[slime-devel] SLIME User Survey

[Thomas F. Burdick]

Luke Gorrie writes:
 > If the ALU can do it then so can we :-). It would be nice to get some
 > feedback to understand which backends are getting the most/least usage
 > and which ones are flaky.
 > 
 > So if you are an active SLIME user and you have a moment then please
 > reply to this mail (send the reply to the list).
 > 
 > Questions:
 > 

 > Which Lisp versions do you use SLIME with?

SBCL (0.8.8 and 0.8.10) on Mac OS X.

 > Which Emacs versions?

Carbon Emacs from CVS, and corresponding X11 builds.
Currently this means GNU Emacs 21.3.50 (or .51, I forget)

 > How well does SLIME work for you?

Better and better; well enough that it hardly ever gets in the way of
the work I'm trying to do.

 > What bugs (reproducible or otherwise) or missing features annoy you?

When using Hemlock, I used to keep a window open with a Garnet tree
widget that kept track of compilation notes.  I tried to setup the a
frame just for the compilation notes buffer, but it didn't work out
too well.  Generally, support for keeping a seperate frame for certain
SLIME buffers (notes, inspector, etc) would be nice.

The compilation notes buffer always pops up when there is exactly one
STYLE-WARNING (usually a redefinition warning, ug), but not when there
are some notes, which I might actually want to see.

The debugger doesn't let me easily inspect the current condition
(although I found the variable where it's kept).  The inspector
doesn't do anything useful when given condition objects.

I haven't tried using a local Emacs to attach to a remote Lisp.  I
gather though, that M-. won't work, if I do; it would be nice to
integrate use Tramp to do this.

Finally, there's no ASDF system editor.

 > Is there some packaging system (e.g. Debian) that you would like to
 > see SLIME 1.0 bundled with? If so, do you know how to coordinate this?

Nope.

 > If you said anything negative above then please say something nice
 > here to make us feel good:

SLIME has developed so quickly that I've gotten very high expectations
for it; it doesn't feel like using some crummy free software
environment where one has lowered expectations, it feels like the
prerelease of a commercial-quality environment.  Great job y'all!