Python syntax in Lisp and Scheme

[Edi Weitz]

On 09 Oct 2003 16:25:22 -0400, j-anthony at rcn.com (Jon S. Anthony) wrote:

> "Andrew Dalke" <adalke at mindspring.com> writes:
> 
> > Is there a free Lisp/Scheme implementation I can experiment with
> > which include in the distribution (without downloading extra
> > packages; a "moby" distribution in xemacs speak):
> >  - unicode
> >  - xml processing (to some structure which I can use XPath on)
> >  - HTTP-1.1 (client and server)
> >  - URI processing, including support for opening and reading from
> >         http:, file:, and https:
> >  - regular expressions on both 8-bit bytes and unicode
> >  - XML-RPC
> >  - calling "external" applications (like system and popen do for C)
> >  - POP3 and mailbox processing
> 
> Yes. Allegro CL (ACL) for one.
> 
> > As far as I can tell, there isn't.  I'll need to mix and match
> > packages
> 
> You obviously can't "tell" too well.

It is true that AllegroCL has all these features and it probably is
the only CL implementation that includes all of them out of the box
but it is not true that it is free (which was one of the things
Mr. Dalke asked for). At least it wasn't true the last time I talked
to the Franz guys some days ago. If that has changed in the last week
please let me know... :)

You might be able to get most of these features with "free" CL
implementations but not all at once I think. (AFAIK CLISP is currently
the only "free" CL which supports Unicode but it is lacking in some
other areas.)

As far as "mix and match" of packages is concerned: Use Debian
(testing) or Gentoo. I've been told it's just a matter of some
invocations of 'apt-get install' or 'emerge' to get the CL packages
you want. At least it shouldn't be harder than, say, getting stuff
from CPAN. What? You don't use Debian or Gentoo? Hey, you said you
wanted "free" stuff - you get what you pay for.

No, seriously. It'd definitely be better (for us Lispers) if we had
more freely available libraries plus a standardized installation
procedure à la CPAN. Currently we don't have that - there are
obviously far more people working on Perl or Python libraries.

So, here are your choices:

1. Buy a commercial Lisp. I've done that and I think it was a good
   decision.

2. Try to improve the situation of the free CL implementations by
   writing libraries or helping with the infrastructure. That's how
   this "Open Source" thingy is supposed to work. I'm also doing this.

3. Run around complaining that you can't use Lisp because a certain
   combination of features is not available for free. We have far too
   many of these guys on c.l.l.

4. Just don't use it. That's fine with me.

It currently looks like the number of people choosing #2 is
increasing. Looks promising. You are invited to take part - it's a
great language and a nice little community... :)

Edi.

PS: You might also want to look at

      <http://web.metacircles.com/cirCLe+CD>.