This is CLISP, a Common Lisp implementation. What is LISP? ------------- LISP is a programming language. It was invented by J. McCarthy in 1959. There have been many dialects of it, but nowadays LISP has been standardized and wide-spread due to the industrial standard COMMON LISP. There are applications in the domains of symbolic knowledge processing (AI), numerical mathematics (MACLISP yielded numerical code as good as FORTRAN), and widely used programs like editors (EMACS) and CAD (AUTOCAD). There is an introduction to the language: Sheila Hughes: Lisp. Pitman Publishing Limited, London 1986. 107 pages. After a while wou will need the standard text containing the language definition: Guy L. Steele Jr.: Common Lisp - The Language. Digital Press. 1. edition 1984, 465 pages. 2. edition 1990, 1032 pages. LISP is run in an interactive environment. You input forms, and they will be evaluated at once. Thus you can inspect variables, call functions with given arguments or define your own functions. Contents: --------- It consists of the following files: lisp.exe main program lisp_1mb.exe main program, use this one if you have only 1 or 2 MB of RAM lispinit.mem memory image needed for startup clisp.1 manual page in Unix man format clisp.man manual page clisp.dvi manual page in dvi format impnotes.txt implementation notes emx-user.doc emx applications user's guide emx-faq.doc frequently asked questions about emx applications delay.exe auxiliary program for running clisp under Windows README this text SUMMARY short description of CLISP ANNOUNCE announcement COPYRIGHT copyright notice GNU-GPL free software license config.lsp site-dependent configuration and - to your convenience, if you like reading source - *.lsp the source of lispinit.mem *.fas the same files, already compiled Hardware requirements: ---------------------- This DOS version of CLISP requires an 80386 (SX or DX) or an 80486 CPU and at least 1 MB of RAM. Installation: ------------- Edit the contents of config.lsp appropriately for your site, especially the definitions of short-site-name and long-site-name. You may also want to edit the time zone definition in defs1.lsp. Then start lisp.exe -M lispinit.mem When the LISP prompt > _ appears, type (compile-file "config") (load "config") and - in case you modified defs1.lsp - (compile-file "defs1") (load "defs1") and then (saveinitmem) to overwrite the file lispinit.mem with your configuration. Then (exit) Then create a directory, and put the executable and the memory image there. Assuming D:\LIB\LISP : mkdir d:\lib\lisp copy lisp.exe d:\lib\lisp copy lispinit.mem d:\lib\lisp And create a batch file that starts lisp: copy con c:\bat\clisp.bat d:\lib\lisp\lisp.exe -M d:\lib\lisp\lispinit.mem %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9 [Ctrl-Z] Installation under Microsoft Windows: ------------------------------------- CLISP also runs in the DOS box of Microsoft Windows 3.1. To achieve this, the following additional steps are necessary: 1. Get and install ma2s2.mathematik.uni-karlsruhe.de:/pub/lisp/clisp/dos/clisp-english.zip as described above. Then copy delay.exe d:\lib\lisp 2. Get and install RSX ftp.uni-kl.de:/pub/pc/dos/programming/c/dpmigcc1.zip 3. Create a batch file that starts lisp: copy con c:\bat\winclisp.bat d:\lib\lisp\delay.exe 1 c:\rsx\bin\rsx.exe d:\lib\lisp\lisp.exe -M d:\lib\lisp\lispinit.mem %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9 [Ctrl-Z] (The paths of course depend on your installation.) 4. Call the PIF editor and input the following: Program file name: c:\bat\winclisp.bat Program title: COMMON LISP Program parameters: Start directory: e:\lisp Screen: Text Memory requirements: requires: 500 maximum: 640 EMS memory: requires: 0 maximum: 0 XMS memory: requires: 1024 maximum: -1 Display: [as you like] Quit_closes_window: [as you like] Execution: [as you like] other_options: [as you like] (You will probably choose the directory which contains your lisp programs as start directory, instead of e:\lisp.) Save it under the name WINCLISP.PIF. 5. In the program manager, in a suitable group: Menu "File" -> "New" -> "Program", window "program properties". Input there: Description: COMMON LISP Command line: winclisp.pif Start directory: e:\lisp Key combination: Ctrl+Alt+Shift+L [as you like] Clicking with the mouse on the such created icon or pressing the key combination given above will now start CLISP. Remarks: * If you want to provide command line parameters for CLISP, set the "Program parameters" field in the PIF editor to "?". You will then always be asked to input arguments for WINCLISP.BAT. * Cut & Paste in DOS boxes (via menu "Edit" -> "Mark" resp. menu "Edit" -> "Insert") inserts an at the end. Therefore one cannot re-edit a pasted line. * But the editing facilities mentioned in CLISP.MAN work. * Bugs in Microsoft Windows and/or RSX can cause system crashes. (That's also the reason for DELAY.EXE.) Good luck! The editor: ----------- Normally CLISP's ED function calls the editor you specified in config.lsp. However, after you did (load "editor") it invokes a builtin screen editor. It is a bit Emacs-like: you can evaluate lisp expressions from within the editor, and the result is pasted into the editor buffer. Type Alt-H to see the full set of commands. When you encounter problems: ---------------------------- If clisp doesn't start up at all, check EMX-USER.DOC. lisp.exe is an EMX application, so everything mentioned there applies to lisp.exe. After errors, you are in the debugger: 1. Break> _ You can evaluate forms, as usual. Furthermore: Help calles help Abort or Unwind climbs up to next higher input loop (show-stack) shows the contents of the stack, helpful for debugging And you can look at the values of the variables of the functions where the error occurred. On bigger problems, e.g. register dumps, please send a description of the error and how to produce it reliably to the authors. Mailing List: ------------- There is a mailing list for users of CLISP. It is the proper forum for questions about CLISP, installation problems, bug reports, application packages etc. For information about the list and how to subscribe it, send mail to listserv@ma2s2.mathematik.uni-karlsruhe.de, with the two lines help information clisp-list in the message body. Acknowledgement: ---------------- If you find CLISP fast and bug-free and you like using it, a gift of $25 (or any amount you like) will be appreciated. Most DOS software costs something, so you will probably already be used to paying. If not, feel free to send us suggestions for improvement. Or grab the source of CLISP, improve it yourself and send us your patches. We are indebted to * Guy L. Steele and many others for the Common Lisp specification. * Richard Stallman's GNU project for GCC and the readline library. * Eberhard Mattes for EMX. Authors: -------- Bruno Haible Michael Stoll Augartenstraáe 40 Gallierweg 39 D - 76137 Karlsruhe D - 53117 Bonn Germany Germany Email: haible@ma2s2.mathematik.uni-karlsruhe.de