From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Richard Riley Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: learning Emacs Lisp Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2008 09:48:50 +0100 Organization: A noiseless patient Spider Message-ID: References: <87k5bbjzvo.fsf@thinkpad.tsdh.de> <1226379475.20507@arno.fh-trier.de> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1226396499 18005 80.91.229.12 (11 Nov 2008 09:41:39 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2008 09:41:39 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Tue Nov 11 10:42:40 2008 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1KzplX-0005ae-JW for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Tue, 11 Nov 2008 10:42:31 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:33910 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1KzpkP-0000n1-SG for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Tue, 11 Nov 2008 04:41:21 -0500 Original-Path: news.stanford.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!goblin1!goblin.stu.neva.ru!news.eternal-september.org!news.motzarella.org!motzarella.org!not-for-mail Original-Newsgroups: gnu.emacs.help Original-Lines: 51 Original-X-Trace: news.eternal-september.org U2FsdGVkX18p5ZPTI/gjqL8WqGZyTVtkhar4iJnxG1JzV8ZrIk09hgMzPlXGwssMCSoUTAKpjVFED9Wasu5nxElvmbZHVQIMwUIXbH/D0BSHmSrE/bFusNU7FNTQOLHYkoUd0s9N2pBSyssgx3kXGw== Original-X-Complaints-To: Please send complaints to abuse@motzarella.org with full headers Original-NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2008 08:49:11 +0000 (UTC) X-Auth-Sender: U2FsdGVkX18B3kEk2CeCHcistccLr6Yf79ZuhL1r2jvy+JUi2gLi7g== Cancel-Lock: sha1:YcarVxgEwD4cf9ZRBUipdRmzOL8= User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.0.60 (gnu/linux) Original-Xref: news.stanford.edu gnu.emacs.help:164314 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:59649 Archived-At: Andreas Politz writes: > Richard Riley wrote: >> Tassilo Horn writes: >> >>> Richard Riley writes: >>> >>> Hi Richard, >>> >>>> [...] but Xah Lee is an excellent resource with carefully argued >>>> points and practical approach to, amongst other things, eLisp usage. >>> This is a joke, isn't it? >> >> Not in the slightest. I can only assume the bit you snipped about some >> more established Emacs users disagreeing with him applies to you? Or the >> tone suggests that. >> >>> When learning a language it's better to take a look at polished code >>> that uses this language's idioms. Xah's on a crusade against even the >>> most basic stuff like correct indentation... >> >> By correct indentation I guess you mean the established custom? I cant >> disagree that customs are good but personally I think the established >> custom in elisp is rather awkward to the extreme. Not that i dont try to >> adhere to it :-; But even looking around the C world we see various >> indentation standards and everyone is entitled to their view. A constant >> style is, of course, better for everyone although it does not >> immediately mean that constant style is the best. As a programmer for >> years I can not even begin to understand how and why eLisp bracketing >> standards became as they did other than maybe to save screen real estate >> in the VT100 type days. FWIW, I think saving space is better for the eye >> too in some ways but I find "at a glance" analysis of most eLisp code >> almost impossible because of the standard of grouping all closing >> brackets. >> > > That darn old emacs again ! Seriously this has more to do with lisp in > general than specifically with elisp. I doubt you'd find any _one_ serious > programmer or author in the whole lisp community who proposes this kind of > style ( each closing paren on a seperate line ). You will notice that I did not propose it. I said the standard is hard for me to read as someone who is not an eLisp magician. I still do not understand (other than the reasons I postulated about above) why it is as it is. I find it very hard to indent and match (ok, emacs helps with matching brackets), but would find it very difficult to read from a printout for example. But this is more my lack of experience possibly. All hindrances can become less so with experience. But would aligned brackets really hurt anyone? I dont think so. It is convention (and convention is a good thing at times) which has the style as it is. Or?