The Confusing way of Lisp

A diversion from the porting work. There's seemingly a better way to import file (package) A into file (package) B in Lisp. The problems arose primarily through the combination of tools I was using. slime is the emacs (I guess it was inevitable) package which allows compiling and running within emacs! Except continual errors make it well worth while killing emacs and starting again. Yes, I did that quite a few times. I shifted from clisp to Steel Bank Common Lisp on a recommendation. The integration of n packages is seemingly termed System Definition Facility... go figure. ASDF seems to be favoured, but is weakly documented when integrated with (you name it) version of Lisp. So far I haven't got it all working. I'm OK from the command line, but not within emacs, which is .. annoying. Amongst other things that is. Vocabulary for one. Lisp is so extensive compared to other languages I was continually reminded that I was 'redefining' some function. Other languages simply baulk and crash. Lisp assumes you know what you're doing. OK OK.

Ah well. It is fun, if frustrating. Some great comparisons though. Once you think about it, Lisp reduces lists of expressions down to a couple of lines, though I am reminded of workign with C. Once I started to become familiar with the syntax I started writing 100 character lines... which were write only. I even recall the purpose, to build up a Mil-Std 1553B command word up from parts! We all laughed at the result. Lessons learned I guess. I'm now torn between legibility and conciseness. More learning, which can't be bad

Anyway, enough for 2007. Very best wishes for the new year to any readers. I hope it's a good one for you.