Python so far

[Bijan Parsia]

Courageous <jkraska1 at san.rr.com> wrote:

> > > Python may be too slow for some tasks, but in the area
> > > of programmer productivity, very little beats it, and
> > > arguably the environments that do (e.g., lisp) have too
> > > many other negatives associated with them.
> > 
> > Care to explain?
> 
> Very high learning curve.

Er...the learning curve claims always confuse me since I never know what
the axes measure. But, while I personally am intimidated a bit by Common
Lisp, I will say that there seems to be an "initial barrier" (for
"getting into it"), then a lot of things that come more or less
naturally after that (where the chief barrier is really programmatic,
i.e, how to take *advantage* of the language, learning idioms, etc.) and
then some things that strike me as intrinsically difficult (but for
which CL doens't seem to *add* difficulty): macros, the MOP, etc.

The disvalue of such a learning pattern depends highly on where you want
to end up.

> Syntactically heavy weight.

Heh. That's what I say about Python (vs. Smalltalk) :) Given that Common
Lisp has a kind of syntactic *flexibility* that Python lacks, I guess
that although it's base notion of syntax is lighter, the general
experience is going to be more complex. (At least, in the sense that CL
*permits* you to think about syntax in certain ways, and that people are
more likely to *extend or change* the syntax, leading to the plethera of
special forms).

> High
> current cost of maintenance.

Don't understand this one.

> Continually deteriorating
> support and availability of technical expertise.

This requires substantial and substantive justification. My impression
is exactly the contrary (deteriorating from what level? if it's
*continual*, when's the zero point going to hit?).

(And surely the nod here goes to Smalltalk :) Python's is exploding, of
course.)

> Expensive
> license fees from Franz. 

Though with non-commerical varients. Plus, MCL is quite reasonable (even
if you count in a mac), LispWorks has a personal version, Cornman Lisp
is shareware, and there are several free beer&speech versions.

> Paucity of recent commercial publication,
> indicating failure of advancement of the state of the art
> vice recent trends.

To the degree that I can disintangle this, both your data and your
reasoning are highly tendentious, and your conclusion simply false.

[snip]

> > Even the syntax (parentheses) became an asset after I learnt to use
> > Emacs effectively.
> 
> Arguably, it's a very bad sign when a language is so complex
> that it requires an editor tuned to it in particular in order
> to be effective in the language.
[snip]

Er...I strongly doubt that the statment you quoted and the one you made
are even vaguely about the same universe.

I *believe* the original poster is referring to the "icky need to count
parenthesis" "problem".

(For those interested in Common Lisp, I personally found the recent
"AllegroServe" web/application server to be quite promising as a
learning vehicle. It's pretty simple and clear, and if you have
experience, as many do, with network applications, it helps with the
comfort level. This is what I've found from perusing the quite decent
documentation. AllegroServe is intended to be or become portable to any
ANSI CL (I believe) so I don't think it "hurts" to learn it using
Franz's NC offerings, pace whatever pain Allegro Lisp intrinically
offers :))

-- 
Bijan Parsia
http://monkeyfist.com/
...among many things.