Subject: Re: beginner question
From: rpw3@rigden.engr.sgi.com (Rob Warnock)
Date: 1998/04/30
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Message-ID: <6i8lpo$1047j@fido.asd.sgi.com>

Erik Naggum  <clerik@naggum.no> wrote:
+---------------
| if you don't stick to the very good convention to use asterisks around
| special variables, the expected unexpectedness will happen.  that's why
| you _always_ want to use asterisks around special variables.
+---------------

Aha! That explains why more than one Scheme expert has bitched at
me when I put asterisks around my global variables in Scheme code.
I was assuming the asterisk convention meant "global" -- I see
now it means "special". (And of course, there *isn't* any "special"
variable type in Scheme, though you can get much of the same effect
with "fluid-let", for those Schemes that have that.)

+---------------
| there is no (declare (nospecial ...)), unfortunately.
| (I think there should be.)
+---------------

Me, too.

Anyway, thanks, everyone, for clearing that up.
(My question turned out not to be quite as dumb
as I feared it might be.)


-Rob

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