I'm still in the process of figuring out how to build Maxima on my system so
I haven't yet gotten any experience using the LISP source, but that said...
One thing I'm not seeing is documentation of the LISP level description of
all of the data structure, nor of all of the LISP functions and LISP macro.
I'm willing to accept that Maxima is written in LISP and that it's a system
that isn't particularly transparent to users, but all of that said, where's
the programmer's documentation?
Is there the lack of documentation an unnecessarily high hurdle to adding
code to the system, even for mathematically sophisticated programmers?
I use symbolic math programs a lot, and I find Maxima exciting because it
provides a free platform. If I want to publish any code that requires to
the use of a symbolic math program, Maxima is obviously the system of choice
because the alternatives are so expensive ($1800 for MMA !).
But even documentation of simple procedures is missing. How do I load Lisp
files for instance? The documentation isn't clear. I tried compiling the
simplification routine Dr. Fateman posted and when I finally got it to start
compiling, the system crashed so hard that the restart menu couldn't get me
a prompt back. I expect that there IS a way to recompile any routine safely
while Maxima runs - this is LISP not C, but the documentation isn't clear on
how to do anything like this.
Joshua Scholar