Subject: Re: Prefix vs Infix vs ... (was Re: `Understanding Common Lisp' book available...) From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.net> Date: 11 Sep 2000 10:47:45 +0000 Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp Message-ID: <3177658065827366@naggum.net> * Chris Page <page@best.NOSPAM.com> | One thing to consider about the whole "Lisp syntax" issue is that | simplicity and orthogonality can sometimes be too "smooth", making | them less expressive than more complex and irregular solutions. | Always keep in mind the possibility that a convoluted syntax like | that of C++ may actually have some merits. This is a really odd argument. Are you confused into thinking that every CL object is expressed via explicit calls to the type constructor, as in a list? Once you learn to _exploit_ Common Lisp, you find that the syntax has rough edges on that smooth surface. When you learn to write your own syntax-supporting reader functions, you find that you don't even need one-character prefix dispatch that basically read like lists. (I'm counting #x as a one-character prefix on x, too, treating the # just like "meta" represented by the escape key.) If you like more syntax, go for it! No language is more flexible in the syntax department than Common Lisp is. If other syntaxes had had merit _to_Lisp_programmers_, they would have been implemented and most probably shared amongst them. I think you should try to understand how come people don't argue for the merits of the syntax of C++, but rather for not deviating from it. A hint: It hurts like hell to learn C++ and so those who do it while not aware of their predicament become psychologically scarred and feel the heavy pressure of deep angst at the sight of foreign syntaxes, fearing more torture and abuse before they can understand. #:Erik -- If this is not what you expected, please alter your expectations.