Comments on: Common Lisp and the Towers of Blub http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub Wed, 01 Feb 2012 14:27:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Steve Knight http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-8876 Steve Knight Tue, 10 Jun 2008 12:04:34 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-8876 <blockquote>From my personal experience at work i must say there aren’t many big projects developed in some less mainstream languages simply because employers and people in charge are afraid of programming languages with a smaller userbase.</blockquote> Yes you're right and I don't think this is going to change. Whilst there is a theory (and I'm sure it's true) that if you can find a good programmer they are good regardless of the language so the programming language is not really the problem. The problem is finding the management with vision. The thing that perplexes me the most is whether good programmers would want to program in something other than a mainstream language because it might reduce their marketability.

From my personal experience at work i must say there aren’t many big projects developed in some less mainstream languages simply because employers and people in charge are afraid of programming languages with a smaller userbase.

Yes you’re right and I don’t think this is going to change. Whilst there is a theory (and I’m sure it’s true) that if you can find a good programmer they are good regardless of the language so the programming language is not really the problem. The problem is finding the management with vision.

The thing that perplexes me the most is whether good programmers would want to program in something other than a mainstream language because it might reduce their marketability.

]]> By: Alex http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-8696 Alex Wed, 21 May 2008 18:13:05 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-8696 From my personal experience at work i must say there aren't many big projects developed in some less mainstream languages simply because employers and people in charge are afraid of programming languages with a smaller userbase. At work we develop stuff for web mostly on php and when i tried to implement some projects in Smalltalk Seaside framework i was greeted with something along the lines of "That looks very promising, but if you ever get hit by bus where the heck am i supposed to pick a programmer that can work in this language charging the same fees i'm paying you?" and that was the end of it. Obviously i live in a small country and that might justify this behavior, personally, i still see it as short-sight. From my personal experience at work i must say there aren’t many big projects developed in some less mainstream languages simply because employers and people in charge are afraid of programming languages with a smaller userbase.
At work we develop stuff for web mostly on php and when i tried to implement some projects in Smalltalk Seaside framework i was greeted with something along the lines of “That looks very promising, but if you ever get hit by bus where the heck am i supposed to pick a programmer that can work in this language charging the same fees i’m paying you?” and that was the end of it. Obviously i live in a small country and that might justify this behavior, personally, i still see it as short-sight.

]]> By: Peter Christensen http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-2641 Peter Christensen Wed, 09 Jan 2008 17:10:14 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-2641 Truy, I had that same question, "If Lisp is so great, how come no one uses it?" There's a forthcoming blog post inside me that examines the logic behind the statement, but for now I've started compiling a list of companies that are known to use Lisp. Granted, it's nothing compared to companies that use C, Java, etc, but it's something. I'm still working on it and have some big lists to parse. Take a look: http://www.pchristensen.com/blog/lisp-companies/ Truy,
I had that same question, “If Lisp is so great, how come no one uses it?” There’s a forthcoming blog post inside me that examines the logic behind the statement, but for now I’ve started compiling a list of companies that are known to use Lisp. Granted, it’s nothing compared to companies that use C, Java, etc, but it’s something. I’m still working on it and have some big lists to parse. Take a look:

http://www.pchristensen.com/blog/lisp-companies/

]]> By: Truy http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-1738 Truy Wed, 14 Nov 2007 08:42:34 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-1738 Hi, Lisp is very powerful, too powerful for many programmers, and far too powerful for most managers / companies. Since people are not likely to change much, the adoption of Lisp is unlikely to change much. Yes, it's more popular now (with developers) than in a long time, but this has more to do with internet, blogs and rss feeds than the language itself, which has been this way for ages. So by all means, learn it and love it - but expecting to see a lot of apps around actually written in CL? Not that likely. Hi,

Lisp is very powerful, too powerful for many programmers, and far too powerful for most managers / companies.
Since people are not likely to change much, the adoption of Lisp is unlikely to change much. Yes, it’s more popular now (with developers) than in a long time, but this has more to do with internet, blogs and rss feeds than the language itself, which has been this way for ages.
So by all means, learn it and love it – but expecting to see a lot of apps around actually written in CL? Not that likely.

]]> By: Steve Knight http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-1705 Steve Knight Mon, 12 Nov 2007 06:36:59 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-1705 Hi Graham! >> maybe I might of found an application written in it somewhere, someday You raise an excellent point, but of course I have a response. I'm not sure if Lisp's resurgence will come to anything much but it's starting to become clearer to me that the original claims about Lisp are based in some truth. Lisp is more powerful than anything I've used before and since I'm not a master of the universe yet a little more power wouldn't go a miss! There is of course a cost. Richard Feynman developed his own set of nomenclature for calculus (<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Surely-Feynman-Adventures-Curious-Character/dp/0393316041" rel="nofollow">Surely You must Be Joking</a>) which was, to him at least, far superior than the ones that we already had developed. And so it is with Lisp, I think, and like Feynman's calculus it's adoption is a problem of communication. Lisp might be a more efficient representation of a program but there is an up-front cost to understanding what it means because by <strong>current</strong> standards it is somewhat unconventional. A mutual ex-colleague of ours (Brian Egge) reminded me that software often gets rewritten a few times and if the first version is written in Lisp and subsequent ones are not then that's not necessarily a failure it's just how it is. It's a language that cries out as a candidate for proof-of-concept ideas in powers-of-one shops. That's why it's got me hooked. Hi Graham!

>> maybe I might of found an application written in it somewhere, someday

You raise an excellent point, but of course I have a response. I’m not sure if Lisp’s resurgence will come to anything much but it’s starting to become clearer to me that the original claims about Lisp are based in some truth. Lisp is more powerful than anything I’ve used before and since I’m not a master of the universe yet a little more power wouldn’t go a miss! There is of course a cost.

Richard Feynman developed his own set of nomenclature for calculus (Surely You must Be Joking) which was, to him at least, far superior than the ones that we already had developed.

And so it is with Lisp, I think, and like Feynman’s calculus it’s adoption is a problem of communication. Lisp might be a more efficient representation of a program but there is an up-front cost to understanding what it means because by current standards it is somewhat unconventional.

A mutual ex-colleague of ours (Brian Egge) reminded me that software often gets rewritten a few times and if the first version is written in Lisp and subsequent ones are not then that’s not necessarily a failure it’s just how it is. It’s a language that cries out as a candidate for proof-of-concept ideas in powers-of-one shops. That’s why it’s got me hooked.

]]> By: Graham King http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-1702 Graham King Mon, 12 Nov 2007 02:38:56 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-1702 Don't do it Steve! Save yourself whilst other human beings still (sort of) understand you! I gave Lisp a month of my life a few years ago. I had to stop when I wore out my bracket key. Lisp did give me a new perspective on things: Languages for Real Programmers = bad. Languages for Children = good. Right now I'm using a lot of Flex and it makes me happy. One might also consider that if it really was the greatest language in the world, maybe I might of found an application written in it somewhere, someday (yes, aside from Emacs). I've used a feed reader in Smalltalk, a jabber server in Erlang, but never anything in Lisp. And Mr Paul Graham might want to admit that he's paying for his champagne in Python generated money, from selling reddit after they re-wrote it from Lisp to Python. Happy bracket counting. Graham Don’t do it Steve! Save yourself whilst other human beings still (sort of) understand you!

I gave Lisp a month of my life a few years ago. I had to stop when I wore out my bracket key. Lisp did give me a new perspective on things: Languages for Real Programmers = bad. Languages for Children = good. Right now I’m using a lot of Flex and it makes me happy.

One might also consider that if it really was the greatest language in the world, maybe I might of found an application written in it somewhere, someday (yes, aside from Emacs). I’ve used a feed reader in Smalltalk, a jabber server in Erlang, but never anything in Lisp. And Mr Paul Graham might want to admit that he’s paying for his champagne in Python generated money, from selling reddit after they re-wrote it from Lisp to Python.

Happy bracket counting.
Graham

]]> By: Jon Harrop http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-1694 Jon Harrop Sun, 11 Nov 2007 15:15:40 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-1694 You might like OCaml or Haskell. They are like Lisp but better... ;-) You might like OCaml or Haskell. They are like Lisp but better… ;-)

]]> By: Tom SW http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-1682 Tom SW Sat, 10 Nov 2007 19:39:29 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-1682 Thanks for helping me discover that I too am crap at maths (project Euler). For the life of me I can't understand how you got to using symbol-macrolet to solve problem 2, though :) Thanks for helping me discover that I too am crap at maths (project Euler).
For the life of me I can’t understand how you got to using symbol-macrolet to solve problem 2, though :)

]]> By: Shorel http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-1670 Shorel Sat, 10 Nov 2007 02:04:06 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-1670 I recommend you this book: http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/pub/WWW/faculty/shapiro/Commonlisp/ It will take your hand and teach you Lisp in a complete and understandable way. PCL will make you see Lisp code and say 'whoa', the Shapiro book will make you write that kind of code (if you do all exercises in the book, that's it) while being actually easier to understand. I recommend you this book:

http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/pub/WWW/faculty/shapiro/Commonlisp/

It will take your hand and teach you Lisp in a complete and understandable way.

PCL will make you see Lisp code and say ‘whoa’, the Shapiro book will make you write that kind of code (if you do all exercises in the book, that’s it) while being actually easier to understand.

]]> By: grules http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub/comment-page-1#comment-1668 grules Sat, 10 Nov 2007 01:23:54 +0000 http://www.hackinghat.com/index.php/lisp/common-lisp-and-the-towers-of-blub#comment-1668 Please do yourself a favor and learn Common Lisp using a book that was created to teach Common Lisp. Not a reference: http://www.gigamonkeys.com/book/ Please do yourself a favor and learn Common Lisp using a book that was created to teach Common Lisp. Not a reference:

http://www.gigamonkeys.com/book/

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