[Gardeners] A batteries package for Common Lisp?

[Ryan Davis]

I agree that this is a matter of community organization.  There are 
several libraries out there to accomplish this, but there isn't any 
momentum behind any one of them.  I think this is due to the 
individualistic tendencies of lisp programs and programmers, but I think 
there are enough people interested in doing Real Work® that we should 
just pick some packages and start writing tutorials.  Instead of 
creating a cl-batteries project that combines other libraries, I think 
what is needed is an index of comprehensive tutorials, which just needs 
more blood and sweat than code.

I think the main usefulness of the python docs is that the information 
is centralized, not that its one dependancy.  A python programmer knows 
they want to send an email, so they go to that page and find "email" and 
are on their way.  The lisp programmer wanting to send an email needs to 
find and evaluate a number of competing libraries that might be what 
they want.  Right now much of the lisp tutorial information is scattered 
through cliki, cl-user, cl-cookbook, blogs, mailing lists, irc logs, 
clhs, and others I'm forgetting.  For example, searching cl-user for 
"email" finds cl-pop, core services, and rfc2822.  Searching for the tag 
"email" reveals cl-http, cl-smtp, cl-pop, mel-base, and rfc2822.  More 
choices are confusing for users who just want a functional solution to a 
common problem.  I have much more interest in a documentation project 
designed to answer questions like "how do I send an email" than another 
meta-package to combine libraries.  I think the meta-package would 
follow naturally after a critical mass of tutorials are written/linked to.

I think expanding a project like cl-cookbook 
(http://cl-cookbook.sourceforge.net/) would be a better use of effort.  
If the beginning of a section of tutorials had a requirements bit saying 
what needed to be asdf-installed, than a cl-cookbook meta-package would 
be straightforward to assemble.  This would also highlight the places 
that are missing good libraries, and create some smaller targets for 
library writers.

Thanks,

Ryan Davis
Acceleration.net
Director of Programming Services
2831 NW 41st street, suite B
Gainesville, FL 32606

Office: 352-335-6500 x 124
Fax: 352-335-6506



Paolo Amoroso wrote:
> "Brad Beveridge" <brad.beveridge at gmail.com> writes:
>
>   
>> I propose that we clone this page http://docs.python.org/lib/lib.html,
>> and emulate as much as possible.
>>     
>
> Done :)
>
>   http://www.cl-user.net/asp/tags/by-topic
>   http://www.cl-user.net/asp/tags/ansi
>   http://www.cl-user.net/asp/map
>   http://www.cl-user.net/asp/index
>
>
>   
>> Thoughts?
>>     
>
> I'll try to be frank again.  Absolutely no blame intended for anybody,
> really.  Real life does take its toll.
>
> But the past year made me utterly skeptical on the possibility of
> completing such projects.  The latest batteries-package-like project
> was STDUTIL:
>
>   http://common-lisp.net/project/stdutil/
>
> Despite the date at the bottom right of the page, I seem to remember
> that it was started just a few months ago.  But there's not much
> beyond a few mailing lists with an automated nag:
>
>   http://common-lisp.net/pipermail/stdutil-devel/2006-June/date.html
>
> Yours is an excellent idea, but I'm afraid ideas are not enough.  It
> takes a lot of "blood, sweat and code" to even start a project.
>
>
> Paolo
>   
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