Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp,comp.lang.dylan,comp.lang.scheme
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!rochester!cornellcs!newsstand.cit.cornell.edu!portc01.blue.aol.com!newsxfer2.itd.umich.edu!uunet!in3.uu.net!EU.net!usenet2.news.uk.psi.net!uknet!usenet1.news.uk.psi.net!uknet!uknet!newsfeed.ed.ac.uk!edcogsci!jeff
From: jeff@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton)
Subject: Re: Common LISP: The Next Generation
Message-ID: <DwuLvE.3Jq.0.macbeth@cogsci.ed.ac.uk>
Organization: HCRC, University of Edinburgh
Date: Wed, 28 Aug 1996 12:40:25 GMT
Lines: 27
Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu comp.lang.lisp:22403 comp.lang.dylan:7046 comp.lang.scheme:16631

Part of the reason Common Lisp is less popular than it might be
is that people keep saying false things about it.  For instance,
in a recent message spot@goober.graphics.cs.cmu.edu (Scott Draves)
wrote:

> the reason Scheme `threw out' so much of CommonLISP
> wasn't because they considered things like records and exceptions were
> superfluous, but because they wanted to Do It Right.  CommonLISP is
> the expediant compromise and union of (then) existing lisp systems.
> Scheme was the intersection: everything that they could agree was
> Right.

Everything there is wrong.

Scheme existed before Common Lisp and so didn't "throw out" anything
from Common Lisp.  However, Common Lisp was influenced by Scheme.

Common Lisp is _not_ a union: if anything, it's an intersection:
it's what those working on several successors to MacLisp could agree
on.  Look in CLtL.  Moreover, Common Lisp is a substantial _cleanup_
compared most previous Lisp.

Finally, Scheme was _not_ the intersection of (then) existing
Lisp systems.  For one thing, you don't get full lexical scoping by
taking the intersection.

-- jd
