From: b...@wetware.com (Bill Coderre)
Subject: Re: Why learn LISP?
Date: 1997/09/08
Message-ID: <bc-0809971211580001@17.127.10.41>#1/1
X-Deja-AN: 270783154
References: <vfr750EG0vwz.9vq@netcom.com> <19970905163301.MAA10640@ladder02.news.aol.com>
Organization: Castle Wetware Internet Services, INC.
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp



manro...@aol.com (ManRodSr) wrote:
|  Thats a wonderful reply and very similar to what I read in a book
|  somewhere that first got me interested. since I've started, every little
|  step along the learning curve has been exciting. However, I am wondering
|  how you are able to get into graphics when my very first question to the
|  group was along those very lines and I was led to believe that we could not
|  do graphics with lisp.
|  did I misunderstand something?

There's something called the Common Lisp Interface Manager, which is
supposed to be a set of standard GUI code, so that people can carry Lisp
code from one platform to another without re-writing. I don't know what
happened to it; is it dead, people?

Most Lisps have their own set of extensions to do graphics. Most of them
are really easy to use. For instance, Mac Common Lisp from Digitool is so
darn easy that they teach you pretty much everything you need to know in
about 10 pages of their "Getting started" pamphlet. 

You can get a LOT of graphics code to go with just about any Lisp by
saying the magic incantation:

"I have <this kind of> Lisp on <this particular> platform, and I'm a rank
beginner looking for some simple graphics code to cut my teeth on. Anybody
got any spare?"

Note that the ONE thing that this group gets WAY too much of is people
trolling around going, "Lisp can't do this, Lisp can't do that," looking
for some kind of flame war. Therefore people sometimes mis-read questions
such as yours as the trolling flame-bait that we despise. This is not your
fault, of course, but it could affect the replies you get.

bc