Land of Lisp

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Learn to Program in Lisp, One Game at a Time!
by Conrad Barski, M.D.

October 2010, 504 pp.
ISBN: 978-1-59327-281-4

Lisp has been hailed as the world’s most powerful programming language, but its cryptic syntax and academic reputation can be enough to scare off even experienced programmers. Those dark days are finally over—Land of Lisp brings the power of functional programming to the people!

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.

About the Author

Conrad Barski has an M.D. from the University of Miami, and nearly 20 years of programming experience. This includes a stint developing an obscure Atari Jaguar game, and working on many medical software projects. Barski is also an avid cartoonist, having created the popular alien Lisp mascot and many graphical tutorials. He currently develops cardiology software and lives in Washington, D.C.

Check out the Land of Lisp music video!

Table of Contents

Introduction

Section I: Lisp Is Power
Chapter 1: Getting Started with Lisp
Chapter 2: Our First Lisp Program
Chapter 3: The Syntax of Lisp Code

Section II: Lisp Is Symmetry
Chapter 4: Conditions
Chapter 5: Learning Lisp Text and Console Programming... By Building a Text Game Engine!
Chapter 6: Interacting with the World: Reading and Printing in Lisp
Chapter 6.5: Lambda: A Function So Important It Deserves Its Own Chapter
Chapter 7: More About Lists
Chapter 8: This Ain't Your Daddy's Wumpus
Chapter 9: Advanced Data Types and Generic Programming

Section III: Lisp Is Hacking
Chapter 10: loop and format: The Seedy Underbelly of Lisp
Chapter 11: Printing Text with the format Function
Chapter 12: Working with Streams
Chapter 13: Let's Create a Web Server!

Interlude: Functional Programming Is Beautiful

Section IV: Lisp Is Science
Chapter 14: Ramping Lisp Up a Notch with Functional Programming
Chapter 15: Dice of Doom: A Game Written in the Functional Style
Chapter 16: The Magic of Lisp Macros
Chapter 17: Domain Specific Languages
Chapter 18: Lazy Programming
Chapter 19: Adding Graphics to Dice of Doom
Chapter 20: Making Dice of Doom More Fun

Epilogue: Land of Lisp: Secrets of the Seven Guilds

View the detailed Table of Contents (PDF).

View the Index (PDF).

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Reviews

"Land of Lisp is an excellent book for someone who wants to learn how to program."
—Slashdot (Read More)

"Land of Lisp is a truly great achievement. It's fun to read and does a good job of introducing the reader to the most important concepts of Lisp, by giving a taste of the language's power, without being overwhelming."
—citizen428.blog() (Read More)

"But really what I like about this book is just the sense of fun that it brings back to programming. Programming after all should be fun."
—brainwagon (Read More)

Land of Lisp is a "great introduction/refresher to Common Lisp and game development."
—DZone IT Book Zone (Read More)

"This is one of the few programming books I have read where I found myself really wanting to finish off each sample so that I could play the resulting game."
—Programming and Prose (Read More)

"Land of Lisp is always entertaining, which makes for perfect bed time or lunch hour reading. Two thumbs up!"
—Make Yourself Obsolete (Read More)

"Land of Lisp became one of my favorite Lisp, and programming, books."
—Jorge Tavares Weblog (Read More)

"Barski uses the time-tried technique employed by many college teachers of AI: using games as course or homework material. This book methodically exposes the reader to increasingly more sophisticated aspects of the language in this manner, and it is perhaps the best rendition of this approach I have read to this day."
—ADMIN Magazine (Read More)

"The book is great. I had lots of fun reading it and I've learnt so much it blew my mind."
—I Do Robots (Read More)

"The book does an excellent job of highlighting the philosophical and technical aspects of the language so by the time you are done with it you feel like you've learned a lot more than just how to write some code."
—Greg Laden, Science Blogs (Read More)

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