Why don't people like lisp?

[Andrew Dalke]

Paul Rubin:
> You could of course do something similar in Lisp, but normally you'd
> just use S-expressions instead of concocting your own weird syntax
> every time you want to build a small language into something.  Then
> you just use the regular Lisp "read" function and the S-expressions
> get parsed automatically for you.  Your whole parser becomes just one
> line of code.

Ahh, but that's writing the domain language to fit the implementation
language.  The moral equivalent for Python would be to use Python's
syntax to define a function, which is simple.  Eg, Suppose the domain
language required that identifiers be labeled with parens, as in a
chemistry specific language where you might want
  1-1'-(ethylenediimino)di-2-proponal
as a native identifier.


                    Andrew
                    dalke at dalkescientific.com