Re: Then why...?

[hughes@aristotle.ils.nwu.edu (Lucian Hughes)]

Blake Meike writes:
>
>I'm not sure that I understand why several of you want to move to 2.0, but
>not to CLOS.  Perhaps you could be clearer about what it is that you *do*
>want and expect to find in 2.0?  If what you've got works (as we find
>version 1.3.2 does) why not stick with it?
>
The answer to this is pretty simple. Who wants to become dated? That's
eventually a recipe for doom, in that at SOME point the older LISPs
will likely become incompatible with future operating systems (who
knows, maybe even with 7.0).  Various other minor difficulties 
will also accumulate. For instance, I've just heard that future
"traps.lisp" file will be generated in a different manner than the
way they are now. Hence if I don't update I won't have easy access to 
future traps call. And what about future public code that comes
out (which people have been very generous with). I'd like to be
able to use such code rather than building everything from scratch
in an outdated form.
   I also suspect all of us would like to keep pace with public
practice in terms of coding standards (e.g., CLOS).. I certainly would
like to do that. But I just can't at this point if means I recode
by hand all my old object lisp code. Also, I would like to use
CLOS it's a good system, but I wouldn't like to rework all my
old code by hand.
  Finally, if you work in a large research environment, as I do, you
will start running into compatibility problems with your fellow 
workers. For instance, where I work we all have to put our programs
on a  single demo machine, All lisp programs are supposed to run off
the same lisp...
  And last but not least, who wants to be sitting around with 
some old model software when they could have the latest and greatest???
  It's worth pointing out  that Apple would presumably like to see us WANT
to 
purchase 2.0 for financial reasons, rather than start hanging on to older
versions.

   Lucian