Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.no> writes: > It is some aspect of the "let's discard all the community effort and start > over from scratch because we're smarter than everybody else" thing.
If you actually went and read the emacs-guile description, you'd note that the stated intent of that project (I won't speak to random RMS statements in other places) is not to eliminate elisp, but rather to integrate guile as another option. Nothing that has gone before is lost. What is available to those who come after is more flexible than before. Where's the harm?
>>>>> "EN" == Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.no> writes:
[...] EN> Each and every time someone in the Computer Science field EN> has a Bright Idea, the world had better be prepared to adapt, EN> because Here Comes Genius and everything everybody has done EN> needs to be done differently from now on, because This Genius EN> Knows Best.
I don't know if "This Genius" himself is to blame for this. There usually are other factors to consider. While I am fairly certain that the geniuses (genii?) in question usually have the stuff to back up their arrogance their marketing apparatus clearly lacks it. As do, unfortunately, the targets of that marketing themselves.
EN> Gratuitous re-invention is very appealing to some people. EN> It means that they do not have to cope with anybody else's EN> ideas. They may hope to garner support behind them, but they EN> sure are not going to be behind anybody else.
There's also some percieved economy in there, in a way. Reinvention sometimes takes less time than understanding the state of the art. This perception is usually misleading, but not always.
EN> I have desired /longevity/ of things for as long back as I EN> can remember.
You are in good company. Knuth does also (re: TeX).
EN> I got involved with SGML because I thought it EN> could help our data survive beyond the application. (That was EN> a mistake, of course. XML hit the fan and now you cannot EN> trust XML data any more than you trust binary files.) [...]
Am I wrong in assuming that with XML you are roughly as safe as you would be with a _documented_ binary format?
[...] EN> The Novice has been the focus of an alarming amount of EN> attention in the computer field. It is not just that the EN> preferred user is unskilled, it is that the whole field in its EN> application rewards novices and punishes experts.
It is unclear what 'expert' means any more. The blind has been leading the blind for so long that sight is becoming irrelevant in signifacnt parts of the marketplace.
EN> What you EN> learn today will be useless a few years hence, so why bother EN> to study and know /anything/ well? [...]
It is _worse_ than that. The semantics of knowing anything well is shifting. I am noticing that (and Tim B. sometimes reminds me) that most of our grumpy observations (rants?) here are observations about _literacy_. You are implying a conscious decision above -- I am not so sure about that.
In article <3242144155107...@naggum.no>, Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.no> wrote: > Of course, Scheme was /also/ a "let's have a revolution and make it better > this time" language, and as such is attractive to revolutionaries.
This is revisionist history. Scheme was an accident, as related by Sussman and Steele in [1]:
"Sometimes a judicious designer can sort through the accumulated set of ideas, discard the less important ones, and produce a new design that is small and clean. ... Scheme wasn't like that at all. We were actually trying to build something complicated and discovered, serenedipitously, that we had accidentally designed something that ... was much simpler than we had intended."
> I have desired /longevity/ of things for as long back as I can > remember. I got involved with SGML because I thought it could > help our data survive beyond the application. (That was a > mistake, of course. XML hit the fan and now you cannot trust XML > data any more than you trust binary files.) I have been a strong > fan of the 125-year-old Dewey Decimal Classification ever since I > learned it as a child from our school librarian. Such a large > system that has been both able to adapt and provide for long-range > stability is no small feat.
I always thought it better than the Library of Congress system. When they introduced that I was very young, but I remember thinking, "Who needs that? Dewey is fine, and I know it! Why do I have to start over?"
> I prefer a society based in the rule of law to groups of eager > people with bright ideas who ignore everything that has gone > before them. It is not only that I want some stability and > predictability, I want to make sure that we actually evolve. > Computer Science is a field that shows some danger signs of not > evolving. Each and every Bright Idea is a revolution, and the > primary purpose of a revolusion is to throw away everything > everybody had done up to some point in time. Revolutions > sometimes do work, but their cost in human terms is /enormous/. > Time and again we see that that which moves slowly from here to > there win and that which tries to make it across the > incompatibility abyss in one leap usually fall into it, instead.
True, but I think people are realizing that the "bright ideas" are over-hyped and don't pan out. You get burned out after a dozen or so. The "solutions" are getting increasingly frothy and lightweight.
Object-oriented design is down to half a shelf at my local Borders, and Java's decreasing markedly. C/C++ holding its own. .NET's coming up. Whole sections on Web tools, Maya, etc., though. The "programmers" are mostly just users these days.
Sadly, no Lisp books whatsoever most of the time.
> The Novice has been the focus of an alarming amount of attention > in the computer field. It is not just that the preferred user is > unskilled, it is that the whole field in its application rewards > novices and punishes experts. What you learn today will be > useless a few years hence, so why bother to study and know > /anything/ well? I think this is the main reason for the IT > winter we are now experiencing.
As soon as you learn Pearl there's Python, then hey, it's Ruby! HTML begets XHTML, then we start again with XML. But most of the new stuff is just applications to create end user content, or toolboxes to wire up and maintain systems.
The alphabet soup in the job ads is astounding. Who has time to become an expert before it all changes again?
> Of course, Scheme was /also/ a "let's have a revolution and make > it better this time" language, and as such is attractive to > revolutionaries.
That's true. OTOH, it predates CL by about eight years. Some of the "revolutionary" Scheme concepts, like lexical scope, influenced the design of CL.
And the revolutionaries have white hair by now and take laxatives :)
In the case of CL, it was "let's form a federation and resolve our differences." Scheme is, for practical purposes, an academic language (let them play, for heavens sake!!), while CL is by far our best production language, even though it's a camel.
"The Evolution of Lisp" [0] has many interesting and amusing remarks on the origin of CL (among other things) and gives a flavor of the era:
=========== [...]
"The MacLisp-descended groups came off in a way that can be best demonstrated with an anecdote. Each group stood up and presented where they were heading and why. Some questions arose about the ill-defined direction of the MacLisp community in contrast to the Interlisp community. Scott Fahlman said, "the MacLisp community is not in a state of chaos. It consists of four well-defined groups going in four well-defined directions." There was a moment's pause for the laughter to subside.
Gabriel attended the Interlisp pow-wow the day before the ARP meeting, and he also witnessed the spectacle of the MacLisp community at the meeting. He didn't believe that the differences between the MacLisp groups were insurmountable, so he began to try to sell the idea of some sort of cooperation among the groups."
[this may be just Gabriel tooting his horn :-]
[...]
"After a day and a half of technical discussion, this group went off to the Oakland Original, a greasy submarine sandwich place not far from CMU. During and after lunch the topic of the name for the Lisp came up, and such obvious names as NIL and SPICE Lisp were proposed and rejected--as giving too much credit to one group and not enough to others--and such non-obvious names as Yu-Hsiang Lisp were also proposed and reluctantly rejected. [...] Later in E-mail, Moon referred to "whatever we call this common Lisp," and this time, amongst great sadness and consternation that a better name could not be had, it was selected."
[...]
"The [draft of the manual], called the Swiss Cheese Edition--because it was full of large holes--was partly a ballot in which various alternatives and yes-no questions were proposed. [...] Three more drafts were made--the Colander Edition (July 29, 1982), the Laser Edition (November 16, 1982), and the Mary Poppins Edition. The cute names are explained by their subtitles:
Colander: Even More Holes Than Before--But They're Smaller!
Laser Edition: Supposed to be Completely Coherent
Mary Poppins Edition: Practically Perfect in Every Way
The final draft was the Excelsior Edition. Recall that "excelsior" is not only a term of high praise but also the name for shredded paper used as packing material."
===========
Some things don't change. After 20 years, we're still arguing. In fact, we have a whole new generation of arguers! OTOH, both CL and Scheme have been pretty stable (ossified?) over that period.
Surely CL isn't the last Lisp. I suspect that one of these days a wholly new Lisp will pop up from somewhere and everyone will jump on it. Until then, IMO, we should support the CL federation as the practical solution for production work. Gradual change might be practical for sparrows or English, but it's not going to work for production Lisp.
After takin a swig o' grog, Bulent Murtezaoglu <b...@acm.org> belched out...:
>>>>>> "EN" == Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.no> writes: > EN> I got involved with SGML because I thought it > EN> could help our data survive beyond the application. (That was > EN> a mistake, of course. XML hit the fan and now you cannot > EN> trust XML data any more than you trust binary files.) [...] > Am I wrong in assuming that with XML you are roughly as safe as you > would be with a _documented_ binary format?
The problem with XML is that the W3C keeps on having to modify the standards because people need one extension or another.
Pretty characteristic of this is to compare XML-RPC to SOAP.
SOAP keeps getting "extended" as companies lobby for one piece of extended functionality or another. I'm currently editing/reviewing a book on "Web Services Security," and am pretty nonplussed by the tremendously frivolous set of security additions that people keep making. By the time SOAP gets as aged as CORBA, it is unlikely that anyone will be able to /imagine/ creating a "complete" SOAP implementation.
And it's NOT 'changing subjects' for me to talk about SOAP rather than 'just XML.' The problems that occur with SOAP are likely to be pretty nicely characteristic of /any/ "XML Application." Any of the "interesting" XML Applications are fair game for the 'dueling standards' game where different companies propose differing layered standards at OASIS/IETF/W3C.
By the way, the specification for XML-RPC, which SOAP was based on, fits on two pages. But none of the big companies are interested in XML-RPC. It's probably comparable with SOAP in much the same manner that "Algol60 was superior to many of its successors." -- (reverse (concatenate 'string "moc.enworbbc@" "enworbbc")) http://cbbrowne.com/info/ Sleep is a poor subsititute for caffeine. -Pat Dughi
g...@jpl.nasa.gov (Erann Gat) writes: > This is revisionist history. Scheme was an accident, as related by > Sussman and Steele in [1]:
another paper that may provide insight into why, when, how etc. is the excellent Steele/Gabriel "the evolution of lisp" paper from the second HOPL in 1993. it is probably online someplace, though i doubt it would include the presentation transcript and the assorted family graphs. it may answer some questions for some people. the book that was published after the conference is an indispensible reference for PL types, if it is still in print.
oz --- [1] Thomas J. Bergin and Richard G. Gibson (eds) History of Programming Languages Addison-Wesley, 1996 -- there is a fault in reality. do not adjust your minds. -- salman rushdie
>> This is revisionist history. Scheme was an accident, as related by >> Sussman and Steele in [1]:
> another paper that may provide insight into why, when, how etc. is > the excellent Steele/Gabriel "the evolution of lisp" paper from the > second HOPL in 1993. it is probably online someplace,
d...@goldshoe.gte.com (Dorai Sitaram) writes: > In article <86wup7n3sr....@gondolin.local.net>, > Alain Picard <apicard+die-spammer-...@optushome.com.au> wrote: > >My only comfort is that I give them very long odds of success > >with that project; there's just too damn much elisp code out > >there.
> What would you gain by their failure and/or what > would lose by their success?
The answer to both questions is the same; what is at stake is not having to learn yet another language; one, moreover, whose essence is _less_ like what I want, rather than more (i.e., if anything, I want elisp to be more like CL). I pretty much understand elisp; I can read 3rd party extensions, see what they do, fix things which don't work.
Am I lazy to not want to learn another language? You bet. The combined laziness of myself and thousands of other elisp hackers should count for something, it seems to me.
ozan s yigit wrote: > g...@jpl.nasa.gov (Erann Gat) writes:
>>This is revisionist history. Scheme was an accident, as related by >>Sussman and Steele in [1]:
> another paper that may provide insight into why, when, how etc. is > the excellent Steele/Gabriel "the evolution of lisp" paper from the > second HOPL in 1993. it is probably online someplace, though i doubt > it would include the presentation transcript and the assorted family > graphs.
Both the proceedings version and an uncut version are available at http://www.dreamsongs.com/Essays.html; if you take a closer look at the description of this paper you will also find a link to the downloadable slides.
> If you actually went and read the emacs-guile description, you'd note > that the stated intent of that project (I won't speak to random RMS > statements in other places) is not to eliminate elisp, but rather to > integrate guile as another option.
Guile-based Emacs: "This project that I (Ken Raeburn) have started is for converting GNU Emacs to use Guile as its programming language. Backwards support for Emacs Lisp will continue to exist, of course, but it'll be through translation and/or interpretation; the Lisp engine itself will no longer be the core of the program."
Have you ever tracked Emacs versions over an extended period of time and seen how much Emacs Lisp changes in a five-year period? Have you ever tracked anything that attempted to have two interfaces over an extended period of time?
The definite harm is that Emacs Lisp and Guile /will/ diverge and that one is more maintained than the other, but even so, the community effort that goes into Emacs will need to be increased just to maintain status quo.
And where are all the /new/ users and developers for Emacs coming from?
-- Erik Naggum, Oslo, Norway
Act from reason, and failure makes you rethink and study harder. Act from faith, and failure makes you blame someone and push harder.
* Bulent Murtezaoglu | Reinvention sometimes takes less time than understanding the state of the | art. This perception is usually misleading, but not always.
Right now, I am working with project to evaluate the applicability of Dewey for automated classification, compared to the Open Directory stunt. My main objection to such stunts it that they get can easily get very enthusiastic people at the start of the project, but over time need paid staff to maintain them and it develops into the dreaded "committee work" when it becomes successful. My take on this is actually deeply social: It is not successful until it becomes a "democratic" committee project. The idiot individualist with megalomania will think that others are his inferiors, that people who work in groups never get anything done while he can get a lot done alone.
A system needs to be alive and workable even when other people than the first enthusiasts start using it. Reinvention and revolution are enthusiast stuff. Invention and evolution are engineering.
| Am I wrong in assuming that with XML you are roughly as safe as you would be | with a _documented_ binary format?
It is a myth that XML is documented. You have no idea what the elements /actually/ mean (and have warped into over time) until you see the source code for the application. XML becomes /more/ application-dependent over time than binary formats because it provides a false security and an appearance that belies its true nature. XML /is/ a binary format, it is just that it is the kind of binary formats that line printers and raw text editors can use, too, and it is no less dependent on the exactness and precision that other binary formats require. At least when you have a binary format, you know that you need to have a version field and proper version management. People who think SGML or XML will save them tend to forget version management and rely on stupid human tendencies to believe that that which they can "read" must also be understandable to the machine. The combination of ignorance of computing principles and programming with the kind of fuzzy thinking we find in people who have never paid attention to details is seriously deadly to information.
| It is unclear what 'expert' means any more. The blind has been leading the | blind for so long that sight is becoming irrelevant in signifacnt parts of | the marketplace.
It saddens me to find that I think this is very good summary of the situation.
| It is _worse_ than that. The semantics of knowing anything well is shifting. | I am noticing that (and Tim B. sometimes reminds me) that most of our grumpy | observations (rants?) here are observations about _literacy_. You are | implying a conscious decision above -- I am not so sure about that.
You may be right. I am far more conscious in general than other people. But with these saddening words, I shall go and be unconscious for a while.
-- Erik Naggum, Oslo, Norway
Act from reason, and failure makes you rethink and study harder. Act from faith, and failure makes you blame someone and push harder.
In article <3242174113416...@naggum.no>, Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.no> wrote: > * Erann Gat > | This is revisionist history.
> Really? What you quoted was not in any way contradicting what I said.
PETRUCHIO. I say it is the moon. KATHERINA. I know it is the moon. PETRUCHIO. Nay, then you lie; it is the blessed sun. KATHERINA. Then, God be bless'd, it is the blessed sun; But sun it is not, when you say it is not; And the moon changes even as your mind. What you will have it nam'd, even that it is, And so it shall be so for all readers of comp.lang.lisp
In article <3242210009461...@naggum.no>, Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.no> wrote: > * Erann Gat > [ typical Erann Gat response ]
> Your lack of ability to argue for your case must be seen as agreement that > it was not in any way contradicting what I said. This is progress.
It is a lack of willingness, not a lack of ability (though you may consider it progress nonetheless). I am sick and tired of arguing with you. My intent in responding to your comment about Scheme was not to start an argument, but to make other people who might be reading that thread aware of a fairly obscure historical fact. I leave it up to them to decide whether what I quoted contradicts what you said or not.
If you (or anyone else) want to know why I think that what I quoted does contradict your position (as if it isn't blatantly obvious) then *ask* me, and I'll be happy to answer. But if you simply want to state flat-out that it doesn't, then fine, it is the blessed sun. I have had my fill of pointless pissing matches.
* Erann Gat | I am sick and tired of arguing with you.
You may wish to read an article I posted recently on the indecency of flaunting your personal problems for others to care about in public.
If you are so sick and tired, the rational response is not to do what you are so sick and tired of. Having to tell the whole world that you are sick and tired only communicates to that world that you have such huge problems coping with your own emotions that you need professional care to get over them and start to take charge of your own life and take responsibility for your own actions. /You/ and /only/ you are responsible for continuing to do what you are so sick and tired of. Your immense lack of intelligent response to your exasperation is not to your professional credit.
| I leave it up to them to decide whether what I quoted contradicts what you | said or not.
No, you don't. You want to control other people's conclusions. Be honest.
| I have had my fill of pointless pissing matches.
If that were so, you would simply not engage in more of them, would you? So it is simply not true. You want to blame the people you piss on for your own stupid behavior. That is so disgusting that words fail to describe it. Quit!
Grow the hell up, Erann Gat. And, /please/ seek professional help with your coping problems. This is not a good place to tell the whole world that you are unable to act rationally on your disturbed emotions. I consider you to be a disgusting disgrace to the community because you never seem to be able to hold your emotions back from poisoning your interactions with others. You rank near the top of the most /unprofessional/ people I have ever met.
And do us all a huge favor and shut the fuck up about how badly you feel. /Do/ something to feel better, damnit!
-- Erik Naggum, Oslo, Norway Today, the sum total of the money I would retain from the offers in the more than 7500 Nigerian 419 scam letters received in the past 33 months would have exceeded USD 100,000,000,000. You can stop sending me more offers, now.
Erik Naggum wrote: > * Erann Gat > | I am sick and tired of arguing with you.
> You may wish to read an article I posted recently on the indecency of > flaunting your personal problems for others to care about in public.
> If you are so sick and tired, the rational response is not to do what you are > so sick and tired of. Having to tell the whole world that you are sick and > tired only communicates to that world that you have such huge problems coping > with your own emotions that you need professional care to get over them and > start to take charge of your own life and take responsibility for your own > actions. /You/ and /only/ you are responsible for continuing to do what you > are so sick and tired of. Your immense lack of intelligent response to your > exasperation is not to your professional credit.
> | I leave it up to them to decide whether what I quoted contradicts what you > | said or not.
> No, you don't. You want to control other people's conclusions. Be honest.
> | I have had my fill of pointless pissing matches.
> If that were so, you would simply not engage in more of them, would you? So > it is simply not true. You want to blame the people you piss on for your own > stupid behavior. That is so disgusting that words fail to describe it. Quit!
> Grow the hell up, Erann Gat. And, /please/ seek professional help with your > coping problems. This is not a good place to tell the whole world that you > are unable to act rationally on your disturbed emotions. I consider you to > be a disgusting disgrace to the community because you never seem to be able > to hold your emotions back from poisoning your interactions with others. You > rank near the top of the most /unprofessional/ people I have ever met.
> And do us all a huge favor and shut the fuck up about how badly you feel. > /Do/ something to feel better, damnit!
as i've said again: you are fascinating ungentle!
and i've never saw again so precise argumentation-lines against 'one-self'!
In article <3242228166365...@naggum.no>, Erik Naggum <e...@naggum.no> wrote: > you never seem to be able to hold your emotions back from poisoning your > interactions with others
and
> Grow the hell up, > shut the fuck up
Res ipsa loquitur.
But, sigh, we have had *this* conversation before too.
* Erann Gat | But, sigh, we have had *this* conversation before too.
What is /wrong/ with you? Do you /have/ to keep pissing on me?
I am beginning to think you are about as toxic as ilias to this forum.
-- Erik Naggum, Oslo, Norway Today, the sum total of the money I would retain from the offers in the more than 7500 Nigerian 419 scam letters received in the past 33 months would have exceeded USD 100,000,000,000. You can stop sending me more offers, now.
> It is a myth that XML is documented. You have no idea what the elements > /actually/ mean (and have warped into over time) until you see the source code > for the application. XML becomes /more/ application-dependent over time than > binary formats because it provides a false security and an appearance that > belies its true nature. XML /is/ a binary format, it is just that it is the > kind of binary formats that line printers and raw text editors can use, too, > and it is no less dependent on the exactness and precision that other binary > formats require. At least when you have a binary format, you know that you > need to have a version field and proper version management. People who think > SGML or XML will save them tend to forget version management and rely on > stupid human tendencies to believe that that which they can "read" must also > be understandable to the machine. The combination of ignorance of computing > principles and programming with the kind of fuzzy thinking we find in people > who have never paid attention to details is seriously deadly to information.
XML is an encoding format, no more than that. It is a pretty good encoding format because it is relatively simple and semi-human-readable, though verbose. Compare with the alteratives - ad hoc binary formats or the IEEE's binary format monstrosity whose name I forget.
But it is not a content model. It does not try to be a content model. It does not define what any/every tag means. You have to define the content model. Sometimes the tag name gives you an idea what the field means.
Content models all have problems:
Semantic drift - the meaning of fields gradually change. Redefinition of tags e.g. if employee type is 'CEO' then salary is in millions of dollars not dollars. Dialects - different people use the message in different incompatible undocumented ways. Lack of clarity about which fields are optional and which are compulsary, and what are the relationships between fields.
You can't blame this on XML. But nor does XML solve them, except in the mendacious minds of marketing people.
* Tim Josling | XML is an encoding format, no more than that.
You may find it illuminating to do a web search on my name and SGML.
| It is a pretty good encoding format because it is relatively simple and | semi-human-readable, though verbose. Compare with the alteratives - ad hoc | binary formats or the IEEE's binary format monstrosity whose name I forget.
As long as you actually believe that such are the alternatives, yes, XML is better than the completely braindamaged. However, if you start to think about the problem, XML starts to become an idiotic non-solution that only creates more problems than it solves. It has all the disadvantages of an ad hoc binary format, and none of the benefits -- namely compactness and version sensitivity.
I am actually flabbergasted that anyone reading comp.lang.lisp would /not/ understand how to make something better than XML and even carp on this "ad-hoc binary format" non-argument. You /do/ realize that Common Lisp offers a ready-made data syntax, as well, do you not?
| But it is not a content model. It does not try to be a content model. It | does not define what any/every tag means. You have to define the content | model. Sometimes the tag name gives you an idea what the field means.
Again, do a quick search for the SGML bibliography. You may find that you have embarrassed yourself, but if you have any new arguments that I have not heard in the past 12 years, please feel free to present them after you have familiarized yourself with what I have done in the SGML arena.
| You can't blame this on XML.
I can, and I do. Languages come with philosophies from which they cannot be separated. The XML philosphy is stale, stupid, and counter-productive relative to its own stated goals, among which the most important was supposed to be the independence of data from the application, which is actually worse with XML than even /your/ "alternatives".
-- Erik Naggum, Oslo, Norway Today, the sum total of the money I would retain from the offers in the more than 7500 Nigerian 419 scam letters received in the past 33 months would have exceeded USD 100,000,000,000. You can stop sending me more offers, now.
Tim Josling <t...@melbpc.org.au> writes: > ... ad hoc binary formats or the IEEE's > binary format monstrosity whose name I forget.
maybe you are thinking of ISO/OSI ASN.1... it is not really that monstrous in its basic form, though it does have a macro system that can make things very, very hairy...
oz --- there is a fault in reality. do not adjust your minds. -- salman rushdie
> > ... ad hoc binary formats or the IEEE's > > binary format monstrosity whose name I forget.
> maybe you are thinking of ISO/OSI ASN.1... it is not really that > monstrous in its basic form, though it does have a macro system that > can make things very, very hairy...
Yes it is ASN.1. I personally prefer XML myself, but MYYV.
