Re: Conquering the world with Lua

[Родион Горковенко <rodiongork@...>]

On Sat, Sep 30, 2023 at 9:02 PM Gavin Wraith <gavin@wra1th.plus.com> wrote:
>
> and the requirements for use or research. For example, users must avoid
> reinventing the wheel. Learners, to the contrary, must reinvent the
> wheel. Unfortunately many administrators believe (wrongly IMHO) that
> just because a language is popular it has to be good for teaching.

That is a very good point, though it presents a question - from how
low level reinventing the wheel should
start. I created also some problems for intel4004 assembly (4-bit
CPU!) which enjoyed some
popularity - but I doubt students should be taught that low :)))

Anyway, your point is very important, yes, and Lua seems just at the
proper level!


> I recommend Roberto's lecture
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxcSvnEIUq4

Wow, thanks a lot, it is cool to watch "the creator" :)

> Scheme (and the SICP book) used to be the big educational programming
> language in the USA. Lua could certainly take its place. Unfortunately

By then it was even thought that LISP / Scheme are good languages for
building AI and other
important branches of programming. One can easily google up
corresponding books. But as I understand
upon browsing these books, it is partly due to fact that by then there
were little or no other dynamic scripting
languages as widespread as LISP-likes. Simply because LISP started
20-30 years before them, I guess.

I like scheme but I agree with the point mentioned somewhere in Lua
history, that all these parentheses make
the language somewhat inhumane (despite very easy for interpreter).

Thanks for all your hints!