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Re: Standardization



But: There is the LSB aka GSB method, which is rather unique to lisp
     and very interesting in itself.
That is: (he can say it better of course) considering the various features such
         DEFUN, to be low level primitives with querks which the local 
         system hackers seem to like. As long as a system supports
         arbitrary compile-time evaluation and a user-extensible compiler,
         [name me a couple APL systems which have that], then one can
         do things "his own super-winning standardized way."
In that sense: "conventional computer language standards" are weak,
                because they are informal. A lisp language standard
                could be a formal (i.e. written in lisp), imbedding
                of a recommended programming language, in the various
                lisp systems available.

I would call this the strong case for lisp standardization. It is in
fact the usual way of doing things for transportable systems such as
Macsyma. Much of what gets said in LISP-FORUM really has to be taken
in light of this. When FOO acts like he is going to *die* if
feature X isn't changed, he is probably just being over dramatic.

I hope this shows that if you are interested in lisp standardization,
you can really do it.

-gjc