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From: bc@apple.UUCP (bill coderre)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.lang.lisp
Subject: Coral/Franz Extended Common Lisp PRESS RELEASE
Message-ID: <1563@apple.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 20-Aug-87 19:27:56 EDT
Article-I.D.: apple.1563
Posted: Thu Aug 20 19:27:56 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 22-Aug-87 14:42:50 EDT
References: <334@su-russell.ARPA>
Organization: Apple Computer, Inc., Cupertino, USA
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Summary: Skip if you dislike advertisments
Xref: mnetor comp.sys.mac:5805 comp.lang.lisp:403

Alright, it's time to post a press release for Coral Extended Common
Lisp (Allegro). {Note: "ECL" is sometimes used elsewhere to refer to
ExperCommonLisp, an entirely unrelated product.}

First, be aware that Coral developed the Mac kernel mentioned here,
to which will be added the Franz ECL extensions. ECL is being renamed
"Allegro".

Second, be aware that I was a tester of the product. Now I am a user.
I have never been paid by them, nor do I have any stake in the
product. I am only working for Apple for the summer, do not confuse
my return address with any official endorsement from Apple.

Anyway, this is a press release I made up, not them. I've brought it
in line with their releases, but mine has considerably more detail.
Any errors in specification are probably my fault.

			 Allegro Common Lisp
			    Coral Software
			      POBox 307
			  Cambridge MA 02142
			    (617)547-2662
		 Outside Massachusetts: (800)521-1027

	    "A programming environment for the CDR of us."

Allegro Common Lisp for the Macintosh line of personal computers is
now shipping for $399.95, INTRODUCTORY PRICE. Allegro is not copy
protected and includes a money-back guarantee.

Allegro CL contains the FULL Common Lisp as specified in *Common
Lisp: the Language* by Guy Steele. Everything mentioned in the book
is implemented. 

Allegro CL will run off floppy disks and will run in a 1MB MacPlus.
At least 2MB and a hard disk are recommended. (Related files
currently clock in at 1.6MByte.)

Allegro will run approximately 5 times faster on a 16MHz 68020
machine, for example a Mac II or a third-party processor upgrade.

When a 68881 coprocessor is present, Allegro will call it directly.

Alegro also supports "leading brand" large screen monitors.

But that's just the start.....

Allegro uses a fast, incremental native code compiler, and is truly
tail-recursive. File compilation is provided now, but standalone
applications are "coming soon."

There is also a low-level interface to allow acess to any Mac OS or
toolbox trap. It provides all the necessary glue to build stack
records, pascal data types, registers, etc. In addition, a Lisp
Assembly-language Programming (LAP) package is "coming soon", and a
foreign function interface will be available (to MPW C, Pascal, and
Assembler). 

There is an object-oriented programming system incorporated: a
version of ObjectLisp, which was developed by Gary Drescher. Despite
being easy to learn and use, ObjectLisp provides powerful multiple
inheritance features. CLOS (the official Common Lisp Object System)
will be "coming soon." (The spec isn't done yet, after all!) Flavors
is "coming soon."

There is also object oriented support for windows. Your window
subclass can fully build on the pre-existing window class. Windows
are also a subclass of streams, so all the CL stream commands will
work. Many quickdraw primitives are provided in high-level form, too,
including operations on regions and pictures.

Menu items, menus, and menubars are provided as objects. Support is
provided so that when a user selects a menu item, an associated
function is called. Menus have all the style and features of regular
Macintosh menus, except for icons and hierarchical menus. Users may
make their own menus and change the menubar, menus, and menu items in
any way.

Dialogs (both modal and modeless) are provided as high-level objects.
Dialog items, similar to menu items, can be subclassed, and call a
function when triggered. Normal dialog items are supported, as well
as one-dimensional scrollable lists, and 2-D scrollable tables.

Simple event-handling is provided. It is easy to write Allegro CL
code that works similarly to a "standard" Macintosh event-driven
program.

A pathname subsystem, which extends and customises CLtL's File System
Interface to the Macintosh environment, is provided.

Built-in is FRED the Editor, an editor which provides many commands
from EMACS, as well as the standard Macintosh editing modes, extended
for a Lisp environment. FRED can be used in your programs, to edit
your own buffers. Of course, full documentation is provided for
extending and modifying FRED's behavior. FRED has a key bindings
window that shows current bindings.

A stack backtrace window is provided for debugging. It also allows
the inspection of call frames, and the temporary binding of call
values, modification of values, evaluation of functions in the
call-frame environment, etc.

A visual stepper is provided, for watching functions execute, and has
similar functionality to the backtrace window.

An inspector with features to examine any CL or Mac datatype included.
The user need merely click on a field or value to inspect it further.

Meta-point is provided, and works across multiple source files.
Edit-definition is provided. An Apropos window is provided.

A kill ring is maintained, has a window interface, and hooks into the
Macintosh Clipboard.

Windows are provided for user preferences for printing and environment
variables. A windows menu is provided for selecting any window.

A "List of Definitions" buffer is provided, with buttons for buffer
and alphabetical order. It also allows jumping directly to a function.

Also "Coming Soon":
Macintosh User Interface Designer
Stack Groups
Common Windows