From ... From: Erik Naggum Subject: Re: R: newbie question about symbols Date: 2000/04/17 Message-ID: <3164962988991097@naggum.no>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 612209614 References: <8d2qub$b9i$1@lacerta.tiscalinet.it> <8dccb4$pqq$2@pegasus.tiscalinet.it> mail-copies-to: never Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Complaints-To: newsmaster@eunet.no X-Trace: oslo-nntp.eunet.no 955975438 15523 195.0.192.66 (17 Apr 2000 12:43:58 GMT) Organization: Naggum Software; vox: +47 8800 8879; fax: +47 8800 8601; http://www.naggum.no User-Agent: Gnus/5.0803 (Gnus v5.8.3) Emacs/20.5 Mime-Version: 1.0 NNTP-Posting-Date: 17 Apr 2000 12:43:58 GMT Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp * "Vanna" | we will try to explain more clearly what we would like to do: | we deal with a package where are defined some functions that receive some | symbols and compare these symbols with other internal symbols; that's not what you would _like_ to do, it's exactly what you do, and as an explanation, it's useless for those who want to help you. what you would like to do is, as a guess, to refer to symbols without a pacakge because you have failed to understand the package system. this is not that uncommon, but insisting that the package system is broken is only half as common. instead of using symbols internal in a given package, use keywords. | (defparameter *somesymbols* '(FOO1 FOO2 FOO3)) (defparameter *somesymbols* '(:FOO1 :FOO2 :FOO3)) | (search-symbol 'FOO1) (search-symbol :FOO1) => T | We are wondering why it is so difficult to deal with symbols defined in | different packages, we think that this problem is common to many other | Lisp users that want to take advantage of using different packages. this arrogance has blocked your progress both in solving the problem and in recognizing the difficulties you have experienced. you have to let go of the idea that you're doing something right if it doesn't work, and at the very least investigate your options. #:Erik