Lisp implementation in sed • Hacker News Board

Re: Lisp implementation in sed

#61

Post by ibrahima » Sat, Jun 28, 2014, 7:30 PM UTC

quotemstr wrote: post #10

sejje wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this was (the only available) programming, I'd quit. Kudos, I think, to the author. His pain tolerance exceeds mine by a vast amount.

> If this was (the only available) programming, I'd quit. We started with nothing, remember? Just the bare metal. If this were the only available programming, I'd write an interpreter for a better language. Never imagine that your current suite of tools is all there is.

I would much rather hand assemble machine code than program in sed. I imagine most people have a better understanding of how computer architecture works than how to do arithmetic and logic with sed.

Re: Lisp implementation in sed

#62

Post by Crito » Sat, Jun 28, 2014, 8:38 PM UTC

mbrock wrote: post #56

Crito wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that Lisp got a reputation for being unreadable because some Lisp programmers have the tendency to get too far into macros to extend the language, resulting in a language that other developers have not seen before.

I think that's pretty much a straw man. Where is all this terrible macro-laden Lisp code? Well, it's probably not totally made up, but you run into overcomplicated abstractions in every language. Somehow it seems more likely that people are put off by the slightly "isolationist" culture of Lisp, or the historical clash between Lisp and Unix, or whatever, and then this "unreadable" idea is like a rationalization for n…

I'm not justifying Lisp's reputation, I am trying to explain it. Whether Lisp's reputation is justified or not is immaterial to my comment. Personally, I believe that the reputation is not justified.

Re: Lisp implementation in sed

#63

Post by bane » Sun, Jun 29, 2014, 2:57 AM UTC

So I guess if all languages are eventually converging on Lisp, are all Lisps eventually converging on sed? Is sed the bottom turtle or are there more?

Re: Lisp implementation in sed

#64

Post by dghf » Sun, Jun 29, 2014, 8:29 AM UTC

sfk wrote: post #58

lispm wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(defun grade (student) (cond ((excellent-work student) :a+) ((okay-stuff student) (if (tried-hard student) :b :b-)) (t :c)))

I'm always amazed that I hardly ever program in Lisp and yet these short snippets are more readable than any other language.

Yes, I've never understood why

    dostuff(x)

is considered so much more readable than

    (dostuff x)