Re: PPC-Native Common Lisp?

[lgm@polaris.ih.att.com (Lawrence G. Mayka)]

In article <777273121.AA09118@clone.his.com> thad.humphries@his.com (Thad Humphries) writes:

   > I heard that MCL will not go native. Is that true? If it is true, is
   > there any other company will port CL to PPC? Our lab is considering to
   > buy 30 PowerMacs, if we can get PPC-native CL. My understanding is
   > that the PowerPC instruction set is only a slight variation on the IBM
   > RS/6000 instruction set.  Multiple vendors (e.g., Harlequin and Franz)
   > support CL on the RS/6000.  Hence, your question more likely boils
   > down to, Does any vendor plan to port their CL to the PowerMac in
   > particular (i.e., to the Mac operating system)?  I don't know the
   > answer, but I assume that it couldn't hurt to write to or speak with
   > the vendors and express your interest. 
   >
   > Lawrence G. Mayka 

   You got some address we can write to to get a campaign going?

Here are Harlequin's and Franz's addresses from the comp.lang.lisp
FAQ.  I suspect that concrete statements like "I would buy x copies of
Common Lisp for the PowerMac at y dollars apiece" are more persuasive
than "I might have to use a PowerMac someday."  I also suspect that
other things being equal, vendors would probably prefer to port their
current CL implementations to the PowerMac (perhaps with an MCL
compatibility package) rather than porting MCL per se.

---
   Write to: Harlequin Inc. One Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142,
   call 800-WORKS-4-YOU (800-967-5749; 617-374-2400/617-252-0052), fax
   617-252-6505 or send email to works@harlequin.com or sm@harlequin.com
   or lou@harlequin.com. European customers should write to Harlequin
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   0223-872-522/873-800 (or 44-223-872-522/873-800 outside UK), telex
   818440 harlqn g, fax 0223-872-519, or send email to ai@harlqn.co.uk or
   works@harlqn.co.uk ("harlqn" and "harlequin" should be
   interchangeable). Further information on Harlequin's Lisp products may
   be obtained by sending mail to lispworks-request@harlequin.co.uk or
   lispworks-request@harlequin.com.
---
   Write to: Franz Inc., 1995 University Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94704 or
   call 1-800-333-7260, 510-548-3600, fax 510-548-8253, telex 340179
   WUPUBTLXSFO. Bug reports can be mailed to bugs@franz.com.  Questions
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---
--
        Lawrence G. Mayka
        AT&T Bell Laboratories
        lgm@ieain.att.com

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