LISP for Recursive Math Problems: Choosing Between Common Lisp and Scheme

  • Thread starter Thread starter qntty
  • Start date Start date
Join the discussion
Registration is free. Ask a follow-up in this thread, or start your own.
Sign up Log in
2 replies · 3K views
qntty
Messages
289
Reaction score
4
I need a programming language primarily to solve tedious, recursive math problems. I've heard that lisp is good for this but don't know whether to go with common lisp or scheme. If there are any other languages that you think will do this better I'd like to hear of those too (I'd prefer not to use a CAS language like maple or mathematica).
 
Physics news on Phys.org


If I am not mistaken, Python does not optimize away tail-call recursion - it will simply put every instance of the function on the stack, eventually leading to an overflow. Scheme does this by design. Scheme and Lisp are much more natural for functional programming techniques than Python.

I suggest Scheme.