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.

This book is available in HTML form via FTP from
  ftp.cs.cmu.edu:/user/ai/lang/lisp/doc/cltl/cltl_ht.tgz  and
  ma2s2.mathematik.uni-karlsruhe.de:/pub/lisp/CLtL2/cltl_ht.tgz .

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             main program
      lispinit.mem     memory image needed for startup
      clisp.1          manual page in Unix man format
      clisp.man        manual page
      clisp.html       manual page in HTML format
      impnotes.txt     implementation notes
      cltl2.txt        notes about the relation of CLISP to CLtL2
      CLOS-guide.txt   brief guide to CLOS
      LISP-tutor.txt   Common LISP hints
      README           this text
      SUMMARY          short description of CLISP
      ANNOUNCE         announcement
      NEWS             list of modifications since the last version
      COPYRIGHT        copyright notice
      GNU-GPL          free software license
      !Run             run file for CLISP
      !Sprites         !clisp icon sprite
      config.lsp       site-dependent configuration
      timezone.lsp     site-dependent time zone

and - to your convenience, if you like reading source -

      *.lsp            the source of lispinit.mem
      *.fas            the same files, already compiled


Hardware requirements:
----------------------

This RISC OS version of CLISP requires at least 4MB RAM and RISC OS 3.0 or
higher. A version of CLISP can probably be made that will work on 2MB
Archimedes machines by cutting out some of the optional parts of the Lisp
languages, notably some parts of CLtL2, CLtL2/dpANS-LOOP, CLOS, Conditions
and generic streams. Anyone in need of a cut down system should email me and
I'll make a cutdown version available on ma2s2.mathematik.uni-karlsruhe.de.


Software requirements:
----------------------

CLISP can be run outside the desktop or from within a task window.

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 at the end of
timezone.lsp.
Then start

         lisp -M mem.lispinit

         or double click on the !Clisp directory.

When the LISP prompt

      > _

appears, type

        (cd "<clisp$path>")

to make sure the !Clisp directory is the currently selected directory. Then
type

        (compile-file "config")
        (load "config")

and - in case you modified timezone.lsp -

        (compile-file "timezone")
        (load "timezone")

and then

        (saveinitmem)

to overwrite the file lispinit.mem with your configuration. Then

        (exit)




When you encounter problems:
----------------------------

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
     Backtrace
               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. stack dumps, please send a description of the error
and how to produce it reliably to the authors or the maintainer. Please
accompany it with the CLISP version, which you get by calling
(lisp-implementation-version).


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:
----------------

We are indebted to
  * Guy L. Steele and many others for the Common Lisp specification.


Authors:
--------

        Bruno Haible                    Michael Stoll
        Augartenstrae 40               Gallierweg 39
    D - 76137 Karlsruhe             D - 53117 Bonn
        Germany                         Germany

Email: haible@ma2s2.mathematik.uni-karlsruhe.de

Acorn RISC OS Port by:
----------------------

        Peter Burwood
        205 Masons Avenue
        Harrow
        Middlesex
        HA3 5AZ
        England

Email: clisp@arcangel.demon.co.uk

Maintainer:
-----------

        Marcus Daniels

Email: marcus@ee.pdx.edu
