Almighty Tools For Almighty Programmers
Common Lisp is the most powerful programming language in history. Emacs is the most powerful text editor in history. Now, it is time for you to make history by mastering the essentials of these almighty tools with Almighty Lisp: Lisp & Emacs Essentials.
Learn Lisp & Emacs ImmediatelyWHAT'S NEW
Big news, almighty bros: Almighty Lisp: Lisp & Emacs Essentials has received a major update, the Almighty Lisp Theme Pack 1 is also getting updated, and a second Almighty Lisp theme pack is coming along for the ride.
THE BOOK, UPDATED
Fresh since the last release:
- A brand-new Windows installation guide—Doom Emacs and Common Lisp on native Windows.
- An expanded Introduction to ease you onto the almighty path.
- Redesigned code and result blocks for cleaner, more readable examples.
- New chapter and section headings across every chapter.
- Clearer Quicklisp installation instructions for macOS and beyond.
- An expanded Errors & Conditions chapter.
- A major overhaul of the included accounting and money projects.
- Countless fixes throughout.
THEME PACK 1, UPDATED
Various tweaks have been made to Theme Pack 1. The most significant are:
- *-moon variants are now darker and generally warmer for more comfortable night-time coding.
- almighty-gear and gear-moon color tweaks.
- almighty-macro-moon is noticably more amber.
- almighty-titan's bg color is significantly darker for more greater eye comfort.
THEME PACK 2, RELEASED
Eight more Almighty Lisp themes for Doom Emacs—four light, four dark:
- almighty-ena / almighty-ena-moon
- almighty-mikasa / almighty-mikasa-moon
- almighty-lisp-x / almighty-lisp-x-moon
- almighty-saga / almighty-saga-moon
Try every theme live in the picker below, then read the whole book in your favorite.
Who This Book Is For
If you’re a Lisp-curious veteran programming looking for the perfect book for getting started with Common Lisp and Emacs, you need to read this book.
If you’ve tried to learn Common Lisp in the past, but couldn’t overcome the Emacs-wall, this book will pull you up and over that wall.
If you seek to learn the tools that will take you to another celestial plane of existence and software engineering ecstasy, first *settle down you insane person* (but I like that enthusiasm), and then begin reading Almighty Lisp: Lisp & Emacs Essentials IMMEDIATELY.
Learn The Language & The Editor
Learning Common Lisp is easy, but it’s complicated by the fact that Emacs is the defacto standard editor for it. Other editors support Common Lisp, but none of them have the rich set of features that you find in Emacs--either for text editing or for Common Lisp development.
Other books on Common Lisp teach the language, but they don’t teach the editor for the language. Finally, with Almighty Lisp: Lisp & Emacs Essentials, you can learn the language and the editor with the same book, drastically speeding up your proficiency with both. You’ll be barfing and slurping while you C-c C-c macros in no time.
What You'll Learn
In Almighty Lisp: Lisp & Emacs Essentials, the Common Lisp content covers:
- The Fundamentals (symbols, functions, control flow, etc.)
- List processing
- Functional Programming features
- The most powerful Object-Oriented Programming language features in any language.
- Macros
- Errors & Conditions
- Creating Executables & Deploying
- ... and more.
There are several small projects included that you can follow along with to practice editing with Emacs and become familiar with the essential features included with Common Lisp. I’ll also introduce you to the ecosystem teach you proper Common Lisp style.
The Emacs content covers:
- Downloading & Installing Doom Emacs
- Basic Survival Emacs Without Keybindings
- Text Editing
- Buffer Navigation & Management
- Window Navigation & Management
- Advanced Features Including Project-Level Search & Replace
- Using the Sly Common Lisp IDE
- Common Lisp Structured Editing
- ... and more.
You won’t need to learn all of Emacs’ features immediately. In fact, you will begin by using Emacs’ GUI menus for basic operations before advancing to using keybindings and using more advanced features.
The Almighty Philosophy
Common Lisp is a language optimized for ultimate adaptability. It’s a generalist’s secret weapon; a programming language that isn’t a master at anything, but is quite capable at doing everything.
With the rise of LLMs and a rapidly changing software industry, it’s easy to feel anxious about your own future as a software developer.
But you don’t need to worry. You need to adapt. Common Lisp is an almighty programming language that enables and even summons its users to become almighty. The macros are waiting. The REPL is loaded. The buffers and windows are at your command.
Be not defeated by the rapidly shifting winds of code and craft. Embrace the piercing light of destiny, beaming from the flaming horizon over an effervescent ocean of functions, classes, and parentheses. Become Almighty.
Read The Book ImmediatelyALMIGHTY THEMES
If you like the color scheme of this website...
If reading the code in the Almighty Lisp: Lisp & Emacs Essentials book reminds you of the good ol' days...
If you just gotta have more primary colors in your life...
Then I have some good news:
I am pleased to announce that a second Almighty Lisp Doom Emacs theme pack has arrived alongside the latest book update. That's sixteen themes across two packs—eight light and eight dark—including a theme with the main Almighty Lisp color palette as seen on this website.
Pricing
THEME PACK 1
$10
Your purchase supports more Lisp propaganda.
Requires Doom Themes
Pack includes:
- almighty-lisp
- almighty-lisp-moon
- almighty-titan
- almighty-titan-moon
- almighty-gear
- almighty-gear-moon
- almighty-macro
- almighty-macro-moon
- Free updates of the above themes.
THEME PACK 2
$10
Your purchase supports more Lisp propaganda.
Requires Doom Themes
Pack includes:
- almighty-ena
- almighty-ena-moon
- almighty-mikasa
- almighty-mikasa-moon
- almighty-lisp-x
- almighty-lisp-x-moon
- almighty-saga
- almighty-saga-moon
- Free updates of the above themes.
THEME PACK 3
$?
This pack will be primarily light themes.
Theme Packs #1 & #2
Click on any of the buttons below to select a theme and test it out. You can read Almighty Lisp: Lisp & Emacs Essentials using the theme.
I have tried to fine tune the colors to match Emacs as close as possible. Due to the differences in color rendering in Emacs and different web browsers, however, the colors on this site may not match exactly on Emacs.
(defclass flying ()
((max-altitude :initarg :max-altitude :initform 1000 :accessor max-altitude)))
(defclass fire-breathing ()
((flame-range :initarg :flame-range :initform 30 :accessor flame-range)))
(defclass armored ()
((armor-rating :initarg :armor-rating :initform 50 :accessor armor-rating)))
(defclass dragon (flying fire-breathing) ())
(defclass warrior (armored) ())
(defclass mage (flying) ())
(defgeneric attack (attacker target))
(defmethod attack ((attacker fire-breathing) (target armored))
(format t "Fire hits armor! ~a% deflected.~%" (armor-rating target)))
(defmethod attack ((attacker flying) (target flying))
(format t "Aerial battle at ~am altitude!~%" (min (max-altitude attacker) (max-altitude target))))
(defmethod attack ((attacker dragon) (target warrior))
(format t "The dragon dives and breathes fire on the warrior!~%")
(call-next-method)) ; also runs fire-breathing vs armored
(defparameter *smaug* (make-instance 'dragon :max-altitude 5000 :flame-range 100))
(defparameter *aragorn* (make-instance 'warrior :armor-rating 80))
(defparameter *gandalf* (make-instance 'mage :max-altitude 200))
(attack *smaug* *aragorn*)
The dragon dives and breathes fire on the warrior! Fire hits armor! 80% deflected. => NIL