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Sorry but that's just wrong. He is complaining about DSLs making things hard to read. That's not fixed by switching to another language or a package manager. Th

by janoc 7y ago

Sorry but that's just wrong. He is complaining about DSLs making things hard to read. That's not fixed by switching to another language or a package manager. That's purely a software engineering problem - nobody forces you to write code in that style. And LISP code being unreadable to others - sorry, that's bull. Seen e.g. some "modern" Javascript stuff recently? Good luck making heads and tails out of some of the frameworks - it often doesn't even look like a Javascript anymore! And nobody seems to be claiming that it leads to the demise of the language. Or numerical calculations in Fortran - still a gold standard for scientific stuff. To me the article is very much an output of someone who couldn't have been bothered to learn the language griping about things he doesn't really understand well and making huge generalizations based on that. Why LISP isn't popular today is simply because that unlike for other languages, there hasn't been a free/cheap compiler and IDE for a PC for a very long time (except for the crippled LispWorks). LISP has always been an university/research thing running on either on specialized machines or later on Unix, not something "mere mortals" had access to. Also most programmers have been taught languages like Pascal/C/Java, maybe Scheme in their introductory courses and have never been exposed to LISP, so they have no way to know about it unless they are themselves curious about it.

karmakaze 7y ago
> Sorry but that's just wrong. He is complaining about DSLs making things hard to read. That's not fixed by switching to another language or a package manager. I wouldn't put the formatting of the adhoc dsls used in a program as the hard part. It's the chosen abstractions and decomposition/composition patterns used. This is true in any language with metaprogramming but why has Lisp suffered more than others? I doubt reader macros. If anything they would help put things in logical rather than implementation required form.
dreamcompiler 7y ago
> there hasn't been a free/cheap compiler and IDE for a PC for a very long time CCL is a free Common Lisp compiler that runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux. On the Mac, it comes with an IDE. It's been around for about 20 years. SBCL is another free compiler that uses Emacs/Slime as an IDE.
- AgentOrange1234 7y ago
  I agree that CCL and SBCL are superb on Linux and Mac. But until at least a few years ago, they were both poorly supported on Windows (requiring something like Cygwin). That may have changed now. Also, AFAIK, CCL is dying now. :(
  - fiddlerwoaroof 7y ago
    CCL's development is relatively slow compared to sbcl, but I'm not sure that it's "dying". And, there's been a brand new compiler on LLVM, clasp, as well as the SICL project.
  - flavio81 7y ago
    >AFAIK, CCL is dying now CCL is the 2nd most downloaded Lisp implementation, so it can't be called "dying." You'll find that new lisp projects are almost invariably tested on CCL too.
    - AgentOrange1234 7y ago
      The latest commit is 2 months ago.[1] I don’t know how to define “dying,” but it doesn’t seem healthy. It saddens me, as it is/was a great tool for me for many years. I hope SBCL can take it from here. 1. https://github.com/Clozure/ccl https://github.com/Clozure/ccl
singularity2001 7y ago
Seen some "modern" Javascript stuff recently? …[mess] nobody seems to be claiming that it leads to the demise of the language. Yes we do;)
- ksaj 7y ago
  Same with Perl 6.
flavio81 7y ago
>there hasn't been a free/cheap compiler and IDE for a PC for a very long time One of the first Common Lisp implementations (80s), Kyoto Common Lisp (KCL), was also free. One of the highest performing Common Lisp implementations, CMU CL (CMU Common Lisp), has been also free for decades. It is still available and SBCL (the most popular implementation today) is partly based on it. >LISP has always been an university/research thing running on either on specialized machines or later on Unix This was only true in the 70s, and only true for the most advanced/modern Lisp dialects like ZetaLisp. The 80s is a different story. You can check out the TIOBE index for 1989 -- the 3rd most popular programming language was Lisp, after C and C++. It's also very interesting that ANSI Common Lisp was the first objective-oriented language to get an ANSI standard. Today you don't need a Unix/linux machine, there are many implementations that run just fine on Windows: ECL, ABCL, SBCL, CCL, and CLISP to name a few. SBCL, ECL and CCL produce native code; SBCL is particularly fast and CCL, while relatively slower, is still a fast implementation.

by janoc 7y ago

karmakaze 7y ago

> Sorry but that's just wrong. He is complaining about DSLs making things hard to read. That's not fixed by switching to another language or a package manager. I wouldn't put the formatting of the adhoc dsls used in a program as the hard part. It's the chosen abstractions and decomposition/composition patterns used. This is true in any language with metaprogramming but why has Lisp suffered more than others? I doubt reader macros. If anything they would help put things in logical rather than implementation required form.

dreamcompiler 7y ago

> there hasn't been a free/cheap compiler and IDE for a PC for a very long time CCL is a free Common Lisp compiler that runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux. On the Mac, it comes with an IDE. It's been around for about 20 years. SBCL is another free compiler that uses Emacs/Slime as an IDE.

AgentOrange1234 7y ago
I agree that CCL and SBCL are superb on Linux and Mac. But until at least a few years ago, they were both poorly supported on Windows (requiring something like Cygwin). That may have changed now. Also, AFAIK, CCL is dying now. :(
- fiddlerwoaroof 7y ago
  CCL's development is relatively slow compared to sbcl, but I'm not sure that it's "dying". And, there's been a brand new compiler on LLVM, clasp, as well as the SICL project.
- flavio81 7y ago
  >AFAIK, CCL is dying now CCL is the 2nd most downloaded Lisp implementation, so it can't be called "dying." You'll find that new lisp projects are almost invariably tested on CCL too.
  - AgentOrange1234 7y ago
    The latest commit is 2 months ago.[1] I don’t know how to define “dying,” but it doesn’t seem healthy. It saddens me, as it is/was a great tool for me for many years. I hope SBCL can take it from here. 1. https://github.com/Clozure/ccl https://github.com/Clozure/ccl

singularity2001 7y ago

Seen some "modern" Javascript stuff recently? …[mess] nobody seems to be claiming that it leads to the demise of the language. Yes we do;)

ksaj 7y ago
Same with Perl 6.

flavio81 7y ago

>there hasn't been a free/cheap compiler and IDE for a PC for a very long time One of the first Common Lisp implementations (80s), Kyoto Common Lisp (KCL), was also free. One of the highest performing Common Lisp implementations, CMU CL (CMU Common Lisp), has been also free for decades. It is still available and SBCL (the most popular implementation today) is partly based on it. >LISP has always been an university/research thing running on either on specialized machines or later on Unix This was only true in the 70s, and only true for the most advanced/modern Lisp dialects like ZetaLisp. The 80s is a different story. You can check out the TIOBE index for 1989 -- the 3rd most popular programming language was Lisp, after C and C++. It's also very interesting that ANSI Common Lisp was the first objective-oriented language to get an ANSI standard. Today you don't need a Unix/linux machine, there are many implementations that run just fine on Windows: ECL, ABCL, SBCL, CCL, and CLISP to name a few. SBCL, ECL and CCL produce native code; SBCL is particularly fast and CCL, while relatively slower, is still a fast implementation.