4 ms·

"It's [2012], and programming languages have almost caught up with 1958." -- paraphrased from, oh, you know, some guy :)

JoeAltmaier 14y ago
DOn't imagine the reasons languages are different from List is that nobody knew any better. Programming in Lisp is like programming in assembler. Reading it is worse. The learning curve is tremendous. Languages serve lots of demographics, not just comp-sci wonks.
- yarrel 14y ago
  "Practical Common Lisp" is a good introduction to the power and readability of non-wonk Lisp.
  - alberich 14y ago
    Agreed. It makes CL look way easier than assembly :D edit: not that I consider it to be like assembly, really.
- KirinDave 14y ago
  When did the shift that makes this okay happen? Once upon a time, people who knew a lot about computer science were respected and praised; people tried to emulate their algorithms, coding style and planning. Now, they are "wonks" for knowing a slightly different (and demonstrably effective) style of programming.
  - JoeAltmaier 14y ago
    Hey! No offense meant. Its just true that a lot of programmers are not CS-trained. So not the target demographic of Lisp.
    - Jtsummers 14y ago
      I would contend that not being CS-trained doesn't eliminate them from the pool of people who could benefit from knowing Lisp and similar languages. As a programmer, unless you just want to be outclassed in a few years, you have to stay on top of developments in the industry and the history of the industry. Knowing the languages that modern languages pull their tricks from is one such way. And it doesn't take a CS degree to do that with many of the resources being put out these days.
      - dalke 14y ago
        If someone is a biology researcher who does some programming for their research, does that programmer need to stay on top of developments in the software industry? Or know the history of the programming field ... as well as keep up with the biology field?
        Lio 14y ago
        Well I guess that depends on what you're doing within you're research. In bioinformatics knowing about, say, functional programming and parallel algorithms could be really useful where data coming out of sequencers is growing faster than Moore's law can keep up, if you want to scale across many cores as efficiently as possible. Or graph theory, or... any number of useful techniques waiting for an application.
        dalke 14y ago
        Certainly. But most aren't so inclined. Most need a way to glue together existing components. For example, "make a web connection to X, call command-line program Y, and use a shared-library extension to do Z. Plot in Excel." The result might be very useful scientifically, and it's definitely programming, but there's no real reason to learn about lambdas, s-expressions, and monads.
        dfox 14y ago
        You would be surprised how often non-CS researchers doing some programming use languages that are essentially Lisp with weird syntax (R, Mathematica...). Which I think exactly demonstrates that you don't need any knowledge of history or modern developments in computing to benefit from Lisp.
  - aaronblohowiak 14y ago
    >When did the shift that makes this okay happen? Now that there are millions of programmers. Programming shifted from a fine art to a pop art, to crib something from Alan Kay.
- andrewcooke 14y ago
  this makes no sense. on a purely personal, self-development level, you're talking yourself out of opportunities for no gain. there's nothing magical about lisp compared to other languages. to read it you don't need a cs degree and you don't need vast levels of intelligence - you just need practice. after a while it becomes quite clear. you're free to think whatever you want, of course, but this kind of negative attitude - "it's for the smart people, not me" - just means that you lose out. lisp itself is not that far from a language like python (or, i guess, in the context of this thread, ruby) once you get used to it. it's really not rocket science. all you're doing here is harming yourself.
  - JoeAltmaier 14y ago
    No, I don't reject it. I'm simply making the point that, still, some people (the majority of people) are not up to Lisp. Most folks never read the manual, just hop on board and start coding. So, thus, the (Very) slow acceptance of Lisp.
- blacksmythe 14y ago
  >> The learning curve is tremendous. Try "Land of Lisp" http://www.amazon.com/Land-Lisp-Learn-Program-Game/dp/1593272812 http://www.amazon.com/Land-Lisp-Learn-Program-Game/dp/159327...

JoeAltmaier 14y ago

DOn't imagine the reasons languages are different from List is that nobody knew any better. Programming in Lisp is like programming in assembler. Reading it is worse. The learning curve is tremendous. Languages serve lots of demographics, not just comp-sci wonks.

yarrel 14y ago
"Practical Common Lisp" is a good introduction to the power and readability of non-wonk Lisp.
- alberich 14y ago
  Agreed. It makes CL look way easier than assembly :D edit: not that I consider it to be like assembly, really.
KirinDave 14y ago
When did the shift that makes this okay happen? Once upon a time, people who knew a lot about computer science were respected and praised; people tried to emulate their algorithms, coding style and planning. Now, they are "wonks" for knowing a slightly different (and demonstrably effective) style of programming.
- JoeAltmaier 14y ago
  Hey! No offense meant. Its just true that a lot of programmers are not CS-trained. So not the target demographic of Lisp.
  - Jtsummers 14y ago
    I would contend that not being CS-trained doesn't eliminate them from the pool of people who could benefit from knowing Lisp and similar languages. As a programmer, unless you just want to be outclassed in a few years, you have to stay on top of developments in the industry and the history of the industry. Knowing the languages that modern languages pull their tricks from is one such way. And it doesn't take a CS degree to do that with many of the resources being put out these days.
    - dalke 14y ago
      If someone is a biology researcher who does some programming for their research, does that programmer need to stay on top of developments in the software industry? Or know the history of the programming field ... as well as keep up with the biology field?
      - Lio 14y ago
        Well I guess that depends on what you're doing within you're research. In bioinformatics knowing about, say, functional programming and parallel algorithms could be really useful where data coming out of sequencers is growing faster than Moore's law can keep up, if you want to scale across many cores as efficiently as possible. Or graph theory, or... any number of useful techniques waiting for an application.
        dalke 14y ago
        Certainly. But most aren't so inclined. Most need a way to glue together existing components. For example, "make a web connection to X, call command-line program Y, and use a shared-library extension to do Z. Plot in Excel." The result might be very useful scientifically, and it's definitely programming, but there's no real reason to learn about lambdas, s-expressions, and monads.
      - dfox 14y ago
        You would be surprised how often non-CS researchers doing some programming use languages that are essentially Lisp with weird syntax (R, Mathematica...). Which I think exactly demonstrates that you don't need any knowledge of history or modern developments in computing to benefit from Lisp.
- aaronblohowiak 14y ago
  >When did the shift that makes this okay happen? Now that there are millions of programmers. Programming shifted from a fine art to a pop art, to crib something from Alan Kay.
andrewcooke 14y ago
this makes no sense. on a purely personal, self-development level, you're talking yourself out of opportunities for no gain. there's nothing magical about lisp compared to other languages. to read it you don't need a cs degree and you don't need vast levels of intelligence - you just need practice. after a while it becomes quite clear. you're free to think whatever you want, of course, but this kind of negative attitude - "it's for the smart people, not me" - just means that you lose out. lisp itself is not that far from a language like python (or, i guess, in the context of this thread, ruby) once you get used to it. it's really not rocket science. all you're doing here is harming yourself.
- JoeAltmaier 14y ago
  No, I don't reject it. I'm simply making the point that, still, some people (the majority of people) are not up to Lisp. Most folks never read the manual, just hop on board and start coding. So, thus, the (Very) slow acceptance of Lisp.
blacksmythe 14y ago
>> The learning curve is tremendous. Try "Land of Lisp" http://www.amazon.com/Land-Lisp-Learn-Program-Game/dp/1593272812 http://www.amazon.com/Land-Lisp-Learn-Program-Game/dp/159327...