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From: marick@ccvaxa.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.lang.lisp
Subject: Re: Spice Lisp (and more Common Lisp ar
Message-ID: <13400024@ccvaxa>
Date: Wed, 2-Jul-86 14:28:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: ccvaxa.13400024
Posted: Wed Jul  2 14:28:00 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 5-Jul-86 05:34:02 EDT
References: <1022@spice.cs.cmu.edu>
Lines: 36
Nf-ID: #R:spice.cs.cmu.edu:1022:ccvaxa:13400024:000:1687
Nf-From: ccvaxa.UUCP!marick    Jul  2 12:28:00 1986


>Well, for one thing, some of the functions [in Spice Lisp] are pages and 
>pages long. An example is the AREF function. It runs to about 20 pages! From
>the software engineering point of view, this is NOT the ideal situation.

I'm afraid that people will take this comment out of context and develop
rock-solid opinions about Spice Lisp.  People tend to do that, you know.

I know a lot about the source to Spice Lisp, since we use it in our Lisp.
That's my only connection with it, but I suppose it taints me -- since
defending Spice Lisp also defends our Lisp.

On the whole, I'd say that it's reasonable code.  Since it was written
by different people at different times, some parts are not as good as 
others.  Looking at the finished product, I can certainly see things
I would have done differently -- but that's true of almost every finished
product I look at, especially my own.

I find the code very readable and quite reasonably free of unisolated
machine dependencies, two things probably most important in an implementation
that's intended to be a "starter kit" for Lisps.  For comparison, I'd say
that Spice Lisp is superior to UNIX in these regards.

Scott Fahlman, Skef Wholey, Rob MacLachlan, and the other people involved
in Spice Lisp have done a lot of work that they didn't have to do.
Their efforts will play a large part in the success of Common Lisp;
those of us who think Common Lisp is a good thing owe them thanks.

By the way, AREF runs to 23 lines.  There are other functions that are
much longer, but I doubt whether any runs to 20 pages.


Brian Marick, Wombat Consort
Gould Computer Systems -- Urbana
...ihnp4!uiucdcs!ccvaxa!marick
ARPA:  Marick@GSWD-VMS