4 ms·

Factor's Visual REPL

46 points by alec 16y ago

swah 16y ago
If only I could install an alternative syntax...
- Avshalom 16y ago
  How much of an alternative syntax do you want? Factors at least as flexible as a lisp
  - krakensden 16y ago
    Yeah, but for some reason keeping track of flow is much harder. I've tried to use Factor a couple times, but I eventually just get lost in trying to make the logic work. Slava Pestov and his crew have done a really tremendous job at the language and environment, though. Everyone should play around with it once or twice :)
  - swah 16y ago
    Yes, a Lisp. I want to write Lisp for Factor. dup swap only gets you so far. Slava's posts are very enlightening, how he decomposes problems into a million words. But in practice, it just takes me too much time to solve problems (that don't involve just calling a library). [edit] Even though you could say I could write code using locals and stuff, but that doesn't feel natural. Or I'm just used to prefix, or prefix is better for some reason. (+ 10 (* 20 30)) looks better to me than 20 30 * 10 +, even though, as Factor folks will tell you, concatenative languages are the ones with the "direct" syntax: Lisp is the one inverted. [edit 2] Another annoying thing: programming in Factor forces you to make a name for code you wouldn't normally name. Again, folks will say that that actually makes your program better, more testable, etc. In practice: harder.
    - slava_pestov 16y ago
      > I want to write Lisp for Factor. That would be a cool project. The Factor compiler enforces static stack effects for words, so mapping them to Lisp functions, and making the generated code efficient, should be pretty doable.
      - swah 16y ago
        How, or in which level would a Lisp be integrated with Factor? Generate Factor code, generate Factor-VM bytecode?
- spooneybarger 16y ago
  Forth was my first language so I'm quite comfortable with it.
senki 16y ago
Racket has something similar. You can insert images to the source code, draw new images to the REPL, etc. http://docs.racket-lang.org/quick/index.html http://docs.racket-lang.org/quick/index.html

46 points by alec 16y ago

swah 16y ago

If only I could install an alternative syntax...

Avshalom 16y ago
How much of an alternative syntax do you want? Factors at least as flexible as a lisp
- krakensden 16y ago
  Yeah, but for some reason keeping track of flow is much harder. I've tried to use Factor a couple times, but I eventually just get lost in trying to make the logic work. Slava Pestov and his crew have done a really tremendous job at the language and environment, though. Everyone should play around with it once or twice :)
- swah 16y ago
  Yes, a Lisp. I want to write Lisp for Factor. dup swap only gets you so far. Slava's posts are very enlightening, how he decomposes problems into a million words. But in practice, it just takes me too much time to solve problems (that don't involve just calling a library). [edit] Even though you could say I could write code using locals and stuff, but that doesn't feel natural. Or I'm just used to prefix, or prefix is better for some reason. (+ 10 (* 20 30)) looks better to me than 20 30 * 10 +, even though, as Factor folks will tell you, concatenative languages are the ones with the "direct" syntax: Lisp is the one inverted. [edit 2] Another annoying thing: programming in Factor forces you to make a name for code you wouldn't normally name. Again, folks will say that that actually makes your program better, more testable, etc. In practice: harder.
  - slava_pestov 16y ago
    > I want to write Lisp for Factor. That would be a cool project. The Factor compiler enforces static stack effects for words, so mapping them to Lisp functions, and making the generated code efficient, should be pretty doable.
    - swah 16y ago
      How, or in which level would a Lisp be integrated with Factor? Generate Factor code, generate Factor-VM bytecode?
spooneybarger 16y ago
Forth was my first language so I'm quite comfortable with it.

senki 16y ago

Racket has something similar. You can insert images to the source code, draw new images to the REPL, etc. http://docs.racket-lang.org/quick/index.html http://docs.racket-lang.org/quick/index.html