Programming Challenge Numbers to Text?

[Levi Pearson]

On May 5, 2006, at 2:34 PM, Shane Hathaway wrote:

> Levi Pearson wrote:
>> That is essentially equivalent to the following C-ish code:
>> fprintf(stdout, "%r\n%r\n%r\n%r\n%r\n", 1, 15, 91283, 4918239,   
>> 2147483947);
>
> Ok, I should have noticed that.
>
>> You sound very obtuse to me, and I would consider your comment a  
>> mark  against you.
>
> I don't think I sound obtuse, although I'm sure I sound dense. ;-)
>
> Still, the fact that it's a language feature rather than a library  
> function looks like a mistake to me.
>

The definition of Common Lisp is almost all 'standard library' stuff,  
because the language grammar itself is rather simple.  Just as printf  
is in the C standard library, format is in standardized Common Lisp.   
BTW, you /can/ extend format to add new ~ directives, so ~r could  
have been implemented as a library.  I think it's great to have a  
string formatting function that makes it trivial to create readable,  
gramatically-correct output strings.

I still haven't figured out your reasoning for thinking this was a  
mistake.  On the other hand, Scheme exists for people who want to use  
Lisp but want to write all the libraries themselves.

		--Levi