Are we close to a Lisp boom ?
Spiros Bousbouras
fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
Peter Hildebrandt
wrote:
I thought about the same question a few days ago when I read an article
about groovy [1], which adds a few lispy features to java. The thing to
think about is, of course, what do we mean by "Lisp boom"? Who are we
speaking about?
(1) The general public (use by hobby programmers, for scripting,
mentioning in blogs, boards, magazines)
(2) Start ups (people use lisp to start a business)
(3) Major corporations (companies using lisp for production software
products, eg. ITA)
(1-2) are of interest, major corporations tend let smaller players figure
out new technology before they adopt them. (2) generally follows from
(1): People use experience gained in hobby and OSS programming to found
their business. So we look at (1) in more detail:
I believe the barrier to entry is too high here, and I think the major
reason is that the lisp world is so pluralistic: Which implementation do
I use? Which IDE? Which libraries? Where do I get what?
(Unfortunately) people expect there to be one way to do things, i.e. they
expect to go to lisp.org, "click here to download", double-click the
installer, select "example-1" and first launch, click "run", and look at
their first own weblog :-)
As a newcomer (I remember!) lisp is quite confusing: which implementation
to use? Where to download? Where is a good discussion board? What are
the libraries? (Obviously I figured it out, but it took me two weeks or
so. I was set up with Java/Eclipse in 15 minutes). I hear you guys cry
out: "But there is implementation X that does A and implementation Y that
does B and C. Choice is what is great about lisp!". I know. Now go and
reread this paragraph.
In conclusion, I believe that the lisp boom won't come before there is a
canonic open source implementation and a canonic repository for
libraries. I believe all the material is there: SBCL would make a great
basis, Eclipse/Cusp a newbie-friendly IDE (which already comes with a few
libs), we have a number of great libraries, and the wholes (currently I
see Ajax/web app and GUI) will hopefully be filled soon.
Now the question is, of course, whether this is what we want. After
reading c.l.l for a year, I'd say: no. There won't be sufficient
community support for a "one corrent solution" approach, so lisp will stay
pluralistic and confusing. On the other had, those who make it through
the first two months or so are rewarded with a great system. And, I
think, among those that have the endurance, a lisp boom has already
begun. But it won't be the ruby-on-rails kind of boom.
Peter
[1] http://groovy.codehaus.org/
--
Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/
Rainer Joswig
<163e1d2b-f338-45ab...@c58g2000hsc.googlegroups.com>,
Spiros Bousbouras <spi...@gmail.com> wrote:
I don't think we will see a Lisp 'boom'. But I think
the slow, but steady growth will continue in the
next years. Plus, some people might be bored with their
current programming tools (it is a fashion industry) and will
look for new ways to do the same as before and write
about it. I hope we won't see too many of those...
Rainer Joswig
"Peter Hildebrandt" <peter.hi...@gmail.com> wrote:
...
> In conclusion, I believe that the lisp boom won't come before there is a
> canonic open source implementation and a canonic repository for
> libraries. I believe all the material is there: SBCL would make a great
> basis, Eclipse/Cusp a newbie-friendly IDE (which already comes with a few
> libs), we have a number of great libraries, and the wholes (currently I
> see Ajax/web app and GUI) will hopefully be filled soon.
>
> Now the question is, of course, whether this is what we want. After
> reading c.l.l for a year, I'd say: no. There won't be sufficient
> community support for a "one corrent solution" approach, so lisp will stay
> pluralistic and confusing. On the other had, those who make it through
> the first two months or so are rewarded with a great system. And, I
> think, among those that have the endurance, a lisp boom has already
> begun. But it won't be the ruby-on-rails kind of boom.
I have already seen one Lisp boom (80s) - mostly fueled by US
military spending. Personally I'd like to see a more civilian approach
which is also sustainable over a longer period of time.
That first Lisp boom ended abruptly and left a huge crater.
I'm also pro-choice and for competition - I don't like
a monoculture. ;-)
>
> Peter
>
> [1] http://groovy.codehaus.org/
Ken Tilton
Peter Hildebrandt wrote:
> On Sat, 03 May 2008 16:34:44 +0200, Spiros Bousbouras
> <spi...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
>> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
>> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
>> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
>
>
> I thought about the same question a few days ago when I read an article
> about groovy [1], which adds a few lispy features to java. The thing
> to think about is, of course, what do we mean by "Lisp boom"? Who are
> we speaking about?
And define "close". :)
Also, can we count Java (gc at least, and anonymous classes
(pwuahahaha)) and Python (interactive and crappy GC at least) and Ruby
(dynamic and blocks at least) and Groovy as being part of the Lisp boom?
Because in the end it is the ideas that matter (and have already
boomed), the rest will follow.
What I see happening is India or China discovering CL specifically and
standardizing on it (er, informally) and crushing the West. Man, that
would be funny, but not surprising. Demming was ignored by Detroit but
listened to by Japan, who then kicked Detroit's ass precisely with
Demming's ideas.
The good news is my passport is good for ten years now thanx to ECLM.
Meanwhile, I think OpenAIR could do for CL (and Cells) what Rails did
for Ruby. Hopefully Andy is making progress.
And watch out for my Algebra app. Early results indicate it works
surprisingly well with unhappy Algebra students, and Algebra has become
the line in the sand for math education in the US. If we get another
success story (here or with ITA) look out. If you thought Paul Graham
made a lot of noise, you haven't been clicking thru my sig.
Given OpenLaszlo, FlapJax, Trellis, and Adobe Adam all doing Cells
without Lisp, to me the fun question is who will win first, Cells or Lisp.
kt
--
http://smuglispweeny.blogspot.com/
http://www.theoryyalgebra.com/
ECLM rant:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1331906677993764413&hl=en
ECLM talk:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9173722505157942928&q=&hl=en
Zach Beane
It seems like there are more meetings lately. I've been trying to keep
track with a Google calendar here:
Just in May there are ten Lisp-oriented meetings or events. That's
pretty cool.
Zach
vanekl
IMO, not until CL goes through another standardization process,
not for the language this time, but for a few libraries:
comm, stream, unicode, thread.
Too bad there isn't a benevolent angel that could fund such
an expenditure <hint>PG</hint>.
scholz...@gmail.com
Without Unicode support, Windows Ports, true Multithreading i think
definietly not.
Ken Tilton
vanekl wrote:
> Spiros Bousbouras wrote:
>
>> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
>> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
>> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>>
>> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
>> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
>
>
> IMO, not until CL goes through another standardization process,
> not for the language this time, but for a few libraries:
> comm, stream, unicode, thread.
Yeah, the damn thing is unusable as it is.
>
> Too bad there isn't a benevolent angel that could fund such
> an expenditure <hint>PG</hint>.
Nah, he went broke trying to do a start-up with CL, a Web store I think.
vanekl
>
>
> vanekl wrote:
>> Spiros Bousbouras wrote:
>>
>>> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
>>> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
>>> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>>>
>>> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
>>> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
>>
>>
>> IMO, not until CL goes through another standardization process,
>> not for the language this time, but for a few libraries:
>> comm, stream, unicode, thread.
>
> Yeah, the damn thing is unusable as it is.
unusable? needlessly inconvenient would be a better choice of words,
methinks. Python has its advantages; ignoring them is... never mind.
>>
>> Too bad there isn't a benevolent angel that could fund such
>> an expenditure <hint>PG</hint>.
>
> Nah, he went broke trying to do a start-up with CL, a Web store I think.
Time to put the cork back in the bottle. The bar is closed. Make sure
you tip your waitress on the way out. Thank you and drive safely.
> kt
>
globalrev
dont know if u misunderstood or not but he is referring to Paul Graham
that
started Viaweb in 1995 which was sold to Yahoo for around 50million
dollars in 1998.
Graham is now working on Arc, a Lisp-dialect.
Ken Tilton
He understood, he just could not handle having pointed out to him the
delightful irony of asking for money to help make Lisp usable from
someone who got rich USING Lisp thirteen years ago.
But what should we expect from someone who says "You've had too much to
drink, drive safely."?
:)
kenny
Majorinc Kazimir
I do not think so. Lisp is significantly harder to learn than,
say, Ruby or Lua, and it provides less advantages to average
programmer than ever.
vanekl
Gawd, next time I'll wink and add 10 smiley faces so the slower members
of the group can catch up.
philip....@gmail.com
If you'd said "beginner programmer" then I'd agree that there are
probably easier ways to learn programming than Common Lisp although
even this is partly due to the confusion over what to download rather
than a fault of the language itself. As for "average programmer", it's
less clear what that means. If it means programmers who are not
sufficiently interested in using more powerful programming tools then
I think it's hard to make the argument that Lisp should be dumbed down
for them. As you point out, there are other languages which excel in
this area.
--
Phil
http://phil.nullable.eu/
John Thingstad
Of course my LispWorks system supports all of the above..
It does not do 'symmetric' multiprocessing if that is what you mean.
I might add that none of these things are a part of the C standard either.
That hasn't prevented C from being a popular language.
Common Lisp is just a common denominator for Lisp's. Commercial versions
like LispWorks and ACL come with large libraries in addition to ANSI
Common Lisp.
As it is - it is strong enough to write real applications today.
--------------
John Thingstad
Ken Tilton
Oh. I see. Yeah, your overall drift did elude me.
Anyway, I see elsewhere you will be in the vanguard of CL's drive to
world domination contributing to (some) Grand Unifying Lisp Web Thingy,
so send along a bit of your clothing and we'll train the hounds on you
as a "friendly".
MarkHa...@gmail.com
> ECLM rant:http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1331906677993764413&hl=en
> ECLM talk:http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9173722505157942928&q=&hl=en
Thankfully for Allegro and Lispworks, Kenny isn't doing their
forecasting.
Joost Diepenmaat
Agreed. I'm also not convinced that Ruby and Lua are a big step
towards closing the gap to good Common Lisp implementations -
especially in the performance area CL kicks ass, and Ruby for example
is mostly "just" a cleaned-up Perl (and Perl also kicks Ruby's ass in
performance). And I am apparently one of the few people here who think
Ruby is quite pretty and likes Perl.
Besides, *fuck* the average programmer. Average programmers should be
in middle management where they can't mess up the code base (much).
--
Joost Diepenmaat | blog: http://joost.zeekat.nl/ | work: http://zeekat.nl/
Ken Tilton
Hunh? This must be my second misconstrual in as many days -- I just
forecasted good things for commercial Lisps.
Corrollary: I do not think Franz went to Japan by mistake.[1]
But whatever you meant, you are right: they know better than I ever will
how well Lisp is doing. My only gauge is this NG... omigod! I have
become an optimist! They may not let me back into NYC. :(
kenny
[1] http://lemonodor.com/archives/001445.html
--
http://smuglispweeny.blogspot.com/
Majorinc Kazimir
@k13g2000hse.googlegroups.com>, philip....@gmail.com
says...
> than a fault of the language itself. As for "average programmer", it's
> less clear what that means. If it means programmers who are not
Average programmer is say, one who mostly rely on available
libraries and only occasionally implement complex algorithms on
his own. His programs might be large but they are mostly made
of simple pieces that need to be connected together without
bugs. I think abstract programming languages provide little
advantage for that kind of job; their advantages show mainly if
one has to develop and test many original and complicated
algorithms - and needs for that decrease due to growing
libraries, databases etc.
It is not fault of the programming language.
Majorinc Kazimir
> Besides, *fuck* the average programmer.
Oh my god! Average programmer is of a wrong sex, and even then
he is overweighted with fat glasses. I'd rather go back to C++!
pls....@gmail.com
> Without Unicode support, Windows Ports, true Multithreading i think
> definietly not.
Gimme everything. And free. And now. And without my contribution.
Does this work anywhere in your personal life?
-PM
Joost Diepenmaat
Hahaha. Anyway, I don't mind average programmers. As long as they know
what they're doing and stay the hell out of my code (unless I'm the
boss and can tell them how to get better, and fire them if they don't
- I'm not arrogant about much, but I trust my programming instincts).
John Thingstad
<jo...@zeekat.nl>:
>
> Besides, *fuck* the average programmer. Average programmers should be
> in middle management where they can't mess up the code base (much).
>
Just like 80% of the population think they drive better than average there
are very few *average* programmers out there :)
Let's call it John's buffoon law..
--------------
John Thingstad
Pertti Kellomäki
It does seem to work all right if one is using Python.
There is lots of stuff out there for which it does not really
matter whether one is using CL, Python, Ruby, or any other half-sane
language. In that situation, the language where you can just
say "import X" for stuff like regexps, HTTP, HTML etc. is going
to win. And for good reason, I might add.
--
Pertti
John Thingstad
<pertti.k...@tut.fi>:
I see thee approaches here.
Indeed if all you do is call library code, who cares how fast the language
is?
After all the library is doing all the work anyhow.
Of course there are cases where Python, Ruby etc are just to slow like
when implementing non trivial algorithms of your own. So you need a
library for everything. (Web designers like this way.)
If you don't have a library you you are left with implementing it in C or
simular. LUA works on this principle. Do the speed critical stuff in
C/C++. Do the glue code in LUA. (Computer games people like this way.)
CL is just another alternative. It allows you to customize the language to
fit the problem and COMPILE it.
Particularly handy if the problem you want to solve isn't that trivial in
the first place.
(Expert systems, CAD/CIM, Gene mapping perhaps)
No CL isn't Ruby and might not attract the same people. Personally I am
fine with that.
--------------
John Thingstad
globalrev
lol so true.
even norwegians say clever stuff sometimes ;) (swedish)
mabr...@gmail.com
Zach Beane
> Nothing in Washington, DC, as usual.
Actually, FringeDC meets on May 10th, but I forgot to add it to my
calendar.
http://www.lisperati.com/fringedc.html has more info.
Zach
pls....@gmail.com
> > Gimme everything. And free. And now. And without my contribution.
> > Does this work anywhere in your personal life?
>
> It does seem to work all right if one is using Python.
Wow, I didn't know that Python does have this kind of bad educational
attitude...
;)
-PM
David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus)
> På Sun, 04 May 2008 05:08:43 +0200, skrev <scholz...@gmail.com>:
>> Without Unicode support, Windows Ports, true Multithreading i think
>> definietly not.
>
> Of course my LispWorks system supports all of the above..
> It does not do 'symmetric' multiprocessing if that is what you mean.
> I might add that none of these things are a part of the C standard either.
> That hasn't prevented C from being a popular language.
However the libraries to do thouse things have been standardized.
> Common Lisp is just a common denominator for Lisp's. Commercial versions
> like LispWorks and ACL come with large libraries in addition to ANSI
> Common Lisp.
Thats the problem. I'm no longer writing CL, I'm writing a dialect of
CL that is dependent on the success or otherwise of my vender.
Edi Weitz
> Of course my LispWorks system supports all of the above.. It does
> not do 'symmetric' multiprocessing if that is what you mean.
The next version will do. Dave Fox made an announcement at the ECLM
asking people interested in beta-testing this to contact LispWorks.
Edi.
--
Lisp is not dead, it just smells funny.
Real email: (replace (subseq "spam...@agharta.de" 5) "edi")
Edi Weitz
> I'm no longer writing CL, I'm writing a dialect of CL that is
> dependent on the success or otherwise of my vender.
How is that different from C/C++?
EL
> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>
> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
At least you guys made it on rank 16 in this <ironic>very
meaningful</ironic> index here:
http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
And in the "cleaned up" list here on rank 11:
http://cdsmith.wordpress.com/2007/06/18/is-tiobe-fatally-flawed/
Not bad, eh ;-)?
--
Eckhard
Ken Tilton
Lock-in is a gray-scale, If you cannot switch from ODB to RDB in a
heavily-caffeinated long weekend we need you extinct.
hth, kenny
Pascal J. Bourguignon
> On Sun, 04 May 2008 19:09:58 +0200, John Thingstad <jpt...@online.no> wrote:
>> På Sun, 04 May 2008 05:08:43 +0200, skrev <scholz...@gmail.com>:
> [...]
>>> Without Unicode support, Windows Ports, true Multithreading i think
>>> definietly not.
>>
>> Of course my LispWorks system supports all of the above..
>> It does not do 'symmetric' multiprocessing if that is what you mean.
>> I might add that none of these things are a part of the C standard either.
>> That hasn't prevented C from being a popular language.
>
> However the libraries to do those things have been standardized.
This is false.
There are some standards, but you have to considerably restrict your
targets to be able to use them.
Even on a single platform like Linux, you've got to choose between
three different API to do multi-threading, for example. And let's not
talk about GUI API!
And while you have some level of POSIX support in linux, unix, macosx
(mach kernel), MS-Windows, BeOS, Haiku, QNX, etc, it is the most
basic common denominator API you can get.
>> Common Lisp is just a common denominator for Lisp's. Commercial versions
>> like LispWorks and ACL come with large libraries in addition to ANSI
>> Common Lisp.
>
> Thats the problem. I'm no longer writing CL, I'm writing a dialect of
> CL that is dependent on the success or otherwise of my vender.
Or you can choose to use libraries that offer some platform
independence, but life won't be easy sometimes.
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__
Duane Rettig
Notice he had to re-split the Lisp and Scheme categories, in order to
make his list believable - would anyone have accepted a list like that
where Lisp/Scheme ranked in positions close to Fortran and C?
:-)
--
Duane Rettig du...@franz.com Franz Inc. http://www.franz.com/
555 12th St., Suite 1450 http://www.555citycenter.com/
Oakland, Ca. 94607 Phone: (510) 452-2000; Fax: (510) 452-0182
Pascal J. Bourguignon
> EL <eckhar...@gmx.de> writes:
>
>> Spiros Bousbouras schrieb:
>>> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
>>> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
>>> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>>> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
>>> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
>>
>> At least you guys made it on rank 16 in this <ironic>very
>> meaningful</ironic> index here:
>> http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
>>
>> And in the "cleaned up" list here on rank 11:
>> http://cdsmith.wordpress.com/2007/06/18/is-tiobe-fatally-flawed/
>>
>> Not bad, eh ;-)?
>
> Notice he had to re-split the Lisp and Scheme categories, in order to
> make his list believable - would anyone have accepted a list like that
> where Lisp/Scheme ranked in positions close to Fortran and C?
>
> :-)
And I notice a CL in 27th position too. If we added Lisp+Scheme+CL,
the sky's the limit! Actually the first position, but good enough :-)
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__
EL
>> Notice he had to re-split the Lisp and Scheme categories, in order to
>> make his list believable - would anyone have accepted a list like that
>> where Lisp/Scheme ranked in positions close to Fortran and C?
>>
>> :-)
>
> And I notice a CL in 27th position too. If we added Lisp+Scheme+CL,
> the sky's the limit! Actually the first position, but good enough :-)
>
Zynically: I thought that Lisp programmers don't need to google that
much for their tools, in order to get something done. Contrahery to the
Java/Python crowd...
So it must really be the interest of newbies that we see here ;-).
--
Eckhard
Robert Uhl
>
>> IMO, not until CL goes through another standardization process, not
>> for the language this time, but for a few libraries: comm, stream,
>> unicode, thread.
>
> Yeah, the damn thing is unusable as it is.
It's not that it's unusable (that's clearly false, as every project
written in CL clearly demonstrates); it's that it's less usable than
would otherwise be the case. It's not an issue of black-and-white: it's
an issue of lighter vs. darker grey. There was a time when CLOS was not
standardised; as The Art of the Metaobject Protocol demonstrates, it
could always be rolled by hand. Surely you agree that a single
standardised CLOS is better than a dozen similar-but-incompatible OOP
libraries? In the same way, standardising libraries would be useful.
The existing pretty-much-similar sockets libraries should be
standardised. Gray Streams should be standard. Unicode should be the
new standard, with clearly-defined migration paths for legacy encodings
(I'm not up on my Unicode specs--perhaps there are some suggestions
already there). Threading and multi-processing should be standardised.
Something interesting would be standard message-passing based on the
Erlang model. I don't know if there's any agreement that the Erlisp
model is the right way to do this though. It would be nice for CL to be
as far ahead of the curve again as it once was. Garbage collection and
closures are pretty common now; optional and keyword arguments are not
unknown (c.f. Python); macros are at a tipping point (people realise
they need them, and are trying to figure out how to get them in
irregular languages); CLOS-style generic functions are in a similar
position; conditions still haven't caught on; I think that integrating
some of Erlang's features might be a way to do for multiprocessing what
CLOS did for OOP.
>> Too bad there isn't a benevolent angel that could fund such
>> an expenditure <hint>PG</hint>.
>
> Nah, he went broke trying to do a start-up with CL, a Web store I think.
PG's too busy reinventing the wheel with Arc to do anything for CL.
--
Robert Uhl <http://public.xdi.org/=ruhl>
People who do technical support for a living are bitter, twisted and
uncharitable. Eight hours a day of telling people what's already in the
manual [...] results in a steady and inexorable progression towards a
state of depressive sociopathy. --dansdata.com
Robert Uhl
>
>> I'm no longer writing CL, I'm writing a dialect of CL that is
>> dependent on the success or otherwise of my vender.
>
> How is that different from C/C++?
With standard C plus standard POSIX, you're pretty much certain that
your app will run anywhere important. You're not certain that it'll run
fast or particularly well, and of course there are those edge cases that
need to be taken care of--but my perception is that C+POSIX is much more
reliable a platform than Common Lisp.
It's also much more low-level and much more prone to segfaults and
security holes. At the moment I'd rather program in non-portable CL
than in portable C, but that's me.
--
Robert Uhl <http://public.xdi.org/=ruhl>
Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and
murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit
suicide. --John Adams, 1814
Duane Rettig
> Duane Rettig <du...@franz.com> writes:
>
>> EL <eckhar...@gmx.de> writes:
>>
>>> Spiros Bousbouras schrieb:
>>>> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
>>>> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
>>>> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>>>> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
>>>> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
>>>
>>> At least you guys made it on rank 16 in this <ironic>very
>>> meaningful</ironic> index here:
>>> http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html
>>>
>>> And in the "cleaned up" list here on rank 11:
>>> http://cdsmith.wordpress.com/2007/06/18/is-tiobe-fatally-flawed/
>>>
>>> Not bad, eh ;-)?
>>
>> Notice he had to re-split the Lisp and Scheme categories, in order to
>> make his list believable - would anyone have accepted a list like that
>> where Lisp/Scheme ranked in positions close to Fortran and C?
>>
>> :-)
>
> And I notice a CL in 27th position too.
Ah, you're talking about the Tiobe site. I was talking about the
"cleaned up" list, which currently places Scheme at #12 and Lisp at #13.
I was the one that originally suggested to the tiobe people that they
combine Lisp and Scheme.
> If we added Lisp+Scheme+CL,
> the sky's the limit! Actually the first position, but good enough :-)
As far as I know, CL is actually included in that mix for the Tiobe
data. It's hard, though, to infer contextually that a particular
instance of "CL" stands for Common Lisp. I read at one point how they
get their data, and that's what led me to make the suggestion to
combine.
I personally place very little faith in numeric measurements like
tiobe's list and LOC measurements, mostly because they can be abused
by both sides of an argument. But for what they're worth (i.e. an
interesting number) they are numbers, and they make possible a narrow
comparison that wouldn't be otherwise available. But take or leave
the list; the guy who wrote the "cleaned up" list (which he apparently
now retracts becase he's seen the light about taking any list too
seriously, including his) was obviously incensed that his own pet
language, Haskell, was rated less popular than APL (which nobody has a
keyboard for anyway :-). Everyone is going to find reasons to hate
the list, and it should be a lesson to those who ask for "proof" that
Lisp is better than something else; it's not going to happen, because
in deconstructing the meaning of the word proof one finds that there
needs to be an observer to the proof/test, and such observation is
always going to be subjective.
Robert Uhl
>
> There is lots of stuff out there for which it does not really matter
> whether one is using CL, Python, Ruby, or any other half-sane
> language. In that situation, the language where you can just say
> "import X" for stuff like regexps, HTTP, HTML etc. is going to
> win. And for good reason, I might add.
Yes. Fortunately, for the important Lisps one just goes to weitz.de and
grabs CL-PPCRE (faster Perl-compatible regexps than Perl!) and
Hunchentoot. HTML generation is another issue, although I'm partial to
CL-WHO (also from Dr. Weitz). For a good portion of the '&c.' weitz.de
is your one-stop shop...
--
Robert Uhl <http://public.xdi.org/=ruhl>
Customs officers enter into a Faustian bargain whereby they are given
absolute power in exchange for their sense of humour. Hitler's dad, you
will remember noddingly, was a Customs officer. And _Hitler_ thought he
was a nasty piece of work. --Mil Millington
Edi Weitz
> With standard C plus standard POSIX, you're pretty much certain that
> your app will run anywhere important.
How many useful and/or successful Windows apps have been written in
pure standard C plus standard POSIX?
plamen...@gmail.com
>
> What I see happening is India or China discovering CL specifically and
> standardizing on it (er, informally) and crushing the West. Man, that
> would be funny, but not surprising.
Kenny, if one knows the history, then he knows the future...
http://home.pipeline.com/~hbaker1/sigplannotices/gigo-1997-04.html
Have fun :)
Plamen Stamov
P.S. And for newbies - read better the rest of the Baker's articles.
George Neuner
wrote:
>On Tue, 06 May 2008 09:43:16 -0600, Robert Uhl <eadm...@NOSPAMgmail.com> wrote:
>
>> With standard C plus standard POSIX, you're pretty much certain that
>> your app will run anywhere important.
>
>How many useful and/or successful Windows apps have been written in
>pure standard C plus standard POSIX?
Zero ... it can't be done. Windows itself abuses portability. The
code between the GUI glue can be portable but the whole cannot be.
George
--
for email reply remove "/" from address
Slobodan Blazeski
> I was the one that originally suggested to the tiobe people that they
> combine Lisp and Scheme.
You're only sin in all those years I'm reading this group.
Pascal J. Bourguignon
> Edi Weitz <spam...@agharta.de> writes:
>>
>>> I'm no longer writing CL, I'm writing a dialect of CL that is
>>> dependent on the success or otherwise of my vender.
>>
>> How is that different from C/C++?
>
> With standard C plus standard POSIX, you're pretty much certain that
> your app will run anywhere important. You're not certain that it'll run
> fast or particularly well, and of course there are those edge cases that
> need to be taken care of--but my perception is that C+POSIX is much more
> reliable a platform than Common Lisp.
In a world of closed source, proprietary OS like we had 20 years ago,
yes.
In a world of free software, easily downloadable from the Net, and
installable on any machine, not anymore, C+POSIX is not more reliable
a platform than Common Lisp or anything else. For example, IIRC,
MacOSX 10.5 is delivered to the users with ruby, without gcc.
It's not harder to download darwin ports, and type port install sbcl
to get a CL platform than it is to type port install gcc to get a
C+POSIX one.
I don't have the impression that MS-Windows is delivered to the users
with a C compiler either... Download for download, you can as well
download sbcl or clisp to make your MS-Windows box a programmable
computer.
> It's also much more low-level and much more prone to segfaults and
> security holes. At the moment I'd rather program in non-portable CL
> than in portable C, but that's me.
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__
Peter Hildebrandt
> On May 3, 8:30 pm, Ken Tilton <kennytil...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>>
>> What I see happening is India or China discovering CL specifically and
>> standardizing on it (er, informally) and crushing the West. Man, that
>> would be funny, but not surprising.
>
> Kenny, if one knows the history, then he knows the future...
>
> http://home.pipeline.com/~hbaker1/sigplannotices/gigo-1997-04.html
Wonderful reading, thanks a lot! :)
Peter
> Have fun :)
>
> Plamen Stamov
>
> P.S. And for newbies - read better the rest of the Baker's articles.
--
Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/
Edi Weitz
>>How many useful and/or successful Windows apps have been written in
>>pure standard C plus standard POSIX?
>
> Zero ... it can't be done.
Thanks, that was the point I was trying to make.
> Windows itself abuses portability. The code between the GUI glue
> can be portable but the whole cannot be.
That's different for GUI programs on OS X or KDE or Gnome?
Rainer Joswig
p...@informatimago.com (Pascal J. Bourguignon) wrote:
> Robert Uhl <eadm...@NOSPAMgmail.com> writes:
>
> > Edi Weitz <spam...@agharta.de> writes:
> >>
> >>> I'm no longer writing CL, I'm writing a dialect of CL that is
> >>> dependent on the success or otherwise of my vender.
> >>
> >> How is that different from C/C++?
> >
> > With standard C plus standard POSIX, you're pretty much certain that
> > your app will run anywhere important. You're not certain that it'll run
> > fast or particularly well, and of course there are those edge cases that
> > need to be taken care of--but my perception is that C+POSIX is much more
> > reliable a platform than Common Lisp.
>
> In a world of closed source, proprietary OS like we had 20 years ago,
> yes.
>
> In a world of free software, easily downloadable from the Net, and
> installable on any machine, not anymore, C+POSIX is not more reliable
> a platform than Common Lisp or anything else. For example, IIRC,
> MacOSX 10.5 is delivered to the users with ruby, without gcc.
The development tools are on the Mac OS X installer DVD. You have to
install them.
> It's not harder to download darwin ports, and type port install sbcl
> to get a CL platform than it is to type port install gcc to get a
> C+POSIX one.
>
> I don't have the impression that MS-Windows is delivered to the users
> with a C compiler either... Download for download, you can as well
> download sbcl or clisp to make your MS-Windows box a programmable
> computer.
>
>
> > It's also much more low-level and much more prone to segfaults and
> > security holes. At the moment I'd rather program in non-portable CL
> > than in portable C, but that's me.
Johan Ur Riise
> Just like 80% of the population think they drive better than average
You know, this is possible, if there are a few really bad drivers.
CL-USER> (defparameter *population* (cons 0 (cons 0 (loop repeat 8 collect 99))))
*POPULATION*
CL-USER> *population*
(0 0 99 99 99 99 99 99 99 99)
CL-USER> (defun mean (list) (float (/ (reduce #'+ list) (length list))))
MEAN
CL-USER> (mean *population*)
79.2
CL-USER> (count 79.2 *population* :test '<)
8
CL-USER> (length *population*)
10
CL-USER>
Duane Rettig
I'm not sure of the meaning of your reply. Are you saying that I
committed an immoral act by suggesting that Scheme and Lisp are
related?
Espen Vestre
>> Just like 80% of the population think they drive better than average
>
> You know, this is possible, if there are a few really bad drivers.
But then the arithmetic mean is a bad average measure... (on data
sets like this, the median is usually a better bet).
--
(espen)
Robert Uhl
>
>> With standard C plus standard POSIX, you're pretty much certain that
>> your app will run anywhere important.
>
> How many useful and/or successful Windows apps have been written in
> pure standard C plus standard POSIX?
Well, cygwin has a lot:-)
Note that I wrote 'anywhere important.' Microsoft Windows is to
computing as the Ottoman Empire was to late nineteenth century politics:
it covers a lot of territory, but no-one takes it seriously anymore.
--
Robert Uhl <http://public.xdi.org/=ruhl>
Death Before Dishonour
Beer Before Lunch
George Neuner
wrote:
>On Tue, 06 May 2008 12:20:29 -0400, George Neuner <gneuner2/@/comcast.net> wrote:
>
>> Windows itself abuses portability. The code between the GUI glue
>> can be portable but the whole cannot be.
>
>That's different for GUI programs on OS X or KDE or Gnome?
It potentially could be if the program were written for raw X instead
of using a widget framework or the native window manager.
Peter Hildebrandt
Actually, the widget frameworks for both KDE and Gnome, Qt and GTK
respectively, are available for linux, windows, and OSX -- meaning that if
you refrain from using platform-specific things, your GUI application will
in fact be portable.
The critical point here is the separation of operating system (platform
specific), window manager (less so), and widget toolkit (portable).
Peter
Slobodan Blazeski
> Slobodan Blazeski <slobodan.blaze...@gmail.com> writes:
> > On May 6, 5:43 pm, Duane Rettig <du...@franz.com> wrote:
> >> I was the one that originally suggested to the tiobe people that they
> >> combine Lisp and Scheme.
>
> > You're only sin in all those years I'm reading this group.
>
> I'm not sure of the meaning of your reply. Are you saying that I
> committed an immoral act by suggesting that Scheme and Lisp are
> related?
are SAME language so they can be aggregated, something that couldn't
be farther from the truth. Tiobe is the index of programming languages
and as soon it started become a index of programming languages WITH
SOME language families the sense was lost. How do I know what part of
lisp popularity comes from scheme and what part comes from lisp. When
that information was lost by aggregation,I stopped fallowing it.
So you did cl a bad favour. But don't worry to much you had a lot of
good karma to spare.
slobodan
The Road To Hell Is Paved With Good Intentions
Edi Weitz
> Note that I wrote 'anywhere important.' Microsoft Windows is to
> computing as the Ottoman Empire was to late nineteenth century
> politics: it covers a lot of territory, but no-one takes it
> seriously anymore.
Whoa, really? And I - naive as I am - thought an operating
system that has a 95% market penetration must have /some/
economical relevance at least. Now you're telling me nobody
except me takes it seriously anymore?
That's what I love about this newsgroup - you get the inside
scoop from real practitioners. And for free!
Thanks, man! Anyone wants my LispWorks Windows license?
Edi.
Edi Weitz
>>That's different for GUI programs on OS X or KDE or Gnome?
>
> It potentially could be if the program were written for raw X
> instead of using a widget framework or the native window manager.
Sounds like fun. And I'm sure the users will like it, especially the
Mac users...
tibor...@gmail.com
> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>
> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
No.
Pascal J. Bourguignon
> On Tue, 06 May 2008 17:03:42 -0600, Robert Uhl <eadm...@NOSPAMgmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Note that I wrote 'anywhere important.' Microsoft Windows is to
>> computing as the Ottoman Empire was to late nineteenth century
>> politics: it covers a lot of territory, but no-one takes it
>> seriously anymore.
>
> Whoa, really? And I - naive as I am - thought an operating
> system that has a 95% market penetration must have /some/
> economical relevance at least. Now you're telling me nobody
> except me takes it seriously anymore?
>
> That's what I love about this newsgroup - you get the inside
> scoop from real practitioners. And for free!
>
> Thanks, man! Anyone wants my LispWorks Windows license?
No, thank you. Really, I wouldn't know what to do with it. Last time
I was forced to touch a MS-Windows system was six months ago, when I
had to go to a cybercafe. And even then, I first installed cygwin to
be able to use it... Last time I programmed for MS-Windows was more
than fifteen years ago, I hardly even remember anything about it.
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__
Pascal J. Bourguignon
> On Tue, 06 May 2008 22:47:20 -0400, George Neuner <gneuner2/@/comcast.net> wrote:
>
>>>That's different for GUI programs on OS X or KDE or Gnome?
>>
>> It potentially could be if the program were written for raw X
>> instead of using a widget framework or the native window manager.
>
> Sounds like fun. And I'm sure the users will like it, especially the
> Mac users...
That said, some MacOS (not MacOSX) applications have been written like
this, re-implementing widgets looking exactly like those of the Mac
Toolbox, to be nice to Mac users. (IIRC, because it was written in
some language where it was easier to do that than to add a FFI to the
Toolbox). Of course, it only lasted until Apple Fashion Director
changed the look-of-the-day of their widgets.
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__
Spiros Bousbouras
> Microsoft Windows is to
> computing as the Ottoman Empire was to late nineteenth century politics:
> it covers a lot of territory, but no-one takes it seriously anymore.
He he , this goes to my quotes file.
Will Schenk
wrote:
> I believe the barrier to entry is too high here, and I think the major
> reason is that the lisp world is so pluralistic: Which implementation do
> I use? Which IDE? Which libraries? Where do I get what?
> (Unfortunately) people expect there to be one way to do things, i.e. they
> expect to go to lisp.org, "click here to download", double-click the
> installer, select "example-1" and first launch, click "run", and look at
> their first own weblog :-)
>
> As a newcomer (I remember!) lisp is quite confusing: which implementation
> to use? Where to download? Where is a good discussion board? What are
> the libraries?
I was actually asking myself this question this weekend: I have a code
problem which for various reasons I need to break out into something
better than ruby. I need local performance specifically and I'd like
to make it distributable. (Something along the mapreduce model
probably.) I need fairly tight control over memory (at least I need
access to mmap() and ideally there's already a good btree
implementation that's fast). Event base concurrency would be nice.
(Also, it should go without saying that it supports sockets and
http.) I know java the best and it's performance quirks, so its a low
risk thing for me, but, ug. The ruby code makes extensive use of meta
programming, and for what I'm doing I expect to do a lot more. So
another reason to not go back to java. I've never used lisp but it
occurs to me that this is probably what the hubbub of macros is all
about.
I've been looking around and everything that's out there is either out
of date or lacking consensus. Developing on OSX and deploying on
gentoo linux. Everything is so fragmented and incompatible, I mean
"pluralistic", that its unclear. If I use Ready Lisp, will I be
committing to deploying on SBCL? Do I need to care about that?
I want exactly the go to lisp.org and click download this. Ruby has
like 5 distros now, MRI, Rubinious, JRuby, IronRuby, some other thing
built on a smalltalk VM -- and when I see that many options, I don't
see choice. I see: In Someway, Every One Of These Choices Profoundly
Suck. I mean, diversity and variation are only positive when you are
talking about surface frivolities; core things are shared and remained
unchanged. There's not a lot of variation in mitochondrial dna.
Lisp seems cool, and I have a good reason now to actually check it out
with a real problem. What would you guys suggest to download and
install? Pls keep the caveats to the minimum.
Thanks.
Rainer Joswig
<53682fc0-b338-4804...@f36g2000hsa.googlegroups.com>,
Will Schenk <wsc...@gmail.com> wrote:
It is good to ask here. You will get many different answers. ;-)
Then you still have to choose, but with more knowledge. ;-)
>
> I want exactly the go to lisp.org and click download this. Ruby has
> like 5 distros now, MRI, Rubinious, JRuby, IronRuby, some other thing
> built on a smalltalk VM -- and when I see that many options, I don't
> see choice. I see: In Someway, Every One Of These Choices Profoundly
> Suck. I mean, diversity and variation are only positive when you are
> talking about surface frivolities; core things are shared and remained
> unchanged. There's not a lot of variation in mitochondrial dna.
>
> Lisp seems cool, and I have a good reason now to actually check it out
> with a real problem. What would you guys suggest to download and
> install? Pls keep the caveats to the minimum.
Well, many who don't want to struggle (and have the money) use
a commercial version (LispWorks, Allegro CL, ...).
I would recommend both of them. IMHO both are excellent
platforms.
For those who don't have the money, like open source, or
have some other reasons there are a several choices with some tradeoffs.
SBCL: generally fast, largish, threads on some ports (Mac OS X)
are 'experimental', widely used. I would just check if it runs on
your platform and try it.
CMUCL: generally fast, largish (I use it on Mac OS X)
Clozure CL: mostly fast, slower FP code, fast compiler, smaller code
ECLS: recently gained more traction, good integration with C
(embeddable)
CLISP: a bit slower than some of the above, small code,
quite portable and very useful for scripting tasks
The IDE for those is usually SLIME/Emacs. The commercial
CL systems have better (IMHO) IDEs - you pay for that.
Plus there are some other options. Scieneer CL for example
might be useful when some performances requirements
would make multi-cpu machines necessary. Corman CL
runs under Windows and is useful, when you want to
write either Windows software or you want a 'cheap'
IDE under Windows. Some old-timers use MCL on Macs.
Some math packages run under GCL.
Dan Weinreb had a good recent overview:
http://common-lisp.net/~dlw/LispSurvey.html
>
> Thanks.
>
> -w
> http://benchcoach.com
Robert Brown
Will Schenk <wsc...@gmail.com> writes:
> Lisp seems cool, and I have a good reason now to actually check it out
> with a real problem. What would you guys suggest to download and
> install? Pls keep the caveats to the minimum.
Personally, I would download the latest sbcl and slime from their
repositories, but other distributions are excellent too.
Be sure to check out the #lisp IRC group on irc.freenode.net. You will
doubtless encounter some problems along the way, and having a live group to
answer your questions is less frustrating than debugging via Usenet news
messages.
Steve Cooper
Anyone got suggestions about why this doesn't already exist? I've been
learning CL with Peter Siebel's LispBox on Windows, and it's a great
start (clisp, slime, and emacs all correctly configured) but why isn't
there a common 'starter distro'? A compier and a large collection of
libraries so people can get going with less trouble?
In response to the original post; I suggest that what gets popular is
a combination of language, compiler/iterpreter, standard libraries,
and optionally, editor; eg, (ruby mri gems), (java javac sdk eclipse),
(c# csc .net framework visual studio), (perl activeperl cpan)
So I think that for there to be a boom, there has to be a default
compiler for beginners, distributed with a large-enough-to-be-useful
set of libraries. It's that compound entity that has a chance of
booming.
John Thingstad
<mindfire...@gmail.com>:
There is. LispWorks Personal Edition and then the Lisp starter pack.
http://www.lispworks.com/downloads/index.html
http://weitz.de/starter-pack/
--------------
John Thingstad
Ken Tilton
Steve Cooper wrote:
>> I want exactly the go to lisp.org and click download this.
>
>
> Anyone got suggestions about why this doesn't already exist? I've been
> learning CL with Peter Siebel's LispBox on Windows, and it's a great
> start (clisp, slime, and emacs all correctly configured) but why isn't
> there a common 'starter distro'? A compier and a large collection of
> libraries so people can get going with less trouble?
History. Lisp began by exploding into variants, then on its deathbed
threw off an ember that was CL the idea, which then got picked up by the
wandering bands of AI winter survivors who again created a multiplicity
of implementations joined by a standard but still a multiplicity hence
not a one-stop shopping experience.
This will not change because CL is doing quite well now and we are all
busy writing applications and do not care much about proselytizing.
Hmmm. Is there an opportunity for LW here? The ACL IDE has not made it
to the mac, not even sure how great the *nix coverage is. Perhaps LW the
company good put out a big "noobs welcome" sign and become the de facto
portal to CL. Too bad CAPI does not have Cells.
>
> In response to the original post; I suggest that what gets popular is
> a combination of language, compiler/iterpreter, standard libraries,
> and optionally, editor; eg, (ruby mri gems), (java javac sdk eclipse),
> (c# csc .net framework visual studio), (perl activeperl cpan)
>
> So I think that for there to be a boom, there has to be a default
> compiler for beginners, distributed with a large-enough-to-be-useful
> set of libraries. It's that compound entity that has a chance of
> booming.
I think this is true, but we got together and decided it would be more
fun to win on the merits of nothing but the language itself.
And it is so much fun watching the noobs trying to get up to speed. Ever
sit at the top of the chairlift on the bunny slope watching the
beginners spilling out of the chairs onto their faces?
Something like that.
kenny
--
http://smuglispweeny.blogspot.com/
http://www.theoryyalgebra.com/
ECLM rant:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1331906677993764413&hl=en
ECLM talk:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9173722505157942928&q=&hl=en
Edi Weitz
> Too bad CAPI does not have Cells.
You didn't manage to sell it to them while you were in Amsterdam? I
was expecting LispWorks with Cells Inside with release 6.0 or earlier.
Ken Tilton
Edi Weitz wrote:
> On Thu, 08 May 2008 13:15:00 -0400, Ken Tilton <kenny...@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>
>>Too bad CAPI does not have Cells.
>
>
> You didn't manage to sell it to them while you were in Amsterdam? I
> was expecting LispWorks with Cells Inside with release 6.0 or earlier.
>
No, they did not see any compelling advantage. How they can live without
dozens of letters zooming around in a circle beats me.
Mind you, neither has Franz been sucked into the Cells empire and they
have seen it up close for years in both AllegroStore and now
AllegroGraph never mind my GUIs (I only CGed briefly, but it is not
clear how big CG is for them being a windows-only deal).
I came close with Franz one time but their chief science officer was
unable to build the Cello project. Crazy thing is it was OpenAL that
stopped him and that is one of the easier bolt-ons.
Not to worry, I think OpenAIR will trigger a Cells boom. It will likely
involve Cells/JS with dependencies reaching across the Interweb, should
be fun.
Slobodan Blazeski
whatever I recommend sbcl+slime for linux, a lot of libraries, large
userbase etc,I don't have a mac so I can't say anything about it. If
you're shopping for web framework take a look at weblocks
http://common-lisp.net/project/cl-weblocks/ great doc easy to install,
work under win/linux/mac
>
> Thanks.
>
> -whttp://benchcoach.com
Rob Warnock
+---------------
Or maybe Johan just lives here: ;-} ;-}
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Wobegon
As Garrison Keillor avers continually:
"Lake Wobegon -- where all the women are strong, all the men are
good looking, and all the children are above average, every one."
-Rob
-----
Rob Warnock <rp...@rpw3.org>
627 26th Avenue <URL:http://rpw3.org/>
San Mateo, CA 94403 (650)572-2607
Espen Vestre
> "Lake Wobegon -- where all the women are strong, all the men are
> good looking, and all the children are above average, every one."
:-)
--
(espen)
Peter Christensen
wrote:
> As a newcomer (I remember!) lisp is quite confusing: which implementation
> to use? Where to download? Where is a good discussion board? What are
> the libraries? (Obviously I figured it out, but it took me two weeks or
> so. I was set up with Java/Eclipse in 15 minutes).
I just wrote a setup guide for CLISP/Emacs/SLIME[1]. When I ran
through it again to test it, it took me about 15-20 minutes. It's not
quite as out-of-the-box as it could be, but it is thorough and
unambiguous.
-Peter
[1] http://www.pchristensen.com/blog/articles/installing-clisp-emacs-and-slime-on-windows-xp/
Ken Tilton
The Tilton Prediction ("A (Lisp) Child Shall Lead Them") made manifest.
Nice work.
kzo
Peter Hildebrandt
> On May 3, 11:21 am, "Peter Hildebrandt" <peter.hildebra...@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> As a newcomer (I remember!) lisp is quite confusing: which implementation
>> to use? Where to download? Where is a good discussion board? What are
>> the libraries? (Obviously I figured it out, but it took me two weeks or
>> so. I was set up with Java/Eclipse in 15 minutes).
>
> I just wrote a setup guide for CLISP/Emacs/SLIME[1]. When I ran
> through it again to test it, it took me about 15-20 minutes. It's not
> quite as out-of-the-box as it could be, but it is thorough and
> unambiguous.
Wow, that is really cool! :-)
I've been thinking about doing something like that for a while, but I
never got round to it. It's great you took the time.
I just reinstalled everything (emacs/slime/sbcl/paredit) in Ubuntu 8.04
-- and I was pleasently suprised: It took about five minutes! (ok, I
was cheating: I reused my old .emacs config file :-)) I hope I manage
to document that once my current project is done.
Again, kudos to you!
Peter
> -Peter
>
> [1] http://www.pchristensen.com/blog/articles/installing-clisp-emacs-and-slime-on-windows-xp/
Dihydrogen Monoxide
> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive fashionable
> languages resemble Lisp more and more then Lisp's turn should come at
> some point.
>
> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would you say we're close to a
> Lisp boom ?
We need to change Lisp's architecture. No more included environment. If
my office suite, my window manager, my X server, my network monitor
applet, my browser, my newsreader, and my terminal all have 50 megs of
lisp attached, that's a problem, especially when I update packages.
We should have something akin to a lisp corba daemon or something of the
sort with live updates by logging into the daemon itself. Maybe every
application could do that. That will make things saner.
When lisp can replace say the dhcp client to make my internet go then it
will be relevant to joe user and mr uptight admin.
We need to do more than just fill in the blanks and expect everyone else
to have an epiphany. Let's publish a lisp shell that replaces bash at
least.
Dihydrogen Monoxide
> Not to worry, I think OpenAIR will trigger a Cells boom. It will likely
> involve Cells/JS with dependencies reaching across the Interweb, should
> be fun.
>
> kenny
That could be the ticket. Reinventing the whole damn OS (Yes I know Ruby
and Python are popular, and Perl even has a complete shell utils
replacement, and NONE of them are required to rewrite the whole OS) is a
hard and unsatisfying task. On the other hand all of them have an
extension to gtk/qt and other good stuff etc.
Cl has extensions, but for some odd reason they feel different. When you
get lisp started you feel like you walked into your castle, if you're a
programmer. If you're not you feel like you're in someone else's castle.
But the future will be modular computing. It's going to be the attempt
which finally buries Microsoft under their own hubris while Lisp could in
fact lead the way.
Personally, I'd like the user, sysadmin, and developer distinctions to
become oh I suppose more blurred.
Unix rewarded you for guessing correctly about what would happen if you
piped two programs together. Lisp could do that as well.
What we need is a GUI which thinks like lisp. Like say an icon represents
a lisp predicate, where you drag it represents the arguments. The way to
trick the user into being a programmer is to interact and provide
feedback.
In fact as you click and drag there should be a feedback window which
contains a lisp program representation of your activity. The window might
ask if you would like to save your clicking as an action icon. The user
would be used to seeing the code rather than thinking it's some special
geeky crap. Heck a phone applet might show changes in the code while the
user types the phone number. Even more complex changes if they add an
area code.
Rather than begging the user to regain his or her humanity, which is what
lisp really does, just give it to them in a subtle way.
For example they could enter a single phone number in the neato gui. But
suppose they really need to find this person at several phone numbers, by
turning the space where the phone number sits in the code into an entry
to be changed they can type in a list.
After a week of lisp hacking they'll beg for more.
Paul Donnelly
> On Sat, 03 May 2008 07:34:44 -0700, Spiros Bousbouras wrote:
>
>> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive fashionable
>> languages resemble Lisp more and more then Lisp's turn should come at
>> some point.
>>
>> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would you say we're close to a
>> Lisp boom ?
>
> We need to change Lisp's architecture. No more included environment. If
> my office suite, my window manager, my X server, my network monitor
> applet, my browser, my newsreader, and my terminal all have 50 megs of
> lisp attached, that's a problem, especially when I update packages.
Why would they possibly be run in separate images?
Dihydrogen Monoxide
Because people click on things some of which are in Lisp, some in C,
some in Python, some in Perl, some in Java. We need a daemonized image
or something to that effect.
Paul Donnelly
Yes, it would be helpful to have a small program to pass code to a
running Lisp, although starting other programs from Lisp would work just
as well. This does not require a new architecture though.
Pascal J. Bourguignon
>> Why would they possibly be run in separate images?
>
> Because people click on things some of which are in Lisp, some in C,
> some in Python, some in Perl, some in Java. We need a daemonized image
> or something to that effect.
And why do you think it's not what we already have?
Aren't you using X11?
Nothing prevents you do things like that.
(with-open-stream
(stuff #+clisp(ext:run-programm "python"
:arguments (list "stuff-implemented-in-python.py"
"-display" ":0.0"
"-window" py-window-id ; insert the python stuff graphics in that box
)
:input :stream :output :stream))
(send stuf 'some-message some-arg)
(display (some-lisp-stuff) :window lisp-window-id)
(get-from stuff 'some-answer))
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__
Dihydrogen Monoxide
natha...@c4l.co.uk
> When lisp can replace say the dhcp client to make my internet go then it
> will be relevant to joe user and mr uptight admin.
Why? What's special about a DHCP client?
natha...@c4l.co.uk
All my Firefox windows are forced to run in the same image. All my
Gnome Terminal windows are forced to run in the same image. When one
Firefox tab crashes, all my Firefox windows disappear. When one Gnome
Terminal window crashes, all my Gnome Terminal windows disappear. The
latter also kills any subprocesses of the terminals; e.g. Emacs or
Thunderbird.
That's why you might not want every application on your computer to
run in the same image.
Andrew Reilly
That's the logic that's currently driving the mania for "virtual
machines" and "hypervisors": your operating system might crash, and that
might take down your other applications. Clearly there's a continuum of
risk versus performance that can be traded off in many ways. I'm quite
happy to run all of my applications under one FreeBSD image: it's as
solid as a rock. Similarly, back when I used emacs, I was more than
happy to have the rapid start-up of emacsclient, which connected to an
existing instance, rather then wait through a start-from-scratch.
There's a quality issue too, of course. I've never had emacs or gnome-
terminal crash on me, but Firfox does it often enough.
Cheers,
--
Andrew
Jon Harrop
> I do not think so. Lisp is significantly harder to learn than,
> say, Ruby or Lua, and it provides less advantages to average
> programmer than ever.
To be fair, that is only half of the story. The other half is that Lisp also
fails to provide advantages for smart programmers who benefit more from
languages like Haskell, OCaml, Scala and F#.
--
Dr Jon D Harrop, Flying Frog Consultancy
http://www.ffconsultancy.com/products/?u
Jon Harrop
> Because people click on things some of which are in Lisp, some in C,
> some in Python, some in Perl, some in Java. We need a daemonized image
> or something to that effect.
In that sense, you need a common language run-time. But Lisp has far more
serious deficiencies than its difficulty of interoperating with far more
popular languages like OCaml.
Jon Harrop
> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>
> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
The world is close to a Lisp boom in the sense that Lisp's dwindling
popularity can barely get any lower.
Jon Harrop
> That's the logic that's currently driving the mania for "virtual
> machines" and "hypervisors": your operating system might crash, and that
> might take down your other applications. Clearly there's a continuum of
> risk versus performance that can be traded off in many ways. I'm quite
> happy to run all of my applications under one FreeBSD image: it's as
> solid as a rock.
Sure but you are misrepresenting the benefits of both VMs and virtualized
OSs.
By far the biggest benefit of virtualization is the ability to migrate
virtual machines between physical machines and duplicate them.
XenEnterprise makes this extremely easy and it is incredibly useful in a
variety of industrial settings (not least banks). For example, one coder
can build a development environment with the appropriate tools in it and
then replicate that VM for the other coders to use without them having to
worry about incompatible versions and so forth.
By far the biggest benefit of .NET as a VM is its robust concurrent GC and
common language run-time that allow programs to be written in multiple
languages using only high-level interop. OCaml, Haskell, Lisp and Scheme
all lack such a foundation and, consequently, trying to use them to build
anything substantial is just building on sand. That is even more important
in the multicore era, where Java has become the only language outside
Microsoft Windows that is capable of exploiting multicores effectively.
> Similarly, back when I used emacs, I was more than
> happy to have the rapid start-up of emacsclient, which connected to an
> existing instance, rather then wait through a start-from-scratch.
> There's a quality issue too, of course. I've never had emacs or gnome-
> terminal crash on me, but Firfox does it often enough.
Emacs is very poor quality software, IMHO. It is unstable, crashing all the
time, and incredibly user unfriendly from a user interface perspective.
Robert Uhl
>
> We need to change Lisp's architecture. No more included environment. If
> my office suite, my window manager, my X server, my network monitor
> applet, my browser, my newsreader, and my terminal all have 50 megs of
> lisp attached, that's a problem, especially when I update packages.
They should all be running within the same Lisp instance. The problem
is that it's a single process, and there's currently no way to securely
isolate the different sub-processes from one another.
Wasn't this a problem with the Lisp Machines--that they were all deeply
single-user? Or did they become multi-user eventually?
--
Robert Uhl <http://public.xdi.org/=ruhl>
Democracy: a system where, when you want coffee they give you a choice
of Coke or Pepsi.
Peter Christensen
wrote:
And here's one for SBCL on Windows:
http://www.pchristensen.com/blog/articles/installing-sbcl-emacs-and-slime-on-windows-xp/
-Peter
John Thingstad
<j...@ffconsultancy.com>:
LispWorks 6 will have support for symmetric multiprocessing I undestand.
It has always had reliable GC.
>> Similarly, back when I used emacs, I was more than
>> happy to have the rapid start-up of emacsclient, which connected to an
>> existing instance, rather then wait through a start-from-scratch.
>> There's a quality issue too, of course. I've never had emacs or gnome-
>> terminal crash on me, but Firfox does it often enough.
>
> Emacs is very poor quality software, IMHO. It is unstable, crashing all
> the
> time, and incredibly user unfriendly from a user interface perspective.
>
???
I have used Emacs for 20 years and have never had it crash on me yet.
--
--------------
John Thingstad
Sohail Somani
> På Fri, 30 May 2008 12:13:31 +0200, skrev Jon Harrop
> <j...@ffconsultancy.com>:
>
>> Emacs is very poor quality software, IMHO. It is unstable, crashing
>> all the
>> time, and incredibly user unfriendly from a user interface perspective.
>>
>
> ???
> I have used Emacs for 20 years and have never had it crash on me yet.
I once used a single Emacs instance for 1.5 month straight. It crashed
when I upgraded the kernel and tried to use ERC (I think.) Compare that
to my digital TV provider who has weekly downtime. I think there is a
Java programmer or a Windows machine involved somewhere.
Lars Rune Nøstdal
> Spiros Bousbouras wrote:
>> If it's true that as we progress in time, successive
>> fashionable languages resemble Lisp more and
>> more then Lisp's turn should come at some point.
>>
>> Do you agree with this argument ? If yes, would
>> you say we're close to a Lisp boom ?
>
> The world is close to a Lisp boom in the sense that Lisp's dwindling
> popularity can barely get any lower.
>
..are you expecting some kind of emotional response to these posts of yours?
--
Lars Rune Nøstdal
http://nostdal.org
Ken Tilton
It's my fault. Jon and I have been disappointed in traffic to our site
lately so I suggested we give trolling one more try to see if there was
anyone left on c.l.l silly enough to engage him. He is in too much of a
funk to try but gave me the go-ahead to use his email address.
Jon was right: it will be a full year before this fishing ground
recovers. Sorry, boss!
kenny
Paul Donnelly
Assuming that when one program goes awry, the whole image goes down, you
have a point. But that wouldn't necessarily happen. Firefox and Gnome
Terminal may crash all the time, but they're also written in C++ and
C. Isn't it more likely that when a Lisp program crashes you drop into
the debugger, leaving the rest of your programs untouched? FFI work can
crash your image for sure, but in this fantasy world where I have a Lisp
desktop, there are also enough libraries and bindings that I don't need
to make more.
Sure, running everything in one image does mean that all programs crash
if the image crashes, but the same goes for your X server or your
kernel. If you suspect the software you're developing is going to crash
hard, run a second image for it until it's stable.