10 ms·

Land of Lisp is finally out...and has a music video.

398 points by drcode 16y ago

drcode 16y ago
Hi HNers- I'm Conrad (aka drcode) the author of said book. Thanks guys for helping build the buzz around LOL! (I should also thank pg for getting me into this stuff in the first place.) I'll be lurking in this thread today and tomorrow... feel free to post any questions about the book or about Lisp in general and I will answer them. Here's the only coupon code currently for the book. I'm posting it exclusively on HN and proggit: 76738380768586 (ASCII for LISPLUV :-) It gives a 35% discount on the Book+eBook combo on the No Starch site (http://nostarch.com/lisp.htm http://nostarch.com/lisp.htm). It expires 11/3. (FYI- If you just want the eBook, No Starch already has a 50% off sale right now across the board. If you only want the print copy, Amazon has a heavily discounted price already, for reasons that are mysterious to me. Oh, and if you've already pre-ordered, just cancel and reorder to get the discount.)
- rsmaniak 16y ago
  Hey I just bought a copy of the e-book but I can't download it yet there's only a dummy file.
  - drcode 16y ago
    Hi- I just talked to my No Starch contact and they said the PDF should appear any moment- apologies... a little glitch on take-off.
    - rsmaniak 16y ago
      Great, thanks!
  - drcode 16y ago
    Hi- The glitch is fixed- You should have just received the correct PDF... Email me at lisperati@gmail.com if this is not the case.
- forwardslash 16y ago
  I preordered your book, can't wait for it to come!
- moogatronic 16y ago
  awesome! I was putting off ordering this while I finished reading Joy of Clojure, but the coupon code forced my hand. Thanks - Looking forward to the print copy arrival.
- swannodette 16y ago
  You've also put together an amazing site for the book! Both the video and comic are hilarious and top notch. I'd send anybody curious about Lisp to your book site in a heartbeat. Long Live Lisp.
- aiurtourist 16y ago
  What a wonderful step in the direction of making Lisp "cool." The site is great, the comic is witty and wonderful, and — after meeting the No Starch guy a few years ago — you chose a great publisher.
- spoon16 16y ago
  purchased, looks fun!
- mark_l_watson 16y ago
  Thanks for the discount code Conrad, I just used it to buy the print+PDF book. Also: I have really enjoyed your writing on the web for a long time!
- Sikul 16y ago
  I enjoyed the comic. There is a typo in the last panel. It says "Doug the developer and and the others could now return to their programming, no longer in fear of bugs." The word "and" is repeated.
  - drcode 16y ago
    Thanks
- vu3rdd 16y ago
  Thanks. I had been waiting for this book for a long time. After some 3 attempts of download, I could download the book. All I can say is that this book is really awesome!
- speek 16y ago
  Congrats on the release. I'm excited to finish reading the book. I just thought you should know, however, that there's a minor mistake (I think) in some of the walkthrough stuff in the pdf. On page 56: > (defun pudding-eater (person) (cond ((eq person 'henry) (setf *arch-enemy* 'stupid-lisp-alien) '(curse you lisp alien – you ate my pudding)) ((eq person 'johnny) (setf *arch-enemy* 'useless-old-johnny) '(i hope you choked on my pudding johnny)) (t '(why you eat my pudding stranger ?)))) > (pudding-eater 'johnny) (I HOPE YOU CHOKED ON MY PUDDING JOHNNY) > *arch-enemy* JOHNNY arch-enemy at this time should hold the value 'useless-old-johnny, not 'johnny
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  - drcode 16y ago
    Yes, you are right- You found the first errata! At least the intent of the code is still clear.
  - kaffiene 16y ago
    But LISP is immune to bugs!?! What gives??
  - ponnap 16y ago
    It seems to work for me. CL-USER> (defvar *arch-enemy* nil) (defun pudding-eater (person) (cond ((eq person 'henry)(setf *arch-enemy* 'stupid-lisp-alien)'(curse you lisp alien - you ate my pudding)) ((eq person 'johnny)(setf *arch-enemy* 'useless-old-johnny)'(i hope you choked on my pudding johnny)) (t'(why you ate my pudding stranger?)))) PUDDING-EATER CL-USER> *arch-enemy* NIL CL-USER> (pudding-eater 'johnny) (I HOPE YOU CHOKED ON MY PUDDING JOHNNY) CL-USER> *arch-enemy* USELESS-OLD-JOHNNY CL-USER>
- alrex021 16y ago
  Firstly, congratulations on completing the book. Will this book be available for Kindle by any chance?
  - drcode 16y ago
    My understanding is it will appear on the kindle in the near future (though I don't know the process for this 100%)
    - dpapathanasiou 16y ago
      If your contract with NoStarch permits, my startup (http://fifobooks.com/ http://fifobooks.com/) could do this for you. I.e., we could produce a native ebook (not pdf) file for the Kindle, iPad, Nook, Sony, and a bunch of other dedicated e-reader devices.
- rlm 16y ago
  Any plans for a epub version? :)
  - drcode 16y ago
    Yes- I believe it will show up in a week or two.
    - rlm 16y ago
      Will it be available if I purchase the PDF or should I wait?
      - drcode 16y ago
        Someone else asked this... I'll let you know as soon as I find out.
        TY 16y ago
        Please do lets us know about this, I read PDFs on my computers and ePubs on my portable devices. And thank you for the book and the awesome video and comic! :-)
        drcode 16y ago
        Yes, it'll be free to download a couple of weeks after you buy the PDF.
        deleted 16y ago
        [deleted]
      - deleted 16y ago
        [deleted]
      - drcode 16y ago
        Yes, it'll be a free download in a couple weeks if you buy the PDF.
- jast 16y ago
  Thanks for this wonderfull book! I have just bought the printed book with the pdf. Very very good! This might be just the perfect companion to "Pratical Common Lisp" by Peter Seibel. I always thought PCL is an excellent book for someone who already knows some Lisp. With these two books, I believe you really achieve a powerfull combo to start learning and using Lisp! And the music is very cool too :-)
- projectileboy 16y ago
  Awesome!! Congratulations - I know it was a long haul, but it looks like it was well worth it.
- silentbicycle 16y ago
  Sweet! Your Casting SPELs in Lisp was one of the things that first got me interested in Lisp years and years ago. :) Just ordered. (The ebook seems to be working fine now.)
- macmac 16y ago
  Will there be a Kindle version of the ebook?
  - drcode 16y ago
    yes- takes a couple more weeks to get the mobi file, free with pdf purchase.
- airfoil 16y ago
  Conrad, this was awesome! Excellent work! Ordering...
- Keyframe 16y ago
  Hah this is awesome. Not only from a coding perspective, but from one artist to another - congrats. I really enjoyed that comic about Lisp fleet. Comic also exposes one nasty thing about it - there is no single implementation that has all of the fleet's features. Do you recommend some specific implementation to go with your book? Anyways, first check that comes in November and I'm buying. Congrats on your project once again, really looks like something special!
  - drcode 16y ago
    I think Common Lisp, Scheme, and Clojure each have a lot to offer. I wish there was one perfect Lisp :)
    - mahmud 16y ago
      I think it was Appel who had a funny proof for the non-existence of the Perfect Compiler, it can be applied to Lisp quite easily. FWIW, the proof used the halting problem and went like this. Assume there is a an unoptimized program that, when ran, would go through a series of motions but ultimately halt without any useful output or side-effect. Assume there existed a perfect compiler, PC; that compiler would need to be sufficiently smart enough to translate the problem to a single HALT instruction (or "Label X: goto X".) But since the halting of programs can not be proven analytically, it stands to reason that PC does not exist.
      - phob 16y ago
        Actually, this could be done if the program didn't use any print or input commands. In general, it still cannot be done.
        mahmud 16y ago
        I said "without any useful output or side-effect". I/O falls under those categories.
  - drcode 16y ago
- apgwoz 16y ago
  I'm really glad you made an mp3/ogg version of the song available. It's been on repeat all morning.
- bjhess 16y ago
  Thanks for the book, and the discount. I've never took the time to really learn Lisp, even though I took a class on it in college. Excited to dig in to Land of Lisp!
- natep 16y ago
  Congratulations on getting the book out (and for the 30% off you gave me)! My only question so far is about the comic...what's the point of the 3 panels in the training facility? Is the 'hug' joke supposed to be funny?
  - drcode 16y ago
    I was trying to make fun of the Wii controller... oh well, you can't win them all...
    - natep 16y ago
      Oh, OK. I think I got the joke and then thought 'oh, that can't be it'. It did give a nice break to the pacing of the story, though.
- mhd 16y ago
  And you found yourself a happy customer. You had me at balancing weasels on a rake. (Or, well, at the discount. Hard to fight against my poor German genes.)
- dytrivedi 16y ago
  Greetings from India. Just purchased eBook + Print. Thanks a bunch for discount. I look forward to become a LISPer. Cheers!
shaunxcode 16y ago
Hey, super stoked for this so I just went to check my amazon order history and discovered my order was no longer there? So I checked my gmail account and in my spam found: "Hello from Amazon.com. Due to a lack of availability from our suppliers, we will not be able to obtain the following item(s) from your order: Conrad Barski "Land of Lisp: Learn to Program in Lisp, One Game at a Time!" http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1593272006 http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1593272006 We've cancelled the item(s) and apologize for the inconvenience. We must also apologize for the length of time it has taken us to reach this conclusion. Until recently, we had still hoped to obtain these item(s) for you. Your credit card will NOT BE CHARGED for this item because you only pay for items when we ship them to you." I am just bummed I did not notice sooner but glad I caught this thread so I can re-order! SO excited - just wanted to give a heads up in case other people were under the impression that they should be seeing it arrive on their doorstep. update: per the authors comment below I have used the promo code to order directly from no starch so I can read the digital version while I wait for the lovely physical copy.
- drcode 16y ago
  Yes, you probably ordered early this year or late last year. Some pre-orders were cancelled because of the delay of the book at that time- apologies. You will see a reference to that in the music video on landoflisp.com. Right now you can order on Amazon without difficulty.
charlief 16y ago
Bought it, I can't wait. I'm trying get my colleagues to try lisp, but I didn't have the marketing tools necessary to convince them Now i do, the music video gives a lot of personification to world (land) of lisp, thank you!
bpeirce 16y ago
Congratulations Conrad on finally getting the book out! I just got my copy from the No Starch website and am reading the ebook now. On first blush the layout looks awesome. I'm looking forward to digging into it. Also, your video on landoflisp.com reminds me of the music video John Carpenter produced with his band for Big Trouble in Little China (I mean that as a compliment): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D03E9kUTTtQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D03E9kUTTtQ
- drcode 16y ago
  Not sure I see the connection, but thanks :P
Shooter 16y ago
I'm excited to finally be getting the book...I just wish I had read comic books as a kid so that I didn't have to struggle with picking up the proper 'comic reading flow' in my thirties ;-) (BTW, Conrad, I think you meant to say 'geezer' instead of 'geyser' in the comic adapted from your epilogue...?) I'm hoping I can use the book to teach lisp to some junior high kids in a disadvantaged youth program. Is it appropriate for that, or no?
- drcode 16y ago
  Thanks- I think I accidentally used an old bitmap- That typo is fixed in the book. I'm not sure the book can really take someone from zero programming experience and teach them Lisp- It assumes at least some programming background. It would be fine for junior high kids if they already know a bit of programming, but I suspect they may not.
brisance 16y ago
The website totally convinced me. I'm buying the eBook now!
- enki 16y ago
  same! glad you wrote that book!
- tremendo 16y ago
  Ditto. And it's so awesome to see the author's whimsy pay off so well, judging by the overall response here.
nlavezzo 16y ago
Hi Conrad - glad to see this available now - I saw your preview at the DC HN Meetup. I love all the art!
- mshafrir 16y ago
  Conrad, I also met you at the DC meetup. Congrats!
pg 16y ago
How fabulous. I smiled all the way through that video. There is something so happy about exuberant, unrepentant nerdery.
mahmud 16y ago
Holly shit!~ (piano solo) "balance weasels on a rake .." Too funny .. :-P Conrad, you're awesome!
lispm 16y ago
Probably the most fun computer book ever released. Conrad, you are my hero!
lispm 16y ago
The comic on the Land of Lisp page is so well done. Click on the blinking words. I'm speechless...
- danpker 16y ago
  Clicking on them doesn't do anything for me (Safari), what do they do?
  - lispm 16y ago
    They explain the ships in detail. Nicely done.
  - drcode 16y ago
    Hmm... I tested on Safari yesterday, seemed fine... I will test in the morning again.
  - drcode 16y ago
    Anyone else with Safari having a problem? Please reply here so I know if a fix is still needed.... Clicking on the "throbbing text" should pop up a window.
    - danpker 16y ago
      It's fixed for me now, it may have just been my net connection. The descriptions are awesome!
- jcl 16y ago
  Agreed... It takes a highly technical subject and makes it wonderfully accessible. It reminds me of _why's work, or Scott McCloud's Google Chrome comic. However, I was amused to read: "Continuations are such an awesome feature that they don't really have a downside." Personally, I find that continuations are utterly mindbending. While the comic says carelessly applied DSLs can make it hard to understand code, I think continuations can make it downright impenetrable. I love this little continuation brainteaser: http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/ftpdir/scheme-mail/HTML/rrrs-1987/msg00013.html http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/ftpdir/scheme-mail/HTML/rrrs...
tianyicui 16y ago
FYI, the Homebrew formula to install CLISP on Mac OS X is at http://github.com/mxcl/homebrew/pull/2707 http://github.com/mxcl/homebrew/pull/2707 If the formula works well, please comment there and suggest the authors accept my pull request. (If not, I ll be very happy to help.)
- sverrejoh 16y ago
  It depends on 'libiconv', which is not part of master.
  - tianyicui 16y ago
    Sorry, my bad. I added the keg-only dependency libiconv. Is it working for you now?
brisance 16y ago
I bought the print and eBook bundle and so far I'm really pleased with it. I'm at Chapter 3 already and it's an easy read; the author explains things in simple English that's very easy to follow. The illustrations help in clarifying concepts and also serve up some humor that keeps things interesting. Kudos!
johnclaus 16y ago
If you'd like a video addendum, courtesy of @lisperati and @johnclaus (the videographer), to this post http://bit.ly/cjDWg5 http://bit.ly/cjDWg5
brisance 16y ago
I'm learning LISP through this book, and it's fun! On p.42, when explaining the c*r functions, I found it easier to just read the "sequence" right-to-left. For example: (cadadr '((peas carrots tomatoes) (pork beef chicken) duck)) BEEF Read as "rest, first, rest, first" of the cons cells, where "a" means "first" and "d" means "rest of the cons cell(s)". Aside: I am now beginning to appreciate Clojure more. :P
- deleted 16y ago
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SeanDav 16y ago
Looks like the "HN Effect" is making the site unavailable. Saw it briefly earlier and looked great!
- drcode 16y ago
  Nope- Just a random major outage at dreamhost- now fixed (hopefully)
deleted 16y ago
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Bootvis 16y ago
Am I the only one having problems downloading the ebook after purchasing?
- drcode 16y ago
  It seems to be working fine for others right now- Please let me know at lisperati@gmail.com if you continue to have problems.
  - Bootvis 16y ago
    It's seems to be fixed now and I could download the eBook after logging in to NoStarch. Thanks for the book!
fogus 16y ago
This has set the bar very high for Lisp book marketing. I am stunned. My plans for a Clojure Lucha libre exhibition look lame by comparison. I need a bowl of parentheses to help me think.
- drcode 16y ago
  Hi fogus -Sorry I couldn't make it to Clojure Conj... liked your slides. My philosophy of marketing is that you need to do something different that no one else has done before to attract attention. There wasn't a programming book with a music video yet, so I exploited that fact :) But of course, there's still plenty other ideas that could be used to market other books/sites...
  - fogus 16y ago
    You're doing a great job. I can't wait to see what you come up with next. I hope to see you at a future Captial Area Clojure UG (http://www.meetup.com/Cap-Clug/ http://www.meetup.com/Cap-Clug/). Do you think you would be up for discussing the Clojure-bits (well, all and any bits are just as good too) of your book one day?
    - drcode 16y ago
      Yeah, I was there last month- Will try to come again tomorrow. Happy to talk about Lisp/Clojure anytime. (with a little notice)
    - drcode 16y ago
      Sorry, won't make it tonight- next month should work though.
akaalias 16y ago
I love this so much.
83457 16y ago
GTW? LOL! Seeing Hunt the Wumpus referenced brings back memories of my TI-99/4A and makes this a must buy. This book reminds me of the magazines/compilations I have with programs and games in TI-BASIC/Assembly Language. http://nostarch.com/download/Lisp08.pdf http://nostarch.com/download/Lisp08.pdf
alexyoung 16y ago
Are the comic and game examples inspired by _why? (also reminds me of http://learnyouahaskell.com/ http://learnyouahaskell.com/)
- drcode 16y ago
  I think my comics at lisperati.com predate all of these, clearly inferior, rivals. (kidding- both are great)
- mahmud 16y ago
  Conrad has been at it since ~2002, IIRC.
paufernandez 16y ago
Page 194: "Hey Buddy! Why don't you try to prove the correctness of this!" - LoL
djm 16y ago
That video just made my day - awesome! Can't wait to get the book. I also realised when browsing the Amazon page that the author is the same guy who wrote 'casting spels' (http://www.lisperati.com/casting.html http://www.lisperati.com/casting.html) which was also great. If your reading this Conrad do you mind me asking you about your art work? It's, hands down, some of the best cartoon drawing I've seen on the web. I'd love to know what tools you use to do the drawing and make the animations, and what process you go through when developing them.
- drcode 16y ago
  Seriously? Best cartoon drawing on the web? I doubt that :) I used to do all the artwork in ink and then scan it. Now I do it all on my iPad with SketchBook Pro (took me a while to figure out how to get decent quality this way- At first, I didn't think decent drawing on an iPad was possible) The animation was all done by importing bitmap artwork into Toon Boom animation. It's a cheesy Windows program (i.e. save your work every 30 minutes, or else...) but is feature rich.
  - djm 16y ago
    Thanks for the reply. I asked about what you are using because I have recently tried doing some drawing with a Wacom graphics tablet and am having trouble (I have one of the cheap ones where you draw on the tablet whilst watching the screen - the disconnect between hand and eye makes it difficult). I'll look at some of the things you mentioned and see about trying them. (thanks again!)
    - drcode 16y ago
      Yeah, I found Wacom tablets to be no good for me, for the reason you describe. The iPad is definitely a better drawing device, as long as you don't care about pressure sensitivity. (Hope they release a large-screen iPad soon :)
      - samatman 16y ago
        Not the same thing, but the Cintiq is a monitor you can draw on, which is pressure sensitive and lets you use whatever desktop-grade software you want. I enjoy your drawings and explanations quite a bit; you'd probably find a Cintiq, even the smaller (awesome) one, to be the most natural drawing experience a computer can currently give.
runevault 16y ago
Been waiting for this book for a long time, glad to finally see it out. Already bought my copy, will be downloading it tonight to start working through it. Congratulations on finally getting it out! :)
anactofgod 16y ago
Nice, Conrad! I haven't tried to balance weasels on a rake in a while. I'm looking forward to seeing how you did it. SMILE
gord 16y ago
Conrad, absolutely loved your video. My 6yo will pore over your comic and Ill no doubt see land-of-lisp refs crop up in his battle scenes. This all got me thinking about developing interactive stories and the ideal lisp game development environment... I hear from people who want to create interactive books and lessons for iPad. I recommend they prototype things in PowerPoint or Keynote first, then hire a developer to turn it into a cocoa app or a HTML5 web app with webkit animations. Its too hard. If the ideal tool was a web app, you could develop games and interactive lessons for iPad and other tablets directly on the device. You'd want a DSL for standard slide/rotate/scale animations, and write code in lisp for game logic. This would bypass expense of developing native cocoa apps yet reach nice platforms. Ideally you'd prototype quickly and be led gently into the best language. I guess mobile is the primary computer for most young people, so would be ideal to take a lisp environment to them.
shiny 16y ago
Sorry for the OT question, but what tools did you use to make that video?
- drcode 16y ago
  http://www.toonboom.com/products/toon-boom-studio/ http://www.toonboom.com/products/toon-boom-studio/
  - Keyframe 16y ago
    OT, but check out Digicel Flipbook if you're seriously interested in 2D animation - http://www.digicelinc.com/ http://www.digicelinc.com/ it will make your life easier.
lobo_tuerto 16y ago
Thank you for an excellent way to introduce such a powerful language (that I've been longing to learn, I must add!) Game programming + Lisp! That's some winning combo! :D
chewbranca 16y ago
Thanks for creating this book! I just picked it up, and everything I've seen so far from the website and the first chapter has been a blast so far. I'm excited to dive into the rest.
lisper 16y ago
When I got to the meowing cats in the music video I knew I had to have a copy of the book. :-) Congrats!
timepilot 16y ago
Thanks for writing this! I also enjoyed the same game code books as a kid - looking forward to learning lisp.
defroost 16y ago
I bought Land of Lisp as soon as I became aware of it. Every time I hear a truck out front I think, its here. Looking forward to total Common Lisp immersion. Thanks for all of your contributions past and present to the Lisp community and of course for the book.
TeMPOraL 16y ago
Congratulations on the release! Music video and the comic (Continuation guild reminds me of Arilou ships from StarControl II) are AWESOME and made my day. I'm currently trying to get money for paper version of the book. By the way, I've shown the music video and the comic to friends of mine, and two of them actually got interested and started to ask questions about Lisp. Their positive reaction makes me think that those materials could be good to show to people to get them seriously interested in parenthesis-oriented-programming ;).
karlzt 16y ago
the video is a little annoying but the comic is amazing.

398 points by drcode 16y ago

Hi HNers- I'm Conrad (aka drcode) the author of said book. Thanks guys for helping build the buzz around LOL! (I should also thank pg for getting me into this stuff in the first place.) I'll be lurking in this thread today and tomorrow... feel free to post any questions about the book or about Lisp in general and I will answer them. Here's the only coupon code currently for the book. I'm posting it exclusively on HN and proggit: 76738380768586 (ASCII for LISPLUV :-) It gives a 35% discount on the Book+eBook combo on the No Starch site (http://nostarch.com/lisp.htm http://nostarch.com/lisp.htm). It expires 11/3. (FYI- If you just want the eBook, No Starch already has a 50% off sale right now across the board. If you only want the print copy, Amazon has a heavily discounted price already, for reasons that are mysterious to me. Oh, and if you've already pre-ordered, just cancel and reorder to get the discount.)

rsmaniak 16y ago
Hey I just bought a copy of the e-book but I can't download it yet there's only a dummy file.
- drcode 16y ago
  Hi- I just talked to my No Starch contact and they said the PDF should appear any moment- apologies... a little glitch on take-off.
  - rsmaniak 16y ago
    Great, thanks!
- drcode 16y ago
  Hi- The glitch is fixed- You should have just received the correct PDF... Email me at lisperati@gmail.com if this is not the case.
forwardslash 16y ago
I preordered your book, can't wait for it to come!
moogatronic 16y ago
awesome! I was putting off ordering this while I finished reading Joy of Clojure, but the coupon code forced my hand. Thanks - Looking forward to the print copy arrival.
swannodette 16y ago
You've also put together an amazing site for the book! Both the video and comic are hilarious and top notch. I'd send anybody curious about Lisp to your book site in a heartbeat. Long Live Lisp.
aiurtourist 16y ago
What a wonderful step in the direction of making Lisp "cool." The site is great, the comic is witty and wonderful, and — after meeting the No Starch guy a few years ago — you chose a great publisher.
spoon16 16y ago
purchased, looks fun!
mark_l_watson 16y ago
Thanks for the discount code Conrad, I just used it to buy the print+PDF book. Also: I have really enjoyed your writing on the web for a long time!
Sikul 16y ago
I enjoyed the comic. There is a typo in the last panel. It says "Doug the developer and and the others could now return to their programming, no longer in fear of bugs." The word "and" is repeated.
- drcode 16y ago
  Thanks
vu3rdd 16y ago
Thanks. I had been waiting for this book for a long time. After some 3 attempts of download, I could download the book. All I can say is that this book is really awesome!
speek 16y ago
Congrats on the release. I'm excited to finish reading the book. I just thought you should know, however, that there's a minor mistake (I think) in some of the walkthrough stuff in the pdf. On page 56: > (defun pudding-eater (person) (cond ((eq person 'henry) (setf *arch-enemy* 'stupid-lisp-alien) '(curse you lisp alien – you ate my pudding)) ((eq person 'johnny) (setf *arch-enemy* 'useless-old-johnny) '(i hope you choked on my pudding johnny)) (t '(why you eat my pudding stranger ?)))) > (pudding-eater 'johnny) (I HOPE YOU CHOKED ON MY PUDDING JOHNNY) > *arch-enemy* JOHNNY arch-enemy at this time should hold the value 'useless-old-johnny, not 'johnny
- deleted 16y ago
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- drcode 16y ago
  Yes, you are right- You found the first errata! At least the intent of the code is still clear.
- kaffiene 16y ago
  But LISP is immune to bugs!?! What gives??
- ponnap 16y ago
  It seems to work for me. CL-USER> (defvar *arch-enemy* nil) (defun pudding-eater (person) (cond ((eq person 'henry)(setf *arch-enemy* 'stupid-lisp-alien)'(curse you lisp alien - you ate my pudding)) ((eq person 'johnny)(setf *arch-enemy* 'useless-old-johnny)'(i hope you choked on my pudding johnny)) (t'(why you ate my pudding stranger?)))) PUDDING-EATER CL-USER> *arch-enemy* NIL CL-USER> (pudding-eater 'johnny) (I HOPE YOU CHOKED ON MY PUDDING JOHNNY) CL-USER> *arch-enemy* USELESS-OLD-JOHNNY CL-USER>
alrex021 16y ago
Firstly, congratulations on completing the book. Will this book be available for Kindle by any chance?
- drcode 16y ago
  My understanding is it will appear on the kindle in the near future (though I don't know the process for this 100%)
  - dpapathanasiou 16y ago
    If your contract with NoStarch permits, my startup (http://fifobooks.com/ http://fifobooks.com/) could do this for you. I.e., we could produce a native ebook (not pdf) file for the Kindle, iPad, Nook, Sony, and a bunch of other dedicated e-reader devices.
rlm 16y ago
Any plans for a epub version? :)
- drcode 16y ago
  Yes- I believe it will show up in a week or two.
  - rlm 16y ago
    Will it be available if I purchase the PDF or should I wait?
    - drcode 16y ago
      Someone else asked this... I'll let you know as soon as I find out.
      - TY 16y ago
        Please do lets us know about this, I read PDFs on my computers and ePubs on my portable devices. And thank you for the book and the awesome video and comic! :-)
        drcode 16y ago
        Yes, it'll be free to download a couple of weeks after you buy the PDF.
        deleted 16y ago
        [deleted]
    - deleted 16y ago
      [deleted]
    - drcode 16y ago
      Yes, it'll be a free download in a couple weeks if you buy the PDF.
jast 16y ago
Thanks for this wonderfull book! I have just bought the printed book with the pdf. Very very good! This might be just the perfect companion to "Pratical Common Lisp" by Peter Seibel. I always thought PCL is an excellent book for someone who already knows some Lisp. With these two books, I believe you really achieve a powerfull combo to start learning and using Lisp! And the music is very cool too :-)
projectileboy 16y ago
Awesome!! Congratulations - I know it was a long haul, but it looks like it was well worth it.
silentbicycle 16y ago
Sweet! Your Casting SPELs in Lisp was one of the things that first got me interested in Lisp years and years ago. :) Just ordered. (The ebook seems to be working fine now.)
macmac 16y ago
Will there be a Kindle version of the ebook?
- drcode 16y ago
  yes- takes a couple more weeks to get the mobi file, free with pdf purchase.
airfoil 16y ago
Conrad, this was awesome! Excellent work! Ordering...
Keyframe 16y ago
Hah this is awesome. Not only from a coding perspective, but from one artist to another - congrats. I really enjoyed that comic about Lisp fleet. Comic also exposes one nasty thing about it - there is no single implementation that has all of the fleet's features. Do you recommend some specific implementation to go with your book? Anyways, first check that comes in November and I'm buying. Congrats on your project once again, really looks like something special!
- drcode 16y ago
  I think Common Lisp, Scheme, and Clojure each have a lot to offer. I wish there was one perfect Lisp :)
  - mahmud 16y ago
    I think it was Appel who had a funny proof for the non-existence of the Perfect Compiler, it can be applied to Lisp quite easily. FWIW, the proof used the halting problem and went like this. Assume there is a an unoptimized program that, when ran, would go through a series of motions but ultimately halt without any useful output or side-effect. Assume there existed a perfect compiler, PC; that compiler would need to be sufficiently smart enough to translate the problem to a single HALT instruction (or "Label X: goto X".) But since the halting of programs can not be proven analytically, it stands to reason that PC does not exist.
    - phob 16y ago
      Actually, this could be done if the program didn't use any print or input commands. In general, it still cannot be done.
      - mahmud 16y ago
        I said "without any useful output or side-effect". I/O falls under those categories.
- drcode 16y ago
apgwoz 16y ago
I'm really glad you made an mp3/ogg version of the song available. It's been on repeat all morning.
bjhess 16y ago
Thanks for the book, and the discount. I've never took the time to really learn Lisp, even though I took a class on it in college. Excited to dig in to Land of Lisp!
natep 16y ago
Congratulations on getting the book out (and for the 30% off you gave me)! My only question so far is about the comic...what's the point of the 3 panels in the training facility? Is the 'hug' joke supposed to be funny?
- drcode 16y ago
  I was trying to make fun of the Wii controller... oh well, you can't win them all...
  - natep 16y ago
    Oh, OK. I think I got the joke and then thought 'oh, that can't be it'. It did give a nice break to the pacing of the story, though.
mhd 16y ago
And you found yourself a happy customer. You had me at balancing weasels on a rake. (Or, well, at the discount. Hard to fight against my poor German genes.)
dytrivedi 16y ago
Greetings from India. Just purchased eBook + Print. Thanks a bunch for discount. I look forward to become a LISPer. Cheers!

shaunxcode 16y ago

Hey, super stoked for this so I just went to check my amazon order history and discovered my order was no longer there? So I checked my gmail account and in my spam found: "Hello from Amazon.com. Due to a lack of availability from our suppliers, we will not be able to obtain the following item(s) from your order: Conrad Barski "Land of Lisp: Learn to Program in Lisp, One Game at a Time!" http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1593272006 http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1593272006 We've cancelled the item(s) and apologize for the inconvenience. We must also apologize for the length of time it has taken us to reach this conclusion. Until recently, we had still hoped to obtain these item(s) for you. Your credit card will NOT BE CHARGED for this item because you only pay for items when we ship them to you." I am just bummed I did not notice sooner but glad I caught this thread so I can re-order! SO excited - just wanted to give a heads up in case other people were under the impression that they should be seeing it arrive on their doorstep. update: per the authors comment below I have used the promo code to order directly from no starch so I can read the digital version while I wait for the lovely physical copy.

drcode 16y ago
Yes, you probably ordered early this year or late last year. Some pre-orders were cancelled because of the delay of the book at that time- apologies. You will see a reference to that in the music video on landoflisp.com. Right now you can order on Amazon without difficulty.

charlief 16y ago

Bought it, I can't wait. I'm trying get my colleagues to try lisp, but I didn't have the marketing tools necessary to convince them Now i do, the music video gives a lot of personification to world (land) of lisp, thank you!

bpeirce 16y ago

Congratulations Conrad on finally getting the book out! I just got my copy from the No Starch website and am reading the ebook now. On first blush the layout looks awesome. I'm looking forward to digging into it. Also, your video on landoflisp.com reminds me of the music video John Carpenter produced with his band for Big Trouble in Little China (I mean that as a compliment): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D03E9kUTTtQ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D03E9kUTTtQ

drcode 16y ago
Not sure I see the connection, but thanks :P

Shooter 16y ago

I'm excited to finally be getting the book...I just wish I had read comic books as a kid so that I didn't have to struggle with picking up the proper 'comic reading flow' in my thirties ;-) (BTW, Conrad, I think you meant to say 'geezer' instead of 'geyser' in the comic adapted from your epilogue...?) I'm hoping I can use the book to teach lisp to some junior high kids in a disadvantaged youth program. Is it appropriate for that, or no?

drcode 16y ago
Thanks- I think I accidentally used an old bitmap- That typo is fixed in the book. I'm not sure the book can really take someone from zero programming experience and teach them Lisp- It assumes at least some programming background. It would be fine for junior high kids if they already know a bit of programming, but I suspect they may not.

brisance 16y ago

The website totally convinced me. I'm buying the eBook now!

enki 16y ago
same! glad you wrote that book!
tremendo 16y ago
Ditto. And it's so awesome to see the author's whimsy pay off so well, judging by the overall response here.

nlavezzo 16y ago

Hi Conrad - glad to see this available now - I saw your preview at the DC HN Meetup. I love all the art!

mshafrir 16y ago
Conrad, I also met you at the DC meetup. Congrats!

pg 16y ago

How fabulous. I smiled all the way through that video. There is something so happy about exuberant, unrepentant nerdery.

mahmud 16y ago

Holly shit!~ (piano solo) "balance weasels on a rake .." Too funny .. :-P Conrad, you're awesome!

lispm 16y ago

Probably the most fun computer book ever released. Conrad, you are my hero!

lispm 16y ago

The comic on the Land of Lisp page is so well done. Click on the blinking words. I'm speechless...

danpker 16y ago
Clicking on them doesn't do anything for me (Safari), what do they do?
- lispm 16y ago
  They explain the ships in detail. Nicely done.
- drcode 16y ago
  Hmm... I tested on Safari yesterday, seemed fine... I will test in the morning again.
- drcode 16y ago
  Anyone else with Safari having a problem? Please reply here so I know if a fix is still needed.... Clicking on the "throbbing text" should pop up a window.
  - danpker 16y ago
    It's fixed for me now, it may have just been my net connection. The descriptions are awesome!
jcl 16y ago
Agreed... It takes a highly technical subject and makes it wonderfully accessible. It reminds me of _why's work, or Scott McCloud's Google Chrome comic. However, I was amused to read: "Continuations are such an awesome feature that they don't really have a downside." Personally, I find that continuations are utterly mindbending. While the comic says carelessly applied DSLs can make it hard to understand code, I think continuations can make it downright impenetrable. I love this little continuation brainteaser: http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/ftpdir/scheme-mail/HTML/rrrs-1987/msg00013.html http://groups.csail.mit.edu/mac/ftpdir/scheme-mail/HTML/rrrs...

tianyicui 16y ago

FYI, the Homebrew formula to install CLISP on Mac OS X is at http://github.com/mxcl/homebrew/pull/2707 http://github.com/mxcl/homebrew/pull/2707 If the formula works well, please comment there and suggest the authors accept my pull request. (If not, I ll be very happy to help.)

sverrejoh 16y ago
It depends on 'libiconv', which is not part of master.
- tianyicui 16y ago
  Sorry, my bad. I added the keg-only dependency libiconv. Is it working for you now?

brisance 16y ago

I bought the print and eBook bundle and so far I'm really pleased with it. I'm at Chapter 3 already and it's an easy read; the author explains things in simple English that's very easy to follow. The illustrations help in clarifying concepts and also serve up some humor that keeps things interesting. Kudos!

johnclaus 16y ago

If you'd like a video addendum, courtesy of @lisperati and @johnclaus (the videographer), to this post http://bit.ly/cjDWg5 http://bit.ly/cjDWg5

brisance 16y ago

I'm learning LISP through this book, and it's fun! On p.42, when explaining the c*r functions, I found it easier to just read the "sequence" right-to-left. For example: (cadadr '((peas carrots tomatoes) (pork beef chicken) duck)) BEEF Read as "rest, first, rest, first" of the cons cells, where "a" means "first" and "d" means "rest of the cons cell(s)". Aside: I am now beginning to appreciate Clojure more. :P

deleted 16y ago
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SeanDav 16y ago

Looks like the "HN Effect" is making the site unavailable. Saw it briefly earlier and looked great!

drcode 16y ago
Nope- Just a random major outage at dreamhost- now fixed (hopefully)

deleted 16y ago

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Bootvis 16y ago

Am I the only one having problems downloading the ebook after purchasing?

drcode 16y ago
It seems to be working fine for others right now- Please let me know at lisperati@gmail.com if you continue to have problems.
- Bootvis 16y ago
  It's seems to be fixed now and I could download the eBook after logging in to NoStarch. Thanks for the book!

fogus 16y ago

This has set the bar very high for Lisp book marketing. I am stunned. My plans for a Clojure Lucha libre exhibition look lame by comparison. I need a bowl of parentheses to help me think.

drcode 16y ago
Hi fogus -Sorry I couldn't make it to Clojure Conj... liked your slides. My philosophy of marketing is that you need to do something different that no one else has done before to attract attention. There wasn't a programming book with a music video yet, so I exploited that fact :) But of course, there's still plenty other ideas that could be used to market other books/sites...
- fogus 16y ago
  You're doing a great job. I can't wait to see what you come up with next. I hope to see you at a future Captial Area Clojure UG (http://www.meetup.com/Cap-Clug/ http://www.meetup.com/Cap-Clug/). Do you think you would be up for discussing the Clojure-bits (well, all and any bits are just as good too) of your book one day?
  - drcode 16y ago
    Yeah, I was there last month- Will try to come again tomorrow. Happy to talk about Lisp/Clojure anytime. (with a little notice)
  - drcode 16y ago
    Sorry, won't make it tonight- next month should work though.

akaalias 16y ago

I love this so much.

83457 16y ago

GTW? LOL! Seeing Hunt the Wumpus referenced brings back memories of my TI-99/4A and makes this a must buy. This book reminds me of the magazines/compilations I have with programs and games in TI-BASIC/Assembly Language. http://nostarch.com/download/Lisp08.pdf http://nostarch.com/download/Lisp08.pdf

alexyoung 16y ago

Are the comic and game examples inspired by _why? (also reminds me of http://learnyouahaskell.com/ http://learnyouahaskell.com/)

drcode 16y ago
I think my comics at lisperati.com predate all of these, clearly inferior, rivals. (kidding- both are great)
mahmud 16y ago
Conrad has been at it since ~2002, IIRC.

paufernandez 16y ago

Page 194: "Hey Buddy! Why don't you try to prove the correctness of this!" - LoL

djm 16y ago

That video just made my day - awesome! Can't wait to get the book. I also realised when browsing the Amazon page that the author is the same guy who wrote 'casting spels' (http://www.lisperati.com/casting.html http://www.lisperati.com/casting.html) which was also great. If your reading this Conrad do you mind me asking you about your art work? It's, hands down, some of the best cartoon drawing I've seen on the web. I'd love to know what tools you use to do the drawing and make the animations, and what process you go through when developing them.

drcode 16y ago
Seriously? Best cartoon drawing on the web? I doubt that :) I used to do all the artwork in ink and then scan it. Now I do it all on my iPad with SketchBook Pro (took me a while to figure out how to get decent quality this way- At first, I didn't think decent drawing on an iPad was possible) The animation was all done by importing bitmap artwork into Toon Boom animation. It's a cheesy Windows program (i.e. save your work every 30 minutes, or else...) but is feature rich.
- djm 16y ago
  Thanks for the reply. I asked about what you are using because I have recently tried doing some drawing with a Wacom graphics tablet and am having trouble (I have one of the cheap ones where you draw on the tablet whilst watching the screen - the disconnect between hand and eye makes it difficult). I'll look at some of the things you mentioned and see about trying them. (thanks again!)
  - drcode 16y ago
    Yeah, I found Wacom tablets to be no good for me, for the reason you describe. The iPad is definitely a better drawing device, as long as you don't care about pressure sensitivity. (Hope they release a large-screen iPad soon :)
    - samatman 16y ago
      Not the same thing, but the Cintiq is a monitor you can draw on, which is pressure sensitive and lets you use whatever desktop-grade software you want. I enjoy your drawings and explanations quite a bit; you'd probably find a Cintiq, even the smaller (awesome) one, to be the most natural drawing experience a computer can currently give.

runevault 16y ago

Been waiting for this book for a long time, glad to finally see it out. Already bought my copy, will be downloading it tonight to start working through it. Congratulations on finally getting it out! :)

anactofgod 16y ago

Nice, Conrad! I haven't tried to balance weasels on a rake in a while. I'm looking forward to seeing how you did it. SMILE

gord 16y ago

Conrad, absolutely loved your video. My 6yo will pore over your comic and Ill no doubt see land-of-lisp refs crop up in his battle scenes. This all got me thinking about developing interactive stories and the ideal lisp game development environment... I hear from people who want to create interactive books and lessons for iPad. I recommend they prototype things in PowerPoint or Keynote first, then hire a developer to turn it into a cocoa app or a HTML5 web app with webkit animations. Its too hard. If the ideal tool was a web app, you could develop games and interactive lessons for iPad and other tablets directly on the device. You'd want a DSL for standard slide/rotate/scale animations, and write code in lisp for game logic. This would bypass expense of developing native cocoa apps yet reach nice platforms. Ideally you'd prototype quickly and be led gently into the best language. I guess mobile is the primary computer for most young people, so would be ideal to take a lisp environment to them.

shiny 16y ago

Sorry for the OT question, but what tools did you use to make that video?

drcode 16y ago
http://www.toonboom.com/products/toon-boom-studio/ http://www.toonboom.com/products/toon-boom-studio/
- Keyframe 16y ago
  OT, but check out Digicel Flipbook if you're seriously interested in 2D animation - http://www.digicelinc.com/ http://www.digicelinc.com/ it will make your life easier.

lobo_tuerto 16y ago

Thank you for an excellent way to introduce such a powerful language (that I've been longing to learn, I must add!) Game programming + Lisp! That's some winning combo! :D

chewbranca 16y ago

Thanks for creating this book! I just picked it up, and everything I've seen so far from the website and the first chapter has been a blast so far. I'm excited to dive into the rest.

lisper 16y ago

When I got to the meowing cats in the music video I knew I had to have a copy of the book. :-) Congrats!

timepilot 16y ago

Thanks for writing this! I also enjoyed the same game code books as a kid - looking forward to learning lisp.

defroost 16y ago

I bought Land of Lisp as soon as I became aware of it. Every time I hear a truck out front I think, its here. Looking forward to total Common Lisp immersion. Thanks for all of your contributions past and present to the Lisp community and of course for the book.

TeMPOraL 16y ago

Congratulations on the release! Music video and the comic (Continuation guild reminds me of Arilou ships from StarControl II) are AWESOME and made my day. I'm currently trying to get money for paper version of the book. By the way, I've shown the music video and the comic to friends of mine, and two of them actually got interested and started to ask questions about Lisp. Their positive reaction makes me think that those materials could be good to show to people to get them seriously interested in parenthesis-oriented-programming ;).

karlzt 16y ago

the video is a little annoying but the comic is amazing.