Is a .exe file absolutely required?
I'm new to lisp as well (been lurking), and that's one thing that I've been wondering about. What exactly is so hard about making a standalone executable out of lisp source?
I can understand that if you want to be able to interact with the source...say for debugging, you need access to the entire environment. But what if you just want to package a binary for distribution?
This kind of goes with the other thread about the standard library. Somebody was mentioning that you would have to include the entire library whether you used it or not. This is not true for programs written in other languages. You either only link in the functions that are referenced in the program, or dynamically link from a shared object file.
Is there something so fundamental to the lisp language that the entire environment needs to be distributed with a (possible very simple) program? I love the idea of the interactive environment when developing code, but for distribution, it seems akin to not only leaving the debugging symbols in place, but attaching a copy of the debugger and standard libraries as well...
Is there something I'm missing? or is this just an issue with the various free implementations that are available and not lisp in general?
-partap
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