Subject: Re: Why does the SBCL REPL suck so bad?
From: rpw3@rpw3.org (Rob Warnock)
Date: Thu, 09 Aug 2007 04:43:49 -0500
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Message-ID: <qbqdnai_W4tIfCfbnZ2dnUVZ_rmjnZ2d@speakeasy.net>
cmo <amalawi@gmail.com> wrote:
+---------------
| you can use *rlwrap* utility with readline library. basicly rlwrap
| will (as the name suggests) wrap sbcl program when you run it provide
| you with ''what you asked for''. then in your shell rc file you can do
| something like
| alias sbcl='rlwrap sbcl' ... and forget about the rlwrap thunking
+---------------

Have you actually ever *tried* "rlwrap" with a Lisp REPL,
especially with multiline s-exprs?!?  I have, and it, uh...
[how to put this as politely as possible?]... sort of sucks. IMHO.

Plus, it captures SIGQUIT, which CMUCL and maybe SBCL(?) map
to a call to ABORT, and losing that *really* sucks!!


-Rob

p.s. To repeat myself [bad taste, I know], GNU "readline()" is *not* a
panacea for REPL input!! <http://www.nhplace.com/kent/PS/Ambitious.html>
explains a few reasons why it probably can't ever be.

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