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tl;dr describes a reimplementaton [0] of the Common Lisp Object Library System for emacs lisp. This allows using object-oriented strategies in emacs lisp script

by Nzen 5y ago

tl;dr describes a reimplementaton [0] of the Common Lisp Object Library System for emacs lisp. This allows using object-oriented strategies in emacs lisp scripts that might otherwise involve more abstract / lower level work over primitive lists for structure [1]. The title seems to be a reference to the 'form' package of the tool. [0] https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_mono/eieio.html https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_mono/eieio.ht... [1] To be clear, I've used CL only briefly. I'm only aware of emacs lisp by reputation. I don't doubt that experienced lispers are comfortable structuring their information as lists of lists and atoms.

dreamcompiler 5y ago
> I don't doubt that experienced lispers are comfortable structuring their information as lists of lists and atoms. I'm a very experienced Common Lisper and I very rarely use lists of lists except for small, incidental purposes. The Common Lisp Object System (as well as defstruct, arrays, hash tables, etc.) exists because lists -- while quite flexible -- are an extremely poor data structure for anything complicated because they make code almost impossible to understand and maintain. Using lists for everything is considered very poor Lisp programming practice -- at least by me.
jinwoo68 5y ago
"Form" is not only the package name of the tool but also a general term in Lisp that refers to S-expressions in the code.