Portable Standard Lisp
Encyclopedia
Portable Standard Lisp is a tail-recursive dynamically bound dialect of Lisp
inspired by its predecessor, Standard Lisp and the Portable Lisp Compiler. It was developed by researchers at the University of Utah
in 1980, which released PSL 3.1; development was handed over to developers at Hewlett-Packard
in 1982 who released PSL 3.3 and up. Portable Standard Lisp was available as a kit containing a screen editor, a compiler
, and an interpreter
for the 68000 processor architecture
, DEC-20s, CRAY-1
s, and the VAX
architecture (among many others). Today, PSL is mainly developed by and available from Konrad-Zuse-Zentrum für Informationstechnik Berlin. Its main modern use is as underlying language for implementations of Reduce.
Like most older lisps, PSL in the first step compiles Lisp to LAP code, which is a platform independent language in its own. However, where older lisps mostly compiled LAP directly to assembler or some architecture dependent intermediate, PSL compiles the LAP to C
code, which would run in a virtual machine language; so programs written in it in principle are as portable as C itself, which is very portable. The compiler itself was written in PSL or a more primitive dialect dubbed "System Lisp"/"SYSLISP" as "an experiment in writing a production-quality Lisp in Lisp itself as much as possible, with only minor amounts of code written by hand in assembly language or other systems languages", so the whole ensemble could bootstrap
itself, and improvements to the compiler improved the compiler itself as well. Some later releases had a compatibility package for Common Lisp
, but this is not sustained in the modern versions.
, and some people found it not very pleasant to use. Richard P. Gabriel wrote in his popular essay Lisp: Good News, Bad News, How to Win Big, "the third most standard Lisp was Portable Standard Lisp, which ran on many machines, but very few people wanted to use it;"
Lisp programming language
Lisp is a family of computer programming languages with a long history and a distinctive, fully parenthesized syntax. Originally specified in 1958, Lisp is the second-oldest high-level programming language in widespread use today; only Fortran is older...
inspired by its predecessor, Standard Lisp and the Portable Lisp Compiler. It was developed by researchers at the University of Utah
University of Utah
The University of Utah, also known as the U or the U of U, is a public, coeducational research university in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States. The university was established in 1850 as the University of Deseret by the General Assembly of the provisional State of Deseret, making it Utah's oldest...
in 1980, which released PSL 3.1; development was handed over to developers at Hewlett-Packard
Hewlett-Packard
Hewlett-Packard Company or HP is an American multinational information technology corporation headquartered in Palo Alto, California, USA that provides products, technologies, softwares, solutions and services to consumers, small- and medium-sized businesses and large enterprises, including...
in 1982 who released PSL 3.3 and up. Portable Standard Lisp was available as a kit containing a screen editor, a compiler
Compiler
A compiler is a computer program that transforms source code written in a programming language into another computer language...
, and an interpreter
Interpreter (computing)
In computer science, an interpreter normally means a computer program that executes, i.e. performs, instructions written in a programming language...
for the 68000 processor architecture
68k
The Motorola 680x0/m68000/68000 is a family of 32-bit CISC microprocessors. During the 1980s and early 1990s, they were popular in personal computers and workstations and were the primary competitors of Intel's x86 microprocessors...
, DEC-20s, CRAY-1
Cray-1
The Cray-1 was a supercomputer designed, manufactured, and marketed by Cray Research. The first Cray-1 system was installed at Los Alamos National Laboratory in 1976, and it went on to become one of the best known and most successful supercomputers in history...
s, and the VAX
VAX
VAX was an instruction set architecture developed by Digital Equipment Corporation in the mid-1970s. A 32-bit complex instruction set computer ISA, it was designed to extend or replace DEC's various Programmed Data Processor ISAs...
architecture (among many others). Today, PSL is mainly developed by and available from Konrad-Zuse-Zentrum für Informationstechnik Berlin. Its main modern use is as underlying language for implementations of Reduce.
Like most older lisps, PSL in the first step compiles Lisp to LAP code, which is a platform independent language in its own. However, where older lisps mostly compiled LAP directly to assembler or some architecture dependent intermediate, PSL compiles the LAP to C
C (programming language)
C is a general-purpose computer programming language developed between 1969 and 1973 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system....
code, which would run in a virtual machine language; so programs written in it in principle are as portable as C itself, which is very portable. The compiler itself was written in PSL or a more primitive dialect dubbed "System Lisp"/"SYSLISP" as "an experiment in writing a production-quality Lisp in Lisp itself as much as possible, with only minor amounts of code written by hand in assembly language or other systems languages", so the whole ensemble could bootstrap
Bootstrapping (compilers)
In computer science, bootstrapping is the process of writing a compiler in the target programming language which it is intended to compile...
itself, and improvements to the compiler improved the compiler itself as well. Some later releases had a compatibility package for Common Lisp
Common Lisp
Common Lisp, commonly abbreviated CL, is a dialect of the Lisp programming language, published in ANSI standard document ANSI INCITS 226-1994 , . From the ANSI Common Lisp standard the Common Lisp HyperSpec has been derived for use with web browsers...
, but this is not sustained in the modern versions.
Criticism
Portable Standard Lisp is not as full of features as e.g. Common LispCommon Lisp
Common Lisp, commonly abbreviated CL, is a dialect of the Lisp programming language, published in ANSI standard document ANSI INCITS 226-1994 , . From the ANSI Common Lisp standard the Common Lisp HyperSpec has been derived for use with web browsers...
, and some people found it not very pleasant to use. Richard P. Gabriel wrote in his popular essay Lisp: Good News, Bad News, How to Win Big, "the third most standard Lisp was Portable Standard Lisp, which ran on many machines, but very few people wanted to use it;"