merits of Lisp vs Python

[Paddy]

JShrager at gmail.com wrote:

> > > > Python has this unsung module called doctest that neatly shows some of
> > > > the strengths of python:   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctest
>
> > > Now I'm *certain* that you're just pulling my leg: You guys document
> > > all your random ten-line hacks in Wikipedia?!?! What a brilliant idea!
>
> > Python is newbie-friendly. Part of that is being accessible.
> > Doctest is about a novel way of using a feature shared by Lisp, that is
> > docstrings. Testing is important, usually not done enough, and doctests
> > are a way to get people to write more tests by making it easier. Does
> > Lisp have similar?
>
> Seems like a trivial commonality between the languages, and a trivial
> library, but that's not at all what I was laughing at...
Yep, doctest is trivial to use. Its part of its power ;-)
>
> > > Hey, you even have dead vaporware projects like uuu documented in
> > > Wikipedia! Cool! (Actually, I don't know that doctest is ten lines in
> > > Python, but it'd be about ten lines of Lisp, if that, so I'm just
> > > guessing here.)
>
> > Does Lisp have a doctest-like module as part of its standard
> > distribution? Or are you saying that  If you ever needed it, then it would be
> > trivial to implement in Lisp, and you would 'roll your own'? There are
> > advantages to doctest being one of Pythons standard modules.
>
> Actually, I don't care what you put into your library -- to some exent,
> the more the merrier (as I've said elsewhere, I wish we had your
> community of busy ... um ... beavers :-) to create libraries full of
> stuff, trivial or not!) The wheat will rise from the chaff. (Some
> Lispers might disagree with me here.)
Its not so much the library creation. You also need the organisation,
and the willingness to accept that others can write good code too, (in
whatever language), and hold off from that first impulse to
roll-your-own library.

>
> But anyway, what I was laughing at had nothing to do with doctest --
> but that you use wikipedia to document your libraries. Elsewhere I have
> aregued that Wikipedia is a stupid marketing document -- *many* Lispers
> disagree with me here, so let's no go down this road, please as it's
> soooooooo OT! So, I'm mostly laughing at the laughability of the
> concept of the Wikipedia as somehow a source of all wisdom, not doctest
> per se. Random ten-line Python libraries (as well as dead vaporware
> python projects, as well as a whole bunch of other useless crap, and
> the very occassionally useful crap) being in Wikiperdia just makes me
> smile, that's all.
Oh, you don't like Wikipedia.
There are a lot of people that use Wikipedia. I think some of them
might want to learn to program. I make it easier for them to find
Python by helping to maintain Python within Wikipedia.
If I am researching anything then I like to cross check with
information from multiple sites. that's just good practice.
Some people dislike Wikipedia which is fine. Some people dislike
Wikipedia and deliberately sabotage it, which is vandalism.

-Paddy.