Discouraged programming practices

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Date: Thu, 3 Oct 85 17:54 EDT
From: David C. Plummer <DCP@SCRC-QUABBIN.ARPA>
Subject: Discouraged programming practices
To: Rob MacLachlan <RAM@C.CS.CMU.EDU>, common-lisp@SU-AI.ARPA
In-Reply-To: <RAM.12146204226.BABYL@C.CS.CMU.EDU>
Message-ID: <851003175412.2.DCP@NEPONSET.SCRC.Symbolics.COM>

    Date: Wed, 25 Sep 1985  22:12 EDT
    From: Rob MacLachlan <RAM@C.CS.CMU.EDU>


    Another discouraged programming practice is to write

	(without-interrupts (loop))

    as it may be difficult to terminate the execution of this form.
    WITHOUT-INTERRUPTS is not a part of Common-Lisp, but it should be.

    :-)?

On the serious side, what exactly does WITHOUT-INTERRUPTS mean?  Does it
mean WITHOUT-SCHEDULING, as it does on a variety of Lisp Machines?  Does
it mean WITHOUT-SCHEDULING-AND-WITHOUT-IO-DEVICES, which is what it
could mean on a 68000, PDP-11 or variety of other machines.  Does it
mean WITHOUT-OPERATING-SYSTEM (which on a time sharing system would be
very anti-social).  On a multi-processor (tightly coupled, loosely
coupled, or in between doesn't matter), does it mean some of the above
for the processor executing it, or does it mean
WITHOUT-ANY-OTHER-PROCESSOR.  Does spawning of sub-tasks to other
processors inherit the WITHOUT-INTERRUPTS.

In other words, WITHOUT-INTERRUPTS is much to vague to put in Common
Lisp.