[Gardeners] Lisp contest

[Larry Clapp]

On 2006-04-23, Peter Seibel wrote:
> On Apr 22, 2006, at 12:29 PM, Pablo Barenbaum wrote:
>> I had the idea that some kind of "Lisp contest" could be good for
>> getting the community together.
>>
>> The rest is left as an exercise to the interested reader. ;-)
>
> So I was thinking along similar lines recently, though not of a
> contest specifically. My thought was that we should have a CL
> Gardeners' Plant a Flower Day. The idea would be that we'd pick a
> specific day, probably on a weekend, and anyone who wants to
> participate would write, on that day, a small Lisp program that does
> something neat. These programs would be like flowers--not big
> gardening projects designed to Save Lisp, but small ornaments for
> the Lisp garden.

+1

Ideas for Flowers, which may or may not follow your general theme of
"write code".  For those that don't, call them Potting Soil.  :)

- Install a library that you know you'll probably need eventually
  (like ASDF or Iterate or a Regular Expression library).  Report on
  your experience.
- Write a HOWTO about installing a library you use.
- Pick any topic from a Perl/Python/Ruby cookbook and answer it.
  Bonus points for doing it in fewer LOC[1] than the original.  :)
- Pick a relatively obscure area where Lisp nevertheless shines and
  write about it.  (For example, unification; I think I understand the
  basic concept, but I've never quiiiite grokked the code.)  Bonus
  points for explaining how this could come up in "every day"
  programming on the web, with a database, in a GUI, etc.
- Pick a CL operator or concept and write about it.  Bonus points for
  picking one you don't understand and figuring it out.  Some
  possibilties: packages, the read table, PROGV, LOOP, FORMAT strings,
  conditions.

Just some thoughts.

-- Larry


[1] LOC, abbrev, "lines of code"