Re: SLIME and SBCL (Common Lisp)

[Jean Louis <bugs@gnu.support>]

* Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> [2021-07-06 09:49]:
> > SBCL does not have a readline.
> 
> A readline, you mean like in C?

Readline is GNU library where it remembers history and offers line
editing capabilities.

CLISP has readline built-in, that helps 10 times more to use the REPL easier
(without Emacs). SBCL does not have it, it asks for so much typing
without Emacs. CLISP not, as it has readline. Maybe you never tried
using CLISP from console only. 

I have been developing Lisp programs in REPL only, without editor. And
I was very reluctant to use Emacs. Today I still go to REPL often and
use its features, but I use Emacs mostly. 

How I was doing it? I would define functions. If function was good, I
would save it. There was and is, a function to save other
functions. Then I could invoke editor from within REPL. I can invoke
any type of editor, save file, load file. That is process in REPL. It
is quite a nice way of developing. People who are not used to it will
of course suggest Emacs and other way around.

> > Yesterday I was supposed to write a general Double Opt-In
> > program in Common Lisp but I wrote it in Emacs Lisp. I guess
> > I will have to rewrite it in Common Lisp, then I will do the
> > same in Chicken, Dr. Racket, Scheme and Perl, then maybe
> > other languages to add.
> 
> A lot of schemes you have, why write the same program in
> several languages?

Some VPS-es are different from others, distributions are different. It
is not always easy to have some language on every remote server. On
the other hand it helps great to do it in few dialects as it it
research on what will work best.

-- 
Jean

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