Re: The Next Move in Programming

From: Dave Roberts (ldave-re-move_at_re-move.droberts.com)
Date: 02/15/04 

Date: Sun, 15 Feb 2004 20:12:04 GMT

Kenny Tilton wrote:

> btw, I had a "bug" this morning a compiler would have caught, passing a
> number where a point (a structure of two numbers) was demanded. But! The
> bug was simply because I had changed an API so that it no longer
> tolerated either a number or a point, and I was working my way thru
> various Cello demos propagating the new state of things.

So this brings up a good point. One of the ways that I typically work
through API changes in C/Java is just that: I recompile and let the
compiler tell me all the places that are now broken. With Lisp, do I have
to go through a complete re-test cycle?

> With a compiler checking my code, I could not even have tested the
> change without first changing all the demos to suit, or I would have had
> to leave in place code which accepted a number but threw an error, so
> the compiler would see a suitable overloaded function for code I had not
> yet refactored.
>
> In Lisp I just leave hopeless code sitting around until I get back to
> it, and if it turns out I decide a given refactoring was a mistake,
> boom!, out it goes and no time was wasted on propagating a doomed change.

Hmmmm... my reaction to this is actually negative in the sense that I get
nervous about forgetting things that I haven't yet done. If I was using
Java with Eclipse as my IDE, I'd just back out changes using the IDE and it
wouldn't be a big deal either. That isn't a language thing, it's an IDE
thing. Speaking of which, is there a good IDE for Lisp with refactoring
support? Emacs is great, right up to the point where you want to do some
massive code reorganization or function/variable renaming, then I find it
painful (go back to search/replace). I would think this would actually be
pretty easy for a Lisp to do given the simple syntax.

-- Dave

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