4 ms·
> These never catch on, and never will. Another possible counterexample is Logo, though perhaps you didn't mean "Lispy languages with fewer parentheses will ne
by rwl 16y ago
> These never catch on, and never will.
Another possible counterexample is Logo, though perhaps you didn't mean "Lispy languages with fewer parentheses will never catch on," but "Front-ends for Common Lisp that use fewer parentheses will never catch on." I can't speak to the latter.
The folks who make Racket have also implemented a variety of non-Lisp languages (e.g., Scribble, Algol[1]) that I believe are parsed to s-expressions and then compiled by Racket. Not sure how many people use these implementations for "serious" programming, but they're there.
[1] http://docs.racket-lang.org/algol60/index.html http://docs.racket-lang.org/algol60/index.html
- Zak 16y agoI don't mean to imply that Lispy languages with non-sexp syntax won't catch on. Python, Ruby and Lua seem to have pretty Lispy semantics, for example. I also do not mean to imply that DSLs or implementations of existing language standards that compile to sexps and get passed to a Lisp runtime to execute won't catch on. I believe Maxima is such a DSL. What I do mean is that a general-purpose replacement syntax for existing Lisps that isn't mainly written in terms of data structure literals won't catch on. Note that I didn't say lists there; Clojure has added vectors and maps to its syntax, but retains a very Lispy overall syntax. I'm not sure if a new language explicitly designed to be a Lisp in everything but front-end syntax will catch on. New languages usually catch on when they present a good solution to a problem lots of people have on a silver platter. They're a lot like startups in that regard.