"ANSI Lisp" rumor

[Guy.Steele@CMU-CS-A.ARPA]

I do not know of any official effort within ANSI to do anything at all
about LISP.  Here is what I do know:  I have been told that a group
in China has suggested that perhaps an ISO standard for LISP should
be promulgated.  I know nothing more about it than that.  However,
at the request of David Wise and J.A.N. Lee, I have sent a copy of
the Common LISP Manual to J.A.N. Lee, who has been involved with
standards of various kinds at ACM.  (David Wise is a member of the SIGPLAN
council, or whatever it is called, and is the LISP expert within that
body.)  The idea is that if either an ISO or ANSI standards effort
were to be undertaken, Wise and Lee feel that such an effort should
certainly take the work done on Common LISP into account, and they want
people in the standards organizations to be aware of the Common LISP
work.  I sent a copy of the Table of Contents to Lee several months
ago, and it was my understanding that he might choose to circulate
copies of it to, for example, members of the SIGPLAN council.
That's where it stands.  I repeat, I know of no effort actually to
start a standards effort; Wise and Lee merely want certain people to
be prepared by already having information about Common LISP if any of
a number of possible developments should unfold.
--Guy