1 Guile NEWS --- history of user-visible changes.
2 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3 See the end for copying conditions.
5 Please send Guile bug reports to bug-guile@gnu.org.
7 Each release reports the NEWS in the following sections:
9 * Changes to the distribution
10 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
11 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
12 * Changes to the C interface
17 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
19 ** A one-dimenisonal array can now be 'equal?' to a vector.
20 ** Structures, records, and SRFI-9 records can now be compared with `equal?'.
23 ** array-set! with bit vector.
24 ** string<? and friends follow char<? etc order on 8-bit chars.
27 Changes since the 1.6.x series:
29 * Changes to the distribution
31 ** Guile is now licensed with the GNU Lesser General Public License.
33 ** The manual is now licensed with the GNU Free Documentation License.
35 ** Guile now requires GNU MP (http://swox.com/gmp).
37 Guile now uses the GNU MP library for arbitrary precision arithmetic.
39 ** Guile now has separate private and public configuration headers.
41 That is, things like HAVE_STRING_H no longer leak from Guile's
44 ** Guile now provides and uses an "effective" version number.
46 Guile now provides scm_effective_version and effective-version
47 functions which return the "effective" version number. This is just
48 the normal full version string without the final micro-version number,
49 so the current effective-version is "1.10". The effective version
50 should remain unchanged during a stable series, and should be used for
51 items like the versioned share directory name
52 i.e. /usr/share/guile/1.10.
54 Providing an unchanging version number during a stable release for
55 things like the versioned share directory can be particularly
56 important for Guile "add-on" packages, since it provides a directory
57 that they can install to that won't be changed out from under them
58 with each micro release during a stable series.
60 ** Thread implementation has changed.
62 When you configure "--with-threads=null", you will get the usual
63 threading API (call-with-new-thread, make-mutex, etc), but you can't
64 actually create new threads. Also, "--with-threads=no" is now
65 equivalent to "--with-threads=null". This means that the thread API
66 is always present, although you might not be able to create new
69 When you configure "--with-threads=pthreads" or "--with-threads=yes",
70 you will get threads that are implemented with the portable POSIX
71 threads. These threads can run concurrently (unlike the previous
72 "coop" thread implementation), but need to cooperate for things like
75 The default is "pthreads", unless your platform doesn't have pthreads,
76 in which case "null" threads are used.
78 See the manual for details, nodes "Initialization", "Multi-Threading",
79 "Blocking", and others.
81 ** There is the new notion of 'discouraged' features.
83 This is a milder form of deprecation.
85 Things that are discouraged should not be used in new code, but it is
86 OK to leave them in old code for now. When a discouraged feature is
87 used, no warning message is printed like there is for 'deprecated'
88 features. Also, things that are merely discouraged are nevertheless
89 implemented efficiently, while deprecated features can be very slow.
91 You can omit discouraged features from libguile by configuring it with
92 the '--disable-discouraged' option.
94 ** Deprecation warnings can be controlled at run-time.
96 (debug-enable 'warn-deprecated) switches them on and (debug-disable
97 'warn-deprecated) switches them off.
99 ** Support for SRFI 61, extended cond syntax for multiple values has
102 This SRFI is always available.
104 ** Support for require-extension, SRFI-55, has been added.
106 The SRFI-55 special form `require-extension' has been added. It is
107 available at startup, and provides a portable way to load Scheme
108 extensions. SRFI-55 only requires support for one type of extension,
109 "srfi"; so a set of SRFIs may be loaded via (require-extension (srfi 1
112 ** New module (srfi srfi-26) provides support for `cut' and `cute'.
114 The (srfi srfi-26) module is an implementation of SRFI-26 which
115 provides the `cut' and `cute' syntax. These may be used to specialize
116 parameters without currying.
118 ** New module (srfi srfi-31)
120 This is an implementation of SRFI-31 which provides a special form
121 `rec' for recursive evaluation.
123 ** The modules (srfi srfi-13), (srfi srfi-14) and (srfi srfi-4) have
124 been merged with the core, making their functionality always
127 The modules are still available, tho, and you could use them together
128 with a renaming import, for example.
130 ** Guile no longer includes its own version of libltdl.
132 The official version is good enough now.
134 ** The --enable-htmldoc option has been removed from 'configure'.
136 Support for translating the documentation into HTML is now always
137 provided. Use 'make html'.
139 ** New module (ice-9 serialize):
141 (serialize FORM1 ...) and (parallelize FORM1 ...) are useful when you
142 don't trust the thread safety of most of your program, but where you
143 have some section(s) of code which you consider can run in parallel to
144 other sections. See ice-9/serialize.scm for more information.
146 ** The configure option '--disable-arrays' has been removed.
148 Support for arrays and uniform numeric arrays is now always included
151 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
153 ** New command line option `-L'.
155 This option adds a directory to the front of the load path.
157 ** New command line option `--no-debug'.
159 Specifying `--no-debug' on the command line will keep the debugging
160 evaluator turned off, even for interactive sessions.
162 ** User-init file ~/.guile is now loaded with the debugging evaluator.
164 Previously, the normal evaluator would have been used. Using the
165 debugging evaluator gives better error messages.
167 ** The '-e' option now 'read's its argument.
169 This is to allow the new '(@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME)' construct to
170 be used with '-e'. For example, you can now write a script like
173 exec guile -e '(@ (demo) main)' -s "$0" "$@"
176 (define-module (demo)
180 (format #t "Demo: ~a~%" args))
183 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
185 ** Guardians have changed back to their original semantics
187 Guardians now behave like described in the paper by Dybvig et al. In
188 particular, they no longer make guarantees about the order in which
189 they return objects, and they can no longer be greedy.
191 They no longer drop cyclic data structures.
193 The C function scm_make_guardian has been changed incompatibly and no
194 longer takes the 'greedy_p' argument.
196 ** New function hashx-remove!
198 This function completes the set of 'hashx' functions.
200 ** The concept of dynamic roots has been factored into continuation
201 barriers and dynamic states.
203 Each thread has a current dynamic state that carries the values of the
204 fluids. You can create and copy dynamic states and use them as the
205 second argument for 'eval'. See "Fluids and Dynamic States" in the
208 To restrict the influence that captured continuations can have on the
209 control flow, you can errect continuation barriers. See "Continuation
210 Barriers" in the manual.
212 The function call-with-dynamic-root now essentially temporarily
213 installs a new dynamic state and errects a continuation barrier.
215 ** The default load path no longer includes "." at the end.
217 Automatically loading modules from the current directory should not
218 happen by default. If you want to allow it in a more controlled
219 manner, set the environment variable GUILE_LOAD_PATH or the Scheme
222 ** The uniform vector and array support has been overhauled.
224 It now complies with SRFI-4 and the weird prototype based uniform
225 array creation has been deprecated. See the manual for more details.
227 Some non-compatible changes have been made:
228 - characters can no longer be stored into byte arrays.
229 - strings and bit vectors are no longer considered to be uniform numeric
231 - array-rank throws an error for non-arrays instead of returning zero.
232 - array-ref does no longer accept non-arrays when no indices are given.
234 There is the new notion of 'generalized vectors' and corresponding
235 procedures like 'generalized-vector-ref'. Generalized vectors include
236 strings, bitvectors, ordinary vectors, and uniform numeric vectors.
238 Arrays use generalized vectors as their storage, so that you still
239 have arrays of characters, bits, etc. However, uniform-array-read!
240 and uniform-array-write can no longer read/write strings and
243 ** There is now support for copy-on-write substrings, mutation-sharing
244 substrings and read-only strings.
246 Three new procedures are related to this: substring/shared,
247 substring/copy, and substring/read-only. See the manual for more
250 ** Backtraces will now highlight the value that caused the error.
252 By default, these values are enclosed in "{...}", such as in this
261 <unnamed port>:1:1: In procedure car in expression (car (quote a)):
262 <unnamed port>:1:1: Wrong type (expecting pair): a
263 ABORT: (wrong-type-arg)
265 The prefix and suffix used for highlighting can be set via the two new
266 printer options 'highlight-prefix' and 'highlight-suffix'. For
267 example, putting this into ~/.guile will output the bad value in bold
270 (print-set! highlight-prefix "\x1b[1m")
271 (print-set! highlight-suffix "\x1b[22m")
274 ** 'gettext' support for internationalization has been added.
276 See the manual for details.
278 ** New syntax '@' and '@@':
280 You can now directly refer to variables exported from a module by
283 (@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME)
285 For example (@ (ice-9 pretty-print) pretty-print) will directly access
286 the pretty-print variable exported from the (ice-9 pretty-print)
287 module. You don't need to 'use' that module first. You can also use
288 '@' as a target of 'set!', as in (set! (@ mod var) val).
290 The related syntax (@@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME) works just like '@',
291 but it can also access variables that have not been exported. It is
292 intended only for kluges and temporary fixes and for debugging, not
295 ** Keyword syntax has been made more disciplined.
297 Previously, the name of a keyword was read as a 'token' but printed as
298 a symbol. Now, it is read as a general Scheme datum which must be a
309 ERROR: In expression (a b c):
313 ERROR: Unbound variable: foo
318 ERROR: Wrong type (expecting symbol): 12
322 ERROR: Wrong type (expecting symbol): (a b c)
326 ** The printing of symbols that might look like keywords can be
329 The new printer option 'quote-keywordish-symbols' controls how symbols
330 are printed that have a colon as their first or last character. The
331 default now is to only quote a symbol with #{...}# when the read
332 option 'keywords' is not '#f'. Thus:
334 guile> (define foo (string->symbol ":foo"))
335 guile> (read-set! keywords #f)
338 guile> (read-set! keywords 'prefix)
341 guile> (print-set! quote-keywordish-symbols #f)
345 ** 'while' now provides 'break' and 'continue'
347 break and continue were previously bound in a while loop, but not
348 documented, and continue didn't quite work properly. The undocumented
349 parameter to break which gave a return value for the while has been
352 ** 'call-with-current-continuation' is now also available under the name
355 ** The module system now checks for duplicate bindings.
357 The module system now can check for name conflicts among imported
360 The behavior can be controlled by specifying one or more 'duplicates'
361 handlers. For example, to make Guile return an error for every name
369 The new default behavior of the module system when a name collision
370 has been detected is to
372 1. Give priority to bindings marked as a replacement.
373 2. Issue a warning (different warning if overriding core binding).
374 3. Give priority to the last encountered binding (this corresponds to
377 If you want the old behavior back without replacements or warnings you
380 (default-duplicate-binding-handler 'last)
382 to your .guile init file.
384 ** New define-module option: :replace
386 :replace works as :export, but, in addition, marks the binding as a
389 A typical example is `format' in (ice-9 format) which is a replacement
390 for the core binding `format'.
392 ** Adding prefixes to imported bindings in the module system
394 There is now a new :use-module option :prefix. It can be used to add
395 a prefix to all imported bindings.
398 :use-module ((bar) :prefix bar:))
400 will import all bindings exported from bar, but rename them by adding
403 ** Conflicting generic functions can be automatically merged.
405 When two imported bindings conflict and they are both generic
406 functions, the two functions can now be merged automatically. This is
407 activated with the 'duplicates' handler 'merge-generics'.
409 ** New function: effective-version
411 Returns the "effective" version number. This is just the normal full
412 version string without the final micro-version number. See "Changes
413 to the distribution" above.
415 ** New threading functions: parallel, letpar, par-map, and friends
417 These are convenient ways to run calculations in parallel in new
418 threads. See "Parallel forms" in the manual for details.
420 ** New function 'try-mutex'.
422 This function will attempt to lock a mutex but will return immediately
423 instead of blocking and indicate failure.
425 ** Waiting on a condition variable can have a timeout.
427 The function 'wait-condition-variable' now takes a third, optional
428 argument that specifies the point in time where the waiting should be
431 ** New function 'broadcast-condition-variable'.
433 ** New functions 'all-threads' and 'current-thread'.
435 ** Signals and system asyncs work better with threads.
437 The function 'sigaction' now takes a fourth, optional, argument that
438 specifies the thread that the handler should run in. When the
439 argument is omitted, the handler will run in the thread that called
442 Likewise, 'system-async-mark' takes a second, optional, argument that
443 specifies the thread that the async should run in. When it is
444 omitted, the async will run in the thread that called
447 C code can use the new functions scm_sigaction_for_thread and
448 scm_system_async_mark_for_thread to pass the new thread argument.
450 When a thread blocks on a mutex, a condition variable or is waiting
451 for IO to be possible, it will still execute system asyncs. This can
452 be used to interrupt such a thread by making it execute a 'throw', for
455 ** The function 'system-async' is deprecated.
457 You can now pass any zero-argument procedure to 'system-async-mark'.
458 The function 'system-async' will just return its argument unchanged
461 ** New functions 'call-with-blocked-asyncs' and
462 'call-with-unblocked-asyncs'
464 The expression (call-with-blocked-asyncs PROC) will call PROC and will
465 block execution of system asyncs for the current thread by one level
466 while PROC runs. Likewise, call-with-unblocked-asyncs will call a
467 procedure and will unblock the execution of system asyncs by one
468 level for the current thread.
470 Only system asyncs are affected by these functions.
472 ** The functions 'mask-signals' and 'unmask-signals' are deprecated.
474 Use 'call-with-blocked-asyncs' or 'call-with-unblocked-asyncs'
475 instead. Those functions are easier to use correctly and can be
478 ** New function 'unsetenv'.
480 ** New macro 'define-syntax-public'.
482 It works like 'define-syntax' and also exports the defined macro (but
485 ** There is support for Infinity and NaNs.
487 Following PLT Scheme, Guile can now work with infinite numbers, and
490 There is new syntax for numbers: "+inf.0" (infinity), "-inf.0"
491 (negative infinity), "+nan.0" (not-a-number), and "-nan.0" (same as
492 "+nan.0"). These numbers are inexact and have no exact counterpart.
494 Dividing by an inexact zero returns +inf.0 or -inf.0, depending on the
495 sign of the dividend. The infinities are integers, and they answer #t
496 for both 'even?' and 'odd?'. The +nan.0 value is not an integer and is
497 not '=' to itself, but '+nan.0' is 'eqv?' to itself.
508 ERROR: Numerical overflow
510 Two new predicates 'inf?' and 'nan?' can be used to test for the
513 ** Inexact zero can have a sign.
515 Guile can now distinguish between plus and minus inexact zero, if your
516 platform supports this, too. The two zeros are equal according to
517 '=', but not according to 'eqv?'. For example
528 ** Guile now has exact rationals.
530 Guile can now represent fractions such as 1/3 exactly. Computing with
531 them is also done exactly, of course:
536 ** 'floor', 'ceiling', 'round' and 'truncate' now return exact numbers
539 For example: (floor 2) now returns an exact 2 where in the past it
540 returned an inexact 2.0. Likewise, (floor 5/4) returns an exact 1.
542 ** inexact->exact no longer returns only integers.
544 Without exact rationals, the closest exact number was always an
545 integer, but now inexact->exact returns the fraction that is exactly
546 equal to a floating point number. For example:
548 (inexact->exact 1.234)
549 => 694680242521899/562949953421312
551 When you want the old behavior, use 'round' explicitly:
553 (inexact->exact (round 1.234))
556 ** New function 'rationalize'.
558 This function finds a simple fraction that is close to a given real
559 number. For example (and compare with inexact->exact above):
561 (rationalize (inexact->exact 1.234) 1/2000)
564 Note that, as required by R5RS, rationalize returns only then an exact
565 result when both its arguments are exact.
567 ** 'odd?' and 'even?' work also for inexact integers.
569 Previously, (odd? 1.0) would signal an error since only exact integers
570 were recognized as integers. Now (odd? 1.0) returns #t, (odd? 2.0)
571 returns #f and (odd? 1.5) signals an error.
573 ** Guile now has uninterned symbols.
575 The new function 'make-symbol' will return an uninterned symbol. This
576 is a symbol that is unique and is guaranteed to remain unique.
577 However, uninterned symbols can not yet be read back in.
579 Use the new function 'symbol-interned?' to check whether a symbol is
582 ** pretty-print has more options.
584 The function pretty-print from the (ice-9 pretty-print) module can now
585 also be invoked with keyword arguments that control things like
586 maximum output width. See the manual for details.
588 ** Variables have no longer a special behavior for `equal?'.
590 Previously, comparing two variables with `equal?' would recursivly
591 compare their values. This is no longer done. Variables are now only
592 `equal?' if they are `eq?'.
594 ** `(begin)' is now valid.
596 You can now use an empty `begin' form. It will yield #<unspecified>
597 when evaluated and simply be ignored in a definition context.
599 ** Deprecated: procedure->macro
601 Change your code to use 'define-macro' or r5rs macros. Also, be aware
602 that macro expansion will not be done during evaluation, but prior to
605 ** Soft ports now allow a `char-ready?' procedure
607 The vector argument to `make-soft-port' can now have a length of
608 either 5 or 6. (Previously the length had to be 5.) The optional 6th
609 element is interpreted as an `input-waiting' thunk -- i.e. a thunk
610 that returns the number of characters that can be read immediately
611 without the soft port blocking.
613 ** Deprecated: undefine
615 There is no replacement for undefine.
617 ** The functions make-keyword-from-dash-symbol and keyword-dash-symbol
618 have been discouraged.
620 They are relics from a time where a keyword like #:foo was used
621 directly as a Tcl option "-foo" and thus keywords were internally
622 stored as a symbol with a starting dash. We now store a symbol
625 Use symbol->keyword and keyword->symbol instead.
627 ** The `cheap' debug option is now obsolete
629 Evaluator trap calls are now unconditionally "cheap" - in other words,
630 they pass a debug object to the trap handler rather than a full
631 continuation. The trap handler code can capture a full continuation
632 by using `call-with-current-continuation' in the usual way, if it so
635 The `cheap' option is retained for now so as not to break existing
636 code which gets or sets it, but setting it now has no effect. It will
637 be removed in the next major Guile release.
639 ** Evaluator trap calls now support `tweaking'
641 `Tweaking' means that the trap handler code can modify the Scheme
642 expression that is about to be evaluated (in the case of an
643 enter-frame trap) or the value that is being returned (in the case of
644 an exit-frame trap). The trap handler code indicates that it wants to
645 do this by returning a pair whose car is the symbol 'instead and whose
646 cdr is the modified expression or return value.
648 * Changes to the C interface
650 ** The functions scm_hash_fn_remove_x and scm_hashx_remove_x no longer
651 take a 'delete' function argument.
653 This argument makes no sense since the delete function is used to
654 remove a pair from an alist, and this must not be configurable.
656 This is an incompatible change.
658 ** The GH interface is now subject to the deprecation mechanism
660 The GH interface has been deprecated for quite some time but now it is
661 actually removed from Guile when it is configured with
662 --disable-deprecated.
664 See the manual "Transitioning away from GH" for more information.
666 ** A new family of functions for converting between C values and
667 Scheme values has been added.
669 These functions follow a common naming scheme and are designed to be
670 easier to use, thread-safe and more future-proof than the older
675 These are predicates that return a C boolean: 1 or 0. Instead of
676 SCM_NFALSEP, you can now use scm_is_true, for example.
678 - <type> scm_to_<type> (SCM val, ...)
680 These are functions that convert a Scheme value into an appropriate
681 C value. For example, you can use scm_to_int to safely convert from
684 - SCM scm_from_<type> (<type> val, ...)
686 These functions convert from a C type to a SCM value; for example,
687 scm_from_int for ints.
689 There is a huge number of these functions, for numbers, strings,
690 symbols, vectors, etc. They are documented in the reference manual in
691 the API section together with the types that they apply to.
693 ** New functions for dealing with complex numbers in C have been added.
695 The new functions are scm_c_make_rectangular, scm_c_make_polar,
696 scm_c_real_part, scm_c_imag_part, scm_c_magnitude and scm_c_angle.
697 They work like scm_make_rectangular etc but take or return doubles
700 ** The function scm_make_complex has been discouraged.
702 Use scm_c_make_rectangular instead.
704 ** The INUM macros have been deprecated.
706 A lot of code uses these macros to do general integer conversions,
707 although the macros only work correctly with fixnums. Use the
708 following alternatives.
710 SCM_INUMP -> scm_is_integer or similar
711 SCM_NINUMP -> !scm_is_integer or similar
712 SCM_MAKINUM -> scm_from_int or similar
713 SCM_INUM -> scm_to_int or similar
715 SCM_VALIDATE_INUM_* -> Do not use these; scm_to_int, etc. will
716 do the validating for you.
718 ** The scm_num2<type> and scm_<type>2num functions and scm_make_real
719 have been discouraged.
721 Use the newer scm_to_<type> and scm_from_<type> functions instead for
722 new code. The functions have been discouraged since they don't fit
725 ** The 'boolean' macros SCM_FALSEP etc have been discouraged.
727 They have strange names, especially SCM_NFALSEP, and SCM_BOOLP
728 evaluates its argument twice. Use scm_is_true, etc. instead for new
731 ** The macro SCM_EQ_P has been discouraged.
733 Use scm_is_eq for new code, which fits better into the naming
736 ** The macros SCM_CONSP, SCM_NCONSP, SCM_NULLP, and SCM_NNULLP have
739 Use the function scm_is_pair or scm_is_null instead.
741 ** The functions scm_round and scm_truncate have been deprecated and
742 are now available as scm_c_round and scm_c_truncate, respectively.
744 These functions occupy the names that scm_round_number and
745 scm_truncate_number should have.
747 ** The functions scm_c_string2str, scm_c_substring2str, and
748 scm_c_symbol2str have been deprecated.
750 Use scm_to_locale_stringbuf or similar instead, maybe together with
753 ** New functions scm_c_make_string, scm_c_string_length,
754 scm_c_string_ref, scm_c_string_set_x, scm_c_substring,
755 scm_c_substring_shared, scm_c_substring_copy.
757 These are like scm_make_string, scm_length, etc. but are slightly
758 easier to use from C.
760 ** The macros SCM_STRINGP, SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_STRING_LENGTH,
761 SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, and SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH have been deprecated.
763 They export too many assumptions about the implementation of strings
764 and symbols that are no longer true in the presence of
765 mutation-sharing substrings and when Guile switches to some form of
768 When working with strings, it is often best to use the normal string
769 functions provided by Guile, such as scm_c_string_ref,
770 scm_c_string_set_x, scm_string_append, etc. Be sure to look in the
771 manual since many more such functions are now provided than
774 When you want to convert a SCM string to a C string, use the
775 scm_to_locale_string function or similar instead. For symbols, use
776 scm_symbol_to_string and then work with that string. Because of the
777 new string representation, scm_symbol_to_string does not need to copy
778 and is thus quite efficient.
780 ** Some string, symbol and keyword functions have been discouraged.
782 They don't fit into the uniform naming scheme and are not explicit
783 about the character encoding.
785 Replace according to the following table:
787 scm_allocate_string -> scm_c_make_string
788 scm_take_str -> scm_take_locale_stringn
789 scm_take0str -> scm_take_locale_string
790 scm_mem2string -> scm_from_locale_stringn
791 scm_str2string -> scm_from_locale_string
792 scm_makfrom0str -> scm_from_locale_string
793 scm_mem2symbol -> scm_from_locale_symboln
794 scm_mem2uninterned_symbol -> scm_from_locale_stringn + scm_make_symbol
795 scm_str2symbol -> scm_from_locale_symbol
797 SCM_SYMBOL_HASH -> scm_hashq
798 SCM_SYMBOL_INTERNED_P -> scm_symbol_interned_p
800 scm_c_make_keyword -> scm_from_locale_keyword
802 ** The functions scm_keyword_to_symbol and sym_symbol_to_keyword are
803 now also available to C code.
805 ** SCM_KEYWORDP and SCM_KEYWORDSYM have been deprecated.
807 Use scm_is_keyword and scm_keyword_to_symbol instead, but note that
808 the latter returns the true name of the keyword, not the 'dash name',
809 as SCM_KEYWORDSYM used to do.
811 ** A new way to access arrays in a thread-safe and efficient way has
814 See the manual, node "Accessing Arrays From C".
816 ** The old uniform vector and bitvector implementations have been
817 unceremoniously removed.
819 This implementation exposed the details of the tagging system of
820 Guile. Use the new C API explained in the manual in node "Uniform
821 Numeric Vectors" and "Bit Vectors", respectively.
823 The following macros are gone: SCM_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_BASE,
824 SCM_UVECTOR_MAXLENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_MAKE_UVECTOR_TAG,
825 SCM_SET_UVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_BITVECTOR_P, SCM_BITVECTOR_BASE,
826 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_BASE, SCM_BITVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH,
827 SCM_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_MAKE_BITVECTOR_TAG,
828 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_BITVEC_REF, SCM_BITVEC_SET,
831 ** The macros dealing with vectors have been deprecated.
833 Use the new functions scm_is_vector, scm_vector_elements,
834 scm_vector_writable_elements, etc, or scm_is_simple_vector,
835 SCM_SIMPLE_VECTOR_REF, SCM_SIMPLE_VECTOR_SET, etc instead. See the
836 manual for more details.
838 Deprecated are SCM_VECTORP, SCM_VELTS, SCM_VECTOR_MAX_LENGTH,
839 SCM_VECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_VECTOR_REF, SCM_VECTOR_SET, SCM_WRITABLE_VELTS.
841 The following macros have been removed: SCM_VECTOR_BASE,
842 SCM_SET_VECTOR_BASE, SCM_MAKE_VECTOR_TAG, SCM_SET_VECTOR_LENGTH,
843 SCM_VELTS_AS_STACKITEMS, SCM_SETVELTS, SCM_GC_WRITABLE_VELTS.
845 ** Some C functions and macros related to arrays have been deprecated.
847 Migrate according to the following table:
849 scm_make_uve -> scm_make_typed_array, scm_make_u8vector etc.
850 scm_make_ra -> scm_make_array
851 scm_shap2ra -> scm_make_array
852 scm_cvref -> scm_c_generalized_vector_ref
853 scm_ra_set_contp -> do not use
854 scm_aind -> scm_array_handle_pos
855 scm_raprin1 -> scm_display or scm_write
857 SCM_ARRAYP -> scm_is_array
858 SCM_ARRAY_NDIM -> scm_c_array_rank
859 SCM_ARRAY_DIMS -> scm_array_handle_dims
860 SCM_ARRAY_CONTP -> do not use
861 SCM_ARRAY_MEM -> do not use
862 SCM_ARRAY_V -> scm_array_handle_elements or similar
863 SCM_ARRAY_BASE -> do not use
865 ** SCM_CELL_WORD_LOC has been deprecated.
867 Use the new macro SCM_CELL_OBJECT_LOC instead, which returns a pointer
868 to a SCM, as opposed to a pointer to a scm_t_bits.
870 This was done to allow the correct use of pointers into the Scheme
871 heap. Previously, the heap words were of type scm_t_bits and local
872 variables and function arguments were of type SCM, making it
873 non-standards-conformant to have a pointer that can point to both.
875 ** New macros SCM_SMOB_DATA_2, SCM_SMOB_DATA_3, etc.
877 These macros should be used instead of SCM_CELL_WORD_2/3 to access the
878 second and third words of double smobs. Likewise for
879 SCM_SET_SMOB_DATA_2 and SCM_SET_SMOB_DATA_3.
881 Also, there is SCM_SMOB_FLAGS and SCM_SET_SMOB_FLAGS that should be
882 used to get and set the 16 exra bits in the zeroth word of a smob.
884 And finally, there is SCM_SMOB_OBJECT and SCM_SMOB_SET_OBJECT for
885 accesing the first immediate word of a smob as a SCM value, and there
886 is SCM_SMOB_OBJECT_LOC for getting a pointer to the first immediate
887 smob word. Like wise for SCM_SMOB_OBJECT_2, etc.
889 ** New way to deal with non-local exits and re-entries.
891 There is a new set of functions that essentially do what
892 scm_internal_dynamic_wind does, but in a way that is more convenient
893 for C code in some situations. Here is a quick example of how to
894 prevent a potential memory leak:
901 scm_dynwind_begin (0);
903 mem = scm_malloc (100);
904 scm_dynwind_unwind_handler (free, mem, SCM_F_WIND_EXPLICITLY);
906 /* MEM would leak if BAR throws an error.
907 SCM_DYNWIND_UNWIND_HANDLER frees it nevertheless.
914 /* Because of SCM_F_WIND_EXPLICITLY, MEM will be freed by
915 SCM_DYNWIND_END as well.
919 For full documentation, see the node "Dynamic Wind" in the manual.
921 ** New function scm_dynwind_free
923 This function calls 'free' on a given pointer when a dynwind context
924 is left. Thus the call to scm_dynwind_unwind_handler above could be
925 replaced with simply scm_dynwind_free (mem).
927 ** New functions scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs and
928 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs
930 Like scm_call_with_blocked_asyncs etc. but for C functions.
932 ** New functions scm_dynwind_block_asyncs and scm_dynwind_unblock_asyncs
934 In addition to scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs you can now also use
935 scm_dynwind_block_asyncs in a 'dynwind context' (see above). Likewise for
936 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs and scm_dynwind_unblock_asyncs.
938 ** The macros SCM_DEFER_INTS, SCM_ALLOW_INTS, SCM_REDEFER_INTS,
939 SCM_REALLOW_INTS have been deprecated.
941 They do no longer fulfill their original role of blocking signal
942 delivery. Depending on what you want to achieve, replace a pair of
943 SCM_DEFER_INTS and SCM_ALLOW_INTS with a dynwind context that locks a
944 mutex, blocks asyncs, or both. See node "Critical Sections" in the
947 ** The value 'scm_mask_ints' is no longer writable.
949 Previously, you could set scm_mask_ints directly. This is no longer
950 possible. Use scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs and
951 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs instead.
953 ** New way to temporarily set the current input, output or error ports
955 C code can now use scm_dynwind_current_<foo>_port in a 'dynwind
956 context' (see above). <foo> is one of "input", "output" or "error".
958 ** New way to temporarily set fluids
960 C code can now use scm_dynwind_fluid in a 'dynwind context' (see
961 above) to temporarily set the value of a fluid.
963 ** New types scm_t_intmax and scm_t_uintmax.
965 On platforms that have them, these types are identical to intmax_t and
966 uintmax_t, respectively. On other platforms, they are identical to
967 the largest integer types that Guile knows about.
969 ** The functions scm_unmemocopy and scm_unmemoize have been removed.
971 You should not have used them.
973 ** Many public #defines with generic names have been made private.
975 #defines with generic names like HAVE_FOO or SIZEOF_FOO have been made
976 private or renamed with a more suitable public name.
978 ** The macro SCM_TYP16S has been deprecated.
980 This macro is not intended for public use.
982 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_INEXACTP has been deprecated.
984 Use scm_is_true (scm_inexact_p (...)) instead.
986 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_REALP has been deprecated.
988 Use scm_is_real instead.
990 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_COMPLEXP has been deprecated.
992 Use scm_is_complex instead.
994 ** Some preprocessor defines have been deprecated.
996 These defines indicated whether a certain feature was present in Guile
997 or not. Going forward, assume that the features are always present.
999 The macros are: USE_THREADS, GUILE_ISELECT, READER_EXTENSIONS,
1000 DEBUG_EXTENSIONS, DYNAMIC_LINKING.
1002 The following macros have been removed completely: MEMOIZE_LOCALS,
1003 SCM_RECKLESS, SCM_CAUTIOUS.
1005 ** The preprocessor define STACK_DIRECTION has been deprecated.
1007 There should be no need to know about the stack direction for ordinary
1010 ** New function: scm_effective_version
1012 Returns the "effective" version number. This is just the normal full
1013 version string without the final micro-version number. See "Changes
1014 to the distribution" above.
1016 ** The function scm_call_with_new_thread has a new prototype.
1018 Instead of taking a list with the thunk and handler, these two
1019 arguments are now passed directly:
1021 SCM scm_call_with_new_thread (SCM thunk, SCM handler);
1023 This is an incompatible change.
1025 ** New snarfer macro SCM_DEFINE_PUBLIC.
1027 This is like SCM_DEFINE, but also calls scm_c_export for the defined
1028 function in the init section.
1030 ** The snarfer macro SCM_SNARF_INIT is now officially supported.
1032 ** Garbage collector rewrite.
1034 The garbage collector is cleaned up a lot, and now uses lazy
1035 sweeping. This is reflected in the output of (gc-stats); since cells
1036 are being freed when they are allocated, the cells-allocated field
1037 stays roughly constant.
1039 For malloc related triggers, the behavior is changed. It uses the same
1040 heuristic as the cell-triggered collections. It may be tuned with the
1041 environment variables GUILE_MIN_YIELD_MALLOC. This is the percentage
1042 for minimum yield of malloc related triggers. The default is 40.
1043 GUILE_INIT_MALLOC_LIMIT sets the initial trigger for doing a GC. The
1046 Debugging operations for the freelist have been deprecated, along with
1047 the C variables that control garbage collection. The environment
1048 variables GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE, GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_2,
1049 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_1, and GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2 should be used.
1051 For understanding the memory usage of a GUILE program, the routine
1052 gc-live-object-stats returns an alist containing the number of live
1053 objects for every type.
1056 ** The function scm_definedp has been renamed to scm_defined_p
1058 The name scm_definedp is deprecated.
1060 ** The struct scm_cell type has been renamed to scm_t_cell
1062 This is in accordance to Guile's naming scheme for types. Note that
1063 the name scm_cell is now used for a function that allocates and
1064 initializes a new cell (see below).
1066 ** New functions for memory management
1068 A new set of functions for memory management has been added since the
1069 old way (scm_must_malloc, scm_must_free, etc) was error prone and
1070 indeed, Guile itself contained some long standing bugs that could
1071 cause aborts in long running programs.
1073 The new functions are more symmetrical and do not need cooperation
1074 from smob free routines, among other improvements.
1076 The new functions are scm_malloc, scm_realloc, scm_calloc, scm_strdup,
1077 scm_strndup, scm_gc_malloc, scm_gc_calloc, scm_gc_realloc,
1078 scm_gc_free, scm_gc_register_collectable_memory, and
1079 scm_gc_unregister_collectable_memory. Refer to the manual for more
1080 details and for upgrading instructions.
1082 The old functions for memory management have been deprecated. They
1083 are: scm_must_malloc, scm_must_realloc, scm_must_free,
1084 scm_must_strdup, scm_must_strndup, scm_done_malloc, scm_done_free.
1086 ** Declarations of exported features are marked with SCM_API.
1088 Every declaration of a feature that belongs to the exported Guile API
1089 has been marked by adding the macro "SCM_API" to the start of the
1090 declaration. This macro can expand into different things, the most
1091 common of which is just "extern" for Unix platforms. On Win32, it can
1092 be used to control which symbols are exported from a DLL.
1094 If you `#define SCM_IMPORT' before including <libguile.h>, SCM_API
1095 will expand into "__declspec (dllimport) extern", which is needed for
1096 linking to the Guile DLL in Windows.
1098 There are also SCM_RL_IMPORT, SCM_SRFI1314_IMPORT, and
1099 SCM_SRFI4_IMPORT, for the corresponding libraries.
1101 ** SCM_NEWCELL and SCM_NEWCELL2 have been deprecated.
1103 Use the new functions scm_cell and scm_double_cell instead. The old
1104 macros had problems because with them allocation and initialization
1105 was separated and the GC could sometimes observe half initialized
1106 cells. Only careful coding by the user of SCM_NEWCELL and
1107 SCM_NEWCELL2 could make this safe and efficient.
1109 ** CHECK_ENTRY, CHECK_APPLY and CHECK_EXIT have been deprecated.
1111 Use the variables scm_check_entry_p, scm_check_apply_p and scm_check_exit_p
1114 ** SRCBRKP has been deprecated.
1116 Use scm_c_source_property_breakpoint_p instead.
1118 ** Deprecated: scm_makmacro
1120 Change your code to use either scm_makmmacro or to define macros in
1121 Scheme, using 'define-macro'.
1123 ** New function scm_c_port_for_each.
1125 This function is like scm_port_for_each but takes a pointer to a C
1126 function as the callback instead of a SCM value.
1128 ** The names scm_internal_select, scm_thread_sleep, and
1129 scm_thread_usleep have been discouraged.
1131 Use scm_std_select, scm_std_sleep, scm_std_usleep instead.
1133 ** The GC can no longer be blocked.
1135 The global flags scm_gc_heap_lock and scm_block_gc have been removed.
1136 The GC can now run (partially) concurrently with other code and thus
1137 blocking it is not well defined.
1139 ** Many definitions have been removed that were previously deprecated.
1141 scm_lisp_nil, scm_lisp_t, s_nil_ify, scm_m_nil_ify, s_t_ify,
1142 scm_m_t_ify, s_0_cond, scm_m_0_cond, s_0_ify, scm_m_0_ify, s_1_ify,
1143 scm_m_1_ify, scm_debug_newcell, scm_debug_newcell2,
1144 scm_tc16_allocated, SCM_SET_SYMBOL_HASH, SCM_IM_NIL_IFY, SCM_IM_T_IFY,
1145 SCM_IM_0_COND, SCM_IM_0_IFY, SCM_IM_1_IFY, SCM_GC_SET_ALLOCATED,
1146 scm_debug_newcell, scm_debug_newcell2, SCM_HUP_SIGNAL, SCM_INT_SIGNAL,
1147 SCM_FPE_SIGNAL, SCM_BUS_SIGNAL, SCM_SEGV_SIGNAL, SCM_ALRM_SIGNAL,
1148 SCM_GC_SIGNAL, SCM_TICK_SIGNAL, SCM_SIG_ORD, SCM_ORD_SIG,
1149 SCM_NUM_SIGS, scm_top_level_lookup_closure_var,
1150 *top-level-lookup-closure*, scm_system_transformer, scm_eval_3,
1151 scm_eval2, root_module_lookup_closure, SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP,
1152 SCM_RWSTRINGP, scm_read_only_string_p, scm_make_shared_substring,
1153 scm_tc7_substring, sym_huh, SCM_VARVCELL, SCM_UDVARIABLEP,
1154 SCM_DEFVARIABLEP, scm_mkbig, scm_big2inum, scm_adjbig, scm_normbig,
1155 scm_copybig, scm_2ulong2big, scm_dbl2big, scm_big2dbl, SCM_FIXNUM_BIT,
1156 SCM_SETCHARS, SCM_SLOPPY_SUBSTRP, SCM_SUBSTR_STR, SCM_SUBSTR_OFFSET,
1157 SCM_LENGTH_MAX, SCM_SETLENGTH, SCM_ROSTRINGP, SCM_ROLENGTH,
1158 SCM_ROCHARS, SCM_ROUCHARS, SCM_SUBSTRP, SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR,
1159 scm_sym2vcell, scm_intern, scm_intern0, scm_sysintern, scm_sysintern0,
1160 scm_sysintern0_no_module_lookup, scm_init_symbols_deprecated,
1161 scm_vector_set_length_x, scm_contregs, scm_debug_info,
1162 scm_debug_frame, SCM_DSIDEVAL, SCM_CONST_LONG, SCM_VCELL,
1163 SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL, SCM_VCELL_INIT, SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL_INIT,
1164 SCM_HUGE_LENGTH, SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR, SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING,
1165 SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING_COPY, SCM_VALIDATE_NULLORROSTRING_COPY,
1166 SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING, DIGITS, scm_small_istr2int, scm_istr2int,
1167 scm_istr2flo, scm_istring2number, scm_istr2int, scm_istr2flo,
1168 scm_istring2number, scm_vtable_index_vcell, scm_si_vcell, SCM_ECONSP,
1169 SCM_NECONSP, SCM_GLOC_VAR, SCM_GLOC_VAL, SCM_GLOC_SET_VAL,
1170 SCM_GLOC_VAL_LOC, scm_make_gloc, scm_gloc_p, scm_tc16_variable,
1171 SCM_CHARS, SCM_LENGTH, SCM_SET_STRING_CHARS, SCM_SET_STRING_LENGTH.
1173 * Changes to bundled modules
1177 Using the (ice-9 debug) module no longer automatically switches Guile
1178 to use the debugging evaluator. If you want to switch to the
1179 debugging evaluator (which is needed for backtrace information if you
1180 hit an error), please add an explicit "(debug-enable 'debug)" to your
1181 code just after the code to use (ice-9 debug).
1184 Changes since Guile 1.4:
1186 * Changes to the distribution
1188 ** A top-level TODO file is included.
1190 ** Guile now uses a versioning scheme similar to that of the Linux kernel.
1192 Guile now always uses three numbers to represent the version,
1193 i.e. "1.6.5". The first number, 1, is the major version number, the
1194 second number, 6, is the minor version number, and the third number,
1195 5, is the micro version number. Changes in major version number
1196 indicate major changes in Guile.
1198 Minor version numbers that are even denote stable releases, and odd
1199 minor version numbers denote development versions (which may be
1200 unstable). The micro version number indicates a minor sub-revision of
1201 a given MAJOR.MINOR release.
1203 In keeping with the new scheme, (minor-version) and scm_minor_version
1204 no longer return everything but the major version number. They now
1205 just return the minor version number. Two new functions
1206 (micro-version) and scm_micro_version have been added to report the
1207 micro version number.
1209 In addition, ./GUILE-VERSION now defines GUILE_MICRO_VERSION.
1211 ** New preprocessor definitions are available for checking versions.
1213 version.h now #defines SCM_MAJOR_VERSION, SCM_MINOR_VERSION, and
1214 SCM_MICRO_VERSION to the appropriate integer values.
1216 ** Guile now actively warns about deprecated features.
1218 The new configure option `--enable-deprecated=LEVEL' and the
1219 environment variable GUILE_WARN_DEPRECATED control this mechanism.
1220 See INSTALL and README for more information.
1222 ** Guile is much more likely to work on 64-bit architectures.
1224 Guile now compiles and passes "make check" with only two UNRESOLVED GC
1225 cases on Alpha and ia64 based machines now. Thanks to John Goerzen
1226 for the use of a test machine, and thanks to Stefan Jahn for ia64
1229 ** New functions: setitimer and getitimer.
1231 These implement a fairly direct interface to the libc functions of the
1234 ** The #. reader extension is now disabled by default.
1236 For safety reasons, #. evaluation is disabled by default. To
1237 re-enable it, set the fluid read-eval? to #t. For example:
1239 (fluid-set! read-eval? #t)
1241 but make sure you realize the potential security risks involved. With
1242 read-eval? enabled, reading a data file from an untrusted source can
1245 ** New SRFI modules have been added:
1247 SRFI-0 `cond-expand' is now supported in Guile, without requiring
1250 (srfi srfi-1) is a library containing many useful pair- and list-processing
1253 (srfi srfi-2) exports and-let*.
1255 (srfi srfi-4) implements homogeneous numeric vector datatypes.
1257 (srfi srfi-6) is a dummy module for now, since guile already provides
1258 all of the srfi-6 procedures by default: open-input-string,
1259 open-output-string, get-output-string.
1261 (srfi srfi-8) exports receive.
1263 (srfi srfi-9) exports define-record-type.
1265 (srfi srfi-10) exports define-reader-ctor and implements the reader
1268 (srfi srfi-11) exports let-values and let*-values.
1270 (srfi srfi-13) implements the SRFI String Library.
1272 (srfi srfi-14) implements the SRFI Character-Set Library.
1274 (srfi srfi-17) implements setter and getter-with-setter and redefines
1275 some accessor procedures as procedures with getters. (such as car,
1276 cdr, vector-ref etc.)
1278 (srfi srfi-19) implements the SRFI Time/Date Library.
1280 ** New scripts / "executable modules"
1282 Subdirectory "scripts" contains Scheme modules that are packaged to
1283 also be executable as scripts. At this time, these scripts are available:
1292 See README there for more info.
1294 These scripts can be invoked from the shell with the new program
1295 "guile-tools", which keeps track of installation directory for you.
1298 $ guile-tools display-commentary srfi/*.scm
1300 guile-tools is copied to the standard $bindir on "make install".
1302 ** New module (ice-9 stack-catch):
1304 stack-catch is like catch, but saves the current state of the stack in
1305 the fluid the-last-stack. This fluid can be useful when using the
1306 debugger and when re-throwing an error.
1308 ** The module (ice-9 and-let*) has been renamed to (ice-9 and-let-star)
1310 This has been done to prevent problems on lesser operating systems
1311 that can't tolerate `*'s in file names. The exported macro continues
1312 to be named `and-let*', of course.
1314 On systems that support it, there is also a compatibility module named
1315 (ice-9 and-let*). It will go away in the next release.
1317 ** New modules (oop goops) etc.:
1320 (oop goops describe)
1322 (oop goops active-slot)
1323 (oop goops composite-slot)
1325 The Guile Object Oriented Programming System (GOOPS) has been
1326 integrated into Guile. For further information, consult the GOOPS
1327 manual and tutorial in the `doc' directory.
1329 ** New module (ice-9 rdelim).
1331 This exports the following procedures which were previously defined
1332 in the default environment:
1334 read-line read-line! read-delimited read-delimited! %read-delimited!
1335 %read-line write-line
1337 For backwards compatibility the definitions are still imported into the
1338 default environment in this version of Guile. However you should add:
1340 (use-modules (ice-9 rdelim))
1342 to any program which uses the definitions, since this may change in
1345 Alternatively, if guile-scsh is installed, the (scsh rdelim) module
1346 can be used for similar functionality.
1348 ** New module (ice-9 rw)
1350 This is a subset of the (scsh rw) module from guile-scsh. Currently
1351 it defines two procedures:
1353 *** New function: read-string!/partial str [port_or_fdes [start [end]]]
1355 Read characters from a port or file descriptor into a string STR.
1356 A port must have an underlying file descriptor -- a so-called
1357 fport. This procedure is scsh-compatible and can efficiently read
1360 *** New function: write-string/partial str [port_or_fdes [start [end]]]
1362 Write characters from a string STR to a port or file descriptor.
1363 A port must have an underlying file descriptor -- a so-called
1364 fport. This procedure is mostly compatible and can efficiently
1365 write large strings.
1367 ** New module (ice-9 match)
1369 This module includes Andrew K. Wright's pattern matcher. See
1370 ice-9/match.scm for brief description or
1372 http://www.star-lab.com/wright/code.html
1374 for complete documentation.
1376 ** New module (ice-9 buffered-input)
1378 This module provides procedures to construct an input port from an
1379 underlying source of input that reads and returns its input in chunks.
1380 The underlying input source is a Scheme procedure, specified by the
1381 caller, which the port invokes whenever it needs more input.
1383 This is useful when building an input port whose back end is Readline
1384 or a UI element such as the GtkEntry widget.
1388 The reference and tutorial documentation that was previously
1389 distributed separately, as `guile-doc', is now included in the core
1390 Guile distribution. The documentation consists of the following
1393 - The Guile Tutorial (guile-tut.texi) contains a tutorial introduction
1396 - The Guile Reference Manual (guile.texi) contains (or is intended to
1397 contain) reference documentation on all aspects of Guile.
1399 - The GOOPS Manual (goops.texi) contains both tutorial-style and
1400 reference documentation for using GOOPS, Guile's Object Oriented
1403 - The Revised^5 Report on the Algorithmic Language Scheme
1406 See the README file in the `doc' directory for more details.
1408 ** There are a couple of examples in the examples/ directory now.
1410 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
1412 ** New command line option `--use-srfi'
1414 Using this option, SRFI modules can be loaded on startup and be
1415 available right from the beginning. This makes programming portable
1416 Scheme programs easier.
1418 The option `--use-srfi' expects a comma-separated list of numbers,
1419 each representing a SRFI number to be loaded into the interpreter
1420 before starting evaluating a script file or the REPL. Additionally,
1421 the feature identifier for the loaded SRFIs is recognized by
1422 `cond-expand' when using this option.
1425 $ guile --use-srfi=8,13
1426 guile> (receive (x z) (values 1 2) (+ 1 2))
1428 guile> (string-pad "bla" 20)
1431 ** Guile now always starts up in the `(guile-user)' module.
1433 Previously, scripts executed via the `-s' option would run in the
1434 `(guile)' module and the repl would run in the `(guile-user)' module.
1435 Now every user action takes place in the `(guile-user)' module by
1438 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
1440 ** Character classifiers work for non-ASCII characters.
1442 The predicates `char-alphabetic?', `char-numeric?',
1443 `char-whitespace?', `char-lower?', `char-upper?' and `char-is-both?'
1444 no longer check whether their arguments are ASCII characters.
1445 Previously, a character would only be considered alphabetic when it
1446 was also ASCII, for example.
1448 ** Previously deprecated Scheme functions have been removed:
1450 tag - no replacement.
1451 fseek - replaced by seek.
1452 list* - replaced by cons*.
1454 ** It's now possible to create modules with controlled environments
1458 (use-modules (ice-9 safe))
1459 (define m (make-safe-module))
1460 ;;; m will now be a module containing only a safe subset of R5RS
1461 (eval '(+ 1 2) m) --> 3
1462 (eval 'load m) --> ERROR: Unbound variable: load
1464 ** Evaluation of "()", the empty list, is now an error.
1466 Previously, the expression "()" evaluated to the empty list. This has
1467 been changed to signal a "missing expression" error. The correct way
1468 to write the empty list as a literal constant is to use quote: "'()".
1470 ** New concept of `Guile Extensions'.
1472 A Guile Extension is just a ordinary shared library that can be linked
1473 at run-time. We found it advantageous to give this simple concept a
1474 dedicated name to distinguish the issues related to shared libraries
1475 from the issues related to the module system.
1477 *** New function: load-extension
1479 Executing (load-extension lib init) is mostly equivalent to
1481 (dynamic-call init (dynamic-link lib))
1483 except when scm_register_extension has been called previously.
1484 Whenever appropriate, you should use `load-extension' instead of
1485 dynamic-link and dynamic-call.
1487 *** New C function: scm_c_register_extension
1489 This function registers a initialization function for use by
1490 `load-extension'. Use it when you don't want specific extensions to
1491 be loaded as shared libraries (for example on platforms that don't
1492 support dynamic linking).
1494 ** Auto-loading of compiled-code modules is deprecated.
1496 Guile used to be able to automatically find and link a shared
1497 library to satisfy requests for a module. For example, the module
1498 `(foo bar)' could be implemented by placing a shared library named
1499 "foo/libbar.so" (or with a different extension) in a directory on the
1502 This has been found to be too tricky, and is no longer supported. The
1503 shared libraries are now called "extensions". You should now write a
1504 small Scheme file that calls `load-extension' to load the shared
1505 library and initialize it explicitly.
1507 The shared libraries themselves should be installed in the usual
1508 places for shared libraries, with names like "libguile-foo-bar".
1510 For example, place this into a file "foo/bar.scm"
1512 (define-module (foo bar))
1514 (load-extension "libguile-foo-bar" "foobar_init")
1516 ** Backward incompatible change: eval EXP ENVIRONMENT-SPECIFIER
1518 `eval' is now R5RS, that is it takes two arguments.
1519 The second argument is an environment specifier, i.e. either
1521 (scheme-report-environment 5)
1522 (null-environment 5)
1523 (interaction-environment)
1529 ** The module system has been made more disciplined.
1531 The function `eval' will save and restore the current module around
1532 the evaluation of the specified expression. While this expression is
1533 evaluated, `(current-module)' will now return the right module, which
1534 is the module specified as the second argument to `eval'.
1536 A consequence of this change is that `eval' is not particularly
1537 useful when you want allow the evaluated code to change what module is
1538 designated as the current module and have this change persist from one
1539 call to `eval' to the next. The read-eval-print-loop is an example
1540 where `eval' is now inadequate. To compensate, there is a new
1541 function `primitive-eval' that does not take a module specifier and
1542 that does not save/restore the current module. You should use this
1543 function together with `set-current-module', `current-module', etc
1544 when you want to have more control over the state that is carried from
1545 one eval to the next.
1547 Additionally, it has been made sure that forms that are evaluated at
1548 the top level are always evaluated with respect to the current module.
1549 Previously, subforms of top-level forms such as `begin', `case',
1550 etc. did not respect changes to the current module although these
1551 subforms are at the top-level as well.
1553 To prevent strange behavior, the forms `define-module',
1554 `use-modules', `use-syntax', and `export' have been restricted to only
1555 work on the top level. The forms `define-public' and
1556 `defmacro-public' only export the new binding on the top level. They
1557 behave just like `define' and `defmacro', respectively, when they are
1558 used in a lexical environment.
1560 Also, `export' will no longer silently re-export bindings imported
1561 from a used module. It will emit a `deprecation' warning and will
1562 cease to perform any re-export in the next version. If you actually
1563 want to re-export bindings, use the new `re-export' in place of
1564 `export'. The new `re-export' will not make copies of variables when
1565 rexporting them, as `export' did wrongly.
1567 ** Module system now allows selection and renaming of imported bindings
1569 Previously, when using `use-modules' or the `#:use-module' clause in
1570 the `define-module' form, all the bindings (association of symbols to
1571 values) for imported modules were added to the "current module" on an
1572 as-is basis. This has been changed to allow finer control through two
1573 new facilities: selection and renaming.
1575 You can now select which of the imported module's bindings are to be
1576 visible in the current module by using the `:select' clause. This
1577 clause also can be used to rename individual bindings. For example:
1579 ;; import all bindings no questions asked
1580 (use-modules (ice-9 common-list))
1582 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them;
1583 ;; the current module sees: every some zonk-y zonk-n
1584 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1586 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1587 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))))
1589 You can also programmatically rename all selected bindings using the
1590 `:renamer' clause, which specifies a proc that takes a symbol and
1591 returns another symbol. Because it is common practice to use a prefix,
1592 we now provide the convenience procedure `symbol-prefix-proc'. For
1595 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them specifically,
1596 ;; and all four w/ prefix "CL:";
1597 ;; the current module sees: CL:every CL:some CL:zonk-y CL:zonk-n
1598 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1600 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1601 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))
1602 :renamer (symbol-prefix-proc 'CL:)))
1604 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them specifically,
1605 ;; and all four by upcasing.
1606 ;; the current module sees: EVERY SOME ZONK-Y ZONK-N
1607 (define (upcase-symbol sym)
1608 (string->symbol (string-upcase (symbol->string sym))))
1610 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1612 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1613 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))
1614 :renamer upcase-symbol))
1616 Note that programmatic renaming is done *after* individual renaming.
1617 Also, the above examples show `use-modules', but the same facilities are
1618 available for the `#:use-module' clause of `define-module'.
1620 See manual for more info.
1622 ** The semantics of guardians have changed.
1624 The changes are for the most part compatible. An important criterion
1625 was to keep the typical usage of guardians as simple as before, but to
1626 make the semantics safer and (as a result) more useful.
1628 *** All objects returned from guardians are now properly alive.
1630 It is now guaranteed that any object referenced by an object returned
1631 from a guardian is alive. It's now impossible for a guardian to
1632 return a "contained" object before its "containing" object.
1634 One incompatible (but probably not very important) change resulting
1635 from this is that it is no longer possible to guard objects that
1636 indirectly reference themselves (i.e. are parts of cycles). If you do
1637 so accidentally, you'll get a warning.
1639 *** There are now two types of guardians: greedy and sharing.
1641 If you call (make-guardian #t) or just (make-guardian), you'll get a
1642 greedy guardian, and for (make-guardian #f) a sharing guardian.
1644 Greedy guardians are the default because they are more "defensive".
1645 You can only greedily guard an object once. If you guard an object
1646 more than once, once in a greedy guardian and the rest of times in
1647 sharing guardians, then it is guaranteed that the object won't be
1648 returned from sharing guardians as long as it is greedily guarded
1651 Guardians returned by calls to `make-guardian' can now take one more
1652 optional parameter, which says whether to throw an error in case an
1653 attempt is made to greedily guard an object that is already greedily
1654 guarded. The default is true, i.e. throw an error. If the parameter
1655 is false, the guardian invocation returns #t if guarding was
1656 successful and #f if it wasn't.
1658 Also, since greedy guarding is, in effect, a side-effecting operation
1659 on objects, a new function is introduced: `destroy-guardian!'.
1660 Invoking this function on a guardian renders it unoperative and, if
1661 the guardian is greedy, clears the "greedily guarded" property of the
1662 objects that were guarded by it, thus undoing the side effect.
1664 Note that all this hair is hardly very important, since guardian
1665 objects are usually permanent.
1667 ** Continuations created by call-with-current-continuation now accept
1668 any number of arguments, as required by R5RS.
1670 ** New function `issue-deprecation-warning'
1672 This function is used to display the deprecation messages that are
1673 controlled by GUILE_WARN_DEPRECATION as explained in the README.
1676 (issue-deprecation-warning "`id' is deprecated. Use `identity' instead.")
1680 ;; `id' is deprecated. Use `identity' instead.
1685 ** New syntax `begin-deprecated'
1687 When deprecated features are included (as determined by the configure
1688 option --enable-deprecated), `begin-deprecated' is identical to
1689 `begin'. When deprecated features are excluded, it always evaluates
1690 to `#f', ignoring the body forms.
1692 ** New function `make-object-property'
1694 This function returns a new `procedure with setter' P that can be used
1695 to attach a property to objects. When calling P as
1699 where `obj' is any kind of object, it attaches `val' to `obj' in such
1700 a way that it can be retrieved by calling P as
1704 This function will replace procedure properties, symbol properties and
1705 source properties eventually.
1707 ** Module (ice-9 optargs) now uses keywords instead of `#&'.
1709 Instead of #&optional, #&key, etc you should now use #:optional,
1710 #:key, etc. Since #:optional is a keyword, you can write it as just
1711 :optional when (read-set! keywords 'prefix) is active.
1713 The old reader syntax `#&' is still supported, but deprecated. It
1714 will be removed in the next release.
1716 ** New define-module option: pure
1718 Tells the module system not to include any bindings from the root
1723 (define-module (totally-empty-module)
1726 ** New define-module option: export NAME1 ...
1728 Export names NAME1 ...
1730 This option is required if you want to be able to export bindings from
1731 a module which doesn't import one of `define-public' or `export'.
1735 (define-module (foo)
1737 :use-module (ice-9 r5rs)
1740 ;;; Note that we're pure R5RS below this point!
1745 ** New function: object->string OBJ
1747 Return a Scheme string obtained by printing a given object.
1749 ** New function: port? X
1751 Returns a boolean indicating whether X is a port. Equivalent to
1752 `(or (input-port? X) (output-port? X))'.
1754 ** New function: file-port?
1756 Determines whether a given object is a port that is related to a file.
1758 ** New function: port-for-each proc
1760 Apply PROC to each port in the Guile port table in turn. The return
1761 value is unspecified. More specifically, PROC is applied exactly once
1762 to every port that exists in the system at the time PORT-FOR-EACH is
1763 invoked. Changes to the port table while PORT-FOR-EACH is running
1764 have no effect as far as PORT-FOR-EACH is concerned.
1766 ** New function: dup2 oldfd newfd
1768 A simple wrapper for the `dup2' system call. Copies the file
1769 descriptor OLDFD to descriptor number NEWFD, replacing the
1770 previous meaning of NEWFD. Both OLDFD and NEWFD must be integers.
1771 Unlike for dup->fdes or primitive-move->fdes, no attempt is made
1772 to move away ports which are using NEWFD. The return value is
1775 ** New function: close-fdes fd
1777 A simple wrapper for the `close' system call. Close file
1778 descriptor FD, which must be an integer. Unlike close (*note
1779 close: Ports and File Descriptors.), the file descriptor will be
1780 closed even if a port is using it. The return value is
1783 ** New function: crypt password salt
1785 Encrypts `password' using the standard unix password encryption
1788 ** New function: chroot path
1790 Change the root directory of the running process to `path'.
1792 ** New functions: getlogin, cuserid
1794 Return the login name or the user name of the current effective user
1797 ** New functions: getpriority which who, setpriority which who prio
1799 Get or set the priority of the running process.
1801 ** New function: getpass prompt
1803 Read a password from the terminal, first displaying `prompt' and
1806 ** New function: flock file operation
1808 Set/remove an advisory shared or exclusive lock on `file'.
1810 ** New functions: sethostname name, gethostname
1812 Set or get the hostname of the machine the current process is running
1815 ** New function: mkstemp! tmpl
1817 mkstemp creates a new unique file in the file system and returns a
1818 new buffered port open for reading and writing to the file. TMPL
1819 is a string specifying where the file should be created: it must
1820 end with `XXXXXX' and will be changed in place to return the name
1821 of the temporary file.
1823 ** New function: open-input-string string
1825 Return an input string port which delivers the characters from
1826 `string'. This procedure, together with `open-output-string' and
1827 `get-output-string' implements SRFI-6.
1829 ** New function: open-output-string
1831 Return an output string port which collects all data written to it.
1832 The data can then be retrieved by `get-output-string'.
1834 ** New function: get-output-string
1836 Return the contents of an output string port.
1838 ** New function: identity
1840 Return the argument.
1842 ** socket, connect, accept etc., now have support for IPv6. IPv6 addresses
1843 are represented in Scheme as integers with normal host byte ordering.
1845 ** New function: inet-pton family address
1847 Convert a printable string network address into an integer. Note that
1848 unlike the C version of this function, the result is an integer with
1849 normal host byte ordering. FAMILY can be `AF_INET' or `AF_INET6'.
1852 (inet-pton AF_INET "127.0.0.1") => 2130706433
1853 (inet-pton AF_INET6 "::1") => 1
1855 ** New function: inet-ntop family address
1857 Convert an integer network address into a printable string. Note that
1858 unlike the C version of this function, the input is an integer with
1859 normal host byte ordering. FAMILY can be `AF_INET' or `AF_INET6'.
1862 (inet-ntop AF_INET 2130706433) => "127.0.0.1"
1863 (inet-ntop AF_INET6 (- (expt 2 128) 1)) =>
1864 ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff
1868 Use `identity' instead.
1874 ** Deprecated: return-it
1878 ** Deprecated: string-character-length
1880 Use `string-length' instead.
1882 ** Deprecated: flags
1884 Use `logior' instead.
1886 ** Deprecated: close-all-ports-except.
1888 This was intended for closing ports in a child process after a fork,
1889 but it has the undesirable side effect of flushing buffers.
1890 port-for-each is more flexible.
1892 ** The (ice-9 popen) module now attempts to set up file descriptors in
1893 the child process from the current Scheme ports, instead of using the
1894 current values of file descriptors 0, 1, and 2 in the parent process.
1896 ** Removed function: builtin-weak-bindings
1898 There is no such concept as a weak binding any more.
1900 ** Removed constants: bignum-radix, scm-line-incrementors
1902 ** define-method: New syntax mandatory.
1904 The new method syntax is now mandatory:
1906 (define-method (NAME ARG-SPEC ...) BODY ...)
1907 (define-method (NAME ARG-SPEC ... . REST-ARG) BODY ...)
1909 ARG-SPEC ::= ARG-NAME | (ARG-NAME TYPE)
1910 REST-ARG ::= ARG-NAME
1912 If you have old code using the old syntax, import
1913 (oop goops old-define-method) before (oop goops) as in:
1915 (use-modules (oop goops old-define-method) (oop goops))
1917 ** Deprecated function: builtin-variable
1918 Removed function: builtin-bindings
1920 There is no longer a distinction between builtin or other variables.
1921 Use module system operations for all variables.
1923 ** Lazy-catch handlers are no longer allowed to return.
1925 That is, a call to `throw', `error', etc is now guaranteed to not
1928 ** Bugfixes for (ice-9 getopt-long)
1930 This module is now tested using test-suite/tests/getopt-long.test.
1931 The following bugs have been fixed:
1933 *** Parsing for options that are specified to have `optional' args now checks
1934 if the next element is an option instead of unconditionally taking it as the
1937 *** An error is now thrown for `--opt=val' when the option description
1938 does not specify `(value #t)' or `(value optional)'. This condition used to
1939 be accepted w/o error, contrary to the documentation.
1941 *** The error message for unrecognized options is now more informative.
1942 It used to be "not a record", an artifact of the implementation.
1944 *** The error message for `--opt' terminating the arg list (no value), when
1945 `(value #t)' is specified, is now more informative. It used to be "not enough
1948 *** "Clumped" single-char args now preserve trailing string, use it as arg.
1949 The expansion used to be like so:
1951 ("-abc5d" "--xyz") => ("-a" "-b" "-c" "--xyz")
1953 Note that the "5d" is dropped. Now it is like so:
1955 ("-abc5d" "--xyz") => ("-a" "-b" "-c" "5d" "--xyz")
1957 This enables single-char options to have adjoining arguments as long as their
1958 constituent characters are not potential single-char options.
1960 ** (ice-9 session) procedure `arity' now works with (ice-9 optargs) `lambda*'
1962 The `lambda*' and derivative forms in (ice-9 optargs) now set a procedure
1963 property `arglist', which can be retrieved by `arity'. The result is that
1964 `arity' can give more detailed information than before:
1968 guile> (use-modules (ice-9 optargs))
1969 guile> (define* (foo #:optional a b c) a)
1971 0 or more arguments in `lambda*:G0'.
1976 3 optional arguments: `a', `b' and `c'.
1977 guile> (define* (bar a b #:key c d #:allow-other-keys) a)
1979 2 required arguments: `a' and `b', 2 keyword arguments: `c'
1980 and `d', other keywords allowed.
1981 guile> (define* (baz a b #:optional c #:rest r) a)
1983 2 required arguments: `a' and `b', 1 optional argument: `c',
1986 * Changes to the C interface
1988 ** Types have been renamed from scm_*_t to scm_t_*.
1990 This has been done for POSIX sake. It reserves identifiers ending
1991 with "_t". What a concept.
1993 The old names are still available with status `deprecated'.
1995 ** scm_t_bits (former scm_bits_t) is now a unsigned type.
1997 ** Deprecated features have been removed.
2001 SCM_INPORTP, SCM_OUTPORTP SCM_ICHRP, SCM_ICHR, SCM_MAKICHR
2002 SCM_SETJMPBUF SCM_NSTRINGP SCM_NRWSTRINGP SCM_NVECTORP SCM_DOUBLE_CELLP
2004 *** C Functions removed
2006 scm_sysmissing scm_tag scm_tc16_flo scm_tc_flo
2007 scm_fseek - replaced by scm_seek.
2008 gc-thunk - replaced by after-gc-hook.
2009 gh_int2scmb - replaced by gh_bool2scm.
2010 scm_tc_dblr - replaced by scm_tc16_real.
2011 scm_tc_dblc - replaced by scm_tc16_complex.
2012 scm_list_star - replaced by scm_cons_star.
2014 ** Deprecated: scm_makfromstr
2016 Use scm_mem2string instead.
2018 ** Deprecated: scm_make_shared_substring
2020 Explicit shared substrings will disappear from Guile.
2022 Instead, "normal" strings will be implemented using sharing
2023 internally, combined with a copy-on-write strategy.
2025 ** Deprecated: scm_read_only_string_p
2027 The concept of read-only strings will disappear in next release of
2030 ** Deprecated: scm_sloppy_memq, scm_sloppy_memv, scm_sloppy_member
2032 Instead, use scm_c_memq or scm_memq, scm_memv, scm_member.
2034 ** New functions: scm_call_0, scm_call_1, scm_call_2, scm_call_3
2036 Call a procedure with the indicated number of arguments. See "Fly
2037 Evaluation" in the manual.
2039 ** New functions: scm_apply_0, scm_apply_1, scm_apply_2, scm_apply_3
2041 Call a procedure with the indicated number of arguments and a list of
2042 further arguments. See "Fly Evaluation" in the manual.
2044 ** New functions: scm_list_1, scm_list_2, scm_list_3, scm_list_4, scm_list_5
2046 Create a list of the given number of elements. See "List
2047 Constructors" in the manual.
2049 ** Renamed function: scm_listify has been replaced by scm_list_n.
2051 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_LIST0, SCM_LIST1, SCM_LIST2, SCM_LIST3, SCM_LIST4,
2052 SCM_LIST5, SCM_LIST6, SCM_LIST7, SCM_LIST8, SCM_LIST9.
2054 Use functions scm_list_N instead.
2056 ** New function: scm_c_read (SCM port, void *buffer, scm_sizet size)
2058 Used by an application to read arbitrary number of bytes from a port.
2059 Same semantics as libc read, except that scm_c_read only returns less
2060 than SIZE bytes if at end-of-file.
2062 Warning: Doesn't update port line and column counts!
2064 ** New function: scm_c_write (SCM port, const void *ptr, scm_sizet size)
2066 Used by an application to write arbitrary number of bytes to an SCM
2067 port. Similar semantics as libc write. However, unlike libc
2068 write, scm_c_write writes the requested number of bytes and has no
2071 Warning: Doesn't update port line and column counts!
2073 ** New function: scm_init_guile ()
2075 In contrast to scm_boot_guile, scm_init_guile will return normally
2076 after initializing Guile. It is not available on all systems, tho.
2078 ** New functions: scm_str2symbol, scm_mem2symbol
2080 The function scm_str2symbol takes a const char* pointing to a zero-terminated
2081 field of characters and creates a scheme symbol object from that C string.
2082 The function scm_mem2symbol takes a const char* and a number of characters and
2083 creates a symbol from the characters in that memory area.
2085 ** New functions: scm_primitive_make_property
2086 scm_primitive_property_ref
2087 scm_primitive_property_set_x
2088 scm_primitive_property_del_x
2090 These functions implement a new way to deal with object properties.
2091 See libguile/properties.c for their documentation.
2093 ** New function: scm_done_free (long size)
2095 This function is the inverse of scm_done_malloc. Use it to report the
2096 amount of smob memory you free. The previous method, which involved
2097 calling scm_done_malloc with negative argument, was somewhat
2098 unintuitive (and is still available, of course).
2100 ** New function: scm_c_memq (SCM obj, SCM list)
2102 This function provides a fast C level alternative for scm_memq for the case
2103 that the list parameter is known to be a proper list. The function is a
2104 replacement for scm_sloppy_memq, but is stricter in its requirements on its
2105 list input parameter, since for anything else but a proper list the function's
2106 behaviour is undefined - it may even crash or loop endlessly. Further, for
2107 the case that the object is not found in the list, scm_c_memq returns #f which
2108 is similar to scm_memq, but different from scm_sloppy_memq's behaviour.
2110 ** New functions: scm_remember_upto_here_1, scm_remember_upto_here_2,
2111 scm_remember_upto_here
2113 These functions replace the function scm_remember.
2115 ** Deprecated function: scm_remember
2117 Use one of the new functions scm_remember_upto_here_1,
2118 scm_remember_upto_here_2 or scm_remember_upto_here instead.
2120 ** New function: scm_allocate_string
2122 This function replaces the function scm_makstr.
2124 ** Deprecated function: scm_makstr
2126 Use the new function scm_allocate_string instead.
2128 ** New global variable scm_gc_running_p introduced.
2130 Use this variable to find out if garbage collection is being executed. Up to
2131 now applications have used scm_gc_heap_lock to test if garbage collection was
2132 running, which also works because of the fact that up to know only the garbage
2133 collector has set this variable. But, this is an implementation detail that
2134 may change. Further, scm_gc_heap_lock is not set throughout gc, thus the use
2135 of this variable is (and has been) not fully safe anyway.
2137 ** New macros: SCM_BITVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH
2139 Use these instead of SCM_LENGTH_MAX.
2141 ** New macros: SCM_CONTINUATION_LENGTH, SCM_CCLO_LENGTH, SCM_STACK_LENGTH,
2142 SCM_STRING_LENGTH, SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_LENGTH,
2143 SCM_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_VECTOR_LENGTH.
2145 Use these instead of SCM_LENGTH.
2147 ** New macros: SCM_SET_CONTINUATION_LENGTH, SCM_SET_STRING_LENGTH,
2148 SCM_SET_SYMBOL_LENGTH, SCM_SET_VECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_LENGTH,
2149 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_LENGTH
2151 Use these instead of SCM_SETLENGTH
2153 ** New macros: SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, SCM_CCLO_BASE,
2154 SCM_VECTOR_BASE, SCM_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_BITVECTOR_BASE, SCM_COMPLEX_MEM,
2157 Use these instead of SCM_CHARS, SCM_UCHARS, SCM_ROCHARS, SCM_ROUCHARS or
2160 ** New macros: SCM_SET_BIGNUM_BASE, SCM_SET_STRING_CHARS,
2161 SCM_SET_SYMBOL_CHARS, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_BASE,
2164 Use these instead of SCM_SETCHARS.
2166 ** New macro: SCM_BITVECTOR_P
2168 ** New macro: SCM_STRING_COERCE_0TERMINATION_X
2170 Use instead of SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR.
2172 ** New macros: SCM_DIR_OPEN_P, SCM_DIR_FLAG_OPEN
2174 For directory objects, use these instead of SCM_OPDIRP and SCM_OPN.
2176 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_OUTOFRANGE, SCM_NALLOC, SCM_HUP_SIGNAL,
2177 SCM_INT_SIGNAL, SCM_FPE_SIGNAL, SCM_BUS_SIGNAL, SCM_SEGV_SIGNAL,
2178 SCM_ALRM_SIGNAL, SCM_GC_SIGNAL, SCM_TICK_SIGNAL, SCM_SIG_ORD,
2179 SCM_ORD_SIG, SCM_NUM_SIGS, SCM_SYMBOL_SLOTS, SCM_SLOTS, SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP,
2180 SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR, SCM_FREEP, SCM_NFREEP, SCM_CHARS, SCM_UCHARS,
2181 SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING, SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING_COPY,
2182 SCM_VALIDATE_NULLORROSTRING_COPY, SCM_ROLENGTH, SCM_LENGTH, SCM_HUGE_LENGTH,
2183 SCM_SUBSTRP, SCM_SUBSTR_STR, SCM_SUBSTR_OFFSET, SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR,
2184 SCM_ROSTRINGP, SCM_RWSTRINGP, SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING, SCM_ROCHARS,
2185 SCM_ROUCHARS, SCM_SETLENGTH, SCM_SETCHARS, SCM_LENGTH_MAX, SCM_GC8MARKP,
2186 SCM_SETGC8MARK, SCM_CLRGC8MARK, SCM_GCTYP16, SCM_GCCDR, SCM_SUBR_DOC,
2187 SCM_OPDIRP, SCM_VALIDATE_OPDIR, SCM_WTA, RETURN_SCM_WTA, SCM_CONST_LONG,
2188 SCM_WNA, SCM_FUNC_NAME, SCM_VALIDATE_NUMBER_COPY,
2189 SCM_VALIDATE_NUMBER_DEF_COPY, SCM_SLOPPY_CONSP, SCM_SLOPPY_NCONSP,
2190 SCM_SETAND_CDR, SCM_SETOR_CDR, SCM_SETAND_CAR, SCM_SETOR_CAR
2192 Use SCM_ASSERT_RANGE or SCM_VALIDATE_XXX_RANGE instead of SCM_OUTOFRANGE.
2193 Use scm_memory_error instead of SCM_NALLOC.
2194 Use SCM_STRINGP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP.
2195 Use SCM_VALIDATE_STRING instead of SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR.
2196 Use SCM_FREE_CELL_P instead of SCM_FREEP/SCM_NFREEP
2197 Use a type specific accessor macro instead of SCM_CHARS/SCM_UCHARS.
2198 Use a type specific accessor instead of SCM(_|_RO|_HUGE_)LENGTH.
2199 Use SCM_VALIDATE_(SYMBOL|STRING) instead of SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING.
2200 Use SCM_STRING_COERCE_0TERMINATION_X instead of SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR.
2201 Use SCM_STRINGP or SCM_SYMBOLP instead of SCM_ROSTRINGP.
2202 Use SCM_STRINGP instead of SCM_RWSTRINGP.
2203 Use SCM_VALIDATE_STRING instead of SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING.
2204 Use SCM_STRING_CHARS instead of SCM_ROCHARS.
2205 Use SCM_STRING_UCHARS instead of SCM_ROUCHARS.
2206 Use a type specific setter macro instead of SCM_SETLENGTH.
2207 Use a type specific setter macro instead of SCM_SETCHARS.
2208 Use a type specific length macro instead of SCM_LENGTH_MAX.
2209 Use SCM_GCMARKP instead of SCM_GC8MARKP.
2210 Use SCM_SETGCMARK instead of SCM_SETGC8MARK.
2211 Use SCM_CLRGCMARK instead of SCM_CLRGC8MARK.
2212 Use SCM_TYP16 instead of SCM_GCTYP16.
2213 Use SCM_CDR instead of SCM_GCCDR.
2214 Use SCM_DIR_OPEN_P instead of SCM_OPDIRP.
2215 Use SCM_MISC_ERROR or SCM_WRONG_TYPE_ARG instead of SCM_WTA.
2216 Use SCM_MISC_ERROR or SCM_WRONG_TYPE_ARG instead of RETURN_SCM_WTA.
2217 Use SCM_VCELL_INIT instead of SCM_CONST_LONG.
2218 Use SCM_WRONG_NUM_ARGS instead of SCM_WNA.
2219 Use SCM_CONSP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_CONSP.
2220 Use !SCM_CONSP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_NCONSP.
2222 ** Removed function: scm_struct_init
2224 ** Removed variable: scm_symhash_dim
2226 ** Renamed function: scm_make_cont has been replaced by
2227 scm_make_continuation, which has a different interface.
2229 ** Deprecated function: scm_call_catching_errors
2231 Use scm_catch or scm_lazy_catch from throw.[ch] instead.
2233 ** Deprecated function: scm_strhash
2235 Use scm_string_hash instead.
2237 ** Deprecated function: scm_vector_set_length_x
2239 Instead, create a fresh vector of the desired size and copy the contents.
2241 ** scm_gensym has changed prototype
2243 scm_gensym now only takes one argument.
2245 ** Deprecated type tags: scm_tc7_ssymbol, scm_tc7_msymbol, scm_tcs_symbols,
2248 There is now only a single symbol type scm_tc7_symbol.
2249 The tag scm_tc7_lvector was not used anyway.
2251 ** Deprecated function: scm_make_smob_type_mfpe, scm_set_smob_mfpe.
2253 Use scm_make_smob_type and scm_set_smob_XXX instead.
2255 ** New function scm_set_smob_apply.
2257 This can be used to set an apply function to a smob type.
2259 ** Deprecated function: scm_strprint_obj
2261 Use scm_object_to_string instead.
2263 ** Deprecated function: scm_wta
2265 Use scm_wrong_type_arg, or another appropriate error signalling function
2268 ** Explicit support for obarrays has been deprecated.
2270 Use `scm_str2symbol' and the generic hashtable functions instead.
2272 ** The concept of `vcells' has been deprecated.
2274 The data type `variable' is now used exclusively. `Vcells' have been
2275 a low-level concept so you are likely not affected by this change.
2277 *** Deprecated functions: scm_sym2vcell, scm_sysintern,
2278 scm_sysintern0, scm_symbol_value0, scm_intern, scm_intern0.
2280 Use scm_c_define or scm_c_lookup instead, as appropriate.
2282 *** New functions: scm_c_module_lookup, scm_c_lookup,
2283 scm_c_module_define, scm_c_define, scm_module_lookup, scm_lookup,
2284 scm_module_define, scm_define.
2286 These functions work with variables instead of with vcells.
2288 ** New functions for creating and defining `subr's and `gsubr's.
2290 The new functions more clearly distinguish between creating a subr (or
2291 gsubr) object and adding it to the current module.
2293 These new functions are available: scm_c_make_subr, scm_c_define_subr,
2294 scm_c_make_subr_with_generic, scm_c_define_subr_with_generic,
2295 scm_c_make_gsubr, scm_c_define_gsubr, scm_c_make_gsubr_with_generic,
2296 scm_c_define_gsubr_with_generic.
2298 ** Deprecated functions: scm_make_subr, scm_make_subr_opt,
2299 scm_make_subr_with_generic, scm_make_gsubr,
2300 scm_make_gsubr_with_generic.
2302 Use the new ones from above instead.
2304 ** C interface to the module system has changed.
2306 While we suggest that you avoid as many explicit module system
2307 operations from C as possible for the time being, the C interface has
2308 been made more similar to the high-level Scheme module system.
2310 *** New functions: scm_c_define_module, scm_c_use_module,
2311 scm_c_export, scm_c_resolve_module.
2313 They mostly work like their Scheme namesakes. scm_c_define_module
2314 takes a function that is called a context where the new module is
2317 *** Deprecated functions: scm_the_root_module, scm_make_module,
2318 scm_ensure_user_module, scm_load_scheme_module.
2320 Use the new functions instead.
2322 ** Renamed function: scm_internal_with_fluids becomes
2325 scm_internal_with_fluids is available as a deprecated function.
2327 ** New function: scm_c_with_fluid.
2329 Just like scm_c_with_fluids, but takes one fluid and one value instead
2332 ** Deprecated typedefs: long_long, ulong_long.
2334 They are of questionable utility and they pollute the global
2337 ** Deprecated typedef: scm_sizet
2339 It is of questionable utility now that Guile requires ANSI C, and is
2342 ** Deprecated typedefs: scm_port_rw_active, scm_port,
2343 scm_ptob_descriptor, scm_debug_info, scm_debug_frame, scm_fport,
2344 scm_option, scm_rstate, scm_rng, scm_array, scm_array_dim.
2346 Made more compliant with the naming policy by adding a _t at the end.
2348 ** Deprecated functions: scm_mkbig, scm_big2num, scm_adjbig,
2349 scm_normbig, scm_copybig, scm_2ulong2big, scm_dbl2big, scm_big2dbl
2351 With the exception of the mysterious scm_2ulong2big, they are still
2352 available under new names (scm_i_mkbig etc). These functions are not
2353 intended to be used in user code. You should avoid dealing with
2354 bignums directly, and should deal with numbers in general (which can
2357 ** Change in behavior: scm_num2long, scm_num2ulong
2359 The scm_num2[u]long functions don't any longer accept an inexact
2360 argument. This change in behavior is motivated by concordance with
2361 R5RS: It is more common that a primitive doesn't want to accept an
2362 inexact for an exact.
2364 ** New functions: scm_short2num, scm_ushort2num, scm_int2num,
2365 scm_uint2num, scm_size2num, scm_ptrdiff2num, scm_num2short,
2366 scm_num2ushort, scm_num2int, scm_num2uint, scm_num2ptrdiff,
2369 These are conversion functions between the various ANSI C integral
2370 types and Scheme numbers. NOTE: The scm_num2xxx functions don't
2371 accept an inexact argument.
2373 ** New functions: scm_float2num, scm_double2num,
2374 scm_num2float, scm_num2double.
2376 These are conversion functions between the two ANSI C float types and
2379 ** New number validation macros:
2380 SCM_NUM2{SIZE,PTRDIFF,SHORT,USHORT,INT,UINT}[_DEF]
2384 ** New functions: scm_gc_protect_object, scm_gc_unprotect_object
2386 These are just nicer-named old scm_protect_object and
2387 scm_unprotect_object.
2389 ** Deprecated functions: scm_protect_object, scm_unprotect_object
2391 ** New functions: scm_gc_[un]register_root, scm_gc_[un]register_roots
2393 These functions can be used to register pointers to locations that
2396 ** Deprecated function: scm_create_hook.
2398 Its sins are: misleading name, non-modularity and lack of general
2402 Changes since Guile 1.3.4:
2404 * Changes to the distribution
2406 ** Trees from nightly snapshots and CVS now require you to run autogen.sh.
2408 We've changed the way we handle generated files in the Guile source
2409 repository. As a result, the procedure for building trees obtained
2410 from the nightly FTP snapshots or via CVS has changed:
2411 - You must have appropriate versions of autoconf, automake, and
2412 libtool installed on your system. See README for info on how to
2413 obtain these programs.
2414 - Before configuring the tree, you must first run the script
2415 `autogen.sh' at the top of the source tree.
2417 The Guile repository used to contain not only source files, written by
2418 humans, but also some generated files, like configure scripts and
2419 Makefile.in files. Even though the contents of these files could be
2420 derived mechanically from other files present, we thought it would
2421 make the tree easier to build if we checked them into CVS.
2423 However, this approach means that minor differences between
2424 developer's installed tools and habits affected the whole team.
2425 So we have removed the generated files from the repository, and
2426 added the autogen.sh script, which will reconstruct them
2430 ** configure now has experimental options to remove support for certain
2433 --disable-arrays omit array and uniform array support
2434 --disable-posix omit posix interfaces
2435 --disable-networking omit networking interfaces
2436 --disable-regex omit regular expression interfaces
2438 These are likely to become separate modules some day.
2440 ** New configure option --enable-debug-freelist
2442 This enables a debugging version of SCM_NEWCELL(), and also registers
2443 an extra primitive, the setter `gc-set-debug-check-freelist!'.
2445 Configure with the --enable-debug-freelist option to enable
2446 the gc-set-debug-check-freelist! primitive, and then use:
2448 (gc-set-debug-check-freelist! #t) # turn on checking of the freelist
2449 (gc-set-debug-check-freelist! #f) # turn off checking
2451 Checking of the freelist forces a traversal of the freelist and
2452 a garbage collection before each allocation of a cell. This can
2453 slow down the interpreter dramatically, so the setter should be used to
2454 turn on this extra processing only when necessary.
2456 ** New configure option --enable-debug-malloc
2458 Include code for debugging of calls to scm_must_malloc/realloc/free.
2462 1. objects freed by scm_must_free has been mallocated by scm_must_malloc
2463 2. objects reallocated by scm_must_realloc has been allocated by
2465 3. reallocated objects are reallocated with the same what string
2467 But, most importantly, it records the number of allocated objects of
2468 each kind. This is useful when searching for memory leaks.
2470 A Guile compiled with this option provides the primitive
2471 `malloc-stats' which returns an alist with pairs of kind and the
2472 number of objects of that kind.
2474 ** All includes are now referenced relative to the root directory
2476 Since some users have had problems with mixups between Guile and
2477 system headers, we have decided to always refer to Guile headers via
2478 their parent directories. This essentially creates a "private name
2479 space" for Guile headers. This means that the compiler only is given
2480 -I options for the root build and root source directory.
2482 ** Header files kw.h and genio.h have been removed.
2484 ** The module (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style) has been removed.
2486 ** New module (ice-9 documentation)
2488 Implements the interface to documentation strings associated with
2491 ** New module (ice-9 time)
2493 Provides a macro `time', which displays execution time of a given form.
2495 ** New module (ice-9 history)
2497 Loading this module enables value history in the repl.
2499 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
2501 ** New command line option --debug
2503 Start Guile with debugging evaluator and backtraces enabled.
2505 This is useful when debugging your .guile init file or scripts.
2507 ** New help facility
2509 Usage: (help NAME) gives documentation about objects named NAME (a symbol)
2510 (help REGEXP) ditto for objects with names matching REGEXP (a string)
2511 (help 'NAME) gives documentation for NAME, even if it is not an object
2512 (help ,EXPR) gives documentation for object returned by EXPR
2513 (help (my module)) gives module commentary for `(my module)'
2514 (help) gives this text
2516 `help' searches among bindings exported from loaded modules, while
2517 `apropos' searches among bindings visible from the "current" module.
2519 Examples: (help help)
2521 (help "output-string")
2523 ** `help' and `apropos' now prints full module names
2525 ** Dynamic linking now uses libltdl from the libtool package.
2527 The old system dependent code for doing dynamic linking has been
2528 replaced with calls to the libltdl functions which do all the hairy
2531 The major improvement is that you can now directly pass libtool
2532 library names like "libfoo.la" to `dynamic-link' and `dynamic-link'
2533 will be able to do the best shared library job you can get, via
2536 The way dynamic libraries are found has changed and is not really
2537 portable across platforms, probably. It is therefore recommended to
2538 use absolute filenames when possible.
2540 If you pass a filename without an extension to `dynamic-link', it will
2541 try a few appropriate ones. Thus, the most platform ignorant way is
2542 to specify a name like "libfoo", without any directories and
2545 ** Guile COOP threads are now compatible with LinuxThreads
2547 Previously, COOP threading wasn't possible in applications linked with
2548 Linux POSIX threads due to their use of the stack pointer to find the
2549 thread context. This has now been fixed with a workaround which uses
2550 the pthreads to allocate the stack.
2552 ** New primitives: `pkgdata-dir', `site-dir', `library-dir'
2554 ** Positions of erring expression in scripts
2556 With version 1.3.4, the location of the erring expression in Guile
2557 scipts is no longer automatically reported. (This should have been
2558 documented before the 1.3.4 release.)
2560 You can get this information by enabling recording of positions of
2561 source expressions and running the debugging evaluator. Put this at
2562 the top of your script (or in your "site" file):
2564 (read-enable 'positions)
2565 (debug-enable 'debug)
2567 ** Backtraces in scripts
2569 It is now possible to get backtraces in scripts.
2573 (debug-enable 'debug 'backtrace)
2575 at the top of the script.
2577 (The first options enables the debugging evaluator.
2578 The second enables backtraces.)
2580 ** Part of module system symbol lookup now implemented in C
2582 The eval closure of most modules is now implemented in C. Since this
2583 was one of the bottlenecks for loading speed, Guile now loads code
2584 substantially faster than before.
2586 ** Attempting to get the value of an unbound variable now produces
2587 an exception with a key of 'unbound-variable instead of 'misc-error.
2589 ** The initial default output port is now unbuffered if it's using a
2590 tty device. Previously in this situation it was line-buffered.
2592 ** New hook: after-gc-hook
2594 after-gc-hook takes over the role of gc-thunk. This hook is run at
2595 the first SCM_TICK after a GC. (Thus, the code is run at the same
2596 point during evaluation as signal handlers.)
2598 Note that this hook should be used only for diagnostic and debugging
2599 purposes. It is not certain that it will continue to be well-defined
2600 when this hook is run in the future.
2602 C programmers: Note the new C level hooks scm_before_gc_c_hook,
2603 scm_before_sweep_c_hook, scm_after_gc_c_hook.
2605 ** Improvements to garbage collector
2607 Guile 1.4 has a new policy for triggering heap allocation and
2608 determining the sizes of heap segments. It fixes a number of problems
2611 1. The new policy can handle two separate pools of cells
2612 (2-word/4-word) better. (The old policy would run wild, allocating
2613 more and more memory for certain programs.)
2615 2. The old code would sometimes allocate far too much heap so that the
2616 Guile process became gigantic. The new code avoids this.
2618 3. The old code would sometimes allocate too little so that few cells
2619 were freed at GC so that, in turn, too much time was spent in GC.
2621 4. The old code would often trigger heap allocation several times in a
2622 row. (The new scheme predicts how large the segments needs to be
2623 in order not to need further allocation.)
2625 All in all, the new GC policy will make larger applications more
2628 The new GC scheme also is prepared for POSIX threading. Threads can
2629 allocate private pools of cells ("clusters") with just a single
2630 function call. Allocation of single cells from such a cluster can
2631 then proceed without any need of inter-thread synchronization.
2633 ** New environment variables controlling GC parameters
2635 GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE Maximal segment size
2638 Allocation of 2-word cell heaps:
2640 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_1 Size of initial heap segment in bytes
2643 GUILE_MIN_YIELD_1 Minimum number of freed cells at each
2644 GC in percent of total heap size
2647 Allocation of 4-word cell heaps
2648 (used for real numbers and misc other objects):
2650 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_2, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2
2652 (See entry "Way for application to customize GC parameters" under
2653 section "Changes to the scm_ interface" below.)
2655 ** Guile now implements reals using 4-word cells
2657 This speeds up computation with reals. (They were earlier allocated
2658 with `malloc'.) There is still some room for optimizations, however.
2660 ** Some further steps toward POSIX thread support have been taken
2662 *** Guile's critical sections (SCM_DEFER/ALLOW_INTS)
2663 don't have much effect any longer, and many of them will be removed in
2667 are only handled at the top of the evaluator loop, immediately after
2668 I/O, and in scm_equalp.
2670 *** The GC can allocate thread private pools of pairs.
2672 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
2674 ** close-input-port and close-output-port are now R5RS
2676 These procedures have been turned into primitives and have R5RS behaviour.
2678 ** New procedure: simple-format PORT MESSAGE ARG1 ...
2680 (ice-9 boot) makes `format' an alias for `simple-format' until possibly
2681 extended by the more sophisticated version in (ice-9 format)
2683 (simple-format port message . args)
2684 Write MESSAGE to DESTINATION, defaulting to `current-output-port'.
2685 MESSAGE can contain ~A (was %s) and ~S (was %S) escapes. When printed,
2686 the escapes are replaced with corresponding members of ARGS:
2687 ~A formats using `display' and ~S formats using `write'.
2688 If DESTINATION is #t, then use the `current-output-port',
2689 if DESTINATION is #f, then return a string containing the formatted text.
2690 Does not add a trailing newline."
2692 ** string-ref: the second argument is no longer optional.
2694 ** string, list->string: no longer accept strings in their arguments,
2695 only characters, for compatibility with R5RS.
2697 ** New procedure: port-closed? PORT
2698 Returns #t if PORT is closed or #f if it is open.
2700 ** Deprecated: list*
2702 The list* functionality is now provided by cons* (SRFI-1 compliant)
2704 ** New procedure: cons* ARG1 ARG2 ... ARGn
2706 Like `list', but the last arg provides the tail of the constructed list,
2707 returning (cons ARG1 (cons ARG2 (cons ... ARGn))).
2709 Requires at least one argument. If given one argument, that argument
2710 is returned as result.
2712 This function is called `list*' in some other Schemes and in Common LISP.
2714 ** Removed deprecated: serial-map, serial-array-copy!, serial-array-map!
2716 ** New procedure: object-documentation OBJECT
2718 Returns the documentation string associated with OBJECT. The
2719 procedure uses a caching mechanism so that subsequent lookups are
2722 Exported by (ice-9 documentation).
2724 ** module-name now returns full names of modules
2726 Previously, only the last part of the name was returned (`session' for
2727 `(ice-9 session)'). Ex: `(ice-9 session)'.
2729 * Changes to the gh_ interface
2731 ** Deprecated: gh_int2scmb
2733 Use gh_bool2scm instead.
2735 * Changes to the scm_ interface
2737 ** Guile primitives now carry docstrings!
2739 Thanks to Greg Badros!
2741 ** Guile primitives are defined in a new way: SCM_DEFINE/SCM_DEFINE1/SCM_PROC
2743 Now Guile primitives are defined using the SCM_DEFINE/SCM_DEFINE1/SCM_PROC
2744 macros and must contain a docstring that is extracted into foo.doc using a new
2745 guile-doc-snarf script (that uses guile-doc-snarf.awk).
2747 However, a major overhaul of these macros is scheduled for the next release of
2750 ** Guile primitives use a new technique for validation of arguments
2752 SCM_VALIDATE_* macros are defined to ease the redundancy and improve
2753 the readability of argument checking.
2755 ** All (nearly?) K&R prototypes for functions replaced with ANSI C equivalents.
2757 ** New macros: SCM_PACK, SCM_UNPACK
2759 Compose/decompose an SCM value.
2761 The SCM type is now treated as an abstract data type and may be defined as a
2762 long, a void* or as a struct, depending on the architecture and compile time
2763 options. This makes it easier to find several types of bugs, for example when
2764 SCM values are treated as integers without conversion. Values of the SCM type
2765 should be treated as "atomic" values. These macros are used when
2766 composing/decomposing an SCM value, either because you want to access
2767 individual bits, or because you want to treat it as an integer value.
2769 E.g., in order to set bit 7 in an SCM value x, use the expression
2771 SCM_PACK (SCM_UNPACK (x) | 0x80)
2773 ** The name property of hooks is deprecated.
2774 Thus, the use of SCM_HOOK_NAME and scm_make_hook_with_name is deprecated.
2776 You can emulate this feature by using object properties.
2778 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_INPORTP, SCM_OUTPORTP, SCM_CRDY, SCM_ICHRP,
2779 SCM_ICHR, SCM_MAKICHR, SCM_SETJMPBUF, SCM_NSTRINGP, SCM_NRWSTRINGP,
2782 These macros will be removed in a future release of Guile.
2784 ** The following types, functions and macros from numbers.h are deprecated:
2785 scm_dblproc, SCM_UNEGFIXABLE, SCM_FLOBUFLEN, SCM_INEXP, SCM_CPLXP, SCM_REAL,
2786 SCM_IMAG, SCM_REALPART, scm_makdbl, SCM_SINGP, SCM_NUM2DBL, SCM_NO_BIGDIG
2788 ** Port internals: the rw_random variable in the scm_port structure
2789 must be set to non-zero in any random access port. In recent Guile
2790 releases it was only set for bidirectional random-access ports.
2792 ** Port internals: the seek ptob procedure is now responsible for
2793 resetting the buffers if required. The change was made so that in the
2794 special case of reading the current position (i.e., seek p 0 SEEK_CUR)
2795 the fport and strport ptobs can avoid resetting the buffers,
2796 in particular to avoid discarding unread chars. An existing port
2797 type can be fixed by adding something like the following to the
2798 beginning of the ptob seek procedure:
2800 if (pt->rw_active == SCM_PORT_READ)
2801 scm_end_input (object);
2802 else if (pt->rw_active == SCM_PORT_WRITE)
2803 ptob->flush (object);
2805 although to actually avoid resetting the buffers and discard unread
2806 chars requires further hacking that depends on the characteristics
2809 ** Deprecated functions: scm_fseek, scm_tag
2811 These functions are no longer used and will be removed in a future version.
2813 ** The scm_sysmissing procedure is no longer used in libguile.
2814 Unless it turns out to be unexpectedly useful to somebody, it will be
2815 removed in a future version.
2817 ** The format of error message strings has changed
2819 The two C procedures: scm_display_error and scm_error, as well as the
2820 primitive `scm-error', now use scm_simple_format to do their work.
2821 This means that the message strings of all code must be updated to use
2822 ~A where %s was used before, and ~S where %S was used before.
2824 During the period when there still are a lot of old Guiles out there,
2825 you might want to support both old and new versions of Guile.
2827 There are basically two methods to achieve this. Both methods use
2830 AC_CHECK_FUNCS(scm_simple_format)
2832 in your configure.in.
2834 Method 1: Use the string concatenation features of ANSI C's
2839 #ifdef HAVE_SCM_SIMPLE_FORMAT
2845 Then represent each of your error messages using a preprocessor macro:
2847 #define E_SPIDER_ERROR "There's a spider in your " ## FMT_S ## "!!!"
2851 (define fmt-s (if (defined? 'simple-format) "~S" "%S"))
2852 (define make-message string-append)
2854 (define e-spider-error (make-message "There's a spider in your " fmt-s "!!!"))
2856 Method 2: Use the oldfmt function found in doc/oldfmt.c.
2860 scm_misc_error ("picnic", scm_c_oldfmt0 ("There's a spider in your ~S!!!"),
2865 (scm-error 'misc-error "picnic" (oldfmt "There's a spider in your ~S!!!")
2869 ** Deprecated: coop_mutex_init, coop_condition_variable_init
2871 Don't use the functions coop_mutex_init and
2872 coop_condition_variable_init. They will change.
2874 Use scm_mutex_init and scm_cond_init instead.
2876 ** New function: int scm_cond_timedwait (scm_cond_t *COND, scm_mutex_t *MUTEX, const struct timespec *ABSTIME)
2877 `scm_cond_timedwait' atomically unlocks MUTEX and waits on
2878 COND, as `scm_cond_wait' does, but it also bounds the duration
2879 of the wait. If COND has not been signaled before time ABSTIME,
2880 the mutex MUTEX is re-acquired and `scm_cond_timedwait'
2881 returns the error code `ETIMEDOUT'.
2883 The ABSTIME parameter specifies an absolute time, with the same
2884 origin as `time' and `gettimeofday': an ABSTIME of 0 corresponds
2885 to 00:00:00 GMT, January 1, 1970.
2887 ** New function: scm_cond_broadcast (scm_cond_t *COND)
2888 `scm_cond_broadcast' restarts all the threads that are waiting
2889 on the condition variable COND. Nothing happens if no threads are
2892 ** New function: scm_key_create (scm_key_t *KEY, void (*destr_function) (void *))
2893 `scm_key_create' allocates a new TSD key. The key is stored in
2894 the location pointed to by KEY. There is no limit on the number
2895 of keys allocated at a given time. The value initially associated
2896 with the returned key is `NULL' in all currently executing threads.
2898 The DESTR_FUNCTION argument, if not `NULL', specifies a destructor
2899 function associated with the key. When a thread terminates,
2900 DESTR_FUNCTION is called on the value associated with the key in
2901 that thread. The DESTR_FUNCTION is not called if a key is deleted
2902 with `scm_key_delete' or a value is changed with
2903 `scm_setspecific'. The order in which destructor functions are
2904 called at thread termination time is unspecified.
2906 Destructors are not yet implemented.
2908 ** New function: scm_setspecific (scm_key_t KEY, const void *POINTER)
2909 `scm_setspecific' changes the value associated with KEY in the
2910 calling thread, storing the given POINTER instead.
2912 ** New function: scm_getspecific (scm_key_t KEY)
2913 `scm_getspecific' returns the value currently associated with
2914 KEY in the calling thread.
2916 ** New function: scm_key_delete (scm_key_t KEY)
2917 `scm_key_delete' deallocates a TSD key. It does not check
2918 whether non-`NULL' values are associated with that key in the
2919 currently executing threads, nor call the destructor function
2920 associated with the key.
2922 ** New function: scm_c_hook_init (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, void *HOOK_DATA, scm_c_hook_type_t TYPE)
2924 Initialize a C level hook HOOK with associated HOOK_DATA and type
2925 TYPE. (See scm_c_hook_run ().)
2927 ** New function: scm_c_hook_add (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, scm_c_hook_function_t FUNC, void *FUNC_DATA, int APPENDP)
2929 Add hook function FUNC with associated FUNC_DATA to HOOK. If APPENDP
2930 is true, add it last, otherwise first. The same FUNC can be added
2931 multiple times if FUNC_DATA differ and vice versa.
2933 ** New function: scm_c_hook_remove (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, scm_c_hook_function_t FUNC, void *FUNC_DATA)
2935 Remove hook function FUNC with associated FUNC_DATA from HOOK. A
2936 function is only removed if both FUNC and FUNC_DATA matches.
2938 ** New function: void *scm_c_hook_run (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, void *DATA)
2940 Run hook HOOK passing DATA to the hook functions.
2942 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_NORMAL, all hook functions are run. The value
2943 returned is undefined.
2945 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_OR, hook functions are run until a function
2946 returns a non-NULL value. This value is returned as the result of
2947 scm_c_hook_run. If all functions return NULL, NULL is returned.
2949 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_AND, hook functions are run until a function
2950 returns a NULL value, and NULL is returned. If all functions returns
2951 a non-NULL value, the last value is returned.
2953 ** New C level GC hooks
2955 Five new C level hooks has been added to the garbage collector.
2957 scm_before_gc_c_hook
2960 are run before locking and after unlocking the heap. The system is
2961 thus in a mode where evaluation can take place. (Except that
2962 scm_before_gc_c_hook must not allocate new cells.)
2964 scm_before_mark_c_hook
2965 scm_before_sweep_c_hook
2966 scm_after_sweep_c_hook
2968 are run when the heap is locked. These are intended for extension of
2969 the GC in a modular fashion. Examples are the weaks and guardians
2972 ** Way for application to customize GC parameters
2974 The application can set up other default values for the GC heap
2975 allocation parameters
2977 GUILE_INIT_HEAP_SIZE_1, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_1,
2978 GUILE_INIT_HEAP_SIZE_2, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2,
2979 GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE,
2983 scm_default_init_heap_size_1, scm_default_min_yield_1,
2984 scm_default_init_heap_size_2, scm_default_min_yield_2,
2985 scm_default_max_segment_size
2987 respectively before callong scm_boot_guile.
2989 (See entry "New environment variables ..." in section
2990 "Changes to the stand-alone interpreter" above.)
2992 ** scm_protect_object/scm_unprotect_object now nest
2994 This means that you can call scm_protect_object multiple times on an
2995 object and count on the object being protected until
2996 scm_unprotect_object has been call the same number of times.
2998 The functions also have better time complexity.
3000 Still, it is usually possible to structure the application in a way
3001 that you don't need to use these functions. For example, if you use a
3002 protected standard Guile list to keep track of live objects rather
3003 than some custom data type, objects will die a natural death when they
3004 are no longer needed.
3006 ** Deprecated type tags: scm_tc16_flo, scm_tc_flo, scm_tc_dblr, scm_tc_dblc
3008 Guile does not provide the float representation for inexact real numbers any
3009 more. Now, only doubles are used to represent inexact real numbers. Further,
3010 the tag names scm_tc_dblr and scm_tc_dblc have been changed to scm_tc16_real
3011 and scm_tc16_complex, respectively.
3013 ** Removed deprecated type scm_smobfuns
3015 ** Removed deprecated function scm_newsmob
3017 ** Warning: scm_make_smob_type_mfpe might become deprecated in a future release
3019 There is an ongoing discussion among the developers whether to
3020 deprecate `scm_make_smob_type_mfpe' or not. Please use the current
3021 standard interface (scm_make_smob_type, scm_set_smob_XXX) in new code
3022 until this issue has been settled.
3024 ** Removed deprecated type tag scm_tc16_kw
3026 ** Added type tag scm_tc16_keyword
3028 (This was introduced already in release 1.3.4 but was not documented
3031 ** gdb_print now prints "*** Guile not initialized ***" until Guile initialized
3033 * Changes to system call interfaces:
3035 ** The "select" procedure now tests port buffers for the ability to
3036 provide input or accept output. Previously only the underlying file
3037 descriptors were checked.
3039 ** New variable PIPE_BUF: the maximum number of bytes that can be
3040 atomically written to a pipe.
3042 ** If a facility is not available on the system when Guile is
3043 compiled, the corresponding primitive procedure will not be defined.
3044 Previously it would have been defined but would throw a system-error
3045 exception if called. Exception handlers which catch this case may
3046 need minor modification: an error will be thrown with key
3047 'unbound-variable instead of 'system-error. Alternatively it's
3048 now possible to use `defined?' to check whether the facility is
3051 ** Procedures which depend on the timezone should now give the correct
3052 result on systems which cache the TZ environment variable, even if TZ
3053 is changed without calling tzset.
3055 * Changes to the networking interfaces:
3057 ** New functions: htons, ntohs, htonl, ntohl: for converting short and
3058 long integers between network and host format. For now, it's not
3059 particularly convenient to do this kind of thing, but consider:
3061 (define write-network-long
3062 (lambda (value port)
3063 (let ((v (make-uniform-vector 1 1 0)))
3064 (uniform-vector-set! v 0 (htonl value))
3065 (uniform-vector-write v port))))
3067 (define read-network-long
3069 (let ((v (make-uniform-vector 1 1 0)))
3070 (uniform-vector-read! v port)
3071 (ntohl (uniform-vector-ref v 0)))))
3073 ** If inet-aton fails, it now throws an error with key 'misc-error
3074 instead of 'system-error, since errno is not relevant.
3076 ** Certain gethostbyname/gethostbyaddr failures now throw errors with
3077 specific keys instead of 'system-error. The latter is inappropriate
3078 since errno will not have been set. The keys are:
3079 'host-not-found, 'try-again, 'no-recovery and 'no-data.
3081 ** sethostent, setnetent, setprotoent, setservent: now take an
3082 optional argument STAYOPEN, which specifies whether the database
3083 remains open after a database entry is accessed randomly (e.g., using
3084 gethostbyname for the hosts database.) The default is #f. Previously
3088 Changes since Guile 1.3.2:
3090 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
3094 An initial version of the Guile debugger written by Chris Hanson has
3095 been added. The debugger is still under development but is included
3096 in the distribution anyway since it is already quite useful.
3102 after an error to enter the debugger. Type `help' inside the debugger
3103 for a description of available commands.
3105 If you prefer to have stack frames numbered and printed in
3106 anti-chronological order and prefer up in the stack to be down on the
3107 screen as is the case in gdb, you can put
3109 (debug-enable 'backwards)
3111 in your .guile startup file. (However, this means that Guile can't
3112 use indentation to indicate stack level.)
3114 The debugger is autoloaded into Guile at the first use.
3116 ** Further enhancements to backtraces
3118 There is a new debug option `width' which controls the maximum width
3119 on the screen of printed stack frames. Fancy printing parameters
3120 ("level" and "length" as in Common LISP) are adaptively adjusted for
3121 each stack frame to give maximum information while still fitting
3122 within the bounds. If the stack frame can't be made to fit by
3123 adjusting parameters, it is simply cut off at the end. This is marked
3126 ** Some modules are now only loaded when the repl is started
3128 The modules (ice-9 debug), (ice-9 session), (ice-9 threads) and (ice-9
3129 regex) are now loaded into (guile-user) only if the repl has been
3130 started. The effect is that the startup time for scripts has been
3131 reduced to 30% of what it was previously.
3133 Correctly written scripts load the modules they require at the top of
3134 the file and should not be affected by this change.
3136 ** Hooks are now represented as smobs
3138 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
3140 ** Readline support has changed again.
3142 The old (readline-activator) module is gone. Use (ice-9 readline)
3143 instead, which now contains all readline functionality. So the code
3144 to activate readline is now
3146 (use-modules (ice-9 readline))
3149 This should work at any time, including from the guile prompt.
3151 To avoid confusion about the terms of Guile's license, please only
3152 enable readline for your personal use; please don't make it the
3153 default for others. Here is why we make this rather odd-sounding
3156 Guile is normally licensed under a weakened form of the GNU General
3157 Public License, which allows you to link code with Guile without
3158 placing that code under the GPL. This exception is important to some
3161 However, since readline is distributed under the GNU General Public
3162 License, when you link Guile with readline, either statically or
3163 dynamically, you effectively change Guile's license to the strict GPL.
3164 Whenever you link any strictly GPL'd code into Guile, uses of Guile
3165 which are normally permitted become forbidden. This is a rather
3166 non-obvious consequence of the licensing terms.
3168 So, to make sure things remain clear, please let people choose for
3169 themselves whether to link GPL'd libraries like readline with Guile.
3171 ** regexp-substitute/global has changed slightly, but incompatibly.
3173 If you include a function in the item list, the string of the match
3174 object it receives is the same string passed to
3175 regexp-substitute/global, not some suffix of that string.
3176 Correspondingly, the match's positions are relative to the entire
3177 string, not the suffix.
3179 If the regexp can match the empty string, the way matches are chosen
3180 from the string has changed. regexp-substitute/global recognizes the
3181 same set of matches that list-matches does; see below.
3183 ** New function: list-matches REGEXP STRING [FLAGS]
3185 Return a list of match objects, one for every non-overlapping, maximal
3186 match of REGEXP in STRING. The matches appear in left-to-right order.
3187 list-matches only reports matches of the empty string if there are no
3188 other matches which begin on, end at, or include the empty match's
3191 If present, FLAGS is passed as the FLAGS argument to regexp-exec.
3193 ** New function: fold-matches REGEXP STRING INIT PROC [FLAGS]
3195 For each match of REGEXP in STRING, apply PROC to the match object,
3196 and the last value PROC returned, or INIT for the first call. Return
3197 the last value returned by PROC. We apply PROC to the matches as they
3198 appear from left to right.
3200 This function recognizes matches according to the same criteria as
3203 Thus, you could define list-matches like this:
3205 (define (list-matches regexp string . flags)
3206 (reverse! (apply fold-matches regexp string '() cons flags)))
3208 If present, FLAGS is passed as the FLAGS argument to regexp-exec.
3212 *** New function: hook? OBJ
3214 Return #t if OBJ is a hook, otherwise #f.
3216 *** New function: make-hook-with-name NAME [ARITY]
3218 Return a hook with name NAME and arity ARITY. The default value for
3219 ARITY is 0. The only effect of NAME is that it will appear when the
3220 hook object is printed to ease debugging.
3222 *** New function: hook-empty? HOOK
3224 Return #t if HOOK doesn't contain any procedures, otherwise #f.
3226 *** New function: hook->list HOOK
3228 Return a list of the procedures that are called when run-hook is
3231 ** `map' signals an error if its argument lists are not all the same length.
3233 This is the behavior required by R5RS, so this change is really a bug
3234 fix. But it seems to affect a lot of people's code, so we're
3235 mentioning it here anyway.
3237 ** Print-state handling has been made more transparent
3239 Under certain circumstances, ports are represented as a port with an
3240 associated print state. Earlier, this pair was represented as a pair
3241 (see "Some magic has been added to the printer" below). It is now
3242 indistinguishable (almost; see `get-print-state') from a port on the
3245 *** New function: port-with-print-state OUTPUT-PORT PRINT-STATE
3247 Return a new port with the associated print state PRINT-STATE.
3249 *** New function: get-print-state OUTPUT-PORT
3251 Return the print state associated with this port if it exists,
3252 otherwise return #f.
3254 *** New function: directory-stream? OBJECT
3256 Returns true iff OBJECT is a directory stream --- the sort of object
3257 returned by `opendir'.
3259 ** New function: using-readline?
3261 Return #t if readline is in use in the current repl.
3263 ** structs will be removed in 1.4
3265 Structs will be replaced in Guile 1.4. We will merge GOOPS into Guile
3266 and use GOOPS objects as the fundamental record type.
3268 * Changes to the scm_ interface
3270 ** structs will be removed in 1.4
3272 The entire current struct interface (struct.c, struct.h) will be
3273 replaced in Guile 1.4. We will merge GOOPS into libguile and use
3274 GOOPS objects as the fundamental record type.
3276 ** The internal representation of subr's has changed
3278 Instead of giving a hint to the subr name, the CAR field of the subr
3279 now contains an index to a subr entry in scm_subr_table.
3281 *** New variable: scm_subr_table
3283 An array of subr entries. A subr entry contains the name, properties
3284 and documentation associated with the subr. The properties and
3285 documentation slots are not yet used.
3287 ** A new scheme for "forwarding" calls to a builtin to a generic function
3289 It is now possible to extend the functionality of some Guile
3290 primitives by letting them defer a call to a GOOPS generic function on
3291 argument mismatch. This means that there is no loss of efficiency in
3296 (use-modules (oop goops)) ; Must be GOOPS version 0.2.
3297 (define-method + ((x <string>) (y <string>))
3298 (string-append x y))
3300 + will still be as efficient as usual in numerical calculations, but
3301 can also be used for concatenating strings.
3303 Who will be the first one to extend Guile's numerical tower to
3304 rationals? :) [OK, there a few other things to fix before this can
3305 be made in a clean way.]
3307 *** New snarf macros for defining primitives: SCM_GPROC, SCM_GPROC1
3309 New macro: SCM_GPROC (CNAME, SNAME, REQ, OPT, VAR, CFUNC, GENERIC)
3311 New macro: SCM_GPROC1 (CNAME, SNAME, TYPE, CFUNC, GENERIC)
3313 These do the same job as SCM_PROC and SCM_PROC1, but they also define
3314 a variable GENERIC which can be used by the dispatch macros below.
3316 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3318 *** New macros for forwarding control to a generic on arg type error
3320 New macro: SCM_WTA_DISPATCH_1 (GENERIC, ARG1, POS, SUBR)
3322 New macro: SCM_WTA_DISPATCH_2 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, POS, SUBR)
3324 These correspond to the scm_wta function call, and have the same
3325 behaviour until the user has called the GOOPS primitive
3326 `enable-primitive-generic!'. After that, these macros will apply the
3327 generic function GENERIC to the argument(s) instead of calling
3330 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3332 *** New macros for argument testing with generic dispatch
3334 New macro: SCM_GASSERT1 (COND, GENERIC, ARG1, POS, SUBR)
3336 New macro: SCM_GASSERT2 (COND, GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, POS, SUBR)
3338 These correspond to the SCM_ASSERT macro, but will defer control to
3339 GENERIC on error after `enable-primitive-generic!' has been called.
3341 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3343 ** New function: SCM scm_eval_body (SCM body, SCM env)
3345 Evaluates the body of a special form.
3347 ** The internal representation of struct's has changed
3349 Previously, four slots were allocated for the procedure(s) of entities
3350 and operators. The motivation for this representation had to do with
3351 the structure of the evaluator, the wish to support tail-recursive
3352 generic functions, and efficiency. Since the generic function
3353 dispatch mechanism has changed, there is no longer a need for such an
3354 expensive representation, and the representation has been simplified.
3356 This should not make any difference for most users.
3358 ** GOOPS support has been cleaned up.
3360 Some code has been moved from eval.c to objects.c and code in both of
3361 these compilation units has been cleaned up and better structured.
3363 *** New functions for applying generic functions
3365 New function: SCM scm_apply_generic (GENERIC, ARGS)
3366 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_0 (GENERIC)
3367 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_1 (GENERIC, ARG1)
3368 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_2 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2)
3369 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_3 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, ARG3)
3371 ** Deprecated function: scm_make_named_hook
3373 It is now replaced by:
3375 ** New function: SCM scm_create_hook (const char *name, int arity)
3377 Creates a hook in the same way as make-hook above but also
3378 binds a variable named NAME to it.
3380 This is the typical way of creating a hook from C code.
3382 Currently, the variable is created in the "current" module.
3383 This might change when we get the new module system.
3385 [The behaviour is identical to scm_make_named_hook.]
3389 Changes since Guile 1.3:
3391 * Changes to mailing lists
3393 ** Some of the Guile mailing lists have moved to sourceware.cygnus.com.
3395 See the README file to find current addresses for all the Guile
3398 * Changes to the distribution
3400 ** Readline support is no longer included with Guile by default.
3402 Based on the different license terms of Guile and Readline, we
3403 concluded that Guile should not *by default* cause the linking of
3404 Readline into an application program. Readline support is now offered
3405 as a separate module, which is linked into an application only when
3406 you explicitly specify it.
3408 Although Guile is GNU software, its distribution terms add a special
3409 exception to the usual GNU General Public License (GPL). Guile's
3410 license includes a clause that allows you to link Guile with non-free
3411 programs. We add this exception so as not to put Guile at a
3412 disadvantage vis-a-vis other extensibility packages that support other
3415 In contrast, the GNU Readline library is distributed under the GNU
3416 General Public License pure and simple. This means that you may not
3417 link Readline, even dynamically, into an application unless it is
3418 distributed under a free software license that is compatible the GPL.
3420 Because of this difference in distribution terms, an application that
3421 can use Guile may not be able to use Readline. Now users will be
3422 explicitly offered two independent decisions about the use of these
3425 You can activate the readline support by issuing
3427 (use-modules (readline-activator))
3430 from your ".guile" file, for example.
3432 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
3434 ** All builtins now print as primitives.
3435 Previously builtin procedures not belonging to the fundamental subr
3436 types printed as #<compiled closure #<primitive-procedure gsubr-apply>>.
3437 Now, they print as #<primitive-procedure NAME>.
3439 ** Backtraces slightly more intelligible.
3440 gsubr-apply and macro transformer application frames no longer appear
3443 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
3445 ** Guile now correctly handles internal defines by rewriting them into
3446 their equivalent letrec. Previously, internal defines would
3447 incrementally add to the innermost environment, without checking
3448 whether the restrictions specified in RnRS were met. This lead to the
3449 correct behaviour when these restriction actually were met, but didn't
3450 catch all illegal uses. Such an illegal use could lead to crashes of
3451 the Guile interpreter or or other unwanted results. An example of
3452 incorrect internal defines that made Guile behave erratically:
3464 The problem with this example is that the definition of `c' uses the
3465 value of `b' directly. This confuses the meoization machine of Guile
3466 so that the second call of `b' (this time in a larger environment that
3467 also contains bindings for `c' and `d') refers to the binding of `c'
3468 instead of `a'. You could also make Guile crash with a variation on
3473 (define (b flag) (if flag a 1))
3474 (define c (1+ (b flag)))
3482 From now on, Guile will issue an `Unbound variable: b' error message
3487 A hook contains a list of functions which should be called on
3488 particular occasions in an existing program. Hooks are used for
3491 A window manager might have a hook before-window-map-hook. The window
3492 manager uses the function run-hooks to call all functions stored in
3493 before-window-map-hook each time a window is mapped. The user can
3494 store functions in the hook using add-hook!.
3496 In Guile, hooks are first class objects.
3498 *** New function: make-hook [N_ARGS]
3500 Return a hook for hook functions which can take N_ARGS arguments.
3501 The default value for N_ARGS is 0.
3503 (See also scm_make_named_hook below.)
3505 *** New function: add-hook! HOOK PROC [APPEND_P]
3507 Put PROC at the beginning of the list of functions stored in HOOK.
3508 If APPEND_P is supplied, and non-false, put PROC at the end instead.
3510 PROC must be able to take the number of arguments specified when the
3513 If PROC already exists in HOOK, then remove it first.
3515 *** New function: remove-hook! HOOK PROC
3517 Remove PROC from the list of functions in HOOK.
3519 *** New function: reset-hook! HOOK
3521 Clear the list of hook functions stored in HOOK.
3523 *** New function: run-hook HOOK ARG1 ...
3525 Run all hook functions stored in HOOK with arguments ARG1 ... .
3526 The number of arguments supplied must correspond to the number given
3527 when the hook was created.
3529 ** The function `dynamic-link' now takes optional keyword arguments.
3530 The only keyword argument that is currently defined is `:global
3531 BOOL'. With it, you can control whether the shared library will be
3532 linked in global mode or not. In global mode, the symbols from the
3533 linked library can be used to resolve references from other
3534 dynamically linked libraries. In non-global mode, the linked
3535 library is essentially invisible and can only be accessed via
3536 `dynamic-func', etc. The default is now to link in global mode.
3537 Previously, the default has been non-global mode.
3539 The `#:global' keyword is only effective on platforms that support
3540 the dlopen family of functions.
3542 ** New function `provided?'
3544 - Function: provided? FEATURE
3545 Return true iff FEATURE is supported by this installation of
3546 Guile. FEATURE must be a symbol naming a feature; the global
3547 variable `*features*' is a list of available features.
3549 ** Changes to the module (ice-9 expect):
3551 *** The expect-strings macro now matches `$' in a regular expression
3552 only at a line-break or end-of-file by default. Previously it would
3553 match the end of the string accumulated so far. The old behaviour
3554 can be obtained by setting the variable `expect-strings-exec-flags'
3557 *** The expect-strings macro now uses a variable `expect-strings-exec-flags'
3558 for the regexp-exec flags. If `regexp/noteol' is included, then `$'
3559 in a regular expression will still match before a line-break or
3560 end-of-file. The default is `regexp/noteol'.
3562 *** The expect-strings macro now uses a variable
3563 `expect-strings-compile-flags' for the flags to be supplied to
3564 `make-regexp'. The default is `regexp/newline', which was previously
3567 *** The expect macro now supplies two arguments to a match procedure:
3568 the current accumulated string and a flag to indicate whether
3569 end-of-file has been reached. Previously only the string was supplied.
3570 If end-of-file is reached, the match procedure will be called an
3571 additional time with the same accumulated string as the previous call
3572 but with the flag set.
3574 ** New module (ice-9 format), implementing the Common Lisp `format' function.
3576 This code, and the documentation for it that appears here, was
3577 borrowed from SLIB, with minor adaptations for Guile.
3579 - Function: format DESTINATION FORMAT-STRING . ARGUMENTS
3580 An almost complete implementation of Common LISP format description
3581 according to the CL reference book `Common LISP' from Guy L.
3582 Steele, Digital Press. Backward compatible to most of the
3583 available Scheme format implementations.
3585 Returns `#t', `#f' or a string; has side effect of printing
3586 according to FORMAT-STRING. If DESTINATION is `#t', the output is
3587 to the current output port and `#t' is returned. If DESTINATION
3588 is `#f', a formatted string is returned as the result of the call.
3589 NEW: If DESTINATION is a string, DESTINATION is regarded as the
3590 format string; FORMAT-STRING is then the first argument and the
3591 output is returned as a string. If DESTINATION is a number, the
3592 output is to the current error port if available by the
3593 implementation. Otherwise DESTINATION must be an output port and
3596 FORMAT-STRING must be a string. In case of a formatting error
3597 format returns `#f' and prints a message on the current output or
3598 error port. Characters are output as if the string were output by
3599 the `display' function with the exception of those prefixed by a
3600 tilde (~). For a detailed description of the FORMAT-STRING syntax
3601 please consult a Common LISP format reference manual. For a test
3602 suite to verify this format implementation load `formatst.scm'.
3603 Please send bug reports to `lutzeb@cs.tu-berlin.de'.
3605 Note: `format' is not reentrant, i.e. only one `format'-call may
3606 be executed at a time.
3609 *** Format Specification (Format version 3.0)
3611 Please consult a Common LISP format reference manual for a detailed
3612 description of the format string syntax. For a demonstration of the
3613 implemented directives see `formatst.scm'.
3615 This implementation supports directive parameters and modifiers (`:'
3616 and `@' characters). Multiple parameters must be separated by a comma
3617 (`,'). Parameters can be numerical parameters (positive or negative),
3618 character parameters (prefixed by a quote character (`''), variable
3619 parameters (`v'), number of rest arguments parameter (`#'), empty and
3620 default parameters. Directive characters are case independent. The
3621 general form of a directive is:
3623 DIRECTIVE ::= ~{DIRECTIVE-PARAMETER,}[:][@]DIRECTIVE-CHARACTER
3625 DIRECTIVE-PARAMETER ::= [ [-|+]{0-9}+ | 'CHARACTER | v | # ]
3627 *** Implemented CL Format Control Directives
3629 Documentation syntax: Uppercase characters represent the
3630 corresponding control directive characters. Lowercase characters
3631 represent control directive parameter descriptions.
3634 Any (print as `display' does).
3638 `~MINCOL,COLINC,MINPAD,PADCHARA'
3642 S-expression (print as `write' does).
3646 `~MINCOL,COLINC,MINPAD,PADCHARS'
3652 print number sign always.
3655 print comma separated.
3657 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARD'
3663 print number sign always.
3666 print comma separated.
3668 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARX'
3674 print number sign always.
3677 print comma separated.
3679 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARO'
3685 print number sign always.
3688 print comma separated.
3690 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARB'
3695 `~N,MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARR'
3699 print a number as a Roman numeral.
3702 print a number as an "old fashioned" Roman numeral.
3705 print a number as an ordinal English number.
3708 print a number as a cardinal English number.
3713 prints `y' and `ies'.
3716 as `~P but jumps 1 argument backward.'
3719 as `~@P but jumps 1 argument backward.'
3724 prints a character as the reader can understand it (i.e. `#\'
3728 prints a character as emacs does (eg. `^C' for ASCII 03).
3731 Fixed-format floating-point (prints a flonum like MMM.NNN).
3732 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHARF'
3734 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
3737 Exponential floating-point (prints a flonum like MMM.NNN`E'EE).
3738 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,EXPONENTDIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHAR,EXPONENTCHARE'
3740 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
3743 General floating-point (prints a flonum either fixed or
3745 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,EXPONENTDIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHAR,EXPONENTCHARG'
3747 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
3750 Dollars floating-point (prints a flonum in fixed with signs
3752 `~DIGITS,SCALE,WIDTH,PADCHAR$'
3754 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
3757 A sign is always printed and appears before the padding.
3760 The sign appears before the padding.
3768 print newline if not at the beginning of the output line.
3770 prints `~&' and then N-1 newlines.
3775 print N page separators.
3785 newline is ignored, white space left.
3788 newline is left, white space ignored.
3793 relative tabulation.
3799 Indirection (expects indirect arguments as a list).
3801 extracts indirect arguments from format arguments.
3804 Case conversion (converts by `string-downcase').
3806 converts by `string-capitalize'.
3809 converts by `string-capitalize-first'.
3812 converts by `string-upcase'.
3815 Argument Jumping (jumps 1 argument forward).
3817 jumps N arguments forward.
3820 jumps 1 argument backward.
3823 jumps N arguments backward.
3826 jumps to the 0th argument.
3829 jumps to the Nth argument (beginning from 0)
3831 `~[STR0~;STR1~;...~;STRN~]'
3832 Conditional Expression (numerical clause conditional).
3834 take argument from N.
3837 true test conditional.
3840 if-else-then conditional.
3846 default clause follows.
3849 Iteration (args come from the next argument (a list)).
3851 at most N iterations.
3854 args from next arg (a list of lists).
3857 args from the rest of arguments.
3860 args from the rest args (lists).
3871 aborts if N <= M <= K
3873 *** Not Implemented CL Format Control Directives
3876 print `#f' as an empty list (see below).
3879 print `#f' as an empty list (see below).
3885 (sorry I don't understand its semantics completely)
3887 *** Extended, Replaced and Additional Control Directives
3889 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHD'
3890 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHX'
3891 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHO'
3892 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHB'
3893 `~N,MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHR'
3894 COMMAWIDTH is the number of characters between two comma
3898 print a R4RS complex number as `~F~@Fi' with passed parameters for
3902 Pretty print formatting of an argument for scheme code lists.
3908 Flushes the output if format DESTINATION is a port.
3911 Print a `#\space' character
3913 print N `#\space' characters.
3916 Print a `#\tab' character
3918 print N `#\tab' characters.
3921 Takes N as an integer representation for a character. No arguments
3922 are consumed. N is converted to a character by `integer->char'. N
3923 must be a positive decimal number.
3926 Print out readproof. Prints out internal objects represented as
3927 `#<...>' as strings `"#<...>"' so that the format output can always
3928 be processed by `read'.
3931 Print out readproof. Prints out internal objects represented as
3932 `#<...>' as strings `"#<...>"' so that the format output can always
3933 be processed by `read'.
3936 Prints information and a copyright notice on the format
3939 prints format version.
3942 may also print number strings, i.e. passing a number as a string
3943 and format it accordingly.
3945 *** Configuration Variables
3947 The format module exports some configuration variables to suit the
3948 systems and users needs. There should be no modification necessary for
3949 the configuration that comes with Guile. Format detects automatically
3950 if the running scheme system implements floating point numbers and
3953 format:symbol-case-conv
3954 Symbols are converted by `symbol->string' so the case type of the
3955 printed symbols is implementation dependent.
3956 `format:symbol-case-conv' is a one arg closure which is either
3957 `#f' (no conversion), `string-upcase', `string-downcase' or
3958 `string-capitalize'. (default `#f')
3960 format:iobj-case-conv
3961 As FORMAT:SYMBOL-CASE-CONV but applies for the representation of
3962 implementation internal objects. (default `#f')
3965 The character prefixing the exponent value in `~E' printing.
3968 *** Compatibility With Other Format Implementations
3974 Downward compatible except for padding support and `~A', `~S',
3975 `~P', `~X' uppercase printing. SLIB format 1.4 uses C-style
3976 `printf' padding support which is completely replaced by the CL
3977 `format' padding style.
3980 Downward compatible except for `~', which is not documented
3981 (ignores all characters inside the format string up to a newline
3982 character). (7.1 implements `~a', `~s', ~NEWLINE, `~~', `~%',
3983 numerical and variable parameters and `:/@' modifiers in the CL
3987 Downward compatible except for `~A' and `~S' which print in
3988 uppercase. (Elk implements `~a', `~s', `~~', and `~%' (no
3989 directive parameters or modifiers)).
3992 Downward compatible except for an optional destination parameter:
3993 S2C accepts a format call without a destination which returns a
3994 formatted string. This is equivalent to a #f destination in S2C.
3995 (S2C implements `~a', `~s', `~c', `~%', and `~~' (no directive
3996 parameters or modifiers)).
3999 ** Changes to string-handling functions.
4001 These functions were added to support the (ice-9 format) module, above.
4003 *** New function: string-upcase STRING
4004 *** New function: string-downcase STRING
4006 These are non-destructive versions of the existing string-upcase! and
4007 string-downcase! functions.
4009 *** New function: string-capitalize! STRING
4010 *** New function: string-capitalize STRING
4012 These functions convert the first letter of each word in the string to
4015 (string-capitalize "howdy there")
4018 As with the other functions, string-capitalize! modifies the string in
4019 place, while string-capitalize returns a modified copy of its argument.
4021 *** New function: string-ci->symbol STRING
4023 Return a symbol whose name is STRING, but having the same case as if
4024 the symbol had be read by `read'.
4026 Guile can be configured to be sensitive or insensitive to case
4027 differences in Scheme identifiers. If Guile is case-insensitive, all
4028 symbols are converted to lower case on input. The `string-ci->symbol'
4029 function returns a symbol whose name in STRING, transformed as Guile
4030 would if STRING were input.
4032 *** New function: substring-move! STRING1 START END STRING2 START
4034 Copy the substring of STRING1 from START (inclusive) to END
4035 (exclusive) to STRING2 at START. STRING1 and STRING2 may be the same
4036 string, and the source and destination areas may overlap; in all
4037 cases, the function behaves as if all the characters were copied
4040 *** Extended functions: substring-move-left! substring-move-right!
4042 These functions now correctly copy arbitrarily overlapping substrings;
4043 they are both synonyms for substring-move!.
4046 ** New module (ice-9 getopt-long), with the function `getopt-long'.
4048 getopt-long is a function for parsing command-line arguments in a
4049 manner consistent with other GNU programs.
4051 (getopt-long ARGS GRAMMAR)
4052 Parse the arguments ARGS according to the argument list grammar GRAMMAR.
4054 ARGS should be a list of strings. Its first element should be the
4055 name of the program; subsequent elements should be the arguments
4056 that were passed to the program on the command line. The
4057 `program-arguments' procedure returns a list of this form.
4059 GRAMMAR is a list of the form:
4060 ((OPTION (PROPERTY VALUE) ...) ...)
4062 Each OPTION should be a symbol. `getopt-long' will accept a
4063 command-line option named `--OPTION'.
4064 Each option can have the following (PROPERTY VALUE) pairs:
4066 (single-char CHAR) --- Accept `-CHAR' as a single-character
4067 equivalent to `--OPTION'. This is how to specify traditional
4069 (required? BOOL) --- If BOOL is true, the option is required.
4070 getopt-long will raise an error if it is not found in ARGS.
4071 (value BOOL) --- If BOOL is #t, the option accepts a value; if
4072 it is #f, it does not; and if it is the symbol
4073 `optional', the option may appear in ARGS with or
4075 (predicate FUNC) --- If the option accepts a value (i.e. you
4076 specified `(value #t)' for this option), then getopt
4077 will apply FUNC to the value, and throw an exception
4078 if it returns #f. FUNC should be a procedure which
4079 accepts a string and returns a boolean value; you may
4080 need to use quasiquotes to get it into GRAMMAR.
4082 The (PROPERTY VALUE) pairs may occur in any order, but each
4083 property may occur only once. By default, options do not have
4084 single-character equivalents, are not required, and do not take
4087 In ARGS, single-character options may be combined, in the usual
4088 Unix fashion: ("-x" "-y") is equivalent to ("-xy"). If an option
4089 accepts values, then it must be the last option in the
4090 combination; the value is the next argument. So, for example, using
4091 the following grammar:
4092 ((apples (single-char #\a))
4093 (blimps (single-char #\b) (value #t))
4094 (catalexis (single-char #\c) (value #t)))
4095 the following argument lists would be acceptable:
4096 ("-a" "-b" "bang" "-c" "couth") ("bang" and "couth" are the values
4097 for "blimps" and "catalexis")
4098 ("-ab" "bang" "-c" "couth") (same)
4099 ("-ac" "couth" "-b" "bang") (same)
4100 ("-abc" "couth" "bang") (an error, since `-b' is not the
4101 last option in its combination)
4103 If an option's value is optional, then `getopt-long' decides
4104 whether it has a value by looking at what follows it in ARGS. If
4105 the next element is a string, and it does not appear to be an
4106 option itself, then that string is the option's value.
4108 The value of a long option can appear as the next element in ARGS,
4109 or it can follow the option name, separated by an `=' character.
4110 Thus, using the same grammar as above, the following argument lists
4112 ("--apples" "Braeburn" "--blimps" "Goodyear")
4113 ("--apples=Braeburn" "--blimps" "Goodyear")
4114 ("--blimps" "Goodyear" "--apples=Braeburn")
4116 If the option "--" appears in ARGS, argument parsing stops there;
4117 subsequent arguments are returned as ordinary arguments, even if
4118 they resemble options. So, in the argument list:
4119 ("--apples" "Granny Smith" "--" "--blimp" "Goodyear")
4120 `getopt-long' will recognize the `apples' option as having the
4121 value "Granny Smith", but it will not recognize the `blimp'
4122 option; it will return the strings "--blimp" and "Goodyear" as
4123 ordinary argument strings.
4125 The `getopt-long' function returns the parsed argument list as an
4126 assocation list, mapping option names --- the symbols from GRAMMAR
4127 --- onto their values, or #t if the option does not accept a value.
4128 Unused options do not appear in the alist.
4130 All arguments that are not the value of any option are returned
4131 as a list, associated with the empty list.
4133 `getopt-long' throws an exception if:
4134 - it finds an unrecognized option in ARGS
4135 - a required option is omitted
4136 - an option that requires an argument doesn't get one
4137 - an option that doesn't accept an argument does get one (this can
4138 only happen using the long option `--opt=value' syntax)
4139 - an option predicate fails
4144 `((lockfile-dir (required? #t)
4147 (predicate ,file-is-directory?))
4148 (verbose (required? #f)
4151 (x-includes (single-char #\x))
4152 (rnet-server (single-char #\y)
4153 (predicate ,string?))))
4155 (getopt-long '("my-prog" "-vk" "/tmp" "foo1" "--x-includes=/usr/include"
4156 "--rnet-server=lamprod" "--" "-fred" "foo2" "foo3")
4158 => ((() "foo1" "-fred" "foo2" "foo3")
4159 (rnet-server . "lamprod")
4160 (x-includes . "/usr/include")
4161 (lockfile-dir . "/tmp")
4164 ** The (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style) module is obsolete; use (ice-9 getopt-long).
4166 It will be removed in a few releases.
4168 ** New syntax: lambda*
4169 ** New syntax: define*
4170 ** New syntax: define*-public
4171 ** New syntax: defmacro*
4172 ** New syntax: defmacro*-public
4173 Guile now supports optional arguments.
4175 `lambda*', `define*', `define*-public', `defmacro*' and
4176 `defmacro*-public' are identical to the non-* versions except that
4177 they use an extended type of parameter list that has the following BNF
4178 syntax (parentheses are literal, square brackets indicate grouping,
4179 and `*', `+' and `?' have the usual meaning):
4181 ext-param-list ::= ( [identifier]* [#&optional [ext-var-decl]+]?
4182 [#&key [ext-var-decl]+ [#&allow-other-keys]?]?
4183 [[#&rest identifier]|[. identifier]]? ) | [identifier]
4185 ext-var-decl ::= identifier | ( identifier expression )
4187 The semantics are best illustrated with the following documentation
4188 and examples for `lambda*':
4191 lambda extended for optional and keyword arguments
4193 lambda* creates a procedure that takes optional arguments. These
4194 are specified by putting them inside brackets at the end of the
4195 paramater list, but before any dotted rest argument. For example,
4196 (lambda* (a b #&optional c d . e) '())
4197 creates a procedure with fixed arguments a and b, optional arguments c
4198 and d, and rest argument e. If the optional arguments are omitted
4199 in a call, the variables for them are unbound in the procedure. This
4200 can be checked with the bound? macro.
4202 lambda* can also take keyword arguments. For example, a procedure
4204 (lambda* (#&key xyzzy larch) '())
4205 can be called with any of the argument lists (#:xyzzy 11)
4206 (#:larch 13) (#:larch 42 #:xyzzy 19) (). Whichever arguments
4207 are given as keywords are bound to values.
4209 Optional and keyword arguments can also be given default values
4210 which they take on when they are not present in a call, by giving a
4211 two-item list in place of an optional argument, for example in:
4212 (lambda* (foo #&optional (bar 42) #&key (baz 73)) (list foo bar baz))
4213 foo is a fixed argument, bar is an optional argument with default
4214 value 42, and baz is a keyword argument with default value 73.
4215 Default value expressions are not evaluated unless they are needed
4216 and until the procedure is called.
4218 lambda* now supports two more special parameter list keywords.
4220 lambda*-defined procedures now throw an error by default if a
4221 keyword other than one of those specified is found in the actual
4222 passed arguments. However, specifying #&allow-other-keys
4223 immediately after the kyword argument declarations restores the
4224 previous behavior of ignoring unknown keywords. lambda* also now
4225 guarantees that if the same keyword is passed more than once, the
4226 last one passed is the one that takes effect. For example,
4227 ((lambda* (#&key (heads 0) (tails 0)) (display (list heads tails)))
4228 #:heads 37 #:tails 42 #:heads 99)
4229 would result in (99 47) being displayed.
4231 #&rest is also now provided as a synonym for the dotted syntax rest
4232 argument. The argument lists (a . b) and (a #&rest b) are equivalent in
4233 all respects to lambda*. This is provided for more similarity to DSSSL,
4234 MIT-Scheme and Kawa among others, as well as for refugees from other
4237 Further documentation may be found in the optargs.scm file itself.
4239 The optional argument module also exports the macros `let-optional',
4240 `let-optional*', `let-keywords', `let-keywords*' and `bound?'. These
4241 are not documented here because they may be removed in the future, but
4242 full documentation is still available in optargs.scm.
4244 ** New syntax: and-let*
4245 Guile now supports the `and-let*' form, described in the draft SRFI-2.
4247 Syntax: (land* (<clause> ...) <body> ...)
4248 Each <clause> should have one of the following forms:
4249 (<variable> <expression>)
4252 Each <variable> or <bound-variable> should be an identifier. Each
4253 <expression> should be a valid expression. The <body> should be a
4254 possibly empty sequence of expressions, like the <body> of a
4257 Semantics: A LAND* expression is evaluated by evaluating the
4258 <expression> or <bound-variable> of each of the <clause>s from
4259 left to right. The value of the first <expression> or
4260 <bound-variable> that evaluates to a false value is returned; the
4261 remaining <expression>s and <bound-variable>s are not evaluated.
4262 The <body> forms are evaluated iff all the <expression>s and
4263 <bound-variable>s evaluate to true values.
4265 The <expression>s and the <body> are evaluated in an environment
4266 binding each <variable> of the preceding (<variable> <expression>)
4267 clauses to the value of the <expression>. Later bindings
4268 shadow earlier bindings.
4270 Guile's and-let* macro was contributed by Michael Livshin.
4272 ** New sorting functions
4274 *** New function: sorted? SEQUENCE LESS?
4275 Returns `#t' when the sequence argument is in non-decreasing order
4276 according to LESS? (that is, there is no adjacent pair `... x y
4277 ...' for which `(less? y x)').
4279 Returns `#f' when the sequence contains at least one out-of-order
4280 pair. It is an error if the sequence is neither a list nor a
4283 *** New function: merge LIST1 LIST2 LESS?
4284 LIST1 and LIST2 are sorted lists.
4285 Returns the sorted list of all elements in LIST1 and LIST2.
4287 Assume that the elements a and b1 in LIST1 and b2 in LIST2 are "equal"
4288 in the sense that (LESS? x y) --> #f for x, y in {a, b1, b2},
4289 and that a < b1 in LIST1. Then a < b1 < b2 in the result.
4290 (Here "<" should read "comes before".)
4292 *** New procedure: merge! LIST1 LIST2 LESS?
4293 Merges two lists, re-using the pairs of LIST1 and LIST2 to build
4294 the result. If the code is compiled, and LESS? constructs no new
4295 pairs, no pairs at all will be allocated. The first pair of the
4296 result will be either the first pair of LIST1 or the first pair of
4299 *** New function: sort SEQUENCE LESS?
4300 Accepts either a list or a vector, and returns a new sequence
4301 which is sorted. The new sequence is the same type as the input.
4302 Always `(sorted? (sort sequence less?) less?)'. The original
4303 sequence is not altered in any way. The new sequence shares its
4304 elements with the old one; no elements are copied.
4306 *** New procedure: sort! SEQUENCE LESS
4307 Returns its sorted result in the original boxes. No new storage is
4308 allocated at all. Proper usage: (set! slist (sort! slist <))
4310 *** New function: stable-sort SEQUENCE LESS?
4311 Similar to `sort' but stable. That is, if "equal" elements are
4312 ordered a < b in the original sequence, they will have the same order
4315 *** New function: stable-sort! SEQUENCE LESS?
4316 Similar to `sort!' but stable.
4317 Uses temporary storage when sorting vectors.
4319 *** New functions: sort-list, sort-list!
4320 Added for compatibility with scsh.
4322 ** New built-in random number support
4324 *** New function: random N [STATE]
4325 Accepts a positive integer or real N and returns a number of the
4326 same type between zero (inclusive) and N (exclusive). The values
4327 returned have a uniform distribution.
4329 The optional argument STATE must be of the type produced by
4330 `copy-random-state' or `seed->random-state'. It defaults to the value
4331 of the variable `*random-state*'. This object is used to maintain the
4332 state of the pseudo-random-number generator and is altered as a side
4333 effect of the `random' operation.
4335 *** New variable: *random-state*
4336 Holds a data structure that encodes the internal state of the
4337 random-number generator that `random' uses by default. The nature
4338 of this data structure is implementation-dependent. It may be
4339 printed out and successfully read back in, but may or may not
4340 function correctly as a random-number state object in another
4343 *** New function: copy-random-state [STATE]
4344 Returns a new object of type suitable for use as the value of the
4345 variable `*random-state*' and as a second argument to `random'.
4346 If argument STATE is given, a copy of it is returned. Otherwise a
4347 copy of `*random-state*' is returned.
4349 *** New function: seed->random-state SEED
4350 Returns a new object of type suitable for use as the value of the
4351 variable `*random-state*' and as a second argument to `random'.
4352 SEED is a string or a number. A new state is generated and
4353 initialized using SEED.
4355 *** New function: random:uniform [STATE]
4356 Returns an uniformly distributed inexact real random number in the
4357 range between 0 and 1.
4359 *** New procedure: random:solid-sphere! VECT [STATE]
4360 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers the sum of whose
4361 squares is less than 1.0. Thinking of VECT as coordinates in
4362 space of dimension N = `(vector-length VECT)', the coordinates are
4363 uniformly distributed within the unit N-shere. The sum of the
4364 squares of the numbers is returned. VECT can be either a vector
4365 or a uniform vector of doubles.
4367 *** New procedure: random:hollow-sphere! VECT [STATE]
4368 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers the sum of whose squares
4369 is equal to 1.0. Thinking of VECT as coordinates in space of
4370 dimension n = `(vector-length VECT)', the coordinates are uniformly
4371 distributed over the surface of the unit n-shere. VECT can be either
4372 a vector or a uniform vector of doubles.
4374 *** New function: random:normal [STATE]
4375 Returns an inexact real in a normal distribution with mean 0 and
4376 standard deviation 1. For a normal distribution with mean M and
4377 standard deviation D use `(+ M (* D (random:normal)))'.
4379 *** New procedure: random:normal-vector! VECT [STATE]
4380 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers which are independent and
4381 standard normally distributed (i.e., with mean 0 and variance 1).
4382 VECT can be either a vector or a uniform vector of doubles.
4384 *** New function: random:exp STATE
4385 Returns an inexact real in an exponential distribution with mean 1.
4386 For an exponential distribution with mean U use (* U (random:exp)).
4388 ** The range of logand, logior, logxor, logtest, and logbit? have changed.
4390 These functions now operate on numbers in the range of a C unsigned
4393 These functions used to operate on numbers in the range of a C signed
4394 long; however, this seems inappropriate, because Guile integers don't
4397 ** New function: make-guardian
4398 This is an implementation of guardians as described in
4399 R. Kent Dybvig, Carl Bruggeman, and David Eby (1993) "Guardians in a
4400 Generation-Based Garbage Collector" ACM SIGPLAN Conference on
4401 Programming Language Design and Implementation, June 1993
4402 ftp://ftp.cs.indiana.edu/pub/scheme-repository/doc/pubs/guardians.ps.gz
4404 ** New functions: delq1!, delv1!, delete1!
4405 These procedures behave similar to delq! and friends but delete only
4406 one object if at all.
4408 ** New function: unread-string STRING PORT
4409 Unread STRING to PORT, that is, push it back onto the port so that
4410 next read operation will work on the pushed back characters.
4412 ** unread-char can now be called multiple times
4413 If unread-char is called multiple times, the unread characters will be
4414 read again in last-in first-out order.
4416 ** the procedures uniform-array-read! and uniform-array-write! now
4417 work on any kind of port, not just ports which are open on a file.
4419 ** Now 'l' in a port mode requests line buffering.
4421 ** The procedure truncate-file now works on string ports as well
4422 as file ports. If the size argument is omitted, the current
4423 file position is used.
4425 ** new procedure: seek PORT/FDES OFFSET WHENCE
4426 The arguments are the same as for the old fseek procedure, but it
4427 works on string ports as well as random-access file ports.
4429 ** the fseek procedure now works on string ports, since it has been
4430 redefined using seek.
4432 ** the setvbuf procedure now uses a default size if mode is _IOFBF and
4433 size is not supplied.
4435 ** the newline procedure no longer flushes the port if it's not
4436 line-buffered: previously it did if it was the current output port.
4438 ** open-pipe and close-pipe are no longer primitive procedures, but
4439 an emulation can be obtained using `(use-modules (ice-9 popen))'.
4441 ** the freopen procedure has been removed.
4443 ** new procedure: drain-input PORT
4444 Drains PORT's read buffers (including any pushed-back characters)
4445 and returns the contents as a single string.
4447 ** New function: map-in-order PROC LIST1 LIST2 ...
4448 Version of `map' which guarantees that the procedure is applied to the
4449 lists in serial order.
4451 ** Renamed `serial-array-copy!' and `serial-array-map!' to
4452 `array-copy-in-order!' and `array-map-in-order!'. The old names are
4453 now obsolete and will go away in release 1.5.
4455 ** New syntax: collect BODY1 ...
4456 Version of `begin' which returns a list of the results of the body
4457 forms instead of the result of the last body form. In contrast to
4458 `begin', `collect' allows an empty body.
4460 ** New functions: read-history FILENAME, write-history FILENAME
4461 Read/write command line history from/to file. Returns #t on success
4462 and #f if an error occured.
4464 ** `ls' and `lls' in module (ice-9 ls) now handle no arguments.
4466 These procedures return a list of definitions available in the specified
4467 argument, a relative module reference. In the case of no argument,
4468 `(current-module)' is now consulted for definitions to return, instead
4469 of simply returning #f, the former behavior.
4471 ** The #/ syntax for lists is no longer supported.
4473 Earlier versions of Scheme accepted this syntax, but printed a
4476 ** Guile no longer consults the SCHEME_LOAD_PATH environment variable.
4478 Instead, you should set GUILE_LOAD_PATH to tell Guile where to find
4481 * Changes to the gh_ interface
4485 Now takes a second argument which is the result array. If this
4486 pointer is NULL, a new array is malloced (the old behaviour).
4488 ** gh_chars2byvect, gh_shorts2svect, gh_floats2fvect, gh_scm2chars,
4489 gh_scm2shorts, gh_scm2longs, gh_scm2floats
4493 * Changes to the scm_ interface
4495 ** Function: scm_make_named_hook (char* name, int n_args)
4497 Creates a hook in the same way as make-hook above but also
4498 binds a variable named NAME to it.
4500 This is the typical way of creating a hook from C code.
4502 Currently, the variable is created in the "current" module. This
4503 might change when we get the new module system.
4505 ** The smob interface
4507 The interface for creating smobs has changed. For documentation, see
4508 data-rep.info (made from guile-core/doc/data-rep.texi).
4510 *** Deprecated function: SCM scm_newsmob (scm_smobfuns *)
4512 >>> This function will be removed in 1.3.4. <<<
4516 *** Function: SCM scm_make_smob_type (const char *name, scm_sizet size)
4517 This function adds a new smob type, named NAME, with instance size
4518 SIZE to the system. The return value is a tag that is used in
4519 creating instances of the type. If SIZE is 0, then no memory will
4520 be allocated when instances of the smob are created, and nothing
4521 will be freed by the default free function.
4523 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_mark (long tc, SCM (*mark) (SCM))
4524 This function sets the smob marking procedure for the smob type
4525 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4526 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4528 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_free (long tc, SCM (*mark) (SCM))
4529 This function sets the smob freeing procedure for the smob type
4530 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4531 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4533 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_print (tc, print)
4535 - Function: void scm_set_smob_print (long tc,
4536 scm_sizet (*print) (SCM,
4540 This function sets the smob printing procedure for the smob type
4541 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4542 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4544 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_equalp (long tc, SCM (*equalp) (SCM, SCM))
4545 This function sets the smob equality-testing predicate for the
4546 smob type specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4547 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4549 *** Macro: void SCM_NEWSMOB (SCM var, long tc, void *data)
4550 Make VALUE contain a smob instance of the type with type code TC and
4551 smob data DATA. VALUE must be previously declared as C type `SCM'.
4553 *** Macro: fn_returns SCM_RETURN_NEWSMOB (long tc, void *data)
4554 This macro expands to a block of code that creates a smob instance
4555 of the type with type code TC and smob data DATA, and returns that
4556 `SCM' value. It should be the last piece of code in a block.
4558 ** The interfaces for using I/O ports and implementing port types
4559 (ptobs) have changed significantly. The new interface is based on
4560 shared access to buffers and a new set of ptob procedures.
4562 *** scm_newptob has been removed
4566 *** Function: SCM scm_make_port_type (type_name, fill_buffer, write_flush)
4568 - Function: SCM scm_make_port_type (char *type_name,
4569 int (*fill_buffer) (SCM port),
4570 void (*write_flush) (SCM port));
4572 Similarly to the new smob interface, there is a set of function
4573 setters by which the user can customize the behaviour of his port
4574 type. See ports.h (scm_set_port_XXX).
4576 ** scm_strport_to_string: New function: creates a new string from
4577 a string port's buffer.
4579 ** Plug in interface for random number generators
4580 The variable `scm_the_rng' in random.c contains a value and three
4581 function pointers which together define the current random number
4582 generator being used by the Scheme level interface and the random
4583 number library functions.
4585 The user is free to replace the default generator with the generator
4588 *** Variable: size_t scm_the_rng.rstate_size
4589 The size of the random state type used by the current RNG
4592 *** Function: unsigned long scm_the_rng.random_bits (scm_rstate *STATE)
4593 Given the random STATE, return 32 random bits.
4595 *** Function: void scm_the_rng.init_rstate (scm_rstate *STATE, chars *S, int N)
4596 Seed random state STATE using string S of length N.
4598 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_the_rng.copy_rstate (scm_rstate *STATE)
4599 Given random state STATE, return a malloced copy.
4602 The default RNG is the MWC (Multiply With Carry) random number
4603 generator described by George Marsaglia at the Department of
4604 Statistics and Supercomputer Computations Research Institute, The
4605 Florida State University (http://stat.fsu.edu/~geo).
4607 It uses 64 bits, has a period of 4578426017172946943 (4.6e18), and
4608 passes all tests in the DIEHARD test suite
4609 (http://stat.fsu.edu/~geo/diehard.html). The generation of 32 bits
4610 costs one multiply and one add on platforms which either supports long
4611 longs (gcc does this on most systems) or have 64 bit longs. The cost
4612 is four multiply on other systems but this can be optimized by writing
4613 scm_i_uniform32 in assembler.
4615 These functions are provided through the scm_the_rng interface for use
4616 by libguile and the application.
4618 *** Function: unsigned long scm_i_uniform32 (scm_i_rstate *STATE)
4619 Given the random STATE, return 32 random bits.
4620 Don't use this function directly. Instead go through the plugin
4621 interface (see "Plug in interface" above).
4623 *** Function: void scm_i_init_rstate (scm_i_rstate *STATE, char *SEED, int N)
4624 Initialize STATE using SEED of length N.
4626 *** Function: scm_i_rstate *scm_i_copy_rstate (scm_i_rstate *STATE)
4627 Return a malloc:ed copy of STATE. This function can easily be re-used
4628 in the interfaces to other RNGs.
4630 ** Random number library functions
4631 These functions use the current RNG through the scm_the_rng interface.
4632 It might be a good idea to use these functions from your C code so
4633 that only one random generator is used by all code in your program.
4635 The default random state is stored in:
4637 *** Variable: SCM scm_var_random_state
4638 Contains the vcell of the Scheme variable "*random-state*" which is
4639 used as default state by all random number functions in the Scheme
4644 double x = scm_c_uniform01 (SCM_RSTATE (SCM_CDR (scm_var_random_state)));
4646 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_c_default_rstate (void)
4647 This is a convenience function which returns the value of
4648 scm_var_random_state. An error message is generated if this value
4649 isn't a random state.
4651 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_c_make_rstate (char *SEED, int LENGTH)
4652 Make a new random state from the string SEED of length LENGTH.
4654 It is generally not a good idea to use multiple random states in a
4655 program. While subsequent random numbers generated from one random
4656 state are guaranteed to be reasonably independent, there is no such
4657 guarantee for numbers generated from different random states.
4659 *** Macro: unsigned long scm_c_uniform32 (scm_rstate *STATE)
4660 Return 32 random bits.
4662 *** Function: double scm_c_uniform01 (scm_rstate *STATE)
4663 Return a sample from the uniform(0,1) distribution.
4665 *** Function: double scm_c_normal01 (scm_rstate *STATE)
4666 Return a sample from the normal(0,1) distribution.
4668 *** Function: double scm_c_exp1 (scm_rstate *STATE)
4669 Return a sample from the exp(1) distribution.
4671 *** Function: unsigned long scm_c_random (scm_rstate *STATE, unsigned long M)
4672 Return a sample from the discrete uniform(0,M) distribution.
4674 *** Function: SCM scm_c_random_bignum (scm_rstate *STATE, SCM M)
4675 Return a sample from the discrete uniform(0,M) distribution.
4676 M must be a bignum object. The returned value may be an INUM.
4680 Changes in Guile 1.3 (released Monday, October 19, 1998):
4682 * Changes to the distribution
4684 ** We renamed the SCHEME_LOAD_PATH environment variable to GUILE_LOAD_PATH.
4685 To avoid conflicts, programs should name environment variables after
4686 themselves, except when there's a common practice establishing some
4689 For now, Guile supports both GUILE_LOAD_PATH and SCHEME_LOAD_PATH,
4690 giving the former precedence, and printing a warning message if the
4691 latter is set. Guile 1.4 will not recognize SCHEME_LOAD_PATH at all.
4693 ** The header files related to multi-byte characters have been removed.
4694 They were: libguile/extchrs.h and libguile/mbstrings.h. Any C code
4695 which referred to these explicitly will probably need to be rewritten,
4696 since the support for the variant string types has been removed; see
4699 ** The header files append.h and sequences.h have been removed. These
4700 files implemented non-R4RS operations which would encourage
4701 non-portable programming style and less easy-to-read code.
4703 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
4705 ** New procedures have been added to implement a "batch mode":
4707 *** Function: batch-mode?
4709 Returns a boolean indicating whether the interpreter is in batch
4712 *** Function: set-batch-mode?! ARG
4714 If ARG is true, switches the interpreter to batch mode. The `#f'
4715 case has not been implemented.
4717 ** Guile now provides full command-line editing, when run interactively.
4718 To use this feature, you must have the readline library installed.
4719 The Guile build process will notice it, and automatically include
4722 The readline library is available via anonymous FTP from any GNU
4723 mirror site; the canonical location is "ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu".
4725 ** the-last-stack is now a fluid.
4727 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
4729 ** You can now use the `guile-config' utility to build programs that use Guile.
4731 Guile now includes a command-line utility called `guile-config', which
4732 can provide information about how to compile and link programs that
4735 *** `guile-config compile' prints any C compiler flags needed to use Guile.
4736 You should include this command's output on the command line you use
4737 to compile C or C++ code that #includes the Guile header files. It's
4738 usually just a `-I' flag to help the compiler find the Guile headers.
4741 *** `guile-config link' prints any linker flags necessary to link with Guile.
4743 This command writes to its standard output a list of flags which you
4744 must pass to the linker to link your code against the Guile library.
4745 The flags include '-lguile' itself, any other libraries the Guile
4746 library depends upon, and any `-L' flags needed to help the linker
4747 find those libraries.
4749 For example, here is a Makefile rule that builds a program named 'foo'
4750 from the object files ${FOO_OBJECTS}, and links them against Guile:
4753 ${CC} ${CFLAGS} ${FOO_OBJECTS} `guile-config link` -o foo
4755 Previous Guile releases recommended that you use autoconf to detect
4756 which of a predefined set of libraries were present on your system.
4757 It is more robust to use `guile-config', since it records exactly which
4758 libraries the installed Guile library requires.
4760 This was originally called `build-guile', but was renamed to
4761 `guile-config' before Guile 1.3 was released, to be consistent with
4762 the analogous script for the GTK+ GUI toolkit, which is called
4766 ** Use the GUILE_FLAGS macro in your configure.in file to find Guile.
4768 If you are using the GNU autoconf package to configure your program,
4769 you can use the GUILE_FLAGS autoconf macro to call `guile-config'
4770 (described above) and gather the necessary values for use in your
4773 The GUILE_FLAGS macro expands to configure script code which runs the
4774 `guile-config' script, to find out where Guile's header files and
4775 libraries are installed. It sets two variables, marked for
4776 substitution, as by AC_SUBST.
4778 GUILE_CFLAGS --- flags to pass to a C or C++ compiler to build
4779 code that uses Guile header files. This is almost always just a
4782 GUILE_LDFLAGS --- flags to pass to the linker to link a
4783 program against Guile. This includes `-lguile' for the Guile
4784 library itself, any libraries that Guile itself requires (like
4785 -lqthreads), and so on. It may also include a -L flag to tell the
4786 compiler where to find the libraries.
4788 GUILE_FLAGS is defined in the file guile.m4, in the top-level
4789 directory of the Guile distribution. You can copy it into your
4790 package's aclocal.m4 file, and then use it in your configure.in file.
4792 If you are using the `aclocal' program, distributed with GNU automake,
4793 to maintain your aclocal.m4 file, the Guile installation process
4794 installs guile.m4 where aclocal will find it. All you need to do is
4795 use GUILE_FLAGS in your configure.in file, and then run `aclocal';
4796 this will copy the definition of GUILE_FLAGS into your aclocal.m4
4800 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
4802 ** Multi-byte strings have been removed, as have multi-byte and wide
4803 ports. We felt that these were the wrong approach to
4804 internationalization support.
4806 ** New function: readline [PROMPT]
4807 Read a line from the terminal, and allow the user to edit it,
4808 prompting with PROMPT. READLINE provides a large set of Emacs-like
4809 editing commands, lets the user recall previously typed lines, and
4810 works on almost every kind of terminal, including dumb terminals.
4812 READLINE assumes that the cursor is at the beginning of the line when
4813 it is invoked. Thus, you can't print a prompt yourself, and then call
4814 READLINE; you need to package up your prompt as a string, pass it to
4815 the function, and let READLINE print the prompt itself. This is
4816 because READLINE needs to know the prompt's screen width.
4818 For Guile to provide this function, you must have the readline
4819 library, version 2.1 or later, installed on your system. Readline is
4820 available via anonymous FTP from prep.ai.mit.edu in pub/gnu, or from
4821 any GNU mirror site.
4823 See also ADD-HISTORY function.
4825 ** New function: add-history STRING
4826 Add STRING as the most recent line in the history used by the READLINE
4827 command. READLINE does not add lines to the history itself; you must
4828 call ADD-HISTORY to make previous input available to the user.
4830 ** The behavior of the read-line function has changed.
4832 This function now uses standard C library functions to read the line,
4833 for speed. This means that it doesn not respect the value of
4834 scm-line-incrementors; it assumes that lines are delimited with
4837 (Note that this is read-line, the function that reads a line of text
4838 from a port, not readline, the function that reads a line from a
4839 terminal, providing full editing capabilities.)
4841 ** New module (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style): Parse command-line arguments.
4843 This module provides some simple argument parsing. It exports one
4846 Function: getopt-gnu-style ARG-LS
4847 Parse a list of program arguments into an alist of option
4850 Each item in the list of program arguments is examined to see if
4851 it meets the syntax of a GNU long-named option. An argument like
4852 `--MUMBLE' produces an element of the form (MUMBLE . #t) in the
4853 returned alist, where MUMBLE is a keyword object with the same
4854 name as the argument. An argument like `--MUMBLE=FROB' produces
4855 an element of the form (MUMBLE . FROB), where FROB is a string.
4857 As a special case, the returned alist also contains a pair whose
4858 car is the symbol `rest'. The cdr of this pair is a list
4859 containing all the items in the argument list that are not options
4860 of the form mentioned above.
4862 The argument `--' is treated specially: all items in the argument
4863 list appearing after such an argument are not examined, and are
4864 returned in the special `rest' list.
4866 This function does not parse normal single-character switches.
4867 You will need to parse them out of the `rest' list yourself.
4869 ** The read syntax for byte vectors and short vectors has changed.
4871 Instead of #bytes(...), write #y(...).
4873 Instead of #short(...), write #h(...).
4875 This may seem nutty, but, like the other uniform vectors, byte vectors
4876 and short vectors want to have the same print and read syntax (and,
4877 more basic, want to have read syntax!). Changing the read syntax to
4878 use multiple characters after the hash sign breaks with the
4879 conventions used in R5RS and the conventions used for the other
4880 uniform vectors. It also introduces complexity in the current reader,
4881 both on the C and Scheme levels. (The Right solution is probably to
4882 change the syntax and prototypes for uniform vectors entirely.)
4885 ** The new module (ice-9 session) provides useful interactive functions.
4887 *** New procedure: (apropos REGEXP OPTION ...)
4889 Display a list of top-level variables whose names match REGEXP, and
4890 the modules they are imported from. Each OPTION should be one of the
4893 value --- Show the value of each matching variable.
4894 shadow --- Show bindings shadowed by subsequently imported modules.
4895 full --- Same as both `shadow' and `value'.
4899 guile> (apropos "trace" 'full)
4900 debug: trace #<procedure trace args>
4901 debug: untrace #<procedure untrace args>
4902 the-scm-module: display-backtrace #<compiled-closure #<primitive-procedure gsubr-apply>>
4903 the-scm-module: before-backtrace-hook ()
4904 the-scm-module: backtrace #<primitive-procedure backtrace>
4905 the-scm-module: after-backtrace-hook ()
4906 the-scm-module: has-shown-backtrace-hint? #f
4909 ** There are new functions and syntax for working with macros.
4911 Guile implements macros as a special object type. Any variable whose
4912 top-level binding is a macro object acts as a macro. The macro object
4913 specifies how the expression should be transformed before evaluation.
4915 *** Macro objects now print in a reasonable way, resembling procedures.
4917 *** New function: (macro? OBJ)
4918 True iff OBJ is a macro object.
4920 *** New function: (primitive-macro? OBJ)
4921 Like (macro? OBJ), but true only if OBJ is one of the Guile primitive
4922 macro transformers, implemented in eval.c rather than Scheme code.
4924 Why do we have this function?
4925 - For symmetry with procedure? and primitive-procedure?,
4926 - to allow custom print procedures to tell whether a macro is
4927 primitive, and display it differently, and
4928 - to allow compilers and user-written evaluators to distinguish
4929 builtin special forms from user-defined ones, which could be
4932 *** New function: (macro-type OBJ)
4933 Return a value indicating what kind of macro OBJ is. Possible return
4936 The symbol `syntax' --- a macro created by procedure->syntax.
4937 The symbol `macro' --- a macro created by procedure->macro.
4938 The symbol `macro!' --- a macro created by procedure->memoizing-macro.
4939 The boolean #f --- if OBJ is not a macro object.
4941 *** New function: (macro-name MACRO)
4942 Return the name of the macro object MACRO's procedure, as returned by
4945 *** New function: (macro-transformer MACRO)
4946 Return the transformer procedure for MACRO.
4948 *** New syntax: (use-syntax MODULE ... TRANSFORMER)
4950 Specify a new macro expander to use in the current module. Each
4951 MODULE is a module name, with the same meaning as in the `use-modules'
4952 form; each named module's exported bindings are added to the current
4953 top-level environment. TRANSFORMER is an expression evaluated in the
4954 resulting environment which must yield a procedure to use as the
4955 module's eval transformer: every expression evaluated in this module
4956 is passed to this function, and the result passed to the Guile
4959 *** macro-eval! is removed. Use local-eval instead.
4961 ** Some magic has been added to the printer to better handle user
4962 written printing routines (like record printers, closure printers).
4964 The problem is that these user written routines must have access to
4965 the current `print-state' to be able to handle fancy things like
4966 detection of circular references. These print-states have to be
4967 passed to the builtin printing routines (display, write, etc) to
4968 properly continue the print chain.
4970 We didn't want to change all existing print code so that it
4971 explicitly passes thru a print state in addition to a port. Instead,
4972 we extented the possible values that the builtin printing routines
4973 accept as a `port'. In addition to a normal port, they now also take
4974 a pair of a normal port and a print-state. Printing will go to the
4975 port and the print-state will be used to control the detection of
4976 circular references, etc. If the builtin function does not care for a
4977 print-state, it is simply ignored.
4979 User written callbacks are now called with such a pair as their
4980 `port', but because every function now accepts this pair as a PORT
4981 argument, you don't have to worry about that. In fact, it is probably
4982 safest to not check for these pairs.
4984 However, it is sometimes necessary to continue a print chain on a
4985 different port, for example to get a intermediate string
4986 representation of the printed value, mangle that string somehow, and
4987 then to finally print the mangled string. Use the new function
4989 inherit-print-state OLD-PORT NEW-PORT
4991 for this. It constructs a new `port' that prints to NEW-PORT but
4992 inherits the print-state of OLD-PORT.
4994 ** struct-vtable-offset renamed to vtable-offset-user
4996 ** New constants: vtable-index-layout, vtable-index-vtable, vtable-index-printer
4998 ** There is now a third optional argument to make-vtable-vtable
4999 (and fourth to make-struct) when constructing new types (vtables).
5000 This argument initializes field vtable-index-printer of the vtable.
5002 ** The detection of circular references has been extended to structs.
5003 That is, a structure that -- in the process of being printed -- prints
5004 itself does not lead to infinite recursion.
5006 ** There is now some basic support for fluids. Please read
5007 "libguile/fluid.h" to find out more. It is accessible from Scheme with
5008 the following functions and macros:
5010 Function: make-fluid
5012 Create a new fluid object. Fluids are not special variables or
5013 some other extension to the semantics of Scheme, but rather
5014 ordinary Scheme objects. You can store them into variables (that
5015 are still lexically scoped, of course) or into any other place you
5016 like. Every fluid has a initial value of `#f'.
5018 Function: fluid? OBJ
5020 Test whether OBJ is a fluid.
5022 Function: fluid-ref FLUID
5023 Function: fluid-set! FLUID VAL
5025 Access/modify the fluid FLUID. Modifications are only visible
5026 within the current dynamic root (that includes threads).
5028 Function: with-fluids* FLUIDS VALUES THUNK
5030 FLUIDS is a list of fluids and VALUES a corresponding list of
5031 values for these fluids. Before THUNK gets called the values are
5032 installed in the fluids and the old values of the fluids are
5033 saved in the VALUES list. When the flow of control leaves THUNK
5034 or reenters it, the values get swapped again. You might think of
5035 this as a `safe-fluid-excursion'. Note that the VALUES list is
5036 modified by `with-fluids*'.
5038 Macro: with-fluids ((FLUID VALUE) ...) FORM ...
5040 The same as `with-fluids*' but with a different syntax. It looks
5041 just like `let', but both FLUID and VALUE are evaluated. Remember,
5042 fluids are not special variables but ordinary objects. FLUID
5043 should evaluate to a fluid.
5045 ** Changes to system call interfaces:
5047 *** close-port, close-input-port and close-output-port now return a
5048 boolean instead of an `unspecified' object. #t means that the port
5049 was successfully closed, while #f means it was already closed. It is
5050 also now possible for these procedures to raise an exception if an
5051 error occurs (some errors from write can be delayed until close.)
5053 *** the first argument to chmod, fcntl, ftell and fseek can now be a
5056 *** the third argument to fcntl is now optional.
5058 *** the first argument to chown can now be a file descriptor or a port.
5060 *** the argument to stat can now be a port.
5062 *** The following new procedures have been added (most use scsh
5065 *** procedure: close PORT/FD
5066 Similar to close-port (*note close-port: Closing Ports.), but also
5067 works on file descriptors. A side effect of closing a file
5068 descriptor is that any ports using that file descriptor are moved
5069 to a different file descriptor and have their revealed counts set
5072 *** procedure: port->fdes PORT
5073 Returns the integer file descriptor underlying PORT. As a side
5074 effect the revealed count of PORT is incremented.
5076 *** procedure: fdes->ports FDES
5077 Returns a list of existing ports which have FDES as an underlying
5078 file descriptor, without changing their revealed counts.
5080 *** procedure: fdes->inport FDES
5081 Returns an existing input port which has FDES as its underlying
5082 file descriptor, if one exists, and increments its revealed count.
5083 Otherwise, returns a new input port with a revealed count of 1.
5085 *** procedure: fdes->outport FDES
5086 Returns an existing output port which has FDES as its underlying
5087 file descriptor, if one exists, and increments its revealed count.
5088 Otherwise, returns a new output port with a revealed count of 1.
5090 The next group of procedures perform a `dup2' system call, if NEWFD
5091 (an integer) is supplied, otherwise a `dup'. The file descriptor to be
5092 duplicated can be supplied as an integer or contained in a port. The
5093 type of value returned varies depending on which procedure is used.
5095 All procedures also have the side effect when performing `dup2' that
5096 any ports using NEWFD are moved to a different file descriptor and have
5097 their revealed counts set to zero.
5099 *** procedure: dup->fdes PORT/FD [NEWFD]
5100 Returns an integer file descriptor.
5102 *** procedure: dup->inport PORT/FD [NEWFD]
5103 Returns a new input port using the new file descriptor.
5105 *** procedure: dup->outport PORT/FD [NEWFD]
5106 Returns a new output port using the new file descriptor.
5108 *** procedure: dup PORT/FD [NEWFD]
5109 Returns a new port if PORT/FD is a port, with the same mode as the
5110 supplied port, otherwise returns an integer file descriptor.
5112 *** procedure: dup->port PORT/FD MODE [NEWFD]
5113 Returns a new port using the new file descriptor. MODE supplies a
5114 mode string for the port (*note open-file: File Ports.).
5116 *** procedure: setenv NAME VALUE
5117 Modifies the environment of the current process, which is also the
5118 default environment inherited by child processes.
5120 If VALUE is `#f', then NAME is removed from the environment.
5121 Otherwise, the string NAME=VALUE is added to the environment,
5122 replacing any existing string with name matching NAME.
5124 The return value is unspecified.
5126 *** procedure: truncate-file OBJ SIZE
5127 Truncates the file referred to by OBJ to at most SIZE bytes. OBJ
5128 can be a string containing a file name or an integer file
5129 descriptor or port open for output on the file. The underlying
5130 system calls are `truncate' and `ftruncate'.
5132 The return value is unspecified.
5134 *** procedure: setvbuf PORT MODE [SIZE]
5135 Set the buffering mode for PORT. MODE can be:
5143 block buffered, using a newly allocated buffer of SIZE bytes.
5144 However if SIZE is zero or unspecified, the port will be made
5147 This procedure should not be used after I/O has been performed with
5150 Ports are usually block buffered by default, with a default buffer
5151 size. Procedures e.g., *Note open-file: File Ports, which accept a
5152 mode string allow `0' to be added to request an unbuffered port.
5154 *** procedure: fsync PORT/FD
5155 Copies any unwritten data for the specified output file descriptor
5156 to disk. If PORT/FD is a port, its buffer is flushed before the
5157 underlying file descriptor is fsync'd. The return value is
5160 *** procedure: open-fdes PATH FLAGS [MODES]
5161 Similar to `open' but returns a file descriptor instead of a port.
5163 *** procedure: execle PATH ENV [ARG] ...
5164 Similar to `execl', but the environment of the new process is
5165 specified by ENV, which must be a list of strings as returned by
5166 the `environ' procedure.
5168 This procedure is currently implemented using the `execve' system
5169 call, but we call it `execle' because of its Scheme calling
5172 *** procedure: strerror ERRNO
5173 Returns the Unix error message corresponding to ERRNO, an integer.
5175 *** procedure: primitive-exit [STATUS]
5176 Terminate the current process without unwinding the Scheme stack.
5177 This is would typically be useful after a fork. The exit status
5178 is STATUS if supplied, otherwise zero.
5180 *** procedure: times
5181 Returns an object with information about real and processor time.
5182 The following procedures accept such an object as an argument and
5183 return a selected component:
5186 The current real time, expressed as time units relative to an
5190 The CPU time units used by the calling process.
5193 The CPU time units used by the system on behalf of the
5197 The CPU time units used by terminated child processes of the
5198 calling process, whose status has been collected (e.g., using
5202 Similarly, the CPU times units used by the system on behalf of
5203 terminated child processes.
5205 ** Removed: list-length
5206 ** Removed: list-append, list-append!
5207 ** Removed: list-reverse, list-reverse!
5209 ** array-map renamed to array-map!
5211 ** serial-array-map renamed to serial-array-map!
5213 ** catch doesn't take #f as first argument any longer
5215 Previously, it was possible to pass #f instead of a key to `catch'.
5216 That would cause `catch' to pass a jump buffer object to the procedure
5217 passed as second argument. The procedure could then use this jump
5218 buffer objekt as an argument to throw.
5220 This mechanism has been removed since its utility doesn't motivate the
5221 extra complexity it introduces.
5223 ** The `#/' notation for lists now provokes a warning message from Guile.
5224 This syntax will be removed from Guile in the near future.
5226 To disable the warning message, set the GUILE_HUSH environment
5227 variable to any non-empty value.
5229 ** The newline character now prints as `#\newline', following the
5230 normal Scheme notation, not `#\nl'.
5232 * Changes to the gh_ interface
5234 ** The gh_enter function now takes care of loading the Guile startup files.
5235 gh_enter works by calling scm_boot_guile; see the remarks below.
5237 ** Function: void gh_write (SCM x)
5239 Write the printed representation of the scheme object x to the current
5240 output port. Corresponds to the scheme level `write'.
5242 ** gh_list_length renamed to gh_length.
5244 ** vector handling routines
5246 Several major changes. In particular, gh_vector() now resembles
5247 (vector ...) (with a caveat -- see manual), and gh_make_vector() now
5248 exists and behaves like (make-vector ...). gh_vset() and gh_vref()
5249 have been renamed gh_vector_set_x() and gh_vector_ref(). Some missing
5250 vector-related gh_ functions have been implemented.
5252 ** pair and list routines
5254 Implemented several of the R4RS pair and list functions that were
5257 ** gh_scm2doubles, gh_doubles2scm, gh_doubles2dvect
5259 New function. Converts double arrays back and forth between Scheme
5262 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5264 ** The function scm_boot_guile now takes care of loading the startup files.
5266 Guile's primary initialization function, scm_boot_guile, now takes
5267 care of loading `boot-9.scm', in the `ice-9' module, to initialize
5268 Guile, define the module system, and put together some standard
5269 bindings. It also loads `init.scm', which is intended to hold
5270 site-specific initialization code.
5272 Since Guile cannot operate properly until boot-9.scm is loaded, there
5273 is no reason to separate loading boot-9.scm from Guile's other
5274 initialization processes.
5276 This job used to be done by scm_compile_shell_switches, which didn't
5277 make much sense; in particular, it meant that people using Guile for
5278 non-shell-like applications had to jump through hoops to get Guile
5279 initialized properly.
5281 ** The function scm_compile_shell_switches no longer loads the startup files.
5282 Now, Guile always loads the startup files, whenever it is initialized;
5283 see the notes above for scm_boot_guile and scm_load_startup_files.
5285 ** Function: scm_load_startup_files
5286 This new function takes care of loading Guile's initialization file
5287 (`boot-9.scm'), and the site initialization file, `init.scm'. Since
5288 this is always called by the Guile initialization process, it's
5289 probably not too useful to call this yourself, but it's there anyway.
5291 ** The semantics of smob marking have changed slightly.
5293 The smob marking function (the `mark' member of the scm_smobfuns
5294 structure) is no longer responsible for setting the mark bit on the
5295 smob. The generic smob handling code in the garbage collector will
5296 set this bit. The mark function need only ensure that any other
5297 objects the smob refers to get marked.
5299 Note that this change means that the smob's GC8MARK bit is typically
5300 already set upon entry to the mark function. Thus, marking functions
5301 which look like this:
5304 if (SCM_GC8MARKP (ptr))
5306 SCM_SETGC8MARK (ptr);
5307 ... mark objects to which the smob refers ...
5310 are now incorrect, since they will return early, and fail to mark any
5311 other objects the smob refers to. Some code in the Guile library used
5314 ** The semantics of the I/O port functions in scm_ptobfuns have changed.
5316 If you have implemented your own I/O port type, by writing the
5317 functions required by the scm_ptobfuns and then calling scm_newptob,
5318 you will need to change your functions slightly.
5320 The functions in a scm_ptobfuns structure now expect the port itself
5321 as their argument; they used to expect the `stream' member of the
5322 port's scm_port_table structure. This allows functions in an
5323 scm_ptobfuns structure to easily access the port's cell (and any flags
5324 it its CAR), and the port's scm_port_table structure.
5326 Guile now passes the I/O port itself as the `port' argument in the
5327 following scm_ptobfuns functions:
5329 int (*free) (SCM port);
5330 int (*fputc) (int, SCM port);
5331 int (*fputs) (char *, SCM port);
5332 scm_sizet (*fwrite) SCM_P ((char *ptr,
5336 int (*fflush) (SCM port);
5337 int (*fgetc) (SCM port);
5338 int (*fclose) (SCM port);
5340 The interfaces to the `mark', `print', `equalp', and `fgets' methods
5343 If you have existing code which defines its own port types, it is easy
5344 to convert your code to the new interface; simply apply SCM_STREAM to
5345 the port argument to yield the value you code used to expect.
5347 Note that since both the port and the stream have the same type in the
5348 C code --- they are both SCM values --- the C compiler will not remind
5349 you if you forget to update your scm_ptobfuns functions.
5352 ** Function: int scm_internal_select (int fds,
5356 struct timeval *timeout);
5358 This is a replacement for the `select' function provided by the OS.
5359 It enables I/O blocking and sleeping to happen for one cooperative
5360 thread without blocking other threads. It also avoids busy-loops in
5361 these situations. It is intended that all I/O blocking and sleeping
5362 will finally go through this function. Currently, this function is
5363 only available on systems providing `gettimeofday' and `select'.
5365 ** Function: SCM scm_internal_stack_catch (SCM tag,
5366 scm_catch_body_t body,
5368 scm_catch_handler_t handler,
5371 A new sibling to the other two C level `catch' functions
5372 scm_internal_catch and scm_internal_lazy_catch. Use it if you want
5373 the stack to be saved automatically into the variable `the-last-stack'
5374 (scm_the_last_stack_var) on error. This is necessary if you want to
5375 use advanced error reporting, such as calling scm_display_error and
5376 scm_display_backtrace. (They both take a stack object as argument.)
5378 ** Function: SCM scm_spawn_thread (scm_catch_body_t body,
5380 scm_catch_handler_t handler,
5383 Spawns a new thread. It does a job similar to
5384 scm_call_with_new_thread but takes arguments more suitable when
5385 spawning threads from application C code.
5387 ** The hook scm_error_callback has been removed. It was originally
5388 intended as a way for the user to install his own error handler. But
5389 that method works badly since it intervenes between throw and catch,
5390 thereby changing the semantics of expressions like (catch #t ...).
5391 The correct way to do it is to use one of the C level catch functions
5392 in throw.c: scm_internal_catch/lazy_catch/stack_catch.
5394 ** Removed functions:
5396 scm_obj_length, scm_list_length, scm_list_append, scm_list_append_x,
5397 scm_list_reverse, scm_list_reverse_x
5399 ** New macros: SCM_LISTn where n is one of the integers 0-9.
5401 These can be used for pretty list creation from C. The idea is taken
5402 from Erick Gallesio's STk.
5404 ** scm_array_map renamed to scm_array_map_x
5406 ** mbstrings are now removed
5408 This means that the type codes scm_tc7_mb_string and
5409 scm_tc7_mb_substring has been removed.
5411 ** scm_gen_putc, scm_gen_puts, scm_gen_write, and scm_gen_getc have changed.
5413 Since we no longer support multi-byte strings, these I/O functions
5414 have been simplified, and renamed. Here are their old names, and
5415 their new names and arguments:
5417 scm_gen_putc -> void scm_putc (int c, SCM port);
5418 scm_gen_puts -> void scm_puts (char *s, SCM port);
5419 scm_gen_write -> void scm_lfwrite (char *ptr, scm_sizet size, SCM port);
5420 scm_gen_getc -> void scm_getc (SCM port);
5423 ** The macros SCM_TYP7D and SCM_TYP7SD has been removed.
5425 ** The macro SCM_TYP7S has taken the role of the old SCM_TYP7D
5427 SCM_TYP7S now masks away the bit which distinguishes substrings from
5430 ** scm_catch_body_t: Backward incompatible change!
5432 Body functions to scm_internal_catch and friends do not any longer
5433 take a second argument. This is because it is no longer possible to
5434 pass a #f arg to catch.
5436 ** Calls to scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect now nest properly.
5438 The function scm_protect_object protects its argument from being freed
5439 by the garbage collector. scm_unprotect_object removes that
5442 These functions now nest properly. That is, for every object O, there
5443 is a counter which scm_protect_object(O) increments and
5444 scm_unprotect_object(O) decrements, if the counter is greater than
5445 zero. Every object's counter is zero when it is first created. If an
5446 object's counter is greater than zero, the garbage collector will not
5447 reclaim its storage.
5449 This allows you to use scm_protect_object in your code without
5450 worrying that some other function you call will call
5451 scm_unprotect_object, and allow it to be freed. Assuming that the
5452 functions you call are well-behaved, and unprotect only those objects
5453 they protect, you can follow the same rule and have confidence that
5454 objects will be freed only at appropriate times.
5457 Changes in Guile 1.2 (released Tuesday, June 24 1997):
5459 * Changes to the distribution
5461 ** Nightly snapshots are now available from ftp.red-bean.com.
5462 The old server, ftp.cyclic.com, has been relinquished to its rightful
5465 Nightly snapshots of the Guile development sources are now available via
5466 anonymous FTP from ftp.red-bean.com, as /pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz.
5468 Via the web, that's: ftp://ftp.red-bean.com/pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz
5469 For getit, that's: ftp.red-bean.com:/pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz
5471 ** To run Guile without installing it, the procedure has changed a bit.
5473 If you used a separate build directory to compile Guile, you'll need
5474 to include the build directory in SCHEME_LOAD_PATH, as well as the
5475 source directory. See the `INSTALL' file for examples.
5477 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
5479 ** The standard Guile load path for Scheme code now includes
5480 $(datadir)/guile (usually /usr/local/share/guile). This means that
5481 you can install your own Scheme files there, and Guile will find them.
5482 (Previous versions of Guile only checked a directory whose name
5483 contained the Guile version number, so you had to re-install or move
5484 your Scheme sources each time you installed a fresh version of Guile.)
5486 The load path also includes $(datadir)/guile/site; we recommend
5487 putting individual Scheme files there. If you want to install a
5488 package with multiple source files, create a directory for them under
5491 ** Guile 1.2 will now use the Rx regular expression library, if it is
5492 installed on your system. When you are linking libguile into your own
5493 programs, this means you will have to link against -lguile, -lqt (if
5494 you configured Guile with thread support), and -lrx.
5496 If you are using autoconf to generate configuration scripts for your
5497 application, the following lines should suffice to add the appropriate
5498 libraries to your link command:
5500 ### Find Rx, quickthreads and libguile.
5501 AC_CHECK_LIB(rx, main)
5502 AC_CHECK_LIB(qt, main)
5503 AC_CHECK_LIB(guile, scm_shell)
5505 The Guile 1.2 distribution does not contain sources for the Rx
5506 library, as Guile 1.0 did. If you want to use Rx, you'll need to
5507 retrieve it from a GNU FTP site and install it separately.
5509 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
5511 ** The dynamic linking features of Guile are now enabled by default.
5512 You can disable them by giving the `--disable-dynamic-linking' option
5515 (dynamic-link FILENAME)
5517 Find the object file denoted by FILENAME (a string) and link it
5518 into the running Guile application. When everything works out,
5519 return a Scheme object suitable for representing the linked object
5520 file. Otherwise an error is thrown. How object files are
5521 searched is system dependent.
5523 (dynamic-object? VAL)
5525 Determine whether VAL represents a dynamically linked object file.
5527 (dynamic-unlink DYNOBJ)
5529 Unlink the indicated object file from the application. DYNOBJ
5530 should be one of the values returned by `dynamic-link'.
5532 (dynamic-func FUNCTION DYNOBJ)
5534 Search the C function indicated by FUNCTION (a string or symbol)
5535 in DYNOBJ and return some Scheme object that can later be used
5536 with `dynamic-call' to actually call this function. Right now,
5537 these Scheme objects are formed by casting the address of the
5538 function to `long' and converting this number to its Scheme
5541 (dynamic-call FUNCTION DYNOBJ)
5543 Call the C function indicated by FUNCTION and DYNOBJ. The
5544 function is passed no arguments and its return value is ignored.
5545 When FUNCTION is something returned by `dynamic-func', call that
5546 function and ignore DYNOBJ. When FUNCTION is a string (or symbol,
5547 etc.), look it up in DYNOBJ; this is equivalent to
5549 (dynamic-call (dynamic-func FUNCTION DYNOBJ) #f)
5551 Interrupts are deferred while the C function is executing (with
5552 SCM_DEFER_INTS/SCM_ALLOW_INTS).
5554 (dynamic-args-call FUNCTION DYNOBJ ARGS)
5556 Call the C function indicated by FUNCTION and DYNOBJ, but pass it
5557 some arguments and return its return value. The C function is
5558 expected to take two arguments and return an `int', just like
5561 int c_func (int argc, char **argv);
5563 ARGS must be a list of strings and is converted into an array of
5564 `char *'. The array is passed in ARGV and its size in ARGC. The
5565 return value is converted to a Scheme number and returned from the
5566 call to `dynamic-args-call'.
5568 When dynamic linking is disabled or not supported on your system,
5569 the above functions throw errors, but they are still available.
5571 Here is a small example that works on GNU/Linux:
5573 (define libc-obj (dynamic-link "libc.so"))
5574 (dynamic-args-call 'rand libc-obj '())
5576 See the file `libguile/DYNAMIC-LINKING' for additional comments.
5578 ** The #/ syntax for module names is depreciated, and will be removed
5579 in a future version of Guile. Instead of
5587 The latter syntax is more consistent with existing Lisp practice.
5589 ** Guile now does fancier printing of structures. Structures are the
5590 underlying implementation for records, which in turn are used to
5591 implement modules, so all of these object now print differently and in
5592 a more informative way.
5594 The Scheme printer will examine the builtin variable *struct-printer*
5595 whenever it needs to print a structure object. When this variable is
5596 not `#f' it is deemed to be a procedure and will be applied to the
5597 structure object and the output port. When *struct-printer* is `#f'
5598 or the procedure return `#f' the structure object will be printed in
5599 the boring #<struct 80458270> form.
5601 This hook is used by some routines in ice-9/boot-9.scm to implement
5602 type specific printing routines. Please read the comments there about
5605 One of the more specific uses of structs are records. The printing
5606 procedure that could be passed to MAKE-RECORD-TYPE is now actually
5607 called. It should behave like a *struct-printer* procedure (described
5610 ** Guile now supports a new R4RS-compliant syntax for keywords. A
5611 token of the form #:NAME, where NAME has the same syntax as a Scheme
5612 symbol, is the external representation of the keyword named NAME.
5613 Keyword objects print using this syntax as well, so values containing
5614 keyword objects can be read back into Guile. When used in an
5615 expression, keywords are self-quoting objects.
5617 Guile suports this read syntax, and uses this print syntax, regardless
5618 of the current setting of the `keyword' read option. The `keyword'
5619 read option only controls whether Guile recognizes the `:NAME' syntax,
5620 which is incompatible with R4RS. (R4RS says such token represent
5623 ** Guile has regular expression support again. Guile 1.0 included
5624 functions for matching regular expressions, based on the Rx library.
5625 In Guile 1.1, the Guile/Rx interface was removed to simplify the
5626 distribution, and thus Guile had no regular expression support. Guile
5627 1.2 again supports the most commonly used functions, and supports all
5628 of SCSH's regular expression functions.
5630 If your system does not include a POSIX regular expression library,
5631 and you have not linked Guile with a third-party regexp library such as
5632 Rx, these functions will not be available. You can tell whether your
5633 Guile installation includes regular expression support by checking
5634 whether the `*features*' list includes the `regex' symbol.
5636 *** regexp functions
5638 By default, Guile supports POSIX extended regular expressions. That
5639 means that the characters `(', `)', `+' and `?' are special, and must
5640 be escaped if you wish to match the literal characters.
5642 This regular expression interface was modeled after that implemented
5643 by SCSH, the Scheme Shell. It is intended to be upwardly compatible
5644 with SCSH regular expressions.
5646 **** Function: string-match PATTERN STR [START]
5647 Compile the string PATTERN into a regular expression and compare
5648 it with STR. The optional numeric argument START specifies the
5649 position of STR at which to begin matching.
5651 `string-match' returns a "match structure" which describes what,
5652 if anything, was matched by the regular expression. *Note Match
5653 Structures::. If STR does not match PATTERN at all,
5654 `string-match' returns `#f'.
5656 Each time `string-match' is called, it must compile its PATTERN
5657 argument into a regular expression structure. This operation is
5658 expensive, which makes `string-match' inefficient if the same regular
5659 expression is used several times (for example, in a loop). For better
5660 performance, you can compile a regular expression in advance and then
5661 match strings against the compiled regexp.
5663 **** Function: make-regexp STR [FLAGS]
5664 Compile the regular expression described by STR, and return the
5665 compiled regexp structure. If STR does not describe a legal
5666 regular expression, `make-regexp' throws a
5667 `regular-expression-syntax' error.
5669 FLAGS may be the bitwise-or of one or more of the following:
5671 **** Constant: regexp/extended
5672 Use POSIX Extended Regular Expression syntax when interpreting
5673 STR. If not set, POSIX Basic Regular Expression syntax is used.
5674 If the FLAGS argument is omitted, we assume regexp/extended.
5676 **** Constant: regexp/icase
5677 Do not differentiate case. Subsequent searches using the
5678 returned regular expression will be case insensitive.
5680 **** Constant: regexp/newline
5681 Match-any-character operators don't match a newline.
5683 A non-matching list ([^...]) not containing a newline matches a
5686 Match-beginning-of-line operator (^) matches the empty string
5687 immediately after a newline, regardless of whether the FLAGS
5688 passed to regexp-exec contain regexp/notbol.
5690 Match-end-of-line operator ($) matches the empty string
5691 immediately before a newline, regardless of whether the FLAGS
5692 passed to regexp-exec contain regexp/noteol.
5694 **** Function: regexp-exec REGEXP STR [START [FLAGS]]
5695 Match the compiled regular expression REGEXP against `str'. If
5696 the optional integer START argument is provided, begin matching
5697 from that position in the string. Return a match structure
5698 describing the results of the match, or `#f' if no match could be
5701 FLAGS may be the bitwise-or of one or more of the following:
5703 **** Constant: regexp/notbol
5704 The match-beginning-of-line operator always fails to match (but
5705 see the compilation flag regexp/newline above) This flag may be
5706 used when different portions of a string are passed to
5707 regexp-exec and the beginning of the string should not be
5708 interpreted as the beginning of the line.
5710 **** Constant: regexp/noteol
5711 The match-end-of-line operator always fails to match (but see the
5712 compilation flag regexp/newline above)
5714 **** Function: regexp? OBJ
5715 Return `#t' if OBJ is a compiled regular expression, or `#f'
5718 Regular expressions are commonly used to find patterns in one string
5719 and replace them with the contents of another string.
5721 **** Function: regexp-substitute PORT MATCH [ITEM...]
5722 Write to the output port PORT selected contents of the match
5723 structure MATCH. Each ITEM specifies what should be written, and
5724 may be one of the following arguments:
5726 * A string. String arguments are written out verbatim.
5728 * An integer. The submatch with that number is written.
5730 * The symbol `pre'. The portion of the matched string preceding
5731 the regexp match is written.
5733 * The symbol `post'. The portion of the matched string
5734 following the regexp match is written.
5736 PORT may be `#f', in which case nothing is written; instead,
5737 `regexp-substitute' constructs a string from the specified ITEMs
5740 **** Function: regexp-substitute/global PORT REGEXP TARGET [ITEM...]
5741 Similar to `regexp-substitute', but can be used to perform global
5742 substitutions on STR. Instead of taking a match structure as an
5743 argument, `regexp-substitute/global' takes two string arguments: a
5744 REGEXP string describing a regular expression, and a TARGET string
5745 which should be matched against this regular expression.
5747 Each ITEM behaves as in REGEXP-SUBSTITUTE, with the following
5750 * A function may be supplied. When this function is called, it
5751 will be passed one argument: a match structure for a given
5752 regular expression match. It should return a string to be
5753 written out to PORT.
5755 * The `post' symbol causes `regexp-substitute/global' to recurse
5756 on the unmatched portion of STR. This *must* be supplied in
5757 order to perform global search-and-replace on STR; if it is
5758 not present among the ITEMs, then `regexp-substitute/global'
5759 will return after processing a single match.
5761 *** Match Structures
5763 A "match structure" is the object returned by `string-match' and
5764 `regexp-exec'. It describes which portion of a string, if any, matched
5765 the given regular expression. Match structures include: a reference to
5766 the string that was checked for matches; the starting and ending
5767 positions of the regexp match; and, if the regexp included any
5768 parenthesized subexpressions, the starting and ending positions of each
5771 In each of the regexp match functions described below, the `match'
5772 argument must be a match structure returned by a previous call to
5773 `string-match' or `regexp-exec'. Most of these functions return some
5774 information about the original target string that was matched against a
5775 regular expression; we will call that string TARGET for easy reference.
5777 **** Function: regexp-match? OBJ
5778 Return `#t' if OBJ is a match structure returned by a previous
5779 call to `regexp-exec', or `#f' otherwise.
5781 **** Function: match:substring MATCH [N]
5782 Return the portion of TARGET matched by subexpression number N.
5783 Submatch 0 (the default) represents the entire regexp match. If
5784 the regular expression as a whole matched, but the subexpression
5785 number N did not match, return `#f'.
5787 **** Function: match:start MATCH [N]
5788 Return the starting position of submatch number N.
5790 **** Function: match:end MATCH [N]
5791 Return the ending position of submatch number N.
5793 **** Function: match:prefix MATCH
5794 Return the unmatched portion of TARGET preceding the regexp match.
5796 **** Function: match:suffix MATCH
5797 Return the unmatched portion of TARGET following the regexp match.
5799 **** Function: match:count MATCH
5800 Return the number of parenthesized subexpressions from MATCH.
5801 Note that the entire regular expression match itself counts as a
5802 subexpression, and failed submatches are included in the count.
5804 **** Function: match:string MATCH
5805 Return the original TARGET string.
5807 *** Backslash Escapes
5809 Sometimes you will want a regexp to match characters like `*' or `$'
5810 exactly. For example, to check whether a particular string represents
5811 a menu entry from an Info node, it would be useful to match it against
5812 a regexp like `^* [^:]*::'. However, this won't work; because the
5813 asterisk is a metacharacter, it won't match the `*' at the beginning of
5814 the string. In this case, we want to make the first asterisk un-magic.
5816 You can do this by preceding the metacharacter with a backslash
5817 character `\'. (This is also called "quoting" the metacharacter, and
5818 is known as a "backslash escape".) When Guile sees a backslash in a
5819 regular expression, it considers the following glyph to be an ordinary
5820 character, no matter what special meaning it would ordinarily have.
5821 Therefore, we can make the above example work by changing the regexp to
5822 `^\* [^:]*::'. The `\*' sequence tells the regular expression engine
5823 to match only a single asterisk in the target string.
5825 Since the backslash is itself a metacharacter, you may force a
5826 regexp to match a backslash in the target string by preceding the
5827 backslash with itself. For example, to find variable references in a
5828 TeX program, you might want to find occurrences of the string `\let\'
5829 followed by any number of alphabetic characters. The regular expression
5830 `\\let\\[A-Za-z]*' would do this: the double backslashes in the regexp
5831 each match a single backslash in the target string.
5833 **** Function: regexp-quote STR
5834 Quote each special character found in STR with a backslash, and
5835 return the resulting string.
5837 *Very important:* Using backslash escapes in Guile source code (as
5838 in Emacs Lisp or C) can be tricky, because the backslash character has
5839 special meaning for the Guile reader. For example, if Guile encounters
5840 the character sequence `\n' in the middle of a string while processing
5841 Scheme code, it replaces those characters with a newline character.
5842 Similarly, the character sequence `\t' is replaced by a horizontal tab.
5843 Several of these "escape sequences" are processed by the Guile reader
5844 before your code is executed. Unrecognized escape sequences are
5845 ignored: if the characters `\*' appear in a string, they will be
5846 translated to the single character `*'.
5848 This translation is obviously undesirable for regular expressions,
5849 since we want to be able to include backslashes in a string in order to
5850 escape regexp metacharacters. Therefore, to make sure that a backslash
5851 is preserved in a string in your Guile program, you must use *two*
5852 consecutive backslashes:
5854 (define Info-menu-entry-pattern (make-regexp "^\\* [^:]*"))
5856 The string in this example is preprocessed by the Guile reader before
5857 any code is executed. The resulting argument to `make-regexp' is the
5858 string `^\* [^:]*', which is what we really want.
5860 This also means that in order to write a regular expression that
5861 matches a single backslash character, the regular expression string in
5862 the source code must include *four* backslashes. Each consecutive pair
5863 of backslashes gets translated by the Guile reader to a single
5864 backslash, and the resulting double-backslash is interpreted by the
5865 regexp engine as matching a single backslash character. Hence:
5867 (define tex-variable-pattern (make-regexp "\\\\let\\\\=[A-Za-z]*"))
5869 The reason for the unwieldiness of this syntax is historical. Both
5870 regular expression pattern matchers and Unix string processing systems
5871 have traditionally used backslashes with the special meanings described
5872 above. The POSIX regular expression specification and ANSI C standard
5873 both require these semantics. Attempting to abandon either convention
5874 would cause other kinds of compatibility problems, possibly more severe
5875 ones. Therefore, without extending the Scheme reader to support
5876 strings with different quoting conventions (an ungainly and confusing
5877 extension when implemented in other languages), we must adhere to this
5878 cumbersome escape syntax.
5880 * Changes to the gh_ interface
5882 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5884 * Changes to system call interfaces:
5886 ** The value returned by `raise' is now unspecified. It throws an exception
5889 *** A new procedure `sigaction' can be used to install signal handlers
5891 (sigaction signum [action] [flags])
5893 signum is the signal number, which can be specified using the value
5896 If action is omitted, sigaction returns a pair: the CAR is the current
5897 signal hander, which will be either an integer with the value SIG_DFL
5898 (default action) or SIG_IGN (ignore), or the Scheme procedure which
5899 handles the signal, or #f if a non-Scheme procedure handles the
5900 signal. The CDR contains the current sigaction flags for the handler.
5902 If action is provided, it is installed as the new handler for signum.
5903 action can be a Scheme procedure taking one argument, or the value of
5904 SIG_DFL (default action) or SIG_IGN (ignore), or #f to restore
5905 whatever signal handler was installed before sigaction was first used.
5906 Flags can optionally be specified for the new handler (SA_RESTART is
5907 always used if the system provides it, so need not be specified.) The
5908 return value is a pair with information about the old handler as
5911 This interface does not provide access to the "signal blocking"
5912 facility. Maybe this is not needed, since the thread support may
5913 provide solutions to the problem of consistent access to data
5916 *** A new procedure `flush-all-ports' is equivalent to running
5917 `force-output' on every port open for output.
5919 ** Guile now provides information on how it was built, via the new
5920 global variable, %guile-build-info. This variable records the values
5921 of the standard GNU makefile directory variables as an assocation
5922 list, mapping variable names (symbols) onto directory paths (strings).
5923 For example, to find out where the Guile link libraries were
5924 installed, you can say:
5926 guile -c "(display (assq-ref %guile-build-info 'libdir)) (newline)"
5929 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5931 ** The new function scm_handle_by_message_noexit is just like the
5932 existing scm_handle_by_message function, except that it doesn't call
5933 exit to terminate the process. Instead, it prints a message and just
5934 returns #f. This might be a more appropriate catch-all handler for
5935 new dynamic roots and threads.
5938 Changes in Guile 1.1 (released Friday, May 16 1997):
5940 * Changes to the distribution.
5942 The Guile 1.0 distribution has been split up into several smaller
5944 guile-core --- the Guile interpreter itself.
5945 guile-tcltk --- the interface between the Guile interpreter and
5946 Tcl/Tk; Tcl is an interpreter for a stringy language, and Tk
5947 is a toolkit for building graphical user interfaces.
5948 guile-rgx-ctax --- the interface between Guile and the Rx regular
5949 expression matcher, and the translator for the Ctax
5950 programming language. These are packaged together because the
5951 Ctax translator uses Rx to parse Ctax source code.
5953 This NEWS file describes the changes made to guile-core since the 1.0
5956 We no longer distribute the documentation, since it was either out of
5957 date, or incomplete. As soon as we have current documentation, we
5962 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
5964 ** guile now accepts command-line arguments compatible with SCSH, Olin
5965 Shivers' Scheme Shell.
5967 In general, arguments are evaluated from left to right, but there are
5968 exceptions. The following switches stop argument processing, and
5969 stash all remaining command-line arguments as the value returned by
5970 the (command-line) function.
5971 -s SCRIPT load Scheme source code from FILE, and exit
5972 -c EXPR evalute Scheme expression EXPR, and exit
5973 -- stop scanning arguments; run interactively
5975 The switches below are processed as they are encountered.
5976 -l FILE load Scheme source code from FILE
5977 -e FUNCTION after reading script, apply FUNCTION to
5978 command line arguments
5979 -ds do -s script at this point
5980 --emacs enable Emacs protocol (experimental)
5981 -h, --help display this help and exit
5982 -v, --version display version information and exit
5983 \ read arguments from following script lines
5985 So, for example, here is a Guile script named `ekko' (thanks, Olin)
5986 which re-implements the traditional "echo" command:
5988 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
5991 (map (lambda (arg) (display arg) (display " "))
5995 (main (command-line))
5997 Suppose we invoke this script as follows:
5999 ekko a speckled gecko
6001 Through the magic of Unix script processing (triggered by the `#!'
6002 token at the top of the file), /usr/local/bin/guile receives the
6003 following list of command-line arguments:
6005 ("-s" "./ekko" "a" "speckled" "gecko")
6007 Unix inserts the name of the script after the argument specified on
6008 the first line of the file (in this case, "-s"), and then follows that
6009 with the arguments given to the script. Guile loads the script, which
6010 defines the `main' function, and then applies it to the list of
6011 remaining command-line arguments, ("a" "speckled" "gecko").
6013 In Unix, the first line of a script file must take the following form:
6015 #!INTERPRETER ARGUMENT
6017 where INTERPRETER is the absolute filename of the interpreter
6018 executable, and ARGUMENT is a single command-line argument to pass to
6021 You may only pass one argument to the interpreter, and its length is
6022 limited. These restrictions can be annoying to work around, so Guile
6023 provides a general mechanism (borrowed from, and compatible with,
6024 SCSH) for circumventing them.
6026 If the ARGUMENT in a Guile script is a single backslash character,
6027 `\', Guile will open the script file, parse arguments from its second
6028 and subsequent lines, and replace the `\' with them. So, for example,
6029 here is another implementation of the `ekko' script:
6031 #!/usr/local/bin/guile \
6035 (for-each (lambda (arg) (display arg) (display " "))
6039 If the user invokes this script as follows:
6041 ekko a speckled gecko
6043 Unix expands this into
6045 /usr/local/bin/guile \ ekko a speckled gecko
6047 When Guile sees the `\' argument, it replaces it with the arguments
6048 read from the second line of the script, producing:
6050 /usr/local/bin/guile -e main -s ekko a speckled gecko
6052 This tells Guile to load the `ekko' script, and apply the function
6053 `main' to the argument list ("a" "speckled" "gecko").
6055 Here is how Guile parses the command-line arguments:
6056 - Each space character terminates an argument. This means that two
6057 spaces in a row introduce an empty-string argument.
6058 - The tab character is not permitted (unless you quote it with the
6059 backslash character, as described below), to avoid confusion.
6060 - The newline character terminates the sequence of arguments, and will
6061 also terminate a final non-empty argument. (However, a newline
6062 following a space will not introduce a final empty-string argument;
6063 it only terminates the argument list.)
6064 - The backslash character is the escape character. It escapes
6065 backslash, space, tab, and newline. The ANSI C escape sequences
6066 like \n and \t are also supported. These produce argument
6067 constituents; the two-character combination \n doesn't act like a
6068 terminating newline. The escape sequence \NNN for exactly three
6069 octal digits reads as the character whose ASCII code is NNN. As
6070 above, characters produced this way are argument constituents.
6071 Backslash followed by other characters is not allowed.
6073 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
6075 ** Guile now builds and installs a shared guile library, if your
6076 system support shared libraries. (It still builds a static library on
6077 all systems.) Guile automatically detects whether your system
6078 supports shared libraries. To prevent Guile from buildisg shared
6079 libraries, pass the `--disable-shared' flag to the configure script.
6081 Guile takes longer to compile when it builds shared libraries, because
6082 it must compile every file twice --- once to produce position-
6083 independent object code, and once to produce normal object code.
6085 ** The libthreads library has been merged into libguile.
6087 To link a program against Guile, you now need only link against
6088 -lguile and -lqt; -lthreads is no longer needed. If you are using
6089 autoconf to generate configuration scripts for your application, the
6090 following lines should suffice to add the appropriate libraries to
6093 ### Find quickthreads and libguile.
6094 AC_CHECK_LIB(qt, main)
6095 AC_CHECK_LIB(guile, scm_shell)
6097 * Changes to Scheme functions
6099 ** Guile Scheme's special syntax for keyword objects is now optional,
6100 and disabled by default.
6102 The syntax variation from R4RS made it difficult to port some
6103 interesting packages to Guile. The routines which accepted keyword
6104 arguments (mostly in the module system) have been modified to also
6105 accept symbols whose names begin with `:'.
6107 To change the keyword syntax, you must first import the (ice-9 debug)
6109 (use-modules (ice-9 debug))
6111 Then you can enable the keyword syntax as follows:
6112 (read-set! keywords 'prefix)
6114 To disable keyword syntax, do this:
6115 (read-set! keywords #f)
6117 ** Many more primitive functions accept shared substrings as
6118 arguments. In the past, these functions required normal, mutable
6119 strings as arguments, although they never made use of this
6122 ** The uniform array functions now operate on byte vectors. These
6123 functions are `array-fill!', `serial-array-copy!', `array-copy!',
6124 `serial-array-map', `array-map', `array-for-each', and
6127 ** The new functions `trace' and `untrace' implement simple debugging
6128 support for Scheme functions.
6130 The `trace' function accepts any number of procedures as arguments,
6131 and tells the Guile interpreter to display each procedure's name and
6132 arguments each time the procedure is invoked. When invoked with no
6133 arguments, `trace' returns the list of procedures currently being
6136 The `untrace' function accepts any number of procedures as arguments,
6137 and tells the Guile interpreter not to trace them any more. When
6138 invoked with no arguments, `untrace' untraces all curretly traced
6141 The tracing in Guile has an advantage over most other systems: we
6142 don't create new procedure objects, but mark the procedure objects
6143 themselves. This means that anonymous and internal procedures can be
6146 ** The function `assert-repl-prompt' has been renamed to
6147 `set-repl-prompt!'. It takes one argument, PROMPT.
6148 - If PROMPT is #f, the Guile read-eval-print loop will not prompt.
6149 - If PROMPT is a string, we use it as a prompt.
6150 - If PROMPT is a procedure accepting no arguments, we call it, and
6151 display the result as a prompt.
6152 - Otherwise, we display "> ".
6154 ** The new function `eval-string' reads Scheme expressions from a
6155 string and evaluates them, returning the value of the last expression
6156 in the string. If the string contains no expressions, it returns an
6159 ** The new function `thunk?' returns true iff its argument is a
6160 procedure of zero arguments.
6162 ** `defined?' is now a builtin function, instead of syntax. This
6163 means that its argument should be quoted. It returns #t iff its
6164 argument is bound in the current module.
6166 ** The new syntax `use-modules' allows you to add new modules to your
6167 environment without re-typing a complete `define-module' form. It
6168 accepts any number of module names as arguments, and imports their
6169 public bindings into the current module.
6171 ** The new function (module-defined? NAME MODULE) returns true iff
6172 NAME, a symbol, is defined in MODULE, a module object.
6174 ** The new function `builtin-bindings' creates and returns a hash
6175 table containing copies of all the root module's bindings.
6177 ** The new function `builtin-weak-bindings' does the same as
6178 `builtin-bindings', but creates a doubly-weak hash table.
6180 ** The `equal?' function now considers variable objects to be
6181 equivalent if they have the same name and the same value.
6183 ** The new function `command-line' returns the command-line arguments
6184 given to Guile, as a list of strings.
6186 When using guile as a script interpreter, `command-line' returns the
6187 script's arguments; those processed by the interpreter (like `-s' or
6188 `-c') are omitted. (In other words, you get the normal, expected
6189 behavior.) Any application that uses scm_shell to process its
6190 command-line arguments gets this behavior as well.
6192 ** The new function `load-user-init' looks for a file called `.guile'
6193 in the user's home directory, and loads it if it exists. This is
6194 mostly for use by the code generated by scm_compile_shell_switches,
6195 but we thought it might also be useful in other circumstances.
6197 ** The new function `log10' returns the base-10 logarithm of its
6200 ** Changes to I/O functions
6202 *** The functions `read', `primitive-load', `read-and-eval!', and
6203 `primitive-load-path' no longer take optional arguments controlling
6204 case insensitivity and a `#' parser.
6206 Case sensitivity is now controlled by a read option called
6207 `case-insensitive'. The user can add new `#' syntaxes with the
6208 `read-hash-extend' function (see below).
6210 *** The new function `read-hash-extend' allows the user to change the
6211 syntax of Guile Scheme in a somewhat controlled way.
6213 (read-hash-extend CHAR PROC)
6214 When parsing S-expressions, if we read a `#' character followed by
6215 the character CHAR, use PROC to parse an object from the stream.
6216 If PROC is #f, remove any parsing procedure registered for CHAR.
6218 The reader applies PROC to two arguments: CHAR and an input port.
6220 *** The new functions read-delimited and read-delimited! provide a
6221 general mechanism for doing delimited input on streams.
6223 (read-delimited DELIMS [PORT HANDLE-DELIM])
6224 Read until we encounter one of the characters in DELIMS (a string),
6225 or end-of-file. PORT is the input port to read from; it defaults to
6226 the current input port. The HANDLE-DELIM parameter determines how
6227 the terminating character is handled; it should be one of the
6230 'trim omit delimiter from result
6231 'peek leave delimiter character in input stream
6232 'concat append delimiter character to returned value
6233 'split return a pair: (RESULT . TERMINATOR)
6235 HANDLE-DELIM defaults to 'peek.
6237 (read-delimited! DELIMS BUF [PORT HANDLE-DELIM START END])
6238 A side-effecting variant of `read-delimited'.
6240 The data is written into the string BUF at the indices in the
6241 half-open interval [START, END); the default interval is the whole
6242 string: START = 0 and END = (string-length BUF). The values of
6243 START and END must specify a well-defined interval in BUF, i.e.
6244 0 <= START <= END <= (string-length BUF).
6246 It returns NBYTES, the number of bytes read. If the buffer filled
6247 up without a delimiter character being found, it returns #f. If the
6248 port is at EOF when the read starts, it returns the EOF object.
6250 If an integer is returned (i.e., the read is successfully terminated
6251 by reading a delimiter character), then the HANDLE-DELIM parameter
6252 determines how to handle the terminating character. It is described
6253 above, and defaults to 'peek.
6255 (The descriptions of these functions were borrowed from the SCSH
6256 manual, by Olin Shivers and Brian Carlstrom.)
6258 *** The `%read-delimited!' function is the primitive used to implement
6259 `read-delimited' and `read-delimited!'.
6261 (%read-delimited! DELIMS BUF GOBBLE? [PORT START END])
6263 This returns a pair of values: (TERMINATOR . NUM-READ).
6264 - TERMINATOR describes why the read was terminated. If it is a
6265 character or the eof object, then that is the value that terminated
6266 the read. If it is #f, the function filled the buffer without finding
6267 a delimiting character.
6268 - NUM-READ is the number of characters read into BUF.
6270 If the read is successfully terminated by reading a delimiter
6271 character, then the gobble? parameter determines what to do with the
6272 terminating character. If true, the character is removed from the
6273 input stream; if false, the character is left in the input stream
6274 where a subsequent read operation will retrieve it. In either case,
6275 the character is also the first value returned by the procedure call.
6277 (The descriptions of this function was borrowed from the SCSH manual,
6278 by Olin Shivers and Brian Carlstrom.)
6280 *** The `read-line' and `read-line!' functions have changed; they now
6281 trim the terminator by default; previously they appended it to the
6282 returned string. For the old behavior, use (read-line PORT 'concat).
6284 *** The functions `uniform-array-read!' and `uniform-array-write!' now
6285 take new optional START and END arguments, specifying the region of
6286 the array to read and write.
6288 *** The `ungetc-char-ready?' function has been removed. We feel it's
6289 inappropriate for an interface to expose implementation details this
6292 ** Changes to the Unix library and system call interface
6294 *** The new fcntl function provides access to the Unix `fcntl' system
6297 (fcntl PORT COMMAND VALUE)
6298 Apply COMMAND to PORT's file descriptor, with VALUE as an argument.
6299 Values for COMMAND are:
6301 F_DUPFD duplicate a file descriptor
6302 F_GETFD read the descriptor's close-on-exec flag
6303 F_SETFD set the descriptor's close-on-exec flag to VALUE
6304 F_GETFL read the descriptor's flags, as set on open
6305 F_SETFL set the descriptor's flags, as set on open to VALUE
6306 F_GETOWN return the process ID of a socket's owner, for SIGIO
6307 F_SETOWN set the process that owns a socket to VALUE, for SIGIO
6308 FD_CLOEXEC not sure what this is
6310 For details, see the documentation for the fcntl system call.
6312 *** The arguments to `select' have changed, for compatibility with
6313 SCSH. The TIMEOUT parameter may now be non-integral, yielding the
6314 expected behavior. The MILLISECONDS parameter has been changed to
6315 MICROSECONDS, to more closely resemble the underlying system call.
6316 The RVEC, WVEC, and EVEC arguments can now be vectors; the type of the
6317 corresponding return set will be the same.
6319 *** The arguments to the `mknod' system call have changed. They are
6322 (mknod PATH TYPE PERMS DEV)
6323 Create a new file (`node') in the file system. PATH is the name of
6324 the file to create. TYPE is the kind of file to create; it should
6325 be 'fifo, 'block-special, or 'char-special. PERMS specifies the
6326 permission bits to give the newly created file. If TYPE is
6327 'block-special or 'char-special, DEV specifies which device the
6328 special file refers to; its interpretation depends on the kind of
6329 special file being created.
6331 *** The `fork' function has been renamed to `primitive-fork', to avoid
6332 clashing with various SCSH forks.
6334 *** The `recv' and `recvfrom' functions have been renamed to `recv!'
6335 and `recvfrom!'. They no longer accept a size for a second argument;
6336 you must pass a string to hold the received value. They no longer
6337 return the buffer. Instead, `recv' returns the length of the message
6338 received, and `recvfrom' returns a pair containing the packet's length
6339 and originating address.
6341 *** The file descriptor datatype has been removed, as have the
6342 `read-fd', `write-fd', `close', `lseek', and `dup' functions.
6343 We plan to replace these functions with a SCSH-compatible interface.
6345 *** The `create' function has been removed; it's just a special case
6348 *** There are new functions to break down process termination status
6349 values. In the descriptions below, STATUS is a value returned by
6352 (status:exit-val STATUS)
6353 If the child process exited normally, this function returns the exit
6354 code for the child process (i.e., the value passed to exit, or
6355 returned from main). If the child process did not exit normally,
6356 this function returns #f.
6358 (status:stop-sig STATUS)
6359 If the child process was suspended by a signal, this function
6360 returns the signal that suspended the child. Otherwise, it returns
6363 (status:term-sig STATUS)
6364 If the child process terminated abnormally, this function returns
6365 the signal that terminated the child. Otherwise, this function
6368 POSIX promises that exactly one of these functions will return true on
6369 a valid STATUS value.
6371 These functions are compatible with SCSH.
6373 *** There are new accessors and setters for the broken-out time vectors
6374 returned by `localtime', `gmtime', and that ilk. They are:
6376 Component Accessor Setter
6377 ========================= ============ ============
6378 seconds tm:sec set-tm:sec
6379 minutes tm:min set-tm:min
6380 hours tm:hour set-tm:hour
6381 day of the month tm:mday set-tm:mday
6382 month tm:mon set-tm:mon
6383 year tm:year set-tm:year
6384 day of the week tm:wday set-tm:wday
6385 day in the year tm:yday set-tm:yday
6386 daylight saving time tm:isdst set-tm:isdst
6387 GMT offset, seconds tm:gmtoff set-tm:gmtoff
6388 name of time zone tm:zone set-tm:zone
6390 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `uname',
6391 describing the host system:
6394 ============================================== ================
6395 name of the operating system implementation utsname:sysname
6396 network name of this machine utsname:nodename
6397 release level of the operating system utsname:release
6398 version level of the operating system utsname:version
6399 machine hardware platform utsname:machine
6401 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getpw',
6402 `getpwnam', `getpwuid', and `getpwent', describing entries from the
6403 system's user database:
6406 ====================== =================
6407 user name passwd:name
6408 user password passwd:passwd
6411 real name passwd:gecos
6412 home directory passwd:dir
6413 shell program passwd:shell
6415 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getgr',
6416 `getgrnam', `getgrgid', and `getgrent', describing entries from the
6417 system's group database:
6420 ======================= ============
6421 group name group:name
6422 group password group:passwd
6424 group members group:mem
6426 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `gethost',
6427 `gethostbyaddr', `gethostbyname', and `gethostent', describing
6431 ========================= ===============
6432 official name of host hostent:name
6433 alias list hostent:aliases
6434 host address type hostent:addrtype
6435 length of address hostent:length
6436 list of addresses hostent:addr-list
6438 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getnet',
6439 `getnetbyaddr', `getnetbyname', and `getnetent', describing internet
6443 ========================= ===============
6444 official name of net netent:name
6445 alias list netent:aliases
6446 net number type netent:addrtype
6447 net number netent:net
6449 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getproto',
6450 `getprotobyname', `getprotobynumber', and `getprotoent', describing
6454 ========================= ===============
6455 official protocol name protoent:name
6456 alias list protoent:aliases
6457 protocol number protoent:proto
6459 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getserv',
6460 `getservbyname', `getservbyport', and `getservent', describing
6464 ========================= ===============
6465 official service name servent:name
6466 alias list servent:aliases
6467 port number servent:port
6468 protocol to use servent:proto
6470 *** There are new accessors for the sockaddr structures returned by
6471 `accept', `getsockname', `getpeername', `recvfrom!':
6474 ======================================== ===============
6475 address format (`family') sockaddr:fam
6476 path, for file domain addresses sockaddr:path
6477 address, for internet domain addresses sockaddr:addr
6478 TCP or UDP port, for internet sockaddr:port
6480 *** The `getpwent', `getgrent', `gethostent', `getnetent',
6481 `getprotoent', and `getservent' functions now return #f at the end of
6482 the user database. (They used to throw an exception.)
6484 Note that calling MUMBLEent function is equivalent to calling the
6485 corresponding MUMBLE function with no arguments.
6487 *** The `setpwent', `setgrent', `sethostent', `setnetent',
6488 `setprotoent', and `setservent' routines now take no arguments.
6490 *** The `gethost', `getproto', `getnet', and `getserv' functions now
6491 provide more useful information when they throw an exception.
6493 *** The `lnaof' function has been renamed to `inet-lnaof'.
6495 *** Guile now claims to have the `current-time' feature.
6497 *** The `mktime' function now takes an optional second argument ZONE,
6498 giving the time zone to use for the conversion. ZONE should be a
6499 string, in the same format as expected for the "TZ" environment variable.
6501 *** The `strptime' function now returns a pair (TIME . COUNT), where
6502 TIME is the parsed time as a vector, and COUNT is the number of
6503 characters from the string left unparsed. This function used to
6504 return the remaining characters as a string.
6506 *** The `gettimeofday' function has replaced the old `time+ticks' function.
6507 The return value is now (SECONDS . MICROSECONDS); the fractional
6508 component is no longer expressed in "ticks".
6510 *** The `ticks/sec' constant has been removed, in light of the above change.
6512 * Changes to the gh_ interface
6514 ** gh_eval_str() now returns an SCM object which is the result of the
6517 ** gh_scm2str() now copies the Scheme data to a caller-provided C
6520 ** gh_scm2newstr() now makes a C array, copies the Scheme data to it,
6521 and returns the array
6523 ** gh_scm2str0() is gone: there is no need to distinguish
6524 null-terminated from non-null-terminated, since gh_scm2newstr() allows
6525 the user to interpret the data both ways.
6527 * Changes to the scm_ interface
6529 ** The new function scm_symbol_value0 provides an easy way to get a
6530 symbol's value from C code:
6532 SCM scm_symbol_value0 (char *NAME)
6533 Return the value of the symbol named by the null-terminated string
6534 NAME in the current module. If the symbol named NAME is unbound in
6535 the current module, return SCM_UNDEFINED.
6537 ** The new function scm_sysintern0 creates new top-level variables,
6538 without assigning them a value.
6540 SCM scm_sysintern0 (char *NAME)
6541 Create a new Scheme top-level variable named NAME. NAME is a
6542 null-terminated string. Return the variable's value cell.
6544 ** The function scm_internal_catch is the guts of catch. It handles
6545 all the mechanics of setting up a catch target, invoking the catch
6546 body, and perhaps invoking the handler if the body does a throw.
6548 The function is designed to be usable from C code, but is general
6549 enough to implement all the semantics Guile Scheme expects from throw.
6551 TAG is the catch tag. Typically, this is a symbol, but this function
6552 doesn't actually care about that.
6554 BODY is a pointer to a C function which runs the body of the catch;
6555 this is the code you can throw from. We call it like this:
6556 BODY (BODY_DATA, JMPBUF)
6558 BODY_DATA is just the BODY_DATA argument we received; we pass it
6559 through to BODY as its first argument. The caller can make
6560 BODY_DATA point to anything useful that BODY might need.
6561 JMPBUF is the Scheme jmpbuf object corresponding to this catch,
6562 which we have just created and initialized.
6564 HANDLER is a pointer to a C function to deal with a throw to TAG,
6565 should one occur. We call it like this:
6566 HANDLER (HANDLER_DATA, THROWN_TAG, THROW_ARGS)
6568 HANDLER_DATA is the HANDLER_DATA argument we recevied; it's the
6569 same idea as BODY_DATA above.
6570 THROWN_TAG is the tag that the user threw to; usually this is
6571 TAG, but it could be something else if TAG was #t (i.e., a
6572 catch-all), or the user threw to a jmpbuf.
6573 THROW_ARGS is the list of arguments the user passed to the THROW
6576 BODY_DATA is just a pointer we pass through to BODY. HANDLER_DATA
6577 is just a pointer we pass through to HANDLER. We don't actually
6578 use either of those pointers otherwise ourselves. The idea is
6579 that, if our caller wants to communicate something to BODY or
6580 HANDLER, it can pass a pointer to it as MUMBLE_DATA, which BODY and
6581 HANDLER can then use. Think of it as a way to make BODY and
6582 HANDLER closures, not just functions; MUMBLE_DATA points to the
6585 Of course, it's up to the caller to make sure that any data a
6586 MUMBLE_DATA needs is protected from GC. A common way to do this is
6587 to make MUMBLE_DATA a pointer to data stored in an automatic
6588 structure variable; since the collector must scan the stack for
6589 references anyway, this assures that any references in MUMBLE_DATA
6592 ** The new function scm_internal_lazy_catch is exactly like
6593 scm_internal_catch, except:
6595 - It does not unwind the stack (this is the major difference).
6596 - If handler returns, its value is returned from the throw.
6597 - BODY always receives #f as its JMPBUF argument (since there's no
6598 jmpbuf associated with a lazy catch, because we don't unwind the
6601 ** scm_body_thunk is a new body function you can pass to
6602 scm_internal_catch if you want the body to be like Scheme's `catch'
6603 --- a thunk, or a function of one argument if the tag is #f.
6605 BODY_DATA is a pointer to a scm_body_thunk_data structure, which
6606 contains the Scheme procedure to invoke as the body, and the tag
6607 we're catching. If the tag is #f, then we pass JMPBUF (created by
6608 scm_internal_catch) to the body procedure; otherwise, the body gets
6611 ** scm_handle_by_proc is a new handler function you can pass to
6612 scm_internal_catch if you want the handler to act like Scheme's catch
6613 --- call a procedure with the tag and the throw arguments.
6615 If the user does a throw to this catch, this function runs a handler
6616 procedure written in Scheme. HANDLER_DATA is a pointer to an SCM
6617 variable holding the Scheme procedure object to invoke. It ought to
6618 be a pointer to an automatic variable (i.e., one living on the stack),
6619 or the procedure object should be otherwise protected from GC.
6621 ** scm_handle_by_message is a new handler function to use with
6622 `scm_internal_catch' if you want Guile to print a message and die.
6623 It's useful for dealing with throws to uncaught keys at the top level.
6625 HANDLER_DATA, if non-zero, is assumed to be a char * pointing to a
6626 message header to print; if zero, we use "guile" instead. That
6627 text is followed by a colon, then the message described by ARGS.
6629 ** The return type of scm_boot_guile is now void; the function does
6630 not return a value, and indeed, never returns at all.
6632 ** The new function scm_shell makes it easy for user applications to
6633 process command-line arguments in a way that is compatible with the
6634 stand-alone guile interpreter (which is in turn compatible with SCSH,
6637 To use the scm_shell function, first initialize any guile modules
6638 linked into your application, and then call scm_shell with the values
6639 of ARGC and ARGV your `main' function received. scm_shell will add
6640 any SCSH-style meta-arguments from the top of the script file to the
6641 argument vector, and then process the command-line arguments. This
6642 generally means loading a script file or starting up an interactive
6643 command interpreter. For details, see "Changes to the stand-alone
6646 ** The new functions scm_get_meta_args and scm_count_argv help you
6647 implement the SCSH-style meta-argument, `\'.
6649 char **scm_get_meta_args (int ARGC, char **ARGV)
6650 If the second element of ARGV is a string consisting of a single
6651 backslash character (i.e. "\\" in Scheme notation), open the file
6652 named by the following argument, parse arguments from it, and return
6653 the spliced command line. The returned array is terminated by a
6656 For details of argument parsing, see above, under "guile now accepts
6657 command-line arguments compatible with SCSH..."
6659 int scm_count_argv (char **ARGV)
6660 Count the arguments in ARGV, assuming it is terminated by a null
6663 For an example of how these functions might be used, see the source
6664 code for the function scm_shell in libguile/script.c.
6666 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
6669 ** The new function scm_compile_shell_switches turns an array of
6670 command-line arguments into Scheme code to carry out the actions they
6671 describe. Given ARGC and ARGV, it returns a Scheme expression to
6672 evaluate, and calls scm_set_program_arguments to make any remaining
6673 command-line arguments available to the Scheme code. For example,
6674 given the following arguments:
6676 -e main -s ekko a speckled gecko
6678 scm_set_program_arguments will return the following expression:
6680 (begin (load "ekko") (main (command-line)) (quit))
6682 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
6685 ** The function scm_shell_usage prints a usage message appropriate for
6686 an interpreter that uses scm_compile_shell_switches to handle its
6687 command-line arguments.
6689 void scm_shell_usage (int FATAL, char *MESSAGE)
6690 Print a usage message to the standard error output. If MESSAGE is
6691 non-zero, write it before the usage message, followed by a newline.
6692 If FATAL is non-zero, exit the process, using FATAL as the
6693 termination status. (If you want to be compatible with Guile,
6694 always use 1 as the exit status when terminating due to command-line
6697 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
6700 ** scm_eval_0str now returns SCM_UNSPECIFIED if the string contains no
6701 expressions. It used to return SCM_EOL. Earth-shattering.
6703 ** The macros for declaring scheme objects in C code have been
6704 rearranged slightly. They are now:
6706 SCM_SYMBOL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
6707 Declare a static SCM variable named C_NAME, and initialize it to
6708 point to the Scheme symbol whose name is SCHEME_NAME. C_NAME should
6709 be a C identifier, and SCHEME_NAME should be a C string.
6711 SCM_GLOBAL_SYMBOL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
6712 Just like SCM_SYMBOL, but make C_NAME globally visible.
6714 SCM_VCELL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
6715 Create a global variable at the Scheme level named SCHEME_NAME.
6716 Declare a static SCM variable named C_NAME, and initialize it to
6717 point to the Scheme variable's value cell.
6719 SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
6720 Just like SCM_VCELL, but make C_NAME globally visible.
6722 The `guile-snarf' script writes initialization code for these macros
6723 to its standard output, given C source code as input.
6725 The SCM_GLOBAL macro is gone.
6727 ** The scm_read_line and scm_read_line_x functions have been replaced
6728 by Scheme code based on the %read-delimited! procedure (known to C
6729 code as scm_read_delimited_x). See its description above for more
6732 ** The function scm_sys_open has been renamed to scm_open. It now
6733 returns a port instead of an FD object.
6735 * The dynamic linking support has changed. For more information, see
6736 libguile/DYNAMIC-LINKING.
6741 User-visible changes from Thursday, September 5, 1996 until Guile 1.0
6744 * Changes to the 'guile' program:
6746 ** Guile now loads some new files when it starts up. Guile first
6747 searches the load path for init.scm, and loads it if found. Then, if
6748 Guile is not being used to execute a script, and the user's home
6749 directory contains a file named `.guile', Guile loads that.
6751 ** You can now use Guile as a shell script interpreter.
6753 To paraphrase the SCSH manual:
6755 When Unix tries to execute an executable file whose first two
6756 characters are the `#!', it treats the file not as machine code to
6757 be directly executed by the native processor, but as source code
6758 to be executed by some interpreter. The interpreter to use is
6759 specified immediately after the #! sequence on the first line of
6760 the source file. The kernel reads in the name of the interpreter,
6761 and executes that instead. It passes the interpreter the source
6762 filename as its first argument, with the original arguments
6763 following. Consult the Unix man page for the `exec' system call
6764 for more information.
6766 Now you can use Guile as an interpreter, using a mechanism which is a
6767 compatible subset of that provided by SCSH.
6769 Guile now recognizes a '-s' command line switch, whose argument is the
6770 name of a file of Scheme code to load. It also treats the two
6771 characters `#!' as the start of a comment, terminated by `!#'. Thus,
6772 to make a file of Scheme code directly executable by Unix, insert the
6773 following two lines at the top of the file:
6775 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
6778 Guile treats the argument of the `-s' command-line switch as the name
6779 of a file of Scheme code to load, and treats the sequence `#!' as the
6780 start of a block comment, terminated by `!#'.
6782 For example, here's a version of 'echo' written in Scheme:
6784 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
6786 (let loop ((args (cdr (program-arguments))))
6789 (display (car args))
6790 (if (pair? (cdr args))
6792 (loop (cdr args)))))
6795 Why does `#!' start a block comment terminated by `!#', instead of the
6796 end of the line? That is the notation SCSH uses, and although we
6797 don't yet support the other SCSH features that motivate that choice,
6798 we would like to be backward-compatible with any existing Guile
6799 scripts once we do. Furthermore, if the path to Guile on your system
6800 is too long for your kernel, you can start the script with this
6804 exec /really/long/path/to/guile -s "$0" ${1+"$@"}
6807 Note that some very old Unix systems don't support the `#!' syntax.
6810 ** You can now run Guile without installing it.
6812 Previous versions of the interactive Guile interpreter (`guile')
6813 couldn't start up unless Guile's Scheme library had been installed;
6814 they used the value of the environment variable `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH'
6815 later on in the startup process, but not to find the startup code
6816 itself. Now Guile uses `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH' in all searches for Scheme
6819 To run Guile without installing it, build it in the normal way, and
6820 then set the environment variable `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH' to a
6821 colon-separated list of directories, including the top-level directory
6822 of the Guile sources. For example, if you unpacked Guile so that the
6823 full filename of this NEWS file is /home/jimb/guile-1.0b3/NEWS, then
6826 export SCHEME_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/my-scheme:/home/jimb/guile-1.0b3
6829 ** Guile's read-eval-print loop no longer prints #<unspecified>
6830 results. If the user wants to see this, she can evaluate the
6831 expression (assert-repl-print-unspecified #t), perhaps in her startup
6834 ** Guile no longer shows backtraces by default when an error occurs;
6835 however, it does display a message saying how to get one, and how to
6836 request that they be displayed by default. After an error, evaluate
6838 to see a backtrace, and
6839 (debug-enable 'backtrace)
6840 to see them by default.
6844 * Changes to Guile Scheme:
6846 ** Guile now distinguishes between #f and the empty list.
6848 This is for compatibility with the IEEE standard, the (possibly)
6849 upcoming Revised^5 Report on Scheme, and many extant Scheme
6852 Guile used to have #f and '() denote the same object, to make Scheme's
6853 type system more compatible with Emacs Lisp's. However, the change
6854 caused too much trouble for Scheme programmers, and we found another
6855 way to reconcile Emacs Lisp with Scheme that didn't require this.
6858 ** Guile's delq, delv, delete functions, and their destructive
6859 counterparts, delq!, delv!, and delete!, now remove all matching
6860 elements from the list, not just the first. This matches the behavior
6861 of the corresponding Emacs Lisp functions, and (I believe) the Maclisp
6862 functions which inspired them.
6864 I recognize that this change may break code in subtle ways, but it
6865 seems best to make the change before the FSF's first Guile release,
6869 ** The compiled-library-path function has been deleted from libguile.
6871 ** The facilities for loading Scheme source files have changed.
6873 *** The variable %load-path now tells Guile which directories to search
6874 for Scheme code. Its value is a list of strings, each of which names
6877 *** The variable %load-extensions now tells Guile which extensions to
6878 try appending to a filename when searching the load path. Its value
6879 is a list of strings. Its default value is ("" ".scm").
6881 *** (%search-load-path FILENAME) searches the directories listed in the
6882 value of the %load-path variable for a Scheme file named FILENAME,
6883 with all the extensions listed in %load-extensions. If it finds a
6884 match, then it returns its full filename. If FILENAME is absolute, it
6885 returns it unchanged. Otherwise, it returns #f.
6887 %search-load-path will not return matches that refer to directories.
6889 *** (primitive-load FILENAME :optional CASE-INSENSITIVE-P SHARP)
6890 uses %seach-load-path to find a file named FILENAME, and loads it if
6891 it finds it. If it can't read FILENAME for any reason, it throws an
6894 The arguments CASE-INSENSITIVE-P and SHARP are interpreted as by the
6897 *** load uses the same searching semantics as primitive-load.
6899 *** The functions %try-load, try-load-with-path, %load, load-with-path,
6900 basic-try-load-with-path, basic-load-with-path, try-load-module-with-
6901 path, and load-module-with-path have been deleted. The functions
6902 above should serve their purposes.
6904 *** If the value of the variable %load-hook is a procedure,
6905 `primitive-load' applies its value to the name of the file being
6906 loaded (without the load path directory name prepended). If its value
6907 is #f, it is ignored. Otherwise, an error occurs.
6909 This is mostly useful for printing load notification messages.
6912 ** The function `eval!' is no longer accessible from the scheme level.
6913 We can't allow operations which introduce glocs into the scheme level,
6914 because Guile's type system can't handle these as data. Use `eval' or
6915 `read-and-eval!' (see below) as replacement.
6917 ** The new function read-and-eval! reads an expression from PORT,
6918 evaluates it, and returns the result. This is more efficient than
6919 simply calling `read' and `eval', since it is not necessary to make a
6920 copy of the expression for the evaluator to munge.
6922 Its optional arguments CASE_INSENSITIVE_P and SHARP are interpreted as
6923 for the `read' function.
6926 ** The function `int?' has been removed; its definition was identical
6927 to that of `integer?'.
6929 ** The functions `<?', `<?', `<=?', `=?', `>?', and `>=?'. Code should
6930 use the R4RS names for these functions.
6932 ** The function object-properties no longer returns the hash handle;
6933 it simply returns the object's property list.
6935 ** Many functions have been changed to throw errors, instead of
6936 returning #f on failure. The point of providing exception handling in
6937 the language is to simplify the logic of user code, but this is less
6938 useful if Guile's primitives don't throw exceptions.
6940 ** The function `fileno' has been renamed from `%fileno'.
6942 ** The function primitive-mode->fdes returns #t or #f now, not 1 or 0.
6945 * Changes to Guile's C interface:
6947 ** The library's initialization procedure has been simplified.
6948 scm_boot_guile now has the prototype:
6950 void scm_boot_guile (int ARGC,
6952 void (*main_func) (),
6955 scm_boot_guile calls MAIN_FUNC, passing it CLOSURE, ARGC, and ARGV.
6956 MAIN_FUNC should do all the work of the program (initializing other
6957 packages, reading user input, etc.) before returning. When MAIN_FUNC
6958 returns, call exit (0); this function never returns. If you want some
6959 other exit value, MAIN_FUNC may call exit itself.
6961 scm_boot_guile arranges for program-arguments to return the strings
6962 given by ARGC and ARGV. If MAIN_FUNC modifies ARGC/ARGV, should call
6963 scm_set_program_arguments with the final list, so Scheme code will
6964 know which arguments have been processed.
6966 scm_boot_guile establishes a catch-all catch handler which prints an
6967 error message and exits the process. This means that Guile exits in a
6968 coherent way when system errors occur and the user isn't prepared to
6969 handle it. If the user doesn't like this behavior, they can establish
6970 their own universal catcher in MAIN_FUNC to shadow this one.
6972 Why must the caller do all the real work from MAIN_FUNC? The garbage
6973 collector assumes that all local variables of type SCM will be above
6974 scm_boot_guile's stack frame on the stack. If you try to manipulate
6975 SCM values after this function returns, it's the luck of the draw
6976 whether the GC will be able to find the objects you allocate. So,
6977 scm_boot_guile function exits, rather than returning, to discourage
6978 people from making that mistake.
6980 The IN, OUT, and ERR arguments were removed; there are other
6981 convenient ways to override these when desired.
6983 The RESULT argument was deleted; this function should never return.
6985 The BOOT_CMD argument was deleted; the MAIN_FUNC argument is more
6989 ** Guile's header files should no longer conflict with your system's
6992 In order to compile code which #included <libguile.h>, previous
6993 versions of Guile required you to add a directory containing all the
6994 Guile header files to your #include path. This was a problem, since
6995 Guile's header files have names which conflict with many systems'
6998 Now only <libguile.h> need appear in your #include path; you must
6999 refer to all Guile's other header files as <libguile/mumble.h>.
7000 Guile's installation procedure puts libguile.h in $(includedir), and
7001 the rest in $(includedir)/libguile.
7004 ** Two new C functions, scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect_object,
7005 have been added to the Guile library.
7007 scm_protect_object (OBJ) protects OBJ from the garbage collector.
7008 OBJ will not be freed, even if all other references are dropped,
7009 until someone does scm_unprotect_object (OBJ). Both functions
7012 Note that calls to scm_protect_object do not nest. You can call
7013 scm_protect_object any number of times on a given object, and the
7014 next call to scm_unprotect_object will unprotect it completely.
7016 Basically, scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect_object just
7017 maintain a list of references to things. Since the GC knows about
7018 this list, all objects it mentions stay alive. scm_protect_object
7019 adds its argument to the list; scm_unprotect_object remove its
7020 argument from the list.
7023 ** scm_eval_0str now returns the value of the last expression
7026 ** The new function scm_read_0str reads an s-expression from a
7027 null-terminated string, and returns it.
7029 ** The new function `scm_stdio_to_port' converts a STDIO file pointer
7030 to a Scheme port object.
7032 ** The new function `scm_set_program_arguments' allows C code to set
7033 the value returned by the Scheme `program-arguments' function.
7038 * Guile no longer includes sophisticated Tcl/Tk support.
7040 The old Tcl/Tk support was unsatisfying to us, because it required the
7041 user to link against the Tcl library, as well as Tk and Guile. The
7042 interface was also un-lispy, in that it preserved Tcl/Tk's practice of
7043 referring to widgets by names, rather than exporting widgets to Scheme
7044 code as a special datatype.
7046 In the Usenix Tk Developer's Workshop held in July 1996, the Tcl/Tk
7047 maintainers described some very interesting changes in progress to the
7048 Tcl/Tk internals, which would facilitate clean interfaces between lone
7049 Tk and other interpreters --- even for garbage-collected languages
7050 like Scheme. They expected the new Tk to be publicly available in the
7053 Since it seems that Guile might soon have a new, cleaner interface to
7054 lone Tk, and that the old Guile/Tk glue code would probably need to be
7055 completely rewritten, we (Jim Blandy and Richard Stallman) have
7056 decided not to support the old code. We'll spend the time instead on
7057 a good interface to the newer Tk, as soon as it is available.
7059 Until then, gtcltk-lib provides trivial, low-maintenance functionality.
7062 Copyright information:
7064 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
7066 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
7067 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
7068 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
7069 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
7071 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
7072 of this document, or of portions of it,
7073 under the above conditions, provided also that they
7074 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
7079 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"