

The killer combination for programming languages or why I like F# - namin
http://spotless-spots.blogspot.com/2008/11/why-i-like-f.html

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jimbokun
"I used to be content programming an esoteric Scheme system in Emacs. Now, I
am convinced by the killer combination of (1) a fun functional language (2) a
widely-used platform with a rich library (3) a professional IDE with a good
debugger. With (1) ML-like, (2) CLR, (3) Visual Studio, you get F#. With (1)
Lisp, (2) JVM, (3) Eclipse, I guess you get Clojure."

The irony is that, for Clojure, Emacs remains a pretty good IDE, while still
allowing for the widely used platform and rich library. Will be hard for
Eclipse to catch up given all the years spent making Emacs a good environment
for Lisp style development, and the fact a Lisp is the Emacs extension
language.

~~~
namin
True :) The only thing I would miss in Emacs is a visual debugger. I used to
write Scheme in a "code carefully so it works the first time around" mode. It
worked out because I worked on small systems and Scheme has extremely clear
semantics. But imagine having to dive into a framework-based project, big
enough that you can't understand it all at once by reading the code. Then, I
find that using a debugger and stepping through the code is a really good way
to get a grasp of the system. Perhaps, slime provides a good debugging
interface -- I just got hooked into visual debuggers before I could find out.

~~~
whalliburton
TRACE and BREAK.

------
DanielBMarkham
Plus if you're a functional noob like I am, you can pop out and do traditional
OO/Procedural code.

It slices, it dices. Heck -- probably even makes Julianne fries.

Tying type inference to IntelliSense is a huge win for the programmer.

------
lst
Before you fall in love, make sure to hear some opposite opinion, like this
one:

[http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.lisp/msg/9555f5757e...](http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.lisp/msg/9555f5757ec5150c)

~~~
DanielBMarkham
Was there a case made against F# in the cited text?

Sounded more like a rant.

I read it twice. I'm unable to discern what reasons the author puts forward
against F#. Seems like most of his criticism is against that certain book.

~~~
icey
It looks like a response to a known troll in comp.lang.lisp to me. I don't
think that the linked group message is really a good argument against F# as
much as it is an acknowledgment that people really dislike Jon Harrop.

