The German School of Lisp ("Fluchtpunkt Lisps")

Interesting article, introduced me to a whole bunch of lisps I had no idea existed.<p>Slightly tangentially, can anyone explain to me what the supposed advantage of using Lisp is over languages such as Python and Ruby (which also provide functional programming, dynamic typing, etc)? I certainly feel that I'm more productive in some languages than others, eg, I can do the same things faster in Ruby than in Java. When I tried working in Clojure for a few mini projects, I enjoyed using it, but didn't feel any more productive than in Ruby.<p>I actually like the Lisp-like syntax, but I usually find myself either a) tying myself in knots trying to avoid the use of variables, or b) missing Ruby's object system. It seems like these might be problems that stem from inexperience, can anyone else comment? Is it worth reading "On Lisp" or SICP to learn how to take advantage of Lisp's unique features (macros and so on)?

<a href="https://github.com/fogus/lithp" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/fogus/lithp</a><p><a href="http://picolisp.com/5000/-2.html" rel="nofollow">http://picolisp.com/5000/-2.html</a><p><a href="http://mumble.net/~jar/tproject/" rel="nofollow">http://mumble.net/~jar/tproject/</a><p><a href="http://www.lambdassociates.org/Lib/libraries.htm" rel="nofollow">http://www.lambdassociates.org/Lib/libraries.htm</a><p><a href="http://www.newlisp.org/" rel="nofollow">http://www.newlisp.org/</a><p><a href="http://www.paulgraham.com/arc.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.paulgraham.com/arc.html</a><p><a href="http://sites.google.com/site/waspvm/" rel="nofollow">http://sites.google.com/site/waspvm/</a><p>Fluchtpunkt Lisps are…<p>Focused: Uncompromising in their vision<p>Spartan: Devoid of the seemingly unnecessary comforts found in many modern languages<p>Controversial: Not always by design, but often because of their design<p>Fun

I just retweeted Michael's tweet link this blog entry - this is really a very good classification of Lisp systems! It could be a potential time sink however, trying more implementations :-)

This is very cool; I wasn't aware of the existence of some of these implementations.<p>The Wasp Lisp is an interesting idea and looks like it has many of the same benefits as Erlang. If I had to guess at what programming languages would look like in the future I'd say they'd at least include capability to (easily) do distributed computation like this, even if they're not based around the concept.<p>There are so many qualities that Lisp has, like its lack of syntax, that makes exploring new ideas very easy.

I just spent a few hours searching but can't find a Lisp for Arduino. Does anyone know a Lisp for Arduino or a Lisp that could produces C code small enough (&#60;32K) for it?<p>After some tries neither Chicken scheme nor Pico Lisp qualifies and PicoBit does not seem to support the Arduino architecture.