[ale] LISP to C

[Michael Campbell]

Beware, down this path lay demons!

One of the problems with language-to-language conversions (unless the
languages are already very similar, which these 2 are decidedly not =) is
the complete loss of idioms in the language you convert to.  You *CAN*
convert them of course, but they generally are, as mentioned below, almost
totally unmaintainable if even readable at all.  I've been at companies
that did these sorts of things in the past and they get you over an initial
"hump" usually, but in the end any such code that had to be looked at later
was always rewritten from scratch.  Some code of course never IS looked at
again (standard libraries and such) and can remain, but after the
institutional knowledge of it has faded, that code has a momentum of
opacity too, and sometimes remains even when it SHOULD be looked at and
modified.





On Mon, Feb 20, 2012 at 12:25 PM, Watson, Keith <krwatson at cc.gatech.edu>wrote:

> ==== begin quote ====
>
> Terry Bailey | 14 Feb 17:05
> LISP to C
>
> Is there a way to convert LISP source code into readable C source code?
>
> ==== end quote ====
>
>
> Terry posted the following question and I just happened to get asked the
> same question today. Here is the answer:
>
> Yes sort of. It can be converted to human readable form but it may not be
> very maintainable.
>
> convert lisp to c - I really didn't expect this search to work but it did.
>
> http://www.google.com/#hl=en&sclient=psy-ab&q=convert+lisp+to+c&pbx=1&oq=convert+lisp+to+c&aq=f&aqi=g1g-v2&aql=&gs_sm=3&gs_upl=39808l43803l5l44535l17l12l0l4l4l0l104l909l11.1l16l0&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf
> .,cf.osb&fp=d272a33775ff33c4&biw=1202&bih=750
>
> http://preview.tinyurl.com/6of4vok
>
>
> is it possible to convert LISP to C?
>
> http://www.velocityreviews.com/forums/t683509-is-it-possible-to-convert-lisp-to-c.html
>
> http://preview.tinyurl.com/36vt4dq
>
>
> ECL may do it
> http://ecls.sourceforge.net/
>
>
> CLiCC: Common Lisp to C Compiler
>
> http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs/project/ai-repository/ai/lang/lisp/impl/clicc/0.html
>
> http://www.cliki.net/CLiCC
>
>
> Chestnut Lisp translator - now defunct
>
> http://www.rhinocerus.net/forum/lang-lisp/425655-chestnut-lisp-translator.html
>
> http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.lisp/msg/88c50739f36e0b7e
>
>
> Thinlisp - a possible successor to Chestnut Lisp translator
> http://www.thinlisp.org/
>
>
> GCL - an implementation of Common Lisp
> http://www.gnu.org/software/gcl/
>
>
> >From the LISP FAQ
> http://www.cs.cmu.edu/Groups/AI/html/faqs/lang/lisp/part4/faq-doc-3.html
>
> Subject: [4-1a] Lisp to C translators
>
> Lisp-to-C Translator translates Common Lisp into human-readable ANSI
> C.  Release 3.2 supports such features as CLOS, the condition system,
> Lisp type declaration heeding, and Mac, Windows, and Alpha
> compatibility.  (Release 3.0, introduced in 1992, eliminated the old
> requirement that the garbage collector had to be called explicitly).
> Works with Lucid, Symbolics, Allegro, Harlequin and MCL.  It costs
> $11,995.  Write to: Chestnut Software, Inc., 2 Park Plaza, Suite 205,
> Boston, MA, 02116, call 617-542-9222, fax 617-542-9220, or e-mail Mr.
> Kenneth J. Koocher <ken at chestnut.com>.
>
> Some Lisp compilers (AKCL, Ibuki) and Scheme compilers (Bigloo,
> Hobbit/SCM, Scheme->C) compile into C.
>
>
> keith
>
> --
>
> Keith R. Watson                        Georgia Institute of Technology
> IT Support professional Lead           College of Computing
> keith.watson at cc.gatech.edu             801 Atlantic Drive NW
> (404) 385-7401                         Atlanta, GA 30332-0280
>
>
>
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