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From: costin@h-sc1.UUCP (dan costin)
Newsgroups: net.lang.lisp
Subject: Re: question for a Common Lisp guru
Message-ID: <958@h-sc1.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 27-Feb-86 22:52:02 EST
Article-I.D.: h-sc1.958
Posted: Thu Feb 27 22:52:02 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Mar-86 17:13:53 EST
References: <1829@hammer.UUCP>
Reply-To: costin@h-sc1.UUCP (dan costin)
Distribution: net
Organization: Harvard Univ. Science Center
Lines: 15

In article <1829@hammer.UUCP> patcl@hammer.UUCP (Pat Clancy) writes:
>
>The book Common Lisp (1984) says that "defun", used to
>establish global function definitions, is a macro (p. 67).
>Yet, this doesn't seem possible, as there does not seem to
>be any special form which could be used to implement such
>a macro...

If the good book says it's a macro, then it's a macro. :-)
Seriously, though, if you use the step function you'll soon find out that
all functions are expanded into blocks with all sorts of stuff in them.
So defun is a macro, really.  Try (describe 'defun).  That should be
the absolutest right answer about what it is.

-dan costin