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From: jaffer@gerber.ai.mit.edu (Aubrey Jaffer)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp,comp.lang.scheme
Subject: Re: Scheme as an Algol-like, not Lisp-like, language
Message-ID: <13645@life.ai.mit.edu>
Date: 3 Mar 91 00:33:37 GMT
References: <1991Feb15.191259.20090@aero.org> <1991Feb15.223520.17267@Think.COM> 	<1991Feb18.191549.7575@aero.org> <1991Feb19.030719.1137@Think.COM> 	<PCG.91Feb23162955@odin.cs.aber.ac.uk> <4234@skye.ed.ac.uk> 	<PCG.91Feb26194909@odin.cs.aber.ac.uk> <JINX.91Feb262130
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In-reply-to: kiran@copper.ucs.indiana.edu's message of 2 Mar 91 09:14:20 GMT


>>Doesn't this argument apply to all special forms and procedures?
>>All we need is if & lambda--should we get rid of and & or,
>>cond, etc.? Or are these tools that allow us to focus on the rest of
>>the program? I use named procedures and macros to avoid the
>>lambda--but also to help me conceptualize what's going on here. 
>>Other syntactic sugar likewise--are you willing to say that all 
>>code should be written at the lowest level possible? 
>>Why not code in binary?

No.  As I said in the beginning of the article, the problem stems from
not being able to syntacticly differentiate between procedure calls
and special forms.  Scheme has less than 20 special forms.  I can
remember that small number.  A requirement that macro (or special
form) symbols start with * or some other marker would make me happy.

The radical suggestion I made was prompted by the realization that
Scheme's 16 special forms seem to cover almost all the ways I write
code (control structure).  No one seems to share that observation with
me.

Someone suggested that `while' should be added to Scheme.  To my mind
`while' is not different enough from `do' to be useful:

(while <CONDITIONAL> <CODE ...>)  ==>
(do () ((not <CONDITIONAL>)) <CODE ...>)