Music 220b: Winter 2001
Fernando Lopez-Lezcano, instructor
Christopher Burns, teaching assistant
Tamara Smyth, teaching assistant

Week 2: more on the lisp interpreter

There are a number of useful commands which control the lisp interpreter. They aren't part of Common Lisp proper, but they're essential for efficient work in CCRMA's lisp environment. You should already be familiar with :cl and :ld --

• :ld
  Load a file containing arbitrary lisp code and execute that code. Much like copying a lisp program and pasting it at the interpreter prompt.
• :cl
  Compile and load a file. We'll reserve this command for files containing CLM instrument definitions (e.g., (definstrument) calls).
• :cd
  Switch to another directory. Can make it easier to specify filenames if you need to issue lots of :ld and :cl commands.
• :help
  Print a listing of all the interpreter commands.
• :zoom
  Zoom in on an error; can be useful when something goes wrong and you need to debug.
• :res
  Reset the error stack; prevents errors from piling up.
• :ex
  Exit the lisp interpreter; it's not a bad idea to do this at the end of your session, before you close xemacs.

Use :help to find out about additional interpreter commands.

In addition, note that you can use 'ctrl-up arrow' and 'ctrl-down arrow' to recall commands that you've already issued to the interpreter -- very useful if you want to issue a command you've already used, or if you want to edit one parameter in a long lisp statement.

Xemacs can also help make your life easier. For instance, you can split the xemacs window into two frames with c-x 2. Open a lisp file in the top window with c-x c-f, then run the interpreter in the bottom window with c-x l. C-x o will switch between windows, and c-x c-e will pass a lisp statement from the file window to the interpreter window, where it will be evaluated.... The xemacs cheat sheet has more useful commands.

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