Potential IDE project

Hello All,

I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I know that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never been able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual Studio, so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested in such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind of holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded individuals out there..

Thanks,
Gerry

RE: Potential IDE project

I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors that are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do much of what you want.

The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task. There’s also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to see some investment, time or money, in those editors.

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Gerry Weaver
Sent: 9 August, 2017 14:10
To: Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Potential IDE project

Hello All,

Thanks,
Gerry

Re: Potential IDE project

Just give me a LW IDE with the following:

Playgrounds as in Xcode, and with CL making a playground should be relatively easier I guess

Thanks,

Deepak

Re: Potential IDE project

Hi Sean,

I guess I'm not the typical case of the frustrated emacs user. I started using emacs on an OS call Xenix. I was forced to use it for several years, so I learned the keystrokes etc.. It never felt right to me. I know it has had improvements since then, but I still prefer the more VS like IDE. I do respect it, and I can imagine how some folks could like it a lot. I'm just more productive with other tools. I plan to use minimalist C++ and Qt. Qt is a rich cross-platform gui toolkit, which provides a lot of stuff out of the box. I am also planning to use QScintilla for the editor. A nice editor component, which also provides some good stuff out of the box. I can't really think of a better alternative to those two for a quick start.

Thanks,
Gerry

From: emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 9, 2017 2:08 AM
To: Gerry Weaver
Cc: Steven Nunez; Lisp Hug Lispworks
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

I too have been where you are. The real *truth* is that there will never be a single perfect LISP IDE because we are all different with different views, preferences etc.

My cure was a simple series of steps:

studying the source code for emacs!!!

study the source code for paredit mode carefully!

learn to use paredit mode effectively

learn to use SLIME effectively

Unless you have LW (I do but rarely use it even though it is free) and live and breathe in it, Emacs *is* the best ready to go solution IMHO... you just have to really make the mental effort to learn all the short cut keystrokes for all the helpful stuff for manipulating s-expressions, navigation.

All the best though, I'd certainly be interested BUT what language do we write it in ? ;)

I ask that because LISP might not be the best cross-platform GUI providing solution... perhaps Clojure would do the job coupled with say J4GL... if you are going to write a good UI ight as well go game-level on it, that was my plan!

:)
All the best!!!

Sean Charles

On 9 August 2017 at 07:27, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:

Hi Steven,

I hear you and you are right. It is a daunting task. It's just that I recently realized that I could continue dreaming or actually start doing something about it. My initial goal would be fairly modest. I would just try to get a syntax highlighting editor going with some kind of project based file management. I'd force myself to use it exclusively, so that I would continue to be motivated. I plan to dedicate a certain amount of time each week to the project. I really don't know where it could end up at this point. The remote image thing would be a very high priority though. Never the less, Rome wasn't built in a day as it were ;-) Thanks for your response.

Thanks,
Gerry

From: Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:17 AM
To: Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks
Subject: RE: Potential IDE project

I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors that are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do much of what you want.

The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task. There’s also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to see some investment, time or money, in those editors.

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Gerry Weaver
Sent: 9 August, 2017 14:10
To: Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Potential IDE project

Hello All,

I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I know that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never been able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual Studio, so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested in such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind of holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded individuals out there.

Thanks,
Gerry

Re: Potential IDE project

Hi Rainer,

I have used the LispWorks IDE for a few years now. I was trying to avoid criticizing it here, because I feel like it would be disrespectful on a list dedicated to "LispWorks". I think the LispWorks folks have done a commendable job on their IDE. Having said that, as with all things, you can't please everyone. Unfortunately, I find myself unable to get completely comfortable with it. I guess when I'm switching back and forth between different IDEs (Visual Studio, QtCreator), LispWorks ends up feeling a little cumbersome. I mainly use Linux for Lisp development, so maybe that would matter for my case. I whole heartedly agree with you on the less is more aspect though. I want a lean, smooth, fast environment that gets out of the way. I think I would end up writing a lot more lisp code, if I had an IDE like that. I am more than happy to give up some functionality for anything close to the lean, smooth, fast feel.. I do feel that all IDE windows and features should be a configuration option. I like IDEs that let me git rid of the stuff that I don't want. I'm definitely not a Java kind of guy and I don't care much for any of that world (even though I've been forced into it a few times). Have you seen QtCreator and other apps written with Qt? What are your thoughts about those apps? I've looked around quite a bit and I haven't been able to come up with a better choice than Qt so far. My current Lisp development environment is Sublime Text and a terminal with a REPL ;-). I've used the LispWorks IDE for debugging a couple of times, but I don't need it very often (even though it is pretty cool).

Thanks,
Gerry

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com <owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com> on behalf of Rainer Joswig <joswig@lisp.de>
Sent: Wednesday, August 9, 2017 2:38 AM
To: Lisp Hug Lispworks
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

Remember that the LispWorks IDE is already cross platform and comes with an Emacs-like editor. Note also that LispWorks comes with the source code for the editor.

It is also useful to give feedback to the LispWorks developers, since it may help them to see which features would help and integrate it into the product with new versions.

Personally LispWorks is my first choice for writing Lisp code and also some other editing tasks. I have GNU Emacs and also the Aquamacs variant of GNU Emacs.

I like the light-weight editing in LispWorks and the look&feel on the Mac. One can easily add too much visual clutter and too much functionality to an editor. Do we really need code folding? I never use that in GNU Emacs. I don't even need paredit or similar. What I use is the s-expression based commands in LispWorks and the mouse support, incl. mouse copy.

What I would prefer is slick look & feel. Smooth scrolling, nice fonts, more visual UI for the editor in menus (there are some useful extended commands which are hard to find), quick command overviews, I would like to be able to have all information in editor windows clickable (like the external format -> click on it to change it), some improvements in error handling for example when using unicode formats, etc.

I think usability is very important and sometimes less is more. I don't need much syntax highlighting and some people were reporting improvements turning it off in their IDEs.

In the Java-World there are big IDEs like Netbeans, Eclipse and IntelliJ. They have much more features than just for Java development. Even though they have lots of useful features which could be reused, I would not like to use them for Lisp development.

It's also that I don't like their visual appearance. They don't look slick and native. They have too many distractions and I don't like the multi-multi-pane window layouts...

Regards,

Rainer Joswig

Am 09.08.2017 um 09:08 schrieb emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:

I too have been where you are. The real *truth* is that there will never be a single perfect LISP IDE because we are all different with different views, preferences etc.

My cure was a simple series of steps:

studying the source code for emacs!!!

study the source code for paredit mode carefully!

learn to use paredit mode effectively

learn to use SLIME effectively

Unless you have LW (I do but rarely use it even though it is free) and live and breathe in it, Emacs *is* the best ready to go solution IMHO... you just have to really make the mental effort to learn all the short cut keystrokes for all the helpful stuff for manipulating s-expressions, navigation.

All the best though, I'd certainly be interested BUT what language do we write it in ? ;)

I ask that because LISP might not be the best cross-platform GUI providing solution... perhaps Clojure would do the job coupled with say J4GL... if you are going to write a good UI ight as well go game-level on it, that was my plan!

:)
All the best!!!

Sean Charles

On 9 August 2017 at 07:27, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:

Hi Steven,

I hear you and you are right. It is a daunting task. It's just that I recently realized that I could continue dreaming or actually start doing something about it. My initial goal would be fairly modest. I would just try to get a syntax highlighting editor going with some kind of project based file management. I'd force myself to use it exclusively, so that I would continue to be motivated. I plan to dedicate a certain amount of time each week to the project. I really don't know where it could end up at this point. The remote image thing would be a very high priority though. Never the less, Rome wasn't built in a day as it were ;-) Thanks for your response.

Thanks,
Gerry

From: Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:17 AM
To: Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks
Subject: RE: Potential IDE project

I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors that are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do much of what you want.

The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task. There’s also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to see some investment, time or money, in those editors.

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Gerry Weaver
Sent: 9 August, 2017 14:10
To: Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Potential IDE project

Hello All,

I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I know that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never been able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual Studio, so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested in such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind of holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded individuals out there.

Thanks,
Gerry

RE: Potential IDE project

Gerry,

Every tried slime/swank? Worth a shot if you like minimal GUI IDEs.

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Gerry Weaver
Sent: 9 August, 2017 16:16
To: Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>; Rainer Joswig <joswig@lisp.de>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

Hi Rainer,

I have used the LispWorks IDE for a few years now. I was trying to avoid criticizing it here, because I feel like it would be disrespectful on a list dedicated to "LispWorks". I think the LispWorks folks have done a commendable job on their IDE. Having said that, as with all things, you can't please everyone. Unfortunately, I find myself unable to get completely comfortable with it. I guess when I'm switching back and forth between different IDEs (Visual Studio, QtCreator), LispWorks ends up feeling a little cumbersome. I mainly use Linux for Lisp development, so maybe that would matter for my case. I whole heartedly agree with you on the less is more aspect though. I want a lean, smooth, fast environment that gets out of the way. I think I would end up writing a lot more lisp code, if I had an IDE like that. I am more than happy to give up some functionality for anything close to the lean, smooth, fast feel. I do feel that all IDE windows and features should be a configuration option. I like IDEs that let me git rid of the stuff that I don't want. I'm definitely not a Java kind of guy and I don't care much for any of that world (even though I've been forced into it a few times). Have you seen QtCreator and other apps written with Qt? What are your thoughts about those apps? I've looked around quite a bit and I haven't been able to come up with a better choice than Qt so far. My current Lisp development environment is Sublime Text and a terminal with a REPL ;-). I've used the LispWorks IDE for debugging a couple of times, but I don't need it very often (even though it is pretty cool).

Thanks,
Gerry

Remember that the LispWorks IDE is already cross platform and comes with an Emacs-like editor. Note also that LispWorks comes with the source code for the editor.

It is also useful to give feedback to the LispWorks developers, since it may help them to see which features would help and integrate it into the product with new versions.

Personally LispWorks is my first choice for writing Lisp code and also some other editing tasks. I have GNU Emacs and also the Aquamacs variant of GNU Emacs.

I think usability is very important and sometimes less is more. I don't need much syntax highlighting and some people were reporting improvements turning it off in their IDEs.

It's also that I don't like their visual appearance. They don't look slick and native. They have too many distractions and I don't like the multi-multi-pane window layouts...

Regards,

Rainer Joswig

Am 09.08.2017 um 09:08 schrieb emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:

I too have been where you are. The real *truth* is that there will never be a single perfect LISP IDE because we are all different with different views, preferences etc.

My cure was a simple series of steps:

studying the source code for emacs!!!

study the source code for paredit mode carefully!

learn to use paredit mode effectively

learn to use SLIME effectively

Unless you have LW (I do but rarely use it even though it is free) and live and breathe in it, Emacs *is* the best ready to go solution IMHO... you just have to really make the mental effort to learn all the short cut keystrokes for all the helpful stuff for manipulating s-expressions, navigation.

All the best though, I'd certainly be interested BUT what language do we write it in ? ;)

I ask that because LISP might not be the best cross-platform GUI providing solution... perhaps Clojure would do the job coupled with say J4GL... if you are going to write a good UI ight as well go game-level on it, that was my plan!

:)
All the best!!!

Sean Charles

On 9 August 2017 at 07:27, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:

Hi Steven,

I hear you and you are right. It is a daunting task. It's just that I recently realized that I could continue dreaming or actually start doing something about it. My initial goal would be fairly modest. I would just try to get a syntax highlighting editor going with some kind of project based file management. I'd force myself to use it exclusively, so that I would continue to be motivated. I plan to dedicate a certain amount of time each week to the project. I really don't know where it could end up at this point. The remote image thing would be a very high priority though. Never the less, Rome wasn't built in a day as it were ;-) Thanks for your response.

Thanks,
Gerry

From: Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:17 AM
To: Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks
Subject: RE: Potential IDE project

I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors that are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do much of what you want.

The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task. There’s also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to see some investment, time or money, in those editors.

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Gerry Weaver
Sent: 9 August, 2017 14:10
To: Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Potential IDE project

Hello All,

I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I know that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never been able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual Studio, so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested in such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind of holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded individuals out there.

Thanks,
Gerry

Re: Potential IDE project

Hi Steven,

Yes. I have tried it. I was actually going to look into whether it would be practical to write a C++ client for swank. Although, the setup was pretty fiddly. I'm definitely going to use it as a reference though. One thing I really want is the ability to send the current editor buffer contents to headless remote images and deploy images to remote machines from the IDE.

Thanks,
Gerry

From: Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 9, 2017 3:20 AM
To: Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks; Rainer Joswig
Subject: RE: Potential IDE project

Gerry,

Every tried slime/swank? Worth a shot if you like minimal GUI IDEs.

Hi Rainer,

I have used the LispWorks IDE for a few years now. I was trying to avoid criticizing it here, because I feel like it would be disrespectful on a list dedicated to "LispWorks". I think the LispWorks folks have done a commendable job on their IDE. Having said that, as with all things, you can't please everyone. Unfortunately, I find myself unable to get completely comfortable with it. I guess when I'm switching back and forth between different IDEs (Visual Studio, QtCreator), LispWorks ends up feeling a little cumbersome. I mainly use Linux for Lisp development, so maybe that would matter for my case. I whole heartedly agree with you on the less is more aspect though. I want a lean, smooth, fast environment that gets out of the way. I think I would end up writing a lot more lisp code, if I had an IDE like that. I am more than happy to give up some functionality for anything close to the lean, smooth, fast feel. I do feel that all IDE windows and features should be a configuration option. I like IDEs that let me git rid of the stuff that I don't want. I'm definitely not a Java kind of guy and I don't care much for any of that world (even though I've been forced into it a few times). Have you seen QtCreator and other apps written with Qt? What are your thoughts about those apps? I've looked around quite a bit and I haven't been able to come up with a better choice than Qt so far. My current Lisp development environment is Sublime Text and a terminal with a REPL ;-). I've used the LispWorks IDE for debugging a couple of times, but I don't need it very often (even though it is pretty cool).

Thanks,
Gerry

Remember that the LispWorks IDE is already cross platform and comes with an Emacs-like editor. Note also that LispWorks comes with the source code for the editor.

It is also useful to give feedback to the LispWorks developers, since it may help them to see which features would help and integrate it into the product with new versions.

Personally LispWorks is my first choice for writing Lisp code and also some other editing tasks. I have GNU Emacs and also the Aquamacs variant of GNU Emacs.

I think usability is very important and sometimes less is more. I don't need much syntax highlighting and some people were reporting improvements turning it off in their IDEs.

It's also that I don't like their visual appearance. They don't look slick and native. They have too many distractions and I don't like the multi-multi-pane window layouts...

Regards,

Rainer Joswig

Am 09.08.2017 um 09:08 schrieb emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:

I too have been where you are. The real *truth* is that there will never be a single perfect LISP IDE because we are all different with different views, preferences etc.

My cure was a simple series of steps:

studying the source code for emacs!!!

study the source code for paredit mode carefully!

learn to use paredit mode effectively

learn to use SLIME effectively

Unless you have LW (I do but rarely use it even though it is free) and live and breathe in it, Emacs *is* the best ready to go solution IMHO... you just have to really make the mental effort to learn all the short cut keystrokes for all the helpful stuff for manipulating s-expressions, navigation.

All the best though, I'd certainly be interested BUT what language do we write it in ? ;)

I ask that because LISP might not be the best cross-platform GUI providing solution... perhaps Clojure would do the job coupled with say J4GL... if you are going to write a good UI ight as well go game-level on it, that was my plan!

:)
All the best!!!

Sean Charles

On 9 August 2017 at 07:27, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:

Hi Steven,

I hear you and you are right. It is a daunting task. It's just that I recently realized that I could continue dreaming or actually start doing something about it. My initial goal would be fairly modest. I would just try to get a syntax highlighting editor going with some kind of project based file management. I'd force myself to use it exclusively, so that I would continue to be motivated. I plan to dedicate a certain amount of time each week to the project. I really don't know where it could end up at this point. The remote image thing would be a very high priority though. Never the less, Rome wasn't built in a day as it were ;-) Thanks for your response.

Thanks,
Gerry

From: Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:17 AM
To: Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks
Subject: RE: Potential IDE project

I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors that are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do much of what you want.

The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task. There’s also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to see some investment, time or money, in those editors.

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Gerry Weaver
Sent: 9 August, 2017 14:10
To: Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Potential IDE project

Hello All,

I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I know that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never been able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual Studio, so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested in such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind of holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded individuals out there.

Thanks,
Gerry

RE: Potential IDE project

I was thinking about this whole editor thread last night. I am really annoyed with GNU emacs too, and would love to have an non-commercial alternative. The trouble is, I think, the 'lisp curse' more than anything else. We (lispers, collectively), really need to focus on community building more than software building.

Climbing down from the soapbox, perhaps contributing / reviving an existing editor project is the best way forward? I had a look again at Dylan Deuce and it seems like a good target. The editor has a good pedigree (in that it was designed and built by some ex-Symbolics folks), is a 3rd gen design and it seems DUIM was ported to common-lisp by Duncan Rose. 

Regards,
	- Steve Nunez

-----Original Message-----
From: 73budden . [mailto:budden73@gmail.com] 
Sent: 9 August, 2017 19:25
To: emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>
Cc: Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com> Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

Hi all!

I'm slowly developing my Lisp IDE for about 2 years already. I tried to "advertise" it in 2015, but received nearly zero feedback, so I translated most of its parts to Russian and stopped further advertising.

Key components are:
1. SWANK. Hence we have most of tools which present in SLIME (some with lower quality, some are better than in SLIME).

2. Some lisp-specific editing commands are borrowed from the fork of EMACS-like HEMLOCK editor, so knows something about CL. E.g. there is "indent sexp" command.

3. Written in a client-server architecture. Server is your lisp image (with IDE server sources loaded), client is a separate GUI application written in tcl/tk. Initially I tried to use tk wrappers for tcl, but quickly rejected that. Writing client in pure tcl is much easier and allows to use all tk components. Wrappers suggest rather narrow set of widgets and anyway when problems arise, you have to learn tcl/tk. Also there are some more or less "debuggers" for tcl, which allow to diagnose things with ease.

4. Permissively licensed.

Site is here https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon_en , but it contains nothing essential today.
Main branch is here: https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon

Some screenshots are here
https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon/wiki/Screenshots (some old, some in Russian).

Generally, everything is still in deep alpha quality, but I use the environment on a daily basis and almost never use EMACS.

Main current features are:

- supports only SBCL. Some effort is needed to port
- tested under Windows and sometimes under Linux
- every tool is in its own Window - like Lispworks IDE
- no minibuffer, REPL is used instead to enter complex editor commands not listed in menu (no command completion yet)
- multi-tabbed text editor with notepad-like look and feel
- some lisp navigation commands (next/previous sexp, up sexp, mark sexp)
- support of (in-readtable) form (missing in SLIME)
- REPL with persistent history and search through the history
- find in files with mutliple result windows (missing in EMACS)
- go to definition
- go to package definition, go to asd system definition (better than in EMACS)
- inspector
- debugger (stack, locals, inspect locals, eval in frame, return from frame, invoke restart)
- thread list (with debug)
- integration with cl-hyperdoc
- compilation error browser, errors are sorted by severity (seem to be missing in EMACS)
- list of definitions in the file (some quick hack with regexp)

I can say definitely that "clcon" is incomparably more advanced than ABLE and LispIDE. It is weaker than Lispworks on EMACS. I never seen slimv, jabberwocky and so on.

Most of UI and some portions of source code are now in Russian, but if actual collaborator would appear, I can fix that and prepare English version.

I'm spending a very little resource on the development in a last year, but some things are to be done:
- fix race conditions in the editor (some work is done, but more to do)
- support CCL
- improve performance of matching paren highlight
- find and replace in files
- automatic window placement
- multiple editor windows (for now we have "open in another editor" menu item)
- auto-completion for editor commands
- improve editor bookmarks (now they are just prototype)
- IDE programmer's guide (just add more examples indeed)
- finish inspector GUI (now it misses some essential things)



2017-08-09 12:01 GMT+03:00, emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:
> One thing I considered but never did (no time as ever) was to convert 
> the swank protocol to Google Buffers format.... has anybody done that 
> already maybe? Then it would open up the protocol to a whole raft of 
> platforms, tools and more importantly, hackers!
>
> :)
>
>
> On 9 August 2017 at 09:51, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi Steven,
>>
>>
>> Yes. I have tried it. I was actually going to look into whether it 
>> would be practical to write a C++ client for swank. Although, the 
>> setup was pretty fiddly. I'm definitely going to use it as a 
>> reference though. One thing I really want is the ability to send the 
>> current editor buffer contents to headless remote images and deploy 
>> images to remote machines from the IDE.
>>
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Gerry
>>
>> ------------------------------
>> *From:* Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 3:20 AM
>> *To:* Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks; Rainer Joswig
>>
>> *Subject:* RE: Potential IDE project
>>
>>
>> Gerry,
>>
>>
>>
>> Every tried slime/swank? Worth a shot if you like minimal GUI IDEs.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com
>> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com]
>> *On Behalf Of *Gerry Weaver
>> *Sent:* 9 August, 2017 16:16
>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com> Rainer Joswig < 
>> joswig@lisp.de>
>> *Subject:* Re: Potential IDE project
>>
>>
>>
>> Hi Rainer,
>>
>>
>>
>> I have used the LispWorks IDE for a few years now. I was trying to 
>> avoid criticizing it here, because I feel like it would be 
>> disrespectful on a list dedicated to "LispWorks". I think the 
>> LispWorks folks have done a commendable job on their IDE. Having said 
>> that, as with all things, you can't please everyone. Unfortunately, I 
>> find myself unable to get completely comfortable with it. I guess 
>> when I'm switching back and forth between different IDEs (Visual 
>> Studio, QtCreator), LispWorks ends up feeling a little cumbersome. I 
>> mainly use Linux for Lisp development, so maybe that would matter for 
>> my case. I whole heartedly agree with you on the less is more aspect 
>> though. I want a lean, smooth, fast environment that gets out of the 
>> way. I think I would end up writing a lot more lisp code, if I had an 
>> IDE like that. I am more than happy to give up some functionality for 
>> anything close to the lean, smooth, fast feel. I do feel that all IDE 
>> windows and features should be a configuration option. I like IDEs 
>> that let me git rid of the stuff that I don't want. I'm definitely 
>> not a Java kind of guy and I don't care much for any of that world 
>> (even though I've been forced into it a few times). Have you seen 
>> QtCreator and other apps written with Qt? What are your thoughts 
>> about those apps? I've looked around quite a bit and I haven't been 
>> able to come up with a better choice than Qt so far. My current Lisp 
>> development environment is Sublime Text and a terminal with a REPL 
>> ;-). I've used the LispWorks IDE for debugging a couple of times, but 
>> I don't need it very often (even though it is pretty cool).
>>
>>
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Gerry
>> ------------------------------
>>
>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com <owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com> 
>> on behalf of Rainer Joswig <joswig@lisp.de>
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 2:38 AM
>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks
>> *Subject:* Re: Potential IDE project
>>
>>
>>
>> Remember that the LispWorks IDE is already cross platform and comes 
>> with an Emacs-like editor. Note also that LispWorks comes with the 
>> source code for the editor.
>>
>>
>>
>> It is also useful to give feedback to the LispWorks developers, since 
>> it may help them to see which features would help and integrate it 
>> into the product with new versions.
>>
>>
>>
>> Personally LispWorks is my first choice for writing Lisp code and 
>> also some other editing tasks. I have GNU Emacs and also the Aquamacs 
>> variant of GNU Emacs.
>>
>>
>>
>> I like the light-weight editing in LispWorks and the look&feel on the 
>> Mac.
>> One can easily add too much visual clutter and too much functionality 
>> to an editor. Do we really need code folding? I never use that in GNU 
>> Emacs. I don't even need paredit or similar. What I use is the 
>> s-expression based commands in LispWorks and the mouse support, incl. 
>> mouse copy.
>>
>>
>>
>> What I would prefer is slick look & feel. Smooth scrolling, nice 
>> fonts, more visual UI for the editor in menus (there are some useful 
>> extended commands which are hard to find), quick command overviews, I 
>> would like to be able to have all information in editor windows 
>> clickable (like the external format -> click on it to change it), 
>> some improvements in error handling for example when using unicode 
>> formats, etc.
>>
>>
>>
>> I think usability is very important and sometimes less is more. I 
>> don't need much syntax highlighting and some people were reporting 
>> improvements turning it off in their IDEs.
>>
>>
>>
>> In the Java-World there are big IDEs like Netbeans, Eclipse and IntelliJ.
>> They have much more features than just for Java development. Even 
>> though they have lots of useful features which could be reused, I 
>> would not like to use them for Lisp development.
>>
>> It's also that I don't like their visual appearance. They don't look 
>> slick and native. They have too many distractions and I don't like 
>> the multi-multi-pane window layouts...
>>
>>
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>>
>>
>> Rainer Joswig
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Am 09.08.2017 um 09:08 schrieb emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:
>>
>> I too have been where you are. The real *truth* is that there will 
>> never be a single perfect LISP IDE because we are all different with 
>> different views, preferences etc.
>>
>>
>>
>> My cure was a simple series of steps:
>>
>>
>>
>> studying the source code for emacs!!!
>>
>> study the source code for paredit mode carefully!
>>
>> learn to use paredit mode effectively
>>
>> learn to use SLIME effectively
>>
>>
>>
>> Unless you have LW (I do but rarely use it even though it is free) 
>> and live and breathe in it, Emacs *is* the best ready to go solution IMHO...
>> you just have to really make the mental effort to learn all the short 
>> cut keystrokes for all the helpful stuff for manipulating 
>> s-expressions, navigation.
>>
>>
>>
>> All the best though, I'd certainly be interested BUT what language do we
>> write it in ?    ;)
>>
>>
>>
>> I ask that because LISP might not be the best cross-platform GUI 
>> providing solution... perhaps Clojure would do the job coupled with 
>> say J4GL... if you are going to write a good UI ight as well go 
>> game-level on it, that was my plan!
>>
>>
>>
>> :)
>> All the best!!!
>>
>>
>>
>> Sean Charles
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On 9 August 2017 at 07:27, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hi Steven,
>>
>>
>>
>> I hear you and you are right. It is a daunting task. It's just that I
>> recently realized that I could continue dreaming or actually start doing
>> something about it. My initial goal would be fairly modest. I would just
>> try to get a syntax highlighting editor going with some kind of project
>> based file management. I'd force myself to use it exclusively, so that I
>> would continue to be motivated. I plan to dedicate a certain amount of
>> time
>> each week to the project. I really don't know where it could end up at
>> this point. The remote image thing would be a very high priority though.
>> Never the less, Rome wasn't built in a day as it were ;-) Thanks for your
>> response.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Gerry
>>
>> ------------------------------
>>
>> *From:* Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:17 AM
>> *To:* Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks
>> *Subject:* RE: Potential IDE project
>>
>>
>>
>> I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the
>> true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors
>> that
>> are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do
>> much of what you want.
>>
>>
>>
>> The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you
>> might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task.
>> There’s
>> also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to
>> see some investment, time or money, in those editors.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com
>> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com]
>> *On Behalf Of *Gerry Weaver
>> *Sent:* 9 August, 2017 14:10
>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
>> *Subject:* Potential IDE project
>>
>>
>>
>> Hello All,
>>
>>
>>
>> I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I
>> know
>> that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never
>> been
>> able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual
>> Studio,
>> so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more
>> traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely
>> miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet
>> library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would
>> like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would
>> probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this
>> because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested
>> in
>> such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make
>> different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested
>> in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly
>> don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind
>> of
>> holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded
>> individuals out there.
>>
>>
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Gerry
>>
>>
>>
>>
>

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

RE: Potential IDE project

Here’s an interesting read:

https://discuss.atom.io/t/the-deuce-editor-architecture/2218

From: emacstheviking [mailto:objitsu@gmail.com]
Sent: 11 August, 2017 15:05
To: Andrew Kirkpatrick <ubermonk@gmail.com>
Cc: Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>; 73budden . <budden73@gmail.com>; Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>; Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

I have often thought that the "Leo" editor ( http://leoeditor.com/ ) which I have used and absolutely loved for many reasons would make a good candidate... it's written in Python BUT of course there is https://github.com/hylang/hy so we could continue to work with our beloved s-expressions !

If you have not used Leo, it's a eye opener to how coding could / should be ?!!?

Plus, using Qt as the UI library must have some advantages althought I always found installing it to be tricky on certain platforms...

That's my .02 cents on the matter

Sean.

On 11 August 2017 at 01:41, Andrew Kirkpatrick <ubermonk@gmail.com> wrote:

If the goal is to avoid emacs and use something not old and
bit-rotten, this is all that comes to mind - though, being happy
enough with Emacs (and not wanting to run an instance of chromium just
to edit text files), I haven't used it much:

https://atom.io/packages/atom-slime

On 11 August 2017 at 10:02, Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com> wrote:
> I was thinking about this whole editor thread last night. I am really annoyed with GNU emacs too, and would love to have an non-commercial alternative. The trouble is, I think, the 'lisp curse' more than anything else. We (lispers, collectively), really need to focus on community building more than software building.
>
> Climbing down from the soapbox, perhaps contributing / reviving an existing editor project is the best way forward? I had a look again at Dylan Deuce and it seems like a good target. The editor has a good pedigree (in that it was designed and built by some ex-Symbolics folks), is a 3rd gen design and it seems DUIM was ported to common-lisp by Duncan Rose.
>
> Regards,
> - Steve Nunez
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: 73budden . [mailto:budden73@gmail.com]
> Sent: 9 August, 2017 19:25
> To: emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>
> Cc: Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>; Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>; Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
> Subject: Re: Potential IDE project
>
> Hi all!
>
> I'm slowly developing my Lisp IDE for about 2 years already. I tried to "advertise" it in 2015, but received nearly zero feedback, so I translated most of its parts to Russian and stopped further advertising.
>
> Key components are:
> 1. SWANK. Hence we have most of tools which present in SLIME (some with lower quality, some are better than in SLIME).
>
> 2. Some lisp-specific editing commands are borrowed from the fork of EMACS-like HEMLOCK editor, so knows something about CL. E.g. there is "indent sexp" command.
>
> 3. Written in a client-server architecture. Server is your lisp image (with IDE server sources loaded), client is a separate GUI application written in tcl/tk. Initially I tried to use tk wrappers for tcl, but quickly rejected that. Writing client in pure tcl is much easier and allows to use all tk components. Wrappers suggest rather narrow set of widgets and anyway when problems arise, you have to learn tcl/tk. Also there are some more or less "debuggers" for tcl, which allow to diagnose things with ease.
>
> 4. Permissively licensed.
>
> Site is here https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon_en , but it contains nothing essential today.
> Main branch is here: https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon
>
> Some screenshots are here
> https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon/wiki/Screenshots (some old, some in Russian).
>
> Generally, everything is still in deep alpha quality, but I use the environment on a daily basis and almost never use EMACS.
>
> Main current features are:
>
> - supports only SBCL. Some effort is needed to port
> - tested under Windows and sometimes under Linux
> - every tool is in its own Window - like Lispworks IDE
> - no minibuffer, REPL is used instead to enter complex editor commands not listed in menu (no command completion yet)
> - multi-tabbed text editor with notepad-like look and feel
> - some lisp navigation commands (next/previous sexp, up sexp, mark sexp)
> - support of (in-readtable) form (missing in SLIME)
> - REPL with persistent history and search through the history
> - find in files with mutliple result windows (missing in EMACS)
> - go to definition
> - go to package definition, go to asd system definition (better than in EMACS)
> - inspector
> - debugger (stack, locals, inspect locals, eval in frame, return from frame, invoke restart)
> - thread list (with debug)
> - integration with cl-hyperdoc
> - compilation error browser, errors are sorted by severity (seem to be missing in EMACS)
> - list of definitions in the file (some quick hack with regexp)
>
> I can say definitely that "clcon" is incomparably more advanced than ABLE and LispIDE. It is weaker than Lispworks on EMACS. I never seen slimv, jabberwocky and so on.
>
> Most of UI and some portions of source code are now in Russian, but if actual collaborator would appear, I can fix that and prepare English version.
>
> I'm spending a very little resource on the development in a last year, but some things are to be done:
> - fix race conditions in the editor (some work is done, but more to do)
> - support CCL
> - improve performance of matching paren highlight
> - find and replace in files
> - automatic window placement
> - multiple editor windows (for now we have "open in another editor" menu item)
> - auto-completion for editor commands
> - improve editor bookmarks (now they are just prototype)
> - IDE programmer's guide (just add more examples indeed)
> - finish inspector GUI (now it misses some essential things)
>
>
>
> 2017-08-09 12:01 GMT+03:00, emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:
>> One thing I considered but never did (no time as ever) was to convert
>> the swank protocol to Google Buffers format.... has anybody done that
>> already maybe? Then it would open up the protocol to a whole raft of
>> platforms, tools and more importantly, hackers!
>>
>> :)
>>
>>
>> On 9 August 2017 at 09:51, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Steven,
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes. I have tried it. I was actually going to look into whether it
>>> would be practical to write a C++ client for swank. Although, the
>>> setup was pretty fiddly. I'm definitely going to use it as a
>>> reference though. One thing I really want is the ability to send the
>>> current editor buffer contents to headless remote images and deploy
>>> images to remote machines from the IDE.
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From:* Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 3:20 AM
>>> *To:* Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks; Rainer Joswig
>>>
>>> *Subject:* RE: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>> Gerry,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Every tried slime/swank? Worth a shot if you like minimal GUI IDEs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com
>>> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com]
>>> *On Behalf Of *Gerry Weaver
>>> *Sent:* 9 August, 2017 16:16
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>; Rainer Joswig <
>>> joswig@lisp.de>
>>> *Subject:* Re: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hi Rainer,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I have used the LispWorks IDE for a few years now. I was trying to
>>> avoid criticizing it here, because I feel like it would be
>>> disrespectful on a list dedicated to "LispWorks". I think the
>>> LispWorks folks have done a commendable job on their IDE. Having said
>>> that, as with all things, you can't please everyone. Unfortunately, I
>>> find myself unable to get completely comfortable with it. I guess
>>> when I'm switching back and forth between different IDEs (Visual
>>> Studio, QtCreator), LispWorks ends up feeling a little cumbersome. I
>>> mainly use Linux for Lisp development, so maybe that would matter for
>>> my case. I whole heartedly agree with you on the less is more aspect
>>> though. I want a lean, smooth, fast environment that gets out of the
>>> way. I think I would end up writing a lot more lisp code, if I had an
>>> IDE like that. I am more than happy to give up some functionality for
>>> anything close to the lean, smooth, fast feel. I do feel that all IDE
>>> windows and features should be a configuration option. I like IDEs
>>> that let me git rid of the stuff that I don't want. I'm definitely
>>> not a Java kind of guy and I don't care much for any of that world
>>> (even though I've been forced into it a few times). Have you seen
>>> QtCreator and other apps written with Qt? What are your thoughts
>>> about those apps? I've looked around quite a bit and I haven't been
>>> able to come up with a better choice than Qt so far. My current Lisp
>>> development environment is Sublime Text and a terminal with a REPL
>>> ;-). I've used the LispWorks IDE for debugging a couple of times, but
>>> I don't need it very often (even though it is pretty cool).
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com <owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
>>> on behalf of Rainer Joswig <joswig@lisp.de>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 2:38 AM
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks
>>> *Subject:* Re: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Remember that the LispWorks IDE is already cross platform and comes
>>> with an Emacs-like editor. Note also that LispWorks comes with the
>>> source code for the editor.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> It is also useful to give feedback to the LispWorks developers, since
>>> it may help them to see which features would help and integrate it
>>> into the product with new versions.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Personally LispWorks is my first choice for writing Lisp code and
>>> also some other editing tasks. I have GNU Emacs and also the Aquamacs
>>> variant of GNU Emacs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I like the light-weight editing in LispWorks and the look&feel on the
>>> Mac.
>>> One can easily add too much visual clutter and too much functionality
>>> to an editor. Do we really need code folding? I never use that in GNU
>>> Emacs. I don't even need paredit or similar. What I use is the
>>> s-expression based commands in LispWorks and the mouse support, incl.
>>> mouse copy.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> What I would prefer is slick look & feel. Smooth scrolling, nice
>>> fonts, more visual UI for the editor in menus (there are some useful
>>> extended commands which are hard to find), quick command overviews, I
>>> would like to be able to have all information in editor windows
>>> clickable (like the external format -> click on it to change it),
>>> some improvements in error handling for example when using unicode
>>> formats, etc.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I think usability is very important and sometimes less is more. I
>>> don't need much syntax highlighting and some people were reporting
>>> improvements turning it off in their IDEs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> In the Java-World there are big IDEs like Netbeans, Eclipse and IntelliJ.
>>> They have much more features than just for Java development. Even
>>> though they have lots of useful features which could be reused, I
>>> would not like to use them for Lisp development.
>>>
>>> It's also that I don't like their visual appearance. They don't look
>>> slick and native. They have too many distractions and I don't like
>>> the multi-multi-pane window layouts...
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Rainer Joswig
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Am 09.08.2017 um 09:08 schrieb emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:
>>>
>>> I too have been where you are. The real *truth* is that there will
>>> never be a single perfect LISP IDE because we are all different with
>>> different views, preferences etc.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> My cure was a simple series of steps:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> studying the source code for emacs!!!
>>>
>>> study the source code for paredit mode carefully!
>>>
>>> learn to use paredit mode effectively
>>>
>>> learn to use SLIME effectively
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Unless you have LW (I do but rarely use it even though it is free)
>>> and live and breathe in it, Emacs *is* the best ready to go solution IMHO...
>>> you just have to really make the mental effort to learn all the short
>>> cut keystrokes for all the helpful stuff for manipulating
>>> s-expressions, navigation.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> All the best though, I'd certainly be interested BUT what language do we
>>> write it in ? ;)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I ask that because LISP might not be the best cross-platform GUI
>>> providing solution... perhaps Clojure would do the job coupled with
>>> say J4GL... if you are going to write a good UI ight as well go
>>> game-level on it, that was my plan!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> :)
>>> All the best!!!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Sean Charles
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 9 August 2017 at 07:27, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Steven,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I hear you and you are right. It is a daunting task. It's just that I
>>> recently realized that I could continue dreaming or actually start doing
>>> something about it. My initial goal would be fairly modest. I would just
>>> try to get a syntax highlighting editor going with some kind of project
>>> based file management. I'd force myself to use it exclusively, so that I
>>> would continue to be motivated. I plan to dedicate a certain amount of
>>> time
>>> each week to the project. I really don't know where it could end up at
>>> this point. The remote image thing would be a very high priority though.
>>> Never the less, Rome wasn't built in a day as it were ;-) Thanks for your
>>> response.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> *From:* Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:17 AM
>>> *To:* Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks
>>> *Subject:* RE: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the
>>> true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors
>>> that
>>> are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do
>>> much of what you want.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you
>>> might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task.
>>> There’s
>>> also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to
>>> see some investment, time or money, in those editors.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com
>>> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com]
>>> *On Behalf Of *Gerry Weaver
>>> *Sent:* 9 August, 2017 14:10
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
>>> *Subject:* Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hello All,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I
>>> know
>>> that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never
>>> been
>>> able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual
>>> Studio,
>>> so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more
>>> traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely
>>> miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet
>>> library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would
>>> like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would
>>> probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this
>>> because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested
>>> in
>>> such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make
>>> different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested
>>> in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly
>>> don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind
>>> of
>>> holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded
>>> individuals out there.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>

> _______________________________________________
> Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
> lisp-hug@lispworks.com
> http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

Re: Potential IDE project

Thanks for the link.

I can't help but think about this editor:

https://github.com/projectured/projectured

I find this project quite interesting: there a video introducing it:

https://youtu.be/s05SlmZ7ZPc

Best,

Cam

On 11 Aug 2017, at 09:41, Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com> wrote:

Here’s an interesting read:

https://discuss.atom.io/t/the-deuce-editor-architecture/2218

From: emacstheviking [mailto:objitsu@gmail.com]
Sent: 11 August, 2017 15:05
To: Andrew Kirkpatrick <ubermonk@gmail.com>
Cc: Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>; 73budden . <budden73@gmail.com>; Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>; Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

I have often thought that the "Leo" editor ( http://leoeditor.com/ ) which I have used and absolutely loved for many reasons would make a good candidate... it's written in Python BUT of course there is https://github.com/hylang/hy so we could continue to work with our beloved s-expressions !

If you have not used Leo, it's a eye opener to how coding could / should be ?!!?

Plus, using Qt as the UI library must have some advantages althought I always found installing it to be tricky on certain platforms...

That's my .02 cents on the matter

Sean.

On 11 August 2017 at 01:41, Andrew Kirkpatrick <ubermonk@gmail.com> wrote:

If the goal is to avoid emacs and use something not old and
bit-rotten, this is all that comes to mind - though, being happy
enough with Emacs (and not wanting to run an instance of chromium just
to edit text files), I haven't used it much:

https://atom.io/packages/atom-slime

On 11 August 2017 at 10:02, Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com> wrote:
> I was thinking about this whole editor thread last night. I am really annoyed with GNU emacs too, and would love to have an non-commercial alternative. The trouble is, I think, the 'lisp curse' more than anything else. We (lispers, collectively), really need to focus on community building more than software building.
>
> Climbing down from the soapbox, perhaps contributing / reviving an existing editor project is the best way forward? I had a look again at Dylan Deuce and it seems like a good target. The editor has a good pedigree (in that it was designed and built by some ex-Symbolics folks), is a 3rd gen design and it seems DUIM was ported to common-lisp by Duncan Rose.
>
> Regards,
> - Steve Nunez
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: 73budden . [mailto:budden73@gmail.com]
> Sent: 9 August, 2017 19:25
> To: emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>
> Cc: Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>; Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>; Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
> Subject: Re: Potential IDE project
>
> Hi all!
>
> I'm slowly developing my Lisp IDE for about 2 years already. I tried to "advertise" it in 2015, but received nearly zero feedback, so I translated most of its parts to Russian and stopped further advertising.
>
> Key components are:
> 1. SWANK. Hence we have most of tools which present in SLIME (some with lower quality, some are better than in SLIME).
>
> 2. Some lisp-specific editing commands are borrowed from the fork of EMACS-like HEMLOCK editor, so knows something about CL. E.g. there is "indent sexp" command.
>
> 3. Written in a client-server architecture. Server is your lisp image (with IDE server sources loaded), client is a separate GUI application written in tcl/tk. Initially I tried to use tk wrappers for tcl, but quickly rejected that. Writing client in pure tcl is much easier and allows to use all tk components. Wrappers suggest rather narrow set of widgets and anyway when problems arise, you have to learn tcl/tk. Also there are some more or less "debuggers" for tcl, which allow to diagnose things with ease.
>
> 4. Permissively licensed.
>
> Site is here https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon_en , but it contains nothing essential today.
> Main branch is here: https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon
>
> Some screenshots are here
> https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon/wiki/Screenshots (some old, some in Russian).
>
> Generally, everything is still in deep alpha quality, but I use the environment on a daily basis and almost never use EMACS.
>
> Main current features are:
>
> - supports only SBCL. Some effort is needed to port
> - tested under Windows and sometimes under Linux
> - every tool is in its own Window - like Lispworks IDE
> - no minibuffer, REPL is used instead to enter complex editor commands not listed in menu (no command completion yet)
> - multi-tabbed text editor with notepad-like look and feel
> - some lisp navigation commands (next/previous sexp, up sexp, mark sexp)
> - support of (in-readtable) form (missing in SLIME)
> - REPL with persistent history and search through the history
> - find in files with mutliple result windows (missing in EMACS)
> - go to definition
> - go to package definition, go to asd system definition (better than in EMACS)
> - inspector
> - debugger (stack, locals, inspect locals, eval in frame, return from frame, invoke restart)
> - thread list (with debug)
> - integration with cl-hyperdoc
> - compilation error browser, errors are sorted by severity (seem to be missing in EMACS)
> - list of definitions in the file (some quick hack with regexp)
>
> I can say definitely that "clcon" is incomparably more advanced than ABLE and LispIDE. It is weaker than Lispworks on EMACS. I never seen slimv, jabberwocky and so on.
>
> Most of UI and some portions of source code are now in Russian, but if actual collaborator would appear, I can fix that and prepare English version.
>
> I'm spending a very little resource on the development in a last year, but some things are to be done:
> - fix race conditions in the editor (some work is done, but more to do)
> - support CCL
> - improve performance of matching paren highlight
> - find and replace in files
> - automatic window placement
> - multiple editor windows (for now we have "open in another editor" menu item)
> - auto-completion for editor commands
> - improve editor bookmarks (now they are just prototype)
> - IDE programmer's guide (just add more examples indeed)
> - finish inspector GUI (now it misses some essential things)
>
>
>
> 2017-08-09 12:01 GMT+03:00, emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:
>> One thing I considered but never did (no time as ever) was to convert
>> the swank protocol to Google Buffers format.... has anybody done that
>> already maybe? Then it would open up the protocol to a whole raft of
>> platforms, tools and more importantly, hackers!
>>
>> :)
>>
>>
>> On 9 August 2017 at 09:51, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Steven,
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes. I have tried it. I was actually going to look into whether it
>>> would be practical to write a C++ client for swank. Although, the
>>> setup was pretty fiddly. I'm definitely going to use it as a
>>> reference though. One thing I really want is the ability to send the
>>> current editor buffer contents to headless remote images and deploy
>>> images to remote machines from the IDE.
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From:* Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 3:20 AM
>>> *To:* Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks; Rainer Joswig
>>>
>>> *Subject:* RE: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>> Gerry,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Every tried slime/swank? Worth a shot if you like minimal GUI IDEs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com
>>> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com]
>>> *On Behalf Of *Gerry Weaver
>>> *Sent:* 9 August, 2017 16:16
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>; Rainer Joswig <
>>> joswig@lisp.de>
>>> *Subject:* Re: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hi Rainer,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I have used the LispWorks IDE for a few years now. I was trying to
>>> avoid criticizing it here, because I feel like it would be
>>> disrespectful on a list dedicated to "LispWorks". I think the
>>> LispWorks folks have done a commendable job on their IDE. Having said
>>> that, as with all things, you can't please everyone. Unfortunately, I
>>> find myself unable to get completely comfortable with it. I guess
>>> when I'm switching back and forth between different IDEs (Visual
>>> Studio, QtCreator), LispWorks ends up feeling a little cumbersome. I
>>> mainly use Linux for Lisp development, so maybe that would matter for
>>> my case. I whole heartedly agree with you on the less is more aspect
>>> though. I want a lean, smooth, fast environment that gets out of the
>>> way. I think I would end up writing a lot more lisp code, if I had an
>>> IDE like that. I am more than happy to give up some functionality for
>>> anything close to the lean, smooth, fast feel. I do feel that all IDE
>>> windows and features should be a configuration option. I like IDEs
>>> that let me git rid of the stuff that I don't want. I'm definitely
>>> not a Java kind of guy and I don't care much for any of that world
>>> (even though I've been forced into it a few times). Have you seen
>>> QtCreator and other apps written with Qt? What are your thoughts
>>> about those apps? I've looked around quite a bit and I haven't been
>>> able to come up with a better choice than Qt so far. My current Lisp
>>> development environment is Sublime Text and a terminal with a REPL
>>> ;-). I've used the LispWorks IDE for debugging a couple of times, but
>>> I don't need it very often (even though it is pretty cool).
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com <owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
>>> on behalf of Rainer Joswig <joswig@lisp.de>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 2:38 AM
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks
>>> *Subject:* Re: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Remember that the LispWorks IDE is already cross platform and comes
>>> with an Emacs-like editor. Note also that LispWorks comes with the
>>> source code for the editor.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> It is also useful to give feedback to the LispWorks developers, since
>>> it may help them to see which features would help and integrate it
>>> into the product with new versions.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Personally LispWorks is my first choice for writing Lisp code and
>>> also some other editing tasks. I have GNU Emacs and also the Aquamacs
>>> variant of GNU Emacs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I like the light-weight editing in LispWorks and the look&feel on the
>>> Mac.
>>> One can easily add too much visual clutter and too much functionality
>>> to an editor. Do we really need code folding? I never use that in GNU
>>> Emacs. I don't even need paredit or similar. What I use is the
>>> s-expression based commands in LispWorks and the mouse support, incl.
>>> mouse copy.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> What I would prefer is slick look & feel. Smooth scrolling, nice
>>> fonts, more visual UI for the editor in menus (there are some useful
>>> extended commands which are hard to find), quick command overviews, I
>>> would like to be able to have all information in editor windows
>>> clickable (like the external format -> click on it to change it),
>>> some improvements in error handling for example when using unicode
>>> formats, etc.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I think usability is very important and sometimes less is more. I
>>> don't need much syntax highlighting and some people were reporting
>>> improvements turning it off in their IDEs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> In the Java-World there are big IDEs like Netbeans, Eclipse and IntelliJ.
>>> They have much more features than just for Java development. Even
>>> though they have lots of useful features which could be reused, I
>>> would not like to use them for Lisp development.
>>>
>>> It's also that I don't like their visual appearance. They don't look
>>> slick and native. They have too many distractions and I don't like
>>> the multi-multi-pane window layouts...
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Rainer Joswig
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Am 09.08.2017 um 09:08 schrieb emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:
>>>
>>> I too have been where you are. The real *truth* is that there will
>>> never be a single perfect LISP IDE because we are all different with
>>> different views, preferences etc.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> My cure was a simple series of steps:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> studying the source code for emacs!!!
>>>
>>> study the source code for paredit mode carefully!
>>>
>>> learn to use paredit mode effectively
>>>
>>> learn to use SLIME effectively
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Unless you have LW (I do but rarely use it even though it is free)
>>> and live and breathe in it, Emacs *is* the best ready to go solution IMHO...
>>> you just have to really make the mental effort to learn all the short
>>> cut keystrokes for all the helpful stuff for manipulating
>>> s-expressions, navigation.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> All the best though, I'd certainly be interested BUT what language do we
>>> write it in ? ;)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I ask that because LISP might not be the best cross-platform GUI
>>> providing solution... perhaps Clojure would do the job coupled with
>>> say J4GL... if you are going to write a good UI ight as well go
>>> game-level on it, that was my plan!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> :)
>>> All the best!!!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Sean Charles
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 9 August 2017 at 07:27, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Steven,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I hear you and you are right. It is a daunting task. It's just that I
>>> recently realized that I could continue dreaming or actually start doing
>>> something about it. My initial goal would be fairly modest. I would just
>>> try to get a syntax highlighting editor going with some kind of project
>>> based file management. I'd force myself to use it exclusively, so that I
>>> would continue to be motivated. I plan to dedicate a certain amount of
>>> time
>>> each week to the project. I really don't know where it could end up at
>>> this point. The remote image thing would be a very high priority though.
>>> Never the less, Rome wasn't built in a day as it were ;-) Thanks for your
>>> response.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> *From:* Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:17 AM
>>> *To:* Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks
>>> *Subject:* RE: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the
>>> true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors
>>> that
>>> are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do
>>> much of what you want.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you
>>> might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task.
>>> There’s
>>> also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to
>>> see some investment, time or money, in those editors.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com
>>> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com]
>>> *On Behalf Of *Gerry Weaver
>>> *Sent:* 9 August, 2017 14:10
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
>>> *Subject:* Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hello All,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I
>>> know
>>> that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never
>>> been
>>> able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual
>>> Studio,
>>> so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more
>>> traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now.. I sorely
>>> miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet
>>> library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would
>>> like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would
>>> probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this
>>> because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested
>>> in
>>> such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make
>>> different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested
>>> in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly
>>> don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind
>>> of
>>> holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded
>>> individuals out there.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>

> _______________________________________________
> Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
> lisp-hug@lispworks.com
> http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

Re: Potential IDE project

Has anybody tried to run this? I get an "arithmetic error FLOATING-POINT-INVALID-OPERATION" error using sbcl on both

OSX and Linux after

(ql:quickload :projectured.executable)

and

(projectured::executable-toplevel)

As a novice Lisper I'm not sure how to where to go from this. The following code snippit suggests to me that there is some

intentionality in the behaviour... but I don't know enough so suss it out. Too bad :( the videos looked interesting

(def function executable-toplevel (&optional filename)

(with-standard-toplevel-restarts

(bind (((:values arguments filenames) (command-line-arguments:process-command-line-options +command-line-options+ (rest sb-ext:*posix-argv*))))

(process-help-command-line-argument arguments +command-line-options+)

(process-version-command-line-argument arguments +version+)

(process-quiet-command-line-argument arguments)

(editor.debug "Parsed command line arguments are: ~S" arguments)

(bind ((document (make-file-document (or filename (first filenames))))

(editor (make-default-editor document))

(measure-reader (process-measure-command-line-argument arguments :measure-reader))

(measure-evaluator (process-measure-command-line-argument arguments :measure-evaluator))

(measure-printer (process-measure-command-line-argument arguments :measure-printer)))

(call-read-evaluate-print-loop editor

:measure-reader measure-reader

:measure-evaluator measure-evaluator

:measure-printer measure-printer)))

+process-return-code/no-error+))

...

(def with-macro with-save-core-and-die-restart ()

(restart-case

(-body-)

#+sbcl

(save-core-and-die ()

:report "Save image to /tmp/sbcl.core and die"

(mapcar

(lambda (thread)

(unless (eq thread sb-thread:*current-thread*)

(sb-thread:terminate-thread thread)))

(sb-thread:list-all-threads))

(sb-ext:save-lisp-and-die "/tmp/sbcl.core"))))

(def with-macro with-standard-toplevel-restarts ()

(restart-case

(with-save-core-and-die-restart

(-body-))

(abort nil

:report (lambda (stream)

(format stream "Give up starting the image and quit the VM process with exit code 2"))

(quit 2))))

Cheers

David

On 13 Aug 2017, at 2:13 am, Camille Troillard <camille.troillard@icloud.com> wrote:

Thanks for the link.
I can't help but think about this editor:
https://github.com/projectured/projectured

I find this project quite interesting: there a video introducing it:
https://youtu.be/s05SlmZ7ZPc

Best,
Cam

RE: Potential IDE project

Wow. That is truly an impressive demonstration, and to think it was all one person!

From: emacstheviking [mailto:objitsu@gmail.com]
Sent: 13 August, 2017 17:08
To: Camille Troillard <camille.troillard@icloud.com>
Cc: Lisp HUG <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>; Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

I cried when I say that.

I have been thinking about an editor like that for over 20 years, even started writing one a few times but using C++ and cairo/pango... I hope he does well with it I truly appreciate his effort.

Pass the tissues.... "Leo" was the closest I found that was already out there.

On 12 August 2017 at 19:13, Camille Troillard <camille.troillard@icloud.com> wrote:

Thanks for the link.

I can't help but think about this editor:

https://github.com/projectured/projectured

I find this project quite interesting: there a video introducing it:

https://youtu.be/s05SlmZ7ZPc

Best,

Cam

On 11 Aug 2017, at 09:41, Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com> wrote:

Here’s an interesting read:

https://discuss.atom.io/t/the-deuce-editor-architecture/2218

From: emacstheviking [mailto:objitsu@gmail.com]
Sent: 11 August, 2017 15:05
To: Andrew Kirkpatrick <ubermonk@gmail.com>
Cc: Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>; 73budden . <budden73@gmail.com>; Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>; Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

I have often thought that the "Leo" editor ( http://leoeditor.com/ ) which I have used and absolutely loved for many reasons would make a good candidate... it's written in Python BUT of course there is https://github.com/hylang/hy so we could continue to work with our beloved s-expressions !

If you have not used Leo, it's a eye opener to how coding could / should be ?!!?

Plus, using Qt as the UI library must have some advantages althought I always found installing it to be tricky on certain platforms...

That's my .02 cents on the matter

Sean.

On 11 August 2017 at 01:41, Andrew Kirkpatrick <ubermonk@gmail.com> wrote:

If the goal is to avoid emacs and use something not old and
bit-rotten, this is all that comes to mind - though, being happy
enough with Emacs (and not wanting to run an instance of chromium just
to edit text files), I haven't used it much:

https://atom.io/packages/atom-slime

On 11 August 2017 at 10:02, Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com> wrote:
> I was thinking about this whole editor thread last night. I am really annoyed with GNU emacs too, and would love to have an non-commercial alternative. The trouble is, I think, the 'lisp curse' more than anything else. We (lispers, collectively), really need to focus on community building more than software building.
>
> Climbing down from the soapbox, perhaps contributing / reviving an existing editor project is the best way forward? I had a look again at Dylan Deuce and it seems like a good target. The editor has a good pedigree (in that it was designed and built by some ex-Symbolics folks), is a 3rd gen design and it seems DUIM was ported to common-lisp by Duncan Rose.
>
> Regards,
> - Steve Nunez
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: 73budden . [mailto:budden73@gmail.com]
> Sent: 9 August, 2017 19:25
> To: emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>
> Cc: Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>; Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>; Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
> Subject: Re: Potential IDE project
>
> Hi all!
>
> I'm slowly developing my Lisp IDE for about 2 years already. I tried to "advertise" it in 2015, but received nearly zero feedback, so I translated most of its parts to Russian and stopped further advertising.
>
> Key components are:
> 1. SWANK. Hence we have most of tools which present in SLIME (some with lower quality, some are better than in SLIME).
>
> 2. Some lisp-specific editing commands are borrowed from the fork of EMACS-like HEMLOCK editor, so knows something about CL. E.g. there is "indent sexp" command.
>
> 3. Written in a client-server architecture. Server is your lisp image (with IDE server sources loaded), client is a separate GUI application written in tcl/tk. Initially I tried to use tk wrappers for tcl, but quickly rejected that. Writing client in pure tcl is much easier and allows to use all tk components. Wrappers suggest rather narrow set of widgets and anyway when problems arise, you have to learn tcl/tk. Also there are some more or less "debuggers" for tcl, which allow to diagnose things with ease.
>
> 4. Permissively licensed.
>
> Site is here https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon_en , but it contains nothing essential today.
> Main branch is here: https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon
>
> Some screenshots are here
> https://bitbucket.org/budden/clcon/wiki/Screenshots (some old, some in Russian).
>
> Generally, everything is still in deep alpha quality, but I use the environment on a daily basis and almost never use EMACS.
>
> Main current features are:
>
> - supports only SBCL. Some effort is needed to port
> - tested under Windows and sometimes under Linux
> - every tool is in its own Window - like Lispworks IDE
> - no minibuffer, REPL is used instead to enter complex editor commands not listed in menu (no command completion yet)
> - multi-tabbed text editor with notepad-like look and feel
> - some lisp navigation commands (next/previous sexp, up sexp, mark sexp)
> - support of (in-readtable) form (missing in SLIME)
> - REPL with persistent history and search through the history
> - find in files with mutliple result windows (missing in EMACS)
> - go to definition
> - go to package definition, go to asd system definition (better than in EMACS)
> - inspector
> - debugger (stack, locals, inspect locals, eval in frame, return from frame, invoke restart)
> - thread list (with debug)
> - integration with cl-hyperdoc
> - compilation error browser, errors are sorted by severity (seem to be missing in EMACS)
> - list of definitions in the file (some quick hack with regexp)
>
> I can say definitely that "clcon" is incomparably more advanced than ABLE and LispIDE. It is weaker than Lispworks on EMACS. I never seen slimv, jabberwocky and so on.
>
> Most of UI and some portions of source code are now in Russian, but if actual collaborator would appear, I can fix that and prepare English version.
>
> I'm spending a very little resource on the development in a last year, but some things are to be done:
> - fix race conditions in the editor (some work is done, but more to do)
> - support CCL
> - improve performance of matching paren highlight
> - find and replace in files
> - automatic window placement
> - multiple editor windows (for now we have "open in another editor" menu item)
> - auto-completion for editor commands
> - improve editor bookmarks (now they are just prototype)
> - IDE programmer's guide (just add more examples indeed)
> - finish inspector GUI (now it misses some essential things)
>
>
>
> 2017-08-09 12:01 GMT+03:00, emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:
>> One thing I considered but never did (no time as ever) was to convert
>> the swank protocol to Google Buffers format.... has anybody done that
>> already maybe? Then it would open up the protocol to a whole raft of
>> platforms, tools and more importantly, hackers!
>>
>> :)
>>
>>
>> On 9 August 2017 at 09:51, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Steven,
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes. I have tried it. I was actually going to look into whether it
>>> would be practical to write a C++ client for swank. Although, the
>>> setup was pretty fiddly. I'm definitely going to use it as a
>>> reference though. One thing I really want is the ability to send the
>>> current editor buffer contents to headless remote images and deploy
>>> images to remote machines from the IDE.
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From:* Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 3:20 AM
>>> *To:* Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks; Rainer Joswig
>>>
>>> *Subject:* RE: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>> Gerry,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Every tried slime/swank? Worth a shot if you like minimal GUI IDEs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com
>>> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com]
>>> *On Behalf Of *Gerry Weaver
>>> *Sent:* 9 August, 2017 16:16
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>; Rainer Joswig <
>>> joswig@lisp.de>
>>> *Subject:* Re: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hi Rainer,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I have used the LispWorks IDE for a few years now. I was trying to
>>> avoid criticizing it here, because I feel like it would be
>>> disrespectful on a list dedicated to "LispWorks". I think the
>>> LispWorks folks have done a commendable job on their IDE. Having said
>>> that, as with all things, you can't please everyone. Unfortunately, I
>>> find myself unable to get completely comfortable with it. I guess
>>> when I'm switching back and forth between different IDEs (Visual
>>> Studio, QtCreator), LispWorks ends up feeling a little cumbersome. I
>>> mainly use Linux for Lisp development, so maybe that would matter for
>>> my case. I whole heartedly agree with you on the less is more aspect
>>> though. I want a lean, smooth, fast environment that gets out of the
>>> way. I think I would end up writing a lot more lisp code, if I had an
>>> IDE like that. I am more than happy to give up some functionality for
>>> anything close to the lean, smooth, fast feel. I do feel that all IDE
>>> windows and features should be a configuration option. I like IDEs
>>> that let me git rid of the stuff that I don't want. I'm definitely
>>> not a Java kind of guy and I don't care much for any of that world
>>> (even though I've been forced into it a few times). Have you seen
>>> QtCreator and other apps written with Qt? What are your thoughts
>>> about those apps? I've looked around quite a bit and I haven't been
>>> able to come up with a better choice than Qt so far. My current Lisp
>>> development environment is Sublime Text and a terminal with a REPL
>>> ;-). I've used the LispWorks IDE for debugging a couple of times, but
>>> I don't need it very often (even though it is pretty cool).
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com <owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
>>> on behalf of Rainer Joswig <joswig@lisp.de>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 2:38 AM
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks
>>> *Subject:* Re: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Remember that the LispWorks IDE is already cross platform and comes
>>> with an Emacs-like editor. Note also that LispWorks comes with the
>>> source code for the editor.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> It is also useful to give feedback to the LispWorks developers, since
>>> it may help them to see which features would help and integrate it
>>> into the product with new versions.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Personally LispWorks is my first choice for writing Lisp code and
>>> also some other editing tasks. I have GNU Emacs and also the Aquamacs
>>> variant of GNU Emacs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I like the light-weight editing in LispWorks and the look&feel on the
>>> Mac.
>>> One can easily add too much visual clutter and too much functionality
>>> to an editor. Do we really need code folding? I never use that in GNU
>>> Emacs. I don't even need paredit or similar. What I use is the
>>> s-expression based commands in LispWorks and the mouse support, incl.
>>> mouse copy.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> What I would prefer is slick look & feel. Smooth scrolling, nice
>>> fonts, more visual UI for the editor in menus (there are some useful
>>> extended commands which are hard to find), quick command overviews, I
>>> would like to be able to have all information in editor windows
>>> clickable (like the external format -> click on it to change it),
>>> some improvements in error handling for example when using unicode
>>> formats, etc.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I think usability is very important and sometimes less is more. I
>>> don't need much syntax highlighting and some people were reporting
>>> improvements turning it off in their IDEs.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> In the Java-World there are big IDEs like Netbeans, Eclipse and IntelliJ.
>>> They have much more features than just for Java development. Even
>>> though they have lots of useful features which could be reused, I
>>> would not like to use them for Lisp development.
>>>
>>> It's also that I don't like their visual appearance. They don't look
>>> slick and native. They have too many distractions and I don't like
>>> the multi-multi-pane window layouts...
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Rainer Joswig
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Am 09.08.2017 um 09:08 schrieb emacstheviking <objitsu@gmail.com>:
>>>
>>> I too have been where you are. The real *truth* is that there will
>>> never be a single perfect LISP IDE because we are all different with
>>> different views, preferences etc.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> My cure was a simple series of steps:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> studying the source code for emacs!!!
>>>
>>> study the source code for paredit mode carefully!
>>>
>>> learn to use paredit mode effectively
>>>
>>> learn to use SLIME effectively
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Unless you have LW (I do but rarely use it even though it is free)
>>> and live and breathe in it, Emacs *is* the best ready to go solution IMHO...
>>> you just have to really make the mental effort to learn all the short
>>> cut keystrokes for all the helpful stuff for manipulating
>>> s-expressions, navigation.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> All the best though, I'd certainly be interested BUT what language do we
>>> write it in ? ;)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I ask that because LISP might not be the best cross-platform GUI
>>> providing solution... perhaps Clojure would do the job coupled with
>>> say J4GL... if you are going to write a good UI ight as well go
>>> game-level on it, that was my plan!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> :)
>>> All the best!!!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Sean Charles
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 9 August 2017 at 07:27, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi Steven,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I hear you and you are right. It is a daunting task. It's just that I
>>> recently realized that I could continue dreaming or actually start doing
>>> something about it. My initial goal would be fairly modest. I would just
>>> try to get a syntax highlighting editor going with some kind of project
>>> based file management. I'd force myself to use it exclusively, so that I
>>> would continue to be motivated. I plan to dedicate a certain amount of
>>> time
>>> each week to the project. I really don't know where it could end up at
>>> this point. The remote image thing would be a very high priority though.
>>> Never the less, Rome wasn't built in a day as it were ;-) Thanks for your
>>> response.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>>
>>> *From:* Steven Nunez <snunez@mapr.com>
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:17 AM
>>> *To:* Gerry Weaver; Lisp Hug Lispworks
>>> *Subject:* RE: Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I don’t like emacs either. Perhaps you share my dislike of emacs in the
>>> true sense of the word: GNU Emacs. There have been emacs-like editors
>>> that
>>> are very good, like xmacs for instance, that would probably be able to do
>>> much of what you want.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The McCLIM guys were at one point trying to create such an editor, you
>>> might check over there. You’ll need help, it is a monumental task.
>>> There’s
>>> also the Dylan editor; that might make a good starting point. I’d love to
>>> see some investment, time or money, in those editors.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *From:* owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com
>>> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com]
>>> *On Behalf Of *Gerry Weaver
>>> *Sent:* 9 August, 2017 14:10
>>> *To:* Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
>>> *Subject:* Potential IDE project
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hello All,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I
>>> know
>>> that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never
>>> been
>>> able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual
>>> Studio,
>>> so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more
>>> traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely
>>> miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet
>>> library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would
>>> like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would
>>> probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this
>>> because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested
>>> in
>>> such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make
>>> different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested
>>> in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly
>>> don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind
>>> of
>>> holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded
>>> individuals out there.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Gerry
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>

> _______________________________________________
> Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
> lisp-hug@lispworks.com
> http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

Re: Potential IDE project

Hi All,

I have been watching this thread while on travel in Europe, and now finally back home in my own lab.

I have used things like Visual Studio, Xcode, Eclipse, and the Dylan system on Mac, as well as being a nearly 40 year veteran of Emacs. I’m trying to understand what your desires are in an editor for Lisp. All of the aforementioned IDE’s were aimed at strongly OOPL approaches, where displaying Classes and their Hierarchies makes a lot of sense.

But Lisp is only that kind of OOPL on some occasions, not anywhere near 100%, in my experience. So I’m wondering what it is that you really want in a Lisp environment that Emacs or Lispworks don’t already provide? Is it a more consistent key bindings methodology? Or are you more interested in a cross-language display paradigm that supports more admixtures of Web programming languages like JS and XML, in addition to Lisp?

- DM

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

Re: Potential IDE project

… okay, I see that I totally misinterpreted what this thread was about. An embedded editor solution was needed. I had thought that people were thinking about what the next leap in Lisp editing would be all about. I guess Lisp is still a few decades beyond the conventional languages. Just not as pretty.

I personally find that current day apps, with layers upon layers of drop-down menus, and artificial categorizations of commands among multiple menus, very unpleasant to use. You have to try to remember which menu you last saw that command. And pretty looking buttons often offer very scan hints on what function they perform. I do not see that as progress against the 1980’s style of text-based settings and personality files.

But I do try to imagine what the editor for the next generation would look like. How many different ways one might want to view the source code for a project. Long linear text at one extreme, and Smalltalk snippet displays at another extreme. The long linear text often shows too much detail and you get lost in it. The Smalltalk panels often offer too little context with respect to their associated Methods. Folded editing is one approach to cutting down on excess information. But what would the next gen editor show?

- DM

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

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Re: Potential IDE project

comments below.

Am 15.08.2017 um 07:56 schrieb Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>:

Hi David,

I have enjoyed reading everyone's take on the editor they would like to have. Some very interesting things have come to light. While I can't speak for anyone else, I can try to tell you what motivated my post. I switch between Visual Studio, Qt Creator, and Sublime Text. I would like something a little more like them for Lisp.

1. For me it is about more than an editor. I'm wanting a IDE that provides some additional features. The ability to target and deploy multiple images would be a good example.

That's a complex feature, given that Lispworks has a lot of browsers and advanced debugging.

Personally I would think that this might need in its full glory a feature that should be optional.

2. When I'm using LispWorks, I miss the feel of some of the other editors and IDEs. This is not to say that there is anything wrong with LispWorks. I just like the feel of some other editors better. This is totally a personal preference. A very simple example would be row and column numbers in the status bar.

Aren't there row and column numbers for the current point in the editor?

menu VIEW > Show column and Line

I also like code folding,

Lispworks has a editor view for searching through definitions.

indent guides, snippets,

for me the main point of snippets would be the curated content. I think generally it's a good idea, though I wonder how much integration it needs into the IDE. There are usually system-wide snippet extensions, but they might lack a special Common Lisp related query UI.

and auto completion. How exactly this would translate to Lisp is something that I'm still exploring.

3. I would like modern platform look and feel with the ability to do color themes. I prefer the darker ones myself.

I never understood that. I learned that the ergonomics of dark UIs is not good. I typically think themes is a system-wide feature.

But I know that it is popular. For me. white background and a nice font.

I am also not a fan of the separate windows. I would prefer an MDI type interface with dockable windows and tool bars.

I think that's a huge UI fail. If a window system of a platform is not capable enough that now each applications implement their own sort-of window systems, then there is something wrong with the platform. I personally also like to have less tools on the screen visible, then even more. Sometimes when I use a JAVA IDE, there is barely enough space to actually edit code - especially on laptops. If I switch views in the iDE (say from edit to debug), the whole screen gets reconfigured. Why? I can't also remember whether these MDI interfaces work usefully with multiple screens.

I know that it is popular, but I have never understood it - especially since many of these IDEs have long crossed the line from useful UI to overly-complex.

4. I want it to be snappy with smooth scrolling.

Yes. That's lacking in some places.

5. I want to be able to edit largish files with the necessary functions to make them manageable. For example, the ability to expand/collapse code folding with a key sequence or tool bar button.

In Lispworks you would use the editor view where you can search through the definitions. If the UI is not good enough, it could be improved.

The ability to see a list of definitions in a side window, so I can jump to the desired variable or function with a mouse click.

Again, that's an editor view. Lispworks has three editor views for that: Definitions, changed definitions, find definitions, ...

6. Refactoring is another area I plan to give some thought.

Okay.

7. I totally agree with you on the nested menu thing. I want all of that to be configurable, so that I can choose what is visible. There is a feature I've used that allows you to create different workspaces (ie; windows position, tool bars, menus, etc.). You can then switch between them with a key sequence or tool button click. You can setup workspaces that are tailored for certain tasks. I find that pretty compelling.

8. I find context sensitive help and documentation lookup useful (Qt Creator is a good example of this).

There is some in the Lispworks IDE. For example I use that Lispworks automatically shows me the arglists for functions and macros.

Some other remarks:

* I like more editor commands/settings in the menus and some more direct manipulation. For example I'd like to click on the external format displayed in the editor modeline and get a dialog. There is only a command 'Set External format'.

* it's definitely useful for each Lispworks user to read the IDE User Guide and the Editor User Guide:

http://www.lispworks.com/documentation/lw70/IDE-M/html/ide-m.htm

http://www.lispworks.com/documentation/lw70/EDUG-M/html/eduser-m.htm

There is actually a lot functionality to learn.

* Lispworks comes with the source code for the Editor

http://www.lispworks.com/documentation/lw70/EDUG-M/html/eduser-m-76.htm#pgfId-899478

Generally:

what might be useful would be to have some user shared IDE setups/extensions/hints repository. Time for another github repository?

Regards,

Rainer Joswig

Disclaimer: I program with Lisp primarily on Linux, so some of my points may not apply to win/mac.

Thanks,
Gerry

________________________________________
From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com <owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com> on behalf of David McClain <dbm@refined-audiometrics.com>
Sent: Monday, August 14, 2017 11:50 PM
To: Lisp HUG
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

… okay, I see that I totally misinterpreted what this thread was about. An embedded editor solution was needed. I had thought that people were thinking about what the next leap in Lisp editing would be all about. I guess Lisp is still a few decades beyond the conventional languages. Just not as pretty.

I personally find that current day apps, with layers upon layers of drop-down menus, and artificial categorizations of commands among multiple menus, very unpleasant to use. You have to try to remember which menu you last saw that command. And pretty looking buttons often offer very scan hints on what function they perform. I do not see that as progress against the 1980’s style of text-based settings and personality files.

But I do try to imagine what the editor for the next generation would look like. How many different ways one might want to view the source code for a project. Long linear text at one extreme, and Smalltalk snippet displays at another extreme. The long linear text often shows too much detail and you get lost in it. The Smalltalk panels often offer too little context with respect to their associated Methods. Folded editing is one approach to cutting down on excess information. But what would the next gen editor show?

- DM

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

RE: Potential IDE project

Hi Rainer,

I started answering your comments individually, but I quickly realized that I failed to explain that I’m not interested in creating replacement for the LispWorks environment. There are things that LispWorks is good at that really wouldn’t/shouldn’t need to be replicated. I just find that I normally don’t need a lot of them and that I’m willing to trade some things for a different look and feel. I agree that LispWorks has some very nice debugging facilities and that trying to duplicate those would really be a waste of time. I think it would be easy to take my remarks as a critique of the LispWorks GUI, but that is not my intention at all. I think of my little project as augmenting the existing tools for my needs. If I were trying to debug a difficult problem, I would most certainly reach for the LispWorks debugger. However, like many other features, I don’t use it all that often. I want to be able to use the LispWorks tools when I need them, but I don’t want to live there all of the time. I want a tool that is lighter and snappier that lives outside the image. In other words, I feel like my project will sit alongside LispWorks in my toolbox, not replace it.

Thanks,

Gerry

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Rainer Joswig
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 2:14 AM
To: Lisp HUG <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

comments below.

Am 15.08.2017 um 07:56 schrieb Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>:

Hi David,

I have enjoyed reading everyone's take on the editor they would like to have. Some very interesting things have come to light. While I can't speak for anyone else, I can try to tell you what motivated my post. I switch between Visual Studio, Qt Creator, and Sublime Text. I would like something a little more like them for Lisp.

1. For me it is about more than an editor. I'm wanting a IDE that provides some additional features. The ability to target and deploy multiple images would be a good example.

That's a complex feature, given that Lispworks has a lot of browsers and advanced debugging.

Personally I would think that this might need in its full glory a feature that should be optional.

2. When I'm using LispWorks, I miss the feel of some of the other editors and IDEs. This is not to say that there is anything wrong with LispWorks. I just like the feel of some other editors better. This is totally a personal preference. A very simple example would be row and column numbers in the status bar.

Aren't there row and column numbers for the current point in the editor?

menu VIEW > Show column and Line

I also like code folding,

Lispworks has a editor view for searching through definitions.

indent guides, snippets,

and auto completion. How exactly this would translate to Lisp is something that I'm still exploring.

3. I would like modern platform look and feel with the ability to do color themes. I prefer the darker ones myself.

I never understood that. I learned that the ergonomics of dark UIs is not good. I typically think themes is a system-wide feature.

But I know that it is popular. For me. white background and a nice font.

I am also not a fan of the separate windows. I would prefer an MDI type interface with dockable windows and tool bars.

I know that it is popular, but I have never understood it - especially since many of these IDEs have long crossed the line from useful UI to overly-complex.

4. I want it to be snappy with smooth scrolling.

Yes. That's lacking in some places.

5. I want to be able to edit largish files with the necessary functions to make them manageable. For example, the ability to expand/collapse code folding with a key sequence or tool bar button.

In Lispworks you would use the editor view where you can search through the definitions. If the UI is not good enough, it could be improved.

The ability to see a list of definitions in a side window, so I can jump to the desired variable or function with a mouse click.

Again, that's an editor view. Lispworks has three editor views for that: Definitions, changed definitions, find definitions, ...

6. Refactoring is another area I plan to give some thought.

Okay.

7. I totally agree with you on the nested menu thing. I want all of that to be configurable, so that I can choose what is visible. There is a feature I've used that allows you to create different workspaces (ie; windows position, tool bars, menus, etc.). You can then switch between them with a key sequence or tool button click. You can setup workspaces that are tailored for certain tasks. I find that pretty compelling.

8. I find context sensitive help and documentation lookup useful (Qt Creator is a good example of this).

There is some in the Lispworks IDE. For example I use that Lispworks automatically shows me the arglists for functions and macros.

Some other remarks:

* it's definitely useful for each Lispworks user to read the IDE User Guide and the Editor User Guide:

http://www.lispworks.com/documentation/lw70/IDE-M/html/ide-m.htm

http://www.lispworks.com/documentation/lw70/EDUG-M/html/eduser-m.htm

There is actually a lot functionality to learn.

* Lispworks comes with the source code for the Editor

http://www.lispworks.com/documentation/lw70/EDUG-M/html/eduser-m-76.htm#pgfId-899478

Generally:

what might be useful would be to have some user shared IDE setups/extensions/hints repository. Time for another github repository?

Regards,

Rainer Joswig

Disclaimer: I program with Lisp primarily on Linux, so some of my points may not apply to win/mac.

Thanks,
Gerry

________________________________________
From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com <owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com> on behalf of David McClain <dbm@refined-audiometrics.com>
Sent: Monday, August 14, 2017 11:50 PM
To: Lisp HUG
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

… okay, I see that I totally misinterpreted what this thread was about. An embedded editor solution was needed. I had thought that people were thinking about what the next leap in Lisp editing would be all about. I guess Lisp is still a few decades beyond the conventional languages. Just not as pretty.

I personally find that current day apps, with layers upon layers of drop-down menus, and artificial categorizations of commands among multiple menus, very unpleasant to use. You have to try to remember which menu you last saw that command. And pretty looking buttons often offer very scan hints on what function they perform. I do not see that as progress against the 1980’s style of text-based settings and personality files.

But I do try to imagine what the editor for the next generation would look like. How many different ways one might want to view the source code for a project. Long linear text at one extreme, and Smalltalk snippet displays at another extreme. The long linear text often shows too much detail and you get lost in it. The Smalltalk panels often offer too little context with respect to their associated Methods. Folded editing is one approach to cutting down on excess information. But what would the next gen editor show?

- DM

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

Re: Potential IDE project

> but I quickly realized that I failed to explain that I’m not interested in creating replacement for the LispWorks environment.

Sure, but this is the LispWorks mailing list, so don't be surprised if people think about that in relationship to the Lispworks IDE. ;-)

> I want a tool that is lighter

Again, that's an interesting point from the viewpoint of a Lispworks user. ;-) When a tool gets updated for 30 years it might assemble a lot of functionality, functionality which is may be no longer discoverable and/or rarely used. Some UI elements - and I'm including the text/command based UI - might need refactoring. Sometimes it's not the amount of new features, but the rearrangement and cleaning up of the UI which brings progress, too.

Unfortunately ;-) I don't think all of the current UI trends in IDEs are real improvements. Many developers are not very good in UI/UX topics and develop their own theories. From a developer view though, actually some stuff is progress. For example I like the integration of test tools (start tests, view results, inspect failed tests, ...) into an IDE. Lispworks has the compilation conditions browser, but not a UI for tests.

Regards,

Rainer

Am 15.08.2017 um 09:43 schrieb Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>:

Hi Rainer,

I started answering your comments individually, but I quickly realized that I failed to explain that I’m not interested in creating replacement for the LispWorks environment. There are things that LispWorks is good at that really wouldn’t/shouldn’t need to be replicated. I just find that I normally don’t need a lot of them and that I’m willing to trade some things for a different look and feel. I agree that LispWorks has some very nice debugging facilities and that trying to duplicate those would really be a waste of time. I think it would be easy to take my remarks as a critique of the LispWorks GUI, but that is not my intention at all. I think of my little project as augmenting the existing tools for my needs. If I were trying to debug a difficult problem, I would most certainly reach for the LispWorks debugger. However, like many other features, I don’t use it all that often. I want to be able to use the LispWorks tools when I need them, but I don’t want to live there all of the time. I want a tool that is lighter and snappier that lives outside the image. In other words, I feel like my project will sit alongside LispWorks in my toolbox, not replace it.

Thanks,
Gerry

RE: Potential IDE project

Hi Rainer,

Yes. I would imagine there could be some confusion about my motives. I thought I had mentioned something before, but I’ve deleted the emails. Let me go on record as saying that I’m a very satisfied LispWorks user and customer. When I decided to get into Lisp, I found LispWorks to be the clear choice far and away from the other options out there. I’m very happy about the inclusion of 64bit in the professional version and I will be purchasing licenses for Linux and FreeBSD when the next release comes out.

Now that I think of it, my issue with the GUI is really not a LispWorks issue per se. I think it has more to do with my view of GUIs in general. I look at there being 3 tiers of GUI. There is native (.net, cocoa, gtk), native/cross platform (Qt, WxWidgets), and other (Lisp, Java, etc.). I have never cared much for anything in the 3^rd tier. I guess it boils down to who it is for. If the customer/end user/me is the priority, then to me, tier 3 is not an option. I think what I really want is a Lisp IDE that is in tier 2 at most. Then again, I’m pretty pragmatic about my use of tools and languages. The right tool for the job and all ;-)

Thanks,

Gerry

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Rainer Joswig
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 3:18 AM
To: Lisp HUG <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

> but I quickly realized that I failed to explain that I’m not interested in creating replacement for the LispWorks environment.

Sure, but this is the LispWorks mailing list, so don't be surprised if people think about that in relationship to the Lispworks IDE. ;-)

> I want a tool that is lighter

Regards,

Rainer

Am 15.08.2017 um 09:43 schrieb Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>:

Hi Rainer,

I started answering your comments individually, but I quickly realized that I failed to explain that I’m not interested in creating replacement for the LispWorks environment. There are things that LispWorks is good at that really wouldn’t/shouldn’t need to be replicated. I just find that I normally don’t need a lot of them and that I’m willing to trade some things for a different look and feel. I agree that LispWorks has some very nice debugging facilities and that trying to duplicate those would really be a waste of time. I think it would be easy to take my remarks as a critique of the LispWorks GUI, but that is not my intention at all. I think of my little project as augmenting the existing tools for my needs. If I were trying to debug a difficult problem, I would most certainly reach for the LispWorks debugger. However, like many other features, I don’t use it all that often. I want to be able to use the LispWorks tools when I need them, but I don’t want to live there all of the time. I want a tool that is lighter and snappier that lives outside the image. In other words, I feel like my project will sit alongside LispWorks in my toolbox, not replace it.

Thanks,

Gerry

Re: Potential IDE project

Just an aside… if you haven’t installed Edi Weitz’s helper tools then you might be missing a lot of nice features in the editor and command bar in the editor. I would like to see his extensions added to LW as part of the distribution.

- DM


_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

RE: Potential IDE project

Hi Rainer,

Point taken. However, one of the unfortunate realities of Lisp in general is the lack and breadth of libraries. While I’m sure it is possible to create a reasonable GUI in Lisp, I’m not sure how practical it really is in this case. I would end up reinventing a lot of stuff that comes out of the box with Qt. Qt can also look really good when used effectively. When considering a project, I always look at library availability very closely. While Lisp is a very productive language in general, the need to reinvent stuff can offset that pretty quickly. If time wasn’t a factor, I would always go for tier 1. Being that I only write Lisp on Unix, I was really considering Qt for a quick start and the benefit of others. I’m afraid I’m not fully aware of the Qt on Mac issues even though I am aware that there are some. However, I don’t know how many of them are Qt itself versus implementation choices. Having said all of this, I’m sure my very limited experience with capi would be a major limiting factor as well.

Thanks,

Gerry

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Rainer Joswig
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 5:36 AM
To: Lisp HUG <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

With LispWorks we then are in tier-2: cross platform + native. LispWorks interfaces directly to the native platform (and not through something like Qt), provides its own cross platform framework and reuses lots of native UI elements (menus, windows, various prompters, drawing, ...) - which makes it comparable/competitive to something like Qt. But even Qt is not very pretty on my Mac. Qt is enough to deliver GUI apps on a Mac, but some applications tend to look&feel unsexy in many ways.

Regards,

Rainer

Am 15.08.2017 um 11:45 schrieb Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>:

Hi Rainer,

Yes. I would imagine there could be some confusion about my motives. I thought I had mentioned something before, but I’ve deleted the emails. Let me go on record as saying that I’m a very satisfied LispWorks user and customer. When I decided to get into Lisp, I found LispWorks to be the clear choice far and away from the other options out there. I’m very happy about the inclusion of 64bit in the professional version and I will be purchasing licenses for Linux and FreeBSD when the next release comes out.

Now that I think of it, my issue with the GUI is really not a LispWorks issue per se. I think it has more to do with my view of GUIs in general. I look at there being 3 tiers of GUI. There is native (.net, cocoa, gtk), native/cross platform (Qt, WxWidgets), and other (Lisp, Java, etc.). I have never cared much for anything in the 3^rd tier. I guess it boils down to who it is for. If the customer/end user/me is the priority, then to me, tier 3 is not an option. I think what I really want is a Lisp IDE that is in tier 2 at most. Then again, I’m pretty pragmatic about my use of tools and languages. The right tool for the job and all ;-)

Thanks,

Gerry

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Rainer Joswig
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 3:18 AM
To: Lisp HUG <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

> but I quickly realized that I failed to explain that I’m not interested in creating replacement for the LispWorks environment.

Sure, but this is the LispWorks mailing list, so don't be surprised if people think about that in relationship to the Lispworks IDE. ;-)

> I want a tool that is lighter

Again, that's an interesting point from the viewpoint of a Lispworks user. ;-) When a tool gets updated for 30 years it might assemble a lot of functionality, functionality which is may be no longer discoverable and/or rarely used. Some UI elements - and I'm including the text/command based UI - might need refactoring. Sometimes it's not the amount of new features, but the rearrangement and cleaning up of the UI which brings progress, too.

Unfortunately ;-) I don't think all of the current UI trends in IDEs are real improvements. Many developers are not very good in UI/UX topics and develop their own theories. From a developer view though, actually some stuff is progress. For example I like the integration of test tools (start tests, view results, inspect failed tests, ...) into an IDE. Lispworks has the compilation conditions browser, but not a UI for tests.

Regards,

Rainer

Am 15.08.2017 um 09:43 schrieb Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>:

Hi Rainer,

I started answering your comments individually, but I quickly realized that I failed to explain that I’m not interested in creating replacement for the LispWorks environment. There are things that LispWorks is good at that really wouldn’t/shouldn’t need to be replicated. I just find that I normally don’t need a lot of them and that I’m willing to trade some things for a different look and feel. I agree that LispWorks has some very nice debugging facilities and that trying to duplicate those would really be a waste of time. I think it would be easy to take my remarks as a critique of the LispWorks GUI, but that is not my intention at all. I think of my little project as augmenting the existing tools for my needs. If I were trying to debug a difficult problem, I would most certainly reach for the LispWorks debugger. However, like many other features, I don’t use it all that often. I want to be able to use the LispWorks tools when I need them, but I don’t want to live there all of the time. I want a tool that is lighter and snappier that lives outside the image. In other words, I feel like my project will sit alongside LispWorks in my toolbox, not replace it.

Thanks,

Gerry

Re: Potential IDE project

You know… reflecting back on nearly 50 years of experience in computing, I have to state that the past 30 leave me a bit negatively impressed by the state of the art in relation to GUI’s…

I don’t consider myself a GUI expert. I have written tons of it, but I was like a guerrilla fighter insofar as getting in as quickly as possible, learning just enough to become useful, then concentrating on the core reason for having the overlaying GUI - the main guts of the problem computing.

(BTW - I really appreciate Martin jumping in there and providing some more very useful hints. Surely some macros could generate a more DSL variant on what he shows.)

What comes to mind at the moment is that for the past 30 years, since the X-Windows project at MIT, we have been defining an Assembly Language of GUI elements. And piecing them together has been as arduous as writing a database engine in Machine Assembly Language. What we all need is a higher order language to describe GUI’s. CAPI does a good first stab, but remains still too low level.

The follow-on Live Kernel to the Self Project (Ungar, Kay) showed some hints of the kind of higher order, almost mathematical, description of graphics and GUI’s. That final project seems to have died, but some gleanings can be had from here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubaX1Smg6pY&t=3s

(the Nile Graphics Language at around 45 minutes into the video. A page of code to describe the entire graphics engine, compositing, etc.)

But lacking that kind of HOL I find myself groping around in CAPI, as needed, as little as possible, till I get sufficient GUI to apply to my main problem space. GUI’s are only an interface for me, not the end result.

- DM

RE: Potential IDE project

In decades, I have yet to see any IDE (have not used all, of course) that would/could work as well - for me - as a Symbolics 3600 Lisp Machine (pre Genera) in 1983.

From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of David McClain
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 12:43 PM
To: Lisp HUG <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

You know… reflecting back on nearly 50 years of experience in computing, I have to state that the past 30 leave me a bit negatively impressed by the state of the art in relation to GUI’s…

(BTW - I really appreciate Martin jumping in there and providing some more very useful hints. Surely some macros could generate a more DSL variant on what he shows.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubaX1Smg6pY&t=3s

(the Nile Graphics Language at around 45 minutes into the video. A page of code to describe the entire graphics engine, compositing, etc.)

- DM

Re: Potential IDE project

…sorry, I referenced the wrong video..

See this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubaX1Smg6pY&t=3731s

“Is it really “Complex”? Or did we just make it “Complicated”? - Alan Kay video

- DM

Re: Potential IDE project

On 8/15/17 Aug 15 -2:42 PM, David McClain wrote:
> What comes to mind at the moment is that for the past 30 years, since
> the X-Windows project at MIT, we have been defining an Assembly Language
> of GUI elements. And piecing them together has been as arduous as
> writing a database engine in Machine Assembly Language. What we all need
> is a higher order language to describe GUI’s. CAPI does a good first
> stab, but remains still too low level.

Mozilla's XUL tried to provide a higher-level language for GUI elements
(in, ugh, XML and RDF :-(), but never got much traction, AFAICT.

It has always seemed to me that the web breakdown into HTML & CSS has
been a disaster, because web applications have evolved and the HTML +
CSS world view theoretically provides "content" and "presentation", but
nowhere "behavior," and the nice way of declaratively attaching
presentation to content is not paralleled by any way to declaratively
attach behavior to content.

Cheers,
r

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

Re: Potential IDE project

Hi,

It’s good to see active discussions in this mailing list; but I think it’s humiliating that this whole “IDE" thread happens in the mailing list of LispWorks, which offers the best “available" IDE for Common Lisp.

The only thing I've learnt here, is the existence of the projectured [1] (from Camille), and I may try it in the future. Nothing else.

Thanks,

Chun Tian

[1] https://github.com/projectured/projectured

> Il giorno 09 ago 2017, alle ore 08:09, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> ha scritto:
> 
> Hello All,
> 
> I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I know that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never been able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual Studio, so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested in such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind of holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded individuals out there.
> 
> Thanks,
> Gerry
> 
>

RE: Potential IDE project

Hi Chun,

I feel very differently about this. I am a LispWorks user/customer. While I agree that LispWorks provides the best IDE available, there is still room for improvement. Hopefully, the LispWorks devs will consider some of the comments made here for future enhancements. One thing I am extremely grateful for is the fact that a polite and objective discussion like this can occur on this list. It speaks highly of LispWorks and the LispWorks community. I posted to this list, because of that and the fact that I respect the opinions here. I'm sorry, if you found it annoying in some way.

Thanks,
Gerry


-----Original Message-----
From: Chun Tian (binghe) [mailto:binghe.lisp@gmail.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 4:29 PM
To: Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>
Cc: Harlequin User Group <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

Hi,

It’s good to see active discussions in this mailing list; but I think it’s humiliating that this whole “IDE" thread happens in the mailing list of LispWorks, which offers the best “available" IDE for Common Lisp.

The only thing I've learnt here, is the existence of the projectured [1] (from Camille), and I may try it in the future. Nothing else.

Thanks,

Chun Tian

[1] https://github.com/projectured/projectured

> Il giorno 09 ago 2017, alle ore 08:09, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> ha scritto:
> 
> Hello All,
> 
> I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I know that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never been able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual Studio, so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested in such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make 
 different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly don't mean to offend anyone who is using o!
 ther tools or start some kind of holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded individuals out there.
> 
> Thanks,
> Gerry
> 
> 


_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

RE: Potential IDE project

Hi Denis,

I wasn't ignoring your post. I wanted to wait until I had the time to look at the links you provided and think it over. Since you ask, I would say c/tk would be tier 2 and tcl/tk would be tier 3. Please don't mind this tier business too much. It is just my own brand of nonsense. I kind of regret mentioning it. I believe people should use the languages and tools that suite them best.

I do appreciate the reminder about tk though. I had been meaning to take another look at that from a c perspective. I remember it being very light weight and snappy. I'm just not sure how much work would be required to get it to a level I would be satisfied with. Having said that, I do think it is possible to create a tk GUI that looks good. Your project is interesting. I plan to download it and take it for a spin when I have the time. I think I would have a tendency to flip it around and use c for the gui and tcl as an embedded scripting language though. What is it that you like about tcl? I'm just curious.

Someone also emailed me privately about wxWidgets. I will be taking a look at that as well. License and static linking is a bonus there. It is also a lot lighter weight than Qt, if I remember correctly. It has been quite a few years since I last used it.

Thanks,
Gerry

-----Original Message-----
From: 73budden . [mailto:budden73@gmail.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 5:18 AM
To: Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>
Subject: Re: Potential IDE project

Hi Gerry!

I have my CL IDE written in tcl/tk (you didn't react on my message about it on Lisp HUG).

What do you think about tk? Is it 2-d tier or 3-d tier in your view? I know it has a bad reputation, but, frankly, I never found it "ugly".
Maybe something is wrong with my eyes. There are some issues in tk, but they are not on "pretty-ugly" axis.

This can be relevant:
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/349409/why-are-tk-guis-considered-ugly

WBR, budden

2017-08-15 12:45 GMT+03:00, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com>:
> Hi Rainer,
>
> Yes. I would imagine there could be some confusion about my motives. I 
> thought I had mentioned something before, but I’ve deleted the emails. 
> Let me go on record as saying that I’m a very satisfied LispWorks user 
> and customer. When I decided to get into Lisp, I found LispWorks to be 
> the clear choice far and away from the other options out there. I’m 
> very happy about the inclusion of 64bit in the professional version 
> and I will be purchasing licenses for Linux and FreeBSD when the next release comes out.
>
> Now that I think of it, my issue with the GUI is really not a 
> LispWorks issue per se. I think it has more to do with my view of GUIs 
> in general. I look at there being 3 tiers of GUI. There is native 
> (.net, cocoa, gtk), native/cross platform (Qt, WxWidgets), and other 
> (Lisp, Java, etc.). I have never cared much for anything in the 3rd 
> tier. I guess it boils down to who it is for. If the customer/end 
> user/me is the priority, then to me, tier 3 is not an option. I think 
> what I really want is a Lisp IDE that is in tier 2 at most. Then 
> again, I’m pretty pragmatic about my use of tools and languages. The 
> right tool for the job and all ;-)
>
>
>
> Thanks,
> Gerry
>
>
> From: owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com 
> [mailto:owner-lisp-hug@lispworks.com] On Behalf Of Rainer Joswig
> Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2017 3:18 AM
> To: Lisp HUG <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
> Subject: Re: Potential IDE project
>
>> but I quickly realized that I failed to explain that I’m not 
>> interested in creating replacement for the LispWorks environment.
>
> Sure, but this is the LispWorks mailing list, so don't be surprised if 
> people think about that in relationship to the Lispworks IDE. ;-)
>
>> I want a tool that is lighter
>
> Again, that's an interesting point from the viewpoint of a Lispworks user.
> ;-)  When a tool gets updated for 30 years it might assemble a lot of 
> functionality, functionality which is may be no longer discoverable 
> and/or rarely used. Some UI elements - and I'm including the 
> text/command based UI
> - might need refactoring. Sometimes it's not the amount of new 
> features, but the rearrangement and cleaning up of the UI which brings progress, too.
>
> Unfortunately ;-) I don't think all of the current UI trends in IDEs 
> are real improvements. Many developers are not very good in UI/UX 
> topics and develop their own theories. From a developer view though, 
> actually some stuff is progress. For example I like the integration of 
> test tools (start tests, view results, inspect failed tests, ...) into 
> an IDE. Lispworks has the compilation conditions browser, but not a UI for tests.
>
> Regards,
>
> Rainer
>
>
> Am 15.08.2017 um 09:43 schrieb Gerry Weaver
> <gerryw@compvia.com<mailto:gerryw@compvia.com>>:
>
> Hi Rainer,
>
> I started answering your comments individually, but I quickly realized 
> that I failed to explain that I’m not interested in creating 
> replacement for the LispWorks environment. There are things that 
> LispWorks is good at that really wouldn’t/shouldn’t need to be 
> replicated. I just find that I normally don’t need a lot of them and 
> that I’m willing to trade some things for a different look and feel. I 
> agree that LispWorks has some very nice debugging facilities and that 
> trying to duplicate those would really be a waste of time. I think it 
> would be easy to take my remarks as a critique of the LispWorks GUI, 
> but that is not my intention at all. I think of my little project as 
> augmenting the existing tools for my needs. If I were trying to debug 
> a difficult problem, I would most certainly reach for the LispWorks debugger. However, like many other features, I don’t use it all that often.
> I want to be able to use the LispWorks tools when I need them, but I 
> don’t want to live there all of the time. I want a tool that is 
> lighter and snappier that lives outside the image. In other words, I 
> feel like my project will sit alongside LispWorks in my toolbox, not replace it.
>
> Thanks,
> Gerry
>
>
>
>

_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

Re: Potential IDE project

On 8/15/17 Aug 15 -10:29 PM, Gerry Weaver wrote:
> Someone also emailed me privately about wxWidgets. I will be taking a look at that as well. License and static linking is a bonus there. It is also a lot lighter weight than Qt, if I remember correctly. It has been quite a few years since I last used it.


I believe that Franz uses Gtk for their UI stuff....  But I'm not sure
it's actually portable across platforms (maybe Windows has a different
one?).


_______________________________________________
Lisp Hug - the mailing list for LispWorks users
lisp-hug@lispworks.com
http://www.lispworks.com/support/lisp-hug.html

Re: Potential IDE project

I share your sentiment in relation to emacs, I have gotten used to it and actually prefer it to the default LW IDE by most part but Lisp definitely needs something else if it were to be accessible to general population.

I have used Visual Studio extensively quite a lot and I would agree with you that it may cause discontent with emacs. There is a Lisp extension for VS but it is not particularly usable at the moment, one can edit code in it but there is no repl. If there was a reasonably functional Lisp extension to VS I would be actually willing pay for that.

On Wed, 09 Aug 2017 07:09:51 +0100, Gerry Weaver <gerryw@compvia.com> wrote:

Hello All,

I've been contemplating the possibility of writing an IDE for Lisp. I know that most Lisp developers use emacs, but try as I might, I have never been able to enjoy using it. I spend a fair amount of time using Visual Studio, so that could well be a factor. Anyway, I have been wanting a more traditional IDE (in the other language sense) for some time now. I sorely miss certain IDE features when programming in Lisp. Things like a snippet library, code completion, code folding, etc.. One major feature I would like to have is the ability to target multiple remote images. I would probably use Qt and QScintilla as a starting point. I'm posting this because I was wondering if there was anyone else who would be interested in such a thing? If I knew that there was interest, I would probably make different choices when developing the project. I would also be interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on the topic in general. I most certainly don't mean to offend anyone who is using other tools or start some kind of holy war. I'm just trying to find out if there are any like minded individuals out there..

Thanks,
Gerry

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FW: Potential IDE project

Hello All,

Well, it has been both interesting and informative. I have received responses ranging from genuine encouragement to incensed outrage (privately of course). I’m not sure what to make of the latter. I guess I don’t understand what is at stake and how my project represents such a threat to those individuals. I was also surprised that some folks provided positive feedback privately, but did not want to have it known publicly. So… Based on the relatively low interest level in what I’m trying to do, I will continue my efforts quietly. I may put something out there at some point, but it is not a priority. I have managed to get something basic going that is already a big improvement over how I was working before. For those of you that are interested in what I’m doing, I will be glad to correspond with you privately going forward. However, as far as I’m concerned at least, this thread has probably run its course.

I would like to thank those folks that have given me good advice and constructive criticism. Denis (73budden) in particular. I am pretty sure that I will have some Lisp/LispWorks questions as I try to get things like debugging working and I hope that I will be able to get some help on those in the future. To all of those who sent the private emails, which could be characterized as nothing less than rabid insanity, relax. Take a deep breath. Your safe. For now ;-)

Thanks,

Gerry

From: Gerry Weaver
Sent: Wednesday, August 9, 2017 1:10 AM
To: Lisp Hug Lispworks <lisp-hug@lispworks.com>
Subject: Potential IDE project

Hello All,

Thanks,
Gerry