The integrated cross-platform development tool for ANSI Common Lisp LispWorks logo

LispWorks® Frequently Asked Questions

General Product Information

Technical Support

General Product Information


Q. What version of LispWorks is currently available?

A. The current version is 5.1 (released March 2008).



Q. What platforms does it run on?

A. See our system requirements page.



Q. What are the hardware requirements for LispWorks?

A. See our system requirements page.



Q. What are the LispWorks "Editions"?

A. LispWorks for Windows, Macintosh and Linux is available in four Editions

The Personal Edition is intended for personal and educational Lisp programming. As a contribution to the Common Lisp community, we make LispWorks Personal Edition available free of charge. While the Personal Edition includes the full Common Lisp compiler and Common LispWorks integrated development environment, it does limit program size and duration and it does not support application delivery.

The Professional Edition includes everything you need for commercial Common Lisp software development and application delivery. CLIM 2.0 is included to allow support of legacy applications.

The Enterprise Edition includes all the features of the Professional Edition, and provides further support for software needs of the modern enterprise, including:

  • Database access through object-oriented SQL/ODBC libraries.
  • Industry standard distributed computing through the LispWorks ORB.
  • Expert system programming through our KnowledgeWorksTM product and an embedded Prolog compiler.

Applications developed with the Professional and Enterprise Editions can be distributed free of charge.

We offer site licenses to teaching and research institutions which need a large number of seats at an economic price. Let us know what your requirements are. Visit your pricing page to see the information we need.



Q. How do I obtain the Personal Edition?

A. Simply download it from the LispWorks web site.



Q. How much does LispWorks cost?

A. LispWorks is very competitively priced - see our price information page or send e-mail to or call +44 1223 421860.



Q. We are an Academic site: is there an academic discount?

A. Yes, generous discounts are available for qualifying organizations. We do not offer discounts to individual students or teaching staff - you must purchase through the academic institution to qualify for an academic discount. For further details, please contact us.



Q. What's the royalty for delivering my own application?

A. End-user applications delivered from the Professional and Enterprise Editions are royalty-free, including those using LispWorks ORB, KnowledgeWorks, Common SQL or CLIM 2.0. We believe this is the least restrictive commercial Lisp deployment model available.



Q. Can my LispWorks application run on another platform?

A. Yes! LispWorks (including the CAPI) is source code compatible between all supported platforms, so your LispWorks applications can be ported between Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, Solaris, HP-UX and Compaq Tru64 UNIX with a minimum of effort.

 

Q. Does my LispWorks license cover multiple platforms?

A. No. LispWorks for Windows, Linux, Macintosh and UNIX are all separately licensed.



Q. Is KnowledgeWorks available on all platforms?

A. Yes. KnowledgeWorks and Prolog are available in LispWorks Enterprise Edition or as an add-on for LispWorks for UNIX. Load them both by entering the form (require "kw")

 

Q. Is LispWorks ORB available on all platforms?

A. Yes. Our CORBA module is available in LispWorks Enterprise Edition or as an add-on for LispWorks for UNIX. Load it by entering the form (require "corba")

 

Q. Is CLIM available on all platforms?

A. Not quite. CLIM is included in LispWorks Professional Edition on Windows, Linux and Macintosh and is available as an add-on for LispWorks for UNIX. However on Macintosh it runs only in the X11/Motif GUI, and not in the native Aqua GUI. We have no plan to port CLIM to Aqua. Load CLIM by entering the form (require "clim")



Q. Does LispWorks have an integrated editor?

A. Yes, a sophisticated code editor is fully integrated as part of the Common LispWorks IDE. If you're not used to the default EMACS keys, switch to more familiar platform-standard editor keys using the LispWorks Editor's emulation.



Q. Can I use libraries written in other languages?

A. Yes, LispWorks includes a full Foreign Language Interface (FLI) for interfacing Lisp to C and Win32 libraries.



Q. Does LispWorks support ODBC?

A. Yes, LispWorks provides an ODBC interface as part of Common SQL on all platforms. Common SQL is a Lisp/SQL interface with a CLOS abstraction over relational databases. Common SQL is included in LispWorks Enterprise Edition and in LispWorks for UNIX.



Q. Does LispWorks for Windows support multiple threads?

A. Yes, LispWorks provides full thread support via the multiprocessing package. Each lightweight process has its own Win32 thread. The IDE itself is fully multithreaded, with each tool running in its own thread. The 4.2 release and later feature improved multithreading, e.g. the Listener tool has an execution process separate from its GUI process.



Q. Does LispWorks support internationalization / localization?

A. Yes, LispWorks has full support for 16 bit characters via extensions to the character and string types. The Foreign Language Interface (FLI) provides support for passing these new datatypes to foreign code in the common encodings. Support for file I/O to common 16-bit file formats is provided.



Q. What is included in the LispWorks ORB?

A. Everything you need to develop and deploy CORBA solutions and provide a complete distributed computing solution for Common Lisp, including a fully integrated Interface Definition Language (IDL) compiler with full Common Lisp language binding, a complete Object Request Broker (ORB), and support for version 2.0 of CORBA as well as relevant portions of the 2.2 standard, for the Portable Object Adapter (POA), the Internet InterOrb Protocol (IIOP™), Dynamic Invocation Interfaces (DII) and for Dynamic Skeleton Interfaces (DSI).



Q. How about connectivity on Windows?

A. LispWorks for Windows provides support for building COM client and server applications, and Automation. LispWorks 4.4 supports embedding ActiveX components.There's also support for DDE client and server applications.



Q. Does LispWorks support fancy graphics?

A. LispWorks includes an example implementation of an OpenGL interface which is integrated into the CAPI.



Q. Is LispWorks available in languages other than English?

A. No. LispWorks is available in English only, although it does provide support for the development of internationalized applications.



Q. Does LispWorks support DLLs?

A. Yes. LispWorks loads and executes dynamic libraries on all platforms via the FLI. Additionally, LispWorks for Windows Professional and Enterprise Editions support generation of standalone DLLs.



Q. Does LispWorks for Windows support ActiveX?

A. Yes, in LispWorks 4.4 and later.


Q. What documentation is available for LispWorks?

A. A full set of documentation is provided in both PDF and HTML formats. This can optionally be installed with the commercial product. On Windows, if the documentation is not installed you can still access it directly from the LispWorks CD. The Personal Edition includes only the HTML documentation (to make a smaller download). All the latest documentation is also available here.

 

Technical Support

Q. How is support provided for LispWorks?

A. Technical support is provided via e-mail. Other than 30 days "Getting Started" support for installation and other typical new-user issues, you will need to have a support contract. See the description of our support service for details. Alternative support arrangements are available on a negotiated basis. Contact us at for additional details. Click here for information on how to contact Lisp Support



Q. I think I have located a bug. How do I submit a bug report?

A. Follow these instructions.

Please note: the most common cause of delays in fixing problems and helping users is failure to follow these instructions.



Q. Is there a place for supported customers to download public patch sets?

A. Full details of available patch sets, plus downloading instructions can be found on our patch site.



Q. Do I need to load all public and private patches each time I start up LispWorks?

A. No, you can save an image with all current public patches and any private patches we have provided by using the function save-image. This functionality is not available in the Personal Edition.

 

Top | Back