More specifically, the benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries. From
the Common Lisp FAQ:
http://www.lispniks.com/faq/faq.html#s6q2
"Most Lisp libraries that are distributed independent of a particular
implementation are portable-if someone wants to declare themself the
benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries, the position is vacant. Put
together a set of well-tested, well-documented libraries and
distribute them in a single blob as the Common Lisp Standard Library
and the world will beat a path to your door."
If you substitute "Starter Pack" for "Common Lisp Standard Library",
then obviously the "benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries" is Edi
Weitz. Well-tested, well-documented, distributed as a single blob,
all sounds good, right? With the number of references I see to
Starter Pack, it seems that the Lisp world is beating a path to Edi's
door.
Now, there would still be more work to be done. But by making Edi
dictator, and Starter Pack the defacto standard library, social
pressure could be brought to bear on all the distributions to include
the Starter Pack libraries in one form or another.
So, anyone else wish to join in making Edi the dictator for the
"Common Lisp Standard Library" (hereafter referred to as Starter
Pack), by acclamation?
-jimbo
On Jul 11, 6:46 pm, ········@gmail.com wrote:
>
> So, anyone else wish to join in making Edi the dictator for the
> "Common Lisp Standard Library" (hereafter referred to as Starter
> Pack), by acclamation?
Round these parts, we prefer to string our dictators up (the impaling-
on-stakes having proved a health hazard).
On Jul 11, 10:46 am, ········@gmail.com wrote:
>
> If you substitute "Starter Pack" for "Common Lisp Standard Library",
> then obviously the "benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries" is Edi
> Weitz. Well-tested, well-documented, distributed as a single blob,
> all sounds good, right? With the number of references I see to
> Starter Pack, it seems that the Lisp world is beating a path to Edi's
> door.
Why not instead extend the "Starter Pack" into a CygWin like
installer? A FireFox plugin allowing ASDF libraries to be installed
from a browser would also be useful.
- Luke
Luke Crook <····@balooga.com> writes:
> On Jul 11, 10:46 am, ········@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>> If you substitute "Starter Pack" for "Common Lisp Standard Library",
>> then obviously the "benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries" is Edi
>> Weitz. Well-tested, well-documented, distributed as a single blob,
>> all sounds good, right? With the number of references I see to
>> Starter Pack, it seems that the Lisp world is beating a path to Edi's
>> door.
>
> Why not instead extend the "Starter Pack" into a CygWin like
> installer? A FireFox plugin allowing ASDF libraries to be installed
> from a browser would also be useful.
Well some linux distribution already provide the packaging of Common
Lisp libraries, like gentoo.
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__ http://www.informatimago.com/
NOTE: The most fundamental particles in this product are held
together by a "gluing" force about which little is currently known
and whose adhesive power can therefore not be permanently
guaranteed.
Pascal wrote:
>> Why not instead extend the "Starter Pack" into a CygWin like
>> installer? A FireFox plugin allowing ASDF libraries to be installed
>> from a browser would also be useful.
>
> Well some linux distribution already provide the packaging of Common
> Lisp libraries, like gentoo.
>
····@mhflaptop01:~$ lsb_release -d -c
Description: Ubuntu 7.04
Codename: feisty
····@mhflaptop01:~$ apt-cache search '^cl-' | grep -i lisp | wc -l
137
Not enough pre-packed libs? And then there's asdf-install:install ...
Cheers, RalfD
········@gmail.com wrote:
> But by making Edi dictator, and Starter Pack the defacto standard
> library, social pressure could be brought to bear on all the
> distributions to include the Starter Pack libraries in one form or
> another.
Just because you say so doesn't make it so.
On Jul 11, 2:15 pm, Matthias Buelow <····@incubus.de> wrote:
> Just because you say so doesn't make it so.
Well, that's why I would like other people to say so, too.
I'm not exactly Mr. Popular around these parts.
-jimbo
········@gmail.com wrote:
> Well, that's why I would like other people to say so, too.
> I'm not exactly Mr. Popular around these parts.
No, I meant to say, "it doesn't work that way".
On Jul 11, 3:43 pm, Matthias Buelow <····@incubus.de> wrote:
> No, I meant to say, "it doesn't work that way".
Well, you're right. It doesn't work that way. Or at least hasn't.
But is there a reason why it couldn't or shouldn't?
For any non-trivial 21st century program you'd like to write, you will
need a significant portion of the libraries in Starter Pack or
equivalents. Starter Pack is a great set of batteries. What's so
wrong with asking implementors to include it?
Making Edi dictator is just a way to help make that happen.
There's no coercion, of course. There's no way to enforce any
implementor to include anything they don't want to. But it's good to
have goals, no?
This is the point at which someone should tell me "So, pick an open
source Lisp or 2 and make Starter Pack work with them" and I should
say "Yes, you're right, I should, I'll shut up now."
-jimbo
On 11 Jul., 22:12, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> Making Edi dictator is just a way to help make that happen.
IMHO the whole "benevolent dictator" thing is not much more than the
pet theory of some people trying to define how a programming language
and/or it's libraries can be made successful. In a pet implementation
of a pet language this pet theory might work out as a trendy way to
decide about pet language design issues. In the real world you cannot
dictate what your users want to use. A starter-pack like Edi's is a
nice thing for - well - starters.
>
> There's no coercion, of course. There's no way to enforce any
> implementor to include anything they don't want to. But it's good to
> have goals, no?
This depends on the specific goals...
> This is the point at which someone should tell me "So, pick an open
> source Lisp or 2 and make Starter Pack work with them" and I should
> say "Yes, you're right, I should, I'll shut up now."
Think about it in another way:
Could you imagine some self-called benevolent dictator who gets Linux
Torvalds into including a "starter-pack" of libraries and applications
(like apache, postgresql, KDE, GNOME...) with the Linux-Kernel? Isn't
it better that there are projects like Debian, Ubuntu, Redhat & Co.
which provide us with linux "starter-packs"?
ciao,
Jochen
From: Chris Barts
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <f746ue$eda$1@aioe.org>
··@codeartist.org <··@codeartist.org> wrote on Wednesday 11 July 2007 15:11
in comp.lang.lisp <························@22g2000hsm.googlegroups.com>:
> On 11 Jul., 22:12, ········@gmail.com wrote:
>> Making Edi dictator is just a way to help make that happen.
>
> IMHO the whole "benevolent dictator" thing is not much more than the
> pet theory of some people trying to define how a programming language
> and/or it's libraries can be made successful. In a pet implementation
> of a pet language this pet theory might work out as a trendy way to
> decide about pet language design issues. In the real world you cannot
> dictate what your users want to use. A starter-pack like Edi's is a
> nice thing for - well - starters.
The benevolent dictator model works in the real world. It's how the Linux
kernel and the Perl programming language are developed, to name just two.
It works because there is someone who can unambiguously say no to any given
proposed plan, and someone who can unambiguously say yes to any given
proposed plan. If someone does not like the answers, they can fork the
codebase and start their own project. In practice, major forks are rare.
--
My address happens to be com (dot) gmail (at) usenet (plus) chbarts,
wardsback and translated.
It's in my header if you need a spoiler.
On 11 Jul, 21:12, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> On Jul 11, 3:43 pm, Matthias Buelow <····@incubus.de> wrote:
>
> > No, I meant to say, "it doesn't work that way".
>
> Well, you're right. It doesn't work that way. Or at least hasn't.
>
> But is there a reason why it couldn't or shouldn't?
>
> For any non-trivial 21st century program you'd like to write, you will
> need a significant portion of the libraries in Starter Pack or
> equivalents. Starter Pack is a great set of batteries. What's so
> wrong with asking implementors to include it?
>
> Making Edi dictator is just a way to help make that happen.
>
> There's no coercion, of course. There's no way to enforce any
> implementor to include anything they don't want to. But it's good to
> have goals, no?
>
> This is the point at which someone should tell me "So, pick an open
> source Lisp or 2 and make Starter Pack work with them" and I should
> say "Yes, you're right, I should, I'll shut up now."
>
> -jimbo
Well what I suggest, is that you submit a document to the CDR
http://cdr.eurolisp.org/ making as good a case as possible for which
libraries (and which versions) should be bundled by default (the
licences will need to be weaker than L-GPL). Then try to persuade one
of the larger open source lisps to start doing it.
Hopefully, other open source lisps will follow, and eventually the
commercial groups will join in as well.
This has much more chance of working than the nominating of Edi *long
may he reign* as dictator for life.
On Jul 11, 5:36 pm, Chris Russell <·····················@gmail.com>
wrote:
> Well what I suggest, is that you submit a document to the CDRhttp://cdr.eurolisp.org/making as good a case as possible for which
> libraries (and which versions) should be bundled by default (the
> licences will need to be weaker than L-GPL). Then try to persuade one
> of the larger open source lisps to start doing it.
That's a good idea, actually. I've seen the CDR site and think it's a
great idea. I actually think it should be promoted harder. When I
first heard it mentioned, I didn't understand what it's purpose is.
The emphasis was on "documents that don't change", not "an alternative
to a heavy handed standardization process".
This might be better homework for me than what I suggested as homework
for myself previously.
-jimbo
········@gmail.com wrote:
> But is there a reason why it couldn't or shouldn't?
What you essentially wanted to do is that a bunch of people on a Usenet
newsgroup (!) tell some vendor how to define their product policy. Do
you really think that would work? You can have this "benevolent
dictator" thing in one open-source project but you can't enforce it in
other people's projects, even less so when they're commercial enterprises.
In article <···············@mid.dfncis.de>,
Matthias Buelow <···@incubus.de> wrote:
> ········@gmail.com wrote:
>
> > But is there a reason why it couldn't or shouldn't?
>
> What you essentially wanted to do is that a bunch of people on a Usenet
> newsgroup (!) tell some vendor how to define their product policy. Do
> you really think that would work? You can have this "benevolent
> dictator" thing in one open-source project but you can't enforce it in
> other people's projects, even less so when they're commercial enterprises.
I think he wants Python. Why not let him go there...
--
http://lispm.dyndns.org
On Jul 11, 5:04 pm, Rainer Joswig <······@lisp.de> wrote:
> I think he wants Python. Why not let him go there...
I want Common Lisp plus Python's philosophy about including batteries.
-jimbo
On 11 Jul., 23:42, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> On Jul 11, 5:04 pm, Rainer Joswig <······@lisp.de> wrote:
>
> > I think he wants Python. Why not let him go there...
>
> I want Common Lisp plus Python's philosophy about including batteries.
>
> -jimbo
I don't.
On 11 Jul., 23:42, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> On Jul 11, 5:04 pm, Rainer Joswig <······@lisp.de> wrote:
>
> > I think he wants Python. Why not let him go there...
>
> I want Common Lisp plus Python's philosophy about including batteries.
>
> -jimbo
I don't.
········@gmail.com writes:
>
> I want Common Lisp plus Python's philosophy about including batteries.
Ditto. Nice, sane, well-designed, well-integrated, standard libraries
would be wonderful. I too pretty much think that Edi Weitz should be
BDFL in charge of STANDARD-LIBRARY.
With the exception of his templating library, everything he touches is
gold.
--
Robert Uhl <http://public.xdi.org/=ruhl>
However, it is important not to stare at the enemy because he may sense
the stalker's presence through a sixth sense.
--US Army Field Manual 21-150 Chapter 7 `Sentry Removal'
········@gmail.com writes:
> On Jul 11, 3:43 pm, Matthias Buelow <····@incubus.de> wrote:
>> No, I meant to say, "it doesn't work that way".
>
> Well, you're right. It doesn't work that way. Or at least hasn't.
>
> But is there a reason why it couldn't or shouldn't?
>
> For any non-trivial 21st century program you'd like to write, you will
> need a significant portion of the libraries in Starter Pack or
> equivalents. Starter Pack is a great set of batteries. What's so
> wrong with asking implementors to include it?
Because it would be like asking Linus Towarld to include emacs to his
linux kernel.
You may ask Matthew Danish and Mikel Evins, or Peter Seibel to include
Edi's libraries in their Lisp-In-A-Box distributions.
> This is the point at which someone should tell me "So, pick an open
> source Lisp or 2 and make Starter Pack work with them" and I should
> say "Yes, you're right, I should, I'll shut up now."
Or contribute to Lisp-In-A-Box http://common-lisp.net/project/lispbox/
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__ http://www.informatimago.com/
NOTE: The most fundamental particles in this product are held
together by a "gluing" force about which little is currently known
and whose adhesive power can therefore not be permanently
guaranteed.
From: Kent M Pitman
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <ubqeid50d.fsf@nhplace.com>
Matthias Buelow <···@incubus.de> writes:
> ········@gmail.com wrote:
>
> > But by making Edi dictator, and Starter Pack the defacto standard
> > library, social pressure could be brought to bear on all the
> > distributions to include the Starter Pack libraries in one form or
> > another.
>
> Just because you say so doesn't make it so.
Indeed.
And while it's important to understand that the suggestion may be made
with all good intent, there is another side to this, which I assume
is what Matthias is doing, in a more brief fashion than I ever seem to
manage myself.
Among other things, and with no intent to be either approving or
disapproving of any particular suggestion of a person or site or
library, comp.lang.lisp is not known to be representative of the Lisp
community, so asking here doesn't have any effect in terms of consensus.
A bunch of positive responses here mean nothing, just as a failure of
responses means nothing. It's interesting, of course, but it's not
proof of consensus or lack thereof, nor necessarily even a hint at what
might be.
Also, the question presupposes that appropriateness of saying what is
de facto standard. The normal definition of de facto standard is that
it doesn't require saying it, because people just know.
And then there's the question of whether a single standard is good, which
many (myself included) have raised as an issue--more on that below.
So as far as I can tell, the actual proposal here is just to afford the
name "standard" to a particular person's approach. Why not just let
that person (or any person) give a unique name to their item, as happened
almost by accident with David Gray and "Gray Streams", and say that the
Weitz Library has <whatever>.
The whole idea of the substandards thing I suggested a while back
(which has thus far not taken off for complicated administrative
reasons that could be oversimplified as either "available time" or
"economics") boiled down to this for me:
True standards are about two things:
(1) writing down the meaning of something and putting it in a publicly
visible place that won't change and will be easy to find
(2) getting people to agree
It used to be important to do both of these, but I came to believe
that the second part was less necessary in today's day [due to various
issues of how the business and computational worlds work] and is a
very expensive thing to avoid. [Not that skipping the step but saying
there was agreement, as I understand is the suggestion here, is a
substitute. Rather, when I say "getting people to agree" is
unnecessary, I don't mean we should fiat things, I mean we should
allow people to disagree and support multiple paradigms.]
Basically, I'm pretty sure the "getting people to agree" is a false
choice. There is very little cost of having multiple ways of doing
something. If people gravitate to one thing, great, but if they
don't, there is little cost of offering alternate options. And the
cost of getting them to agree can be quite high in many ways, not
always apparent.
So, to me, the cost of saying "dictator" and "standard" is one of
disrupting people who are already using something else and making them
bear useless peer pressure about what they're using, rather than
worrying about interchange standards for DATA. Data is really what
matters, not programs. There are myriad libraries for XML, for
example, but it doesn't matter. It matters that there is some library
that each person likes, or even two or three that can co-reside, and
it matters that everyone agrees on a data interchange model. Things
like that are more important in practice, but are not generally
language issues.
Standards are contentious and they are in many cases unnecessary.
(Someone once observed to me that the word "science" gets added to
things that people wish were sciences but aren't, like "computer
science". True sciences mostly don't need the word "science" because
people just know physics is a science. I see a corollary for
standard, especially when no standards body has been activated to
manage the standard--but even sometimes otherwise.)
If it turns out that all vendors are already including the relevant
items, then indeed, you have a case to make that it's a de facto
standard. But if not, then I don't think it's a fair initial
presumption...
Incidentally, something I am NOT interested in doing is holding things
back because my substandards idea doesn't have currency. I'm not
proposing that as an alternative and saying "wait". What I am saying
is that what bothers me is not people using these things if they are
getting used, it's the notion that a non-deliberative process that is
not obviously representative of the community is suggesting speaking
for a community that is not even clearly defined. There are several
missing steps there. The idea behind substandards was to side-step
all of that too, but the way I wanted to do that was to not declare
itself to be unique. If anyone, including Edi, with serious resources
to muster and interest wants to contact me privately about making that
work, I'll be happy to discuss it in more detail.
The two key things I'd want out of any non-deliberative standard site
would be:
- Pluralism/Inclusiveness. Permitting more than one way to do things.
Not locking out everyone after the first person to drive a stake in
the ground.
- Politics-Neutral. Fairly accommodating BOTH free / open source AND
also commercial interests [including those incompatible with GPL and
friends].
Any process that purports to speak for the community without identifying
the community and documenting a fair polling of the community it purports
to speak for is suspect.
Of course, anyone who makes a newly named item like Graham's ARC is
implicitly doing this because anyone is free not to rally around. As
long as he doesn't call his process a standard for what he detached
from in order to do his thing, I'm all for it. Then it's voluntary.
Otherwise, it's forced on people--as "dictator" correctly implies.
And I didn't even get into the philosophy of dictators. Benevolent and
correct dictators are always good. It's just that they can decay into
Malevolent or wrong, and then that can be less good...
This is just my personal opinion, and in addition is my opinion today.
I'm certainly open to discussion and it's not like I never change my
mind. I also emphasize that I claim no special right to dictate how
things go; I didn't even get to do that as the editor the spec, and I
certainly wouldn't do it now when my status is even less official.
But all of that said, I have put a fair deal of thought into this, so
I do have some fairly strongly held opinions that I'm open to sharing.
On Jul 11, 5:06 pm, Kent M Pitman <······@nhplace.com> wrote:
> Among other things, and with no intent to be either approving or
> disapproving of any particular suggestion of a person or site or
> library, comp.lang.lisp is not known to be representative of the Lisp
> community, so asking here doesn't have any effect in terms of consensus.
> A bunch of positive responses here mean nothing, just as a failure of
> responses means nothing. It's interesting, of course, but it's not
> proof of consensus or lack thereof, nor necessarily even a hint at what
> might be.
That certainly makes it difficult to even ascertain what a consensus
might be. Is there even any way to communicate with the "Lisp
community" then?
> True standards are about two things:
> (1) writing down the meaning of something and putting it in a publicly
> visible place that won't change and will be easy to find
> (2) getting people to agree
I don't want a standard, or a sub-standard. I would like to see
Common Lisp implementations include more libraries by default. And it
would be nice if there was some commonality in the libraries they
choose to include, to make porting code a little easier.
> So, to me, the cost of saying "dictator" and "standard" is one of
> disrupting people who are already using something else and making them
> bear useless peer pressure about what they're using, rather than
> worrying about interchange standards for DATA. Data is really what
> matters, not programs. There are myriad libraries for XML, for
> example, but it doesn't matter. It matters that there is some library
> that each person likes, or even two or three that can co-reside, and
> it matters that everyone agrees on a data interchange model. Things
> like that are more important in practice, but are not generally
> language issues.
I think it's helpful that someone new to the language but familiar
with XML finds that there is a library for handling XML installed in
their Lisp system without much effort on their part.
I think that's why Starter Pack is appropriately named. There's
nothing that says these libraries are the best for everyone's needs,
but it at least allows a new Lisper to start writing useful programs
relatively quickly.
> This is just my personal opinion, and in addition is my opinion today.
> I'm certainly open to discussion and it's not like I never change my
> mind. I also emphasize that I claim no special right to dictate how
> things go; I didn't even get to do that as the editor the spec, and I
> certainly wouldn't do it now when my status is even less official.
> But all of that said, I have put a fair deal of thought into this, so
> I do have some fairly strongly held opinions that I'm open to sharing.
Thank you for your thoughtful comments. My only real goal for my
proposal is that Common Lisp distributions come by default with more
libraries for common 21st century programming tasks, and I think
Starter Pack would fulfill that. Other means to that end would make
me equally happy.
And my reason for wanting to see more default libraries is to make
Common Lisp more approachable by new programmers and non-Lisp
programmers.
-jimbo
From: Kent M Pitman
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <ulkdmph97.fsf@nhplace.com>
········@gmail.com writes:
> Thank you for your thoughtful comments. My only real goal for my
> proposal is that Common Lisp distributions come by default with more
> libraries for common 21st century programming tasks, and I think
> Starter Pack would fulfill that. Other means to that end would make
> me equally happy.
I applaud your interest and don't mean to dampen your attempts to
address the underlying issue, even if I would do it differently.
I think this is a reasonable goal for a person or people to be going
after seriously. I think true community consensus is tricky and so
you do best promoting it by not overstepping at the outset. But I
think you can succeed in your real goal without the consensus part.
Words like "accessible", "well-known", and "easy" do not have to imply
"canonical".
I might suggest that a reasonable first goal would be to make SOME
starter pack, not THE starter pack. Get SOME vendor or vendors to do
as you like, or even get an open source system and augment it by some
set of things that you have a right to add and offer it bundled, as
happened with a number of Linux systems. Rather than try to
standardize Linux, there became a competition among them. It's
perhaps confusing to some people, and it isn't universally good. But
it's probably more good than saying that the many ideas that were the
different branches of that were all trash except for One Right Way.
That way risks ire at people who lose features they care about, worry
by people with better ideas in the pipeline that just aren't ready for
primetime yet, etc.
> And my reason for wanting to see more default libraries is to make
> Common Lisp more approachable by new programmers and non-Lisp
> programmers.
I'd say that any given programmer will generally approach only one
implementation to start with, so pick something to promote and work
with and then suggest that. Work one by one to get others to join
board voluntarily, avoiding words like "dictator".
Even in the times of ANSI CL, we rejected many good ideas not on the
basis of their goodness but on the basis of "no current practice".
That created a certain level of achievement that was required for
discussion, and that was that at least one vendor (and preferrably
several) were needed before we could consider most things. It wasn't
about forcing people to come together, but about saying that where they
don't do it voluntarily, there truly is no voluntary consensus.
These days, there's no formal process active that I know of, and I'm
not even sure that's bad. I reiterate that if someone with a serious
degree of resource, commitment, and/or money [i.e., someone who isn't
just idly gabbing but can make the case they're about to commit to a
serious endeavor] wants to talk about mechanisms that might support
the kind of thing I'm talking about, I'm willing to provide some
conceptual feedback/suggestions "offline" (e.g., in email). But while
comp.lang.lisp is a good forum for idly brainstorming, I don't think
it's a good forum for thoughtful deliberation or project planning, so
there's only so far I'll take a discussion here.
But I'm glad you didn't take my comments as dumping cold water on your
flames of passion. Even if we don't agree at the outset, it doesn't
mean we don't have things to share with one another. Nor does it mean
one of us might not adjust our position. Recently in another thread,
someone made some question and as soon as I chimed in, the
conversation spun out of control as if I'd tried to shut it down. I
hadn't tried that and I thought it sad that the discussion prematurely
went sour. My saying what would be good for me is not my trying to
fight anyone, nor to dictate policy. (Heck, you were offering to
appoint someone dictator after all. I could have just run for office
if that was my goal. How much more convenient could you have made it
for me?) My intent was to provide you, or anyone, with the best data
I could muster on what is needed to make a proposal that would gain me
as an active ally in the discussion. And I assume others will
volunteer their own take.
If there are any constructive suggestions I (or anyone) can make or
answers to specific questions I (or anyone) can offer in that regard.
There's a line in the movie 1776 I wish I could recall because I
wanted to quote it a a couple times in the last week... a comment made
by one of the delegates when Congressw as trying to open debate on
forming the new nation. It went something to the effect of "I've
never seen any idea so dangerous that it couldn't bear a bit of
discussing." I'm sure I didn't get it close enough to Google for.
Nor am I probably as eloquent or historical. But I hope you still
get my point.
On 12 Jul, 02:01, Kent M Pitman <······@nhplace.com> wrote:
> ········@gmail.com writes:
> > Thank you for your thoughtful comments. My only real goal for my
> > proposal is that Common Lisp distributions come by default with more
> > libraries for common 21st century programming tasks
>
> I applaud your interest and don't mean to dampen your attempts to
> address the underlying issue, even if I would do it differently.
I think that the dictator idea would be tricky because CL is so
established and has multiple leading-edges including excellent
commercial and open source compilers, prolific library writers and
well known experts on usenet, irc and bloggers. But I suspect the
dictator idea itself was a bit tongue in cheek and if you read his
other threads, jimbo seems to have a common goal of making CL more
accessible to newcomers and more useful to us all. I think it's hard
to argue with this reasoning!
It's been well discussed in the past why opening up CL for re-
standardisation is not currently an option but the idea of an
'optional extended standard library' seems like a very good starting
point to me. I don't know if this should be approached as a CDR
initially, whether it should be based on Edi's existing Starter Pack
or if it should focus on one implementation but the fact it's being
discussed on c.l.l at all is encouraging.
Where do we go from here?
----
Phil
http://phil.nullable.eu/
···············@gmail.com wrote:
> Where do we go from here?
I favor minimal bottom-up approaches. In this light, you could take the
following steps:
+ Create a mailing list for interested people who want to define a set
of "standard" libraries.
+ Discuss and agree on a selection of such (hopefully already
well-supported) libraries.
+ Come up with a CDR document that describes that selection of
libraries; maybe including APIs and test cases, but that may even not be
necessary.
+ Submit the CDR document - the recommendation is that there will then
be a period of 6 weeks (or more) of public review. After that, the
document will be finalized (unless retracted by the authors).
+ Then wait and see whether and in what way the vendors adopt this
recommendation.
Pascal
--
My website: http://p-cos.net
Common Lisp Document Repository: http://cdr.eurolisp.org
Closer to MOP & ContextL: http://common-lisp.net/project/closer/
From: Kent M Pitman
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <uabu1tyzm.fsf@nhplace.com>
Pascal Costanza <··@p-cos.net> writes:
> ···············@gmail.com wrote:
>
> > Where do we go from here?
>
> I favor minimal bottom-up approaches. In this light, you could take
> the following steps:
>
> + Create a mailing list for interested people who want to define a set
> of "standard" libraries.
The presence of the single word "standard" in this discussion is what
triggers almost the entirety of my involvement in this, though I think
there is a resouce use / focus issue, which I've touched on at the end
of this message.
This message is in response to the discussion generally and is not
intended to specifically be a private conversation between me and Pascal.
(Not that that's ever stopped anyone.)
- - - -
I suggest you read up on antitrust law before you get too far down
this road. There are a lot of details you want to make sure you do
right before you claim what you have is standard. I'm not a lawyer,
so I don't have the ability to tell you for sure what those issues
are. But I know that's a big deal part of it.
The essential character of a standards body is that the consensus it
is specially engineered to step around the issues of anti-trust law
because it provides a well-known mechanism for assuring fairness. Any
time you create something you call standard that does not do this, you
risk that no vendor can participate without fear of suit because they
are exposed to an anti-trust suit by anyone who feels economically at
risk due to the decisions of a market cartel trying to entrench its
way of doing things at the expense of market competitors. I doubt
that is what you seek to do, but you should be careful you don't run
afoul of these issues.
If you have a community where you hang out a shingle and say "this is
foo lisp and if you use it, you agree that I'm in charge", I think
you're clear of that. But if you take an existing name and say "I
appoint myself the czar of how you'll be doing things", I think that's
where the line is probably drawn. Or such has been my impression after
years of participation in the standards bodies.
My personal theory, because I dislike the overhead of standards as
much as anyone, is that the solution is probably around the idea of
standardizing on the option for REGISTERING procedures, not the idea
for LOCKING OUT the registry of competing procedures [which is my
model of what these ad hoc consensus things do]. There's a too easy
path from the power that comes with being "in charge" to thinking you
have been endowed with corresponding "wisdom". (We see that in play
a lot in US politics right now.) The protection against that is the
continued power of the citizenry, through process, to do what they
need to do without permission of the people "in charge". That is, the
people in charge should concern themselves with creating mechanisms for
enabling individuals.
That's why it's way more important to offer a set-syntax operation
than to standardize on what the sharpsign macro does. Once users have
that, they can build their own reality.
And too often, people think "I got my useful stuff from a standard
thing" and reason back from that to think "it must be the standardness
that made it useful". When really the standardness just made it
FINDABLE. And it would have been just as findable and just as usable
if there were two things there, each thriving (usually even both
loadable in the same image if it comes down to that--we have
namespacing after all), and then people can decide which commuunity to
join. Maybe there will be natural monopolies that arise THROUGH USE,
and that's ok. But making them arise by FIAT, while it worked well in
the early days of Lisp, when address space was smaller and Lisp was at
risk of disappearing entirely, doesn't seem like the right thing.
- - - -
Regarding resource use / focus:
(I incidentally also think that no matter what libraries you make, the
hard thing to keep up with is the rate of new things being created in
the other languages. So you'd be better off, if you want to talk
standards, to focus narrowly on simply lobbying vendors to adopt a
common cross-call model with at least JVM and CLR, for example.
Creating a bunch of libraries that merely seek to reproduce those
other things won't be much of a step forward, whereas having the
single reliable capability of cross-calling those other vast
repositories would be fundamentally empowering.)
On Jul 12, 11:37 am, Kent M Pitman <······@nhplace.com> wrote:
> The presence of the single word "standard" in this discussion is what
> triggers almost the entirety of my involvement in this, though I think
> there is a resouce use / focus issue, which I've touched on at the end
> of this message.
Agreed that the word "standard", even with the quotes, has too much
baggage, both in the historical Lisp sense, and possibly legal sense.
Would "starter" be an acceptable substitute? It seems Edi made a
pretty good choice calling his package "Starter Pack".
-jimbo
From: Kent M Pitman
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <uwsx5urey.fsf@nhplace.com>
········@gmail.com writes:
> On Jul 12, 11:37 am, Kent M Pitman <······@nhplace.com> wrote:
> > The presence of the single word "standard" in this discussion is what
> > triggers almost the entirety of my involvement in this, though I think
> > there is a resouce use / focus issue, which I've touched on at the end
> > of this message.
>
> Agreed that the word "standard", even with the quotes, has too much
> baggage, both in the historical Lisp sense, and possibly legal sense.
>
> Would "starter" be an acceptable substitute? It seems Edi made a
> pretty good choice calling his package "Starter Pack".
I think it would be a lot better personally. The point is that then it
doesn't claim to represent, just to be useful. And the market is full
of things claiming to be useful, without crowding out other things also
claiming to be useful.
The following additional comments should be regarded as advisory, but
non-preemptive:
I would point out that in terms of trademarks, not that you're
planning to do that but the philosophy of trademarks still applies,
when you use a "mark" that is coincidentally descriptive, it's hard to
get the mark. So if you make a furnace called "Warm Furnace", there
is little chance you'll get protection on the name "Warm" because
people need it as descriptive in English and you can't lock down
ordinary words. If you use the name "Cold Furnace", though, "Cold" is
not generally a word that applies to furnaces (at least when they're
working) and so would enjoy more protection. So if you claim a name
like "starter", beware that you are trying to claim a common noun, and
you will inevitably suffer at least some pushback, even if not organized
pushback, where others claim to have a starter pack too. If instead you
call it the EdiPak or the JimboPak or FooPack some such thing that is
chosen really just as a GUID and not as a descriptive name, and then you
describe it by sentences like "The FooPack is the way to get started."
or even "Jimbo's Starter Pack is the way to get started." you avoid all
of that.
The tendancy to want to avoid modifiers is natural, but it complicates
discussions and creates ire. For example, the Pro-Choice picked a wrong
name not because Pro-Abortion is better [it objectively isn't--it's
cynically designed to actively cause a misimpression] but because there
are other issues of "choice" (like school choice) that are locked out
of having the name. Pro-School-Choice and Pro-Reproductive-Choice would
be better names. One can pick the shorter name, but one should know that
they are treading on others' desire to use the same term, and should at
least be tolerant if others jump to use the same name. The same is true
of Free Software, btw. I have issues with the movement, but one aspect
of it that bothers me especially (and which carries a certain amount of
irony) is the degree to which it grabs the word "free" and insists on a
particular use of it, suggesting that other uses (the free as in beer
phenomenon) are not "free software". It would be better if it had another
modifier like Stallman's Free Software or User-Centric Free Software.
Grabbing the name gives you control of a market space, but but one would
hope if you were using a name like "free" that you'd respect others freedom
to disagree, and (there's the irony) often that doesn't happen.
So back to starter pack, I'd be happier about endorsing a "So-and-So's
Starter Pack" as a name than endorsing blah as The Starter Pack. But
I'm not going to raise a big political stink. I'm just going to rise
to the defense of anyone who gets told they can't use the name Starter
for their own competitive package. So I'm hinting that you could
avoid that issue.
In the meta, what I'm saying is the same thing as I said before: I
want to support pluralism. So if I were doing it, I'd just call it
Kent's Starter Pack or HyperMeta Starter Pack. Since I'm not, I
recommend you call yours by some such name so that I can later
introduce mine without confusing anyone. But that's not the same as
warning you that you're creating a problem. Just know that if I wanted
to come out with one, I might then pick Beginner Pack. Or Newbie Pack.
And if you thought that would step on your turf, then you'd be seeing
the mirror image of what I saw.
So often, the way to analyze these things fairly comes down to the
simple idea of reversing one or more key assumptions in what you're
doing and seeing if it feels comfortable to be on the outside...
Kent M Pitman wrote:
> Pascal Costanza <··@p-cos.net> writes:
>
>> ···············@gmail.com wrote:
>>
>>> Where do we go from here?
>> I favor minimal bottom-up approaches. In this light, you could take
>> the following steps:
>>
>> + Create a mailing list for interested people who want to define a set
>> of "standard" libraries.
>
> The presence of the single word "standard" in this discussion is what
> triggers almost the entirety of my involvement in this, though I think
> there is a resouce use / focus issue, which I've touched on at the end
> of this message.
OK, apparently putting the word "standard" in quotes is not good enough.
I specifically wanted to avoid the kinds of connotations you seem to
hear when that word is uttered. (This could be because I am not a native
speaker.)
So replace this with: "Create a mailing list for interested people who
want to define a pre-packaged set of libraries."
> I suggest you read up on antitrust law before you get too far down
> this road. There are a lot of details you want to make sure you do
> right before you claim what you have is standard. I'm not a lawyer,
> so I don't have the ability to tell you for sure what those issues
> are. But I know that's a big deal part of it.
This fear of antitrust laws seems to be based on American cultural
assumptions. They sound extremely alien to me.
A group of self-elected people cannot just create anything that's
binding for everyone else. The idea is to create something, put it in
the open field, and then see how it is being adopted.
Pascal
--
My website: http://p-cos.net
Common Lisp Document Repository: http://cdr.eurolisp.org
Closer to MOP & ContextL: http://common-lisp.net/project/closer/
On 2007-07-16 06:27:25 -0400, Pascal Costanza <····@p-cos.-net> said:
> This fear of antitrust laws seems to be based on American cultural
> assumptions. They sound extremely alien to me.
Worth remembering in this context that the 'A' in ANSI Common Lisp is
for 'American.' If we're talking about proposing standards of any kind
for ANSI Common Lisp its quite reasonable to take into account American
anti-trust law. Vendors will be understandably wary of running afoul of
this.
That's why the suggestion to remove the word "standard" from the
discussion is the most workable one. Might I suggest that the term
"widely and freely available" has similar appeal but none of the
potential legal issues.
Raffael Cavallaro wrote:
> On 2007-07-16 06:27:25 -0400, Pascal Costanza <····@p-cos.-net> said:
>
>> This fear of antitrust laws seems to be based on American cultural
>> assumptions. They sound extremely alien to me.
>
> Worth remembering in this context that the 'A' in ANSI Common Lisp is
> for 'American.' If we're talking about proposing standards of any kind
> for ANSI Common Lisp its quite reasonable to take into account American
> anti-trust law. Vendors will be understandably wary of running afoul of
> this.
>
> That's why the suggestion to remove the word "standard" from the
> discussion is the most workable one. Might I suggest that the term
> "widely and freely available" has similar appeal but none of the
> potential legal issues.
Sure, why not.
Note the following, though: When we came up with the Common Lisp
Document Repository (CDR) idea, we have been aware of discussions about
antitrust law issues (in the context of CLRFI), and we have been careful
in ensuring that they don't apply. More specifically, there are two
important ingredients:
+ We don't claim anything wrt standardization at all. All we do is
assign unambiguous numbers to documents and ensure that such documents
do not change anymore (after a certain initial period where corrections
can be made). We believe that this provides an essential value add to
widely and freely available documents (like specifications of
libraries), namely the possibility to refer to a document by just
uttering 'CDR nnn' (where 'nnn' stands for a unique number). This is
similar to SRFIs for Scheme, and Schemers seem to take good advantage of
such an approach.
Also important: We don't prescribe in any way what acceptable contents
of such documents are (except for the fact that they should be about Lisp).
+ We don't approve or recommend documents. This is a completely
author-driven process, and authors have the sole responsibility for the
contents of such documents. In other words, say, if CL vendor A submits
a document, this doesn't mean that this is a recommended standard, or
anything remotely. It just gives that vendor a unique CDR number with
which they (and others) can then refer to that document. Whether or
whether not any of the documents are accepted by the Lisp community as,
for example, de-facto standards, is completely outside of the scope of CDR.
My suggestion for creating a mailing list and coming up with a
description of a set of widely available libraries was not meant to go
beyond this.
Pascal
--
My website: http://p-cos.net
Common Lisp Document Repository: http://cdr.eurolisp.org
Closer to MOP & ContextL: http://common-lisp.net/project/closer/
From: Joe Davison
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <m2zm1rvqpd.fsf@Jason.local>
This reminds me of the situation around 1985 when there were many
different C compilers available for CP/M & DOS, but before stdio was
actually made part of the C Standard (which probably didn't exist then,
either). Every compiler had it's own way to handle file access and while
they were fairly similar, actually porting a program from one to another
was a pain.
Someone finally package an implementation of the stdio library with
one of the compilers -- probably one of the free ones, actually.
Then there was a review of C compilers in Byte Magazine and the reviewer
slammed all the C compilers that didn't include the stdio library.
Within about 3 months, there were no C compilers that didn't include
stdio.
Clearly, the same process wouldn't work with Common Lisp, because what
magazine would review Common Lisp implementations?
joe
On 2007-07-20, Joe Davison <····@ieee.org> wrote:
> Clearly, the same process wouldn't work with Common Lisp, because
> what magazine would review Common Lisp implementations?
Dr. Dobb's Journal might. They seem interested in Lisp, a little.
From: Cesar Rabak
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <f80o4l$5d7$1@aioe.org>
Joe Davison escreveu:
> This reminds me of the situation around 1985 when there were many
> different C compilers available for CP/M & DOS, but before stdio was
> actually made part of the C Standard (which probably didn't exist then,
> either). Every compiler had it's own way to handle file access and while
> they were fairly similar, actually porting a program from one to another
> was a pain.
>
I cannot find this article (cited below), but, the K&R book in its 1978
edition had a full chapter (Chapter 7)about stdio and in the caput of
it, the following appears "...Finally, the routines are meant to be
"portable," in the sense that they will exist in compatible form on
system where C exists,..."
> Someone finally package an implementation of the stdio library with
> one of the compilers -- probably one of the free ones, actually.
I would like to know what C compiler was free (in any sense) in 1985.
>
> Then there was a review of C compilers in Byte Magazine and the reviewer
> slammed all the C compilers that didn't include the stdio library.
>
> Within about 3 months, there were no C compilers that didn't include
> stdio.
>
> Clearly, the same process wouldn't work with Common Lisp, because what
> magazine would review Common Lisp implementations?
>
> joe
On Sun, 22 Jul 2007 20:11:14 -0300, Cesar Rabak <·······@yahoo.com.br>
wrote:
>I would like to know what C compiler was free (in any sense) in 1985.
By 1985, "cc" came included with most versions of Unix. There were
also a couple of freeware CP/M Z80 compilers.
George
--
for email reply remove "/" from address
On 2007-07-16 09:19:05 -0400, Pascal Costanza <··@p-cos.net> said:
> My suggestion for creating a mailing list and coming up with a
> description of a set of widely available libraries was not meant to go
> beyond this.
Well I think it may be possible to go just a bit beyond this - you
could certify (by testing and code review) that the libraries will run
under any standard compliant implementation, or at least create a
separate category for such standard conforming libraries. I think its
misleading for library authors to represent their code as common lisp
while sprinkling their code with #+ and #- so that many users find that
their implementation is not among those conditionally compiled for.
Pascal Costanza <··@p-cos.net> writes:
>> I suggest you read up on antitrust law before you get too far down
>> this road. There are a lot of details you want to make sure you do
>> right before you claim what you have is standard. I'm not a lawyer,
>> so I don't have the ability to tell you for sure what those issues
>> are. But I know that's a big deal part of it.
>
> This fear of antitrust laws seems to be based on American cultural
> assumptions. They sound extremely alien to me.
>
> A group of self-elected people cannot just create anything that's
> binding for everyone else. The idea is to create something, put it in
> the open field, and then see how it is being adopted.
IANAL, but US competition law had a large influence worldwide. A lot
of the EU competition law and related institutions were crafted using
their American counterparts as a model. I don't know about this
specific issue though.
Tamas
On 2007-07-12, Kent M Pitman <······@nhplace.com> wrote:
> There's a line in the movie 1776 I wish I could recall because I
> wanted to quote it a a couple times in the last week... a comment made
> by one of the delegates when Congressw as trying to open debate on
> forming the new nation. It went something to the effect of "I've
> never seen any idea so dangerous that it couldn't bear a bit of
> discussing."
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068156/quotes#qt0115872
Hopkins: Well, in all my years I ain't never heard, seen nor smelled
an issue that was so dangerous it couldn't be talked about.
For movie quotes, use IMDb. :) They're not *all* there, of course,
but a lot of the good ones are.
········@gmail.com writes:
> I don't want a standard, or a sub-standard. I would like to see
> Common Lisp implementations include more libraries by default. And it
> would be nice if there was some commonality in the libraries they
> choose to include, to make porting code a little easier.
>
When I install FreeBSD, I run pkg_add cmucl. That doesn't
have batteries included so I also do pkg_add cmucl-extra.
The people who create and maintain the packages are doing
valuable work and I thank them.
This step, of packaging implementations to make them easy to
install, also provides an opportunity. One can create a
lisp-batteries-included package. This will achieve much the
same effect as an implementation including more libraries by
default.
It is perhaps a small enough task that a single person could
maintain batteries-included packages for two or three
implementations on two of three platforms, all using the
same libraries. This could become a popular target for
authors of CL programs who are aiming at portability.
Currently some one who wants a quick taste of CL can install
a batteries-not-included implementation and try it out using
emacs' inferior lisp mode very quickly, using hardly any
disk space. While installing a big batteries-included port
is obviously the way to go for doing serious work, I would
not like to see the light-weight option go away.
Alan Crowe
Edinburgh
Scotland
On 2007-07-11 17:06:42 -0400, Kent M Pitman <······@nhplace.com> said:
> And I didn't even get into the philosophy of dictators. Benevolent and
> correct dictators are always good. It's just that they can decay into
> Malevolent or wrong, and then that can be less good...
damn - I was going to nominate Kent as Common Lisp Dictator for Life ;^)
On 2007-07-12 20:04:14 -0400, Daniel Barlow <···@coruskate.net> said:
> His life or yours?
Is this some sort of thinly veiled threat from the Common Lisp Mob? ;^)
From: Don Geddis
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <87tzs9zer5.fsf@geddis.org>
Kent M Pitman <······@nhplace.com> wrote on 11 Jul 2007 17:0:
> (Someone once observed to me that the word "science" gets added to
> things that people wish were sciences but aren't, like "computer
> science". True sciences mostly don't need the word "science" because
> people just know physics is a science.
I get the joke, and I've heard it before, but I don't think it's true.
This "physics envy" is a bit misplaced.
To start with, there are different kinds of physics. There's the science kind,
which could even be divided into "theoretical" vs. "experimental". And then
there is "applied physics".
There are lots of things you can do with computers. You can just use them,
running some already-built application, to solve some real-world problem.
You can program them, creating new software that had never existed before, but
not expanding the frontier of human knowledge while doing so. And, finally,
you can research what the tool is capable of doing, in theory. This last thing
is "computer science". P = NP (or not), is as much science (or math) as
anything in any other scientific field is.
I think you (or the joke) has read too much into the naming of the field, some
of which may be accidental. In truth, "<field> science" probably arises when
there is some very popular non-scientific use of "<field>", as with computers.
The implication that it is a poor bastard stepchild to physics, and not a
"real" science, is false.
-- Don
_______________________________________________________________________________
Don Geddis http://don.geddis.org/ ···@geddis.org
There are things I regret saying to people, but I guess the thing I regret most
is telling Don that I'd come help him move his furniture this weekend.
-- Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handey [1999]
On Jul 11, 7:46 pm, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> More specifically, the benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries. From
> the Common Lisp FAQ:
>
> http://www.lispniks.com/faq/faq.html#s6q2
>
> "Most Lisp libraries that are distributed independent of a particular
> implementation are portable-if someone wants to declare themself the
> benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries, the position is vacant. Put
> together a set of well-tested, well-documented libraries and
> distribute them in a single blob as the Common Lisp Standard Library
> and the world will beat a path to your door."
>
> If you substitute "Starter Pack" for "Common Lisp Standard Library",
> then obviously the "benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries" is Edi
> Weitz. Well-tested, well-documented, distributed as a single blob,
> all sounds good, right? With the number of references I see to
> Starter Pack, it seems that the Lisp world is beating a path to Edi's
> door.
>
> Now, there would still be more work to be done. But by making Edi
> dictator, and Starter Pack the defacto standard library, social
> pressure could be brought to bear on all the distributions to include
> the Starter Pack libraries in one form or another.
>
> So, anyone else wish to join in making Edi the dictator for the
> "Common Lisp Standard Library" (hereafter referred to as Starter
> Pack), by acclamation?
>
> -jimbo
1. Stop whining
2. Download latest starter pack
3. Download all libs from it
4. Download more battle proven and popular libs (with their
dependancies) like : iterate, series, cl-containers ..(some docs &
tutorials wont hurt too)
5. Pack them & publish in a single archive
6. Repeat above steps as often as you can to keep libs up to date
········@gmail.com writes:
> More specifically, the benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries.
Would this dictator have the power to force programmers to work on
libraries? Could he send them to some gulag if progress is not fast
enough? If the pay is fine, I could postulate...
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__ http://www.informatimago.com/
NOTE: The most fundamental particles in this product are held
together by a "gluing" force about which little is currently known
and whose adhesive power can therefore not be permanently
guaranteed.
On Jul 11, 8:46 pm, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> More specifically, the benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries. From
There already is one, it's just not public. Like the best benevolent
dictators he mostly minds his own business.
Cheers,
-- Nikodemus
········@gmail.com wrote:
> More specifically, the benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries.
Benevolent dictators are good. We need more of them.
Pascal
--
My website: http://p-cos.net
Common Lisp Document Repository: http://cdr.eurolisp.org
Closer to MOP & ContextL: http://common-lisp.net/project/closer/
On Jul 12, 1:17 pm, Pascal Costanza <····@p-cos.net> wrote:
> ········@gmail.com wrote:
> > More specifically, the benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries.
>
> Benevolent dictators are good. We need more of them.
>
> Pascal
>
> --
> My website:http://p-cos.net
> Common Lisp Document Repository:http://cdr.eurolisp.org
> Closer to MOP & ContextL:http://common-lisp.net/project/closer/
Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely
On 2007-07-12 07:25:32 -0400, Slobodan Blazeski
<·················@gmail.com> said:
> Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always
so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.
-Bertrand Russell
Raffael Cavallaro wrote:
> On 2007-07-12 07:25:32 -0400, Slobodan Blazeski
> <·················@gmail.com> said:
>
>> Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely
>
>
> The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always
> so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.
> -Bertrand Russell
>
As usual....
http://www.xs4all.nl/~ace/Literaria/Poem-Graves.html
kzo
On Jul 12, 10:38 pm, Raffael Cavallaro <················@pas-d'espam-
s'il-vous-plait-mac.com> wrote:
> On 2007-07-12 07:25:32 -0400, Slobodan Blazeski
> <·················@gmail.com> said:
>
> > Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely
>
> The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always
> so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.
> -Bertrand Russell
Wise men make proverbs, but fools repeat them." -- Samuel Palmer
:)
Bobi
········@gmail.com wrote:
> More specifically, the benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries.
My first thought was, oh, good, I have always wanted to be a
revolutionary. My second thought was, oh, wait, Lisp is the
revolutionary. So we have this nice reflection in which I will be
rebelling against the authority you will create to manage amd
orchestrate the future of...what part of "Go away." do you not understand?
We have seen the enemy, and it is Jimbo.
kenneth
On Jul 12, 6:26 pm, Ken Tilton <···········@optonline.net> wrote:
> We have seen the enemy, and it is Jimbo.
You're just upset you didn't think of this idea first.
Well, you'll just have to fall back on being the guy who single
handedly made Lisp popular. At least that's something.
-jimbo
From: Edi Weitz
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <uwsx574m6.fsf@agharta.de>
On Wed, 11 Jul 2007 10:46:44 -0700, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> making Edi dictator
Ask my daughter and she'll confirm I'm not the right guy for that job.
Edi.
--
Lisp is not dead, it just smells funny.
Real email: (replace (subseq ·········@agharta.de" 5) "edi")
On Jul 12, 10:24 pm, Edi Weitz <········@agharta.de> wrote:
> On Wed, 11 Jul 2007 10:46:44 -0700, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> > making Edi dictator
>
> Ask my daughter and she'll confirm I'm not the right guy for that job.
>
> Edi.
>
> --
>
> Lisp is not dead, it just smells funny.
>
> Real email: (replace (subseq ·········@agharta.de" 5) "edi")
You didn't even ask how much we're paying.
bobi
From: Edi Weitz
Subject: Re: Nomination for Common Lisp dictator
Date:
Message-ID: <u1wfczq5j.fsf@agharta.de>
On Fri, 13 Jul 2007 00:11:21 -0700, Slobodan Blazeski <·················@gmail.com> wrote:
> You didn't even ask how much we're paying.
Dictators don't get paid, they just take the money.
Edi.
--
Lisp is not dead, it just smells funny.
Real email: (replace (subseq ·········@agharta.de" 5) "edi")
On Jul 13, 10:03 am, Edi Weitz <········@agharta.de> wrote:
> On Fri, 13 Jul 2007 00:11:21 -0700, Slobodan Blazeski <·················@gmail.com> wrote:
> > You didn't even ask how much we're paying.
>
> Dictators don't get paid, they just take the money.
>
> Edi.
Assuming there are any money involved. Are there Jimbo?
On Jul 13, 7:11 am, Slobodan Blazeski <·················@gmail.com>
wrote:
> Assuming there are any money involved. Are there Jimbo?
No. Just fawning adulation, gratitude, respect, prestige, and
obeisance from Lisp programmers everywhere.
But Edi already has all that, so, oh well.
-jimbo
On Jul 11, 12:46 pm, ········@gmail.com wrote:
> More specifically, the benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries. From
> the Common Lisp FAQ:
>
> http://www.lispniks.com/faq/faq.html#s6q2
>
> "Most Lisp libraries that are distributed independent of a particular
> implementation are portable-if someone wants to declare themself the
> benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries, the position is vacant. Put
> together a set of well-tested, well-documented libraries and
> distribute them in a single blob as the Common Lisp Standard Library
> and the world will beat a path to your door."
>
> If you substitute "Starter Pack" for "Common Lisp Standard Library",
> then obviously the "benevolent dictator for Lisp libraries" is Edi
> Weitz. Well-tested, well-documented, distributed as a single blob,
> all sounds good, right? With the number of references I see to
> Starter Pack, it seems that the Lisp world is beating a path to Edi's
> door.
>
> Now, there would still be more work to be done. But by making Edi
> dictator, and Starter Pack the defacto standard library, social
> pressure could be brought to bear on all the distributions to include
> the Starter Pack libraries in one form or another.
>
> So, anyone else wish to join in making Edi the dictator for the
> "Common Lisp Standard Library" (hereafter referred to as Starter
> Pack), by acclamation?
>
> -jimbo
You might want to ask Edi first if he wants to take the job.