Lisp FAQ list

[barmar@Think.COM (Barry Margolin)]

I'm compiling a list of frequently-asked questions about Lisp with
answers, as these types of lists have become popular on Usenet.  I'll be
posting it to the Usenet newsgroup comp.lang.lisp periodically (such
large, periodic postings seem less appropriate for mailing lists such as
these, because people don't like such postings coming directly to them,
but they're easy to skip when reading netnews).  I'll also post the
initial one to common-lisp@mcc.com, and perhaps periodically post a
pointer to where it may be FTPed from.  When I get a version that I
think is in reasonable shape I may try to publish it in Lisp Pointers.

I'm looking for good questions to include in the list.  Please send me
mail with any questions you think I should include.  If you know the
answer, include it; if not, I'll try to answer it myself.  In
addition to the ones people submit specifically for this use, I'll
include questions that I've seen or see in the future.

Some of the questions I already know I'll include are:

* How can I access structure slots by slot name?
* Why doesn't (read-from-string <string> :start 5) work?
* How do I compile <package> in <implementation> [for various popular
  {<package>,<implementation>} tuples, especially {CLX,(A)KCL} and
  {PCL,(A)KCL}]?
* How can I use CLOS and packages together?

I could actually use answers to the third question above.

I'd also like to include non-language information in the FAQ list.  This
would include a list of mailing lists and newsgroups related to Lisp, a
list of Lisp vendors and user groups with contact addresses and phone
numbers, a list of useful reference material (the "useful" qualifier is
intended to weed out obsolete stuff such as the Lisp 1.5 Reference
Manual -- other than this I'd like to be non-judgemental), a list of
popular Lisp implementations and utilities available for free on the net
(e.g. KCL, XLISP, PCL, and the various packages for interfacing Emacs
and Lisp).  I'll definitely need help compiling most of this (although I
already have a pretty good list of mailing lists, thanks to Joe Karnicky
and Rick Duffy).

					Barry Margolin
					Thinking Machines Corporation
					245 First Street
					Cambridge, MA 02142
					USA
					Fax: +1 (617) 234-4444
					Internet: barmar@think.com
					UUCP: {uunet,harvard}!think!barmar

P.S. to Mary van Deusen: Please consider the above to be a letter to the
editor for Lisp Pointers.