Figuring out LISP programming…
I have always (that is since I wrote my first lines of QBASIC code under MS-DOS 5.0) had interest to learn new programming languages, just out of interest towards programming as a hobby. Lately I have grown more and more interested on learning to program Common Lisp, a language highly praised by those using it but also one of those that has always looked way too cryptic for me (considering that I do know various different languages and rarely bump into one that I’m totally baffled about when looking at it :) ).
Now I have decided to find out what all the fuss is about and learn at least the basics of Common Lisp - however I’m having hard time finding a tutorial that is both good for someone who knows nothing about Lisp and does not stop after “Hello World” and couple simple examples of mathematical functions :)
So far I have found that GNU programs include a Lisp compiler and interpreter called ‘gcl‘ (GNU Common Lisp) and one simple tutorial on very basics of Common Lisp.
What I’m hoping as I’m writing about this is that maybe someone with knowledge is reading this and could post a comment with link(s) to a good tutorial for me to start working with :) Whether it will happen or not I will certainly be posting about my future experiments with Lisp here - I would like to gain at least enough knowledge to produce a Lisp version of my ‘tree.sh‘ (shell script to output directory tree structure nicely) as it is a good short program to write for getting overall picture of how a language feels write with compared to others - in fact I might write it with multiple languages for comparison of them (just for the fun of it).
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Author is a 29 years old linux zealot and hacker from Finland.
Tags: GPL, Linux/Unix Software, Lisp, Open Source, Programming
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November 1st, 2009 at 3:03 am
Tutorial: http://gigamonkeys.com/book/
GCL is a bit outdated.
Use SBCL or Clozure CL.
November 2nd, 2009 at 2:14 am
http://www.gigamonkeys.com/book - practical common lisp is far and away the best CL tutorial, it stops after writing a streaming mp3 shoutcast server, that far enough? :P
November 2nd, 2009 at 2:54 am
also, don’t use GCL… it is probably the least functional of the available lisp implementations it is less than alpha quality. use sbcl for the best combination of speed and active development (and nice apt-gettable packages if you happen to be of the debiany persuasion)
November 7th, 2009 at 7:34 pm
Thanks guys… That tutorial seems to be just what I was looking for, I will look more deeply into it. Also thanks for pointing out that GCL is not a good choice, now I don’t have to learn that the hard way :)