Re: Extension for Lisp files

[JonL at PARC-MAXC]

Unfortunately, the MacLisp choice for LSP was necessitated by
compatibilitly between TOPS-10 and TOPS-20 implementations.
The reason ATSIGN takes only 3-letter extensions of OZ is that
it is running in TOPS-10 compatiblity mode.  If any of you 
hackers fix this (i.e., get a native Twenex version of ATSIGN)
Johan DeKleer and I sure would like a copy to use on MAXC.

It's not too late for Twenex MacLisp to become "incompatible" with
TOPS-10 -- there's about three places in the system where the
symbol LSP is built in (I could spend a little time on the phone
with you if you'd like to tackle this one);  also there's about
half-dozen places where LSP is built in to lisp-based code (such
as the places that look for FOO.INIT files for various systems FOO)
which  includes COMPLR, NILAID,  SHARAB and possibly one or
two more.  But there are indeed many TOPS-10 lusers of MacLisp --
witness the cry for help by Pedro Otaduy recently.

[SHARAB *could* be made to work on Twenex too, but there's little point
to it -- there is a more general facililty developed at Yale which works at 
the Twenex level, rather than the Lisp level, for aiding in incremental
sharing of "cascaded" systems.  KMP and GJC both had copies of it on 
the EE machine last fall.]