Re: Lark - A surface syntax for Common Lisp

Yes, I had my fill of “Macros” between Scheme (Racket) and Rust. Neither of those are what I consider tools to lighten the load of writing source code, in the same way that conventional Lisp Macros do. I did do a little bit in Dylan way back when. But I still prefer the "what you see is what you" get with Lisp Macros.

Rust worries way to much about “memory safety”, and Racket worries way too much about "variable capture".


> On Feb 15, 2026, at 09:52, Tim Bradshaw (as tfb at cley dot com) <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> On 15 Feb 2026, at 15:49, David McClain (as dbm at refined-audiometrics dot com) <[email protected]> wrote:
>> 
>> On a more serious note, the existing S-expr surface syntax is a huge reason for the enormous utility of Lisp macros. Noisy syntaxae (sp?) just make that so much more difficult.
> 
> Have a look at macros in Rhombus.  It's not helped by the 'I wrote a PhD and here is how macros should work using post-abstract deconvolved automorphic lattices' thing, but even then, oh god.  CL macros are in many ways nasty, but what Rhombus does is not the fix.
> 
> --tim
> 
> Oh, sorry, I've just been told that it's reconvolved: deconvolved was two weeks ago.