This is a little library for state machines. These are definitely not finite state machines, or anything really formal. It is also not optimized in any way.
Macro define-state-machine name creates a state machine with name. Any existing states will be retained. Name must be a symbol.
Macro in-state-machine name sets the *current-state-machine* variable, making it a default for defining states.
Macro defsm* name just does both of the above.
Function drop-state-machine name erases the state machine.
Function find-state-machine name finds a state machine named by symbol name
Class state-machine-state is a state machine instance which will be passed through all states, so it might be a good place to keep any additional state. It has to be initialized with arguments :state-machine and :next-state to be ready for execution.
Generic Function drive-state-machine state-machine-state &rest driver-args will execute next state of state machine of state-machine-state, passing driver-args as driver arguments (see defstate).
Macro defstate name-and-options state-args driver-args &body body defines a state. name-and-options is either a symbol naming a state, or a list of form (name . option-plist), with option keys being :state-machine naming a state machine (with *current-state-machine* being the default) and :state with a value being a symbol to which state-machine-state object is bound. state-args is a destructuring lambda list for arguments passed to next-state, and driver-args is a destructuring lambda list for arguments passed to drive-state-machine.
Local function next-state next-state &rest next-state-args is active within defstate body. It immediately terminates the execution of the state body and prepares the state-machine-state object for next execution. Special values of next-state are nil, which means termination of state machine, possibly returning to a higher in chain, and t which means repeat current state, possibly with new arguments.
Local function sub-machine next-state sub-machine sub-state &rest next-state-args immediately terminates the execution of the state body and moves the state-machine-state object into another state machine, with the initial state sub-state and state arguments next-state-args. When that machine terminates state-machine-state object is moved into next-state state with whatever arguments the submachine terminated with.