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Absence? There's absolutely syntax in Clojure. 1) Lexemes have a specific structure. 2) Core data types have a specific syntax (representable with a grammar)
by mschaef 7y ago
Absence? There's absolutely syntax in Clojure.
1) Lexemes have a specific structure.
2) Core data types have a specific syntax (representable with a grammar).
3) The data types used to represent programming constructs also have a specific set of syntactic rules by which they are assembled.
It's a different kind of syntax than the usual - more raw/direct, perhaps - but it's a misconception to say there is an absence of syntax. A big part of the reason I mention this is that the nature of Lisp's syntax is one of its biggest strengths.
- paultopia 7y agoFair enough. I was aiming for a non-technical use of the term "syntax" more or less tracking the cognitive burden of remembering and parsing out the relationship between symbols for the programmer. Like, putting s-expressions in the front seat feels like a much lower cognitive load to me than, for example, all the stuff you have to think about writing, or, god help you, reading, pointfree haskell or line noise perl
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- LandR 7y agoYes, there is syntax, but there is a lot less noise and syntactic bureaucracy compared to other languges.