[I was going to stay out of this, but since no-one has mentioned it yet...]

Robert Uhl  <eadmund42@NOSPAMgmail.com> wrote:
+---------------
| Rainer Joswig <joswig@lisp.de> writes:
| > * "FOO" is robust against read-table changes. "FOO" stays uppercase.
| >   :foo might be interned as lowercase.
| 
| That's an interesting definition of 'robust,' since presumably if one
| _does_ fiddle with the readtable then one _wants_ read-in code to Do the
| Right Thing.
+---------------

To me, other than the default :UPCASE the only variant of READTABLE-CASE
that "Does The Right Thing" [for some definition of "Right"] is
:INVERT, which takes stuff the way we normally code it in Lisp and
uppercases it so that <<car>> is still (find-symbol "CAR") so the
code doesn't break... but *also* preserves the case of CamelCase
symbols, which can be very useful when reading a bunch of externally-
generated files. My favorite example is EDIF [".edif" or ".EDN"]
electronics design file format, which is basically just one huge
S-expr [often megabytes!] with case-sensitive symbols.

+---------------
| > * Most Lisp functions print package and symbol names in uppercase.
| >   Should I downcase and 'keywordify' them if I generate code?
| 
| (setf *print-case* :downcase)
| 
| This is the most absolutely wonderful thing in the world, making Lisp
| look sane and intelligent (as opposed to all-caps, which is a work of
| the devil) IMHO.
+---------------

No, no, no! (setf (readtable-case *readtable*) :invert) is better!  ;-}
The printer looks at *both* READTABLE-CASE and *PRINT-CASE* and
"Does The Right Thing" when the former is :INVERT and the latter
is :UPCASE, namely, re-inverts on printing. So your Lisp still
looks "sane and intelligent" but doesn't lose any information
due to case-folding:

    > (setf (readtable-case *readtable*) :invert)

    :invert
    > (list 'foo 'BAR 'Baz 'CamelCase)

    (foo BAR Baz CamelCase)
    > (mapcar #'symbol-name *)

    ("FOO" "bar" "Baz" "CamelCase")
    > 

+---------------
| > * many tools (inspector, debugger, pretty printer, grinder, ...)
| >   will show uppercase symbols and uppercase symbol names.
| 
| See above.  The only place I see ugly, perverse capital letters is in
| SBCL error messages, which impolitely ignore *print-case*.
+---------------

CMUCL, at least, "Does The Right Thing" [by your definition]
when READTABLE-CASE is :INVERT and *PRINT-CASE* is :UPCASE,
namely, still re-inverts the case during error messages.

So try leaving *PRINT-CASE* alone [that is, in the default :UPCASE],
and see how READTABLE-CASE :INVERT works for you...


-Rob

-----
Rob Warnock			<rpw3@rpw3.org>
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