CLIM 2 User Guide

Generally, a black square is used to indicate a new topic in the description. Note the following about these
definitions:
Packages
Unless otherwise specified, all symbols naming objects are in the clim package. Most of the example code
have a clim: package qualifier but some do not. If you enter example code, be sure that the clim package
is used or that the clim: qualifier is present. The clim-user package uses the clim package and also
the common-lisp package, so all common-lisp and clim symbols can be referenced without qualifiers
when the current package is clim-user. clim-user does not use excl (the package containing
many of the Allegro CL extensions). The excl package has no symbol conflicts with clim-user so you
can use excl when in clim-user if you wish.
Keyword arguments
In other Allegro CL manuals, keyword arguments are named with a keyword in formal argument lists and
are referred to as ‘the value of the :xxx keyword argument’ in the text. In this manual, we use a different
method. Keyword arguments do not have a preceding : in the argument list (but they do follow &key); and
the argument is referred to in the text in argument notation (again, without a :). Thus for example:
accept-from-string
[Function]
Arguments: type string &key view default default-type
activation-gestures additional-activation-gestures
delimiter-gestures additional-delimiter-gestures
(start 0) end
■ Reads the printed representation of an object of type type from string. This function is like
accept, except that the input is taken from string, starting at the position start and ending at
end. view, default, and default-type are as in accept.
■ [...]
In this example, there are many keyword arguments. One is start, which defaults to 0. If you want to
specify a value for start in a call to accept-from-string, you would do it as follows:
(accept-from-string symbol "ab var1" string :start 3)
Type faces
Type faces are used to distinguish between symbols naming functions and other operators, symbols naming
other things (like constants, variables, etc.), printed forms, and examples.
• Function and other operator names are printed in bold Courier.
• Arguments (and other placeholders) are in slant Courier.
• Symbols naming other things are printed in plain Courier. That face is thus used for
constants (such as #\A and nil) and special symbols (such as *package*) and keywords
and lambda-list keywords (such as :test and &optional, respectively).
• Printed forms and examples are printed in Courier, typically with user input in plain and
what the system prints in bold.
• Longer examples sometimes are printed in a reduced size, so that all 80 characters in a line are
printed on the same line.
We have tried to be careful to break symbol names at a hyphen in the symbol name. Thus, drawrectangle
will be broken at the hyphen or not at all.
12 CLIM 2.2 User Guide