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Every language should be faster* than C in some way otherwise no-one would use it. Scripting languages are faster to code in. Fortran is faster at complex mat
by sambeau 16y ago
Every language should be faster* than C in some way otherwise no-one would use it.
Scripting languages are faster to code in.
Fortran is faster at complex matrix maths.
Lisp is faster to code in and faster to run for a large set of computing problems.
C wins the trade-of of speed-to-create vs speed-of-execution for most system programming tasks but usually when compared to bare assembly code. But there are a large number of problems that it is horribly unsuited for. Hence we end up with c-programs with accidentally embedded lisp implementations.
* - where faster can also mean faster to code to a secure standard.
- koenigdavidmj 16y ago> Hence we end up with c-programs with accidentally embedded lisp implementations. See Greenspun's Tenth Rule: Any sufficiently complicated C or Fortran program contains an ad hoc, informally-specified, bug-ridden, slow implementation of half of Common Lisp. And of course the famous corollary: Including Common Lisp. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenspun%27s_Tenth_Rule http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenspun%27s_Tenth_Rule
- silentbicycle 16y agoXML is proof that Greenspun's Tenth Rule applies to data, as well. :)
- derleth 16y agoI've said this before, but JSON is actually more like sexprs than XML is.
- silentbicycle 16y agoAgreed, but XML does a far better job of re-implementing sexprs badly.
- Xurinos 16y agoCorrect me if I am wrong, but somewhere I read that a while back, Lisp implementations caught up to and surpassed Fortran implementations in terms of math speed... suggesting that Fortran's main strength was finally outdone.
- sedachv 16y agoRichard Fateman published two papers on this, one where MacLisp beat out Fortran, in 1973 (http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?doid=1086803.1086804 http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?doid=1086803.1086804), and a really comprehensive paper about Common Lisp in 1995 (http://www.scribd.com/doc/49112889/fateman-et-al-fast-floating-point-processing-in-common-lisp http://www.scribd.com/doc/49112889/fateman-et-al-fast-floati...).