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* How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevel functional language to the level of FORTH ?
@ 2011-01-01  7:04 girosenth
  2011-01-01 11:39 ` Elena
                   ` (9 more replies)
  0 siblings, 10 replies; 84+ messages in thread
From: girosenth @ 2011-01-01  7:04 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: help-gnu-emacs; +Cc: girosenth, girosenth

How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevel
functional language to the level of FORTH ?

There are many people who have trivia complaints about parens in lisp,
but I dont.

LISP is a prefix notation.

sequence of operations would look like this on operands (ops) :

(f ops (g ops (h ops (j ops (k ops (l ops ))...))))

How do you make it readable ?
How do you home to the center or centers ?

(f (g (h (j (k (l ops)))...)))

is easy to read or

ops l k j h g f

???

Which is linear reading from L->R ? LISP or FORTH ?

AND, if I must break the nested function structure, will I not be
visiting the forbidden territory of imperative programming ?

(setq L (l ops))
(setq K (k L  ))
....
....
(setq F (f G  ))


If I use setq, I am using globals, atleast in elisp.

If I use let*, I have limited options as I am constrained inside the
rigid structure of let*

(let*
  ((L (l ops))
   (K (k L  ))
   ....
   (F (f G  )))

some more
)

Is there a postfix functional language that also gets rid of parens
and is not as primitive as FORTH or POSTSCRIPT ?

What are the syntax advantages of ERLANG, ML, CAML, OCAML, HASKELL,
PROLOG, RUBY over LISP ?

How does one improve readability so that the code is self-commenting ?

girosenth


^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 84+ messages in thread
* RE: How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevel functional language to the level of FORTH ?
@ 2011-01-02 16:50 Drew Adams
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 84+ messages in thread
From: Drew Adams @ 2011-01-02 16:50 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: help-gnu-emacs

> yeah I guess the LOOP macro is where I got stuck in doing Lisp.

The `loop' macro is scarcely Lisp ;-).  Its syntax is certainly is not very
representative of Lisp's syntax, which is apparently the bugaboo of this thread.

`loop' is to Lisp as `find' is to a UNIX/GNU/Linux shell.  `loop' and `find' are
each practically a language unto itself.  Each can be useful ... and daunting to
the uninitiated.

If you learn the language of `loop' you might (or might not) like it, but not
liking the language of `loop' has little relation to not liking the language of
Lisp. ;-)

Some might appreciate this:
http://common-lisp.net/project/iterate/doc/index.html#Top

or the short version:
http://common-lisp.net/project/iterate/doc/Don_0027t-Loop-Iterate.html#Don_0027t
-Loop-Iterate

No flames from the Loopite Liberation Legion, if you please. ;-)




^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 84+ messages in thread

end of thread, other threads:[~2011-01-21 21:43 UTC | newest]

Thread overview: 84+ messages (download: mbox.gz follow: Atom feed
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
2011-01-01  7:04 How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevel functional language to the level of FORTH ? girosenth
2011-01-01 11:39 ` Elena
2011-01-01 14:15 ` Pascal J. Bourguignon
2011-01-01 16:08   ` Nathan
2011-01-01 18:05     ` Jan Burse
2011-01-01 23:56     ` The Quiet Center
2011-01-02  1:10       ` Jan Burse
2011-01-02  3:45       ` LanX
2011-01-02  4:04         ` LanX
2011-01-02  5:36           ` Nathan
2011-01-02  6:46             ` Paul Rubin
2011-01-02 15:01               ` LanX
2011-01-02 15:14                 ` Jerome Baum
2011-01-02 21:21                 ` Paul Rubin
2011-01-02  7:14             ` w_a_x_man
2011-01-02  6:59       ` w_a_x_man
2011-01-03 15:22         ` LanX
2011-01-02 14:07       ` Frank GOENNINGER
2011-01-07  9:41       ` w_a_x_man
2011-01-09 10:41         ` How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevelfunctional " WJ
2011-01-03 10:29     ` How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevel functional " Didier Verna
2011-01-03 13:05       ` Tim Harig
2011-01-04  4:49         ` rusi
2011-01-04  5:39           ` D Herring
2011-01-04  8:02             ` Tim Harig
2011-01-04  9:09               ` Nicolas Neuss
2011-01-04 10:00               ` Tim Bradshaw
2011-01-04 12:21                 ` Tim Harig
2011-01-04 12:23                   ` Tim Bradshaw
2011-01-04 13:33                     ` Tim Harig
2011-01-04 12:41                   ` Tamas K Papp
2011-01-04 23:32                 ` Tim X
2011-01-05  1:35                   ` [OT] LISP community advocacy [was Re: How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevel functional language to the level of FORTH ?] Tim Harig
2011-01-05  9:52                   ` How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevel functional language to the level of FORTH ? Tim Bradshaw
2011-01-04  6:24           ` Pascal J. Bourguignon
2011-01-04 15:43             ` Raffael Cavallaro
2011-01-04 10:18         ` Didier Verna
2011-01-01 22:50   ` girosenth
2011-01-02 21:11     ` Thien-Thi Nguyen
2011-01-03 16:21     ` José A. Romero L.
2011-01-03 18:03     ` jacko
2011-01-02 23:45   ` Chip Eastham
2011-01-01 18:27 ` How to improve the readability of Steve Revilak
2011-01-01 19:22 ` How to improve the readability of (any) LISP or any highlevel functional language to the level of FORTH ? prad
2011-01-01 23:56 ` Pascal Costanza
2011-01-02  5:39   ` D Herring
2011-01-02 14:17     ` Frank GOENNINGER
2011-01-02 14:53       ` Jerome Baum
2011-01-02 14:58         ` LanX
2011-01-02 17:55     ` Bernd Paysan
2011-01-03 18:07   ` jacko
2011-01-02 12:59 ` Doug Hoffman
2011-01-02 19:14   ` w_a_x_man
2011-01-03  5:20     ` Elizabeth D Rather
2011-01-03 10:48     ` MarkWills
2011-01-03 15:13       ` LanX
2011-01-03 18:20     ` jacko
2011-01-03 18:22     ` jacko
2011-01-03 10:18 ` Didier Verna
2011-01-04  6:47 ` pineapple
2011-01-04 14:14   ` P.M.Lawrence
2011-01-05 14:58 ` Xah Lee
2011-01-05 16:21   ` Andrew Haley
2011-01-05 21:29     ` Pascal J. Bourguignon
2011-01-06  8:57       ` Jonathan Groll
2011-01-07  5:36     ` Xah Lee
2011-01-07 13:28       ` Andrew Haley
2011-01-07 16:19         ` Xah Lee
2011-01-05 17:59   ` Elena
2011-01-05 20:13     ` Xah Lee
2011-01-05 21:42     ` Pascal J. Bourguignon
2011-01-06 13:38       ` Doug Hoffman
2011-01-06 19:20         ` Pascal J. Bourguignon
2011-01-07  0:09           ` w_a_x_man
2011-01-07 12:04           ` Doug Hoffman
2011-01-06 22:59   ` Xah Lee
2011-01-07 11:47     ` Jan Burse
2011-01-21 10:03       ` rupertlssmith
2011-01-21 16:08         ` Jan Burse
2011-01-21 21:43           ` D. J. Penton
2011-01-18 22:55 ` m_l_g3
2011-01-19 13:45   ` Doug Hoffman
2011-01-21 16:15   ` Jan Burse
  -- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
2011-01-02 16:50 Drew Adams

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