Comments by "Luredreier" (@Luredreier) on "Code vs Data (Metaprogramming) - Computerphile" video.

  1. Think of meta programming as inventing something new like multiplication or even pluss in math prior to those things being invented. Or any other new concept. For instance, there was a time when no one had invented zero. Math at the time had to be done with numbers with a value since there was no zero. In a programming language with metaprogramming you can invent such a new concept as zero, define it and use it instead of defining it every single time you need to use the concept.
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  2. Metaprogramming is a programming paradigm that can be used in multiple different programming languages. However only a few supports the paradigm fully with features such as homoiconicity... That said, you can do metaprogramming without homoiconicity. It's just way more of a pain to do so...
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  3. Not quite. It's a programming paradigm. You can do this with a functional programming language (well some of them). But this and functional programming isn't the same exact thing.
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  4. You can then get data that becomes code at runtime too...
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  5. It's not about not being happy about for loopes. It's about being able to implement for loops on the fly in a language where it doesn't exist already. Or any other feature for that matter. If you can come up with a new consept you can implement it and use user input as a part of the implementation if desired. You can change the code itself based on user input. And sure, you can write a program that can write code for its own code. However what about writing a program that can write the code used to run itself during the runtime? Regarding the spagetti code argument. Yes, partially. But it doesn't have to be.
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