3 ms·

> The tradeoff is that if you use unpopular software, like lisp, you can often gain more leverage in specific situations. HN’s software is the most flexible cod

by zelly 7y ago

> The tradeoff is that if you use unpopular software, like lisp, you can often gain more leverage in specific situations. HN’s software is the most flexible codebase I’ve ever seen, but few have ever studied it deeply. Viaweb used those principles to dominate the competition at a time when everybody was writing websites in C. But are those days gone? In Paul Graham's days, Lisp was not as unpopular as it is today. It was more like choosing to use Ruby in 2020. On its way out but still in the public consciousness.

sillysaurusx 7y ago
Hmm. I think Viaweb was the first web application (or at least, no one's disputed that claim) and they kept their choice to use lisp a secret until acquisition. If someone else was using lisp to make websites, it seems like they must have independently rediscovered the idea. It was started in 1995 and acquired in 1998, so that wasn't a very long time for lisp to come into the public consciousness. It seems like at best it was considered an AI research language.
- zelly 7y ago
  No one was making web applications with anything. The consumer-facing web was still in its infancy. > It was started in 1995 and acquired in 1998, so that wasn't a very long time for lisp to come into the public consciousness Lisp was the only game in town other than C for multiple decades. Absolutely everyone learned it in university. It was the main garbage collected scripting language, like Python today.
  - pjmlp 7y ago
    During the 80's and 90's that place belongs to Basic dialects, not Lisp. And when Viaweb came to be, there was also ML, Smalltalk, Perl and Tcl to choose from. This if we focus only on the context of UNIX, because otherwise the language spectrum gets even wider.
- p_l 7y ago
  Viaweb started a year after complex web applications were done, including White House information system using COMLINK system built on CL-HTTP (designed at Intelligent Information Infrastructure Project at MIT AI Lab). I think I've also seen GUI apps exported over HTTP using clickable image maps and early tricks for streaming images. Viaweb was one of the first "make your own shop" web applications, yes. Not first web application.
- p_l 7y ago
  As for Lisp - in computing circles, it was very big name, at least in places that weren't on the low-end side. The Second AI Winter was at the time heavily kicking it by association, and big name companies had just went under (Symbolics, TI shuttering Explorer line, etc.)
csharptwdec19 7y ago
LISP won't die until Autodesk says so. Seriously, the AutoCAD community has some of the brightest (or, at least, most clever) developers I've ever met.

by zelly 7y ago

sillysaurusx 7y ago

Hmm. I think Viaweb was the first web application (or at least, no one's disputed that claim) and they kept their choice to use lisp a secret until acquisition. If someone else was using lisp to make websites, it seems like they must have independently rediscovered the idea. It was started in 1995 and acquired in 1998, so that wasn't a very long time for lisp to come into the public consciousness. It seems like at best it was considered an AI research language.

zelly 7y ago
No one was making web applications with anything. The consumer-facing web was still in its infancy. > It was started in 1995 and acquired in 1998, so that wasn't a very long time for lisp to come into the public consciousness Lisp was the only game in town other than C for multiple decades. Absolutely everyone learned it in university. It was the main garbage collected scripting language, like Python today.
- pjmlp 7y ago
  During the 80's and 90's that place belongs to Basic dialects, not Lisp. And when Viaweb came to be, there was also ML, Smalltalk, Perl and Tcl to choose from. This if we focus only on the context of UNIX, because otherwise the language spectrum gets even wider.
p_l 7y ago
Viaweb started a year after complex web applications were done, including White House information system using COMLINK system built on CL-HTTP (designed at Intelligent Information Infrastructure Project at MIT AI Lab). I think I've also seen GUI apps exported over HTTP using clickable image maps and early tricks for streaming images. Viaweb was one of the first "make your own shop" web applications, yes. Not first web application.
p_l 7y ago
As for Lisp - in computing circles, it was very big name, at least in places that weren't on the low-end side. The Second AI Winter was at the time heavily kicking it by association, and big name companies had just went under (Symbolics, TI shuttering Explorer line, etc.)

csharptwdec19 7y ago

LISP won't die until Autodesk says so. Seriously, the AutoCAD community has some of the brightest (or, at least, most clever) developers I've ever met.