Studying A Programmer’s Information to COMMON LISP — Paolo Amoroso’s Journal
I received an inexpensive used copy of the ebook A Programmer’s Guide to COMMON LISP by Deborah G. Tatar, Digital Press, 1987.
Why did I learn such an outdated ebook, printed a number of years after CLtL1 and effectively earlier than ANSI finalized the Frequent Lisp commonplace?
I am all the time in search of good Lisp books. Since Medley is my major Lisp setting, I am significantly excited about books printed when the system was initially developed and used. These works are related as a result of they cowl a set of options near the state of the Frequent Lisp implementation of Medley, and current a programming model typical of Lisp growth in these years.
Two outdated opinions received me interested by A Programmer’s Information to COMMON LISP, one by Daniel Weinreb and the opposite by Richard Caruana.
Each opinions level out the ebook is completely different from most modern introductory Lisp books which concentrate on AI. Though Tatar’s does comprise some AI code, equivalent to an attention-grabbing and full toy skilled system, the pattern code spans a wider vary of domains like a textual content formatter much like nroff.
What units A Programmer’s Information to COMMON LISP aside from different Lisp books is its setting impartial dialogue of the interactive Lisp programming course of. Writing code within the editor, evaluating expressions from the editor, interacting with the REPL for testing expressions and exploring, and so forth.
I’ve by no means seen the method expressed so clearly in any ebook, previous of current. I am conversant in it however the materials is particulary useful for full newbies.
Though the quick chapter on macros presents some attention-grabbing examples like a simplified model of defstruct, it would not focus on gensym and variable seize. That is uncommon. But it surely’s just one of some points and the ebook is a precious addition to my Lisp library.
Discuss…
Email | Reply @amoroso@fosstodon.org