Author: Tord Romstad
Date: 00:37:46 01/23/04
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On January 22, 2004 at 22:58:00, Robert Hyatt wrote: >you know, when I was first introduced to Lisp a _long_ time ago, I looked >the person right in the eye and said "that is a write-only language." > >My opinion has not changed. Then just go ahead and hack the readtable to your liking. Lisp is not called a "programmable programming language" for no reason. The syntax, like most other aspects of the language, is fully programmable. Readtables are first-class objects and can be copied, manipulated, passed to and returned from functions. You can even change it at runtime if you want. It won't even break your macros. You may wonder why hardly anyone uses anything except the default s-expression syntax. The reason is that all experienced Lisp programmers learn to love the syntax, and find it to be one of the main attractions of the language. It is not at all difficult to read, once you get used to it. I read Lisp code much more easily and fluently than any of the more mainstream languages. >:) > >Thank goodness vi supports the % key. :) The editor friendlyness is one of the benefits of the syntax. Thanks to the syntax, Lisp code is much easier and faster to write, manipulate and navigate than code in other languages. When writing C code, I am forced to take a very low-level approach to editing, and move around, copy and delete code on a line or character basis most of the time. When writing Lisp code, I can navigate by expressions rather than by lines and characters. Tord
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