7 ms·

One thing to keep in mind is that common lisp is actually a super new and exciting language... All the implementations used to be proprietary for a long time (b

One thing to keep in mind is that common lisp is actually a super new and exciting language... All the implementations used to be proprietary for a long time (but there's been widespread acknowledgement of the merits of the language from the very beginning). Now that we've got super awesome FOSS implementations the party has gotten started and immediately there are so many crazy cool things coming out. I think common lisp is basically a better rust for a lot of the things rust is being used for.. Although of course rust is way better for many things also. It's not really an apples-to-apples comparison but the point is that common lisp is quite fast and good for application development (which rust is too but often with more complexity than necessary). Another thing to remember is this rule of thumb where if you want to make a neutral prior for how long a technology will be around you should basically just look at how long it has already existed. Something exists for a week, probably it will be around for another week. Something exists for a decade, probably it will be around for another decade. Of course this is not a very detailed assessment but SICL and CIEL are respectively efforts at minimizing the bootstrap and modernizing the final product. There will be more of these efforts and eventually lisp will become a totally different language (as we approach the energy minimum for the vocabulary)... Essentially what I am trying to say is that right now; lisp code is the code that I have the most confidence in w.r.t. longevity.

aidenn0 5y ago
I don't have exact dates, but I definitely used cmucl on linux/x86 before 2000 (though not much before; 1999 maybe?).
neutronicus 5y ago
IMO Common Lisp is extremely unlike Rust, which is basically (C++)++, and I would not use them for the same things
- jhgb 5y ago
  CL is quite unlike Rust, but I've actually found lots of similarities between CL and C++: religiously stressing backwards compatibility and the ability to run very old software, providing the ability to hook and customize as many things as possible while providing default implementations, being unopiniated with regards to programming paradigms...
- pjmlp 5y ago
  Symbolics and Xerox PARC beg to differ, and their products failed to establish themselves more due to their mismanagement than technical. Rust still needs to grow up quite a bit before it can assert to be (C++)++ specially in anything that involves a GPU.
gnufx 5y ago
Static for 25+ years, but "super new"?? Of implementations, CMUCL even predates Common Lisp, but I don't know when it implemented CL. GNU Common Lisp was available GPL'd around the time of the standard and, I think Clisp.
perihelions 5y ago
- "if you want to make a neutral prior for how long a technology will be around you should basically just look at how long it has already existed" AKA Lindy's effect. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect
pjmlp 5y ago
While FOSS implementations are great, their tooling is still missing the whole stack experience as offered by Allegro and Lispworks.
vegai_ 5y ago
> I think common lisp is basically a better rust for a lot of the things rust is being used for.. More like a superior python with an awkward syntax and some crazy legacy (loop macro being the worst offender perhaps). Just the other day, my ipython interpreter killed itself after having an uptime of 8 hours. No reason, just got tired of living. In such occasions, I hope I would've spent more time assimilating my brain to some common lisp craziness so I wouldn't have to deal with shit like that.
- reikonomusha 5y ago
  LOOP gets weird flack from some purist mindset. There's no issue with it in practice.
  - vegai_ 5y ago
    Yeah, the other, possibly worse, problem is that experienced common lisp programmers think that LOOP is ok ;)
  - maydup-nem 5y ago
    purist? no, it's a very practical mindset. if you are into lisp, you should already appreciate the power of parenthesis. i literally have to spend time parsing the barren (longish) loop macros to understand wth is going on and what keyword is suppossed to stick to where. in other, totally unrelated news, forget about customizability and embrace the ever-crappy indentation (especially with aggressive-indent) and the awful non-sexp-based editing. what looks like purism is in fact guided by simple pain avoidance. no, fren, iterate all the way. it is regular common lisp code and doesn't make you context switch due to some _obviously_ misguided DSL design. i don't understand why some lispers are so adamantly supportive of LOOP. what's more, some of them _despise_ iterate (because reasons). i just don't get it. PS As a bonus, iterate has an actually usable manual [1]. For LOOP, i have to go to gigamonkeys and whatnot. [1] https://iterate.common-lisp.dev/doc/index.html#Top https://iterate.common-lisp.dev/doc/index.html#Top
    - taeric 5y ago
bitwize 5y ago
SBCL was adopted in production in Lisp shops like ITA circa 2005 or so? So even if you consider production-grade, open source Common Lisp only, it's still older than Go or Rust. Common Lisp is not "super new" by any means, but it is still exciting. It's like the redwoods of California: ancient, but evergreen.
- p_l 5y ago
  And SBCL is fork of long mainstay of open source Common Lisp, CMUCL (pretty sure ITA moved from CMUCL to SBCL)

aidenn0 5y ago

I don't have exact dates, but I definitely used cmucl on linux/x86 before 2000 (though not much before; 1999 maybe?).

neutronicus 5y ago

IMO Common Lisp is extremely unlike Rust, which is basically (C++)++, and I would not use them for the same things

jhgb 5y ago
CL is quite unlike Rust, but I've actually found lots of similarities between CL and C++: religiously stressing backwards compatibility and the ability to run very old software, providing the ability to hook and customize as many things as possible while providing default implementations, being unopiniated with regards to programming paradigms...
pjmlp 5y ago
Symbolics and Xerox PARC beg to differ, and their products failed to establish themselves more due to their mismanagement than technical. Rust still needs to grow up quite a bit before it can assert to be (C++)++ specially in anything that involves a GPU.

gnufx 5y ago

Static for 25+ years, but "super new"?? Of implementations, CMUCL even predates Common Lisp, but I don't know when it implemented CL. GNU Common Lisp was available GPL'd around the time of the standard and, I think Clisp.

perihelions 5y ago

- "if you want to make a neutral prior for how long a technology will be around you should basically just look at how long it has already existed" AKA Lindy's effect. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect

pjmlp 5y ago

While FOSS implementations are great, their tooling is still missing the whole stack experience as offered by Allegro and Lispworks.

vegai_ 5y ago

> I think common lisp is basically a better rust for a lot of the things rust is being used for.. More like a superior python with an awkward syntax and some crazy legacy (loop macro being the worst offender perhaps). Just the other day, my ipython interpreter killed itself after having an uptime of 8 hours. No reason, just got tired of living. In such occasions, I hope I would've spent more time assimilating my brain to some common lisp craziness so I wouldn't have to deal with shit like that.

reikonomusha 5y ago
LOOP gets weird flack from some purist mindset. There's no issue with it in practice.
- vegai_ 5y ago
  Yeah, the other, possibly worse, problem is that experienced common lisp programmers think that LOOP is ok ;)
- maydup-nem 5y ago
  purist? no, it's a very practical mindset. if you are into lisp, you should already appreciate the power of parenthesis. i literally have to spend time parsing the barren (longish) loop macros to understand wth is going on and what keyword is suppossed to stick to where. in other, totally unrelated news, forget about customizability and embrace the ever-crappy indentation (especially with aggressive-indent) and the awful non-sexp-based editing. what looks like purism is in fact guided by simple pain avoidance. no, fren, iterate all the way. it is regular common lisp code and doesn't make you context switch due to some _obviously_ misguided DSL design. i don't understand why some lispers are so adamantly supportive of LOOP. what's more, some of them _despise_ iterate (because reasons). i just don't get it. PS As a bonus, iterate has an actually usable manual [1]. For LOOP, i have to go to gigamonkeys and whatnot. [1] https://iterate.common-lisp.dev/doc/index.html#Top https://iterate.common-lisp.dev/doc/index.html#Top
  - taeric 5y ago

bitwize 5y ago

SBCL was adopted in production in Lisp shops like ITA circa 2005 or so? So even if you consider production-grade, open source Common Lisp only, it's still older than Go or Rust. Common Lisp is not "super new" by any means, but it is still exciting. It's like the redwoods of California: ancient, but evergreen.

p_l 5y ago
And SBCL is fork of long mainstay of open source Common Lisp, CMUCL (pretty sure ITA moved from CMUCL to SBCL)