Common Lisp

1

Go Programming Language

That's my personal opinion, but I think that programming language pages should have more information density. I also think that using your average "startup template" for Common Lisp is a bit weird. A good example of what I like might be the OCaml homepage https://lisp-lang.org/, the Go homepage https://golang.org/. The Haskell homepage has a REPL with a tutorial, which encourages you to play around with the language, I think that's a good idea https://www.haskell.org/. TypeScript's page is also nice https://www.typescriptlang.org/. For something a little bit different, Dhall is also good at quickly demonstrating how it works https://dhall-lang.org/. That might just be a consequence of my time on Hacker News, but I think the insistance on Paul Graham is a bit much. The chart about server performance felt a bit weird to me, as I think the difference between Ruby and JS would be bigger at least. So I checked on techempower benchmarks (https://www.techempower.com/benchmarks/) and sadly there is no common lisp. It's also not on the last runs (https://tfb-status.techempower.com/). I think putting the origin of the results and a way to reproduce them would be a good thing. I don't doubt that common lisp is fast, but that diagram looks a bit too much like hollow marketing, especially with the image behind. The page about OO (https://lisp-lang.org/learn/clos) has a good explanation of multiple dispatch, but I think it should come with an example. The first steps pages (https://lisp-lang.org/learn/first-steps) also explains atoms well, but it doesn't explain lists after mentionning them. In general this feels a bit unpolished, though some part are good. There's no mention of the Common Lisp cookbook (https://lispcookbook.github.io/cl-cookbook/), which sadly confirms a bit the "Lisp users all have NIH syndrome" meme.

#Programming Language #OOP #Generic Programming Language 292 social mentions

2

Dhall Configuration Language

That's my personal opinion, but I think that programming language pages should have more information density. I also think that using your average "startup template" for Common Lisp is a bit weird. A good example of what I like might be the OCaml homepage https://lisp-lang.org/, the Go homepage https://golang.org/. The Haskell homepage has a REPL with a tutorial, which encourages you to play around with the language, I think that's a good idea https://www.haskell.org/. TypeScript's page is also nice https://www.typescriptlang.org/. For something a little bit different, Dhall is also good at quickly demonstrating how it works https://dhall-lang.org/. That might just be a consequence of my time on Hacker News, but I think the insistance on Paul Graham is a bit much. The chart about server performance felt a bit weird to me, as I think the difference between Ruby and JS would be bigger at least. So I checked on techempower benchmarks (https://www.techempower.com/benchmarks/) and sadly there is no common lisp. It's also not on the last runs (https://tfb-status.techempower.com/). I think putting the origin of the results and a way to reproduce them would be a good thing. I don't doubt that common lisp is fast, but that diagram looks a bit too much like hollow marketing, especially with the image behind. The page about OO (https://lisp-lang.org/learn/clos) has a good explanation of multiple dispatch, but I think it should come with an example. The first steps pages (https://lisp-lang.org/learn/first-steps) also explains atoms well, but it doesn't explain lists after mentionning them. In general this feels a bit unpolished, though some part are good. There's no mention of the Common Lisp cookbook (https://lispcookbook.github.io/cl-cookbook/), which sadly confirms a bit the "Lisp users all have NIH syndrome" meme.

#Configuration Management #Software Development #Productivity 83 social mentions

3

OCaml

> A good example of what I like might be the OCaml homepage https://lisp-lang.org/ That should be https://ocaml.org/ of course :).

#Programming Language #OOP #Generic Programming Language 30 social mentions

4

Julia

I agree that a language homepage should be information dense, and give the new user a clear overview without having to scroll. I think the Common Lisp homepage is an improvement over what I remember from years ago, and while it’s visually <i>appealing</i> it’s not as immediately <i>useful</i> as I’d like. Besides the examples Zababa offered, I’d say the home pages for Ruby, Julia, and Python are also good: https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/ https://julialang.org/ https://www.python.org/.

#Technical Computing #Programming Language #OOP 115 social mentions

5

Common Lisp

This website (and all the author's libraries) was such a refresher. It has been important for me to not run away from CL (again). At that time, the "official" website, the first Google result for CL looked like this: https://web.archive.org/web/20160305135106/https://common-lisp.net/ Fortunately, they revamped it circa 2018: https://common-lisp.net/ (work mainly due to @mmontone if I'm not mistaken). Since then, the Cookbook was expanded with useful content (it was kind of hard to find up to date information online, on even simple matters like how to build a binary) and we got some useful lists too, like https://github.com/CodyReichert/awesome-cl and a list of (current, existing) companies: https://github.com/azzamsa/awesome-lisp-companies/ Hopefully it's easier than ever to have your questions answered and start hacking in Lisp! Another very helpful resource by Fernando was his state of CL ecosystem: https://borretti.me/article/common-lisp-sotu-2015 It really helped have an overview of the ecosystem, pick libraries and work on consolidation. I compiled one for 2020 here: https://lisp-journey.gitlab.io/blog/state-of-the-common-lisp-ecosystem-2020/.

#Programming Language #OOP #Generic Programming Language 11 social mentions

My favorite quick reference I have printed out is http://clqr.boundp.org/ But when I don't want to flip through it, or find the short description for something insufficient, then yeah the HyperSpec is usually my first stop for quickly referencing something. I use vim, so I just move my cursor over a symbol and type ",h" and that opens a browser tab on that thing in the hyperspec -- e.g. If I want to remind myself what the state parameter of make-random-state does, I open http://www.lispworks.com/documentation/HyperSpec/Body/f_mk_rnd.htm Though I often first type ",s" which is just an alias for (describe 'symbol) which shows me locally the symbol documentation, and for this one I'd learn the same thing without having to have my browser open. I think some people configure their emacs to do the common IDE thing of showing you the doc along with the function signature as you type, I just have the latter. I also make use of jump-to-source since reading the code is often the quickest way of answering a question about it. PAIP is a great book, but I tend to use PCL as a quick reference: https://gigamonkeys.com/book/ Especially until you use classes/format/conditions/loop enough to get used to them, chapters 17/18/19/22 are helpful. It's still a recommended first book for newcomers that's worth going through entirely though, not just as a reference. https://lispcookbook.github.io/cl-cookbook/ is a useful community cookbook with info on a lot of topics. CLTL2 is a reference I haven't used that much, there are a few things that are in it that didn't make it to the ANSI spec, but what I have read I've found useful and clarifying. https://www.cs.cmu.edu/Groups/AI/html/cltl/clm/node1.html Guy Steele (whose 66th birthday is today) is a great writer.

#Online Learning #Online Education #Programming 49 social mentions

7

Racket Lang

#Programming Language #OOP #Generic Programming Language 91 social mentions