Re: DEFMACRO incompatible

[Robert W. Kerns <RWK at MIT-MC>]

    Date:  3 FEB 1981 2349-EST
    From: Moon at MIT-AI (David A. Moon)

    It would be unreasonable to change the Lisp machine one, since
    that would make DEFMACRO incompatible with DEFUN and all other
    function-defining special forms.  Why can't DEFMACRO put its
    declarations in the body where all other function-defining things
    put them?

Really?  DEFMACRO is compatible with MACRO and FSETQ-CAREFULLY and ....?
I really don't understand any of this.  The options you can supply to
DEFMACRO are like the options you can supply to DEFSTRUCT.  Declarations,
at least as I think of them, are information for the compiler.  Are you
suggesting that DEFMACRO, if the first form of the body is a DECLARE,
should parse that DECLARE?  My initial reaction to this is that this is not
something it should be doing.  Perhaps you can convince me otherwise.

    I'm not sure in what sense the Maclisp one is documented and the
    Lisp machine one is not.  I know of no published Maclisp
    documentation that mentions DEFMACRO.  If you are talking about
    on-line files, of course the Lisp machine one is documented.

I was being silly.  The relevant difference between the LISPM
documentation and the MacLisp documentation for DEFMACRO is that I know
where the MacLisp documention is.  Unfortunately, I didn't realize this
until after I sent the message.  Sorry.