Make an editor which will randomly color-code each set of parentheses such that they or their background is in a set of colors which don't appear as other keywords (like function defs or strings or whatever) so as not to add confusion. You now have a way of more easily seeing every matching pair of parens without having to hover over each one. However, now you have to deal with a strange assortment of colors on your screen.
Oh wait, you can just use a gradient of colors instead of random ones, with the more-nested paren pairs having colors farther in on the gradient. Silly me.
"Oh wait, you can just use a gradient of colors instead of random ones, with the more-nested paren pairs having colors farther in on the gradient. Silly me."
"Logo is a computer programming language used for functional programming. It is an easier-to-read adaptation and dialect of the Lisp language; some have called it Lisp without the parentheses."
Parens let you have multiple expressions in one line, which indentation alone could not really express (except perhaps in a Haskell-like with currying, . and $ operators, etc).
For example, I don't see how (map (fn [x] (+ x 2)) (concat (take 5 my-series) etc...)) could be broken down with indentation alone without taking quite a few extra lines.
Comments
As python is beautiful, lisp is parenthesis-y.
Has anyone thought about a Lisp dialect that uses white space, like Python, to get rid of the ()?
Yes.
http://tinyurl.com/ct3xyb
http://www.dwheeler.com/readable/
Why don't you make your editor to paint them white and indent them?
Make an editor which will randomly color-code each set of parentheses such that they or their background is in a set of colors which don't appear as other keywords (like function defs or strings or whatever) so as not to add confusion. You now have a way of more easily seeing every matching pair of parens without having to hover over each one. However, now you have to deal with a strange assortment of colors on your screen.
Oh wait, you can just use a gradient of colors instead of random ones, with the more-nested paren pairs having colors farther in on the gradient. Silly me.
"Oh wait, you can just use a gradient of colors instead of random ones, with the more-nested paren pairs having colors farther in on the gradient. Silly me."
Good idea! Is it doable in VIM now? :|
Some of us prefer the parens.
"Logo is a computer programming language used for functional programming. It is an easier-to-read adaptation and dialect of the Lisp language; some have called it Lisp without the parentheses."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_programming_language
Parens let you have multiple expressions in one line, which indentation alone could not really express (except perhaps in a Haskell-like with currying, . and $ operators, etc).
For example, I don't see how (map (fn [x] (+ x 2)) (concat (take 5 my-series) etc...)) could be broken down with indentation alone without taking quite a few extra lines.
Dylan removes the parenthesis, but it doesn't go as far as using whitespace.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dylan_programming_language
See I-expressions.