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Hexstream

3,090 karma · joined August 22, 2007

20+ years of programming, 15+ years of Common Lisp, 10+ years of Common Lisp Open Source.

[ my public key: https://keybase.io/hexstream; my proof: https://keybase.io/hexstream/sigs/LEcxc2CHs5onKwnA7vtRPPYzR00wDTaKI3kCKUhdYXI ]

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Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
No, my bubble just needs a bit of funding so I can be even more effective at contributing to Common Lisp Open Source.
Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
I am assuming he would not say that if he deeply hated college dropouts and did not want to acknowledge their success.
Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
Thank you.

I am aiming to help make Common Lisp (or a close descendant) a top 5 programming language by 2040.

I believe this is eminently achievable given proper approaches, and funding me would certainly help towards that goal.

https://twitter.com/HexstreamSoft/status/1213964177657794577

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
The point of the fundraiser is to enable me to concentrate almost all my energy on Common Lisp Open Source instead of having to divert energy elsewhere due to financial concerns.

Given the overall context, the direct and substantial benefit to the Common Lisp community of me getting at least minimal funding ought to be obvious.

The most immediate effect of me starting to look for a job would be to significantly reduce the energy I can spend towards Common Lisp Open Source.

Basically, I already have the dream job, but now I just need to get paid at least a bit. Even a small fraction of a "real" salary would be truly life-changing!

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
I can't immediately find where in his essays he talked favorably about college dropouts, but there is this: https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1110248609545703425
Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
It is chaotic, I'll give you that. This is a direct reflection of the chaotic state of the Common Lisp community and of all the hard work that is going to be required to bring it to a state of dignity.

I am actively working on bringing about this change, and although I am already fairly effective despite the constant and increasingly blatant sabotage and almost total lack of funding, I would be quite a bit more effective with at least some minimal funding.

For instance, 1000$/month would be effectively infinite money for me at this time. I'm not exactly asking for the moon here...

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
My CV and other writings and most especially my work itself pretty extensively justify that I'm the right person for the job. Of course, it's probably pretty hard to tell without significant Common Lisp expertise...

My CV: https://cv.hexstream.expert/

My work: https://www.hexstreamsoft.com/

Also, you should probably ask Paul Graham what he thinks of college dropouts...

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
> It does not help to "prove" an assertion by making further unsubstantiated assertions.

Exactly, so stop doing that, then. Including sealioning.

> Why is Lisp the "best programming language"?

First, the best programming language is Common Lisp, not just any Lisp. Second, I already gave hints towards answering your question above, but you do have to do your homework if you want to even have a chance at understanding.

> How can we recognize a programming language as the "best" one at all?

Easily, if you understand the best programming language and see that all others are blub.

> Why do "we need even more sophisticated" extensive advocacy pieces?

Because then we can just point non-believers like you at it to automatically win all arguments.

> What "better infrastructure" is required for what purpose?

Have you even read the Common Lisp Revival 2020 Fundraiser pitch? I encourage everyone to do so, and urgently.

https://github.com/sponsors/Hexstream

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
Did you mean to present an argument of some sort?
Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
Simple syntax is just one of countless crucial features.

Here is just a trivial sample: https://twitter.com/HexstreamSoft/status/1334220825281654785

Fairly extensive advocacy pieces already exist, and we need even more sophisticated ones, and better infrastructure overall, and it would be much easier to do that with proper funding.

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
This is dead serious.

Do you find the idea of funding Common Lisp Open Source abhorrent? Because that is the primary focus of my work and my life.

Do you think this would have more intrinsic value if someone else promoted it for me? And I have never understood the hate against relevant self-promotion. Why don't you want value creators to promote their work themselves?

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
I am creating tons of Common Lisp community resources that definitely help attract a more diverse audience to Common Lisp, incidentally. (Not everyone is comfortable with the "pop up in chat and ask experts" model.)

My CV offers a lot of pertinent details about my work: https://cv.hexstream.expert/

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
Common Lisp really IS the best programming language in the world, though. This is a statement of fact.

We could do a better job of proving it and demonstrating it to the world, and it would be easier to do it faster with funding.

Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
I would like to review your Common Lisp credentials.
Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
The Common Lisp Revival 2020 Fundraiser is mostly oriented towards people who understand the value of Common Lisp. Thank you.
Hexstream··on Urgent appeal to Paul Graham, etc.: Please help kickstart Common Lisp revolution
Thank you for your interest.

I believe you are looking for the Common Lisp Revival 2020 Fundraiser pitch:

https://github.com/sponsors/Hexstream

Hexstream··on Please tell us what features you'd like in news.ycombinator
tl;dr: I'd very much like a "noprocrast front-page only" or "comment threads ignore noprocrast" checkbox.

I have a huge noprocrast.

Having to /logout just to check out a story or its comments that I got linked from somewhere else (and that I know I really want to check, specifically) is really annoying.

To me, this is a completely different use-case than browsing stories on the front-page. Browsing of the front-page is a significant threat to my productivity, hence the huge noprocrast. Browsing of stories I have a direct link to is not a significant threat to my productivity.

Hence, the suggestion above.

Hexstream··on Dictionary of Algorithms and Data Structures
Nothing for Rete? Come on.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rete_algorithm

Hexstream··on Troll Management: Handling Conspiracy Theorists on a Forum (2009)
It's a gender-neutral pronoun. (Great concept in theory but looks stupid and won't catch on, IMHO.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spivak_pronouns

Hexstream··on Don't distract new programmers with OOP
In Common Lisp we have optional type declarations, and a common strategy for implementations (for SBCL, say) is to treat such declarations as assertions by default, leading to more safety, and for performance-sensitive parts of the code you can "(locally (declare (optimize speed (safety 0))))", which makes the type declarations act as performance optimizations for that part of the code.
Hexstream··on Clojure: if-let and when-let
I find your lack of parentheses disturbing. I'd personally prefer:

  (b-when foo (plusp 1)
    (frob foo))
These implementations also don't handle declarations correctly ;P A surprisingly tricky topic.
Hexstream··on What if Lisp were invented by the Japanese?
At the cost (among other things) of not being able to pass functions as arguments, though that could be worked around.
Hexstream··on Generating Worlds in a Minecraft-like Game
"Once thats iterated over, and an acceptable base created, it begins to populate the world with starting civilizations of elves, humans, goblins and megabeasts. After that, it runs a history and civilization simulator for about a 1050 years. Entire civilizations will rise and fall, cities will be destroyed, legends created, monsters raised into god hood in that time. One of the most famous stories has been of an elf child being kidnapped by the dwarves, being accepted into its society to finally become one of the most famous Kings ever known. You can read the legends of your make believe world, to find out who rose, who fell and what really happened. At this point you have about as much back story as a Tolkien-esque world."

O_O

Hexstream··on Oops: No copied Java code or weapons of mass destruction found in Android
Nevermind that, at least one study showed that if someone with view X is presented with "evidence" that it's indeed true, and then later presented with a full debunking of it, view X will be reinforced.
Hexstream··on My Experiences as a Female Software Engineer
Failing that, Forth or J ;P
Hexstream··on Programming Innocence
Yes, and this is a great force in my betterment. I'll see 4 different people talk about 4 completely different advanced techniques they use, and each of them master them so much that they talk about their feats like it's not really hard at all.

So eventually I tend to forget the context of the whole thing and come to think: "Hey, I can master these 4 advanced techniques myself, after all they're not really hard at all". And I eventually succeed ;P

Hexstream··on I've made Dayta free
anglais. (What's the point of using "classy" French if you mess up the orthograph? Maybe better to abstain.)
Hexstream··on Zinc: a low level language between assembler, C and C++ with Ruby-like syntax
Haha! I'm on Dvorak too and didn't understand at all why JohnnyCache thought hitting "-" was so much harder than Space! I guess I've been completely converted for too long.
Hexstream··on Zinc: a low level language between assembler, C and C++ with Ruby-like syntax
From the article:

"I did this because I hate uppercase characters in the middle of identifiers and I'm too lazy to type shift to get the '_'. In addition, I find it more readable."

just-use-lisp-style-identifiers-then

Hexstream··on Dropbox hits 1.0
"But don't forget that *.0s have a clear marketing value."

If everyone starts doing "version marketing", this marketing value will likely eventually erode.

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