Chiaslip is an result of inspiration in Lisp language, that has more than 60 years on. Chia network choosed this language for:
Completely sandboxed. Chialisp resource utilization is completely controlled. The language needs to be run on half a million computers, so it is important that the program cannot reach out and affect everyone's machines in an unintended way. A lisp program is evaluated and therefore cannot spawn any new processes or interact with the system it is running on.
Composability. A lisp program is itself just a list. This feature allows for powerful techniques that allow you to modify source code during program evaluation. Doing so can allow a "smart coin" to enforce rules on a participating coin while still allowing it to utilize the full programmability that Chialisp has to offer. Using lisp programs like this allows you to have layers of smart coins in which the output of an "inner" puzzle can be used in the evaluation of the "outer" puzzle.
Interoperability. Every smart coin in the Chia ecosystem, no matter how complex, is fundamentally a coin that is locked up with a Chialisp puzzle. The input to any puzzle will always be a lisp data structure, and the output will always be a list of conditions that all puzzles share. This means that everything in Chia interoperates with everything else. Any smart coin should be able to interact or communicate with any other smart coin, regardless of whether either coin was specifically designed to do so.
asset - a thing which can be owned. Most assets in the world have nothing to do with Chia.
token - a representation of an underlying asset, including in this case a set of coins on a chain
asset token - a divisible and fungible token, as opposed to a non-fungible token (NFT) which is less featureful
coin - a thing which exists on the Chia blockchain, analogous to a UTXO in Bitcoin
token coin - a coin which represents an underlying asset. In Chia the identity of coins changes even as the capability of being the underlying asset keeps getting passed between them
asset coin - a coin which specifically represents an asset token as opposed to a non-fungible token, or NFT
NFT coin - a coin represents an NFT. It usually has a parent which was the same NFT and a child which is also the same NFT.
CAT1 - the first Chia Asset Token standard. We may make a CAT2 in the future but it will be a while, if ever.
CAT - A Catch-all term for CAT1, CAT1.1 or CAT2 or possibly some other CAT standard in the future.
CAT1 token - a token which followers the CAT1 standard in its implementation
CAT token - a term which doesn’t specify which CAT standard is being followed. Also used if you’re being more informal or are just too lazy to type the 1. If you’re being really informal or lazy you can use the lowercase cat. You can also just call it a CAT since ‘CAT token’ is short for ‘chia asset token token’ which is valid but sounds weird.
CAT coin - a single coin which is part of a CAT token
X - a hypothetical name of a CAT token
X coin - a coin which specifically represents part of the token X. Multiple X coins can be called a litter.