More Lisp-In-Perl

[runrig]

This was inspired by Lisp-In-Perl and my slight disappointment in both it and perl-lisp on CPAN. I've come up with my own implementation of Lisp-like linked-lists and functions/methods, so I could do what neither of the other lisps could, namely:

(defun transpose (x) (apply 'mapcar (cons 'list x))

Which on this input:
(transpose '((1 2 3) (4 5 6) (7 8 9) (10 11 12)))
Should product this output:
((1 4 7 10) (2 5 8 11) (3 6 9 12))

The perl version of this (which currently works!) goes like this:

use LISP qw(cons);

# Create linked list (Not an array!)
my $list = LISP->new([[1,2,3,4],[5,6,7,8],[9,10,11,12]]);
print $list->string; # Prints ((1 2 3 4) (5 6 7 8) (9 10 11 12))
my $mapcarf = LISP->new(\&LISP::Lambda::mapcar);
my $listf   = LISP->new($list->can('list'));
# We probably ought to go for closure on mapcarf and listf
# But this is OK for now
my $transpose = sub {$mapcarf->apply(cons($listf, shift))};
$list=$transpose->($list);
print $list->string;   # Prints ((1 5 9) (2 6 10) (3 7 11) (4 8 12))
$list=$transpose->($list);
print $list->string;   # Prints ((1 2 3 4) (5 6 7 8) (9 10 11 12))

It's only a matter of time before I get a full-blown lisp2perl compiler (I think). I'm looking for input on what I've got so far. Shall I post the whole thing(about 600 lines) or just upload it to CPAN?

[KM]

Why don't you provide a link for us to see it on your own webspace? IMO, 600 lines is a lot to post here (basically a pain to read) and don't "just" upload something to CPAN if you simply want input. I'd be interested in a link though, as well as what your module(s) does which the other ones do not, and how you have tried to collaborate with the other Lisp-ish module authors to make sure noone is making Yet Another Lisp Module :-)

Cheers,
KM

[runrig]

Well, seeing that I don't currently have any webspace or access to upload to any public ftp site, but I do already have an account on CPAN (and can delete files if I need to), I went ahead and uploaded the file to my directory here. You'll need a PAUSE account to get to it until it makes its way around to public servers (I think thats how it works).

This is neither a Lisp compiler nor interpreter yet, and it may be YALM, but I was dissatisfied by the other modules for such basic reasons that I thought an entirely new module was warranted.

The module in Lisp-In-Perl was ok, but implemented lists in a way that requires its own garbage collector, which though novel, is sort of absurd when perl can take out the garbage on its own. And the perl-lisp distribution on CPAN implemented lists using arrays, which made using Lisp list functions impossible.

And I just wanted to create a more OO way of manipulating the lists. Also I wanted to experiment with autoloading, where I came up with this recursive autoloading routine (which is but one of the things I am looking for input on):

sub AUTOLOAD {
 return if $AUTOLOAD =~ /::DESTROY$/;
 # Autoload cadr, caddr, etc.
 if ($AUTOLOAD =~ /::c([ad]+)([ad])r$/) {
  no strict 'refs';
  my $meth1 = "c$1r";
  my $meth2 = "c$2r";
  *{$AUTOLOAD} = sub { shift->$meth2->$meth1 };
  goto &$AUTOLOAD;
 }
 carp $AUTOLOAD =~ /(.*)::(.*)$/
  ? qq!Couldn't load sub/method "$2" via package "$1"!
  : "Couldn't load subroutine $AUTOLOAD";
}

Update: It seems to have made its way to CPAN and can be found here. I'm thinking that maybe I should rename it as it might conflict with perl-lisp, because I forgot that some OS's are case-insensitive when it comes to file names.