Choosing a programming language as a competitive tool

[Douglas Alan]

"Steven D. Majewski" <sdm7g at Virginia.EDU> writes:

> On Fri, 4 May 2001, Courageous wrote:

> > IMO, Lisp is "inherently difficult" the same way Perl is. Sitting down
> > and reading Lisp code written by various programmers will often
> > result in reading what appears to be almost another language each
> > time.

> That's not a bad comparison: to Perl. But as a few others have said:
> Writing Perl is easy -- it's going back and reading what you've
> written 6 weeks later that's tough! ( Someone else (Tim?)  said: I
> find it easier to read someone else Python code than to read my own
> Perl code 6 months later. )  Lisp is definitely easier to write than
> to read.  I still think Python is easier.  But Lisp is probably
> easier, or at least not more difficult than most.

I just can't see this comparison of Lisp to Perl.  Lisp was the
easiest language I ever learned, except for Python, which was about
equivalently easy.  I can pick up Lisp programs I wrote 20 years ago
and read them like I wrote them yesterday -- and I haven't programmed
in Lisp in 16 years.  It is elegant, flexible, and powerful.  Some
people don't like it because it has a funny syntax.  Everyone is
entitled to their opinion, but I find that a bit superficial of a
reason.  Once you get used to Lisp's syntax, it becomes very natural.

Perl, on the other hand, I find to be the most atrocious thing on the
planet.  It's completely baroque and convoluted.  Programs I wrote
yesterday seem like I wrote them 20 years ago.

|>oug