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Frame from Oculus Connect 2: Live Coding Session with John Carmack Plays via YouTube's privacy-enhanced embed

Oculus Connect 2: Live Coding Session with John Carmack

Meta VR
Demos
YouTube
3 HN users recommended this demo3 months2016–2023 score 3.5
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

Cited for watching Carmack code fluently and for the fast iteration cycle of Racket-based VR scripting.

John Carmack live-codes a simple VR application at Oculus Connect 2 using a Racket-based environment for rapid development and deployment on Gear VR.

“it was fantastic because, first, you were showing to your audience how to work with Racket” (HN, 2017)

1 strong recommendations · 2 recommendations · 9 citations · Demos · intermediate · partly dated

12 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@pera Aug 2017 Strongly recommends
on HN thread John Carmack on Functional Programming (2013) [video]
Actually I really like the format of your presentations: just yesterday I watched your live coding session with vrscript ( [this video] ) and it was fantastic because, first, you were showing to your audience how to work with Racket (and some of the features in DrRacket), and second, you build from zero a demo in a very casual, easy going way. I honestly don't think that a standard slide-based presentation would have been better in any way...
Fantastic casual live coding of a demo from zero in Racket.
@khrm May 2016 Recommends
on HN thread Whoever does not understand Lisp is doomed to reinvent it (2007)
Checkout the VR script by John Carmack [this video] It's on racket (scheme dialect). There are no language which can make you more efficient. But some languages open your mind. Just read SICP and find out what makes language EPIC. Many big projects are in Php. But surely no one would claim that it makes php "the EPIC" or even great.
Carmack's VR scripting in Racket.
@staunch May 2019 Recommends
on HN thread Racket: John Carmack’s VRScript Samples (2015)
He also did a live coding demo showing off this VR scripting concept. Having such a fast iteration cycle is very compelling. Hopefully at least some Javascript version of this will exist, even though this seems like a perfect application for a Lisp. [this video] I wish he did live coding. Jonathan Blow's Twitch channel (naysayer88) is very compelling. Carmack's would be as well.
Live coding demo with fast iteration cycle for VR scripting.

Citations, criticism and jokes

@jierenchen May 2020 Cites it
on HN thread Ronin – A Lisp-based image processing tool
Read more
This is exceptionally cool. Thanks for sharing and building! When I'm using Sketch or Movie Maker or Logic or some other GUI-based >>x<< editing tool, the thing that keeps going through my head is: "Dammit I wish I had the abstraction tools that I have as a programmer. It would literally make this task 100x faster." To me Ronin is some strong validation that all these editing tools would be much improved by a human-readable and programmable intermediate representation of what you're doing with the GUI. The GUI is just an editor for modifying this representation. John Carmack did some work when he was at Oculus on something like this for VR: - [this video] These ideas are all in their infancy, but really excited to see people starting to make moves in this field. Thanks again!
Carmack's work on programmable representation for VR.
@flocial Sep 2020 Cites it
on HN thread Carmack on not being a power editor user
Read more
I suspect the majority of programmers who say this have internalized the core api features they depend on (function calls, syntax, common algorithms, etc.) that make them super productive. Whereas average programmers and below need all the help they can get from their editor to tame the wild goose chase of looking up common functions, scouring StackOverflow, and even looking for random snippets on long abandoned blogs, etc. In other words his mastery greatly reduces his dependence on IDE/editor features so this makes perfect sense. Watching Carmack live coding, he types with conviction and gets things done: [this video] Sitting down with OpenBSD during a cabin retreat: [link]
Carmack live coding fluently.
@nickjj Jun 2021 Cites it
on HN thread Note that I wouldn’t pass the listed minimum requirements
> What was Carmack's development focus during Oculus? I'm not sure exactly but there's a bunch of keynotes from Carmack around Oculus Connect on YouTube. Here's one from 2014: [link] , and another one from a year later where he's live coding in a VR environment [this video] . You'll find a bunch more if you search too. I remember skimming through them years ago not because I'm into VR development but I've been a life long fan of Carmack's work and like listening to him talk about things.
Carmack live coding in a VR environment.
@jambutters Jul 2021 Cites it
on HN thread Racket v8.2
the biggest adoption it would have gotten is that it was going to be used the main language of vrscripting [this video] but it seems like john couldnt push it everyone into it
Racket was to be the main VR scripting language.
@placesalt Jun 2023 Cites it
on HN thread Racket Frustrates Me
There's a live coding talk by John Carmack where he uses Racket for making small programs for the Oculus: [this video] He seemed happy enough with the language.
Carmack using Racket for small Oculus programs.

Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.

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