RE: adding namespaces to emacs-lisp (better elisp?)

[Drew Adams <drew.adams@oracle.com>]

> http://nic.ferrier.me.uk/blog/2013_06/adding-namespaces-to-elisp is
> a proposal to add namespaces to emacs-lisp.
> 
> I'd be really interested in what people think about this, whether it
> would be worth my time trying to do this or not.

OK, I'll start.  I am in favor of the Common Lisp spec - IOW, Common
Lisp "packages".  I am in favor of such a namespace system for Emacs
Lisp.

I read your proposal overview, Nic.  It's not clear to me just what
the differences would be from the Common Lisp package system.
Perhaps you could spell the differences out in more detail somewhere.

But the closer we can get to the CL spec the better, IMO.  If we
could conform to it completely, that would be great.

Even keeping the same terminology, symbol names etc. as CL would
help.  It would help users who are coming from Common Lisp or who
happen to read Common Lisp doc.

And it would help the reuse/transfer of existing code from CL to
Elisp.  (Yes, such reuse/transfer might require some massaging, but
similar syntax and semantics would help minimize that operation.)

Of course, adopting CL terminology in this regard should mean that
we would drop the terminology used so far for Emacs "packages".
An argument can be made that both uses of the word "package" are
somewhat unfortunate.

At this point, I think conforming to the terminology that has been
used in CL for 30 years is the right approach, regardless of
whether CL "packages" are really, in effect, namespaces.

So +1 for adding CL-style namespaces to Emacs Lisp.  One opinion.