Re:I Miss Lisp
by Almaviva on Sunday December 12, 2010 @01:06PM
(#1997494)
It absolutely needs to be admitted that it is easy to make a well intentioned unmaintainable mess in Lisp and other highly dynamic languages. Brilliant programmer A will add a lot of layers and abstractions that make sense in one context, which is great until brilliant programmer B does so in a different context. This all seems to break down somewhere when the number of programmers exceeds 1.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
Re:I Miss Lisp
by ScottBurson on Sunday December 12, 2010 @01:15PM
(#1997514)
I've worked on several large Lisp systems, and have never had this problem.
You can make a mess in any language. I will grant that Lisp offers more ways to do that than most languages, but so does C++ (template metaprogramming, anyone?).
Template metaprogramming is awesome. All of the C++ messes I've seen are related to ridiculous OO crap.
Re:I Miss Lisp
by ScottBurson on Sunday December 12, 2010 @05:15PM
(#1998228)
Well, my point is that you can make a mess using template metaprogramming. Maybe that doesn't actually happen too often, because anyone smart enough to use TMP at all is smart enough not to make a mess :)
But you're right, the actual messes I've seen in C++ have not involved TMP. Come to think of it, most of them have been around "const" misuse.
What does "add a lot of layers and abstractions that make sense in one context" mean? Is that like "entities and/or actions placed or performed in a certain manner for a particular purpose, or to carry out a certain task"?
Everything in a high-level programming language is an "abstraction". And anything outside the grammar of the language is a convention.