Re: Are we close to a Lisp boom ?

On May 7, 7:55=A0pm, Will Schenk <wsch...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> On May 3, 12:21=A0pm, "Peter Hildebrandt" <peter.hildebra...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> wrote:
>
> > I believe the barrier to entry is too high here, and I think the major
=
=A0
> > reason is that the lisp world is so pluralistic: =A0Which
implementation=
 do =A0
> > I use? =A0Which IDE? =A0Which libraries? =A0Where do I get what? =A0
> > (Unfortunately) people expect there to be one way to do things, i.e.
the=
y =A0
> > expect to go to lisp.org, "click here to download", double-click the
=A0=

> > installer, select "example-1" and first launch, click "run", and look
at=
 =A0
> > their first own weblog :-)
>
> > As a newcomer (I remember!) lisp is quite confusing: =A0which
implementa=
tion =A0
> > to use? =A0Where to download? =A0Where is a good discussion board?
=A0Wh=
at are =A0
> > the libraries?
>
> I was actually asking myself this question this weekend: I have a code
> problem which for various reasons I need to break out into something
> better than ruby. =A0I need local performance specifically and I'd like
> to make it distributable. =A0(Something along the mapreduce model
> probably.) =A0I need fairly tight control over memory (at least I need
> access to mmap() and ideally there's already a good btree
> implementation that's fast). =A0Event base concurrency would be nice.
> (Also, it should go without saying that it sup****ts sockets and
> http.) =A0I know java the best and it's performance quirks, so its a low
> risk thing for me, but, ug. =A0The ruby code makes extensive use of meta
> programming, and for what I'm doing I expect to do a lot more. =A0So
> another reason to not go back to java. =A0I've never used lisp but it
> occurs to me that this is probably what the hubbub of macros is all
> about.
>
> I've been looking around and everything that's out there is either out
> of date or lacking consensus. =A0Developing on OSX and deploying on
> gentoo linux. =A0Everything is so fragmented and incompatible, I mean
> "pluralistic", that its unclear. =A0If I use Ready Lisp, will I be
> committing to deploying on SBCL? =A0Do I need to care about that?
>
> I want exactly the go to lisp.org and click download this. =A0Ruby has
> like 5 distros now, MRI, Rubinious, JRuby, IronRuby, some other thing
> built on a smalltalk VM -- and when I see that many options, I don't
> see choice. =A0I see: In Someway, Every One Of These Choices Profoundly
> Suck. =A0I mean, diversity and variation are only positive when you are
> talking about surface frivolities; core things are shared and remained
> unchanged. =A0There's not a lot of variation in mitochondrial dna.
>
> Lisp seems cool, and I have a good reason now to actually check it out
> with a real problem. =A0What would you guys suggest to download and
> install? =A0Pls keep the caveats to the minimum.
If you don't want to use commercial lisp because of money,ideology or
whatever I recommend sbcl+slime for linux, a lot of libraries, large
userbase etc,I don't have a mac so I can't say anything about it.   If
you're shopping for  web framework take a look at weblocks
http://common-lisp.net/project/cl-weblocks/
great doc easy to install,
work under win/linux/mac
>
> Thanks.
>
> -whttp://benchcoach.com