why is there not a lisp pc?
in [Lisp]
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From: gavino on 31 Dec 2009 05:40 On Dec 30, 5:25 am, Tamas K Papp <tkp...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On Tue, 29 Dec 2009 11:04:23 -0800, Pillsy wrote: > > On Dec 29, 1:41 pm, Tamas K Papp <tkp...(a)gmail.com> wrote: [...] > >> As Pascal remarked above, you can write a Lisp VM on an Intel PC and > >> have your very own Lisp Machine, with many (if not all) of the claimed > >> benefits. But no one is doing this, so the benefits must be quite > >> small. > > > It just means benefits don't outweigh not having a decent web browser. > > :-) > > > But they could be amazingly huge and still not make up for that lack. > > If some tool has "amazingly huge" benefits, people usually end up > creating it. Eg many people consider having a Common Lisp > implementation to be very beneficial, so they are willing to devote a > substantial amount of effort (free implementations) or money > (commercial ones) in order to have one. > > Yet when I asked about the benefits of Lisp Machines, all I got were > either (1) vague arguments about how nice it would be to have all the > "environment" in Lisp, (2) patronizing responses on how I can't > imagine how great it is unless I have used one, without any details. > > (1): I still can't see why it would matter to have the OS etc in Lisp. > This may be because I don't want to hack the OS: my ideal state of > existence is when I can ignore the OS entirely and get on with my > work. I don't want to hack device drivers and filesystems, I prefer > not to know that such things exist. Yes, sometimes I have to deal > with them, but that's usually a PITA and I hate doing it. Fortunately > for me, there are people who do like doing these things. They seem to > prefer C, and I am fine with that. I imagine that if I tried telling > them how they would be better off using Lisp, I would get a > well-deserved laugh. > > (2): The tone that some people use when they talk about Lisp Machines > reminds me of other groups which enjoy reminiscencing about solutions > that they hold in high regard but disappeared for various (mostly > economic) reasons. I still hear people talking about NeXTstep or > Amiga as if nothing that has happened ever since can compare. Maybe. > I think that even if a particular product line disappears, worthwhile > solutions resurface in other forms. > > Cheers, > > Tamas No reason to get riled up. It is possible a lisp pc would be fun to use. I am amazed that web is using something like javascript to deliver dynamic content, instead of a read languae client/interpreter. Seems web has grown organically with herd just doing it that way cuz others do in an incrememnatal style. I really cherish instances where people do something different and it works nicely. eg BSD, linux, paul graham's viaweb, plan 9 from bell labs, lisp, haskell, forth, smalltalk, erlang, etcetc even things such as the rotary engine I think it is great when an alternative design does well. I could even throw in the accidenatal discovery of philly cheese steak sandwiches or chiecken in hot sauce commonly called "buffalo wings". Innovation is awesome.
From: gavino on 31 Dec 2009 05:42 On Dec 30, 6:38 am, "Frode V. Fjeld" <fr...(a)netfonds.no> wrote: > Tamas K Papp <tkp...(a)gmail.com> writes: > > > Yet when I asked about the benefits of Lisp Machines, all I got were > > either (1) vague arguments about how nice it would be to have all the > > "environment" in Lisp, (2) patronizing responses on how I can't > > imagine how great it is unless I have used one, without any details. > > Lisp would be a tool to make a tool (the OS) that supports tools > (applications) that help you do what you want to do. I'm guessing this > rather long chain of tools explains something of why it's hard to give a > list of concrete benefits. Also, there's nothing that is inherently only > possible to do in lisp and not other languages/systems. The question is > rather in what direction(s) the languages/systems tends to lead in terms > of the end-user experience. That is, "given this basic system, what is > easy/natural to build on top of it?" > > There has been a huge collective effort over the last few decades to > build good "desktop" systems based on the predominant C/unix technology > (that includes linux, windows, mac, etc.), and the observation is I > believe that there's still significant aspects of the old lisp-machines > that were better, even if the number of man-years put into those lisp > systems were minuscule in comparison. > > That's not to say that it's impossible for some hypothetical future > "ubluntu linux 18.0" to provide everything the lisp machines did and > more. But I do think (also) this suggests that there are serious > drawbacks to the way we are making operating systems today, and that > these have negative effects on the end-user experience. > > > (1): I still can't see why it would matter to have the OS etc in Lisp. > > The point would be to provide a better overall end-user experience. I > don't think "Lisp" as such is the full answer to that call, but it might > be part of the answer. > > > This may be because I don't want to hack the OS: my ideal state of > > existence is when I can ignore the OS entirely and get on with my > > work. I don't want to hack device drivers and filesystems, I prefer > > not to know that such things exist. Yes, sometimes I have to deal > > with them, but that's usually a PITA and I hate doing it. Fortunately > > for me, there are people who do like doing these things. They seem to > > prefer C, and I am fine with that. I imagine that if I tried telling > > them how they would be better off using Lisp, I would get a > > well-deserved laugh. > > To simply reimplement the OS kernels we use today in lisp would indeed > be laughable. > > > (2): The tone that some people use when they talk about Lisp Machines > > reminds me of other groups which enjoy reminiscencing about solutions > > that they hold in high regard but disappeared for various (mostly > > economic) reasons. I still hear people talking about NeXTstep or > > Amiga as if nothing that has happened ever since can compare. Maybe. > > I think that even if a particular product line disappears, worthwhile > > solutions resurface in other forms. > > Arguably much of the last few years of development in software has been > a resurfacing of solutions/ideas from the lisp machines, such as GC and > language/VM-based security/safety. That's not to say there aren't more > good ideas to reuse :) > > -- > Frode V. Fjeld How was the interface on lisp machines? Any gui? graphics? video?
From: gavino on 31 Dec 2009 05:44 On Dec 30, 1:51 pm, Alan Mackenzie <a...(a)muc.de> wrote: > Tamas K Papp <tkp...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Tue, 29 Dec 2009 21:34:08 +0000, Alan Mackenzie wrote: > >> You can compile that language with the lisp machine as the target > >> architecture. The lisp machine is just as general, it just emphasises > >> languages dominated by heavily nested function calls, rather than > >> those made up of assignment statements. The architectures that came > >> to dominate (Intel, Motorola 68000, some RISCs) did so because > >> "C-like" languages had far more programmers that "lisp-like" > >> languages. > > Maybe, but I am still not convinced that this was the main reason. > > First, the number of programmers is itself endogenous: programmers > > gravitate to languages which they find useful. > > Kind of, perhaps. Programmers use whatever language their boss says, or > what the free software project they've just joined uses. I doubt many > consciously chose their language, though some do. > > > Sure, there are some other factors, but in the days of Lisp machines, > > these worked in favor of Lisp much more than today (it was much more > > widespread, had a significant presence at universities, etc). > > Second, Intel-like architectures could have had other advantages which > > have nothing to do with the number of programmers. Maybe they were > > simpler, cheaper to produce, easier to optimize, etc. > > The Intel 80x86 architecture came to predominate for exactly one reason, > namely that it was chosen by IBM for their PC back in the early 1980s. > Microsoft's software predominates for exactly the same reason. Nobody > would claim that the 80x86 was particularly good; other 16-bit machines > of that era used the Motorola 68000 (the Atari ST, Amiga, the Apple Mac). > Since that time, better RISC chips have appeared, yet the 30 yo Intel > architecture is as entrenched as ever. If RISC chips couldn't displace > the 80x86, what chance did a Lisp Machine have? > > > I don't think we can explain how these architectures came to dominate > > without taking these factors into account, and when we do this, I would > > be surprised if the "Lisp had less programmers" story still retains a > > lot of explanatory power. > > You're right here, I think. However, let's put it this way: If the > number of competent Lisp programmers in the 1980s had been higher by a > factor of 100, I think we would still have lisp machines today. > > > Tamas > > -- > Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany). I am sad when I heard that MIT had given up using scheme and switched to python for programming courses. Are there any universities today using common lisp as a teaching language?
From: gavino on 31 Dec 2009 05:45 On Dec 30, 2:33 pm, Tamas K Papp <tkp...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On Wed, 30 Dec 2009 18:51:45 +0000, Alan Mackenzie wrote: > > Tamas K Papp <tkp...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > >> Maybe, but I am still not convinced that this was the main reason. > >> First, the number of programmers is itself endogenous: programmers > >> gravitate to languages which they find useful. > > > Kind of, perhaps. Programmers use whatever language their boss says, or > > what the free software project they've just joined uses. I doubt many > > consciously chose their language, though some do. > > I agree with you. Scientists who program also tend to use widespread > languages---usually the first language that was taught reasonably well > to them---without any further thought. Very few make a conscious > choice. > > > The Intel 80x86 architecture came to predominate for exactly one reason, > > namely that it was chosen by IBM for their PC back in the early 1980s. > > Microsoft's software predominates for exactly the same reason. Nobody > > would claim that the 80x86 was particularly good; other 16-bit machines > > of that era used the Motorola 68000 (the Atari ST, Amiga, the Apple > > Mac). Since that time, better RISC chips have appeared, yet the 30 yo > > Intel architecture is as entrenched as ever. If RISC chips couldn't > > displace the 80x86, what chance did a Lisp Machine have? > > Again, I agree. Chip design and manufacturing exhibit significant > economies of scale, so if a technology is entrenched for whatever > reason, it will have a good chance of prevailing. If Company A > sells 10^n times the CPUs Company B sells, then A can pour more money > into the process, design new chips faster, and take advantage of > Moore's law. Then you can buy the latest A chip using today's > technology for the price of the latest B chip which lags a year > behind, even though it would have beaten last year's A chip. The > critical value of n is an interesting empirical question. > > But I am wondering if this pattern will hold if Moore's law breaks > down. If you can't squeeze more bang into a single CPU, and > multithreaded CPUs don't deliver the promised miracles either, then > architectural choices for CPUs may matter again. I am not saying that > Lisp Machines will be resurrected, but x86 may not be the only > architecture around if it can be dominated---maybe in a niche. > > The above scenario would be more likely to happen if free software > were more prevalent. If MS controls software, then they get to decide > whether your new CPU architecture lives or dies. But if they don't, > you may get away with rewriting a fraction of existing software (eg a > compatibility layer, etc). > > >> I don't think we can explain how these architectures came to dominate > >> without taking these factors into account, and when we do this, I would > >> be surprised if the "Lisp had less programmers" story still retains a > >> lot of explanatory power. > > > You're right here, I think. However, let's put it this way: If the > > number of competent Lisp programmers in the 1980s had been higher by a > > factor of 100, I think we would still have lisp machines today. > > A related thought: anecdotal evidence suggests that Lisp makes certain > programmers more productive for certain tasks. Current desktop > environments have a lot of man-hours put into them, but if you are > more productive, you can make a working desktop environment with a lot > less effort. OTOH I think that this is precisely the kind of software > that has a lot of nitty-gritty details that will take a lot of time, > regardless of the language. > > If I were a super-rich and I wanted to finance the development of a > Lisp machine, I would first aim for a successful "Lisp environment" > (not a Lisp machine, but a Lisp-based OS on stock hardware, not unlike > Movitz when/if it grows up). I would make it super-easy to contribute > simple utilities, and provide a compatibility layer (that runs current > desktop software, doesn't matter if it is 1/10 the speed). I would > only experiment with Lisp-optimized hardware after I have a > functioning ecosystem on x86. So having a Lisp Machine per se would > be of secondary importance to me. But of course this is all a pipe > dream :-) > > Tamas would it be possible to write something like X windows in lisp?
From: gavino on 31 Dec 2009 05:47
On Dec 30, 6:32 pm, Kaz Kylheku <kkylh...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On 2009-12-30, Mahesh Subramaniya <mahesh...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > So, why do we need a lisp PC basically? > > What we need to do is to precisely define ``lisp PC''. > > I don't know what a ``lisp PC'' is. > > If I don't know what it is, then how can I tell whether or not I need one? > > It may be safe to assume that if I don't need any kind of PC at the moment, and > if a ``lisp PC'' is a kind of PC, then I don't need a ``lisp PC''. > > > I'm a novice user in lisp. Trying to understand few things in the world > > of Lisp. > > A machine programmed Lisp from the ground up has the potential to be more > efficient in its use of resources, as well as more reliable and secure, than a > machine with a conventional kernel programmed in a higher level assembly > language. > > An all-Lisp system can be devised in such a way that there is no need for > separate privileged and unprivileged modes of execution, and no > virtual memory. > > That translates to performance. woa, and what about the gui? and how could it be more secure? sound/ video? no virtual memory how? because lisp garbage collection handles it? or? interesting post! why also more reliable? |