5 ms·

Common Lisp Koans

100 points by galois198 11y ago

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
ihuman 11y ago
I'm surprised to see that this is on Google's Github page. Do they have any projects (besides this) that use Common Lisp?
- chaitanya 11y ago
  They bought ITA Software a few years ago, which largely used Common Lisp.
  - bch 11y ago
    And additionally employ Peter Norvig[0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Norvig https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Norvig
- tsuru 11y ago
  I think they also use Common Lisp with their work on D-wave quantum computers. I'd still wager the ITA group has the lion share of Lisp though.
- mapcars 11y ago
  They also have a style guide: https://google.github.io/styleguide/lispguide.xml https://google.github.io/styleguide/lispguide.xml
sdfin 11y ago
Is there any reason today to study Common Lisp instead of a more popular and evolving Lisp, like Clojure or Racket?
- mapcars 11y ago
  Yes, they are _completely_ different languages, despite being lisps.
  - sdfin 11y ago
    Thanks. Any suggestion about with which one to start? I don't believe that I'd use them for work or for many personal projects, but I've read about the advantages of learning FP. So I'd like to learn something that teaches me to think about programming in a different way and be able to apply those insights into the code I write in Java or other procedural or OO languages used at work.
    - mapcars 11y ago
      OCaml, Haskell and friends will give you best FP insights. Common Lisp is far beyond these categories =)
    - yenda 11y ago
      Clojure is definitely a perfect fit for you then, you can even interop with your Java code.
- mapcars 11y ago
  btw, your question assumes that Common Lisp is not evolving. This is not correct at all. Which improvements Clojure evolving consists of? Transducers? Cl got them too: https://github.com/aamedina/transducers https://github.com/aamedina/transducers Transactional memory? http://stmx.org/ http://stmx.org/ ClojureScript? http://davazp.net/jscl/jscl.html http://davazp.net/jscl/jscl.html These are only infrastructure things, Common Lisp has language features which are just impossible in Clojure while it based on JVM.
  - coldtea 11y ago
    >btw, your question assumes that Common Lisp is not evolving. This is not correct at all. Which improvements Clojure evolving consists of? Traction for one. >Transducers? Cl got them too Pointing to some random libs that implement the same concept doesn't mean it's part of a languages culture/ecosystem/common practice as transducers are to closure. E.g. I could say "Rails? Well, language X has a rails like framework too", but that wouldn't mean you get the same benefits of using that framework over rails, when you include language adoption, community vibrancy, availability of programmers to hire, tooling, books, etc.

100 points by galois198 11y ago

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

I'm surprised to see that this is on Google's Github page. Do they have any projects (besides this) that use Common Lisp?

chaitanya 11y ago
They bought ITA Software a few years ago, which largely used Common Lisp.
- bch 11y ago
  And additionally employ Peter Norvig[0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Norvig https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Norvig
tsuru 11y ago
I think they also use Common Lisp with their work on D-wave quantum computers. I'd still wager the ITA group has the lion share of Lisp though.
mapcars 11y ago
They also have a style guide: https://google.github.io/styleguide/lispguide.xml https://google.github.io/styleguide/lispguide.xml

sdfin 11y ago

Is there any reason today to study Common Lisp instead of a more popular and evolving Lisp, like Clojure or Racket?

mapcars 11y ago
Yes, they are _completely_ different languages, despite being lisps.
- sdfin 11y ago
  Thanks. Any suggestion about with which one to start? I don't believe that I'd use them for work or for many personal projects, but I've read about the advantages of learning FP. So I'd like to learn something that teaches me to think about programming in a different way and be able to apply those insights into the code I write in Java or other procedural or OO languages used at work.
  - mapcars 11y ago
    OCaml, Haskell and friends will give you best FP insights. Common Lisp is far beyond these categories =)
  - yenda 11y ago
    Clojure is definitely a perfect fit for you then, you can even interop with your Java code.
mapcars 11y ago
btw, your question assumes that Common Lisp is not evolving. This is not correct at all. Which improvements Clojure evolving consists of? Transducers? Cl got them too: https://github.com/aamedina/transducers https://github.com/aamedina/transducers Transactional memory? http://stmx.org/ http://stmx.org/ ClojureScript? http://davazp.net/jscl/jscl.html http://davazp.net/jscl/jscl.html These are only infrastructure things, Common Lisp has language features which are just impossible in Clojure while it based on JVM.
- coldtea 11y ago
  >btw, your question assumes that Common Lisp is not evolving. This is not correct at all. Which improvements Clojure evolving consists of? Traction for one. >Transducers? Cl got them too Pointing to some random libs that implement the same concept doesn't mean it's part of a languages culture/ecosystem/common practice as transducers are to closure. E.g. I could say "Rails? Well, language X has a rails like framework too", but that wouldn't mean you get the same benefits of using that framework over rails, when you include language adoption, community vibrancy, availability of programmers to hire, tooling, books, etc.