Does Mac OS X come with a Lisp environment built in with Emacs?

Question

I have been trying to find an environment that does not involve installing anything else on my mac for Lisp, as I will not be using it after I get the homework done (who know if I continue using it). I have tried to look but I can't find anything. Anybody know if it does have it, and how to use it within Emacs?

Answer 1

You have a few options for one-click Lisp environments.

If you prefer an Emacs-based environment, check out LispBox. This actually installs a separate instance of Emacs, afaik, so you probably won't have your existing Emacs settings with it.

If you want to use your existing Emacs, SLIME is available both through quicklisp (which you really should be using) or through ELPA.

If you're ok with not having an Emacs environment, and you're not going to be using the language for long, look into LispWorks personal, which has a one-click environment installer in OS X.

If you were actually asking about Scheme (or could go for either Scheme or Common Lisp), take a look at Racket (not technically a Scheme, it actually has a lot of additional features, but they do support R5RS and have a fairly short list of unsupported R6RS features).

Answer 2

Emacs Lisp is rather different from regular Lisp, so it's probably not directly useful for classes or self-study if your target is something like Scheme or Common Lisp. But yes, Emacs has its own Lisp interpreter (or rather, is its own Lisp interpreter). You might want to read up on the differences between Emacs elisp and other dialects / variants to determine whether it might suit your needs.