further, I'm pretty sure if you only absolutely only wanted features for manipulating things

I feel like lisp fits this bill to some degree. Being the AST itself it is "without syntax" to some degree. I wonder if you dislike Lisps? I can't really tell you what this means with regards to our discussion I'm just curious.

> And I, too, like programming language and I feel what makes a language as such cool/useful/etc is that you express a computer's action in a compact, elegant and clear fashion for one's fellow human beings.

Definitely! I would never suggest that we should entirely ignore how the syntax affects our ability to read the code but, to borrow the lisp example again, I don't care about typing lots of parenthesis if I'm otherwise effective.

Again, your earlier comment is not unfounded and I appreciate where you are coming from.

Re: Clean – A functional programming language

#62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does Rust make it any easier?

All clauses are defined within curly brackets like C so indentation has no meaning and you can let tools take care of that.

But is it any easier to tell which clause an else is connected to? Python has tools too.

Re: Clean – A functional programming language

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It's kind of a bummer to me that the one of the top comments here is about the syntax. "I get that people have syntax preferences and that there's a certain level of "sniff" test that goes along with these things, but as a fan of programming languages I am always interested in the semantics." Well, as the syntax commenter, perhaps I'm a bit defensive but I feel like syntax is inherently an important part of what mak…

I agree with most of what you say, and I'm sorry I should have been clear that I don't think your comment is without merit. In truth, I am reacting more to the general direction I see in PL discussion on HN (which is what I should have said but was too lazy to find other examples). > To take it further, I'm pretty sure if you only absolutely only wanted features for manipulating things I feel like lisp fits this bill…

Thanks for the generous reply,

I'll admit my professional work has been limited to C++, python, Ruby, PL/SQL, Matlab and small DSLs. I've played lisp and the-fp-languages in college. Lisp and the-fp-language both seemed to at least have clean, simple syntax rules.

I started using Ruby both it was hip and because it's free form syntax was really fun. If there were languages I definitely to learn, I would be less critical about syntax and style.

My original comment on Clean's syntax wasn't intended as a full judgment on the language but simply a reaction, a reaction I shared because it seems like subjective impressions of syntax matter for the reasons I mention above.

Re: Clean – A functional programming language

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're describing is the exact same, just different syntax.

Yes, we are talking about syntax. OP's first four words: "The thing about syntax".

No, the comment replied to has the first four words "Might be cool to". The differences are so minuscule that the argument could be made for it to be 2 differing standards for the same language.

Re: Clean – A functional programming language

#65
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're describing is the exact same, just different syntax.

That's the whole point. Syntax can be very influential in how people use (or don't) a language

Yes and no. For what I replied to is essentially garden shedding the language. The overall problem is grasping the concepts, weather or not you want es6 style lambdas, or proper haskell function definitions is irrelevant if you don't understand the concepts.

Re: Clean – A functional programming language

#66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All clauses are defined within curly brackets like C so indentation has no meaning and you can let tools take care of that.

But is it any easier to tell which clause an else is connected to? Python has tools too.

When you refactor, yes. In python, say you add a new condition inside a condition, it's really easy to get lost and indent the wrong one to the wrong level.

Re: Clean – A functional programming language

#67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, we are talking about syntax. OP's first four words: "The thing about syntax".

No, the comment replied to has the first four words "Might be cool to". The differences are so minuscule that the argument could be made for it to be 2 differing standards for the same language.

I don't understand your point, much less why you're using the "first four words" thing back at me on my own comment.

The differences may be miniscule. They are syntactic. "Might be cool to" have this other syntax. You're just belaboring the obvious.

Re: Clean – A functional programming language

#68
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

C won befoee package managers and Linux distributions existed.

Because it was the language of UNIX distributions (not called that, but it's the same concept).

They went hand in hand. I know lots of people that installed Linux in the 90s so they could use GCC.
Post reply on HN