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From: jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Subject: Re: Problem with (apply #'or <list>)? (cl 3.0.1)
Message-ID: <4147@skye.ed.ac.uk>
Date: 18 Feb 91 12:25:10 GMT
References: <1991Feb15.065508.28609@cs.columbia.edu> <1991Feb15.192603.12714@cs.columbia.edu>
Reply-To: jeff@aiai.UUCP (Jeff Dalton)
Organization: AIAI, University of Edinburgh, Scotland
Lines: 14

This seems to be a "frequently asked question".

There's a short answer ("OR is a macro, and macros can't be applied")
and a long one (an explanation of why macros such as OR can't be applied).

The long answer is sometimes needed because (1) in some Lisps apply
could be used on macros, and (2) because of (1) or for some other
reason, some people expect it to work, at least for the macros that
are enough like functions.

(I don't want to type in the long answer now, because it's long and
because it's been done before and because this time maybe no one needs
it.  But if anyone every draws up a FAQ list, they might want to bear
this in mind.)