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Ugly Common Lisp Data Type Questions

29 points by brewski 16y ago

KirinDave 16y ago
These questions are good, but there's something important to remember before drawing any real conclusions about common lisp: The spec is older than some few readers here at this site. Most useful programs deviate significantly from the spec in order to deliver features that modern systems consider essential but were not of tremendous import back when the spec was solidified. So yeah, Common Lisp (the spec) has a lot of weird warts, compromises, and holes. That's why modern lisps like Clojure, Nu, Racket and the like are so exciting: they're taking a set of very good ideas and moving them into our modern 2010 network-driven-high-throughput-SIMD-demanding cloud-computing-era. The syntax and the semantics of syntax manipulation coupled with procedure-oriented programming are a powerful cocktail that was only briefly given the popularity it deserves in our software engineering culture.
- tjr 16y ago
  Yes, good and fair questions. Indeed, Common Lisp isn't flawless or beautiful in every respect, and Steele would surely admit that himself. The Lisp concept is pretty beautiful, and CL, for better or worse, has been more ubituitous than most other dialects of Lisp. When I hear people (including myself) wax eloquent about the beauty of Lisp, even Common Lisp in particular, I don't take that to mean that every detail of the design is beautiful, but rather, the whole of Lisp / Common Lisp is a beautiful programming system. I can look out my office window here and see a beautiful tree, though I know upon closer inspection I could find some flaws and imperfections in the tree. Perhaps a branch has broken off, or maybe an animal has gnawed away at some bark. That doesn't do away with its overarching beauty.
  - KirinDave 16y ago
    Right. And there are features in common lisp that I really want to see escape into mainstream. Condition and signal handling, in particular, is an amazing thing that almost no language has a good answer to.
    - tomjen3 16y ago
      Yeah, I do hope they add conditions and restarts to C#5 (or any language that people will pay me to use).
- lelele 16y ago
  Right. However, if you ask about Common Lisp's warts on comp.lang.lisp - to avoid learning and following outdated design practices - lispers answer there aren't any.

29 points by brewski 16y ago

These questions are good, but there's something important to remember before drawing any real conclusions about common lisp: The spec is older than some few readers here at this site. Most useful programs deviate significantly from the spec in order to deliver features that modern systems consider essential but were not of tremendous import back when the spec was solidified. So yeah, Common Lisp (the spec) has a lot of weird warts, compromises, and holes. That's why modern lisps like Clojure, Nu, Racket and the like are so exciting: they're taking a set of very good ideas and moving them into our modern 2010 network-driven-high-throughput-SIMD-demanding cloud-computing-era. The syntax and the semantics of syntax manipulation coupled with procedure-oriented programming are a powerful cocktail that was only briefly given the popularity it deserves in our software engineering culture.

tjr 16y ago
Yes, good and fair questions. Indeed, Common Lisp isn't flawless or beautiful in every respect, and Steele would surely admit that himself. The Lisp concept is pretty beautiful, and CL, for better or worse, has been more ubituitous than most other dialects of Lisp. When I hear people (including myself) wax eloquent about the beauty of Lisp, even Common Lisp in particular, I don't take that to mean that every detail of the design is beautiful, but rather, the whole of Lisp / Common Lisp is a beautiful programming system. I can look out my office window here and see a beautiful tree, though I know upon closer inspection I could find some flaws and imperfections in the tree. Perhaps a branch has broken off, or maybe an animal has gnawed away at some bark. That doesn't do away with its overarching beauty.
- KirinDave 16y ago
  Right. And there are features in common lisp that I really want to see escape into mainstream. Condition and signal handling, in particular, is an amazing thing that almost no language has a good answer to.
  - tomjen3 16y ago
    Yeah, I do hope they add conditions and restarts to C#5 (or any language that people will pay me to use).
lelele 16y ago
Right. However, if you ask about Common Lisp's warts on comp.lang.lisp - to avoid learning and following outdated design practices - lispers answer there aren't any.