Re: Where do you want to go tomorrow?
As an aside, I've never touched CL and know nothing about it save
what little I've gleaned while working on XEmacs. For that matter,
elisp was my first introduction to lisp, although I now occasionally
do some work with scheme48 and use scsh quite a bit. So I'm biased in
that that's all I know, and having implanted Scheme into a program,
have a little experience with that.
"Stephen J. Turnbull" <turnbull(a)sk.tsukuba.ac.jp> writes:
>>>>> "ms" == Michael Sperber
<sperber(a)informatik.uni-tuebingen.de> writes:
Ah, and I do agree with your assessment that CL's goal of
compatibility with various historically important Lisps is
inappropriate for XEmacs's substrate. I don't really see the need for
so many different ways of expressing a conditional, for example, and
they always leave me with the sneaking suspicion that
(cond ((this that)))
(if this that)
and
(when this that)
have different semantics, but I'm not sure what it is.... This is a
great way to create a write-only language, IMHO.
When I first started elisp programming (and occasionally now, for that
matter) I saw all these differing ways of accomplising the same result
and just about quit because I couldn't resolve which was better to use
any any situation. As far as performance, readability, and style,
elisp seems to be a crap shoot, and I'd really like to slim that down.
Encouraging potential new contributors into overcoming 'lisp-anxiety'
is also a big plus. As there seems to be more than a little FUD
surrounding CL and the ammount of historical baggage it brings (and
the supposedly steep learning curve), I think abolishing this FUD
should be a first step for CL proponents.
>From that page:
ms> Many features aren't part of the Scheme standard because they
ms> can be easily expressed within the language as it stands. True
ms> concepts are more important, and here CL is weak. I could go
ms> on about the virtues of hygienic macros, the evils of CL-style
ms> macros, especially in connection with module systems, the
ms> usefulness and beauty of call-with-current-continuation
ms> etc. etc. etc. Someone make me.
OK. *twist, twist, twist*
I'll fetch the hot coals... ;-)
However, URLs where I can find out WTF the vocabulary means ahead of
time would be vewy hehpfuh.[1] I've been to Indiana's Scheme
Repository; I don't know where to start.
[snip]
Point is that a lot of the people who should contribute to this
discussion don't even know where to start asking questions. I assume
I'm not the only person totally ignorant of modern programming
language theory on this list. Is that assumption unjustified?
I too am at sea when it comes to theory (sad outcome of being a
self-taught programmer). I can use scheme, and I can use elisp, and
for that matter I can most probably use CL, but I am in no position to
judge which should be the next substrate for XEmacs. However, having
embedded scheme once, I would definatly be of more help in doing
somthing similar again. I'm not adverse to learning new things (it's
my personal opinion that when a person stops wanting to learn in this
trade, it's time for them to get out), so teach me!
Footnotes:
[1] See? I have been doing my homework. At least I know that "We're
hunting RABBIT." Or a modern version thereof. [ObRef Bugs Bunny/Elmer
Fudd.]
Not only am I not on language theory, but I missed THAT too... (and I
own almost every released bit of Warner animation... sniff... ;-])
--
Jareth Hein | jareth(a)camelot.co.jp | ハイン ジェラス
Toolsmith & Program lead | http://www.camelot.co.jp | 開発部チーフ
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