Subject: Re: Error: The function DEFCLASS is undefined
From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.no>
Date: 06 Oct 2002 02:09:03 +0000
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Message-ID: <3242858943605340@naggum.no>

* Christopher C. Stacy
| LOOP was brought into Common Lisp from MACLISP, and I am sure 
| there must be a LOOP library implementation that can be optionally
| loaded into GCL.  LOOP hadn't made it into the Common Lisp standard,
| but it certainly existed in all its full-blown glory.

  The interesting thing about GCL is its history.  It dates back to Kyoto
  Common Lisp (KCL), which was the first implementation of Common Lisp that
  did not have access to the rich oral tradition of the Lisp community,
  only the specification.  This led to numerous interesting differences
  from the expecations of those who did have access to the oral tradition,
  and let to a much better specification the second time around with many
  cleanup issues going back to the Kyoto implementation.  The sad thing is
  that this compiler never tracked the developments of the language and was
  by and large abandoned.  W. Schelter at the University of Austin picked
  it up and made several enhancements to it and made it known as the Austin
  Kyoto Common Lisp (AKCL), but as far as I know, he has left Common Lisp
  and this world behind, and it was unsupported for several years before it
  was resurrected by the FSF as GNU Common Lisp in preference to CMUCL for
  political reasons.

-- 
Erik Naggum, Oslo, Norway

Act from reason, and failure makes you rethink and study harder.
Act from faith, and failure makes you blame someone and push harder.