Re: The secret of hand compiling LISP/Scheme

[Kaz Kylheku]

On Oct 8, 1:41 pm, gnuist...@hotmail.com wrote:
> Tony, thanks for the info. But why do I need to go to forth for
> this? why cant someone show me how to hand compile the jmc.pdf
> into an assembly code like L. Peter Deutsch, a 13-15 year old
> kid wrote and PUBLISHED as the first author, making money from
> the ARPA grant because his father worked in the area and he
> had the connections to get the info from the place where it was
> discovered. I suspect they thought that the kid is safer and
> less competitive than some grown up to share the info.

Your question is not unlike that of that young man who, be it truth or
legend, wrote to composer Wolfgang A. Mozart, asking for advice about
how to get started in writing symphonies. Mozart replied that a
symphony is a complex musical form, and that one should start by
writing simpler works and work his way up over years. The man
objected, "But Herr Mozart, you were already writing symphonies when
you were eight years old!" To which Mozart replied, "Indeed, but I
didn't have to ask how."

Like young Mozart, Peter Deutsch probably didn't have to ask how. He
may have had access to equipment and people through his father, but
ultimately he did the grunt work of taking a high level program as a
specification of behavior, and writing the corresponding assembly
program.