Maker and classic computing fanatic Hartmut Grawe has designed a handheld to ship a wealth of performance for the Lisp programmer on the go.
“[The LispDeck is a] handheld cyberdeck operating fully on Lisp,” Grawe explains. “A big touchscreen, a secondary display, full USB keyboard help plus rotary encoder, SD Card, RFM69 [radio] and WLAN — all this managed from a Lisp REPL [Read-Eval-Print Loop] operating on the greater than succesful Teensy 4.1, supported by a built-in fullscreen editor and a small assist lexicon.”
The LispDeck is a Teensy 4.1-powered dual-screen transportable designed for uLisp improvement on the transfer. (📷: Hartmut Grawe)
Developed by John McCarthy within the late Fifties and first carried out as a working interpreter in 1960 by Steve Russell, Lisp is a language well-established however not so broadly recognized outdoors its circle of followers. Amongst these followers is David-Johnson Davies, who created uLisp — a microcontroller-centric model of Lisp, successfully sharing the identical relationship to its predecessor as MicroPython and Python.
It is the uLisp mission that triggered Grawe’s artistic urges — initially experimenting with utilizing uLisp on a LILYGO T-Deck however discovering the compact display uncomfortable, so getting down to construct one thing better-suited to his wants. “I started to pursue the concept of making a Lisp machine that is actually usable with out ruining one’s eyes,” he explains, “with a full keyboard and a cushty editor programmed in uLisp itself that may save and cargo my work using an SD Card.
“Fortunately, {hardware} elements becoming into that mounted concept can be found, so the LispBox got here into being as the primary iteration: a yr 2024 true house laptop that ‘boots’ inside seconds into nothing however the [Lisp] REPL immediate, able to be programmed with out PC or pill help whereas operating at unimaginable 600MHz.”
In addition to its two shows, the machine contains Wi-Fi and LoRa radio modules and a rotary encoder to pick from a Lisp lexicon for speedy improvement. (📷: Hartmut Grawe))
Having been utilizing the LispBox for some months, Grawe realised that there was a necessity for one thing else: a handheld variant, battery-powered and easily-portable for the Lisper on the go. Thus, the LispDeck. Just like the LispBox, with which it is appropriate, the LispDeck is powered by a Teensy 4.1 microcontroller, linked to an Adafruit RA8875 show controller and 5″ touchscreen, a smaller secondary ST77350-based 160×128 TFT show, an Adafruit Radio FeatherWing RFM96 radio module, an Espressif ESP-01S ESP8266 module for Wi-Fi networking, a rotary encoder, and an off-the-shelf removable wi-fi USB keyboard, all in a 3D-printed housing.
“Why deviate from the same old and confirmed Raspberry Pi cyberdeck path in any respect? As a result of I actually like to have the ability to utterly perceive and management the machine right down to the final bit like within the aforementioned previous days,” Grawe explains, “however with out being caught within the eight-bit previous. True, theoretically that is potential with the beloved [Raspberry] Pi as effectively, however provided that you are prepared to digest tens of millions of Linux supply code traces.”
The keyboard, hooked up to the Teensy 4.1 through USB, is removable for improved ergonomics. (📷: Hartmut Grawe))
“The LispDeck, however, presents computing oomph miles past historical ‘Cray’ [supercomputers],” Grawe continues, “on boards the dimensions of a chewing gum stick or much less, obtainable at pocket cash costs and designed to face up to even clumsy tinkerer’s arms like mine.”
The mission is documented in full on Hackaday.io; supply code and 3D-print recordsdata have been added to the LispBox GitHub repository underneath the permissive MIT license.
