Re: How close is elisp to CL now?

[Didier Verna]

juliewith <galaxybeinglambda@gmail.com> wrote:

> Not being proficient in Lisp but wanting to be, I was wondering if the
> lexical scoping in 24.x has now pushed elisp closer to Common Lisp in
> capabilities. If so how close? Could elisp now (potentially) do all
> the "higher level" sorts of things CL does?

  Lexical scope brings Emacs Lisp closer to *any* sane Lisp (which
  should be lexically scoped by default[1]). This, in fact, has little
  to do with Common Lisp. One could even argue that it is the opposite,
  since one disctinctive feature of Common Lisp is precisely to offer
  dynamic scoping, provided that you ask for it explicitely.

  You may be interested in reading
  http://random-state.net/features-of-common-lisp.html for a nice list
  of Common Lisp features (some of them are arguably "general Lisp
  features" rather than Common Lisp ones).


Footnotes: 
[1]  Although honestly, in more than 15 years of elisp hacking, dynamic
scope screwed me up less than a dozen times...

-- 
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