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Re:I can't keep up with idiomatic Rust by api on Thursday April 09, 2020 @10:29AM (#22822850)
Why does nobody use it? I've never heard a satisfactory answer from LISPers. "People are dumb" is not a satisfactory answer.
Re:I can't keep up with idiomatic Rust by jdmichal on Thursday April 09, 2020 @11:36AM (#22823563)
The best answer I've seen is the Lisp Curse. It's basically the idea that Lisp is so flexible that every project becomes its own DSL / idiomatic version of Lisp. Imagine what's being discussed here, except that every programmer actually has the power to just make the change rather than have to submit it to the central Rust team for consideration and eventual implementation.

http://winestockwebdesign.com/Essays/Lisp_Curse.html

Re:I can't keep up with idiomatic Rust by kazinator on Thursday April 09, 2020 @11:41AM (#22823603)
I had the same thought. Lisp puts an end to the bikeshedding; everyone can build their own shed and paint it whatever they want, without having to break upstream.

It also applies to the recent "Why I'm Leaving Elm" article. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22821447

Part of the struggle depicted in the article is between user defined language extensions "competing" with the upstream compiler.

That's exactly a social problem that becomes a technical problem in Lisp.

Re:I can't keep up with idiomatic Rust by pcwalton on Thursday April 09, 2020 @04:50PM (#22827036)
There are a multitude of reasons, but I think the biggest ones are (1) the unfamiliar syntax; (2) the fact that Lisp runtimes tend to want all code that interacts with it to also be Lisp instead of focusing on FFI and interoperability; (3) Unix and C were free and so went viral.
Re:I can't keep up with idiomatic Rust by astrange on Thursday April 09, 2020 @08:55PM (#22828845)
Because of the rule of least power, it's actually bad for a language to be able to do anything.