Love of the Common Lisp REPL
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When I was planning my retirement, I had the notion that learning to
code in Lisp would be a great way to spend my time after
retirement.
To prepare for this, I began by learning how to use Emacs. While still
working, I installed Emacs and started with a few key bindings,
gradually learning more key bindings along the way.
With two decades of Vi and Vim under my belt, it took some time to get
comfortable working with Emacs.
I then delved into Elisp and quickly learned that Emacs is
indispensable while creating Lisp code. The code's automatic
indentation enhances the readability. Emacs also comes in handy by
displaying matching parenthesis.
Common Lisp
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The following stage was to learn about Lisp. It took some time to
decide on a Lisp, but in the end I went with Common Lisp and installed
SBCL. The web offers a wealth of reading information about SBCL.
In the past, I learned to code by reading books and other sources and
then starting doing by applying what I had learned. I learned to code
in C, PHP, Perl, Postscript, awk, m4, and, of course, shell script
this way.
Now I approach Common Lisp again with the combination of reading and
practicing. I have build some applications and I am learning every
day.
SLIME and Common Lisp
---------------------
SLIME and Common Lisp are a match made in heaven. Using the REPL is an
exciting new experience. Compile a single function and the
modifications are immediately available in your running program
without restarting. The possibility to look at the variables while the
program is running is also fantastic.
Although I am still at the beginner level, REPL-driven development
has really grown on me and I love it.
