From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.io!.POSTED.blaine.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Emanuel Berg Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Lions & tigers & variables - Oh my! [was: Lisp error on function :documentation] Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2022 01:25:43 +0200 Message-ID: <87y1tcbtoo.fsf@dataswamp.org> References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Injection-Info: ciao.gmane.io; posting-host="blaine.gmane.org:116.202.254.214"; logging-data="23357"; mail-complaints-to="usenet@ciao.gmane.io" User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Cancel-Lock: sha1:PYixxA9lIEYG6f8NVtFAZSjvQYM= Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane-mx.org@gnu.org Wed Oct 19 12:01:33 2022 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane-mx.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([209.51.188.17]) by ciao.gmane.io with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.92) (envelope-from ) id 1ol5tF-0005sT-Nv for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane-mx.org; Wed, 19 Oct 2022 12:01:33 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:37074 helo=lists1p.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1ol5tE-0001tb-9Z for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane-mx.org; Wed, 19 Oct 2022 06:01:32 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:470:142:3::10]:37214) by lists.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1okvy6-00073P-MX for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Tue, 18 Oct 2022 19:25:54 -0400 Original-Received: from ciao.gmane.io ([116.202.254.214]:38268) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.2:ECDHE_RSA_AES_256_GCM_SHA384:256) (Exim 4.90_1) (envelope-from ) id 1okvy4-0007Da-VY for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Tue, 18 Oct 2022 19:25:54 -0400 Original-Received: from list by ciao.gmane.io with local (Exim 4.92) (envelope-from ) id 1okvy2-0002hD-K7 for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Wed, 19 Oct 2022 01:25:50 +0200 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ Mail-Followup-To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Mail-Copies-To: never Received-SPF: pass client-ip=116.202.254.214; envelope-from=geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane-mx.org; helo=ciao.gmane.io X-Spam_score_int: -15 X-Spam_score: -1.6 X-Spam_bar: - X-Spam_report: (-1.6 / 5.0 requ) BAYES_00=-1.9, HEADER_FROM_DIFFERENT_DOMAINS=0.25, SPF_HELO_NONE=0.001, SPF_PASS=-0.001 autolearn=no autolearn_force=no X-Spam_action: no action X-Mailman-Approved-At: Wed, 19 Oct 2022 05:56:16 -0400 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.29 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane-mx.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "help-gnu-emacs" Xref: news.gmane.io gmane.emacs.help:140154 Archived-At: Drew Adams wrote: >> global variables can be virtually eliminated by using >> closures > > _*ALL*_ variables can (really, not virtually) be eliminated, > with combinatory logic. Magic. But not in practise writing code ... > That doesn't mean you'll likely find it preferable to do all > your programming without variables. It does mean that > variables aren't at all necessary. Right. > Yes, all of that is OT. What's not OT is that for > Emacs users, _in particular_, special (global) vars > can be quite useful. All global variables are dynamic/special but not all dynamic/special variables are global ... > https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/emacs-paper.html#SEC15 Good paper ... Lisp is Loose! The traditional attitude towards Lisp holds that it is useful only for esoteric amusements and Artificial Intelligence. The appearance of Multics EMACS as a Honeywell product is the death knell of this view. Now, a mainframe manufacturer is offering a system utility program written in Lisp; a program intended for heavy use by the general user community. The special properties of Lisp, which make extensibility possible, are a key feature, even though many of the users will not be programmers. Lisp has escaped from the ivory tower forever, and is a force to be reckoned with as a system programming language. I don't know, maybe the ivory tower has just changed form :) -- underground experts united https://dataswamp.org/~incal