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Land of Lisp: Learn to Program in Lisp, One Game at a Time! 1st Edition
With his brilliantly quirky comics and out-of-this-world games, longtime Lisper Conrad Barski teaches you the mysteries of Common Lisp. You’ll start with the basics, like list manipulation, I/O, and recursion, then move on to more complex topics like macros, higher order programming, and domain-specific languages. Then, when your brain overheats, you can kick back with an action-packed comic book interlude!
Along the way you’ll create (and play) games like Wizard Adventure, a text adventure with a whiskey-soaked twist, and Grand Theft Wumpus, the most violent version of Hunt the Wumpus the world has ever seen.
You'll learn to:
–Master the quirks of Lisp’s syntax and semantics
–Write concise and elegant functional programs
–Use macros, create domain-specific languages, and learn other advanced Lisp techniques
–Create your own web server, and use it to play browser-based games
–Put your Lisp skills to the test by writing brain-melting games like Dice of Doom and Orc Battle
With Land of Lisp, the power of functional programming is yours to wield.
- ISBN-101593272812
- ISBN-13978-1593272814
- Edition1st
- PublisherNo Starch Press
- Publication dateOctober 15, 2010
- LanguageEnglish
- Dimensions7.06 x 1.22 x 9.25 inches
- Print length504 pages
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- Publisher : No Starch Press; 1st edition (October 15, 2010)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 504 pages
- ISBN-10 : 1593272812
- ISBN-13 : 978-1593272814
- Item Weight : 2.15 pounds
- Dimensions : 7.06 x 1.22 x 9.25 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #1,216,392 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #43 in Lisp Programming
- #86 in Functional Software Programming
- #694 in Game Programming
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I looked around for any sort of contemporary reading material on Lisp, as much of what exists is dated and terse, so I was therefore very excited to see this book with a gigantic green alien on the cover, and whose pages are littered with comics. I had high hopes that it would be an interesting venture, and I was not disappointed: Land of Lisp is an incredibly clever, intelligently presented textbook on the Lisp language, its history, and importance in the realm of functional programming. I got a real sense of passion from Barski in his delivery of the material; he clearly loves the language himself. More importantly, he demonstrates a finely tuned understanding of not only its syntax and use, but also its value and place in programming. This is evidenced by the fact that Barski spends an equal amount of time introducing you to core fundamentals of Lisp, as well as covering the history of why these parts of the language exist--a part of programming textbooks that is often left out. This is important for old and new programmers alike, because it paints a complete picture of the language--not only what it does--but why, and the 'why' is often necessary to take a programmer out of the hobbyist mentality and into the realm of becoming a true professional.
Barski even goes so far as to cover the myriad of dialects that Lisp has spawned (including Clojure), and spends some time exposing the reader to the bias that the various Lisp communities have with each other, which I found fascinating. Having been in software development for nearly two decades, I can empathize with the author on language communities having their religious convictions for a particular dialect, and I was surprised (and impressed) that Barski took the time to cover this darker side of programming in Land of Lisp.
All of this is just icing on the cake, however, as the core material delivers exactly what it promises: a unique and fun look into the Lisp language, by way of many small, digestible programming examples in the form of games. The first half of the book has the reader working on stand-alone games, each taking advantage of a new part (read: benefit) of Lisp, slowly introducing the reader to the realm of functional programming. The second half of the book is a series of smaller programming tasks that all build towards a final web-based game. This, coupled with the author's clever wit and humorous artwork has lead me to be thoroughly satisfied with this textbook. If you have any interest at all in any of the dialects which are based upon Lisp, I strongly urge you to start at the core language to caused them all to be, and do so via Land of Lisp. I have a feeling you'll come away with a new found respect for functional programming, and may even become a "Lisper" yourself.
As a teacher of computer science, I tend to prefer teaching out of books with a coherent pedagogy. How to Design Programs is my favorite textbook. Simply Scheme is another good one.
Land of Lisp doesn't seem to be grounded in any kind of modern pedagogical philosophy. Instead, it has a kind of retro feel that is appealing in its own way. This book takes me back to the 80s, learning how to program by typing in complex BASIC programs out of magazines and books. Many of the programs I typed in, I didn't understand 100%. But each time I entered a program, I learned something, and then by tweaking the programs and seeing what it would do, I learned a little more. One of my favorite middle school memories is the time I managed to understand a text adventure BASIC program well enough to write my own. Land of Lisp, in fact, has code for a rudimentary text adventure engine, as well as a blatant "Retro type-in game" of Robots that fits compactly in less than a page of code. So it's easy to see why this book evokes in me a sense of nostalgia.
I think Scheme is a better language for learning programming than Common Lisp. Common Lisp lacks a bit of Scheme's elegance, and it's just harder to get a Lisp environment up and running. But Land of Lisp doesn't make any apologies for Common Lisp's quirks. On the contrary, it revels in the cars and the cdrs, and the convoluted loop macro and format strings which allow you to write some ridiculously concise code (like the retro type-in robot game). The book repeatedly brags about how amazing Lisp is, sometimes to the point of overstating the case for dynamic, functional languages. This is not a book that will attract non-programmers to programming, but for that rare breed of person who was "born to program", the book has an infectious enthusiasm for programming in general, and Lisp specifically.
In my mind, the truly special thing about Land of Lisp is its inspired collection of engaging and well-chosen projects, which are quite a bit different from the run-of-the-mill exercises in a typical textbook. As a teacher, I am glad to own this book because I'm always on the lookout for great project ideas for my students. A book with one great project is usually worth the price -- this book has several! I intend to use these project ideas with my Scheme students. Obviously, the programs translate the easiest to other Lisp dialects, but even if you don't teach Lisp, I'd recommend purchasing this book and trying to port these projects to your favorite language. Orc Battle, for example, should be doable in any object-oriented language. A number of the projects would probably work well in Python. I would advise against trying to tackle these projects in Java (the resulting programs would be too verbose), but a modern multi-paradigm variant of Java, (e.g., Scala), should work just fine.
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ゲームを作りながらLISPの基本が学べます。
LISPを書いたことがある必要はありませんが、プログラミング上の様々な
概念が出てくるため他の言語でプログラミング経験がある人向けです。
LISPでのプログラミング手法を学びながら、最終的にはブラウザ上で
遊べるグラフィカルな対戦ボードゲームを作るところまで進みます。
その途中ではオブジェクト指向が出てきたり関数型プログラミングが
出てきたりと実に様々な手法が目まぐるしく紹介されています。
実際に手を動かして動く物を完成させながら読み進めることができるためとても楽しいです。
また、Common LISPでは「通常」サポートされていない機能について
他のLISP方言(Clojureなど)と随所で比較していることも参考になります。
さらに後半では単なる比較にとどまらず、Clojure等で標準サポートされている
遅延評価をマクロを使ってCommon LISPで実現します。
言語に新たな機能を加えられるという、LISPの懐の深さを感じることができました。
注意点として、本書ではCommon LISPのCLISPと呼ばれる処理系を使って
プログラムを書くことを前提としている点を挙げておきます。
他の処理系(SBCLなど)ではWebサーバなどいくつかのコードが動きません。
*CLISPについては本書の最初に入手先が書かれています。WindowsでもMacでも利用可能です。
LISPに興味のある(でもまだ触れていない)プログラマに
LISPへの楽しい入り口としてお勧めします。
However it is badly let down by the Kindle format which renders the code examples virtually unreadable. Anyone who knows Lisp knows how hard it can be to read code even when its well formatted, and unfortunately the Kindle version ruins your ability to follow the examples.
I will be happy to re-visit and re-score this book 5 stars if the publishers fixed the problems.








