Are there any good editors for Lisp programming, other than Emacs?

Question

I'm looking for an alternative, since I find emacs difficult to use. I'd rather use an editor that supports all the usual shortcuts I'm used to, such as arrow keys to move the cursor around, CTRL+SHIFT+RightArrow to select the next word, etc.

Basically, I don't want to have to relearn all my familiar shortcuts just so I can use emacs.

Can anyone recommend a suitable editor?

Another thing - Notepad++ supports LISP syntax coloring, but it doesn't have an integrated LISP console like emacs does. Would it be fine to just have a Notepad++ window and a Command Line window open, side-by-side, and use the command-line whenever I want to run my program?

Perhaps a more interesting question is "Why did you want to use Emacs in the first place?" If you did decide to use it, you could configure the key commands to work however you wanted. — grettke, Nov 12 '08 at 03:38
I suspect, since it based heavily on LISP, it knows a lot about the language constructs (for syntax coloring and such). — paxdiablo, Nov 12 '08 at 03:45

score 18 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 12 '08 at 05:05

Firstly, the arrow keys should work just fine on Emacs. (Emacs die-hards will tell you Ctrl-f/b/p/n are preferable, but you don't have to listen to them.) If they don't work by default, something is wrong.

Recent versions of Emacs come with cua-mode, which will make all the other common shortcuts like Ctrl-x/c/v for cut-copy-paste, shift-arrows to select, and so on work as well. If they don't work by default, type "M-x (that's Alt-x on most keyboards) cua-mode".

In general, if you want a particular keystroke to invoke a certain function, then type M-x global-set-key [hit Return] [hit the keystroke] [type name of function], e.g. M-x global-set-key RET [hit the down arrow] next-line RET.

Emacs was made for Lisp by Lisp programmers, and it is the best editor for Lisp simply on account of having been the standard Lisp editor for decades and having every idea for improvement been implemented.

score 8 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 12 '08 at 03:37

8

Use DrScheme. It has got all of the standard keybindings that you might expect. Here are my notes on using it. Yes, it is built for Scheme, but maybe it would work well for you.

answered Nov 12 '08 at 03:37

grettke

1,407
7
10

score 6 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 10 '09 at 09:45

6

Try LispIDE. It's kind of rudimentary but may improve things a bit for you.

answered Mar 10 '09 at 09:45

Fantastic! Much better than using Emacs IMO. – Sandeep Datta Oct 05 '09 at 14:02
I prefer both Notepad++ and Sublime because it supports automatic indenting. – Lime Sep 18 '15 at 03:55

score 5 · Answer 4 · answered Nov 13 '08 at 06:27

5

It's not just emacs you want to use, it's also SLIME. SLIME will let you connect to a Lisp REPL (running the Swank back-end). You can connect to a server process and start interacting with it. Take a look at the SLIME homepage

answered Nov 13 '08 at 06:27

user37248

257
2
4

jussij · Answer 5 · 2008-11-12T23:40:25.737

4

The Zeus programmers editor has a configurable syntax highlighter so it should be possible to configure it for Lisp highlighting.

Zeus even has a Emacs keyboard emulation mode and is fully scriptable, but unfortunately it is not scriptable in Lisp ;)

Edited: In response Luís Oliveira comments: He's looking for a Lisp IDE.

Zeus does have project/workspace management, compiler/linker/tool support, class browsing, code completion, integrated version control, just like a lot of IDEs.

But Zeus is more than an IDE because it provides a lot of the functionality of an IDE without being tied to any one particular language, in fact just like Emacs.

edited Nov 12 '08 at 23:40

answered Nov 12 '08 at 05:22

jussij

10,370
1
33
49

The OP is not looking for syntax highlighting, that's the easy part. He's looking for a Lisp IDE. – Luís Oliveira Nov 12 '08 at 13:13
2

He also says "Notepad++ supports LISP syntax coloring, but it doesn't have an integrated LISP console like emacs does." What's with the name calling? – Luís Oliveira Nov 13 '08 at 23:23
A Lisp IDE without connection to the REPL is a bit pointless. – Svante Nov 16 '08 at 01:28

score 3 · Answer 6 · answered Nov 16 '08 at 03:01

I tried for long to find a good editor for my scheme code besides emacs, but even with emacs tringer foubles, it was still the best. jEdit was the second best, but its kind of like saying that the choices between cake, sawdust and dirt, the sawdust was second best.

Emacs with paredit mode just owns for structured editing of s expressions. Add to that the highlight parens mode, and it gets even better.

The thing about using emacs, is that the editors extensions language is lisp, so it is a great way to learn lisp.

score 1 · Answer 7 · answered Aug 03 '09 at 15:35

If you have a Mac, I would recommend Aquamacs, which is a beginner-friendly version of GNU-emacs, and therefore has all the power of emacs, while still offering "standard" copy-paste, save and other features, including normal file dialogs and windows.

score 1 · Answer 8 · edited May 23 '17 at 11:46

1

Take a look at this question

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/22850/getting-started-with-lisp

One thing it mentions is CUSP which runs inside Eclipse.

Also if you are doing Scheme (you don't say which Lisp you are referring to), I second the recommendation of DrScheme.

edited May 23 '17 at 11:46

Community

1
1

answered Nov 12 '08 at 03:39

Nathan Shively-Sanders

18,329
4
46
56

It's very similar. Most people mean Scheme when they say LISP. – helloandre Nov 13 '08 at 02:58
Scheme is a Lisp dialect with an emphasis on functional programming. – Svante Nov 16 '08 at 01:26
Scheme is a Lisp dialect. It lends itself to functional programming quite well, but it is method agnostic. – Jonathan Arkell Nov 16 '08 at 02:54
Even Logo is Lisp, but nobody edits Logo in Emacs... – Michael Paulukonis Feb 25 '09 at 14:38

score 1 · Answer 9 · answered Nov 12 '08 at 04:09

1

I suspect that nearly anyone that programs LISP will use emacs. You may be putting yourself at a disadvantage if you ever have to work with real LISP programmers.

Additionally, a good programmer should not be tied to any one editor. Learn to deal without Windows-based key acceleration.

answered Nov 12 '08 at 04:09

HUAGHAGUAH

1,063
6
3

No, definitely not "nearly anyone" uses Emacs for Common Lisp nowadays. And one is neither putting himself at a disadvantage when having to work with "real Lisp programmers" [casing changed for modernity's sake], as I can tell from my own experience as a Vim Lisper who's worked with Emacs users. – Leslie P. Polzer Feb 27 '09 at 11:08

score 1 · Answer 10 · answered Nov 12 '08 at 17:48

1

In addition to CUSP, which has been mentioned, there's also ABLE, a relatively simple Lisp editor with REPL integration and stuff. Personally, I don't have experience using it as I'm happy with SLIME.

answered Nov 12 '08 at 17:48

Matthias Benkard

15,497
4
39
47

score 1 · Answer 11 · answered Nov 15 '08 at 23:55

1

I'm undoubtedly a little late on this, but plain old vi(1) --- regular legacy vi --- works quite well, with paren matching and at least some basic s-exp stuff. Set up your EXRC to use

:set ai lisp aw

It's not SLIME, but it's something.

answered Nov 15 '08 at 23:55

Charlie Martin

110,348
25
193
263

Yes, you also can use vim :set sm – superK May 28 '13 at 10:02

score 1 · Answer 12 · answered Feb 25 '09 at 12:32

1

Some commercial Lisp systems (Allegro CL, LispWorks, Corman CL) are coming with their own editors. Typically one can choose between platform specific keybindings and Emacs-like keybindings.

answered Feb 25 '09 at 12:32

Rainer Joswig

136,269
10
221
346

score 0 · Answer 13 · edited Sep 23 '13 at 17:59

0

Emacs is not as weird and unfriendly as it once was. Depending on what platform you prefer, there are two modern, updated Emacs implementations with more familiar user interfaces.

If you are a Mac OS X user, the more polished is Aquamacs:

If you prefer Linux or Windows, then there is Xah Lee's ErgoEmacs:

Both are FOSS and free to download.

edited Sep 23 '13 at 17:59

MKB

7,587
9
45
71

answered Sep 23 '13 at 17:31

Liam Proven

121
5

score 0 · Answer 14 · answered Nov 12 '08 at 03:38

There are those that say there are no good editors for anything, other than emacs. I'm sure you'll find a few of them here (although I'm a vim fan).

The vim macro language is a powerful one which can let you run external programs (including the one in the current edit buffer).

But, if you're used to Notepad++, you'll probably find it as hard to move to vim as you would to emacs, so maybe your proposed solution is the best one.

score 0 · Answer 15 · answered Nov 16 '08 at 04:41

0

try McCLIM, newlisp

http://www.cliki.net/IDE

answered Nov 16 '08 at 04:41

plan9assembler

2,862
1
24
13

score 0 · Answer 16 · answered Feb 27 '09 at 11:09

Another thing - Notepad++ supports LISP syntax coloring, but it doesn't have an integrated LISP console like emacs does. Would it be fine to just have a Notepad++ window and a Command Line window open, side-by-side, and use the command-line whenever I want to run my program?

Yes! Take advantage of ASD though and just reload the system after making changes.

Don't restart your image every time.

Do try Eclipse/Cusp or Limp if you want REPL integration, though.

Are there any good editors for Lisp programming, other than Emacs?

16 Answers16