Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!crackers!jjmhome!smds!rh From: rh@smds.UUCP (Richard Harter) Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp Subject: Re: Is this the end of the lisp wave? Summary: See ma, no maintenance Message-ID: <299@smds.UUCP> Date: 18 Jan 91 01:11:06 GMT References: <4178@syma.sussex.ac.uk> <5332@idunno.Princeton.EDU> <2795309d.5117@petunia.CalPoly.EDU> Organization: SMDS Inc., Concord, MA Lines: 30 In article <2795309d.5117@petunia.CalPoly.EDU>, jdudeck@polyslo.CalPoly.EDU (John R. Dudeck) writes: : In an article nagle@well.sf.ca.us (John Nagle) wrote: : > LISP, in its grander forms, was intended to support an environment : >in which everything was fluid, in which programs could modify themselves, : >examine their own inner workings in a reasonable representation, : >and in which a program could create new sections of program in an : >integrated way. The dream was of programs that used these facilities : >to improve themselves. Lenat's AM and Eurisko actually did so; few : >other programs ever did. : > Unfortunately, that didn't seem to lead much of anywhere. : I would say "fortunately". It's hard enough to control complexity when : we are able to analyze and decompose a problem and nail things down : in the solution as much as possible. I hope I never have to maintain : a program that is fluid. You miss the point -- you wouldn't have to maintain such a program; it would maintain itself. :-) But seriously, the objective was to bypass the complexity of program building by having the self-building programs. It may be that the ultimate failure of the early attempts at auto-programming were really due to not having a built-in understanding of software complexity. -- Richard Harter, Software Maintenance and Development Systems, Inc. Net address: jjmhome!smds!rh Phone: 508-369-7398 US Mail: SMDS Inc., PO Box 555, Concord MA 01742 This sentence no verb. This sentence short. This signature done.