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I’m glad you had a better experience than I. I tried learning CL back in 2006 and read a quickstart guide from the #lisp IRC channel. It had sentences in it li

I’m glad you had a better experience than I. I tried learning CL back in 2006 and read a quickstart guide from the #lisp IRC channel. It had sentences in it like: “ Using a plain text editor without any runtime connection to your Lisp implementation just because you think you prefer its keybindings is stupid and self-defeating.” And “Follow these directions or risk our wrath, or at least unsympathetic attitudes!” The document, mercifully, doesn’t appear to exist any more. Maybe when I called them on it at the time they realized that maybe there’s a better way and changed it. But it definitely made a poor first impression.

Jtsummers 6y ago
Yeah. I think you were looking at it near the end of the "smug lisp weenie" era. Looking at some content from the early 00s does not give a favorable impression of the CL community or its attitudes. I came into it about the same time, but started paying attention to the community proper circa 2008. By then, I think the efforts to popularize the language and grow the community had tempered it quite a bit.
klibertp 6y ago
You could mention that it was almost 15 years ago in your previous post. That's more than enough time for the whole community attitudes to change, and they did.
susam 6y ago
I have been hanging out on IRC since 2006 too. The open source communities back then were indeed caustic. #python was an exception. #python used to be very nice to beginners. #c was perhaps the worst. The attitude of these communities has changed a lot since then. It has been 14 years since then! Right now, #lisp and #emacs and their Reddit counterparts r/lisp and r/emacs are a very pleasant, friendly, and supportive community. For those looking to becoming a part of the Lisp or Emacs community, I strongly recommend giving #lisp, #emacs, r/lisp, and r/emacs a chance.

Jtsummers 6y ago

Yeah. I think you were looking at it near the end of the "smug lisp weenie" era. Looking at some content from the early 00s does not give a favorable impression of the CL community or its attitudes. I came into it about the same time, but started paying attention to the community proper circa 2008. By then, I think the efforts to popularize the language and grow the community had tempered it quite a bit.

klibertp 6y ago

You could mention that it was almost 15 years ago in your previous post. That's more than enough time for the whole community attitudes to change, and they did.

susam 6y ago

I have been hanging out on IRC since 2006 too. The open source communities back then were indeed caustic. #python was an exception. #python used to be very nice to beginners. #c was perhaps the worst. The attitude of these communities has changed a lot since then. It has been 14 years since then! Right now, #lisp and #emacs and their Reddit counterparts r/lisp and r/emacs are a very pleasant, friendly, and supportive community. For those looking to becoming a part of the Lisp or Emacs community, I strongly recommend giving #lisp, #emacs, r/lisp, and r/emacs a chance.