From: Craig Morehouse
Subject: What Lisp to use?
Date: 
Message-ID: <3707D776.12E26ACC@gdi.net>
I hope this isn't an unreasonable question to ask the group, but I need
some informed opinions and haven't used Lisp for over a decade.

My situation is this...

I'm going to write some educational courseware to run on Linux. I use a
Sparc box with RedHat 5.2. and I'm going to write it under GPL in some
Lisp variant.

I want the courseware to be able to run on any architecture that
supports X and Linux. I want to be able to support most graphic file
formats and do limited animations. I'd like sound support as well, but
this isn't mandatory.

Question is, what's the best version to use so that...
    A: the Executable can be made to run anywhere;
    B: the Source can be freely distributed.

An Object-Oriented version would be fun, but I expect to settle on the
lowest common denominator that can run anywhere.

What would you use?

Thanks,
Craig Morehouse

email response is fine, too.

From: Christopher R. Barry
Subject: Re: What Lisp to use?
Date: 
Message-ID: <87n20oq9wh.fsf@2xtreme.net>
Craig Morehouse <······@gdi.net> writes:

> My situation is this...
> 
> I'm going to write some educational courseware to run on Linux. I use a
> Sparc box with RedHat 5.2. and I'm going to write it under GPL in some
> Lisp variant.
> 
> I want the courseware to be able to run on any architecture that
> supports X and Linux. I want to be able to support most graphic file
> formats and do limited animations. I'd like sound support as well, but
> this isn't mandatory.
> 
> Question is, what's the best version to use so that...
>     A: the Executable can be made to run anywhere;
>     B: the Source can be freely distributed.
> 
> An Object-Oriented version would be fun, but I expect to settle on the
> lowest common denominator that can run anywhere.

Use CMUCL for your Lisp and Garnet for your GUI toolkit. This
combination will meet most of your stated goals.

To do the graphics file formats and sound, you could make calls to a C
library via the FFI.

As for "all Linux/X architectures" - I'm not sure there are CMUCL
binaries for Linux for every architecture it runs on, though I'm
pretty sure CMUCL runs under at least some Unix for every architecture
Linux supports.

> What would you use?

From the constraints stated, probably Java[TM].

Christopher
From: Tom Breton
Subject: Re: What Lisp to use?
Date: 
Message-ID: <m3d81imuft.fsf@world.std.com>
Craig Morehouse <······@gdi.net> writes:

> My situation is this...
> 
> I'm going to write some educational courseware to run on Linux. I use a
> Sparc box with RedHat 5.2. and I'm going to write it under GPL in some
> Lisp variant.
> 
> I want the courseware to be able to run on any architecture that
> supports X and Linux. I want to be able to support most graphic file
> formats and do limited animations. I'd like sound support as well, but
> this isn't mandatory.
> 
> Question is, what's the best version to use so that...
>     A: the Executable can be made to run anywhere;
>     B: the Source can be freely distributed.
> 
> An Object-Oriented version would be fun, but I expect to settle on the
> lowest common denominator that can run anywhere.


When I looked at CMUCL, a week ago, the web docs seemed to suggest the
Linux support wasn't entirely ready.  I ended up going with CLISP,
which seems to be extremely portable, and definitely works with Linux
and ReadHat Linux 5.1.

It is a hog to compile, but pretty straitforward.  Don't get the
binary rpm -- it requires glibc version (something).108.  Also, the
CLISP source rpm is not a "source rpm", but a container for the tarred
source, so expect to install it, untar it, read the docs, and follow
instructions to make it.

You'll like CLISP, I think.

-- 
Tom Breton, http://world.std.com/~tob
Ugh-free Spelling (no "gh") http://world.std.com/~tob/ugh-free.html
From: Lars Marius Garshol
Subject: Re: What Lisp to use?
Date: 
Message-ID: <wkk8vqcos8.fsf@ifi.uio.no>
* Tom Breton
| 
| When I looked at CMUCL, a week ago, the web docs seemed to suggest
| the Linux support wasn't entirely ready.

Hm? I've installed CMUCL on my Debian box at work at it seems to work
fine. Once I get more disk space I'll install it at home as well.

--Lars M.
From: Martin Cracauer
Subject: Re: What Lisp to use?
Date: 
Message-ID: <7ecai5$ia5$1@counter.bik-gmbh.de>
Tom Breton <···@world.std.com> writes:

>Craig Morehouse <······@gdi.net> writes:

>> I'm going to write some educational courseware to run on Linux. I use a
>> Sparc box with RedHat 5.2. and I'm going to write it under GPL in some
>> Lisp variant.
>> 
>> I want the courseware to be able to run on any architecture that
>> supports X and Linux. I want to be able to support most graphic file
>> formats and do limited animations. I'd like sound support as well, but
>> this isn't mandatory.
>> 
>> Question is, what's the best version to use so that...
>>     A: the Executable can be made to run anywhere;
>>     B: the Source can be freely distributed.
>> 
>> An Object-Oriented version would be fun, but I expect to settle on the
>> lowest common denominator that can run anywhere.

>When I looked at CMUCL, a week ago, the web docs seemed to suggest the
>Linux support wasn't entirely ready.  

I wrote the Web pages and I certainly can't remember having written
something like this.  It is true that the FreeBSD version is in better
shape and has more manpower behind it than the Linux binary, but as
far as I can judge, the Linux binary works fine and even has a nice
self-recompiling source debian package.

There is no Linux/SPARC version, though, so CLISP is probably the
better choice (it isn't a bad choice in any case) unless the original
author looks for something to really bite into. [HINT, HINT :-)]

Martin
--
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Martin Cracauer <········@bik-gmbh.de> http://www.bik-gmbh.de/~cracauer/
"Where do you want to do today?" Hard to tell running your calendar 
 program on a semi-reliable operating system, eh?
From: Tom Breton
Subject: Re: What Lisp to use?
Date: 
Message-ID: <m3iub9cgzo.fsf@world.std.com>
········@bik-gmbh.de  (Martin Cracauer) writes:

> Tom Breton <···@world.std.com> writes:
> 
> >When I looked at CMUCL, a week ago, the web docs seemed to suggest the
> >Linux support wasn't entirely ready.  
> 
> I wrote the Web pages and I certainly can't remember having written
> something like this.  

I must have been thinking of architecture rather than OS.  The page
(not yours, I think) reads something like:

   "This page contains information regarding the CMU Common Lisp system
   and a port of it to Intel x86 architecture. Available now are:
     * Current status of the port."
	[This leads to a page that is under construction or being
	revised.]


-- 
Tom Breton, http://world.std.com/~tob
Ugh-free Spelling (no "gh") http://world.std.com/~tob/ugh-free.html