4 ms·

I am curious why is hackernews always so happy and obsessed with lisp, there is almost daily a lisp post on the frontpage. I dont really care/mind but I am just

by Sjenk 9y ago

I am curious why is hackernews always so happy and obsessed with lisp, there is almost daily a lisp post on the frontpage. I dont really care/mind but I am just curious as why people love lisp so much. The only thing that I notice about Lisp are the bracket jokes and memes.

kovrik 9y ago
Because lisps are unique and cool. Really, they are quite special.
tombert 9y ago
Lisp is one of those languages that, once I learned it (Clojure in my case), I started wondering why every language wasn't more like it. Once you get used to the parentheses and whatnot, it's actually an incredibly beautiful language that gives you the ability to augment the language without waiting for updates via its elegant macro system.
jdmoreira 9y ago
Lisps have properties that are not so common in other languages: - Homoiconicity: Code and data are the same (s-expressions) - Lisp code is basically the AST in itself - It's trivial to implement lisp in lisp (eval) - Continuations (call/cc) - Macros - etc... It's a truly fascinating language. I never really did any Lisp coding outside some university projects and I still obsess and read about Scheme all the time.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
metaobject 9y ago
Paul Graham and Robert Morris built one of the first web applications (that's a PG claim, btw) that allowed users to build their own, separate websites that had shopping carts, custom UI, etc. They wrote the app in Common Lisp and claimed that it was their secret weapon which allowed them to iterate faster and stay ahead of their competition. They ended up selling their company (ViaWeb) to Yahoo for $50 million (IIRC). PG also authored two books on Lisp, and HN is written in Arc (a Lisp built on top of Racket). Around 2005 I was doing a lot of Lisp programming and I was really interested in what PG had to say. He was writing a lot of essays then and giving lots of talks, etc. Unfortunately, I don't get the opportunity to use Lisp as much as I used to, but I'm doing a lot of Python and even played around with Hy (Lisp on top of Python). So I'm interested in Lisp as I find it to be an incredibly powerful language that is really fun to use.
josmar 9y ago
After being a user of languages for a long time, writing my own LISP was the experience of leaving Platons cave and seeing what the thing I use daily really is made of. What is "if"? What is a boolean, a variable, a function? It's a beautiful thing. I wish I would never have to climb down into the cave (languages with more advanced parsers) again.
- spc476 9y ago
  You climed in the wrong direction. What you want is assembly. That's where software ends up. Also, it's interpreters all the way down. Even assembly is interpreted.
  - cabaalis 9y ago
    >Also, it's interpreters all the way down. Even assembly is interpreted. Speak truth to power. Every time someone says this there seem to be nothing but haters.
    - omginternets 9y ago
      >Even assembly is interpreted. Could you please elaborate on this point? I'm still very much in the cave.
      - spc476 9y ago
        I'll use x86-32 for elaboration [1]. When the CPU sees the byte sequence 0xB8 0x90 0x41 0x5A 0x7B, it has to interpet what those bytes mean. It sees the 0xB8, so then it knows that you are loading the EAX register with an immedate value. The next four bytes (0x90, 0x41, 0x5A, 0x7B) are read and stored into EAX (as 0x7B5A4190, because Intel is little endian). That is the case for all instructions. Each one is interpreted by the CPU. And for modern CPUs, even translated into an internal format that is futher interpreted. [1] Sans power right now. Using my cellphone as a hot-spot and my iPad as a laptop. The aftermath of hurricanes is brutal in Florida.
Sjenk 9y ago
Thanks for all the explanations. Now I understand why u guys get excited from it. Almost sounds to good to be true.
flavio81 9y ago
>I am just curious as why people love lisp so much. Lisp is addictive, like a hard drug. Lisp is the original "programmable programming language". Experienced programmers with no previous knowledge of Lisp should relish (or doubt in disbelief) at the features provided. Lisp, at least Common Lisp (but other Lisp dialects as well) might claim to be the most powerful and versatile programming language (and environment) available. CL can run pretty fast. At the same speed than Java on the oracle JVM, and if some tricks are applied it should match C and Fortran speed under certain conditions. CL code is extremely portable. Lisp has been used for very high level tasks (AI, etc) and for low level tasks (operating systems for Lisp machines).
dragandj 9y ago
> The only thing that I notice about Lisp are the bracket jokes and memes. You have also noticed that lots of people use it to create cool things which reach the HN front page.
- kazinator 9y ago
  Including the front page itself.

by Sjenk 9y ago

kovrik 9y ago

Because lisps are unique and cool. Really, they are quite special.

tombert 9y ago

Lisp is one of those languages that, once I learned it (Clojure in my case), I started wondering why every language wasn't more like it. Once you get used to the parentheses and whatnot, it's actually an incredibly beautiful language that gives you the ability to augment the language without waiting for updates via its elegant macro system.

jdmoreira 9y ago

Lisps have properties that are not so common in other languages: - Homoiconicity: Code and data are the same (s-expressions) - Lisp code is basically the AST in itself - It's trivial to implement lisp in lisp (eval) - Continuations (call/cc) - Macros - etc... It's a truly fascinating language. I never really did any Lisp coding outside some university projects and I still obsess and read about Scheme all the time.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

metaobject 9y ago

Paul Graham and Robert Morris built one of the first web applications (that's a PG claim, btw) that allowed users to build their own, separate websites that had shopping carts, custom UI, etc. They wrote the app in Common Lisp and claimed that it was their secret weapon which allowed them to iterate faster and stay ahead of their competition. They ended up selling their company (ViaWeb) to Yahoo for $50 million (IIRC). PG also authored two books on Lisp, and HN is written in Arc (a Lisp built on top of Racket). Around 2005 I was doing a lot of Lisp programming and I was really interested in what PG had to say. He was writing a lot of essays then and giving lots of talks, etc. Unfortunately, I don't get the opportunity to use Lisp as much as I used to, but I'm doing a lot of Python and even played around with Hy (Lisp on top of Python). So I'm interested in Lisp as I find it to be an incredibly powerful language that is really fun to use.

josmar 9y ago

After being a user of languages for a long time, writing my own LISP was the experience of leaving Platons cave and seeing what the thing I use daily really is made of. What is "if"? What is a boolean, a variable, a function? It's a beautiful thing. I wish I would never have to climb down into the cave (languages with more advanced parsers) again.

spc476 9y ago
You climed in the wrong direction. What you want is assembly. That's where software ends up. Also, it's interpreters all the way down. Even assembly is interpreted.
- cabaalis 9y ago
  >Also, it's interpreters all the way down. Even assembly is interpreted. Speak truth to power. Every time someone says this there seem to be nothing but haters.
  - omginternets 9y ago
    >Even assembly is interpreted. Could you please elaborate on this point? I'm still very much in the cave.
    - spc476 9y ago
      I'll use x86-32 for elaboration [1]. When the CPU sees the byte sequence 0xB8 0x90 0x41 0x5A 0x7B, it has to interpet what those bytes mean. It sees the 0xB8, so then it knows that you are loading the EAX register with an immedate value. The next four bytes (0x90, 0x41, 0x5A, 0x7B) are read and stored into EAX (as 0x7B5A4190, because Intel is little endian). That is the case for all instructions. Each one is interpreted by the CPU. And for modern CPUs, even translated into an internal format that is futher interpreted. [1] Sans power right now. Using my cellphone as a hot-spot and my iPad as a laptop. The aftermath of hurricanes is brutal in Florida.

Sjenk 9y ago

Thanks for all the explanations. Now I understand why u guys get excited from it. Almost sounds to good to be true.

flavio81 9y ago

>I am just curious as why people love lisp so much. Lisp is addictive, like a hard drug. Lisp is the original "programmable programming language". Experienced programmers with no previous knowledge of Lisp should relish (or doubt in disbelief) at the features provided. Lisp, at least Common Lisp (but other Lisp dialects as well) might claim to be the most powerful and versatile programming language (and environment) available. CL can run pretty fast. At the same speed than Java on the oracle JVM, and if some tricks are applied it should match C and Fortran speed under certain conditions. CL code is extremely portable. Lisp has been used for very high level tasks (AI, etc) and for low level tasks (operating systems for Lisp machines).

dragandj 9y ago

> The only thing that I notice about Lisp are the bracket jokes and memes. You have also noticed that lots of people use it to create cool things which reach the HN front page.

kazinator 9y ago
Including the front page itself.