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Use .net or lisp?

11 REPLIES 11
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Message 1 of 12
Anonymous
343 Views, 11 Replies

Use .net or lisp?

I'm asking this question here because I would think the people reading this
forum are passiniate about .net
I've been using playing with lisp for about 13 years. I'm not a serious
programer but I can hack some code together.
My question is should I invest my time in learning the .net languages. Or a
better question is. My company hired
a developer and he wants to write all the autocad apps in .net instead of
lisp. Am I going to be able to contribute
on these projects if they are all in .net?

--
Dave
11 REPLIES 11
Message 2 of 12
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

"Am I going to be able to contribute on these projects if they are all in
.net?"

Ah, there's the real question. What do you mean by "contribute"? I'm not a
programmer either - just a simple designer - I wish I had a dedicated
programmer on staff where I could "design" the program and let he\she code
away! But alas, that's not the case.

If you want to be in the trenches coding then you'll need to learn either C#
or VB.NET (which ever language is to be used.)

Have fun!

jb
Message 3 of 12
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

There are .NET implementations of many different languages; a Google search
for .NET LISP returns nearly 8 million hits. Some LISP-like ideas are
making their way into C# 3.0.

In theory, any .NET language should pretty much be able to use the .NET
wrappers for AutoCAD; although in practice, most people are probably going
to use C# or VB.NET. Personally, I would try hard to use the .NET APIs (and
C#) for any new AutoCAD-based development.

Dan

"David Allen" wrote in message
news:5209035@discussion.autodesk.com...
I'm asking this question here because I would think the people reading this
forum are passiniate about .net
I've been using playing with lisp for about 13 years. I'm not a serious
programer but I can hack some code together.
My question is should I invest my time in learning the .net languages. Or a
better question is. My company hired
a developer and he wants to write all the autocad apps in .net instead of
lisp. Am I going to be able to contribute
on these projects if they are all in .net?

--
Dave
Message 4 of 12
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

David Allen wrote:

> My company hired a developer and he wants to write all the autocad
> apps in .net instead of lisp. Am I going to be able to contribute on
> these projects if they are all in .net?

You can learn it if you put enough time/effort into it. But regardless
DO NOT hold that .NET programmer back.

Terry
Message 5 of 12
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

If you explore the .net sdk sample folder (1.1 or greater) - you will find a
lisp.net implimentation. The project is coded in c#. You can attach a pure
lisp file with the project and it will compile it for use with .net. I have
been meaning to try it out with some old lisp code wraped in the correct
header for an autocad netload but I have been too busy. You may want to
expirement with it. You might have an easier time implementing it if your
new developer is familar with c# and can adjust the lisp.net project to work
easier with autocad.
--
CB




"Terry W. Dotson" wrote in message
news:5209268@discussion.autodesk.com...
David Allen wrote:

> My company hired a developer and he wants to write all the autocad
> apps in .net instead of lisp. Am I going to be able to contribute on
> these projects if they are all in .net?

You can learn it if you put enough time/effort into it. But regardless
DO NOT hold that .NET programmer back.

Terry
Message 6 of 12
Scott Underwood
in reply to: Anonymous

If you use cad alot I would explore as many different customization languages as possible.

I started really getting into LISP about four years ago and have saved myself a lot of time with the routines I have created.

I then started using vb.net to make some stanalone programs that don't interact with autocad. Once I was familiar with vb.net I jumped into customizing autocad with VBA. Which is great because I work Land Desktop and there are lots of simple time saving routines that are needed to compliment the autodesk product.

VBA and vb.net are pretty similar, if you have a routine in VBA you can pretty easily migrate it to vb.net. If you have used visualLISP and objects and object properties in your lisp programing it will give you a head start into VBA/vb.net.

Needless to say I would make friends with your in house programer. It would be great to have someone take all your ideas and make them a reality. Plus you can probably learn a lot if he's willing to help you out and colaborate with you on your own programs and his.

If he doesn't have any autocad experience or doesn't know your company's work process he's going to need alot of info from you and the other users to create routines and programs to show the company that he's worth being paid just to develop software.

I would recommend picking out something that doesn't seem to complecated and try to do it with VBA. Then move on to .net. Try making a simple stand alone program in vb.net (2005 express version is free from micro$oft)

http://www.vbdotnetforums.com/


Good luck.
Message 7 of 12
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

Ya we have already started talking and yes his experience seems to be more
programing and less CAD.
I can see the benifit of using .net for large projects but I just do not see
it replacing what I can do with lisp which is very limited.
Basic programs I can bang out quicker or use freely availble lisp code.
Maybe I'm just not seeing freebie .net code out there.

--
Dave

wrote in message news:5210060@discussion.autodesk.com...
If you use cad alot I would explore as many different customization
languages as possible.

I started really getting into LISP about four years ago and have saved
myself a lot of time with the routines I have created.

I then started using vb.net to make some stanalone programs that don't
interact with autocad. Once I was familiar with vb.net I jumped into
customizing autocad with VBA. Which is great because I work Land Desktop
and there are lots of simple time saving routines that are needed to
compliment the autodesk product.

VBA and vb.net are pretty similar, if you have a routine in VBA you can
pretty easily migrate it to vb.net. If you have used visualLISP and objects
and object properties in your lisp programing it will give you a head start
into VBA/vb.net.

Needless to say I would make friends with your in house programer. It would
be great to have someone take all your ideas and make them a reality. Plus
you can probably learn a lot if he's willing to help you out and colaborate
with you on your own programs and his.

If he doesn't have any autocad experience or doesn't know your company's
work process he's going to need alot of info from you and the other users to
create routines and programs to show the company that he's worth being paid
just to develop software.

I would recommend picking out something that doesn't seem to complecated and
try to do it with VBA. Then move on to .net. Try making a simple stand
alone program in vb.net (2005 express version is free from micro$oft)

http://www.vbdotnetforums.com/


Good luck.
Message 8 of 12
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

I think the problem is that he only wants to work on huge large scale
programs when alot of time its the little
helper apps that make a drafter productive in day to day activities. Say
for example an xref renamer that uses
ObjectDBX. I already have code from these newsgroups that about 400 lines.
It just needs polish before
it can be used by everyone. If he programs it from .net then he is going to
have to research how to do DBX
and code it 100% from scratch. That will take alot longer.

As far as learning it, you hit it. I don't have enough time 🙂

--
Dave

"Terry W. Dotson" wrote in message
news:5209268@discussion.autodesk.com...
David Allen wrote:

> My company hired a developer and he wants to write all the autocad
> apps in .net instead of lisp. Am I going to be able to contribute on
> these projects if they are all in .net?

You can learn it if you put enough time/effort into it. But regardless
DO NOT hold that .NET programmer back.

Terry
Message 9 of 12
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

David,
Since you have the CAD experience he lacks why you don't you take the role
as "designer"? You can use Lisp to quickly illustrate "how" the program
interacts with cad - i.e. How to design it: then let him build it. If by
chance he starts to take too long, read "too costly", then you've
illustrated to your superiors the benifits of "quick and dirty" lisp.

Just a thought.

jb
Message 10 of 12
Scott Underwood
in reply to: Anonymous

LISP is great for small, quick code, and even larger apps (if you have the patience, and/or ability). For simple express tool like routines I stick to LISP. Plus I use LISP to run my VBA routines, load menus, etc.

Now that I have started using VBA it is easier to develop certain projects, especially if you're going to be interacting with the Object Model. Once you see how to run a routine in VBA it's pretty easy to move on to .net.

Think of the autodesk programming options like tools in a toolbox and pick the best tool for the job.

Once he sees the power of LISP he may be interested in learning it for small routines to compliment his .net abilities.

As far as freebie/sample .net code I wouldn't expect to see much of it. Look at the discussion groups at the number of posts in each group (LISP, VBA, .net, ARX) LISP is by far the most popular, then VBA, .net&ARX.

Good luck.
Message 11 of 12
smcclure
in reply to: Anonymous

I personally think that LISP is much harder than any .NET language. I still have trouble reading LISP code. In the spirit of full disclosure, though, I must point out that I learned things "backwards", and developed in .NET, C, Java, and VB before I even touched LISP.

- Scott
Message 12 of 12
Anonymous
in reply to: Anonymous

smcclure wrote:
> I personally think that LISP is much harder than any .NET language. I still have trouble reading LISP code. In the spirit of full disclosure, though, I must point out that I learned things "backwards", and developed in .NET, C, Java, and VB before I even touched LISP.
>
> - Scott

Correctly written Lisp is quite readable, once you have some familiarity
with the language. The trick is to indent it according to the program
structure, and read it based on the indentation, not the parentheses.

In the larger Lisp culture (Common Lisp and Scheme, these days) there
are commonly agreed indentation rules; in practice, whatever the Emacs
editor does 🙂

The problem here is that about 90 % of all AutoLISP code publicly
available, including most of Autodesk documentation, is not written
accoding to those rules.

So, whenever I get my hands on some AutoLISP program, the first thing I
do before even trying to understand it is to re-indent it.

--

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