[cello-devel] corman second thoughts

[Thomas F. Burdick]

Kenny Tilton writes:
 > It just occurred to me what the problem may have been that made me 
 > abandon the Corman and CLisp ports. The key Cells mechanism called 
 > "echoing" works via the generic function c-echo-slot-name. Two problems: 
 > the method combination is progn, and the dispatch requires EQL 
 > specialization.
 > 
 > The first question is whether those limitations still apply to either 
 > implementation. Perhaps newer versions have fixed these. If not..

After years of harassment, flaming, threats, pleading, flames,
begging, Erik Naggum, and periodic diaspora of users, CLISP is finally
working on supporting CLOS in ernest.  Meaning that as of February
2004, method combinations should work.  Mind you, I checked out a copy
of the CLISP source today, and couldn't get it to compile on OS X --
but that's a bug, and it should be safe to say that bleeding-edge
CLISP has proper support for method combinations.  Finally!

 > hopefully they have mended their CLOS ways.

It looks like CLISP has started considering CLOS shortcomings as bugs,
and not only that, but they have hacker(s) willing to work on those
bugs.

As for Corman, I got the impression from R.C. that he had the same
attitude as I had with the Anaconda/CL-80 project: sure, there are
bugs, CL is a big language -- tell me the problems you actually run
into and I'll fix them, on a need-to-use basis.  As a former
implementor, I recommend telling Corman, "I can't use your lisp for
Cello because of X, Y, and Z".