7. Dialects

A dialect of Lisp is a specific implementation. For the parts of Common Lisp which are well specified, they are usually the same. For the parts that are not (debugger, top-level loop, etc.), there is usually the same functionality but different commands.

ILISP provides the means to specify these differences so that the ILISP commands will use the specific command peculiar to an implementation, but still offer the same behavior with the same interface.

7.1 Defining new dialects

To define a new dialect use the macro defdialect. For examples, look at the dialect definitions in `ilisp-acl.el', `ilisp-cmu.el', `ilisp-kcl.el', `ilisp-luc.el'. There are hooks and variables for almost anything that you are likely to need to change. The relationship between dialects is hierarchical with the root values being defined in setup-ilisp. For a new dialect, you only need to change the variables that are different than in the parent dialect.

7.2 Writing new commands

Basic tools for creating new commands:

deflocal

Define a new buffer local variable.

ilisp-dialect

List of dialect types. For specific dialect clauses.

lisp-symbol

Create a symbol.

lisp-symbol-name

Return a symbol's name

lisp-symbol-delimiter

Return a symbol's qualification

lisp-symbol-package

Return a symbol's package

lisp-string-to-symbol

Convert string to symbol

lisp-symbol-to-string

Convert symbol to string

lisp-buffer-symbol

Convert symbol to string qualified for buffer

lisp-previous-symbol

Return previous symbol

lisp-previous-sexp

Return previous sexp

lisp-def-name

Return name of current definition

lisp-function-name

Return previous function symbol

ilisp-read

Read an sexp with completion, arglist, etc

ilisp-read-symbol

Read a symbol or list with completion

ilisp-completing-read

Read from choices or list with completion

Notes:

• Special commands like arglist should use ilisp-send to send a message to the inferior Lisp.

• Eval/compile commands should use eval-region-lisp or compile-region-lisp.

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