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I would recommend either a Scheme or Common Lisp, if you really want to learn and understand Lisp. Clojure is an interesting derivative, but if you want to lear
by _ph_ 7y ago
I would recommend either a Scheme or Common Lisp, if you really want to learn and understand Lisp. Clojure is an interesting derivative, but if you want to learn Lisp, you should start with one of the above, a little bit dependant on what kind of application appeals to you most.
But if you want me to narrow down my recommendation to a single answer, it would be Common Lisp. It has one single comprehensive standard and there is a lot of real-world development done in Common Lisp. Scheme has a smaller standard, so while that is easier to pick up quickly, most Scheme implementations have a lot of extensions for all the stuff not in the small standard :p. So with Common Lisp, you have a much larger overlap between implementations.
For development, SBCL is great, as it is a free and open source implementation of Common Lisp which also has one of the best compilers to native code around, with well written code, you can get amazingly fast speed.
Practicall Common Lisp is a great resource for learning. It is very comprehensive, covering the important parts of the language and has some real-world examples. Land of Lisp is very nice, a bit more playful.
- bjoli 7y agoi would say CL for serious work and scheme for what it teaches you. I would say that the principle of scheme with a few well chosen primitives that compose into efficient abstractions is something I will forever carry with me. Common lisp is amazing as well. large and full of warts, but incredibly practical and battle-tested. if I were to write a larger project from scratch I would either pick SBCL or chez scheme, even though I myself am a guile weenie. if I had access to Allegro CL or lispworks I doubt I would ever leave the comfort of them.
- potta_coffee 7y agoHave you tried Chicken? I'm playing with Scheme again and trying to decide between Chicken and Chez.
- bjoli 7y agochicken's IRC channel taught me scheme. A bunch of very nice people. I have called it the friendliest place online for years. I ended up having to write some portable r6rs code, and that is easier in guile and chez, so that's why I went. I still feel a bit like I owe them to spread the word. Chicken is a very capable and plenty fast scheme. installing 3rd party software is a lot easier in chicken than any other scheme. I would say that it is slightly faster than, or just as fast as guile3, but slower than chez.
- potta_coffee 7y agoThanks for your assessment. Chicken's community looks pretty cool. I'm not super concerned about speed or portability right now, I'm just scratching a personal itch. I'll have to check out Chez soon though.