NEnequo·Jun 11, 2024Submission
1 points · Open discussiongoogle
lisp-koans
Common Lisp2013–2024
google / lisp-koans · Archived
lisp-koans
Common Lisp Koans is a language learning exercise in the same vein as the ruby koans, python koans and others. It is a port of the prior koans with some modifications to highlight lisp-specific features. Structured as ordered groups of broken unit tests, the project guides the learner progressively through many Common Lisp language features.
14Distinct people
17Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
3.2KGitHub stars
What to know before exploring
What it is
Common Lisp Koans is a language learning exercise in the same vein as the ruby koans, python koans and others. It is a port of the prior koans with some modifications to highlight lisp-specific features. Structured as ordered groups of broken unit tests, the project guides the learner progressively through many Common Lisp language features.
GitHub
Where it is used
No documented product use was verified in the last source check.
What people are saying
No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.
No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.
Also in these discussions
No other repository is repeatedly linked in the same discussions.
This week on Hacker News
Nov 7–Nov 14 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/14/2026, 3:03:16 PM UTC.
No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.
Mentions over time
HN mentions by year17 dated mentions
Observed mentions: 2013-06-01 06:10:08 UTC to 2024-06-11 11:52:25 UTC.
Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.
View mention counts and date ranges
| Period | Start (UTC) | End (exclusive, UTC) | Mentions | Submissions | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | 2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 4 | 2 | 2 |
| 2014 | 2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2015 | 2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 5 | 1 | 4 |
| 2016 | 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 2017 | 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2018 | 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2019 | 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| 2020 | 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 4 | 2 | 2 |
| 2021 | 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2022 | 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| 2023 | 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2024 | 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC | 1 | 1 | 0 |
What Hacker News says
17 sourcesIf you like the koan format, you might like to check out Lisp koans (Common Lisp), which I found to be quite enjoyable.
https://github.com/google/lisp-koans
In Git Koans (2013)If you've seen the Lisp Koans in the past, you might want to revisit them someday. Around half a year ago I've rewritten[0] the original set of koans, fixed multiple correctness issues, added some content, and cleaned up the test framework; they now look much better than the original version.
[0] https://github.com/google/lisp-koans/pull/111
In Lisp KoansShow HN: I've rewritten the Common Lisp Koans
9 points · Open discussion> what do you do to learn CL?
The best thing I've done is watch a video on making a reddit clone in Lisp. I couldn't get the libraries to work, but I plan on using other libraries to do the same thing either tomorrow or the next day. It's made me realize that I really need to start walking through other people's code.
https://vimeo.com/138249727
Google's LISP koans which is ~30 exercises where you complete the code and make the tests pass. Covers everything from mapcar to multi-threading.
https://github.com/google/lisp-koans
I'm currently on Ch. 9/32 of Peter Seigel's "Practical Common Lisp". I find the book to be a much better resource after already being familiar with the topics covered. It does a great job of going into the nuances and gotchas of the language, but because is so much more text than code, it's hard for me to apprecia
Read the rest
te all of those little details if I'm still trying to grasp the fundamentals of the topic.
http://www.gigamonkeys.com/book/
I write all the code I see with a pencil and paper (including all of those koans). I read a block of code and then try to rewrite it from memory.
Currently using vim. Haven't gotten around yet to using a live environment.
Future resources:
Paul Graham's "Roots of Lisp"
Paul Graham's "On Lisp"
Build a Lisp compiler
SICP
Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming
Upgrade my editor
Yeah, there's a lot I want to go through. It's gonna take me a few months just to go through all of the resources I have bookmarked so far. And I haven't even started looking for code that I want to read. End goal is to master Lisp.
I started with Practical Common Lisp, but found out Lisp-koans (https://github.com/google/lisp-koans) support my flow of learning CL better, as I do some koans while commuting in the train :)
In State of the Common Lisp EcosystemFor Common Lisp, Google has a set of Lisp Koans hosted on Github: https://github.com/google/lisp-koans
In Ask HN: Lisp interactive tutorials?I'm doing the Google/lisp-koans (https://github.com/google/lisp-koans), and I do agree, these articles are great on learning the innerworks of the tools and the language itself. Great stuff.
In Debugging Lisp Part 2: InspectingFrom the top of my head..:
The Praetorian Bootcamp challenges are similar to the Matasano ones: https://www.praetorian.com/challenges/
Lisp Koans: https://github.com/google/lisp-koans
Project Euler: https://projecteuler.net/
Exercism: http://exercism.io/
99 Lisp Problems: http://www.ic.unicamp.br/~meidanis/courses/mc336/2006s2/func...
In Running Lisp in ProductionThe lisp koans should execute on any common lisp implementation modulo the threads koan group. If you modify the file ".koans"
https://github.com/google/lisp-koans/blob/master/.koans
to remove the last entry ":threads" it should work.
In Lisp Koans by GoogleShowing the 15 most recent of 17 sources. Enable JavaScript to search and browse every indexed mention.