Re: Scheme syntax vs. other languages

[James Harkins]

> > D is obviously the wrong fit for an lp extension language, but scheme
> > has a couple of strikes against it right from the start.
> 
> Sure, it requires getting into.  Not that D doesn't.  The rules of
> Scheme syntax can be learnt in one afternoon.  The syntax may not
> exactly resemble mathematical notation or plain language, but it is
> simple and regular.  If we were out for natural language, our extension
> language for LilyPond would be COBOL.
> 
> Scheme has a low lexical and syntactical impact, and the price for that
> is a uniform syntax, and a uniform syntax has few structuring visual
> elements.  One payback for that is that you can do syntax
> transformations in a predictable and reliable way.

I'm certainly in no position to argue for another extension language for LP -- 
just saying up front that isn't the purpose of this e-mail. Just throwing an 
opinion into the pot.

In my SuperCollider work, more and more I prefer a coding style that favors 
legibility over concision. Many people use SC for live coding, where concision 
is more important -- you have to be able to type the code FAST in front of an 
audience. As a result, SC is full of syntax sugar, some of it quite lovely, 
some of it obscure. You can create a new array with 10 random numbers concisely 
like this -- { rrand(1, 10) } ! 10 -- but lately I prefer to write the more 
"canonical" syntax Array.fill(10, { rrand(1, 10) }). Someone unfamiliar with SC 
can make a reasonable guess what Array.fill does, but ! is opaque.

I find scheme to be impossible to read without an editor that highlights 
matching brackets. I can start to make sense out of it once the editor shows me 
which () belong together. That's an obstacle -- it pushes learning lisp into 
the category of Things I Really Ought to Do Someday If for No Reason Other Than 
Building Character. I may yet do that for LP and/or Emacs, but it's 
intimidating -- and if it's intimidating for me, I expect it's more so for 
other LP users.

But yes, scheme has a lot going for it here.
James


--
James Harkins /// dewdrop world
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