The charter at ftp://ftp.uu.net/usenet/control/comp/comp.lang.lisp states that the purpose of comp.lang.lisp is "Discussion about LISP". It is somewhat in the nature of things that newsgroups' purposes evolve, as do names. Firstly, the newsgroup has evolved such that the main topic of discussion is ANSI Common Lisp, though discussion about other lisp variants is welcome within reasonable bounds. Secondly, the spelling "LISP" is passé; while it does reflect the initial abbreviation, it no longer reflects the actual language, so "Lisp" is the preferred capitalization.

Discussion of the language defined by the ANSI Common Lisp standard is definitely on-topic on comp.lang.lisp. Unlike comp.lang.c, we do not restrict our discussions to the standard, but also actively discuss the differences between implementations and implementation-specific extensions.

Since the Lisp community is remarkably long-lived, discussion of the history and evolution of Lisp tends also to be welcomed, or at least tolerated; discussion of non-standard lisps (though generally not Scheme or Emacs Lisp) is also accepted. Though CLOS (the Common Lisp Object System) has its own newsgroup it is also part of ANSI CL, and so is a valid topic for discussion.

Questions about Scheme, Emacs Lisp and AutoLisp tend not to be terribly welcome, as they have their own fora in the comp.lang.scheme, comp.emacs and comp.cad.autocad newsgroups.

Scheme is a member of the greater family of Lisp languages, assuming that is considered to include others like Dylan and Emacs Lisp. The design of Scheme predates the ANSI Common Lisp standard, and some CL features such as lexical scoping may be considered to have been derived from Scheme.

More detailed comparative discussions don't generally prove very productive; those that are interested in discussing Scheme should first consider discussing it in comp.lang.scheme, where discussion would be much more welcome and appropriate.

But of course!

However, we will need the e-mail address of your lecturer or teaching instructor to best aid you; for it is only fair that if we do the homework we should get the course credits. Alternatively, should you wish to hire a consultant from the group, competitive rates can be arranged.

Post the assignment, and your attempt so far; state explicitly that it is homework. You may find a kind soul on the group to explain some point that you are missing; this is more likely the more visible your own work is. Posts of the form "my assignment is due tomorrow please hlep!" are unlikely to engender much sympathy.