5 ms·

(How to Write a (Lisp) Interpreter (In Python)) (2010)

66 points by ivanvas 5y ago

ravish0007 5y ago
[Plug] Translation of this in JS at my bootcamp (https://github.com/ravish0007/geekskool/blob/main/assignments/lisp.js https://github.com/ravish0007/geekskool/blob/main/assignment...) while doing this, I became fan of SICP :)
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
da39a3ee 5y ago
> Way back in 1984 I was writing a Ph.D. thesis... My fellow grad student Tony DeRose felt the same need, and together we sketched out a simple Lisp program that would handle this as a preprocessor. This is how to fail to become an academic and instead become a computer programmer.
avmich 5y ago
Norvig's codes are very educational. Unfortunately :) Peter long since stopped updating them; in JScheme, he mentioned the wish to move to R5RS standard, but other, more important things intervened. Are there similar codes for more recent Scheme's - with some more advanced capabilities, like hygienic macros and full continuations - demonstrated?
tony-allan 5y ago
Updated for Python 3 https://gist.github.com/tonyallan/be8d3f30d281b23f36990b34bb5e2390 https://gist.github.com/tonyallan/be8d3f30d281b23f36990b34bb...
sbuccini 5y ago
This is one of my favorite interview questions! I still vividly remember sitting at the airport on my way back home for the first time since arriving at Cal, jamming on this project in order to get a few bonus points for 61A. Good times!
Jtsummers 5y ago
This has been submitted a few times in the past. Here are some with comments (skipping ones with no or few comments): Sept 30, 2010 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1745322 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1745322 (39 comments) Oct 1, 2010 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1746916 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1746916 (11 comments) May 31, 2014 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7825054 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7825054 (41 comments) Oct 24, 2016 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12777852 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12777852 (28 comments) Aug 2, 2019 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20590439 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20590439 (29 comments) 10 days ago - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30327437 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30327437 (3 comments)
- tony-allan 5y ago
  It would be good if the submit feature of HN listed the most recent entry for the same URL!
Jaydon564 5y ago
If you don't know how compilers work, then you don't know how computers work.
musicale 5y ago
See also: easy syntactic translation of Scheme subset (from The Little Schemer) into JavaScript https://www.crockford.com/little.html https://www.crockford.com/little.html Which (site-appropriately) notes: > Pay particular attention to The Applicative Order Y Combinator, one of the most strange and wonderful artifacts of Computer Science.

66 points by ivanvas 5y ago

[Plug] Translation of this in JS at my bootcamp (https://github.com/ravish0007/geekskool/blob/main/assignments/lisp.js https://github.com/ravish0007/geekskool/blob/main/assignment...) while doing this, I became fan of SICP :)

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

da39a3ee 5y ago

> Way back in 1984 I was writing a Ph.D. thesis... My fellow grad student Tony DeRose felt the same need, and together we sketched out a simple Lisp program that would handle this as a preprocessor. This is how to fail to become an academic and instead become a computer programmer.

avmich 5y ago

Norvig's codes are very educational. Unfortunately :) Peter long since stopped updating them; in JScheme, he mentioned the wish to move to R5RS standard, but other, more important things intervened. Are there similar codes for more recent Scheme's - with some more advanced capabilities, like hygienic macros and full continuations - demonstrated?

tony-allan 5y ago

Updated for Python 3 https://gist.github.com/tonyallan/be8d3f30d281b23f36990b34bb5e2390 https://gist.github.com/tonyallan/be8d3f30d281b23f36990b34bb...

sbuccini 5y ago

This is one of my favorite interview questions! I still vividly remember sitting at the airport on my way back home for the first time since arriving at Cal, jamming on this project in order to get a few bonus points for 61A. Good times!

Jtsummers 5y ago

This has been submitted a few times in the past. Here are some with comments (skipping ones with no or few comments): Sept 30, 2010 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1745322 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1745322 (39 comments) Oct 1, 2010 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1746916 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1746916 (11 comments) May 31, 2014 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7825054 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7825054 (41 comments) Oct 24, 2016 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12777852 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12777852 (28 comments) Aug 2, 2019 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20590439 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20590439 (29 comments) 10 days ago - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30327437 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30327437 (3 comments)

tony-allan 5y ago
It would be good if the submit feature of HN listed the most recent entry for the same URL!

Jaydon564 5y ago

If you don't know how compilers work, then you don't know how computers work.

musicale 5y ago

See also: easy syntactic translation of Scheme subset (from The Little Schemer) into JavaScript https://www.crockford.com/little.html https://www.crockford.com/little.html Which (site-appropriately) notes: > Pay particular attention to The Applicative Order Y Combinator, one of the most strange and wonderful artifacts of Computer Science.