Re: issue QUOTE-MAY-COPY, version 2

[sandra%defun@cs.utah.edu (Sandra J Loosemore)]

I'm not real sure if this line of thought is turning out to be
particularly productive.  To me it seems pretty clear that any copying
of constants that goes on happens as a result of transforming an
arbitrary data structure into a program.  In other words, the list

    (defun foo () '(a b c))

is just a list.  It doesn't become a program until it is passed to
EVAL or COMPILE or if it appears in a file being compiled with
COMPILE-FILE.  The question we are trying to resolve is whether pieces
of the data structure that represent constant objects must appear
literally in the resulting program, or whether the transformation may
construct a equivalent copies instead. 

Perhaps I chose a misleading name for this issue.  I don't think
anybody is arguing that QUOTE itself must do whatever copying is
allowed.  We could rename the issue to something less confusing, if
anybody has a suggestion.

-Sandra
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