1 Guile NEWS --- history of user-visible changes.
2 Copyright (C) 1996-2011 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3 See the end for copying conditions.
5 Please send Guile bug reports to bug-guile@gnu.org.
8 Changes in 2.0.1 (since 2.0.0):
12 ** guile.m4 supports linking with rpath
14 The GUILE_FLAGS macro now sets GUILE_LIBS and GUILE_LTLIBS, which
15 include appropriate directives to the linker to include libguile-2.0.so
16 in the runtime library lookup path.
18 ** `begin' expands macros in its body before other expressions
20 This enables support for programs like the following:
25 (or (= x 0) (odd? (- x 1)))))
28 ((odd? x) (not (even? x)))))
31 ** REPL reader usability enhancements
33 The REPL now flushes input after a read error, which should prevent one
34 error from causing other errors. The REPL also now interprets comments
37 ** REPL output has configurable width
39 The REPL now defaults to output with the current terminal's width, in
40 columns. See "Debug Commands" in the manual for more information on
43 ** Better C access to the module system
45 Guile now has convenient C accessors to look up variables or values in
46 modules and their public interfaces. See `scm_c_public_ref' and friends
47 in "Accessing Modules from C" in the manual.
49 ** Added `scm_call_5', `scm_call_6'
51 See "Fly Evaluation" in the manual.
53 ** Added `scm_from_latin1_keyword', `scm_from_utf8_keyword'
55 See "Keyword Procedures" in the manual, for more. Note that
56 `scm_from_locale_keyword' should not be used when the name is a C string
59 ** R6RS unicode and string I/O work
61 Added efficient implementations of `get-string-n' and `get-string-n!'
62 for binary ports. Exported `current-input-port', `current-output-port'
63 and `current-error-port' from `(rnrs io ports)', and enhanced support
66 ** Added `pointer->scm', `scm->pointer' to `(system foreign)'
68 These procedure are useful if one needs to pass and receive SCM values
69 to and from foreign functions. See "Foreign Variables" in the manual,
72 ** Added `heap-allocated-since-gc' to `(gc-stats)'
74 Also fixed the long-standing bug in the REPL `,stat' command.
76 ** Add `on-error' REPL option
78 This option controls what happens when an error occurs at the REPL, and
79 defaults to `debug', indicating that Guile should enter the debugger.
80 Other values include `report', which will simply print a backtrace
81 without entering the debugger. See "System Commands" in the manual.
83 ** Enforce immutability of string literals
85 Attempting to mutate a string literal now causes a runtime error.
87 ** Fix pthread redirection
89 Guile 2.0.0 shipped with headers that, if configured with pthread
90 support, would re-define `pthread_create', `pthread_join', and other API
91 to redirect to the BDW-GC wrappers, `GC_pthread_create', etc. This was
92 unintended, and not necessary: because threads must enter Guile with
93 scm_with_guile, Guile can handle thread registration itself, without
94 needing to make the GC aware of all threads. This oversight has been
97 ** `with-continuation-barrier' now unwinds on `quit'
99 A throw to `quit' in a continuation barrier will cause Guile to exit.
100 Before, it would do so before unwinding to the barrier, which would
101 prevent cleanup handlers from running. This has been fixed so that it
102 exits only after unwinding.
104 ** `string->pointer' and `pointer->string' have optional encoding arg
106 This allows users of the FFI to more easily deal in strings with
107 particular (non-locale) encodings, like "utf-8". See "Void Pointers and
108 Byte Access" in the manual, for more.
110 ** R6RS fixnum arithmetic optimizations
112 R6RS fixnum operations are are still slower than generic arithmetic,
115 ** New procedure: `define-inlinable'
117 See "Inlinable Procedures" in the manual, for more.
119 ** New procedure: `exact-integer-sqrt'
121 See "Integer Operations" in the manual, for more.
123 ** "Extended read syntax" for symbols parses better
125 In #{foo}# symbols, backslashes are now treated as escapes, as the
126 symbol-printing code intended. Additionally, "\x" within #{foo}# is now
127 interpreted as starting an R6RS hex escape. This is backward compatible
128 because the symbol printer would never produce a "\x" before. The
129 printer also works better too.
131 ** Added --force-auto-compile option
133 This allows a user to invalidate the auto-compilation cache. It's
134 usually not needed. See "Compilation" in the manual, for a discussion.
138 ** GOOPS documentation updates
142 Thanks to Mark Harig for improvements to guile.1.
144 ** SRFI-23 documented
146 The humble `error' SRFI now has an entry in the manual.
150 ** `(ice-9 binary-ports)': XXX, in the manual
151 ** `(ice-9 binary-ports)': "R6RS I/O Ports", in the manual
152 ** `(ice-9 eval-string)': "Fly Evaluation", in the manual
156 ** Fixed iconv_t memory leak on close-port
157 ** Fixed some leaks with weak hash tables
158 ** Export `vhash-delq' and `vhash-delv' from `(ice-9 vlist)'
159 ** `after-gc-hook' works again
160 ** `define-record-type' now allowed in nested contexts
161 ** `exact-integer-sqrt' now handles large integers correctly
162 ** Fixed C extension examples in manual
163 ** `vhash-delete' honors HASH argument
164 ** Make `locale-digit-grouping' more robust
165 ** Default exception printer robustness fixes
166 ** Fix presence of non-I CPPFLAGS in `guile-2.0.pc'
167 ** `read' updates line/column numbers when reading SCSH block comments
168 ** Fix imports of multiple custom interfaces of same module
169 ** Fix encoding scanning for non-seekable ports
170 ** Fix `setter' when called with a non-setter generic
171 ** Fix f32 and f64 bytevectors to not accept rationals
172 ** Fix description of the R6RS `finite?' in manual
173 ** Quotient, remainder and modulo accept inexact integers again
174 ** Fix `continue' within `while' to take zero arguments
175 ** Fix alignment for structures in FFI
176 ** Fix port-filename of stdin, stdout, stderr to match the docs
177 ** Fix weak hash table-related bug in `define-wrapped-pointer-type'
178 ** Fix partial continuation application with pending procedure calls
179 ** scm_{to,from}_locale_string use current locale, not current ports
180 ** Fix thread cleanup, by using a pthread_key destructor
181 ** Fix `quit' at the REPL
182 ** Fix a failure to sync regs in vm bytevector ops
183 ** Fix (texinfo reflection) to handle nested structures like syntax patterns
184 ** Fix stexi->html double translation
185 ** Fix tree-il->scheme fix for <prompt>
186 ** Fix compilation of <prompt> in <fix> in single-value context
187 ** Fix race condition in ensure-writable-dir
188 ** Fix error message on ,disassemble "non-procedure"
189 ** Fix prompt and abort with the boot evaluator
190 ** Fix `procedure->pointer' for functions returning `void'
191 ** Fix error reporting in dynamic-pointer
192 ** Fix problems detecting coding: in block comments
193 ** Fix duplicate load-path and load-compiled-path in compilation environment
194 ** Add fallback read(2) suppport for .go files if mmap(2) unavailable
195 ** Fix c32vector-set!, c64vector-set!
196 ** Fix mistakenly deprecated read syntax for uniform complex vectors
197 ** Fix parsing of exact numbers with negative exponents
198 ** Ignore SIGPIPE in (system repl server)
199 ** Fix optional second arg to R6RS log function
200 ** Fix R6RS `assert' to return true value.
201 ** Fix fencepost error when seeking in bytevector input ports
205 Changes in 2.0.0 (changes since the 1.8.x series):
207 * New modules (see the manual for details)
209 ** `(srfi srfi-18)', more sophisticated multithreading support
210 ** `(srfi srfi-27)', sources of random bits
211 ** `(srfi srfi-38)', External Representation for Data With Shared Structure
212 ** `(srfi srfi-42)', eager comprehensions
213 ** `(srfi srfi-45)', primitives for expressing iterative lazy algorithms
214 ** `(srfi srfi-67)', compare procedures
215 ** `(ice-9 i18n)', internationalization support
216 ** `(ice-9 futures)', fine-grain parallelism
217 ** `(rnrs bytevectors)', the R6RS bytevector API
218 ** `(rnrs io ports)', a subset of the R6RS I/O port API
219 ** `(system xref)', a cross-referencing facility (FIXME undocumented)
220 ** `(ice-9 vlist)', lists with constant-time random access; hash lists
221 ** `(system foreign)', foreign function interface
222 ** `(sxml match)', a pattern matcher for SXML
223 ** `(srfi srfi-9 gnu)', extensions to the SRFI-9 record library
224 ** `(system vm coverage)', a line-by-line code coverage library
225 ** `(web uri)', URI data type, parser, and unparser
226 ** `(web http)', HTTP header parsers and unparsers
227 ** `(web request)', HTTP request data type, reader, and writer
228 ** `(web response)', HTTP response data type, reader, and writer
229 ** `(web server)', Generic HTTP server
230 ** `(ice-9 poll)', a poll wrapper
231 ** `(web server http)', HTTP-over-TCP web server implementation
233 ** Replaced `(ice-9 match)' with Alex Shinn's compatible, hygienic matcher.
235 Guile's copy of Andrew K. Wright's `match' library has been replaced by
236 a compatible hygienic implementation by Alex Shinn. It is now
237 documented, see "Pattern Matching" in the manual.
239 Compared to Andrew K. Wright's `match', the new `match' lacks
240 `match-define', `match:error-control', `match:set-error-control',
241 `match:error', `match:set-error', and all structure-related procedures.
243 ** Imported statprof, SSAX, and texinfo modules from Guile-Lib
245 The statprof statistical profiler, the SSAX XML toolkit, and the texinfo
246 toolkit from Guile-Lib have been imported into Guile proper. See
247 "Standard Library" in the manual for more details.
249 ** Integration of lalr-scm, a parser generator
251 Guile has included Dominique Boucher's fine `lalr-scm' parser generator
252 as `(system base lalr)'. See "LALR(1) Parsing" in the manual, for more
255 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
257 ** Guile now can compile Scheme to bytecode for a custom virtual machine.
259 Compiled code loads much faster than Scheme source code, and runs around
260 3 or 4 times as fast, generating much less garbage in the process.
262 ** Evaluating Scheme code does not use the C stack.
264 Besides when compiling Guile itself, Guile no longer uses a recursive C
265 function as an evaluator. This obviates the need to check the C stack
266 pointer for overflow. Continuations still capture the C stack, however.
268 ** New environment variables: GUILE_LOAD_COMPILED_PATH,
269 GUILE_SYSTEM_LOAD_COMPILED_PATH
271 GUILE_LOAD_COMPILED_PATH is for compiled files what GUILE_LOAD_PATH is
272 for source files. It is a different path, however, because compiled
273 files are architecture-specific. GUILE_SYSTEM_LOAD_COMPILED_PATH is like
276 ** New read-eval-print loop (REPL) implementation
278 Running Guile with no arguments drops the user into the new REPL. See
279 "Using Guile Interactively" in the manual, for more information.
281 ** Remove old Emacs interface
283 Guile had an unused `--emacs' command line argument that was supposed to
284 help when running Guile inside Emacs. This option has been removed, and
285 the helper functions `named-module-use!' and `load-emacs-interface' have
288 ** Add `(system repl server)' module and `--listen' command-line argument
290 The `(system repl server)' module exposes procedures to listen on
291 sockets for connections, and serve REPLs to those clients. The --listen
292 command-line argument allows any Guile program to thus be remotely
295 See "Invoking Guile" for more information on `--listen'.
297 ** Command line additions
299 The guile binary now supports a new switch "-x", which can be used to
300 extend the list of filename extensions tried when loading files
303 ** New reader options: `square-brackets', `r6rs-hex-escapes',
306 The reader supports a new option (changeable via `read-options'),
307 `square-brackets', which instructs it to interpret square brackets as
308 parentheses. This option is on by default.
310 When the new `r6rs-hex-escapes' reader option is enabled, the reader
311 will recognize string escape sequences as defined in R6RS. R6RS string
312 escape sequences are incompatible with Guile's existing escapes, though,
313 so this option is off by default.
315 Additionally, Guile follows the R6RS newline escaping rules when the
316 `hungry-eol-escapes' option is enabled.
318 See "String Syntax" in the manual, for more information.
320 ** Function profiling and tracing at the REPL
322 The `,profile FORM' REPL meta-command can now be used to statistically
323 profile execution of a form, to see which functions are taking the most
324 time. See `,help profile' for more information.
326 Similarly, `,trace FORM' traces all function applications that occur
327 during the execution of `FORM'. See `,help trace' for more information.
329 ** Recursive debugging REPL on error
331 When Guile sees an error at the REPL, instead of saving the stack, Guile
332 will directly enter a recursive REPL in the dynamic context of the
333 error. See "Error Handling" in the manual, for more information.
335 A recursive REPL is the same as any other REPL, except that it
336 has been augmented with debugging information, so that one can inspect
337 the context of the error. The debugger has been integrated with the REPL
338 via a set of debugging meta-commands.
340 For example, one may access a backtrace with `,backtrace' (or
341 `,bt'). See "Interactive Debugging" in the manual, for more
344 ** New `guile-tools' commands: `compile', `disassemble'
346 Pass the `--help' command-line option to these commands for more
349 ** Guile now adds its install prefix to the LTDL_LIBRARY_PATH
351 Users may now install Guile to nonstandard prefixes and just run
352 `/path/to/bin/guile', instead of also having to set LTDL_LIBRARY_PATH to
353 include `/path/to/lib'.
355 ** Guile's Emacs integration is now more keyboard-friendly
357 Backtraces may now be disclosed with the keyboard in addition to the
360 ** Load path change: search in version-specific paths before site paths
362 When looking for a module, Guile now searches first in Guile's
363 version-specific path (the library path), *then* in the site dir. This
364 allows Guile's copy of SSAX to override any Guile-Lib copy the user has
365 installed. Also it should cut the number of `stat' system calls by half,
368 ** Value history in the REPL on by default
370 By default, the REPL will save computed values in variables like `$1',
371 `$2', and the like. There are programmatic and interactive interfaces to
372 control this. See "Value History" in the manual, for more information.
374 ** Readline tab completion for arguments
376 When readline is enabled, tab completion works for arguments too, not
377 just for the operator position.
379 ** Expression-oriented readline history
381 Guile's readline history now tries to operate on expressions instead of
382 input lines. Let us know what you think!
384 ** Interactive Guile follows GNU conventions
386 As recommended by the GPL, Guile now shows a brief copyright and
387 warranty disclaimer on startup, along with pointers to more information.
389 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
391 ** Support for R6RS libraries
393 The `library' and `import' forms from the latest Scheme report have been
394 added to Guile, in such a way that R6RS libraries share a namespace with
395 Guile modules. R6RS modules may import Guile modules, and are available
396 for Guile modules to import via use-modules and all the rest. See "R6RS
397 Libraries" in the manual for more information.
399 ** Implementations of R6RS libraries
401 Guile now has implementations for all of the libraries defined in the
402 R6RS. Thanks to Julian Graham for this excellent hack. See "R6RS
403 Standard Libraries" in the manual for a full list of libraries.
405 ** Partial R6RS compatibility
407 Guile now has enough support for R6RS to run a reasonably large subset
410 Guile is not fully R6RS compatible. Many incompatibilities are simply
411 bugs, though some parts of Guile will remain R6RS-incompatible for the
412 foreseeable future. See "R6RS Incompatibilities" in the manual, for more
415 Please contact bug-guile@gnu.org if you have found an issue not
416 mentioned in that compatibility list.
418 ** New implementation of `primitive-eval'
420 Guile's `primitive-eval' is now implemented in Scheme. Actually there is
421 still a C evaluator, used when building a fresh Guile to interpret the
422 compiler, so we can compile eval.scm. Thereafter all calls to
423 primitive-eval are implemented by VM-compiled code.
425 This allows all of Guile's procedures, be they interpreted or compiled,
426 to execute on the same stack, unifying multiple-value return semantics,
427 providing for proper tail recursion between interpreted and compiled
428 code, and simplifying debugging.
430 As part of this change, the evaluator no longer mutates the internal
431 representation of the code being evaluated in a thread-unsafe manner.
433 There are two negative aspects of this change, however. First, Guile
434 takes a lot longer to compile now. Also, there is less debugging
435 information available for debugging interpreted code. We hope to improve
436 both of these situations.
438 There are many changes to the internal C evalator interface, but all
439 public interfaces should be the same. See the ChangeLog for details. If
440 we have inadvertantly changed an interface that you were using, please
441 contact bug-guile@gnu.org.
443 ** Procedure removed: `the-environment'
445 This procedure was part of the interpreter's execution model, and does
446 not apply to the compiler.
448 ** No more `local-eval'
450 `local-eval' used to exist so that one could evaluate code in the
451 lexical context of a function. Since there is no way to get the lexical
452 environment any more, as that concept has no meaning for the compiler,
453 and a different meaning for the interpreter, we have removed the
456 If you think you need `local-eval', you should probably implement your
457 own metacircular evaluator. It will probably be as fast as Guile's
460 ** Scheme source files will now be compiled automatically.
462 If a compiled .go file corresponding to a .scm file is not found or is
463 not fresh, the .scm file will be compiled on the fly, and the resulting
464 .go file stored away. An advisory note will be printed on the console.
466 Note that this mechanism depends on the timestamp of the .go file being
467 newer than that of the .scm file; if the .scm or .go files are moved
468 after installation, care should be taken to preserve their original
471 Auto-compiled files will be stored in the $XDG_CACHE_HOME/guile/ccache
472 directory, where $XDG_CACHE_HOME defaults to ~/.cache. This directory
473 will be created if needed.
475 To inhibit automatic compilation, set the GUILE_AUTO_COMPILE environment
476 variable to 0, or pass --no-auto-compile on the Guile command line.
478 ** New POSIX procedures: `getrlimit' and `setrlimit'
480 Note however that the interface of these functions is likely to change
481 in the next prerelease.
483 ** New POSIX procedure: `getsid'
485 Scheme binding for the `getsid' C library call.
487 ** New POSIX procedure: `getaddrinfo'
489 Scheme binding for the `getaddrinfo' C library function.
491 ** Multicast socket options
493 Support was added for the IP_MULTICAST_TTL and IP_MULTICAST_IF socket
494 options. See "Network Sockets and Communication" in the manual, for
497 ** `recv!', `recvfrom!', `send', `sendto' now deal in bytevectors
499 These socket procedures now take bytevectors as arguments, instead of
500 strings. There is some deprecated string support, however.
502 ** New GNU procedures: `setaffinity' and `getaffinity'.
504 See "Processes" in the manual, for more information.
506 ** New procedures: `compose', `negate', and `const'
508 See "Higher-Order Functions" in the manual, for more information.
510 ** New procedure in `(oops goops)': `method-formals'
512 ** New procedures in (ice-9 session): `add-value-help-handler!',
513 `remove-value-help-handler!', `add-name-help-handler!'
514 `remove-name-help-handler!', `procedure-arguments'
516 The value and name help handlers provide some minimal extensibility to
517 the help interface. Guile-lib's `(texinfo reflection)' uses them, for
518 example, to make stexinfo help documentation available. See those
519 procedures' docstrings for more information.
521 `procedure-arguments' describes the arguments that a procedure can take,
522 combining arity and formals. For example:
524 (procedure-arguments resolve-interface)
525 => ((required . (name)) (rest . args))
527 Additionally, `module-commentary' is now publically exported from
530 ** Removed: `procedure->memoizing-macro', `procedure->syntax'
532 These procedures created primitive fexprs for the old evaluator, and are
533 no longer supported. If you feel that you need these functions, you
534 probably need to write your own metacircular evaluator (which will
535 probably be as fast as Guile's, anyway).
537 ** New language: ECMAScript
539 Guile now ships with one other high-level language supported,
540 ECMAScript. The goal is to support all of version 3.1 of the standard,
541 but not all of the libraries are there yet. This support is not yet
542 documented; ask on the mailing list if you are interested.
544 ** New language: Brainfuck
546 Brainfuck is a toy language that closely models Turing machines. Guile's
547 brainfuck compiler is meant to be an example of implementing other
548 languages. See the manual for details, or
549 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brainfuck for more information about the
550 Brainfuck language itself.
552 ** New language: Elisp
554 Guile now has an experimental Emacs Lisp compiler and runtime. You can
555 now switch to Elisp at the repl: `,language elisp'. All kudos to Daniel
556 Kraft and Brian Templeton, and all bugs to bug-guile@gnu.org.
558 ** Better documentation infrastructure for macros
560 It is now possible to introspect on the type of a macro, e.g.
561 syntax-rules, identifier-syntax, etc, and extract information about that
562 macro, such as the syntax-rules patterns or the defmacro arguments.
563 `(texinfo reflection)' takes advantage of this to give better macro
566 ** Support for arbitrary procedure metadata
568 Building on its support for docstrings, Guile now supports multiple
569 docstrings, adding them to the tail of a compiled procedure's
570 properties. For example:
576 (procedure-properties foo)
577 => ((name . foo) (documentation . "one") (documentation . "two"))
579 Also, vectors of pairs are now treated as additional metadata entries:
582 #((quz . #f) (docstring . "xyzzy"))
584 (procedure-properties bar)
585 => ((name . bar) (quz . #f) (docstring . "xyzzy"))
587 This allows arbitrary literals to be embedded as metadata in a compiled
590 ** The psyntax expander now knows how to interpret the @ and @@ special
593 ** The psyntax expander is now hygienic with respect to modules.
595 Free variables in a macro are scoped in the module that the macro was
596 defined in, not in the module the macro is used in. For example, code
599 (define-module (foo) #:export (bar))
600 (define (helper x) ...)
602 (syntax-rules () ((_ x) (helper x))))
604 (define-module (baz) #:use-module (foo))
607 It used to be you had to export `helper' from `(foo)' as well.
608 Thankfully, this has been fixed.
610 ** Support for version information in Guile's `module' form
612 Guile modules now have a `#:version' field. See "R6RS Version
613 References", "General Information about Modules", "Using Guile Modules",
614 and "Creating Guile Modules" in the manual for more information.
616 ** Support for renaming bindings on module export
618 Wherever Guile accepts a symbol as an argument to specify a binding to
619 export, it now also accepts a pair of symbols, indicating that a binding
620 should be renamed on export. See "Creating Guile Modules" in the manual
621 for more information.
623 ** New procedure: `module-export-all!'
625 This procedure exports all current and future bindings from a module.
626 Use as `(module-export-all! (current-module))'.
628 ** New procedure `reload-module', and `,reload' REPL command
630 See "Module System Reflection" and "Module Commands" in the manual, for
633 ** `eval-case' has been deprecated, and replaced by `eval-when'.
635 The semantics of `eval-when' are easier to understand. See "Eval When"
636 in the manual, for more information.
638 ** Guile is now more strict about prohibiting definitions in expression
641 Although previous versions of Guile accepted it, the following
642 expression is not valid, in R5RS or R6RS:
644 (if test (define foo 'bar) (define foo 'baz))
646 In this specific case, it would be better to do:
648 (define foo (if test 'bar 'baz))
650 It is possible to circumvent this restriction with e.g.
651 `(module-define! (current-module) 'foo 'baz)'. Contact the list if you
654 ** Support for `letrec*'
656 Guile now supports `letrec*', a recursive lexical binding operator in
657 which the identifiers are bound in order. See "Local Bindings" in the
658 manual, for more details.
660 ** Internal definitions now expand to `letrec*'
662 Following the R6RS, internal definitions now expand to letrec* instead
663 of letrec. The following program is invalid for R5RS, but valid for
668 (define baz (+ bar 20))
671 ;; R5RS and Guile <= 1.8:
672 (foo) => Unbound variable: bar
673 ;; R6RS and Guile >= 2.0:
676 This change should not affect correct R5RS programs, or programs written
677 in earlier Guile dialects.
679 ** Macro expansion produces structures instead of s-expressions
681 In the olden days, macroexpanding an s-expression would yield another
682 s-expression. Though the lexical variables were renamed, expansions of
683 core forms like `if' and `begin' were still non-hygienic, as they relied
684 on the toplevel definitions of `if' et al being the conventional ones.
686 The solution is to expand to structures instead of s-expressions. There
687 is an `if' structure, a `begin' structure, a `toplevel-ref' structure,
688 etc. The expander already did this for compilation, producing Tree-IL
689 directly; it has been changed now to do so when expanding for the
692 ** Defmacros must now produce valid Scheme expressions.
694 It used to be that defmacros could unquote in Scheme values, as a way of
695 supporting partial evaluation, and avoiding some hygiene issues. For
698 (define (helper x) ...)
699 (define-macro (foo bar)
702 Assuming this macro is in the `(baz)' module, the direct translation of
705 (define (helper x) ...)
706 (define-macro (foo bar)
707 `((@@ (baz) helper) ,bar))
709 Of course, one could just use a hygienic macro instead:
713 ((_ bar) (helper bar))))
715 ** Guile's psyntax now supports docstrings and internal definitions.
717 The following Scheme is not strictly legal:
724 However its intent is fairly clear. Guile interprets "bar" to be the
725 docstring of `foo', and the definition of `baz' is still in definition
728 ** Support for settable identifier syntax
730 Following the R6RS, "variable transformers" are settable
731 identifier-syntax. See "Identifier macros" in the manual, for more
734 ** syntax-case treats `_' as a placeholder
736 Following R6RS, a `_' in a syntax-rules or syntax-case pattern matches
737 anything, and binds no pattern variables. Unlike the R6RS, Guile also
738 permits `_' to be in the literals list for a pattern.
740 ** Macros need to be defined before their first use.
742 It used to be that with lazy memoization, this might work:
746 (define-macro (ref x) x)
749 But now, the body of `foo' is interpreted to mean a call to the toplevel
750 `ref' function, instead of a macro expansion. The solution is to define
751 macros before code that uses them.
753 ** Functions needed by macros at expand-time need to be present at
756 For example, this code will work at the REPL:
758 (define (double-helper x) (* x x))
759 (define-macro (double-literal x) (double-helper x))
760 (double-literal 2) => 4
762 But it will not work when a file is compiled, because the definition of
763 `double-helper' is not present at expand-time. The solution is to wrap
764 the definition of `double-helper' in `eval-when':
766 (eval-when (load compile eval)
767 (define (double-helper x) (* x x)))
768 (define-macro (double-literal x) (double-helper x))
769 (double-literal 2) => 4
771 See the documentation for eval-when for more information.
773 ** `macroexpand' produces structures, not S-expressions.
775 Given the need to maintain referential transparency, both lexically and
776 modular, the result of expanding Scheme expressions is no longer itself
777 an s-expression. If you want a human-readable approximation of the
778 result of `macroexpand', call `tree-il->scheme' from `(language
781 ** Removed function: `macroexpand-1'
783 It is unclear how to implement `macroexpand-1' with syntax-case, though
784 PLT Scheme does prove that it is possible.
786 ** New reader macros: #' #` #, #,@
788 These macros translate, respectively, to `syntax', `quasisyntax',
789 `unsyntax', and `unsyntax-splicing'. See the R6RS for more information.
790 These reader macros may be overridden by `read-hash-extend'.
792 ** Incompatible change to #'
794 Guile did have a #' hash-extension, by default, which just returned the
795 subsequent datum: #'foo => foo. In the unlikely event that anyone
796 actually used this, this behavior may be reinstated via the
797 `read-hash-extend' mechanism.
799 ** `unquote' and `unquote-splicing' accept multiple expressions
801 As per the R6RS, these syntax operators can now accept any number of
802 expressions to unquote.
804 ** Scheme expresssions may be commented out with #;
806 #; comments out an entire expression. See SRFI-62 or the R6RS for more
809 ** Prompts: Delimited, composable continuations
811 Guile now has prompts as part of its primitive language. See "Prompts"
812 in the manual, for more information.
814 Expressions entered in at the REPL, or from the command line, are
815 surrounded by a prompt with the default prompt tag.
817 ** `make-stack' with a tail-called procedural narrowing argument no longer
818 works (with compiled procedures)
820 It used to be the case that a captured stack could be narrowed to select
821 calls only up to or from a certain procedure, even if that procedure
822 already tail-called another procedure. This was because the debug
823 information from the original procedure was kept on the stack.
825 Now with the new compiler, the stack only contains active frames from
826 the current continuation. A narrow to a procedure that is not in the
827 stack will result in an empty stack. To fix this, narrow to a procedure
828 that is active in the current continuation, or narrow to a specific
829 number of stack frames.
831 ** Backtraces through compiled procedures only show procedures that are
832 active in the current continuation
834 Similarly to the previous issue, backtraces in compiled code may be
835 different from backtraces in interpreted code. There are no semantic
836 differences, however. Please mail bug-guile@gnu.org if you see any
837 deficiencies with Guile's backtraces.
839 ** `positions' reader option enabled by default
841 This change allows primitive-load without --auto-compile to also
842 propagate source information through the expander, for better errors and
843 to let macros know their source locations. The compiler was already
844 turning it on anyway.
846 ** New macro: `current-source-location'
848 The macro returns the current source location (to be documented).
850 ** syntax-rules and syntax-case macros now propagate source information
851 through to the expanded code
853 This should result in better backtraces.
855 ** The currying behavior of `define' has been removed.
857 Before, `(define ((f a) b) (* a b))' would translate to
859 (define f (lambda (a) (lambda (b) (* a b))))
861 Now a syntax error is signaled, as this syntax is not supported by
862 default. Use the `(ice-9 curried-definitions)' module to get back the
865 ** New procedure, `define!'
867 `define!' is a procedure that takes two arguments, a symbol and a value,
868 and binds the value to the symbol in the current module. It's useful to
869 programmatically make definitions in the current module, and is slightly
870 less verbose than `module-define!'.
872 ** All modules have names now
874 Before, you could have anonymous modules: modules without names. Now,
875 because of hygiene and macros, all modules have names. If a module was
876 created without a name, the first time `module-name' is called on it, a
877 fresh name will be lazily generated for it.
879 ** The module namespace is now separate from the value namespace
881 It was a little-known implementation detail of Guile's module system
882 that it was built on a single hierarchical namespace of values -- that
883 if there was a module named `(foo bar)', then in the module named
884 `(foo)' there was a binding from `bar' to the `(foo bar)' module.
886 This was a neat trick, but presented a number of problems. One problem
887 was that the bindings in a module were not apparent from the module
888 itself; perhaps the `(foo)' module had a private binding for `bar', and
889 then an external contributor defined `(foo bar)'. In the end there can
890 be only one binding, so one of the two will see the wrong thing, and
891 produce an obtuse error of unclear provenance.
893 Also, the public interface of a module was also bound in the value
894 namespace, as `%module-public-interface'. This was a hack from the early
895 days of Guile's modules.
897 Both of these warts have been fixed by the addition of fields in the
898 `module' data type. Access to modules and their interfaces from the
899 value namespace has been deprecated, and all accessors use the new
900 record accessors appropriately.
902 When Guile is built with support for deprecated code, as is the default,
903 the value namespace is still searched for modules and public interfaces,
904 and a deprecation warning is raised as appropriate.
906 Finally, to support lazy loading of modules as one used to be able to do
907 with module binder procedures, Guile now has submodule binders, called
908 if a given submodule is not found. See boot-9.scm for more information.
910 ** New procedures: module-ref-submodule, module-define-submodule,
911 nested-ref-module, nested-define-module!, local-ref-module,
914 These new accessors are like their bare variants, but operate on
915 namespaces instead of values.
917 ** The (app modules) module tree is officially deprecated
919 It used to be that one could access a module named `(foo bar)' via
920 `(nested-ref the-root-module '(app modules foo bar))'. The `(app
921 modules)' bit was a never-used and never-documented abstraction, and has
922 been deprecated. See the following mail for a full discussion:
924 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guile-devel/2010-04/msg00168.html
926 The `%app' binding is also deprecated.
928 ** `module-filename' field and accessor
930 Modules now record the file in which they are defined. This field may be
931 accessed with the new `module-filename' procedure.
933 ** Modules load within a known environment
935 It takes a few procedure calls to define a module, and those procedure
936 calls need to be in scope. Now we ensure that the current module when
937 loading a module is one that has the needed bindings, instead of relying
940 ** `load' is a macro (!) that resolves paths relative to source file dir
942 The familiar Schem `load' procedure is now a macro that captures the
943 name of the source file being expanded, and dispatches to the new
944 `load-in-vicinity'. Referencing `load' by bare name returns a closure
945 that embeds the current source file name.
947 This fix allows `load' of relative paths to be resolved with respect to
948 the location of the file that calls `load'.
950 ** Many syntax errors have different texts now
952 Syntax errors still throw to the `syntax-error' key, but the arguments
953 are often different now. Perhaps in the future, Guile will switch to
954 using standard SRFI-35 conditions.
956 ** Returning multiple values to compiled code will silently truncate the
957 values to the expected number
959 For example, the interpreter would raise an error evaluating the form,
960 `(+ (values 1 2) (values 3 4))', because it would see the operands as
961 being two compound "values" objects, to which `+' does not apply.
963 The compiler, on the other hand, receives multiple values on the stack,
964 not as a compound object. Given that it must check the number of values
965 anyway, if too many values are provided for a continuation, it chooses
966 to truncate those values, effectively evaluating `(+ 1 3)' instead.
968 The idea is that the semantics that the compiler implements is more
969 intuitive, and the use of the interpreter will fade out with time.
970 This behavior is allowed both by the R5RS and the R6RS.
972 ** Multiple values in compiled code are not represented by compound
975 This change may manifest itself in the following situation:
977 (let ((val (foo))) (do-something) val)
979 In the interpreter, if `foo' returns multiple values, multiple values
980 are produced from the `let' expression. In the compiler, those values
981 are truncated to the first value, and that first value is returned. In
982 the compiler, if `foo' returns no values, an error will be raised, while
983 the interpreter would proceed.
985 Both of these behaviors are allowed by R5RS and R6RS. The compiler's
986 behavior is more correct, however. If you wish to preserve a potentially
987 multiply-valued return, you will need to set up a multiple-value
988 continuation, using `call-with-values'.
990 ** Defmacros are now implemented in terms of syntax-case.
992 The practical ramification of this is that the `defmacro?' predicate has
993 been removed, along with `defmacro-transformer', `macro-table',
994 `xformer-table', `assert-defmacro?!', `set-defmacro-transformer!' and
995 `defmacro:transformer'. This is because defmacros are simply macros. If
996 any of these procedures provided useful facilities to you, we encourage
997 you to contact the Guile developers.
999 ** Hygienic macros documented as the primary syntactic extension mechanism.
1001 The macro documentation was finally fleshed out with some documentation
1002 on `syntax-rules' and `syntax-case' macros, and other parts of the macro
1003 expansion process. See "Macros" in the manual, for details.
1005 ** psyntax is now the default expander
1007 Scheme code is now expanded by default by the psyntax hygienic macro
1008 expander. Expansion is performed completely before compilation or
1011 Notably, syntax errors will be signalled before interpretation begins.
1012 In the past, many syntax errors were only detected at runtime if the
1013 code in question was memoized.
1015 As part of its expansion, psyntax renames all lexically-bound
1016 identifiers. Original identifier names are preserved and given to the
1017 compiler, but the interpreter will see the renamed variables, e.g.,
1018 `x432' instead of `x'.
1020 Note that the psyntax that Guile uses is a fork, as Guile already had
1021 modules before incompatible modules were added to psyntax -- about 10
1022 years ago! Thus there are surely a number of bugs that have been fixed
1023 in psyntax since then. If you find one, please notify bug-guile@gnu.org.
1025 ** syntax-rules and syntax-case are available by default.
1027 There is no longer any need to import the `(ice-9 syncase)' module
1028 (which is now deprecated). The expander may be invoked directly via
1029 `macroexpand', though it is normally searched for via the current module
1032 Also, the helper routines for syntax-case are available in the default
1033 environment as well: `syntax->datum', `datum->syntax',
1034 `bound-identifier=?', `free-identifier=?', `generate-temporaries',
1035 `identifier?', and `syntax-violation'. See the R6RS for documentation.
1037 ** Tail patterns in syntax-case
1039 Guile has pulled in some more recent changes from the psyntax portable
1040 syntax expander, to implement support for "tail patterns". Such patterns
1041 are supported by syntax-rules and syntax-case. This allows a syntax-case
1042 match clause to have ellipses, then a pattern at the end. For example:
1045 (syntax-rules (else)
1046 ((_ val match-clause ... (else e e* ...))
1049 Note how there is MATCH-CLAUSE, which is ellipsized, then there is a
1050 tail pattern for the else clause. Thanks to Andreas Rottmann for the
1051 patch, and Kent Dybvig for the code.
1053 ** Lexical bindings introduced by hygienic macros may not be referenced
1054 by nonhygienic macros.
1056 If a lexical binding is introduced by a hygienic macro, it may not be
1057 referenced by a nonhygienic macro. For example, this works:
1060 (define-macro (bind-x val body)
1061 `(let ((x ,val)) ,body))
1062 (define-macro (ref x)
1064 (bind-x 10 (ref x)))
1069 (define-syntax bind-x
1071 ((_ val body) (let ((x val)) body))))
1072 (define-macro (ref x)
1074 (bind-x 10 (ref x)))
1076 It is not normal to run into this situation with existing code. However,
1077 if you have defmacros that expand to hygienic macros, it is possible to
1078 run into situations like this. For example, if you have a defmacro that
1079 generates a `while' expression, the `break' bound by the `while' may not
1080 be visible within other parts of your defmacro. The solution is to port
1081 from defmacros to syntax-rules or syntax-case.
1083 ** Macros may no longer be referenced as first-class values.
1085 In the past, you could evaluate e.g. `if', and get its macro value. Now,
1086 expanding this form raises a syntax error.
1088 Macros still /exist/ as first-class values, but they must be
1089 /referenced/ via the module system, e.g. `(module-ref (current-module)
1092 ** Macros may now have docstrings.
1094 `object-documentation' from `(ice-9 documentation)' may be used to
1095 retrieve the docstring, once you have a macro value -- but see the above
1096 note about first-class macros. Docstrings are associated with the syntax
1097 transformer procedures.
1099 ** `case-lambda' is now available in the default environment.
1101 The binding in the default environment is equivalent to the one from the
1102 `(srfi srfi-16)' module. Use the srfi-16 module explicitly if you wish
1103 to maintain compatibility with Guile 1.8 and earlier.
1105 ** Procedures may now have more than one arity.
1107 This can be the case, for example, in case-lambda procedures. The
1108 arities of compiled procedures may be accessed via procedures from the
1109 `(system vm program)' module; see "Compiled Procedures", "Optional
1110 Arguments", and "Case-lambda" in the manual.
1112 ** Deprecate arity access via (procedure-properties proc 'arity)
1114 Instead of accessing a procedure's arity as a property, use the new
1115 `procedure-minimum-arity' function, which gives the most permissive
1116 arity that the the function has, in the same format as the old arity
1119 ** `lambda*' and `define*' are now available in the default environment
1121 As with `case-lambda', `(ice-9 optargs)' continues to be supported, for
1122 compatibility purposes. No semantic change has been made (we hope).
1123 Optional and keyword arguments now dispatch via special VM operations,
1124 without the need to cons rest arguments, making them very fast.
1126 ** New syntax: define-once
1128 `define-once' is like Lisp's `defvar': it creates a toplevel binding,
1129 but only if one does not exist already.
1131 ** New function, `truncated-print', with `format' support
1133 `(ice-9 pretty-print)' now exports `truncated-print', a printer that
1134 will ensure that the output stays within a certain width, truncating the
1135 output in what is hopefully an intelligent manner. See the manual for
1138 There is a new `format' specifier, `~@y', for doing a truncated
1139 print (as opposed to `~y', which does a pretty-print). See the `format'
1140 documentation for more details.
1142 ** Better pretty-printing
1144 Indentation recognizes more special forms, like `syntax-case', and read
1145 macros like `quote' are printed better.
1147 ** Passing a number as the destination of `format' is deprecated
1149 The `format' procedure in `(ice-9 format)' now emits a deprecation
1150 warning if a number is passed as its first argument.
1152 Also, it used to be that you could omit passing a port to `format', in
1153 some cases. This still works, but has been formally deprecated.
1155 ** SRFI-4 vectors reimplemented in terms of R6RS bytevectors
1157 Guile now implements SRFI-4 vectors using bytevectors. Often when you
1158 have a numeric vector, you end up wanting to write its bytes somewhere,
1159 or have access to the underlying bytes, or read in bytes from somewhere
1160 else. Bytevectors are very good at this sort of thing. But the SRFI-4
1161 APIs are nicer to use when doing number-crunching, because they are
1162 addressed by element and not by byte.
1164 So as a compromise, Guile allows all bytevector functions to operate on
1165 numeric vectors. They address the underlying bytes in the native
1166 endianness, as one would expect.
1168 Following the same reasoning, that it's just bytes underneath, Guile
1169 also allows uniform vectors of a given type to be accessed as if they
1170 were of any type. One can fill a u32vector, and access its elements with
1171 u8vector-ref. One can use f64vector-ref on bytevectors. It's all the
1174 In this way, uniform numeric vectors may be written to and read from
1175 input/output ports using the procedures that operate on bytevectors.
1177 Calls to SRFI-4 accessors (ref and set functions) from Scheme are now
1178 inlined to the VM instructions for bytevector access.
1180 See "SRFI-4" in the manual, for more information.
1182 ** Nonstandard SRFI-4 procedures now available from `(srfi srfi-4 gnu)'
1184 Guile's `(srfi srfi-4)' now only exports those srfi-4 procedures that
1185 are part of the standard. Complex uniform vectors and the
1186 `any->FOOvector' family are now available only from `(srfi srfi-4 gnu)'.
1188 Guile's default environment imports `(srfi srfi-4)', and probably should
1189 import `(srfi srfi-4 gnu)' as well.
1191 See "SRFI-4 Extensions" in the manual, for more information.
1193 ** New syntax: include-from-path.
1195 `include-from-path' is like `include', except it looks for its file in
1196 the load path. It can be used to compile other files into a file.
1198 ** New syntax: quasisyntax.
1200 `quasisyntax' is to `syntax' as `quasiquote' is to `quote'. See the R6RS
1201 documentation for more information. Thanks to Andre van Tonder for the
1204 ** `*unspecified*' is identifier syntax
1206 `*unspecified*' is no longer a variable, so it is optimized properly by
1207 the compiler, and is not `set!'-able.
1209 ** Changes and bugfixes in numerics code
1211 *** Added six new sets of fast quotient and remainder operators
1213 Added six new sets of fast quotient and remainder operator pairs with
1214 different semantics than the R5RS operators. They support not only
1215 integers, but all reals, including exact rationals and inexact
1216 floating point numbers.
1218 These procedures accept two real numbers N and D, where the divisor D
1219 must be non-zero. Each set of operators computes an integer quotient
1220 Q and a real remainder R such that N = Q*D + R and |R| < |D|. They
1221 differ only in how N/D is rounded to produce Q.
1223 `euclidean-quotient' returns the integer Q and `euclidean-remainder'
1224 returns the real R such that N = Q*D + R and 0 <= R < |D|. `euclidean/'
1225 returns both Q and R, and is more efficient than computing each
1226 separately. Note that when D > 0, `euclidean-quotient' returns
1227 floor(N/D), and when D < 0 it returns ceiling(N/D).
1229 `centered-quotient', `centered-remainder', and `centered/' are similar
1230 except that the range of remainders is -abs(D/2) <= R < abs(D/2), and
1231 `centered-quotient' rounds N/D to the nearest integer. Note that these
1232 operators are equivalent to the R6RS integer division operators `div',
1233 `mod', `div-and-mod', `div0', `mod0', and `div0-and-mod0'.
1235 `floor-quotient' and `floor-remainder' compute Q and R, respectively,
1236 where Q has been rounded toward negative infinity. `floor/' returns
1237 both Q and R, and is more efficient than computing each separately.
1238 Note that when applied to integers, `floor-remainder' is equivalent to
1239 the R5RS integer-only `modulo' operator. `ceiling-quotient',
1240 `ceiling-remainder', and `ceiling/' are similar except that Q is
1241 rounded toward positive infinity.
1243 For `truncate-quotient', `truncate-remainder', and `truncate/', Q is
1244 rounded toward zero. Note that when applied to integers,
1245 `truncate-quotient' and `truncate-remainder' are equivalent to the
1246 R5RS integer-only operators `quotient' and `remainder'.
1248 For `round-quotient', `round-remainder', and `round/', Q is rounded to
1249 the nearest integer, with ties going to the nearest even integer.
1251 *** Complex number changes
1253 Guile is now able to represent non-real complex numbers whose
1254 imaginary part is an _inexact_ zero (0.0 or -0.0), per R6RS.
1255 Previously, such numbers were immediately changed into inexact reals.
1257 (real? 0.0+0.0i) now returns #f, per R6RS, although (zero? 0.0+0.0i)
1258 still returns #t, per R6RS. (= 0 0.0+0.0i) and (= 0.0 0.0+0.0i) are
1259 #t, but the same comparisons using `eqv?' or `equal?' are #f.
1261 Like other non-real numbers, these complex numbers with inexact zero
1262 imaginary part will raise exceptions is passed to procedures requiring
1263 reals, such as `<', `>', `<=', `>=', `min', `max', `positive?',
1264 `negative?', `inf?', `nan?', `finite?', etc.
1266 **** `make-rectangular' changes
1268 scm_make_rectangular `make-rectangular' now returns a real number only
1269 if the imaginary part is an _exact_ 0. Previously, it would return a
1270 real number if the imaginary part was an inexact zero.
1272 scm_c_make_rectangular now always returns a non-real complex number,
1273 even if the imaginary part is zero. Previously, it would return a
1274 real number if the imaginary part was zero.
1276 **** `make-polar' changes
1278 scm_make_polar `make-polar' now returns a real number only if the
1279 angle or magnitude is an _exact_ 0. If the magnitude is an exact 0,
1280 it now returns an exact 0. Previously, it would return a real
1281 number if the imaginary part was an inexact zero.
1283 scm_c_make_polar now always returns a non-real complex number, even if
1284 the imaginary part is 0.0. Previously, it would return a real number
1285 if the imaginary part was 0.0.
1287 **** `imag-part' changes
1289 scm_imag_part `imag-part' now returns an exact 0 if applied to an
1290 inexact real number. Previously it returned an inexact zero in this
1293 *** `eqv?' and `equal?' now compare numbers equivalently
1295 scm_equal_p `equal?' now behaves equivalently to scm_eqv_p `eqv?' for
1296 numeric values, per R5RS. Previously, equal? worked differently,
1297 e.g. `(equal? 0.0 -0.0)' returned #t but `(eqv? 0.0 -0.0)' returned #f,
1298 and `(equal? +nan.0 +nan.0)' returned #f but `(eqv? +nan.0 +nan.0)'
1301 *** `(equal? +nan.0 +nan.0)' now returns #t
1303 Previously, `(equal? +nan.0 +nan.0)' returned #f, although
1304 `(let ((x +nan.0)) (equal? x x))' and `(eqv? +nan.0 +nan.0)'
1305 both returned #t. R5RS requires that `equal?' behave like
1306 `eqv?' when comparing numbers.
1308 *** Change in handling products `*' involving exact 0
1310 scm_product `*' now handles exact 0 differently. A product containing
1311 an exact 0 now returns an exact 0 if and only if the other arguments
1312 are all exact. An inexact zero is returned if and only if the other
1313 arguments are all finite but not all exact. If an infinite or NaN
1314 value is present, a NaN value is returned. Previously, any product
1315 containing an exact 0 yielded an exact 0, regardless of the other
1318 *** `expt' and `integer-expt' changes when the base is 0
1320 While `(expt 0 0)' is still 1, and `(expt 0 N)' for N > 0 is still
1321 zero, `(expt 0 N)' for N < 0 is now a NaN value, and likewise for
1322 integer-expt. This is more correct, and conforming to R6RS, but seems
1323 to be incompatible with R5RS, which would return 0 for all non-zero
1326 *** `expt' and `integer-expt' are more generic, less strict
1328 When raising to an exact non-negative integer exponent, `expt' and
1329 `integer-expt' are now able to exponentiate any object that can be
1330 multiplied using `*'. They can also raise an object to an exact
1331 negative integer power if its reciprocal can be taken using `/'.
1332 In order to allow this, the type of the first argument is no longer
1333 checked when raising to an exact integer power. If the exponent is 0
1334 or 1, the first parameter is not manipulated at all, and need not
1335 even support multiplication.
1337 *** Infinities are no longer integers, nor rationals
1339 scm_integer_p `integer?' and scm_rational_p `rational?' now return #f
1340 for infinities, per R6RS. Previously they returned #t for real
1341 infinities. The real infinities and NaNs are still considered real by
1342 scm_real `real?' however, per R6RS.
1344 *** NaNs are no longer rationals
1346 scm_rational_p `rational?' now returns #f for NaN values, per R6RS.
1347 Previously it returned #t for real NaN values. They are still
1348 considered real by scm_real `real?' however, per R6RS.
1350 *** `inf?' and `nan?' now throw exceptions for non-reals
1352 The domain of `inf?' and `nan?' is the real numbers. Guile now signals
1353 an error when a non-real number or non-number is passed to these
1354 procedures. (Note that NaNs _are_ considered numbers by scheme, despite
1357 *** `rationalize' bugfixes and changes
1359 Fixed bugs in scm_rationalize `rationalize'. Previously, it returned
1360 exact integers unmodified, although that was incorrect if the epsilon
1361 was at least 1 or inexact, e.g. (rationalize 4 1) should return 3 per
1362 R5RS and R6RS, but previously it returned 4. It also now handles
1363 cases involving infinities and NaNs properly, per R6RS.
1365 *** Trigonometric functions now return exact numbers in some cases
1367 scm_sin `sin', scm_cos `cos', scm_tan `tan', scm_asin `asin', scm_acos
1368 `acos', scm_atan `atan', scm_sinh `sinh', scm_cosh `cosh', scm_tanh
1369 `tanh', scm_sys_asinh `asinh', scm_sys_acosh `acosh', and
1370 scm_sys_atanh `atanh' now return exact results in some cases.
1372 *** New procedure: `finite?'
1374 Add scm_finite_p `finite?' from R6RS to guile core, which returns #t
1375 if and only if its argument is neither infinite nor a NaN. Note that
1376 this is not the same as (not (inf? x)) or (not (infinite? x)), since
1377 NaNs are neither finite nor infinite.
1379 *** Improved exactness handling for complex number parsing
1381 When parsing non-real complex numbers, exactness specifiers are now
1382 applied to each component, as is done in PLT Scheme. For complex
1383 numbers written in rectangular form, exactness specifiers are applied
1384 to the real and imaginary parts before calling scm_make_rectangular.
1385 For complex numbers written in polar form, exactness specifiers are
1386 applied to the magnitude and angle before calling scm_make_polar.
1388 Previously, exactness specifiers were applied to the number as a whole
1389 _after_ calling scm_make_rectangular or scm_make_polar.
1391 For example, (string->number "#i5.0+0i") now does the equivalent of:
1393 (make-rectangular (exact->inexact 5.0) (exact->inexact 0))
1395 which yields 5.0+0.0i. Previously it did the equivalent of:
1397 (exact->inexact (make-rectangular 5.0 0))
1401 ** Unicode characters
1403 Unicode characters may be entered in octal format via e.g. `#\454', or
1404 created via (integer->char 300). A hex external representation will
1405 probably be introduced at some point.
1409 Internally, strings are now represented either in the `latin-1'
1410 encoding, one byte per character, or in UTF-32, with four bytes per
1411 character. Strings manage their own allocation, switching if needed.
1413 Extended characters may be written in a literal string using the
1414 hexadecimal escapes `\xXX', `\uXXXX', or `\UXXXXXX', for 8-bit, 16-bit,
1415 or 24-bit codepoints, respectively, or entered directly in the native
1416 encoding of the port on which the string is read.
1420 One may now use U+03BB (GREEK SMALL LETTER LAMBDA) as an identifier.
1422 ** Support for non-ASCII source code files
1424 The default reader now handles source code files for some of the
1425 non-ASCII character encodings, such as UTF-8. A non-ASCII source file
1426 should have an encoding declaration near the top of the file. Also,
1427 there is a new function, `file-encoding', that scans a port for a coding
1428 declaration. See the section of the manual entitled, "Character Encoding
1431 The pre-1.9.3 reader handled 8-bit clean but otherwise unspecified source
1432 code. This use is now discouraged. Binary input and output is
1433 currently supported by opening ports in the ISO-8859-1 locale.
1435 ** Source files default to UTF-8.
1437 If source files do not specify their encoding via a `coding:' block,
1438 the default encoding is UTF-8, instead of being taken from the current
1441 ** Interactive Guile installs the current locale.
1443 Instead of leaving the user in the "C" locale, running the Guile REPL
1444 installs the current locale. [FIXME xref?]
1446 ** Support for locale transcoding when reading from and writing to ports
1448 Ports now have an associated character encoding, and port read and write
1449 operations do conversion to and from locales automatically. Ports also
1450 have an associated strategy for how to deal with locale conversion
1453 See the documentation in the manual for the four new support functions,
1454 `set-port-encoding!', `port-encoding', `set-port-conversion-strategy!',
1455 and `port-conversion-strategy'.
1457 ** String and SRFI-13 functions can operate on Unicode strings
1459 ** Unicode support for SRFI-14 character sets
1461 The default character sets are no longer locale dependent and contain
1462 characters from the whole Unicode range. There is a new predefined
1463 character set, `char-set:designated', which contains all assigned
1464 Unicode characters. There is a new debugging function, `%char-set-dump'.
1466 ** Character functions operate on Unicode characters
1468 `char-upcase' and `char-downcase' use default Unicode casing rules.
1469 Character comparisons such as `char<?' and `char-ci<?' now sort based on
1470 Unicode code points.
1472 ** Global variables `scm_charnames' and `scm_charnums' are removed
1474 These variables contained the names of control characters and were
1475 used when writing characters. While these were global, they were
1476 never intended to be public API. They have been replaced with private
1479 ** EBCDIC support is removed
1481 There was an EBCDIC compile flag that altered some of the character
1482 processing. It appeared that full EBCDIC support was never completed
1483 and was unmaintained.
1485 ** Compile-time warnings
1487 Guile can warn about potentially unbound free variables. Pass the
1488 -Wunbound-variable on the `guile-tools compile' command line, or add
1489 `#:warnings '(unbound-variable)' to your `compile' or `compile-file'
1490 invocation. Warnings are also enabled by default for expressions entered
1493 Guile can also warn when you pass the wrong number of arguments to a
1494 procedure, with -Warity-mismatch, or `arity-mismatch' in the
1495 `#:warnings' as above.
1497 Other warnings include `-Wunused-variable' and `-Wunused-toplevel', to
1498 warn about unused local or global (top-level) variables, and `-Wformat',
1499 to check for various errors related to the `format' procedure.
1501 ** A new `memoize-symbol' evaluator trap has been added.
1503 This trap can be used for efficiently implementing a Scheme code
1506 ** Duplicate bindings among used modules are resolved lazily.
1508 This slightly improves program startup times.
1510 ** New thread cancellation and thread cleanup API
1512 See `cancel-thread', `set-thread-cleanup!', and `thread-cleanup'.
1514 ** New threads are in `(guile-user)' by default, not `(guile)'
1516 It used to be that a new thread entering Guile would do so in the
1517 `(guile)' module, unless this was the first time Guile was initialized,
1518 in which case it was `(guile-user)'. This has been fixed to have all
1519 new threads unknown to Guile default to `(guile-user)'.
1521 ** New helpers: `print-exception', `set-exception-printer!'
1523 These functions implement an extensible exception printer. Guile
1524 registers printers for all of the exceptions it throws. Users may add
1525 their own printers. There is also `scm_print_exception', for use by C
1526 programs. Pleasantly, this allows SRFI-35 and R6RS exceptions to be
1527 printed appropriately.
1529 ** GOOPS dispatch in scheme
1531 As an implementation detail, GOOPS dispatch is no longer implemented by
1532 special evaluator bytecodes, but rather directly via a Scheme function
1533 associated with an applicable struct. There is some VM support for the
1534 underlying primitives, like `class-of'.
1536 This change will in the future allow users to customize generic function
1537 dispatch without incurring a performance penalty, and allow us to
1538 implement method combinations.
1540 ** Applicable struct support
1542 One may now make structs from Scheme that may be applied as procedures.
1543 To do so, make a struct whose vtable is `<applicable-struct-vtable>'.
1544 That struct will be the vtable of your applicable structs; instances of
1545 that new struct are assumed to have the procedure in their first slot.
1546 `<applicable-struct-vtable>' is like Common Lisp's
1547 `funcallable-standard-class'. Likewise there is
1548 `<applicable-struct-with-setter-vtable>', which looks for the setter in
1549 the second slot. This needs to be better documented.
1553 GOOPS had a number of concepts that were relevant to the days of Tcl,
1554 but not any more: operators and entities, mainly. These objects were
1555 never documented, and it is unlikely that they were ever used. Operators
1556 were a kind of generic specific to the Tcl support. Entities were
1557 replaced by applicable structs, mentioned above.
1559 ** New struct slot allocation: "hidden"
1561 A hidden slot is readable and writable, but will not be initialized by a
1562 call to make-struct. For example in your layout you would say "ph"
1563 instead of "pw". Hidden slots are useful for adding new slots to a
1564 vtable without breaking existing invocations to make-struct.
1566 ** eqv? not a generic
1568 One used to be able to extend `eqv?' as a primitive-generic, but no
1569 more. Because `eqv?' is in the expansion of `case' (via `memv'), which
1570 should be able to compile to static dispatch tables, it doesn't make
1571 sense to allow extensions that would subvert this optimization.
1573 ** `inet-ntop' and `inet-pton' are always available.
1575 Guile now use a portable implementation of `inet_pton'/`inet_ntop', so
1576 there is no more need to use `inet-aton'/`inet-ntoa'. The latter
1577 functions are deprecated.
1579 ** `getopt-long' parsing errors throw to `quit', not `misc-error'
1581 This change should inhibit backtraces on argument parsing errors.
1582 `getopt-long' has been modified to print out the error that it throws
1585 ** New primitive: `tmpfile'.
1587 See "File System" in the manual.
1589 ** Random generator state may be serialized to a datum
1591 `random-state->datum' will serialize a random state to a datum, which
1592 may be written out, read back in later, and revivified using
1593 `datum->random-state'. See "Random" in the manual, for more details.
1595 ** Fix random number generator on 64-bit platforms
1597 There was a nasty bug on 64-bit platforms in which asking for a random
1598 integer with a range between 2**32 and 2**64 caused a segfault. After
1599 many embarrassing iterations, this was fixed.
1601 ** Fast bit operations.
1603 The bit-twiddling operations `ash', `logand', `logior', and `logxor' now
1604 have dedicated bytecodes. Guile is not just for symbolic computation,
1605 it's for number crunching too.
1607 ** Faster SRFI-9 record access
1609 SRFI-9 records are now implemented directly on top of Guile's structs,
1610 and their accessors are defined in such a way that normal call-sites
1611 inline to special VM opcodes, while still allowing for the general case
1612 (e.g. passing a record accessor to `apply').
1614 ** R6RS block comment support
1616 Guile now supports R6RS nested block comments. The start of a comment is
1617 marked with `#|', and the end with `|#'.
1619 ** `guile-2' cond-expand feature
1621 To test if your code is running under Guile 2.0 (or its alpha releases),
1622 test for the `guile-2' cond-expand feature. Like this:
1624 (cond-expand (guile-2 (eval-when (compile)
1625 ;; This must be evaluated at compile time.
1626 (fluid-set! current-reader my-reader)))
1628 ;; Earlier versions of Guile do not have a
1629 ;; separate compilation phase.
1630 (fluid-set! current-reader my-reader)))
1632 ** New global variables: %load-compiled-path, %load-compiled-extensions
1634 These are analogous to %load-path and %load-extensions.
1636 ** New fluid: `%file-port-name-canonicalization'
1638 This fluid parameterizes the file names that are associated with file
1639 ports. If %file-port-name-canonicalization is 'absolute, then file names
1640 are canonicalized to be absolute paths. If it is 'relative, then the
1641 name is canonicalized, but any prefix corresponding to a member of
1642 `%load-path' is stripped off. Otherwise the names are passed through
1645 In addition, the `compile-file' and `compile-and-load' procedures bind
1646 %file-port-name-canonicalization to their `#:canonicalization' keyword
1647 argument, which defaults to 'relative. In this way, one might compile
1648 "../module/ice-9/boot-9.scm", but the path that gets residualized into
1649 the .go is "ice-9/boot-9.scm".
1651 ** New procedure, `make-promise'
1653 `(make-promise (lambda () foo))' is equivalent to `(delay foo)'.
1655 ** `defined?' may accept a module as its second argument
1657 Previously it only accepted internal structures from the evaluator.
1659 ** New entry into %guile-build-info: `ccachedir'
1661 ** Fix bug in `module-bound?'.
1663 `module-bound?' was returning true if a module did have a local
1664 variable, but one that was unbound, but another imported module bound
1665 the variable. This was an error, and was fixed.
1667 ** `(ice-9 syncase)' has been deprecated.
1669 As syntax-case is available by default, importing `(ice-9 syncase)' has
1670 no effect, and will trigger a deprecation warning.
1672 ** New readline history functions
1674 The (ice-9 readline) module now provides add-history, read-history,
1675 write-history and clear-history, which wrap the corresponding GNU
1676 History library functions.
1678 ** Removed deprecated uniform array procedures:
1679 dimensions->uniform-array, list->uniform-array, array-prototype
1681 Instead, use make-typed-array, list->typed-array, or array-type,
1684 ** Deprecate the old `scm-style-repl'
1686 The following bindings from boot-9 are now found in `(ice-9
1687 scm-style-repl)': `scm-style-repl', `error-catching-loop',
1688 `error-catching-repl', `bad-throw', `scm-repl-silent'
1689 `assert-repl-silence', `repl-print-unspecified',
1690 `assert-repl-print-unspecified', `scm-repl-verbose',
1691 `assert-repl-verbosity', `scm-repl-prompt', `set-repl-prompt!', `repl',
1692 `default-pre-unwind-handler', `handle-system-error',
1694 The following bindings have been deprecated, with no replacement:
1695 `pre-unwind-handler-dispatch'.
1697 The following bindings have been totally removed:
1698 `before-signal-stack'.
1700 Deprecated forwarding shims have been installed so that users that
1701 expect these bindings in the main namespace will still work, but receive
1702 a deprecation warning.
1704 ** `set-batch-mode?!' replaced by `ensure-batch-mode!'
1706 "Batch mode" is a flag used to tell a program that it is not running
1707 interactively. One usually turns it on after a fork. It may not be
1708 turned off. `ensure-batch-mode!' deprecates the old `set-batch-mode?!',
1709 because it is a better interface, as it can only turn on batch mode, not
1712 ** Deprecate `save-stack', `the-last-stack'
1714 It used to be that the way to debug programs in Guile was to capture the
1715 stack at the time of error, drop back to the REPL, then debug that
1716 stack. But this approach didn't compose, was tricky to get right in the
1717 presence of threads, and was not very powerful.
1719 So `save-stack', `stack-saved?', and `the-last-stack' have been moved to
1720 `(ice-9 save-stack)', with deprecated bindings left in the root module.
1722 ** `top-repl' has its own module
1724 The `top-repl' binding, called with Guile is run interactively, is now
1725 is its own module, `(ice-9 top-repl)'. A deprecated forwarding shim was
1726 left in the default environment.
1728 ** `display-error' takes a frame
1730 The `display-error' / `scm_display_error' helper now takes a frame as an
1731 argument instead of a stack. Stacks are still supported in deprecated
1732 builds. Additionally, `display-error' will again source location
1733 information for the error.
1735 ** No more `(ice-9 debug)'
1737 This module had some debugging helpers that are no longer applicable to
1738 the current debugging model. Importing this module will produce a
1739 deprecation warning. Users should contact bug-guile for support.
1741 ** Remove obsolete debug-options
1743 Removed `breakpoints', `trace', `procnames', `indent', `frames',
1744 `maxdepth', and `debug' debug-options.
1746 ** `backtrace' debug option on by default
1748 Given that Guile 2.0 can always give you a backtrace, backtraces are now
1751 ** `turn-on-debugging' deprecated
1753 ** Remove obsolete print-options
1755 The `source' and `closure-hook' print options are obsolete, and have
1758 ** Remove obsolete read-options
1760 The "elisp-strings" and "elisp-vectors" read options were unused and
1761 obsolete, so they have been removed.
1763 ** Remove eval-options and trap-options
1765 Eval-options and trap-options are obsolete with the new VM and
1768 ** Remove (ice-9 debugger) and (ice-9 debugging)
1770 See "Traps" and "Interactive Debugging" in the manual, for information
1771 on their replacements.
1773 ** Remove the GDS Emacs integration
1775 See "Using Guile in Emacs" in the manual, for info on how we think you
1776 should use Guile with Emacs.
1778 ** Deprecated: `lazy-catch'
1780 `lazy-catch' was a form that captured the stack at the point of a
1781 `throw', but the dynamic state at the point of the `catch'. It was a bit
1782 crazy. Please change to use `catch', possibly with a throw-handler, or
1783 `with-throw-handler'.
1785 ** Deprecated: primitive properties
1787 The `primitive-make-property', `primitive-property-set!',
1788 `primitive-property-ref', and `primitive-property-del!' procedures were
1789 crufty and only used to implement object properties, which has a new,
1790 threadsafe implementation. Use object properties or weak hash tables
1793 ** Deprecated `@bind' syntax
1795 `@bind' was part of an older implementation of the Emacs Lisp language,
1796 and is no longer used.
1798 ** Miscellaneous other deprecations
1800 `cuserid' has been deprecated, as it only returns 8 bytes of a user's
1801 login. Use `(passwd:name (getpwuid (geteuid)))' instead.
1803 Additionally, the procedures `apply-to-args', `has-suffix?', `scheme-file-suffix'
1804 `get-option', `for-next-option', `display-usage-report',
1805 `transform-usage-lambda', `collect', and `set-batch-mode?!' have all
1808 ** Add support for unbound fluids
1810 See `make-unbound-fluid', `fluid-unset!', and `fluid-bound?' in the
1813 ** Add `variable-unset!'
1815 See "Variables" in the manual, for more details.
1817 ** Last but not least, the `λ' macro can be used in lieu of `lambda'
1819 * Changes to the C interface
1821 ** Guile now uses libgc, the Boehm-Demers-Weiser garbage collector
1823 The semantics of `scm_gc_malloc ()' have been changed, in a
1824 backward-compatible way. A new allocation routine,
1825 `scm_gc_malloc_pointerless ()', was added.
1827 Libgc is a conservative GC, which we hope will make interaction with C
1828 code easier and less error-prone.
1830 ** New procedures: `scm_to_stringn', `scm_from_stringn'
1831 ** New procedures: scm_{to,from}_{utf8,latin1}_symbol{n,}
1832 ** New procedures: scm_{to,from}_{utf8,utf32,latin1}_string{n,}
1834 These new procedures convert to and from string representations in
1835 particular encodings.
1837 Users should continue to use locale encoding for user input, user
1838 output, or interacting with the C library.
1840 Use the Latin-1 functions for ASCII, and for literals in source code.
1842 Use UTF-8 functions for interaction with modern libraries which deal in
1843 UTF-8, and UTF-32 for interaction with utf32-using libraries.
1845 Otherwise, use scm_to_stringn or scm_from_stringn with a specific
1848 ** New type definitions for `scm_t_intptr' and friends.
1850 `SCM_T_UINTPTR_MAX', `SCM_T_INTPTR_MIN', `SCM_T_INTPTR_MAX',
1851 `SIZEOF_SCM_T_BITS', `scm_t_intptr' and `scm_t_uintptr' are now
1852 available to C. Have fun!
1854 ** The GH interface (deprecated in version 1.6, 2001) was removed.
1856 ** Internal `scm_i_' functions now have "hidden" linkage with GCC/ELF
1858 This makes these internal functions technically not callable from
1861 ** Functions for handling `scm_option' now no longer require an argument
1862 indicating length of the `scm_t_option' array.
1864 ** Procedures-with-setters are now implemented using applicable structs
1866 From a user's perspective this doesn't mean very much. But if, for some
1867 odd reason, you used the SCM_PROCEDURE_WITH_SETTER_P, SCM_PROCEDURE, or
1868 SCM_SETTER macros, know that they're deprecated now. Also, scm_tc7_pws
1871 ** Remove old evaluator closures
1873 There used to be ranges of typecodes allocated to interpreted data
1874 structures, but that it no longer the case, given that interpreted
1875 procedure are now just regular VM closures. As a result, there is a
1876 newly free tc3, and a number of removed macros. See the ChangeLog for
1879 ** Primitive procedures are now VM trampoline procedures
1881 It used to be that there were something like 12 different typecodes
1882 allocated to primitive procedures, each with its own calling convention.
1883 Now there is only one, the gsubr. This may affect user code if you were
1884 defining a procedure using scm_c_make_subr rather scm_c_make_gsubr. The
1885 solution is to switch to use scm_c_make_gsubr. This solution works well
1886 both with the old 1.8 and and with the current 1.9 branch.
1888 Guile's old evaluator used to have special cases for applying "gsubrs",
1889 primitive procedures with specified numbers of required, optional, and
1890 rest arguments. Now, however, Guile represents gsubrs as normal VM
1891 procedures, with appropriate bytecode to parse out the correct number of
1892 arguments, including optional and rest arguments, and then with a
1893 special bytecode to apply the gsubr.
1895 This allows primitive procedures to appear on the VM stack, allowing
1896 them to be accurately counted in profiles. Also they now have more
1897 debugging information attached to them -- their number of arguments, for
1898 example. In addition, the VM can completely inline the application
1899 mechanics, allowing for faster primitive calls.
1901 However there are some changes on the C level. There is no more
1902 `scm_tc7_gsubr' or `scm_tcs_subrs' typecode for primitive procedures, as
1903 they are just VM procedures. Likewise the macros `SCM_GSUBR_TYPE',
1904 `SCM_GSUBR_MAKTYPE', `SCM_GSUBR_REQ', `SCM_GSUBR_OPT', and
1905 `SCM_GSUBR_REST' are gone, as are `SCM_SUBR_META_INFO', `SCM_SUBR_PROPS'
1906 `SCM_SET_SUBR_GENERIC_LOC', and `SCM_SUBR_ARITY_TO_TYPE'.
1908 Perhaps more significantly, `scm_c_make_subr',
1909 `scm_c_make_subr_with_generic', `scm_c_define_subr', and
1910 `scm_c_define_subr_with_generic'. They all operated on subr typecodes,
1911 and there are no more subr typecodes. Use the scm_c_make_gsubr family
1914 Normal users of gsubrs should not be affected, though, as the
1915 scm_c_make_gsubr family still is the correct way to create primitive
1918 ** Remove deprecated array C interfaces
1920 Removed the deprecated array functions `scm_i_arrayp',
1921 `scm_i_array_ndim', `scm_i_array_mem', `scm_i_array_v',
1922 `scm_i_array_base', `scm_i_array_dims', and the deprecated macros
1923 `SCM_ARRAYP', `SCM_ARRAY_NDIM', `SCM_ARRAY_CONTP', `SCM_ARRAY_MEM',
1924 `SCM_ARRAY_V', `SCM_ARRAY_BASE', and `SCM_ARRAY_DIMS'.
1926 ** Remove unused snarf macros
1928 `SCM_DEFINE1', `SCM_PRIMITIVE_GENERIC_1', `SCM_PROC1, and `SCM_GPROC1'
1929 are no more. Use SCM_DEFINE or SCM_PRIMITIVE_GENERIC instead.
1931 ** New functions: `scm_call_n', `scm_c_run_hookn'
1933 `scm_call_n' applies to apply a function to an array of arguments.
1934 `scm_c_run_hookn' runs a hook with an array of arguments.
1936 ** Some SMOB types changed to have static typecodes
1938 Fluids, dynamic states, and hash tables used to be SMOB objects, but now
1939 they have statically allocated tc7 typecodes.
1941 ** Preparations for changing SMOB representation
1943 If things go right, we'll be changing the SMOB representation soon. To
1944 that end, we did a lot of cleanups to calls to e.g. SCM_CELL_WORD_2(x) when
1945 the code meant SCM_SMOB_DATA_2(x); user code will need similar changes
1946 in the future. Code accessing SMOBs using SCM_CELL macros was never
1947 correct, but until now things still worked. Users should be aware of
1950 ** Changed invocation mechanics of applicable SMOBs
1952 Guile's old evaluator used to have special cases for applying SMOB
1953 objects. Now, with the VM, when Guile sees a SMOB, it looks up a VM
1954 trampoline procedure for it, and use the normal mechanics to apply the
1955 trampoline. This simplifies procedure application in the normal,
1958 The upshot is that the mechanics used to apply a SMOB are different from
1959 1.8. Descriptors no longer have `apply_0', `apply_1', `apply_2', and
1960 `apply_3' functions, and the macros SCM_SMOB_APPLY_0 and friends are now
1961 deprecated. Just use the scm_call_0 family of procedures.
1963 ** Removed support shlibs for SRFIs 1, 4, 13, 14, and 60
1965 Though these SRFI support libraries did expose API, they encoded a
1966 strange version string into their library names. That version was never
1967 programmatically exported, so there was no way people could use the
1970 This was a fortunate oversight, as it allows us to remove the need for
1971 extra, needless shared libraries --- the C support code for SRFIs 4, 13,
1972 and 14 was already in core --- and allow us to incrementally return the
1973 SRFI implementation to Scheme.
1975 ** New C function: scm_module_public_interface
1977 This procedure corresponds to Scheme's `module-public-interface'.
1979 ** Undeprecate `scm_the_root_module ()'
1981 It's useful to be able to get the root module from C without doing a
1984 ** Inline vector allocation
1986 Instead of having vectors point out into the heap for their data, their
1987 data is now allocated inline to the vector object itself. The same is
1988 true for bytevectors, by default, though there is an indirection
1989 available which should allow for making a bytevector from an existing
1992 ** New struct constructors that don't involve making lists
1994 `scm_c_make_struct' and `scm_c_make_structv' are new varargs and array
1995 constructors, respectively, for structs. You might find them useful.
1999 In Guile 1.8, there were debugging frames on the C stack. Now there is
2000 no more need to explicitly mark the stack in this way, because Guile has
2001 a VM stack that it knows how to walk, which simplifies the C API
2002 considerably. See the ChangeLog for details; the relevant interface is
2003 in libguile/stacks.h. The Scheme API has not been changed significantly.
2005 ** Removal of Guile's primitive object system.
2007 There were a number of pieces in `objects.[ch]' that tried to be a
2008 minimal object system, but were never documented, and were quickly
2009 obseleted by GOOPS' merge into Guile proper. So `scm_make_class_object',
2010 `scm_make_subclass_object', `scm_metaclass_standard', and like symbols
2011 from objects.h are no more. In the very unlikely case in which these
2012 were useful to you, we urge you to contact guile-devel.
2016 Actually the future is still in the state that it was, is, and ever
2017 shall be, Amen, except that `futures.c' and `futures.h' are no longer a
2018 part of it. These files were experimental, never compiled, and would be
2019 better implemented in Scheme anyway. In the future, that is.
2021 ** Deprecate trampolines
2023 There used to be C functions `scm_trampoline_0', `scm_trampoline_1', and
2024 so on. The point was to do some precomputation on the type of the
2025 procedure, then return a specialized "call" procedure. However this
2026 optimization wasn't actually an optimization, so it is now deprecated.
2027 Just use `scm_call_0', etc instead.
2029 ** Deprecated `scm_badargsp'
2031 This function is unused in Guile, but was part of its API.
2033 ** Better support for Lisp `nil'.
2035 The bit representation of `nil' has been tweaked so that it is now very
2036 efficient to check e.g. if a value is equal to Scheme's end-of-list or
2037 Lisp's nil. Additionally there are a heap of new, specific predicates
2038 like scm_is_null_or_nil.
2040 ** Better integration of Lisp `nil'.
2042 `scm_is_boolean', `scm_is_false', and `scm_is_null' all return true now
2043 for Lisp's `nil'. This shouldn't affect any Scheme code at this point,
2044 but when we start to integrate more with Emacs, it is possible that we
2045 break code that assumes that, for example, `(not x)' implies that `x' is
2046 `eq?' to `#f'. This is not a common assumption. Refactoring affected
2047 code to rely on properties instead of identities will improve code
2048 correctness. See "Nil" in the manual, for more details.
2050 ** Support for static allocation of strings, symbols, and subrs.
2052 Calls to snarfing CPP macros like SCM_DEFINE macro will now allocate
2053 much of their associated data as static variables, reducing Guile's
2056 ** `scm_stat' has an additional argument, `exception_on_error'
2057 ** `scm_primitive_load_path' has an additional argument `exception_on_not_found'
2059 ** `scm_set_port_seek' and `scm_set_port_truncate' use the `scm_t_off' type
2061 Previously they would use the `off_t' type, which is fragile since its
2062 definition depends on the application's value for `_FILE_OFFSET_BITS'.
2064 ** The `long_long' C type, deprecated in 1.8, has been removed
2066 ** Removed deprecated uniform array procedures: scm_make_uve,
2067 scm_array_prototype, scm_list_to_uniform_array,
2068 scm_dimensions_to_uniform_array, scm_make_ra, scm_shap2ra, scm_cvref,
2069 scm_ra_set_contp, scm_aind, scm_raprin1
2071 These functions have been deprecated since early 2005.
2073 * Changes to the distribution
2075 ** Guile's license is now LGPLv3+
2077 In other words the GNU Lesser General Public License, version 3 or
2078 later (at the discretion of each person that chooses to redistribute
2083 Guile's build is visually quieter, due to the use of Automake 1.11's
2084 AM_SILENT_RULES. Build as `make V=1' to see all of the output.
2086 ** GOOPS documentation folded into Guile reference manual
2088 GOOPS, Guile's object system, used to be documented in separate manuals.
2089 This content is now included in Guile's manual directly.
2091 ** `guile-config' will be deprecated in favor of `pkg-config'
2093 `guile-config' has been rewritten to get its information from
2094 `pkg-config', so this should be a transparent change. Note however that
2095 guile.m4 has yet to be modified to call pkg-config instead of
2098 ** Guile now provides `guile-2.0.pc' instead of `guile-1.8.pc'
2100 Programs that use `pkg-config' to find Guile or one of its Autoconf
2101 macros should now require `guile-2.0' instead of `guile-1.8'.
2103 ** New installation directory: $(pkglibdir)/1.9/ccache
2105 If $(libdir) is /usr/lib, for example, Guile will install its .go files
2106 to /usr/lib/guile/1.9/ccache. These files are architecture-specific.
2108 ** Parallel installability fixes
2110 Guile now installs its header files to a effective-version-specific
2111 directory, and includes the effective version (e.g. 2.0) in the library
2112 name (e.g. libguile-2.0.so).
2114 This change should be transparent to users, who should detect Guile via
2115 the guile.m4 macro, or the guile-2.0.pc pkg-config file. It will allow
2116 parallel installs for multiple versions of Guile development
2119 ** Dynamically loadable extensions may be placed in a Guile-specific path
2121 Before, Guile only searched the system library paths for extensions
2122 (e.g. /usr/lib), which meant that the names of Guile extensions had to
2123 be globally unique. Installing them to a Guile-specific extensions
2124 directory is cleaner. Use `pkg-config --variable=extensiondir
2125 guile-2.0' to get the location of the extensions directory.
2127 ** User Scheme code may be placed in a version-specific path
2129 Before, there was only one way to install user Scheme code to a
2130 version-specific Guile directory: install to Guile's own path,
2131 e.g. /usr/share/guile/2.0. The site directory,
2132 e.g. /usr/share/guile/site, was unversioned. This has been changed to
2133 add a version-specific site directory, e.g. /usr/share/guile/site/2.0,
2134 searched before the global site directory.
2136 ** New dependency: libgc
2138 See http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Hans_Boehm/gc/, for more information.
2140 ** New dependency: GNU libunistring
2142 See http://www.gnu.org/software/libunistring/, for more information. Our
2143 Unicode support uses routines from libunistring.
2145 ** New dependency: libffi
2147 See http://sourceware.org/libffi/, for more information.
2151 Changes in 1.8.8 (since 1.8.7)
2155 ** Fix possible buffer overruns when parsing numbers
2156 ** Avoid clash with system setjmp/longjmp on IA64
2157 ** Fix `wrong type arg' exceptions with IPv6 addresses
2160 Changes in 1.8.7 (since 1.8.6)
2162 * New modules (see the manual for details)
2164 ** `(srfi srfi-98)', an interface to access environment variables
2168 ** Fix compilation with `--disable-deprecated'
2169 ** Fix %fast-slot-ref/set!, to avoid possible segmentation fault
2170 ** Fix MinGW build problem caused by HAVE_STRUCT_TIMESPEC confusion
2171 ** Fix build problem when scm_t_timespec is different from struct timespec
2172 ** Fix build when compiled with -Wundef -Werror
2173 ** More build fixes for `alphaev56-dec-osf5.1b' (Tru64)
2174 ** Build fixes for `powerpc-ibm-aix5.3.0.0' (AIX 5.3)
2175 ** With GCC, always compile with `-mieee' on `alpha*' and `sh*'
2176 ** Better diagnose broken `(strftime "%z" ...)' in `time.test' (bug #24130)
2177 ** Fix parsing of SRFI-88/postfix keywords longer than 128 characters
2178 ** Fix reading of complex numbers where both parts are inexact decimals
2180 ** Allow @ macro to work with (ice-9 syncase)
2182 Previously, use of the @ macro in a module whose code is being
2183 transformed by (ice-9 syncase) would cause an "Invalid syntax" error.
2184 Now it works as you would expect (giving the value of the specified
2187 ** Have `scm_take_locale_symbol ()' return an interned symbol (bug #25865)
2190 Changes in 1.8.6 (since 1.8.5)
2192 * New features (see the manual for details)
2194 ** New convenience function `scm_c_symbol_length ()'
2196 ** Single stepping through code from Emacs
2198 When you use GDS to evaluate Scheme code from Emacs, you can now use
2199 `C-u' to indicate that you want to single step through that code. See
2200 `Evaluating Scheme Code' in the manual for more details.
2202 ** New "guile(1)" man page!
2204 * Changes to the distribution
2206 ** Automake's `AM_MAINTAINER_MODE' is no longer used
2208 Thus, the `--enable-maintainer-mode' configure option is no longer
2209 available: Guile is now always configured in "maintainer mode".
2211 ** `ChangeLog' files are no longer updated
2213 Instead, changes are detailed in the version control system's logs. See
2214 the top-level `ChangeLog' files for details.
2219 ** `symbol->string' now returns a read-only string, as per R5RS
2220 ** Fix incorrect handling of the FLAGS argument of `fold-matches'
2221 ** `guile-config link' now prints `-L$libdir' before `-lguile'
2222 ** Fix memory corruption involving GOOPS' `class-redefinition'
2223 ** Fix possible deadlock in `mutex-lock'
2224 ** Fix build issue on Tru64 and ia64-hp-hpux11.23 (`SCM_UNPACK' macro)
2225 ** Fix build issue on mips, mipsel, powerpc and ia64 (stack direction)
2226 ** Fix build issue on hppa2.0w-hp-hpux11.11 (`dirent64' and `readdir64_r')
2227 ** Fix build issue on i386-unknown-freebsd7.0 ("break strict-aliasing rules")
2228 ** Fix misleading output from `(help rationalize)'
2229 ** Fix build failure on Debian hppa architecture (bad stack growth detection)
2230 ** Fix `gcd' when called with a single, negative argument.
2231 ** Fix `Stack overflow' errors seen when building on some platforms
2232 ** Fix bug when `scm_with_guile ()' was called several times from the
2234 ** The handler of SRFI-34 `with-exception-handler' is now invoked in the
2235 dynamic environment of the call to `raise'
2236 ** Fix potential deadlock in `make-struct'
2237 ** Fix compilation problem with libltdl from Libtool 2.2.x
2238 ** Fix sloppy bound checking in `string-{ref,set!}' with the empty string
2241 Changes in 1.8.5 (since 1.8.4)
2243 * Infrastructure changes
2245 ** Guile repository switched from CVS to Git
2247 The new repository can be accessed using
2248 "git-clone git://git.sv.gnu.org/guile.git", or can be browsed on-line at
2249 http://git.sv.gnu.org/gitweb/?p=guile.git . See `README' for details.
2251 ** Add support for `pkg-config'
2253 See "Autoconf Support" in the manual for details.
2255 * New modules (see the manual for details)
2259 * New features (see the manual for details)
2261 ** New `postfix' read option, for SRFI-88 keyword syntax
2262 ** Some I/O primitives have been inlined, which improves I/O performance
2263 ** New object-based traps infrastructure
2265 This is a GOOPS-based infrastructure that builds on Guile's low-level
2266 evaluator trap calls and facilitates the development of debugging
2267 features like single-stepping, breakpoints, tracing and profiling.
2268 See the `Traps' node of the manual for details.
2270 ** New support for working on Guile code from within Emacs
2272 Guile now incorporates the `GDS' library (previously distributed
2273 separately) for working on Guile code from within Emacs. See the
2274 `Using Guile In Emacs' node of the manual for details.
2278 ** `scm_add_slot ()' no longer segfaults (fixes bug #22369)
2279 ** Fixed `(ice-9 match)' for patterns like `((_ ...) ...)'
2281 Previously, expressions like `(match '((foo) (bar)) (((_ ...) ...) #t))'
2282 would trigger an unbound variable error for `match:andmap'.
2284 ** `(oop goops describe)' now properly provides the `describe' feature
2285 ** Fixed `args-fold' from `(srfi srfi-37)'
2287 Previously, parsing short option names of argument-less options would
2288 lead to a stack overflow.
2290 ** `(srfi srfi-35)' is now visible through `cond-expand'
2291 ** Fixed type-checking for the second argument of `eval'
2292 ** Fixed type-checking for SRFI-1 `partition'
2293 ** Fixed `struct-ref' and `struct-set!' on "light structs"
2294 ** Honor struct field access rights in GOOPS
2295 ** Changed the storage strategy of source properties, which fixes a deadlock
2296 ** Allow compilation of Guile-using programs in C99 mode with GCC 4.3 and later
2297 ** Fixed build issue for GNU/Linux on IA64
2298 ** Fixed build issues on NetBSD 1.6
2299 ** Fixed build issue on Solaris 2.10 x86_64
2300 ** Fixed build issue with DEC/Compaq/HP's compiler
2301 ** Fixed `scm_from_complex_double' build issue on FreeBSD
2302 ** Fixed `alloca' build issue on FreeBSD 6
2303 ** Removed use of non-portable makefile constructs
2304 ** Fixed shadowing of libc's <random.h> on Tru64, which broke compilation
2305 ** Make sure all tests honor `$TMPDIR'
2308 Changes in 1.8.4 (since 1.8.3)
2312 ** CR (ASCII 0x0d) is (again) recognized as a token delimiter by the reader
2313 ** Fixed a segmentation fault which occurred when displaying the
2314 backtrace of a stack with a promise object (made by `delay') in it.
2315 ** Make `accept' leave guile mode while blocking
2316 ** `scm_c_read ()' and `scm_c_write ()' now type-check their port argument
2317 ** Fixed a build problem on AIX (use of func_data identifier)
2318 ** Fixed a segmentation fault which occurred when hashx-ref or hashx-set! was
2319 called with an associator proc that returns neither a pair nor #f.
2320 ** Secondary threads now always return a valid module for (current-module).
2321 ** Avoid MacOS build problems caused by incorrect combination of "64"
2322 system and library calls.
2323 ** `guile-snarf' now honors `$TMPDIR'
2324 ** `guile-config compile' now reports CPPFLAGS used at compile-time
2325 ** Fixed build with Sun Studio (Solaris 9)
2326 ** Fixed wrong-type-arg errors when creating zero length SRFI-4
2327 uniform vectors on AIX.
2328 ** Fixed a deadlock that occurs upon GC with multiple threads.
2329 ** Fixed compile problem with GCC on Solaris and AIX (use of _Complex_I)
2330 ** Fixed autotool-derived build problems on AIX 6.1.
2331 ** Fixed NetBSD/alpha support
2332 ** Fixed MacOS build problem caused by use of rl_get_keymap(_name)
2334 * New modules (see the manual for details)
2338 * Documentation fixes and improvements
2340 ** Removed premature breakpoint documentation
2342 The features described are not available in the series of 1.8.x
2343 releases, so the documentation was misleading and has been removed.
2345 ** More about Guile's default *random-state* variable
2347 ** GOOPS: more about how to use `next-method'
2349 * Changes to the distribution
2351 ** Corrected a few files that referred incorrectly to the old GPL + special exception licence
2353 In fact Guile since 1.8.0 has been licensed with the GNU Lesser
2354 General Public License, and the few incorrect files have now been
2355 fixed to agree with the rest of the Guile distribution.
2357 ** Removed unnecessary extra copies of COPYING*
2359 The distribution now contains a single COPYING.LESSER at its top level.
2362 Changes in 1.8.3 (since 1.8.2)
2364 * New modules (see the manual for details)
2371 ** The `(ice-9 slib)' module now works as expected
2372 ** Expressions like "(set! 'x #t)" no longer yield a crash
2373 ** Warnings about duplicate bindings now go to stderr
2374 ** A memory leak in `make-socket-address' was fixed
2375 ** Alignment issues (e.g., on SPARC) in network routines were fixed
2376 ** A threading issue that showed up at least on NetBSD was fixed
2377 ** Build problems on Solaris and IRIX fixed
2379 * Implementation improvements
2381 ** The reader is now faster, which reduces startup time
2382 ** Procedures returned by `record-accessor' and `record-modifier' are faster
2385 Changes in 1.8.2 (since 1.8.1):
2387 * New procedures (see the manual for details)
2389 ** set-program-arguments
2392 * Incompatible changes
2394 ** The body of a top-level `define' no longer sees the binding being created
2396 In a top-level `define', the binding being created is no longer visible
2397 from the `define' body. This breaks code like
2398 "(define foo (begin (set! foo 1) (+ foo 1)))", where `foo' is now
2399 unbound in the body. However, such code was not R5RS-compliant anyway,
2404 ** Fractions were not `equal?' if stored in unreduced form.
2405 (A subtle problem, since printing a value reduced it, making it work.)
2406 ** srfi-60 `copy-bit' failed on 64-bit systems
2407 ** "guile --use-srfi" option at the REPL can replace core functions
2408 (Programs run with that option were ok, but in the interactive REPL
2409 the core bindings got priority, preventing SRFI replacements or
2411 ** `regexp-exec' doesn't abort() on #\nul in the input or bad flags arg
2412 ** `kill' on mingw throws an error for a PID other than oneself
2413 ** Procedure names are attached to procedure-with-setters
2414 ** Array read syntax works with negative lower bound
2415 ** `array-in-bounds?' fix if an array has different lower bounds on each index
2416 ** `*' returns exact 0 for "(* inexact 0)"
2417 This follows what it always did for "(* 0 inexact)".
2418 ** SRFI-19: Value returned by `(current-time time-process)' was incorrect
2419 ** SRFI-19: `date->julian-day' did not account for timezone offset
2420 ** `ttyname' no longer crashes when passed a non-tty argument
2421 ** `inet-ntop' no longer crashes on SPARC when passed an `AF_INET' address
2422 ** Small memory leaks have been fixed in `make-fluid' and `add-history'
2423 ** GOOPS: Fixed a bug in `method-more-specific?'
2424 ** Build problems on Solaris fixed
2425 ** Build problems on HP-UX IA64 fixed
2426 ** Build problems on MinGW fixed
2429 Changes in 1.8.1 (since 1.8.0):
2431 * LFS functions are now used to access 64-bit files on 32-bit systems.
2433 * New procedures (see the manual for details)
2435 ** primitive-_exit - [Scheme] the-root-module
2436 ** scm_primitive__exit - [C]
2437 ** make-completion-function - [Scheme] (ice-9 readline)
2438 ** scm_c_locale_stringn_to_number - [C]
2439 ** scm_srfi1_append_reverse [C]
2440 ** scm_srfi1_append_reverse_x [C]
2448 ** Build problems have been fixed on MacOS, SunOS, and QNX.
2450 ** `strftime' fix sign of %z timezone offset.
2452 ** A one-dimensional array can now be 'equal?' to a vector.
2454 ** Structures, records, and SRFI-9 records can now be compared with `equal?'.
2456 ** SRFI-14 standard char sets are recomputed upon a successful `setlocale'.
2458 ** `record-accessor' and `record-modifier' now have strict type checks.
2460 Record accessor and modifier procedures now throw an error if the
2461 record type of the record they're given is not the type expected.
2462 (Previously accessors returned #f and modifiers silently did nothing).
2464 ** It is now OK to use both autoload and use-modules on a given module.
2466 ** `apply' checks the number of arguments more carefully on "0 or 1" funcs.
2468 Previously there was no checking on primatives like make-vector that
2469 accept "one or two" arguments. Now there is.
2471 ** The srfi-1 assoc function now calls its equality predicate properly.
2473 Previously srfi-1 assoc would call the equality predicate with the key
2474 last. According to the SRFI, the key should be first.
2476 ** A bug in n-par-for-each and n-for-each-par-map has been fixed.
2478 ** The array-set! procedure no longer segfaults when given a bit vector.
2480 ** Bugs in make-shared-array have been fixed.
2482 ** string<? and friends now follow char<? etc order on 8-bit chars.
2484 ** The format procedure now handles inf and nan values for ~f correctly.
2486 ** exact->inexact should no longer overflow when given certain large fractions.
2488 ** srfi-9 accessor and modifier procedures now have strict record type checks.
2490 This matches the srfi-9 specification.
2492 ** (ice-9 ftw) procedures won't ignore different files with same inode number.
2494 Previously the (ice-9 ftw) procedures would ignore any file that had
2495 the same inode number as a file they had already seen, even if that
2496 file was on a different device.
2499 Changes in 1.8.0 (changes since the 1.6.x series):
2501 * Changes to the distribution
2503 ** Guile is now licensed with the GNU Lesser General Public License.
2505 ** The manual is now licensed with the GNU Free Documentation License.
2507 ** Guile now requires GNU MP (http://swox.com/gmp).
2509 Guile now uses the GNU MP library for arbitrary precision arithmetic.
2511 ** Guile now has separate private and public configuration headers.
2513 That is, things like HAVE_STRING_H no longer leak from Guile's
2516 ** Guile now provides and uses an "effective" version number.
2518 Guile now provides scm_effective_version and effective-version
2519 functions which return the "effective" version number. This is just
2520 the normal full version string without the final micro-version number,
2521 so the current effective-version is "1.8". The effective version
2522 should remain unchanged during a stable series, and should be used for
2523 items like the versioned share directory name
2524 i.e. /usr/share/guile/1.8.
2526 Providing an unchanging version number during a stable release for
2527 things like the versioned share directory can be particularly
2528 important for Guile "add-on" packages, since it provides a directory
2529 that they can install to that won't be changed out from under them
2530 with each micro release during a stable series.
2532 ** Thread implementation has changed.
2534 When you configure "--with-threads=null", you will get the usual
2535 threading API (call-with-new-thread, make-mutex, etc), but you can't
2536 actually create new threads. Also, "--with-threads=no" is now
2537 equivalent to "--with-threads=null". This means that the thread API
2538 is always present, although you might not be able to create new
2541 When you configure "--with-threads=pthreads" or "--with-threads=yes",
2542 you will get threads that are implemented with the portable POSIX
2543 threads. These threads can run concurrently (unlike the previous
2544 "coop" thread implementation), but need to cooperate for things like
2547 The default is "pthreads", unless your platform doesn't have pthreads,
2548 in which case "null" threads are used.
2550 See the manual for details, nodes "Initialization", "Multi-Threading",
2551 "Blocking", and others.
2553 ** There is the new notion of 'discouraged' features.
2555 This is a milder form of deprecation.
2557 Things that are discouraged should not be used in new code, but it is
2558 OK to leave them in old code for now. When a discouraged feature is
2559 used, no warning message is printed like there is for 'deprecated'
2560 features. Also, things that are merely discouraged are nevertheless
2561 implemented efficiently, while deprecated features can be very slow.
2563 You can omit discouraged features from libguile by configuring it with
2564 the '--disable-discouraged' option.
2566 ** Deprecation warnings can be controlled at run-time.
2568 (debug-enable 'warn-deprecated) switches them on and (debug-disable
2569 'warn-deprecated) switches them off.
2571 ** Support for SRFI 61, extended cond syntax for multiple values has
2574 This SRFI is always available.
2576 ** Support for require-extension, SRFI-55, has been added.
2578 The SRFI-55 special form `require-extension' has been added. It is
2579 available at startup, and provides a portable way to load Scheme
2580 extensions. SRFI-55 only requires support for one type of extension,
2581 "srfi"; so a set of SRFIs may be loaded via (require-extension (srfi 1
2584 ** New module (srfi srfi-26) provides support for `cut' and `cute'.
2586 The (srfi srfi-26) module is an implementation of SRFI-26 which
2587 provides the `cut' and `cute' syntax. These may be used to specialize
2588 parameters without currying.
2590 ** New module (srfi srfi-31)
2592 This is an implementation of SRFI-31 which provides a special form
2593 `rec' for recursive evaluation.
2595 ** The modules (srfi srfi-13), (srfi srfi-14) and (srfi srfi-4) have
2596 been merged with the core, making their functionality always
2599 The modules are still available, tho, and you could use them together
2600 with a renaming import, for example.
2602 ** Guile no longer includes its own version of libltdl.
2604 The official version is good enough now.
2606 ** The --enable-htmldoc option has been removed from 'configure'.
2608 Support for translating the documentation into HTML is now always
2609 provided. Use 'make html'.
2611 ** New module (ice-9 serialize):
2613 (serialize FORM1 ...) and (parallelize FORM1 ...) are useful when you
2614 don't trust the thread safety of most of your program, but where you
2615 have some section(s) of code which you consider can run in parallel to
2616 other sections. See ice-9/serialize.scm for more information.
2618 ** The configure option '--disable-arrays' has been removed.
2620 Support for arrays and uniform numeric arrays is now always included
2623 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
2625 ** New command line option `-L'.
2627 This option adds a directory to the front of the load path.
2629 ** New command line option `--no-debug'.
2631 Specifying `--no-debug' on the command line will keep the debugging
2632 evaluator turned off, even for interactive sessions.
2634 ** User-init file ~/.guile is now loaded with the debugging evaluator.
2636 Previously, the normal evaluator would have been used. Using the
2637 debugging evaluator gives better error messages.
2639 ** The '-e' option now 'read's its argument.
2641 This is to allow the new '(@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME)' construct to
2642 be used with '-e'. For example, you can now write a script like
2645 exec guile -e '(@ (demo) main)' -s "$0" "$@"
2648 (define-module (demo)
2652 (format #t "Demo: ~a~%" args))
2655 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
2657 ** Guardians have changed back to their original semantics
2659 Guardians now behave like described in the paper by Dybvig et al. In
2660 particular, they no longer make guarantees about the order in which
2661 they return objects, and they can no longer be greedy.
2663 They no longer drop cyclic data structures.
2665 The C function scm_make_guardian has been changed incompatibly and no
2666 longer takes the 'greedy_p' argument.
2668 ** New function hashx-remove!
2670 This function completes the set of 'hashx' functions.
2672 ** The concept of dynamic roots has been factored into continuation
2673 barriers and dynamic states.
2675 Each thread has a current dynamic state that carries the values of the
2676 fluids. You can create and copy dynamic states and use them as the
2677 second argument for 'eval'. See "Fluids and Dynamic States" in the
2680 To restrict the influence that captured continuations can have on the
2681 control flow, you can errect continuation barriers. See "Continuation
2682 Barriers" in the manual.
2684 The function call-with-dynamic-root now essentially temporarily
2685 installs a new dynamic state and errects a continuation barrier.
2687 ** The default load path no longer includes "." at the end.
2689 Automatically loading modules from the current directory should not
2690 happen by default. If you want to allow it in a more controlled
2691 manner, set the environment variable GUILE_LOAD_PATH or the Scheme
2692 variable %load-path.
2694 ** The uniform vector and array support has been overhauled.
2696 It now complies with SRFI-4 and the weird prototype based uniform
2697 array creation has been deprecated. See the manual for more details.
2699 Some non-compatible changes have been made:
2700 - characters can no longer be stored into byte arrays.
2701 - strings and bit vectors are no longer considered to be uniform numeric
2703 - array-rank throws an error for non-arrays instead of returning zero.
2704 - array-ref does no longer accept non-arrays when no indices are given.
2706 There is the new notion of 'generalized vectors' and corresponding
2707 procedures like 'generalized-vector-ref'. Generalized vectors include
2708 strings, bitvectors, ordinary vectors, and uniform numeric vectors.
2710 Arrays use generalized vectors as their storage, so that you still
2711 have arrays of characters, bits, etc. However, uniform-array-read!
2712 and uniform-array-write can no longer read/write strings and
2715 ** There is now support for copy-on-write substrings, mutation-sharing
2716 substrings and read-only strings.
2718 Three new procedures are related to this: substring/shared,
2719 substring/copy, and substring/read-only. See the manual for more
2722 ** Backtraces will now highlight the value that caused the error.
2724 By default, these values are enclosed in "{...}", such as in this
2733 <unnamed port>:1:1: In procedure car in expression (car (quote a)):
2734 <unnamed port>:1:1: Wrong type (expecting pair): a
2735 ABORT: (wrong-type-arg)
2737 The prefix and suffix used for highlighting can be set via the two new
2738 printer options 'highlight-prefix' and 'highlight-suffix'. For
2739 example, putting this into ~/.guile will output the bad value in bold
2740 on an ANSI terminal:
2742 (print-set! highlight-prefix "\x1b[1m")
2743 (print-set! highlight-suffix "\x1b[22m")
2746 ** 'gettext' support for internationalization has been added.
2748 See the manual for details.
2750 ** New syntax '@' and '@@':
2752 You can now directly refer to variables exported from a module by
2755 (@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME)
2757 For example (@ (ice-9 pretty-print) pretty-print) will directly access
2758 the pretty-print variable exported from the (ice-9 pretty-print)
2759 module. You don't need to 'use' that module first. You can also use
2760 '@' as a target of 'set!', as in (set! (@ mod var) val).
2762 The related syntax (@@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME) works just like '@',
2763 but it can also access variables that have not been exported. It is
2764 intended only for kluges and temporary fixes and for debugging, not
2767 ** Keyword syntax has been made more disciplined.
2769 Previously, the name of a keyword was read as a 'token' but printed as
2770 a symbol. Now, it is read as a general Scheme datum which must be a
2781 ERROR: In expression (a b c):
2785 ERROR: Unbound variable: foo
2790 ERROR: Wrong type (expecting symbol): 12
2794 ERROR: Wrong type (expecting symbol): (a b c)
2798 ** The printing of symbols that might look like keywords can be
2801 The new printer option 'quote-keywordish-symbols' controls how symbols
2802 are printed that have a colon as their first or last character. The
2803 default now is to only quote a symbol with #{...}# when the read
2804 option 'keywords' is not '#f'. Thus:
2806 guile> (define foo (string->symbol ":foo"))
2807 guile> (read-set! keywords #f)
2810 guile> (read-set! keywords 'prefix)
2813 guile> (print-set! quote-keywordish-symbols #f)
2817 ** 'while' now provides 'break' and 'continue'
2819 break and continue were previously bound in a while loop, but not
2820 documented, and continue didn't quite work properly. The undocumented
2821 parameter to break which gave a return value for the while has been
2824 ** 'call-with-current-continuation' is now also available under the name
2827 ** The module system now checks for duplicate bindings.
2829 The module system now can check for name conflicts among imported
2832 The behavior can be controlled by specifying one or more 'duplicates'
2833 handlers. For example, to make Guile return an error for every name
2836 (define-module (foo)
2841 The new default behavior of the module system when a name collision
2842 has been detected is to
2844 1. Give priority to bindings marked as a replacement.
2845 2. Issue a warning (different warning if overriding core binding).
2846 3. Give priority to the last encountered binding (this corresponds to
2849 If you want the old behavior back without replacements or warnings you
2852 (default-duplicate-binding-handler 'last)
2854 to your .guile init file.
2856 ** New define-module option: :replace
2858 :replace works as :export, but, in addition, marks the binding as a
2861 A typical example is `format' in (ice-9 format) which is a replacement
2862 for the core binding `format'.
2864 ** Adding prefixes to imported bindings in the module system
2866 There is now a new :use-module option :prefix. It can be used to add
2867 a prefix to all imported bindings.
2869 (define-module (foo)
2870 :use-module ((bar) :prefix bar:))
2872 will import all bindings exported from bar, but rename them by adding
2875 ** Conflicting generic functions can be automatically merged.
2877 When two imported bindings conflict and they are both generic
2878 functions, the two functions can now be merged automatically. This is
2879 activated with the 'duplicates' handler 'merge-generics'.
2881 ** New function: effective-version
2883 Returns the "effective" version number. This is just the normal full
2884 version string without the final micro-version number. See "Changes
2885 to the distribution" above.
2887 ** New threading functions: parallel, letpar, par-map, and friends
2889 These are convenient ways to run calculations in parallel in new
2890 threads. See "Parallel forms" in the manual for details.
2892 ** New function 'try-mutex'.
2894 This function will attempt to lock a mutex but will return immediately
2895 instead of blocking and indicate failure.
2897 ** Waiting on a condition variable can have a timeout.
2899 The function 'wait-condition-variable' now takes a third, optional
2900 argument that specifies the point in time where the waiting should be
2903 ** New function 'broadcast-condition-variable'.
2905 ** New functions 'all-threads' and 'current-thread'.
2907 ** Signals and system asyncs work better with threads.
2909 The function 'sigaction' now takes a fourth, optional, argument that
2910 specifies the thread that the handler should run in. When the
2911 argument is omitted, the handler will run in the thread that called
2914 Likewise, 'system-async-mark' takes a second, optional, argument that
2915 specifies the thread that the async should run in. When it is
2916 omitted, the async will run in the thread that called
2917 'system-async-mark'.
2919 C code can use the new functions scm_sigaction_for_thread and
2920 scm_system_async_mark_for_thread to pass the new thread argument.
2922 When a thread blocks on a mutex, a condition variable or is waiting
2923 for IO to be possible, it will still execute system asyncs. This can
2924 be used to interrupt such a thread by making it execute a 'throw', for
2927 ** The function 'system-async' is deprecated.
2929 You can now pass any zero-argument procedure to 'system-async-mark'.
2930 The function 'system-async' will just return its argument unchanged
2933 ** New functions 'call-with-blocked-asyncs' and
2934 'call-with-unblocked-asyncs'
2936 The expression (call-with-blocked-asyncs PROC) will call PROC and will
2937 block execution of system asyncs for the current thread by one level
2938 while PROC runs. Likewise, call-with-unblocked-asyncs will call a
2939 procedure and will unblock the execution of system asyncs by one
2940 level for the current thread.
2942 Only system asyncs are affected by these functions.
2944 ** The functions 'mask-signals' and 'unmask-signals' are deprecated.
2946 Use 'call-with-blocked-asyncs' or 'call-with-unblocked-asyncs'
2947 instead. Those functions are easier to use correctly and can be
2950 ** New function 'unsetenv'.
2952 ** New macro 'define-syntax-public'.
2954 It works like 'define-syntax' and also exports the defined macro (but
2957 ** There is support for Infinity and NaNs.
2959 Following PLT Scheme, Guile can now work with infinite numbers, and
2962 There is new syntax for numbers: "+inf.0" (infinity), "-inf.0"
2963 (negative infinity), "+nan.0" (not-a-number), and "-nan.0" (same as
2964 "+nan.0"). These numbers are inexact and have no exact counterpart.
2966 Dividing by an inexact zero returns +inf.0 or -inf.0, depending on the
2967 sign of the dividend. The infinities are integers, and they answer #t
2968 for both 'even?' and 'odd?'. The +nan.0 value is not an integer and is
2969 not '=' to itself, but '+nan.0' is 'eqv?' to itself.
2980 ERROR: Numerical overflow
2982 Two new predicates 'inf?' and 'nan?' can be used to test for the
2985 ** Inexact zero can have a sign.
2987 Guile can now distinguish between plus and minus inexact zero, if your
2988 platform supports this, too. The two zeros are equal according to
2989 '=', but not according to 'eqv?'. For example
3000 ** Guile now has exact rationals.
3002 Guile can now represent fractions such as 1/3 exactly. Computing with
3003 them is also done exactly, of course:
3008 ** 'floor', 'ceiling', 'round' and 'truncate' now return exact numbers
3009 for exact arguments.
3011 For example: (floor 2) now returns an exact 2 where in the past it
3012 returned an inexact 2.0. Likewise, (floor 5/4) returns an exact 1.
3014 ** inexact->exact no longer returns only integers.
3016 Without exact rationals, the closest exact number was always an
3017 integer, but now inexact->exact returns the fraction that is exactly
3018 equal to a floating point number. For example:
3020 (inexact->exact 1.234)
3021 => 694680242521899/562949953421312
3023 When you want the old behavior, use 'round' explicitly:
3025 (inexact->exact (round 1.234))
3028 ** New function 'rationalize'.
3030 This function finds a simple fraction that is close to a given real
3031 number. For example (and compare with inexact->exact above):
3033 (rationalize (inexact->exact 1.234) 1/2000)
3036 Note that, as required by R5RS, rationalize returns only then an exact
3037 result when both its arguments are exact.
3039 ** 'odd?' and 'even?' work also for inexact integers.
3041 Previously, (odd? 1.0) would signal an error since only exact integers
3042 were recognized as integers. Now (odd? 1.0) returns #t, (odd? 2.0)
3043 returns #f and (odd? 1.5) signals an error.
3045 ** Guile now has uninterned symbols.
3047 The new function 'make-symbol' will return an uninterned symbol. This
3048 is a symbol that is unique and is guaranteed to remain unique.
3049 However, uninterned symbols can not yet be read back in.
3051 Use the new function 'symbol-interned?' to check whether a symbol is
3054 ** pretty-print has more options.
3056 The function pretty-print from the (ice-9 pretty-print) module can now
3057 also be invoked with keyword arguments that control things like
3058 maximum output width. See the manual for details.
3060 ** Variables have no longer a special behavior for `equal?'.
3062 Previously, comparing two variables with `equal?' would recursivly
3063 compare their values. This is no longer done. Variables are now only
3064 `equal?' if they are `eq?'.
3066 ** `(begin)' is now valid.
3068 You can now use an empty `begin' form. It will yield #<unspecified>
3069 when evaluated and simply be ignored in a definition context.
3071 ** Deprecated: procedure->macro
3073 Change your code to use 'define-macro' or r5rs macros. Also, be aware
3074 that macro expansion will not be done during evaluation, but prior to
3077 ** Soft ports now allow a `char-ready?' procedure
3079 The vector argument to `make-soft-port' can now have a length of
3080 either 5 or 6. (Previously the length had to be 5.) The optional 6th
3081 element is interpreted as an `input-waiting' thunk -- i.e. a thunk
3082 that returns the number of characters that can be read immediately
3083 without the soft port blocking.
3085 ** Deprecated: undefine
3087 There is no replacement for undefine.
3089 ** The functions make-keyword-from-dash-symbol and keyword-dash-symbol
3090 have been discouraged.
3092 They are relics from a time where a keyword like #:foo was used
3093 directly as a Tcl option "-foo" and thus keywords were internally
3094 stored as a symbol with a starting dash. We now store a symbol
3097 Use symbol->keyword and keyword->symbol instead.
3099 ** The `cheap' debug option is now obsolete
3101 Evaluator trap calls are now unconditionally "cheap" - in other words,
3102 they pass a debug object to the trap handler rather than a full
3103 continuation. The trap handler code can capture a full continuation
3104 by using `call-with-current-continuation' in the usual way, if it so
3107 The `cheap' option is retained for now so as not to break existing
3108 code which gets or sets it, but setting it now has no effect. It will
3109 be removed in the next major Guile release.
3111 ** Evaluator trap calls now support `tweaking'
3113 `Tweaking' means that the trap handler code can modify the Scheme
3114 expression that is about to be evaluated (in the case of an
3115 enter-frame trap) or the value that is being returned (in the case of
3116 an exit-frame trap). The trap handler code indicates that it wants to
3117 do this by returning a pair whose car is the symbol 'instead and whose
3118 cdr is the modified expression or return value.
3120 * Changes to the C interface
3122 ** The functions scm_hash_fn_remove_x and scm_hashx_remove_x no longer
3123 take a 'delete' function argument.
3125 This argument makes no sense since the delete function is used to
3126 remove a pair from an alist, and this must not be configurable.
3128 This is an incompatible change.
3130 ** The GH interface is now subject to the deprecation mechanism
3132 The GH interface has been deprecated for quite some time but now it is
3133 actually removed from Guile when it is configured with
3134 --disable-deprecated.
3136 See the manual "Transitioning away from GH" for more information.
3138 ** A new family of functions for converting between C values and
3139 Scheme values has been added.
3141 These functions follow a common naming scheme and are designed to be
3142 easier to use, thread-safe and more future-proof than the older
3145 - int scm_is_* (...)
3147 These are predicates that return a C boolean: 1 or 0. Instead of
3148 SCM_NFALSEP, you can now use scm_is_true, for example.
3150 - <type> scm_to_<type> (SCM val, ...)
3152 These are functions that convert a Scheme value into an appropriate
3153 C value. For example, you can use scm_to_int to safely convert from
3156 - SCM scm_from_<type> (<type> val, ...)
3158 These functions convert from a C type to a SCM value; for example,
3159 scm_from_int for ints.
3161 There is a huge number of these functions, for numbers, strings,
3162 symbols, vectors, etc. They are documented in the reference manual in
3163 the API section together with the types that they apply to.
3165 ** New functions for dealing with complex numbers in C have been added.
3167 The new functions are scm_c_make_rectangular, scm_c_make_polar,
3168 scm_c_real_part, scm_c_imag_part, scm_c_magnitude and scm_c_angle.
3169 They work like scm_make_rectangular etc but take or return doubles
3172 ** The function scm_make_complex has been discouraged.
3174 Use scm_c_make_rectangular instead.
3176 ** The INUM macros have been deprecated.
3178 A lot of code uses these macros to do general integer conversions,
3179 although the macros only work correctly with fixnums. Use the
3180 following alternatives.
3182 SCM_INUMP -> scm_is_integer or similar
3183 SCM_NINUMP -> !scm_is_integer or similar
3184 SCM_MAKINUM -> scm_from_int or similar
3185 SCM_INUM -> scm_to_int or similar
3187 SCM_VALIDATE_INUM_* -> Do not use these; scm_to_int, etc. will
3188 do the validating for you.
3190 ** The scm_num2<type> and scm_<type>2num functions and scm_make_real
3191 have been discouraged.
3193 Use the newer scm_to_<type> and scm_from_<type> functions instead for
3194 new code. The functions have been discouraged since they don't fit
3197 ** The 'boolean' macros SCM_FALSEP etc have been discouraged.
3199 They have strange names, especially SCM_NFALSEP, and SCM_BOOLP
3200 evaluates its argument twice. Use scm_is_true, etc. instead for new
3203 ** The macro SCM_EQ_P has been discouraged.
3205 Use scm_is_eq for new code, which fits better into the naming
3208 ** The macros SCM_CONSP, SCM_NCONSP, SCM_NULLP, and SCM_NNULLP have
3211 Use the function scm_is_pair or scm_is_null instead.
3213 ** The functions scm_round and scm_truncate have been deprecated and
3214 are now available as scm_c_round and scm_c_truncate, respectively.
3216 These functions occupy the names that scm_round_number and
3217 scm_truncate_number should have.
3219 ** The functions scm_c_string2str, scm_c_substring2str, and
3220 scm_c_symbol2str have been deprecated.
3222 Use scm_to_locale_stringbuf or similar instead, maybe together with
3225 ** New functions scm_c_make_string, scm_c_string_length,
3226 scm_c_string_ref, scm_c_string_set_x, scm_c_substring,
3227 scm_c_substring_shared, scm_c_substring_copy.
3229 These are like scm_make_string, scm_length, etc. but are slightly
3230 easier to use from C.
3232 ** The macros SCM_STRINGP, SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_STRING_LENGTH,
3233 SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, and SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH have been deprecated.
3235 They export too many assumptions about the implementation of strings
3236 and symbols that are no longer true in the presence of
3237 mutation-sharing substrings and when Guile switches to some form of
3240 When working with strings, it is often best to use the normal string
3241 functions provided by Guile, such as scm_c_string_ref,
3242 scm_c_string_set_x, scm_string_append, etc. Be sure to look in the
3243 manual since many more such functions are now provided than
3246 When you want to convert a SCM string to a C string, use the
3247 scm_to_locale_string function or similar instead. For symbols, use
3248 scm_symbol_to_string and then work with that string. Because of the
3249 new string representation, scm_symbol_to_string does not need to copy
3250 and is thus quite efficient.
3252 ** Some string, symbol and keyword functions have been discouraged.
3254 They don't fit into the uniform naming scheme and are not explicit
3255 about the character encoding.
3257 Replace according to the following table:
3259 scm_allocate_string -> scm_c_make_string
3260 scm_take_str -> scm_take_locale_stringn
3261 scm_take0str -> scm_take_locale_string
3262 scm_mem2string -> scm_from_locale_stringn
3263 scm_str2string -> scm_from_locale_string
3264 scm_makfrom0str -> scm_from_locale_string
3265 scm_mem2symbol -> scm_from_locale_symboln
3266 scm_mem2uninterned_symbol -> scm_from_locale_stringn + scm_make_symbol
3267 scm_str2symbol -> scm_from_locale_symbol
3269 SCM_SYMBOL_HASH -> scm_hashq
3270 SCM_SYMBOL_INTERNED_P -> scm_symbol_interned_p
3272 scm_c_make_keyword -> scm_from_locale_keyword
3274 ** The functions scm_keyword_to_symbol and sym_symbol_to_keyword are
3275 now also available to C code.
3277 ** SCM_KEYWORDP and SCM_KEYWORDSYM have been deprecated.
3279 Use scm_is_keyword and scm_keyword_to_symbol instead, but note that
3280 the latter returns the true name of the keyword, not the 'dash name',
3281 as SCM_KEYWORDSYM used to do.
3283 ** A new way to access arrays in a thread-safe and efficient way has
3286 See the manual, node "Accessing Arrays From C".
3288 ** The old uniform vector and bitvector implementations have been
3289 unceremoniously removed.
3291 This implementation exposed the details of the tagging system of
3292 Guile. Use the new C API explained in the manual in node "Uniform
3293 Numeric Vectors" and "Bit Vectors", respectively.
3295 The following macros are gone: SCM_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_BASE,
3296 SCM_UVECTOR_MAXLENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_MAKE_UVECTOR_TAG,
3297 SCM_SET_UVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_BITVECTOR_P, SCM_BITVECTOR_BASE,
3298 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_BASE, SCM_BITVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH,
3299 SCM_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_MAKE_BITVECTOR_TAG,
3300 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_BITVEC_REF, SCM_BITVEC_SET,
3303 ** The macros dealing with vectors have been deprecated.
3305 Use the new functions scm_is_vector, scm_vector_elements,
3306 scm_vector_writable_elements, etc, or scm_is_simple_vector,
3307 SCM_SIMPLE_VECTOR_REF, SCM_SIMPLE_VECTOR_SET, etc instead. See the
3308 manual for more details.
3310 Deprecated are SCM_VECTORP, SCM_VELTS, SCM_VECTOR_MAX_LENGTH,
3311 SCM_VECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_VECTOR_REF, SCM_VECTOR_SET, SCM_WRITABLE_VELTS.
3313 The following macros have been removed: SCM_VECTOR_BASE,
3314 SCM_SET_VECTOR_BASE, SCM_MAKE_VECTOR_TAG, SCM_SET_VECTOR_LENGTH,
3315 SCM_VELTS_AS_STACKITEMS, SCM_SETVELTS, SCM_GC_WRITABLE_VELTS.
3317 ** Some C functions and macros related to arrays have been deprecated.
3319 Migrate according to the following table:
3321 scm_make_uve -> scm_make_typed_array, scm_make_u8vector etc.
3322 scm_make_ra -> scm_make_array
3323 scm_shap2ra -> scm_make_array
3324 scm_cvref -> scm_c_generalized_vector_ref
3325 scm_ra_set_contp -> do not use
3326 scm_aind -> scm_array_handle_pos
3327 scm_raprin1 -> scm_display or scm_write
3329 SCM_ARRAYP -> scm_is_array
3330 SCM_ARRAY_NDIM -> scm_c_array_rank
3331 SCM_ARRAY_DIMS -> scm_array_handle_dims
3332 SCM_ARRAY_CONTP -> do not use
3333 SCM_ARRAY_MEM -> do not use
3334 SCM_ARRAY_V -> scm_array_handle_elements or similar
3335 SCM_ARRAY_BASE -> do not use
3337 ** SCM_CELL_WORD_LOC has been deprecated.
3339 Use the new macro SCM_CELL_OBJECT_LOC instead, which returns a pointer
3340 to a SCM, as opposed to a pointer to a scm_t_bits.
3342 This was done to allow the correct use of pointers into the Scheme
3343 heap. Previously, the heap words were of type scm_t_bits and local
3344 variables and function arguments were of type SCM, making it
3345 non-standards-conformant to have a pointer that can point to both.
3347 ** New macros SCM_SMOB_DATA_2, SCM_SMOB_DATA_3, etc.
3349 These macros should be used instead of SCM_CELL_WORD_2/3 to access the
3350 second and third words of double smobs. Likewise for
3351 SCM_SET_SMOB_DATA_2 and SCM_SET_SMOB_DATA_3.
3353 Also, there is SCM_SMOB_FLAGS and SCM_SET_SMOB_FLAGS that should be
3354 used to get and set the 16 exra bits in the zeroth word of a smob.
3356 And finally, there is SCM_SMOB_OBJECT and SCM_SMOB_SET_OBJECT for
3357 accesing the first immediate word of a smob as a SCM value, and there
3358 is SCM_SMOB_OBJECT_LOC for getting a pointer to the first immediate
3359 smob word. Like wise for SCM_SMOB_OBJECT_2, etc.
3361 ** New way to deal with non-local exits and re-entries.
3363 There is a new set of functions that essentially do what
3364 scm_internal_dynamic_wind does, but in a way that is more convenient
3365 for C code in some situations. Here is a quick example of how to
3366 prevent a potential memory leak:
3373 scm_dynwind_begin (0);
3375 mem = scm_malloc (100);
3376 scm_dynwind_unwind_handler (free, mem, SCM_F_WIND_EXPLICITLY);
3378 /* MEM would leak if BAR throws an error.
3379 SCM_DYNWIND_UNWIND_HANDLER frees it nevertheless.
3386 /* Because of SCM_F_WIND_EXPLICITLY, MEM will be freed by
3387 SCM_DYNWIND_END as well.
3391 For full documentation, see the node "Dynamic Wind" in the manual.
3393 ** New function scm_dynwind_free
3395 This function calls 'free' on a given pointer when a dynwind context
3396 is left. Thus the call to scm_dynwind_unwind_handler above could be
3397 replaced with simply scm_dynwind_free (mem).
3399 ** New functions scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs and
3400 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs
3402 Like scm_call_with_blocked_asyncs etc. but for C functions.
3404 ** New functions scm_dynwind_block_asyncs and scm_dynwind_unblock_asyncs
3406 In addition to scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs you can now also use
3407 scm_dynwind_block_asyncs in a 'dynwind context' (see above). Likewise for
3408 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs and scm_dynwind_unblock_asyncs.
3410 ** The macros SCM_DEFER_INTS, SCM_ALLOW_INTS, SCM_REDEFER_INTS,
3411 SCM_REALLOW_INTS have been deprecated.
3413 They do no longer fulfill their original role of blocking signal
3414 delivery. Depending on what you want to achieve, replace a pair of
3415 SCM_DEFER_INTS and SCM_ALLOW_INTS with a dynwind context that locks a
3416 mutex, blocks asyncs, or both. See node "Critical Sections" in the
3419 ** The value 'scm_mask_ints' is no longer writable.
3421 Previously, you could set scm_mask_ints directly. This is no longer
3422 possible. Use scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs and
3423 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs instead.
3425 ** New way to temporarily set the current input, output or error ports
3427 C code can now use scm_dynwind_current_<foo>_port in a 'dynwind
3428 context' (see above). <foo> is one of "input", "output" or "error".
3430 ** New way to temporarily set fluids
3432 C code can now use scm_dynwind_fluid in a 'dynwind context' (see
3433 above) to temporarily set the value of a fluid.
3435 ** New types scm_t_intmax and scm_t_uintmax.
3437 On platforms that have them, these types are identical to intmax_t and
3438 uintmax_t, respectively. On other platforms, they are identical to
3439 the largest integer types that Guile knows about.
3441 ** The functions scm_unmemocopy and scm_unmemoize have been removed.
3443 You should not have used them.
3445 ** Many public #defines with generic names have been made private.
3447 #defines with generic names like HAVE_FOO or SIZEOF_FOO have been made
3448 private or renamed with a more suitable public name.
3450 ** The macro SCM_TYP16S has been deprecated.
3452 This macro is not intended for public use.
3454 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_INEXACTP has been deprecated.
3456 Use scm_is_true (scm_inexact_p (...)) instead.
3458 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_REALP has been deprecated.
3460 Use scm_is_real instead.
3462 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_COMPLEXP has been deprecated.
3464 Use scm_is_complex instead.
3466 ** Some preprocessor defines have been deprecated.
3468 These defines indicated whether a certain feature was present in Guile
3469 or not. Going forward, assume that the features are always present.
3471 The macros are: USE_THREADS, GUILE_ISELECT, READER_EXTENSIONS,
3472 DEBUG_EXTENSIONS, DYNAMIC_LINKING.
3474 The following macros have been removed completely: MEMOIZE_LOCALS,
3475 SCM_RECKLESS, SCM_CAUTIOUS.
3477 ** The preprocessor define STACK_DIRECTION has been deprecated.
3479 There should be no need to know about the stack direction for ordinary
3482 ** New function: scm_effective_version
3484 Returns the "effective" version number. This is just the normal full
3485 version string without the final micro-version number. See "Changes
3486 to the distribution" above.
3488 ** The function scm_call_with_new_thread has a new prototype.
3490 Instead of taking a list with the thunk and handler, these two
3491 arguments are now passed directly:
3493 SCM scm_call_with_new_thread (SCM thunk, SCM handler);
3495 This is an incompatible change.
3497 ** New snarfer macro SCM_DEFINE_PUBLIC.
3499 This is like SCM_DEFINE, but also calls scm_c_export for the defined
3500 function in the init section.
3502 ** The snarfer macro SCM_SNARF_INIT is now officially supported.
3504 ** Garbage collector rewrite.
3506 The garbage collector is cleaned up a lot, and now uses lazy
3507 sweeping. This is reflected in the output of (gc-stats); since cells
3508 are being freed when they are allocated, the cells-allocated field
3509 stays roughly constant.
3511 For malloc related triggers, the behavior is changed. It uses the same
3512 heuristic as the cell-triggered collections. It may be tuned with the
3513 environment variables GUILE_MIN_YIELD_MALLOC. This is the percentage
3514 for minimum yield of malloc related triggers. The default is 40.
3515 GUILE_INIT_MALLOC_LIMIT sets the initial trigger for doing a GC. The
3518 Debugging operations for the freelist have been deprecated, along with
3519 the C variables that control garbage collection. The environment
3520 variables GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE, GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_2,
3521 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_1, and GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2 should be used.
3523 For understanding the memory usage of a GUILE program, the routine
3524 gc-live-object-stats returns an alist containing the number of live
3525 objects for every type.
3528 ** The function scm_definedp has been renamed to scm_defined_p
3530 The name scm_definedp is deprecated.
3532 ** The struct scm_cell type has been renamed to scm_t_cell
3534 This is in accordance to Guile's naming scheme for types. Note that
3535 the name scm_cell is now used for a function that allocates and
3536 initializes a new cell (see below).
3538 ** New functions for memory management
3540 A new set of functions for memory management has been added since the
3541 old way (scm_must_malloc, scm_must_free, etc) was error prone and
3542 indeed, Guile itself contained some long standing bugs that could
3543 cause aborts in long running programs.
3545 The new functions are more symmetrical and do not need cooperation
3546 from smob free routines, among other improvements.
3548 The new functions are scm_malloc, scm_realloc, scm_calloc, scm_strdup,
3549 scm_strndup, scm_gc_malloc, scm_gc_calloc, scm_gc_realloc,
3550 scm_gc_free, scm_gc_register_collectable_memory, and
3551 scm_gc_unregister_collectable_memory. Refer to the manual for more
3552 details and for upgrading instructions.
3554 The old functions for memory management have been deprecated. They
3555 are: scm_must_malloc, scm_must_realloc, scm_must_free,
3556 scm_must_strdup, scm_must_strndup, scm_done_malloc, scm_done_free.
3558 ** Declarations of exported features are marked with SCM_API.
3560 Every declaration of a feature that belongs to the exported Guile API
3561 has been marked by adding the macro "SCM_API" to the start of the
3562 declaration. This macro can expand into different things, the most
3563 common of which is just "extern" for Unix platforms. On Win32, it can
3564 be used to control which symbols are exported from a DLL.
3566 If you `#define SCM_IMPORT' before including <libguile.h>, SCM_API
3567 will expand into "__declspec (dllimport) extern", which is needed for
3568 linking to the Guile DLL in Windows.
3570 There are also SCM_RL_IMPORT, SCM_SRFI1314_IMPORT, and
3571 SCM_SRFI4_IMPORT, for the corresponding libraries.
3573 ** SCM_NEWCELL and SCM_NEWCELL2 have been deprecated.
3575 Use the new functions scm_cell and scm_double_cell instead. The old
3576 macros had problems because with them allocation and initialization
3577 was separated and the GC could sometimes observe half initialized
3578 cells. Only careful coding by the user of SCM_NEWCELL and
3579 SCM_NEWCELL2 could make this safe and efficient.
3581 ** CHECK_ENTRY, CHECK_APPLY and CHECK_EXIT have been deprecated.
3583 Use the variables scm_check_entry_p, scm_check_apply_p and scm_check_exit_p
3586 ** SRCBRKP has been deprecated.
3588 Use scm_c_source_property_breakpoint_p instead.
3590 ** Deprecated: scm_makmacro
3592 Change your code to use either scm_makmmacro or to define macros in
3593 Scheme, using 'define-macro'.
3595 ** New function scm_c_port_for_each.
3597 This function is like scm_port_for_each but takes a pointer to a C
3598 function as the callback instead of a SCM value.
3600 ** The names scm_internal_select, scm_thread_sleep, and
3601 scm_thread_usleep have been discouraged.
3603 Use scm_std_select, scm_std_sleep, scm_std_usleep instead.
3605 ** The GC can no longer be blocked.
3607 The global flags scm_gc_heap_lock and scm_block_gc have been removed.
3608 The GC can now run (partially) concurrently with other code and thus
3609 blocking it is not well defined.
3611 ** Many definitions have been removed that were previously deprecated.
3613 scm_lisp_nil, scm_lisp_t, s_nil_ify, scm_m_nil_ify, s_t_ify,
3614 scm_m_t_ify, s_0_cond, scm_m_0_cond, s_0_ify, scm_m_0_ify, s_1_ify,
3615 scm_m_1_ify, scm_debug_newcell, scm_debug_newcell2,
3616 scm_tc16_allocated, SCM_SET_SYMBOL_HASH, SCM_IM_NIL_IFY, SCM_IM_T_IFY,
3617 SCM_IM_0_COND, SCM_IM_0_IFY, SCM_IM_1_IFY, SCM_GC_SET_ALLOCATED,
3618 scm_debug_newcell, scm_debug_newcell2, SCM_HUP_SIGNAL, SCM_INT_SIGNAL,
3619 SCM_FPE_SIGNAL, SCM_BUS_SIGNAL, SCM_SEGV_SIGNAL, SCM_ALRM_SIGNAL,
3620 SCM_GC_SIGNAL, SCM_TICK_SIGNAL, SCM_SIG_ORD, SCM_ORD_SIG,
3621 SCM_NUM_SIGS, scm_top_level_lookup_closure_var,
3622 *top-level-lookup-closure*, scm_system_transformer, scm_eval_3,
3623 scm_eval2, root_module_lookup_closure, SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP,
3624 SCM_RWSTRINGP, scm_read_only_string_p, scm_make_shared_substring,
3625 scm_tc7_substring, sym_huh, SCM_VARVCELL, SCM_UDVARIABLEP,
3626 SCM_DEFVARIABLEP, scm_mkbig, scm_big2inum, scm_adjbig, scm_normbig,
3627 scm_copybig, scm_2ulong2big, scm_dbl2big, scm_big2dbl, SCM_FIXNUM_BIT,
3628 SCM_SETCHARS, SCM_SLOPPY_SUBSTRP, SCM_SUBSTR_STR, SCM_SUBSTR_OFFSET,
3629 SCM_LENGTH_MAX, SCM_SETLENGTH, SCM_ROSTRINGP, SCM_ROLENGTH,
3630 SCM_ROCHARS, SCM_ROUCHARS, SCM_SUBSTRP, SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR,
3631 scm_sym2vcell, scm_intern, scm_intern0, scm_sysintern, scm_sysintern0,
3632 scm_sysintern0_no_module_lookup, scm_init_symbols_deprecated,
3633 scm_vector_set_length_x, scm_contregs, scm_debug_info,
3634 scm_debug_frame, SCM_DSIDEVAL, SCM_CONST_LONG, SCM_VCELL,
3635 SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL, SCM_VCELL_INIT, SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL_INIT,
3636 SCM_HUGE_LENGTH, SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR, SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING,
3637 SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING_COPY, SCM_VALIDATE_NULLORROSTRING_COPY,
3638 SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING, DIGITS, scm_small_istr2int, scm_istr2int,
3639 scm_istr2flo, scm_istring2number, scm_istr2int, scm_istr2flo,
3640 scm_istring2number, scm_vtable_index_vcell, scm_si_vcell, SCM_ECONSP,
3641 SCM_NECONSP, SCM_GLOC_VAR, SCM_GLOC_VAL, SCM_GLOC_SET_VAL,
3642 SCM_GLOC_VAL_LOC, scm_make_gloc, scm_gloc_p, scm_tc16_variable,
3643 SCM_CHARS, SCM_LENGTH, SCM_SET_STRING_CHARS, SCM_SET_STRING_LENGTH.
3645 * Changes to bundled modules
3649 Using the (ice-9 debug) module no longer automatically switches Guile
3650 to use the debugging evaluator. If you want to switch to the
3651 debugging evaluator (which is needed for backtrace information if you
3652 hit an error), please add an explicit "(debug-enable 'debug)" to your
3653 code just after the code to use (ice-9 debug).
3656 Changes since Guile 1.4:
3658 * Changes to the distribution
3660 ** A top-level TODO file is included.
3662 ** Guile now uses a versioning scheme similar to that of the Linux kernel.
3664 Guile now always uses three numbers to represent the version,
3665 i.e. "1.6.5". The first number, 1, is the major version number, the
3666 second number, 6, is the minor version number, and the third number,
3667 5, is the micro version number. Changes in major version number
3668 indicate major changes in Guile.
3670 Minor version numbers that are even denote stable releases, and odd
3671 minor version numbers denote development versions (which may be
3672 unstable). The micro version number indicates a minor sub-revision of
3673 a given MAJOR.MINOR release.
3675 In keeping with the new scheme, (minor-version) and scm_minor_version
3676 no longer return everything but the major version number. They now
3677 just return the minor version number. Two new functions
3678 (micro-version) and scm_micro_version have been added to report the
3679 micro version number.
3681 In addition, ./GUILE-VERSION now defines GUILE_MICRO_VERSION.
3683 ** New preprocessor definitions are available for checking versions.
3685 version.h now #defines SCM_MAJOR_VERSION, SCM_MINOR_VERSION, and
3686 SCM_MICRO_VERSION to the appropriate integer values.
3688 ** Guile now actively warns about deprecated features.
3690 The new configure option `--enable-deprecated=LEVEL' and the
3691 environment variable GUILE_WARN_DEPRECATED control this mechanism.
3692 See INSTALL and README for more information.
3694 ** Guile is much more likely to work on 64-bit architectures.
3696 Guile now compiles and passes "make check" with only two UNRESOLVED GC
3697 cases on Alpha and ia64 based machines now. Thanks to John Goerzen
3698 for the use of a test machine, and thanks to Stefan Jahn for ia64
3701 ** New functions: setitimer and getitimer.
3703 These implement a fairly direct interface to the libc functions of the
3706 ** The #. reader extension is now disabled by default.
3708 For safety reasons, #. evaluation is disabled by default. To
3709 re-enable it, set the fluid read-eval? to #t. For example:
3711 (fluid-set! read-eval? #t)
3713 but make sure you realize the potential security risks involved. With
3714 read-eval? enabled, reading a data file from an untrusted source can
3717 ** New SRFI modules have been added:
3719 SRFI-0 `cond-expand' is now supported in Guile, without requiring
3722 (srfi srfi-1) is a library containing many useful pair- and list-processing
3725 (srfi srfi-2) exports and-let*.
3727 (srfi srfi-4) implements homogeneous numeric vector datatypes.
3729 (srfi srfi-6) is a dummy module for now, since guile already provides
3730 all of the srfi-6 procedures by default: open-input-string,
3731 open-output-string, get-output-string.
3733 (srfi srfi-8) exports receive.
3735 (srfi srfi-9) exports define-record-type.
3737 (srfi srfi-10) exports define-reader-ctor and implements the reader
3740 (srfi srfi-11) exports let-values and let*-values.
3742 (srfi srfi-13) implements the SRFI String Library.
3744 (srfi srfi-14) implements the SRFI Character-Set Library.
3746 (srfi srfi-17) implements setter and getter-with-setter and redefines
3747 some accessor procedures as procedures with getters. (such as car,
3748 cdr, vector-ref etc.)
3750 (srfi srfi-19) implements the SRFI Time/Date Library.
3752 ** New scripts / "executable modules"
3754 Subdirectory "scripts" contains Scheme modules that are packaged to
3755 also be executable as scripts. At this time, these scripts are available:
3764 See README there for more info.
3766 These scripts can be invoked from the shell with the new program
3767 "guile-tools", which keeps track of installation directory for you.
3770 $ guile-tools display-commentary srfi/*.scm
3772 guile-tools is copied to the standard $bindir on "make install".
3774 ** New module (ice-9 stack-catch):
3776 stack-catch is like catch, but saves the current state of the stack in
3777 the fluid the-last-stack. This fluid can be useful when using the
3778 debugger and when re-throwing an error.
3780 ** The module (ice-9 and-let*) has been renamed to (ice-9 and-let-star)
3782 This has been done to prevent problems on lesser operating systems
3783 that can't tolerate `*'s in file names. The exported macro continues
3784 to be named `and-let*', of course.
3786 On systems that support it, there is also a compatibility module named
3787 (ice-9 and-let*). It will go away in the next release.
3789 ** New modules (oop goops) etc.:
3792 (oop goops describe)
3794 (oop goops active-slot)
3795 (oop goops composite-slot)
3797 The Guile Object Oriented Programming System (GOOPS) has been
3798 integrated into Guile. For further information, consult the GOOPS
3799 manual and tutorial in the `doc' directory.
3801 ** New module (ice-9 rdelim).
3803 This exports the following procedures which were previously defined
3804 in the default environment:
3806 read-line read-line! read-delimited read-delimited! %read-delimited!
3807 %read-line write-line
3809 For backwards compatibility the definitions are still imported into the
3810 default environment in this version of Guile. However you should add:
3812 (use-modules (ice-9 rdelim))
3814 to any program which uses the definitions, since this may change in
3817 Alternatively, if guile-scsh is installed, the (scsh rdelim) module
3818 can be used for similar functionality.
3820 ** New module (ice-9 rw)
3822 This is a subset of the (scsh rw) module from guile-scsh. Currently
3823 it defines two procedures:
3825 *** New function: read-string!/partial str [port_or_fdes [start [end]]]
3827 Read characters from a port or file descriptor into a string STR.
3828 A port must have an underlying file descriptor -- a so-called
3829 fport. This procedure is scsh-compatible and can efficiently read
3832 *** New function: write-string/partial str [port_or_fdes [start [end]]]
3834 Write characters from a string STR to a port or file descriptor.
3835 A port must have an underlying file descriptor -- a so-called
3836 fport. This procedure is mostly compatible and can efficiently
3837 write large strings.
3839 ** New module (ice-9 match)
3841 This module includes Andrew K. Wright's pattern matcher. See
3842 ice-9/match.scm for brief description or
3844 http://www.star-lab.com/wright/code.html
3846 for complete documentation.
3848 ** New module (ice-9 buffered-input)
3850 This module provides procedures to construct an input port from an
3851 underlying source of input that reads and returns its input in chunks.
3852 The underlying input source is a Scheme procedure, specified by the
3853 caller, which the port invokes whenever it needs more input.
3855 This is useful when building an input port whose back end is Readline
3856 or a UI element such as the GtkEntry widget.
3860 The reference and tutorial documentation that was previously
3861 distributed separately, as `guile-doc', is now included in the core
3862 Guile distribution. The documentation consists of the following
3865 - The Guile Tutorial (guile-tut.texi) contains a tutorial introduction
3868 - The Guile Reference Manual (guile.texi) contains (or is intended to
3869 contain) reference documentation on all aspects of Guile.
3871 - The GOOPS Manual (goops.texi) contains both tutorial-style and
3872 reference documentation for using GOOPS, Guile's Object Oriented
3875 - The Revised^5 Report on the Algorithmic Language Scheme
3878 See the README file in the `doc' directory for more details.
3880 ** There are a couple of examples in the examples/ directory now.
3882 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
3884 ** New command line option `--use-srfi'
3886 Using this option, SRFI modules can be loaded on startup and be
3887 available right from the beginning. This makes programming portable
3888 Scheme programs easier.
3890 The option `--use-srfi' expects a comma-separated list of numbers,
3891 each representing a SRFI number to be loaded into the interpreter
3892 before starting evaluating a script file or the REPL. Additionally,
3893 the feature identifier for the loaded SRFIs is recognized by
3894 `cond-expand' when using this option.
3897 $ guile --use-srfi=8,13
3898 guile> (receive (x z) (values 1 2) (+ 1 2))
3900 guile> (string-pad "bla" 20)
3903 ** Guile now always starts up in the `(guile-user)' module.
3905 Previously, scripts executed via the `-s' option would run in the
3906 `(guile)' module and the repl would run in the `(guile-user)' module.
3907 Now every user action takes place in the `(guile-user)' module by
3910 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
3912 ** Character classifiers work for non-ASCII characters.
3914 The predicates `char-alphabetic?', `char-numeric?',
3915 `char-whitespace?', `char-lower?', `char-upper?' and `char-is-both?'
3916 no longer check whether their arguments are ASCII characters.
3917 Previously, a character would only be considered alphabetic when it
3918 was also ASCII, for example.
3920 ** Previously deprecated Scheme functions have been removed:
3922 tag - no replacement.
3923 fseek - replaced by seek.
3924 list* - replaced by cons*.
3926 ** It's now possible to create modules with controlled environments
3930 (use-modules (ice-9 safe))
3931 (define m (make-safe-module))
3932 ;;; m will now be a module containing only a safe subset of R5RS
3933 (eval '(+ 1 2) m) --> 3
3934 (eval 'load m) --> ERROR: Unbound variable: load
3936 ** Evaluation of "()", the empty list, is now an error.
3938 Previously, the expression "()" evaluated to the empty list. This has
3939 been changed to signal a "missing expression" error. The correct way
3940 to write the empty list as a literal constant is to use quote: "'()".
3942 ** New concept of `Guile Extensions'.
3944 A Guile Extension is just a ordinary shared library that can be linked
3945 at run-time. We found it advantageous to give this simple concept a
3946 dedicated name to distinguish the issues related to shared libraries
3947 from the issues related to the module system.
3949 *** New function: load-extension
3951 Executing (load-extension lib init) is mostly equivalent to
3953 (dynamic-call init (dynamic-link lib))
3955 except when scm_register_extension has been called previously.
3956 Whenever appropriate, you should use `load-extension' instead of
3957 dynamic-link and dynamic-call.
3959 *** New C function: scm_c_register_extension
3961 This function registers a initialization function for use by
3962 `load-extension'. Use it when you don't want specific extensions to
3963 be loaded as shared libraries (for example on platforms that don't
3964 support dynamic linking).
3966 ** Auto-loading of compiled-code modules is deprecated.
3968 Guile used to be able to automatically find and link a shared
3969 library to satisfy requests for a module. For example, the module
3970 `(foo bar)' could be implemented by placing a shared library named
3971 "foo/libbar.so" (or with a different extension) in a directory on the
3974 This has been found to be too tricky, and is no longer supported. The
3975 shared libraries are now called "extensions". You should now write a
3976 small Scheme file that calls `load-extension' to load the shared
3977 library and initialize it explicitly.
3979 The shared libraries themselves should be installed in the usual
3980 places for shared libraries, with names like "libguile-foo-bar".
3982 For example, place this into a file "foo/bar.scm"
3984 (define-module (foo bar))
3986 (load-extension "libguile-foo-bar" "foobar_init")
3988 ** Backward incompatible change: eval EXP ENVIRONMENT-SPECIFIER
3990 `eval' is now R5RS, that is it takes two arguments.
3991 The second argument is an environment specifier, i.e. either
3993 (scheme-report-environment 5)
3994 (null-environment 5)
3995 (interaction-environment)
4001 ** The module system has been made more disciplined.
4003 The function `eval' will save and restore the current module around
4004 the evaluation of the specified expression. While this expression is
4005 evaluated, `(current-module)' will now return the right module, which
4006 is the module specified as the second argument to `eval'.
4008 A consequence of this change is that `eval' is not particularly
4009 useful when you want allow the evaluated code to change what module is
4010 designated as the current module and have this change persist from one
4011 call to `eval' to the next. The read-eval-print-loop is an example
4012 where `eval' is now inadequate. To compensate, there is a new
4013 function `primitive-eval' that does not take a module specifier and
4014 that does not save/restore the current module. You should use this
4015 function together with `set-current-module', `current-module', etc
4016 when you want to have more control over the state that is carried from
4017 one eval to the next.
4019 Additionally, it has been made sure that forms that are evaluated at
4020 the top level are always evaluated with respect to the current module.
4021 Previously, subforms of top-level forms such as `begin', `case',
4022 etc. did not respect changes to the current module although these
4023 subforms are at the top-level as well.
4025 To prevent strange behavior, the forms `define-module',
4026 `use-modules', `use-syntax', and `export' have been restricted to only
4027 work on the top level. The forms `define-public' and
4028 `defmacro-public' only export the new binding on the top level. They
4029 behave just like `define' and `defmacro', respectively, when they are
4030 used in a lexical environment.
4032 Also, `export' will no longer silently re-export bindings imported
4033 from a used module. It will emit a `deprecation' warning and will
4034 cease to perform any re-export in the next version. If you actually
4035 want to re-export bindings, use the new `re-export' in place of
4036 `export'. The new `re-export' will not make copies of variables when
4037 rexporting them, as `export' did wrongly.
4039 ** Module system now allows selection and renaming of imported bindings
4041 Previously, when using `use-modules' or the `#:use-module' clause in
4042 the `define-module' form, all the bindings (association of symbols to
4043 values) for imported modules were added to the "current module" on an
4044 as-is basis. This has been changed to allow finer control through two
4045 new facilities: selection and renaming.
4047 You can now select which of the imported module's bindings are to be
4048 visible in the current module by using the `:select' clause. This
4049 clause also can be used to rename individual bindings. For example:
4051 ;; import all bindings no questions asked
4052 (use-modules (ice-9 common-list))
4054 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them;
4055 ;; the current module sees: every some zonk-y zonk-n
4056 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
4058 (remove-if . zonk-y)
4059 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))))
4061 You can also programmatically rename all selected bindings using the
4062 `:renamer' clause, which specifies a proc that takes a symbol and
4063 returns another symbol. Because it is common practice to use a prefix,
4064 we now provide the convenience procedure `symbol-prefix-proc'. For
4067 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them specifically,
4068 ;; and all four w/ prefix "CL:";
4069 ;; the current module sees: CL:every CL:some CL:zonk-y CL:zonk-n
4070 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
4072 (remove-if . zonk-y)
4073 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))
4074 :renamer (symbol-prefix-proc 'CL:)))
4076 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them specifically,
4077 ;; and all four by upcasing.
4078 ;; the current module sees: EVERY SOME ZONK-Y ZONK-N
4079 (define (upcase-symbol sym)
4080 (string->symbol (string-upcase (symbol->string sym))))
4082 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
4084 (remove-if . zonk-y)
4085 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))
4086 :renamer upcase-symbol))
4088 Note that programmatic renaming is done *after* individual renaming.
4089 Also, the above examples show `use-modules', but the same facilities are
4090 available for the `#:use-module' clause of `define-module'.
4092 See manual for more info.
4094 ** The semantics of guardians have changed.
4096 The changes are for the most part compatible. An important criterion
4097 was to keep the typical usage of guardians as simple as before, but to
4098 make the semantics safer and (as a result) more useful.
4100 *** All objects returned from guardians are now properly alive.
4102 It is now guaranteed that any object referenced by an object returned
4103 from a guardian is alive. It's now impossible for a guardian to
4104 return a "contained" object before its "containing" object.
4106 One incompatible (but probably not very important) change resulting
4107 from this is that it is no longer possible to guard objects that
4108 indirectly reference themselves (i.e. are parts of cycles). If you do
4109 so accidentally, you'll get a warning.
4111 *** There are now two types of guardians: greedy and sharing.
4113 If you call (make-guardian #t) or just (make-guardian), you'll get a
4114 greedy guardian, and for (make-guardian #f) a sharing guardian.
4116 Greedy guardians are the default because they are more "defensive".
4117 You can only greedily guard an object once. If you guard an object
4118 more than once, once in a greedy guardian and the rest of times in
4119 sharing guardians, then it is guaranteed that the object won't be
4120 returned from sharing guardians as long as it is greedily guarded
4123 Guardians returned by calls to `make-guardian' can now take one more
4124 optional parameter, which says whether to throw an error in case an
4125 attempt is made to greedily guard an object that is already greedily
4126 guarded. The default is true, i.e. throw an error. If the parameter
4127 is false, the guardian invocation returns #t if guarding was
4128 successful and #f if it wasn't.
4130 Also, since greedy guarding is, in effect, a side-effecting operation
4131 on objects, a new function is introduced: `destroy-guardian!'.
4132 Invoking this function on a guardian renders it unoperative and, if
4133 the guardian is greedy, clears the "greedily guarded" property of the
4134 objects that were guarded by it, thus undoing the side effect.
4136 Note that all this hair is hardly very important, since guardian
4137 objects are usually permanent.
4139 ** Continuations created by call-with-current-continuation now accept
4140 any number of arguments, as required by R5RS.
4142 ** New function `issue-deprecation-warning'
4144 This function is used to display the deprecation messages that are
4145 controlled by GUILE_WARN_DEPRECATION as explained in the README.
4148 (issue-deprecation-warning "`id' is deprecated. Use `identity' instead.")
4152 ;; `id' is deprecated. Use `identity' instead.
4157 ** New syntax `begin-deprecated'
4159 When deprecated features are included (as determined by the configure
4160 option --enable-deprecated), `begin-deprecated' is identical to
4161 `begin'. When deprecated features are excluded, it always evaluates
4162 to `#f', ignoring the body forms.
4164 ** New function `make-object-property'
4166 This function returns a new `procedure with setter' P that can be used
4167 to attach a property to objects. When calling P as
4171 where `obj' is any kind of object, it attaches `val' to `obj' in such
4172 a way that it can be retrieved by calling P as
4176 This function will replace procedure properties, symbol properties and
4177 source properties eventually.
4179 ** Module (ice-9 optargs) now uses keywords instead of `#&'.
4181 Instead of #&optional, #&key, etc you should now use #:optional,
4182 #:key, etc. Since #:optional is a keyword, you can write it as just
4183 :optional when (read-set! keywords 'prefix) is active.
4185 The old reader syntax `#&' is still supported, but deprecated. It
4186 will be removed in the next release.
4188 ** New define-module option: pure
4190 Tells the module system not to include any bindings from the root
4195 (define-module (totally-empty-module)
4198 ** New define-module option: export NAME1 ...
4200 Export names NAME1 ...
4202 This option is required if you want to be able to export bindings from
4203 a module which doesn't import one of `define-public' or `export'.
4207 (define-module (foo)
4209 :use-module (ice-9 r5rs)
4212 ;;; Note that we're pure R5RS below this point!
4217 ** New function: object->string OBJ
4219 Return a Scheme string obtained by printing a given object.
4221 ** New function: port? X
4223 Returns a boolean indicating whether X is a port. Equivalent to
4224 `(or (input-port? X) (output-port? X))'.
4226 ** New function: file-port?
4228 Determines whether a given object is a port that is related to a file.
4230 ** New function: port-for-each proc
4232 Apply PROC to each port in the Guile port table in turn. The return
4233 value is unspecified. More specifically, PROC is applied exactly once
4234 to every port that exists in the system at the time PORT-FOR-EACH is
4235 invoked. Changes to the port table while PORT-FOR-EACH is running
4236 have no effect as far as PORT-FOR-EACH is concerned.
4238 ** New function: dup2 oldfd newfd
4240 A simple wrapper for the `dup2' system call. Copies the file
4241 descriptor OLDFD to descriptor number NEWFD, replacing the
4242 previous meaning of NEWFD. Both OLDFD and NEWFD must be integers.
4243 Unlike for dup->fdes or primitive-move->fdes, no attempt is made
4244 to move away ports which are using NEWFD. The return value is
4247 ** New function: close-fdes fd
4249 A simple wrapper for the `close' system call. Close file
4250 descriptor FD, which must be an integer. Unlike close (*note
4251 close: Ports and File Descriptors.), the file descriptor will be
4252 closed even if a port is using it. The return value is
4255 ** New function: crypt password salt
4257 Encrypts `password' using the standard unix password encryption
4260 ** New function: chroot path
4262 Change the root directory of the running process to `path'.
4264 ** New functions: getlogin, cuserid
4266 Return the login name or the user name of the current effective user
4269 ** New functions: getpriority which who, setpriority which who prio
4271 Get or set the priority of the running process.
4273 ** New function: getpass prompt
4275 Read a password from the terminal, first displaying `prompt' and
4278 ** New function: flock file operation
4280 Set/remove an advisory shared or exclusive lock on `file'.
4282 ** New functions: sethostname name, gethostname
4284 Set or get the hostname of the machine the current process is running
4287 ** New function: mkstemp! tmpl
4289 mkstemp creates a new unique file in the file system and returns a
4290 new buffered port open for reading and writing to the file. TMPL
4291 is a string specifying where the file should be created: it must
4292 end with `XXXXXX' and will be changed in place to return the name
4293 of the temporary file.
4295 ** New function: open-input-string string
4297 Return an input string port which delivers the characters from
4298 `string'. This procedure, together with `open-output-string' and
4299 `get-output-string' implements SRFI-6.
4301 ** New function: open-output-string
4303 Return an output string port which collects all data written to it.
4304 The data can then be retrieved by `get-output-string'.
4306 ** New function: get-output-string
4308 Return the contents of an output string port.
4310 ** New function: identity
4312 Return the argument.
4314 ** socket, connect, accept etc., now have support for IPv6. IPv6 addresses
4315 are represented in Scheme as integers with normal host byte ordering.
4317 ** New function: inet-pton family address
4319 Convert a printable string network address into an integer. Note that
4320 unlike the C version of this function, the result is an integer with
4321 normal host byte ordering. FAMILY can be `AF_INET' or `AF_INET6'.
4324 (inet-pton AF_INET "127.0.0.1") => 2130706433
4325 (inet-pton AF_INET6 "::1") => 1
4327 ** New function: inet-ntop family address
4329 Convert an integer network address into a printable string. Note that
4330 unlike the C version of this function, the input is an integer with
4331 normal host byte ordering. FAMILY can be `AF_INET' or `AF_INET6'.
4334 (inet-ntop AF_INET 2130706433) => "127.0.0.1"
4335 (inet-ntop AF_INET6 (- (expt 2 128) 1)) =>
4336 ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff
4340 Use `identity' instead.
4346 ** Deprecated: return-it
4350 ** Deprecated: string-character-length
4352 Use `string-length' instead.
4354 ** Deprecated: flags
4356 Use `logior' instead.
4358 ** Deprecated: close-all-ports-except.
4360 This was intended for closing ports in a child process after a fork,
4361 but it has the undesirable side effect of flushing buffers.
4362 port-for-each is more flexible.
4364 ** The (ice-9 popen) module now attempts to set up file descriptors in
4365 the child process from the current Scheme ports, instead of using the
4366 current values of file descriptors 0, 1, and 2 in the parent process.
4368 ** Removed function: builtin-weak-bindings
4370 There is no such concept as a weak binding any more.
4372 ** Removed constants: bignum-radix, scm-line-incrementors
4374 ** define-method: New syntax mandatory.
4376 The new method syntax is now mandatory:
4378 (define-method (NAME ARG-SPEC ...) BODY ...)
4379 (define-method (NAME ARG-SPEC ... . REST-ARG) BODY ...)
4381 ARG-SPEC ::= ARG-NAME | (ARG-NAME TYPE)
4382 REST-ARG ::= ARG-NAME
4384 If you have old code using the old syntax, import
4385 (oop goops old-define-method) before (oop goops) as in:
4387 (use-modules (oop goops old-define-method) (oop goops))
4389 ** Deprecated function: builtin-variable
4390 Removed function: builtin-bindings
4392 There is no longer a distinction between builtin or other variables.
4393 Use module system operations for all variables.
4395 ** Lazy-catch handlers are no longer allowed to return.
4397 That is, a call to `throw', `error', etc is now guaranteed to not
4400 ** Bugfixes for (ice-9 getopt-long)
4402 This module is now tested using test-suite/tests/getopt-long.test.
4403 The following bugs have been fixed:
4405 *** Parsing for options that are specified to have `optional' args now checks
4406 if the next element is an option instead of unconditionally taking it as the
4409 *** An error is now thrown for `--opt=val' when the option description
4410 does not specify `(value #t)' or `(value optional)'. This condition used to
4411 be accepted w/o error, contrary to the documentation.
4413 *** The error message for unrecognized options is now more informative.
4414 It used to be "not a record", an artifact of the implementation.
4416 *** The error message for `--opt' terminating the arg list (no value), when
4417 `(value #t)' is specified, is now more informative. It used to be "not enough
4420 *** "Clumped" single-char args now preserve trailing string, use it as arg.
4421 The expansion used to be like so:
4423 ("-abc5d" "--xyz") => ("-a" "-b" "-c" "--xyz")
4425 Note that the "5d" is dropped. Now it is like so:
4427 ("-abc5d" "--xyz") => ("-a" "-b" "-c" "5d" "--xyz")
4429 This enables single-char options to have adjoining arguments as long as their
4430 constituent characters are not potential single-char options.
4432 ** (ice-9 session) procedure `arity' now works with (ice-9 optargs) `lambda*'
4434 The `lambda*' and derivative forms in (ice-9 optargs) now set a procedure
4435 property `arglist', which can be retrieved by `arity'. The result is that
4436 `arity' can give more detailed information than before:
4440 guile> (use-modules (ice-9 optargs))
4441 guile> (define* (foo #:optional a b c) a)
4443 0 or more arguments in `lambda*:G0'.
4448 3 optional arguments: `a', `b' and `c'.
4449 guile> (define* (bar a b #:key c d #:allow-other-keys) a)
4451 2 required arguments: `a' and `b', 2 keyword arguments: `c'
4452 and `d', other keywords allowed.
4453 guile> (define* (baz a b #:optional c #:rest r) a)
4455 2 required arguments: `a' and `b', 1 optional argument: `c',
4458 * Changes to the C interface
4460 ** Types have been renamed from scm_*_t to scm_t_*.
4462 This has been done for POSIX sake. It reserves identifiers ending
4463 with "_t". What a concept.
4465 The old names are still available with status `deprecated'.
4467 ** scm_t_bits (former scm_bits_t) is now a unsigned type.
4469 ** Deprecated features have been removed.
4473 SCM_INPORTP, SCM_OUTPORTP SCM_ICHRP, SCM_ICHR, SCM_MAKICHR
4474 SCM_SETJMPBUF SCM_NSTRINGP SCM_NRWSTRINGP SCM_NVECTORP SCM_DOUBLE_CELLP
4476 *** C Functions removed
4478 scm_sysmissing scm_tag scm_tc16_flo scm_tc_flo
4479 scm_fseek - replaced by scm_seek.
4480 gc-thunk - replaced by after-gc-hook.
4481 gh_int2scmb - replaced by gh_bool2scm.
4482 scm_tc_dblr - replaced by scm_tc16_real.
4483 scm_tc_dblc - replaced by scm_tc16_complex.
4484 scm_list_star - replaced by scm_cons_star.
4486 ** Deprecated: scm_makfromstr
4488 Use scm_mem2string instead.
4490 ** Deprecated: scm_make_shared_substring
4492 Explicit shared substrings will disappear from Guile.
4494 Instead, "normal" strings will be implemented using sharing
4495 internally, combined with a copy-on-write strategy.
4497 ** Deprecated: scm_read_only_string_p
4499 The concept of read-only strings will disappear in next release of
4502 ** Deprecated: scm_sloppy_memq, scm_sloppy_memv, scm_sloppy_member
4504 Instead, use scm_c_memq or scm_memq, scm_memv, scm_member.
4506 ** New functions: scm_call_0, scm_call_1, scm_call_2, scm_call_3
4508 Call a procedure with the indicated number of arguments. See "Fly
4509 Evaluation" in the manual.
4511 ** New functions: scm_apply_0, scm_apply_1, scm_apply_2, scm_apply_3
4513 Call a procedure with the indicated number of arguments and a list of
4514 further arguments. See "Fly Evaluation" in the manual.
4516 ** New functions: scm_list_1, scm_list_2, scm_list_3, scm_list_4, scm_list_5
4518 Create a list of the given number of elements. See "List
4519 Constructors" in the manual.
4521 ** Renamed function: scm_listify has been replaced by scm_list_n.
4523 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_LIST0, SCM_LIST1, SCM_LIST2, SCM_LIST3, SCM_LIST4,
4524 SCM_LIST5, SCM_LIST6, SCM_LIST7, SCM_LIST8, SCM_LIST9.
4526 Use functions scm_list_N instead.
4528 ** New function: scm_c_read (SCM port, void *buffer, scm_sizet size)
4530 Used by an application to read arbitrary number of bytes from a port.
4531 Same semantics as libc read, except that scm_c_read only returns less
4532 than SIZE bytes if at end-of-file.
4534 Warning: Doesn't update port line and column counts!
4536 ** New function: scm_c_write (SCM port, const void *ptr, scm_sizet size)
4538 Used by an application to write arbitrary number of bytes to an SCM
4539 port. Similar semantics as libc write. However, unlike libc
4540 write, scm_c_write writes the requested number of bytes and has no
4543 Warning: Doesn't update port line and column counts!
4545 ** New function: scm_init_guile ()
4547 In contrast to scm_boot_guile, scm_init_guile will return normally
4548 after initializing Guile. It is not available on all systems, tho.
4550 ** New functions: scm_str2symbol, scm_mem2symbol
4552 The function scm_str2symbol takes a const char* pointing to a zero-terminated
4553 field of characters and creates a scheme symbol object from that C string.
4554 The function scm_mem2symbol takes a const char* and a number of characters and
4555 creates a symbol from the characters in that memory area.
4557 ** New functions: scm_primitive_make_property
4558 scm_primitive_property_ref
4559 scm_primitive_property_set_x
4560 scm_primitive_property_del_x
4562 These functions implement a new way to deal with object properties.
4563 See libguile/properties.c for their documentation.
4565 ** New function: scm_done_free (long size)
4567 This function is the inverse of scm_done_malloc. Use it to report the
4568 amount of smob memory you free. The previous method, which involved
4569 calling scm_done_malloc with negative argument, was somewhat
4570 unintuitive (and is still available, of course).
4572 ** New function: scm_c_memq (SCM obj, SCM list)
4574 This function provides a fast C level alternative for scm_memq for the case
4575 that the list parameter is known to be a proper list. The function is a
4576 replacement for scm_sloppy_memq, but is stricter in its requirements on its
4577 list input parameter, since for anything else but a proper list the function's
4578 behaviour is undefined - it may even crash or loop endlessly. Further, for
4579 the case that the object is not found in the list, scm_c_memq returns #f which
4580 is similar to scm_memq, but different from scm_sloppy_memq's behaviour.
4582 ** New functions: scm_remember_upto_here_1, scm_remember_upto_here_2,
4583 scm_remember_upto_here
4585 These functions replace the function scm_remember.
4587 ** Deprecated function: scm_remember
4589 Use one of the new functions scm_remember_upto_here_1,
4590 scm_remember_upto_here_2 or scm_remember_upto_here instead.
4592 ** New function: scm_allocate_string
4594 This function replaces the function scm_makstr.
4596 ** Deprecated function: scm_makstr
4598 Use the new function scm_allocate_string instead.
4600 ** New global variable scm_gc_running_p introduced.
4602 Use this variable to find out if garbage collection is being executed. Up to
4603 now applications have used scm_gc_heap_lock to test if garbage collection was
4604 running, which also works because of the fact that up to know only the garbage
4605 collector has set this variable. But, this is an implementation detail that
4606 may change. Further, scm_gc_heap_lock is not set throughout gc, thus the use
4607 of this variable is (and has been) not fully safe anyway.
4609 ** New macros: SCM_BITVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH
4611 Use these instead of SCM_LENGTH_MAX.
4613 ** New macros: SCM_CONTINUATION_LENGTH, SCM_CCLO_LENGTH, SCM_STACK_LENGTH,
4614 SCM_STRING_LENGTH, SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_LENGTH,
4615 SCM_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_VECTOR_LENGTH.
4617 Use these instead of SCM_LENGTH.
4619 ** New macros: SCM_SET_CONTINUATION_LENGTH, SCM_SET_STRING_LENGTH,
4620 SCM_SET_SYMBOL_LENGTH, SCM_SET_VECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_LENGTH,
4621 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_LENGTH
4623 Use these instead of SCM_SETLENGTH
4625 ** New macros: SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, SCM_CCLO_BASE,
4626 SCM_VECTOR_BASE, SCM_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_BITVECTOR_BASE, SCM_COMPLEX_MEM,
4629 Use these instead of SCM_CHARS, SCM_UCHARS, SCM_ROCHARS, SCM_ROUCHARS or
4632 ** New macros: SCM_SET_BIGNUM_BASE, SCM_SET_STRING_CHARS,
4633 SCM_SET_SYMBOL_CHARS, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_BASE,
4636 Use these instead of SCM_SETCHARS.
4638 ** New macro: SCM_BITVECTOR_P
4640 ** New macro: SCM_STRING_COERCE_0TERMINATION_X
4642 Use instead of SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR.
4644 ** New macros: SCM_DIR_OPEN_P, SCM_DIR_FLAG_OPEN
4646 For directory objects, use these instead of SCM_OPDIRP and SCM_OPN.
4648 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_OUTOFRANGE, SCM_NALLOC, SCM_HUP_SIGNAL,
4649 SCM_INT_SIGNAL, SCM_FPE_SIGNAL, SCM_BUS_SIGNAL, SCM_SEGV_SIGNAL,
4650 SCM_ALRM_SIGNAL, SCM_GC_SIGNAL, SCM_TICK_SIGNAL, SCM_SIG_ORD,
4651 SCM_ORD_SIG, SCM_NUM_SIGS, SCM_SYMBOL_SLOTS, SCM_SLOTS, SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP,
4652 SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR, SCM_FREEP, SCM_NFREEP, SCM_CHARS, SCM_UCHARS,
4653 SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING, SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING_COPY,
4654 SCM_VALIDATE_NULLORROSTRING_COPY, SCM_ROLENGTH, SCM_LENGTH, SCM_HUGE_LENGTH,
4655 SCM_SUBSTRP, SCM_SUBSTR_STR, SCM_SUBSTR_OFFSET, SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR,
4656 SCM_ROSTRINGP, SCM_RWSTRINGP, SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING, SCM_ROCHARS,
4657 SCM_ROUCHARS, SCM_SETLENGTH, SCM_SETCHARS, SCM_LENGTH_MAX, SCM_GC8MARKP,
4658 SCM_SETGC8MARK, SCM_CLRGC8MARK, SCM_GCTYP16, SCM_GCCDR, SCM_SUBR_DOC,
4659 SCM_OPDIRP, SCM_VALIDATE_OPDIR, SCM_WTA, RETURN_SCM_WTA, SCM_CONST_LONG,
4660 SCM_WNA, SCM_FUNC_NAME, SCM_VALIDATE_NUMBER_COPY,
4661 SCM_VALIDATE_NUMBER_DEF_COPY, SCM_SLOPPY_CONSP, SCM_SLOPPY_NCONSP,
4662 SCM_SETAND_CDR, SCM_SETOR_CDR, SCM_SETAND_CAR, SCM_SETOR_CAR
4664 Use SCM_ASSERT_RANGE or SCM_VALIDATE_XXX_RANGE instead of SCM_OUTOFRANGE.
4665 Use scm_memory_error instead of SCM_NALLOC.
4666 Use SCM_STRINGP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP.
4667 Use SCM_VALIDATE_STRING instead of SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR.
4668 Use SCM_FREE_CELL_P instead of SCM_FREEP/SCM_NFREEP
4669 Use a type specific accessor macro instead of SCM_CHARS/SCM_UCHARS.
4670 Use a type specific accessor instead of SCM(_|_RO|_HUGE_)LENGTH.
4671 Use SCM_VALIDATE_(SYMBOL|STRING) instead of SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING.
4672 Use SCM_STRING_COERCE_0TERMINATION_X instead of SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR.
4673 Use SCM_STRINGP or SCM_SYMBOLP instead of SCM_ROSTRINGP.
4674 Use SCM_STRINGP instead of SCM_RWSTRINGP.
4675 Use SCM_VALIDATE_STRING instead of SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING.
4676 Use SCM_STRING_CHARS instead of SCM_ROCHARS.
4677 Use SCM_STRING_UCHARS instead of SCM_ROUCHARS.
4678 Use a type specific setter macro instead of SCM_SETLENGTH.
4679 Use a type specific setter macro instead of SCM_SETCHARS.
4680 Use a type specific length macro instead of SCM_LENGTH_MAX.
4681 Use SCM_GCMARKP instead of SCM_GC8MARKP.
4682 Use SCM_SETGCMARK instead of SCM_SETGC8MARK.
4683 Use SCM_CLRGCMARK instead of SCM_CLRGC8MARK.
4684 Use SCM_TYP16 instead of SCM_GCTYP16.
4685 Use SCM_CDR instead of SCM_GCCDR.
4686 Use SCM_DIR_OPEN_P instead of SCM_OPDIRP.
4687 Use SCM_MISC_ERROR or SCM_WRONG_TYPE_ARG instead of SCM_WTA.
4688 Use SCM_MISC_ERROR or SCM_WRONG_TYPE_ARG instead of RETURN_SCM_WTA.
4689 Use SCM_VCELL_INIT instead of SCM_CONST_LONG.
4690 Use SCM_WRONG_NUM_ARGS instead of SCM_WNA.
4691 Use SCM_CONSP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_CONSP.
4692 Use !SCM_CONSP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_NCONSP.
4694 ** Removed function: scm_struct_init
4696 ** Removed variable: scm_symhash_dim
4698 ** Renamed function: scm_make_cont has been replaced by
4699 scm_make_continuation, which has a different interface.
4701 ** Deprecated function: scm_call_catching_errors
4703 Use scm_catch or scm_lazy_catch from throw.[ch] instead.
4705 ** Deprecated function: scm_strhash
4707 Use scm_string_hash instead.
4709 ** Deprecated function: scm_vector_set_length_x
4711 Instead, create a fresh vector of the desired size and copy the contents.
4713 ** scm_gensym has changed prototype
4715 scm_gensym now only takes one argument.
4717 ** Deprecated type tags: scm_tc7_ssymbol, scm_tc7_msymbol, scm_tcs_symbols,
4720 There is now only a single symbol type scm_tc7_symbol.
4721 The tag scm_tc7_lvector was not used anyway.
4723 ** Deprecated function: scm_make_smob_type_mfpe, scm_set_smob_mfpe.
4725 Use scm_make_smob_type and scm_set_smob_XXX instead.
4727 ** New function scm_set_smob_apply.
4729 This can be used to set an apply function to a smob type.
4731 ** Deprecated function: scm_strprint_obj
4733 Use scm_object_to_string instead.
4735 ** Deprecated function: scm_wta
4737 Use scm_wrong_type_arg, or another appropriate error signalling function
4740 ** Explicit support for obarrays has been deprecated.
4742 Use `scm_str2symbol' and the generic hashtable functions instead.
4744 ** The concept of `vcells' has been deprecated.
4746 The data type `variable' is now used exclusively. `Vcells' have been
4747 a low-level concept so you are likely not affected by this change.
4749 *** Deprecated functions: scm_sym2vcell, scm_sysintern,
4750 scm_sysintern0, scm_symbol_value0, scm_intern, scm_intern0.
4752 Use scm_c_define or scm_c_lookup instead, as appropriate.
4754 *** New functions: scm_c_module_lookup, scm_c_lookup,
4755 scm_c_module_define, scm_c_define, scm_module_lookup, scm_lookup,
4756 scm_module_define, scm_define.
4758 These functions work with variables instead of with vcells.
4760 ** New functions for creating and defining `subr's and `gsubr's.
4762 The new functions more clearly distinguish between creating a subr (or
4763 gsubr) object and adding it to the current module.
4765 These new functions are available: scm_c_make_subr, scm_c_define_subr,
4766 scm_c_make_subr_with_generic, scm_c_define_subr_with_generic,
4767 scm_c_make_gsubr, scm_c_define_gsubr, scm_c_make_gsubr_with_generic,
4768 scm_c_define_gsubr_with_generic.
4770 ** Deprecated functions: scm_make_subr, scm_make_subr_opt,
4771 scm_make_subr_with_generic, scm_make_gsubr,
4772 scm_make_gsubr_with_generic.
4774 Use the new ones from above instead.
4776 ** C interface to the module system has changed.
4778 While we suggest that you avoid as many explicit module system
4779 operations from C as possible for the time being, the C interface has
4780 been made more similar to the high-level Scheme module system.
4782 *** New functions: scm_c_define_module, scm_c_use_module,
4783 scm_c_export, scm_c_resolve_module.
4785 They mostly work like their Scheme namesakes. scm_c_define_module
4786 takes a function that is called a context where the new module is
4789 *** Deprecated functions: scm_the_root_module, scm_make_module,
4790 scm_ensure_user_module, scm_load_scheme_module.
4792 Use the new functions instead.
4794 ** Renamed function: scm_internal_with_fluids becomes
4797 scm_internal_with_fluids is available as a deprecated function.
4799 ** New function: scm_c_with_fluid.
4801 Just like scm_c_with_fluids, but takes one fluid and one value instead
4804 ** Deprecated typedefs: long_long, ulong_long.
4806 They are of questionable utility and they pollute the global
4809 ** Deprecated typedef: scm_sizet
4811 It is of questionable utility now that Guile requires ANSI C, and is
4814 ** Deprecated typedefs: scm_port_rw_active, scm_port,
4815 scm_ptob_descriptor, scm_debug_info, scm_debug_frame, scm_fport,
4816 scm_option, scm_rstate, scm_rng, scm_array, scm_array_dim.
4818 Made more compliant with the naming policy by adding a _t at the end.
4820 ** Deprecated functions: scm_mkbig, scm_big2num, scm_adjbig,
4821 scm_normbig, scm_copybig, scm_2ulong2big, scm_dbl2big, scm_big2dbl
4823 With the exception of the mysterious scm_2ulong2big, they are still
4824 available under new names (scm_i_mkbig etc). These functions are not
4825 intended to be used in user code. You should avoid dealing with
4826 bignums directly, and should deal with numbers in general (which can
4829 ** Change in behavior: scm_num2long, scm_num2ulong
4831 The scm_num2[u]long functions don't any longer accept an inexact
4832 argument. This change in behavior is motivated by concordance with
4833 R5RS: It is more common that a primitive doesn't want to accept an
4834 inexact for an exact.
4836 ** New functions: scm_short2num, scm_ushort2num, scm_int2num,
4837 scm_uint2num, scm_size2num, scm_ptrdiff2num, scm_num2short,
4838 scm_num2ushort, scm_num2int, scm_num2uint, scm_num2ptrdiff,
4841 These are conversion functions between the various ANSI C integral
4842 types and Scheme numbers. NOTE: The scm_num2xxx functions don't
4843 accept an inexact argument.
4845 ** New functions: scm_float2num, scm_double2num,
4846 scm_num2float, scm_num2double.
4848 These are conversion functions between the two ANSI C float types and
4851 ** New number validation macros:
4852 SCM_NUM2{SIZE,PTRDIFF,SHORT,USHORT,INT,UINT}[_DEF]
4856 ** New functions: scm_gc_protect_object, scm_gc_unprotect_object
4858 These are just nicer-named old scm_protect_object and
4859 scm_unprotect_object.
4861 ** Deprecated functions: scm_protect_object, scm_unprotect_object
4863 ** New functions: scm_gc_[un]register_root, scm_gc_[un]register_roots
4865 These functions can be used to register pointers to locations that
4868 ** Deprecated function: scm_create_hook.
4870 Its sins are: misleading name, non-modularity and lack of general
4874 Changes since Guile 1.3.4:
4876 * Changes to the distribution
4878 ** Trees from nightly snapshots and CVS now require you to run autogen.sh.
4880 We've changed the way we handle generated files in the Guile source
4881 repository. As a result, the procedure for building trees obtained
4882 from the nightly FTP snapshots or via CVS has changed:
4883 - You must have appropriate versions of autoconf, automake, and
4884 libtool installed on your system. See README for info on how to
4885 obtain these programs.
4886 - Before configuring the tree, you must first run the script
4887 `autogen.sh' at the top of the source tree.
4889 The Guile repository used to contain not only source files, written by
4890 humans, but also some generated files, like configure scripts and
4891 Makefile.in files. Even though the contents of these files could be
4892 derived mechanically from other files present, we thought it would
4893 make the tree easier to build if we checked them into CVS.
4895 However, this approach means that minor differences between
4896 developer's installed tools and habits affected the whole team.
4897 So we have removed the generated files from the repository, and
4898 added the autogen.sh script, which will reconstruct them
4902 ** configure now has experimental options to remove support for certain
4905 --disable-arrays omit array and uniform array support
4906 --disable-posix omit posix interfaces
4907 --disable-networking omit networking interfaces
4908 --disable-regex omit regular expression interfaces
4910 These are likely to become separate modules some day.
4912 ** New configure option --enable-debug-freelist
4914 This enables a debugging version of SCM_NEWCELL(), and also registers
4915 an extra primitive, the setter `gc-set-debug-check-freelist!'.
4917 Configure with the --enable-debug-freelist option to enable
4918 the gc-set-debug-check-freelist! primitive, and then use:
4920 (gc-set-debug-check-freelist! #t) # turn on checking of the freelist
4921 (gc-set-debug-check-freelist! #f) # turn off checking
4923 Checking of the freelist forces a traversal of the freelist and
4924 a garbage collection before each allocation of a cell. This can
4925 slow down the interpreter dramatically, so the setter should be used to
4926 turn on this extra processing only when necessary.
4928 ** New configure option --enable-debug-malloc
4930 Include code for debugging of calls to scm_must_malloc/realloc/free.
4934 1. objects freed by scm_must_free has been mallocated by scm_must_malloc
4935 2. objects reallocated by scm_must_realloc has been allocated by
4937 3. reallocated objects are reallocated with the same what string
4939 But, most importantly, it records the number of allocated objects of
4940 each kind. This is useful when searching for memory leaks.
4942 A Guile compiled with this option provides the primitive
4943 `malloc-stats' which returns an alist with pairs of kind and the
4944 number of objects of that kind.
4946 ** All includes are now referenced relative to the root directory
4948 Since some users have had problems with mixups between Guile and
4949 system headers, we have decided to always refer to Guile headers via
4950 their parent directories. This essentially creates a "private name
4951 space" for Guile headers. This means that the compiler only is given
4952 -I options for the root build and root source directory.
4954 ** Header files kw.h and genio.h have been removed.
4956 ** The module (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style) has been removed.
4958 ** New module (ice-9 documentation)
4960 Implements the interface to documentation strings associated with
4963 ** New module (ice-9 time)
4965 Provides a macro `time', which displays execution time of a given form.
4967 ** New module (ice-9 history)
4969 Loading this module enables value history in the repl.
4971 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
4973 ** New command line option --debug
4975 Start Guile with debugging evaluator and backtraces enabled.
4977 This is useful when debugging your .guile init file or scripts.
4979 ** New help facility
4981 Usage: (help NAME) gives documentation about objects named NAME (a symbol)
4982 (help REGEXP) ditto for objects with names matching REGEXP (a string)
4983 (help 'NAME) gives documentation for NAME, even if it is not an object
4984 (help ,EXPR) gives documentation for object returned by EXPR
4985 (help (my module)) gives module commentary for `(my module)'
4986 (help) gives this text
4988 `help' searches among bindings exported from loaded modules, while
4989 `apropos' searches among bindings visible from the "current" module.
4991 Examples: (help help)
4993 (help "output-string")
4995 ** `help' and `apropos' now prints full module names
4997 ** Dynamic linking now uses libltdl from the libtool package.
4999 The old system dependent code for doing dynamic linking has been
5000 replaced with calls to the libltdl functions which do all the hairy
5003 The major improvement is that you can now directly pass libtool
5004 library names like "libfoo.la" to `dynamic-link' and `dynamic-link'
5005 will be able to do the best shared library job you can get, via
5008 The way dynamic libraries are found has changed and is not really
5009 portable across platforms, probably. It is therefore recommended to
5010 use absolute filenames when possible.
5012 If you pass a filename without an extension to `dynamic-link', it will
5013 try a few appropriate ones. Thus, the most platform ignorant way is
5014 to specify a name like "libfoo", without any directories and
5017 ** Guile COOP threads are now compatible with LinuxThreads
5019 Previously, COOP threading wasn't possible in applications linked with
5020 Linux POSIX threads due to their use of the stack pointer to find the
5021 thread context. This has now been fixed with a workaround which uses
5022 the pthreads to allocate the stack.
5024 ** New primitives: `pkgdata-dir', `site-dir', `library-dir'
5026 ** Positions of erring expression in scripts
5028 With version 1.3.4, the location of the erring expression in Guile
5029 scipts is no longer automatically reported. (This should have been
5030 documented before the 1.3.4 release.)
5032 You can get this information by enabling recording of positions of
5033 source expressions and running the debugging evaluator. Put this at
5034 the top of your script (or in your "site" file):
5036 (read-enable 'positions)
5037 (debug-enable 'debug)
5039 ** Backtraces in scripts
5041 It is now possible to get backtraces in scripts.
5045 (debug-enable 'debug 'backtrace)
5047 at the top of the script.
5049 (The first options enables the debugging evaluator.
5050 The second enables backtraces.)
5052 ** Part of module system symbol lookup now implemented in C
5054 The eval closure of most modules is now implemented in C. Since this
5055 was one of the bottlenecks for loading speed, Guile now loads code
5056 substantially faster than before.
5058 ** Attempting to get the value of an unbound variable now produces
5059 an exception with a key of 'unbound-variable instead of 'misc-error.
5061 ** The initial default output port is now unbuffered if it's using a
5062 tty device. Previously in this situation it was line-buffered.
5064 ** New hook: after-gc-hook
5066 after-gc-hook takes over the role of gc-thunk. This hook is run at
5067 the first SCM_TICK after a GC. (Thus, the code is run at the same
5068 point during evaluation as signal handlers.)
5070 Note that this hook should be used only for diagnostic and debugging
5071 purposes. It is not certain that it will continue to be well-defined
5072 when this hook is run in the future.
5074 C programmers: Note the new C level hooks scm_before_gc_c_hook,
5075 scm_before_sweep_c_hook, scm_after_gc_c_hook.
5077 ** Improvements to garbage collector
5079 Guile 1.4 has a new policy for triggering heap allocation and
5080 determining the sizes of heap segments. It fixes a number of problems
5083 1. The new policy can handle two separate pools of cells
5084 (2-word/4-word) better. (The old policy would run wild, allocating
5085 more and more memory for certain programs.)
5087 2. The old code would sometimes allocate far too much heap so that the
5088 Guile process became gigantic. The new code avoids this.
5090 3. The old code would sometimes allocate too little so that few cells
5091 were freed at GC so that, in turn, too much time was spent in GC.
5093 4. The old code would often trigger heap allocation several times in a
5094 row. (The new scheme predicts how large the segments needs to be
5095 in order not to need further allocation.)
5097 All in all, the new GC policy will make larger applications more
5100 The new GC scheme also is prepared for POSIX threading. Threads can
5101 allocate private pools of cells ("clusters") with just a single
5102 function call. Allocation of single cells from such a cluster can
5103 then proceed without any need of inter-thread synchronization.
5105 ** New environment variables controlling GC parameters
5107 GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE Maximal segment size
5110 Allocation of 2-word cell heaps:
5112 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_1 Size of initial heap segment in bytes
5115 GUILE_MIN_YIELD_1 Minimum number of freed cells at each
5116 GC in percent of total heap size
5119 Allocation of 4-word cell heaps
5120 (used for real numbers and misc other objects):
5122 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_2, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2
5124 (See entry "Way for application to customize GC parameters" under
5125 section "Changes to the scm_ interface" below.)
5127 ** Guile now implements reals using 4-word cells
5129 This speeds up computation with reals. (They were earlier allocated
5130 with `malloc'.) There is still some room for optimizations, however.
5132 ** Some further steps toward POSIX thread support have been taken
5134 *** Guile's critical sections (SCM_DEFER/ALLOW_INTS)
5135 don't have much effect any longer, and many of them will be removed in
5139 are only handled at the top of the evaluator loop, immediately after
5140 I/O, and in scm_equalp.
5142 *** The GC can allocate thread private pools of pairs.
5144 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
5146 ** close-input-port and close-output-port are now R5RS
5148 These procedures have been turned into primitives and have R5RS behaviour.
5150 ** New procedure: simple-format PORT MESSAGE ARG1 ...
5152 (ice-9 boot) makes `format' an alias for `simple-format' until possibly
5153 extended by the more sophisticated version in (ice-9 format)
5155 (simple-format port message . args)
5156 Write MESSAGE to DESTINATION, defaulting to `current-output-port'.
5157 MESSAGE can contain ~A (was %s) and ~S (was %S) escapes. When printed,
5158 the escapes are replaced with corresponding members of ARGS:
5159 ~A formats using `display' and ~S formats using `write'.
5160 If DESTINATION is #t, then use the `current-output-port',
5161 if DESTINATION is #f, then return a string containing the formatted text.
5162 Does not add a trailing newline."
5164 ** string-ref: the second argument is no longer optional.
5166 ** string, list->string: no longer accept strings in their arguments,
5167 only characters, for compatibility with R5RS.
5169 ** New procedure: port-closed? PORT
5170 Returns #t if PORT is closed or #f if it is open.
5172 ** Deprecated: list*
5174 The list* functionality is now provided by cons* (SRFI-1 compliant)
5176 ** New procedure: cons* ARG1 ARG2 ... ARGn
5178 Like `list', but the last arg provides the tail of the constructed list,
5179 returning (cons ARG1 (cons ARG2 (cons ... ARGn))).
5181 Requires at least one argument. If given one argument, that argument
5182 is returned as result.
5184 This function is called `list*' in some other Schemes and in Common LISP.
5186 ** Removed deprecated: serial-map, serial-array-copy!, serial-array-map!
5188 ** New procedure: object-documentation OBJECT
5190 Returns the documentation string associated with OBJECT. The
5191 procedure uses a caching mechanism so that subsequent lookups are
5194 Exported by (ice-9 documentation).
5196 ** module-name now returns full names of modules
5198 Previously, only the last part of the name was returned (`session' for
5199 `(ice-9 session)'). Ex: `(ice-9 session)'.
5201 * Changes to the gh_ interface
5203 ** Deprecated: gh_int2scmb
5205 Use gh_bool2scm instead.
5207 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5209 ** Guile primitives now carry docstrings!
5211 Thanks to Greg Badros!
5213 ** Guile primitives are defined in a new way: SCM_DEFINE/SCM_DEFINE1/SCM_PROC
5215 Now Guile primitives are defined using the SCM_DEFINE/SCM_DEFINE1/SCM_PROC
5216 macros and must contain a docstring that is extracted into foo.doc using a new
5217 guile-doc-snarf script (that uses guile-doc-snarf.awk).
5219 However, a major overhaul of these macros is scheduled for the next release of
5222 ** Guile primitives use a new technique for validation of arguments
5224 SCM_VALIDATE_* macros are defined to ease the redundancy and improve
5225 the readability of argument checking.
5227 ** All (nearly?) K&R prototypes for functions replaced with ANSI C equivalents.
5229 ** New macros: SCM_PACK, SCM_UNPACK
5231 Compose/decompose an SCM value.
5233 The SCM type is now treated as an abstract data type and may be defined as a
5234 long, a void* or as a struct, depending on the architecture and compile time
5235 options. This makes it easier to find several types of bugs, for example when
5236 SCM values are treated as integers without conversion. Values of the SCM type
5237 should be treated as "atomic" values. These macros are used when
5238 composing/decomposing an SCM value, either because you want to access
5239 individual bits, or because you want to treat it as an integer value.
5241 E.g., in order to set bit 7 in an SCM value x, use the expression
5243 SCM_PACK (SCM_UNPACK (x) | 0x80)
5245 ** The name property of hooks is deprecated.
5246 Thus, the use of SCM_HOOK_NAME and scm_make_hook_with_name is deprecated.
5248 You can emulate this feature by using object properties.
5250 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_INPORTP, SCM_OUTPORTP, SCM_CRDY, SCM_ICHRP,
5251 SCM_ICHR, SCM_MAKICHR, SCM_SETJMPBUF, SCM_NSTRINGP, SCM_NRWSTRINGP,
5254 These macros will be removed in a future release of Guile.
5256 ** The following types, functions and macros from numbers.h are deprecated:
5257 scm_dblproc, SCM_UNEGFIXABLE, SCM_FLOBUFLEN, SCM_INEXP, SCM_CPLXP, SCM_REAL,
5258 SCM_IMAG, SCM_REALPART, scm_makdbl, SCM_SINGP, SCM_NUM2DBL, SCM_NO_BIGDIG
5260 ** Port internals: the rw_random variable in the scm_port structure
5261 must be set to non-zero in any random access port. In recent Guile
5262 releases it was only set for bidirectional random-access ports.
5264 ** Port internals: the seek ptob procedure is now responsible for
5265 resetting the buffers if required. The change was made so that in the
5266 special case of reading the current position (i.e., seek p 0 SEEK_CUR)
5267 the fport and strport ptobs can avoid resetting the buffers,
5268 in particular to avoid discarding unread chars. An existing port
5269 type can be fixed by adding something like the following to the
5270 beginning of the ptob seek procedure:
5272 if (pt->rw_active == SCM_PORT_READ)
5273 scm_end_input (object);
5274 else if (pt->rw_active == SCM_PORT_WRITE)
5275 ptob->flush (object);
5277 although to actually avoid resetting the buffers and discard unread
5278 chars requires further hacking that depends on the characteristics
5281 ** Deprecated functions: scm_fseek, scm_tag
5283 These functions are no longer used and will be removed in a future version.
5285 ** The scm_sysmissing procedure is no longer used in libguile.
5286 Unless it turns out to be unexpectedly useful to somebody, it will be
5287 removed in a future version.
5289 ** The format of error message strings has changed
5291 The two C procedures: scm_display_error and scm_error, as well as the
5292 primitive `scm-error', now use scm_simple_format to do their work.
5293 This means that the message strings of all code must be updated to use
5294 ~A where %s was used before, and ~S where %S was used before.
5296 During the period when there still are a lot of old Guiles out there,
5297 you might want to support both old and new versions of Guile.
5299 There are basically two methods to achieve this. Both methods use
5302 AC_CHECK_FUNCS(scm_simple_format)
5304 in your configure.in.
5306 Method 1: Use the string concatenation features of ANSI C's
5311 #ifdef HAVE_SCM_SIMPLE_FORMAT
5317 Then represent each of your error messages using a preprocessor macro:
5319 #define E_SPIDER_ERROR "There's a spider in your " ## FMT_S ## "!!!"
5323 (define fmt-s (if (defined? 'simple-format) "~S" "%S"))
5324 (define make-message string-append)
5326 (define e-spider-error (make-message "There's a spider in your " fmt-s "!!!"))
5328 Method 2: Use the oldfmt function found in doc/oldfmt.c.
5332 scm_misc_error ("picnic", scm_c_oldfmt0 ("There's a spider in your ~S!!!"),
5337 (scm-error 'misc-error "picnic" (oldfmt "There's a spider in your ~S!!!")
5341 ** Deprecated: coop_mutex_init, coop_condition_variable_init
5343 Don't use the functions coop_mutex_init and
5344 coop_condition_variable_init. They will change.
5346 Use scm_mutex_init and scm_cond_init instead.
5348 ** New function: int scm_cond_timedwait (scm_cond_t *COND, scm_mutex_t *MUTEX, const struct timespec *ABSTIME)
5349 `scm_cond_timedwait' atomically unlocks MUTEX and waits on
5350 COND, as `scm_cond_wait' does, but it also bounds the duration
5351 of the wait. If COND has not been signaled before time ABSTIME,
5352 the mutex MUTEX is re-acquired and `scm_cond_timedwait'
5353 returns the error code `ETIMEDOUT'.
5355 The ABSTIME parameter specifies an absolute time, with the same
5356 origin as `time' and `gettimeofday': an ABSTIME of 0 corresponds
5357 to 00:00:00 GMT, January 1, 1970.
5359 ** New function: scm_cond_broadcast (scm_cond_t *COND)
5360 `scm_cond_broadcast' restarts all the threads that are waiting
5361 on the condition variable COND. Nothing happens if no threads are
5364 ** New function: scm_key_create (scm_key_t *KEY, void (*destr_function) (void *))
5365 `scm_key_create' allocates a new TSD key. The key is stored in
5366 the location pointed to by KEY. There is no limit on the number
5367 of keys allocated at a given time. The value initially associated
5368 with the returned key is `NULL' in all currently executing threads.
5370 The DESTR_FUNCTION argument, if not `NULL', specifies a destructor
5371 function associated with the key. When a thread terminates,
5372 DESTR_FUNCTION is called on the value associated with the key in
5373 that thread. The DESTR_FUNCTION is not called if a key is deleted
5374 with `scm_key_delete' or a value is changed with
5375 `scm_setspecific'. The order in which destructor functions are
5376 called at thread termination time is unspecified.
5378 Destructors are not yet implemented.
5380 ** New function: scm_setspecific (scm_key_t KEY, const void *POINTER)
5381 `scm_setspecific' changes the value associated with KEY in the
5382 calling thread, storing the given POINTER instead.
5384 ** New function: scm_getspecific (scm_key_t KEY)
5385 `scm_getspecific' returns the value currently associated with
5386 KEY in the calling thread.
5388 ** New function: scm_key_delete (scm_key_t KEY)
5389 `scm_key_delete' deallocates a TSD key. It does not check
5390 whether non-`NULL' values are associated with that key in the
5391 currently executing threads, nor call the destructor function
5392 associated with the key.
5394 ** New function: scm_c_hook_init (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, void *HOOK_DATA, scm_c_hook_type_t TYPE)
5396 Initialize a C level hook HOOK with associated HOOK_DATA and type
5397 TYPE. (See scm_c_hook_run ().)
5399 ** New function: scm_c_hook_add (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, scm_c_hook_function_t FUNC, void *FUNC_DATA, int APPENDP)
5401 Add hook function FUNC with associated FUNC_DATA to HOOK. If APPENDP
5402 is true, add it last, otherwise first. The same FUNC can be added
5403 multiple times if FUNC_DATA differ and vice versa.
5405 ** New function: scm_c_hook_remove (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, scm_c_hook_function_t FUNC, void *FUNC_DATA)
5407 Remove hook function FUNC with associated FUNC_DATA from HOOK. A
5408 function is only removed if both FUNC and FUNC_DATA matches.
5410 ** New function: void *scm_c_hook_run (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, void *DATA)
5412 Run hook HOOK passing DATA to the hook functions.
5414 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_NORMAL, all hook functions are run. The value
5415 returned is undefined.
5417 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_OR, hook functions are run until a function
5418 returns a non-NULL value. This value is returned as the result of
5419 scm_c_hook_run. If all functions return NULL, NULL is returned.
5421 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_AND, hook functions are run until a function
5422 returns a NULL value, and NULL is returned. If all functions returns
5423 a non-NULL value, the last value is returned.
5425 ** New C level GC hooks
5427 Five new C level hooks has been added to the garbage collector.
5429 scm_before_gc_c_hook
5432 are run before locking and after unlocking the heap. The system is
5433 thus in a mode where evaluation can take place. (Except that
5434 scm_before_gc_c_hook must not allocate new cells.)
5436 scm_before_mark_c_hook
5437 scm_before_sweep_c_hook
5438 scm_after_sweep_c_hook
5440 are run when the heap is locked. These are intended for extension of
5441 the GC in a modular fashion. Examples are the weaks and guardians
5444 ** Way for application to customize GC parameters
5446 The application can set up other default values for the GC heap
5447 allocation parameters
5449 GUILE_INIT_HEAP_SIZE_1, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_1,
5450 GUILE_INIT_HEAP_SIZE_2, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2,
5451 GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE,
5455 scm_default_init_heap_size_1, scm_default_min_yield_1,
5456 scm_default_init_heap_size_2, scm_default_min_yield_2,
5457 scm_default_max_segment_size
5459 respectively before callong scm_boot_guile.
5461 (See entry "New environment variables ..." in section
5462 "Changes to the stand-alone interpreter" above.)
5464 ** scm_protect_object/scm_unprotect_object now nest
5466 This means that you can call scm_protect_object multiple times on an
5467 object and count on the object being protected until
5468 scm_unprotect_object has been call the same number of times.
5470 The functions also have better time complexity.
5472 Still, it is usually possible to structure the application in a way
5473 that you don't need to use these functions. For example, if you use a
5474 protected standard Guile list to keep track of live objects rather
5475 than some custom data type, objects will die a natural death when they
5476 are no longer needed.
5478 ** Deprecated type tags: scm_tc16_flo, scm_tc_flo, scm_tc_dblr, scm_tc_dblc
5480 Guile does not provide the float representation for inexact real numbers any
5481 more. Now, only doubles are used to represent inexact real numbers. Further,
5482 the tag names scm_tc_dblr and scm_tc_dblc have been changed to scm_tc16_real
5483 and scm_tc16_complex, respectively.
5485 ** Removed deprecated type scm_smobfuns
5487 ** Removed deprecated function scm_newsmob
5489 ** Warning: scm_make_smob_type_mfpe might become deprecated in a future release
5491 There is an ongoing discussion among the developers whether to
5492 deprecate `scm_make_smob_type_mfpe' or not. Please use the current
5493 standard interface (scm_make_smob_type, scm_set_smob_XXX) in new code
5494 until this issue has been settled.
5496 ** Removed deprecated type tag scm_tc16_kw
5498 ** Added type tag scm_tc16_keyword
5500 (This was introduced already in release 1.3.4 but was not documented
5503 ** gdb_print now prints "*** Guile not initialized ***" until Guile initialized
5505 * Changes to system call interfaces:
5507 ** The "select" procedure now tests port buffers for the ability to
5508 provide input or accept output. Previously only the underlying file
5509 descriptors were checked.
5511 ** New variable PIPE_BUF: the maximum number of bytes that can be
5512 atomically written to a pipe.
5514 ** If a facility is not available on the system when Guile is
5515 compiled, the corresponding primitive procedure will not be defined.
5516 Previously it would have been defined but would throw a system-error
5517 exception if called. Exception handlers which catch this case may
5518 need minor modification: an error will be thrown with key
5519 'unbound-variable instead of 'system-error. Alternatively it's
5520 now possible to use `defined?' to check whether the facility is
5523 ** Procedures which depend on the timezone should now give the correct
5524 result on systems which cache the TZ environment variable, even if TZ
5525 is changed without calling tzset.
5527 * Changes to the networking interfaces:
5529 ** New functions: htons, ntohs, htonl, ntohl: for converting short and
5530 long integers between network and host format. For now, it's not
5531 particularly convenient to do this kind of thing, but consider:
5533 (define write-network-long
5534 (lambda (value port)
5535 (let ((v (make-uniform-vector 1 1 0)))
5536 (uniform-vector-set! v 0 (htonl value))
5537 (uniform-vector-write v port))))
5539 (define read-network-long
5541 (let ((v (make-uniform-vector 1 1 0)))
5542 (uniform-vector-read! v port)
5543 (ntohl (uniform-vector-ref v 0)))))
5545 ** If inet-aton fails, it now throws an error with key 'misc-error
5546 instead of 'system-error, since errno is not relevant.
5548 ** Certain gethostbyname/gethostbyaddr failures now throw errors with
5549 specific keys instead of 'system-error. The latter is inappropriate
5550 since errno will not have been set. The keys are:
5551 'host-not-found, 'try-again, 'no-recovery and 'no-data.
5553 ** sethostent, setnetent, setprotoent, setservent: now take an
5554 optional argument STAYOPEN, which specifies whether the database
5555 remains open after a database entry is accessed randomly (e.g., using
5556 gethostbyname for the hosts database.) The default is #f. Previously
5560 Changes since Guile 1.3.2:
5562 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
5566 An initial version of the Guile debugger written by Chris Hanson has
5567 been added. The debugger is still under development but is included
5568 in the distribution anyway since it is already quite useful.
5574 after an error to enter the debugger. Type `help' inside the debugger
5575 for a description of available commands.
5577 If you prefer to have stack frames numbered and printed in
5578 anti-chronological order and prefer up in the stack to be down on the
5579 screen as is the case in gdb, you can put
5581 (debug-enable 'backwards)
5583 in your .guile startup file. (However, this means that Guile can't
5584 use indentation to indicate stack level.)
5586 The debugger is autoloaded into Guile at the first use.
5588 ** Further enhancements to backtraces
5590 There is a new debug option `width' which controls the maximum width
5591 on the screen of printed stack frames. Fancy printing parameters
5592 ("level" and "length" as in Common LISP) are adaptively adjusted for
5593 each stack frame to give maximum information while still fitting
5594 within the bounds. If the stack frame can't be made to fit by
5595 adjusting parameters, it is simply cut off at the end. This is marked
5598 ** Some modules are now only loaded when the repl is started
5600 The modules (ice-9 debug), (ice-9 session), (ice-9 threads) and (ice-9
5601 regex) are now loaded into (guile-user) only if the repl has been
5602 started. The effect is that the startup time for scripts has been
5603 reduced to 30% of what it was previously.
5605 Correctly written scripts load the modules they require at the top of
5606 the file and should not be affected by this change.
5608 ** Hooks are now represented as smobs
5610 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
5612 ** Readline support has changed again.
5614 The old (readline-activator) module is gone. Use (ice-9 readline)
5615 instead, which now contains all readline functionality. So the code
5616 to activate readline is now
5618 (use-modules (ice-9 readline))
5621 This should work at any time, including from the guile prompt.
5623 To avoid confusion about the terms of Guile's license, please only
5624 enable readline for your personal use; please don't make it the
5625 default for others. Here is why we make this rather odd-sounding
5628 Guile is normally licensed under a weakened form of the GNU General
5629 Public License, which allows you to link code with Guile without
5630 placing that code under the GPL. This exception is important to some
5633 However, since readline is distributed under the GNU General Public
5634 License, when you link Guile with readline, either statically or
5635 dynamically, you effectively change Guile's license to the strict GPL.
5636 Whenever you link any strictly GPL'd code into Guile, uses of Guile
5637 which are normally permitted become forbidden. This is a rather
5638 non-obvious consequence of the licensing terms.
5640 So, to make sure things remain clear, please let people choose for
5641 themselves whether to link GPL'd libraries like readline with Guile.
5643 ** regexp-substitute/global has changed slightly, but incompatibly.
5645 If you include a function in the item list, the string of the match
5646 object it receives is the same string passed to
5647 regexp-substitute/global, not some suffix of that string.
5648 Correspondingly, the match's positions are relative to the entire
5649 string, not the suffix.
5651 If the regexp can match the empty string, the way matches are chosen
5652 from the string has changed. regexp-substitute/global recognizes the
5653 same set of matches that list-matches does; see below.
5655 ** New function: list-matches REGEXP STRING [FLAGS]
5657 Return a list of match objects, one for every non-overlapping, maximal
5658 match of REGEXP in STRING. The matches appear in left-to-right order.
5659 list-matches only reports matches of the empty string if there are no
5660 other matches which begin on, end at, or include the empty match's
5663 If present, FLAGS is passed as the FLAGS argument to regexp-exec.
5665 ** New function: fold-matches REGEXP STRING INIT PROC [FLAGS]
5667 For each match of REGEXP in STRING, apply PROC to the match object,
5668 and the last value PROC returned, or INIT for the first call. Return
5669 the last value returned by PROC. We apply PROC to the matches as they
5670 appear from left to right.
5672 This function recognizes matches according to the same criteria as
5675 Thus, you could define list-matches like this:
5677 (define (list-matches regexp string . flags)
5678 (reverse! (apply fold-matches regexp string '() cons flags)))
5680 If present, FLAGS is passed as the FLAGS argument to regexp-exec.
5684 *** New function: hook? OBJ
5686 Return #t if OBJ is a hook, otherwise #f.
5688 *** New function: make-hook-with-name NAME [ARITY]
5690 Return a hook with name NAME and arity ARITY. The default value for
5691 ARITY is 0. The only effect of NAME is that it will appear when the
5692 hook object is printed to ease debugging.
5694 *** New function: hook-empty? HOOK
5696 Return #t if HOOK doesn't contain any procedures, otherwise #f.
5698 *** New function: hook->list HOOK
5700 Return a list of the procedures that are called when run-hook is
5703 ** `map' signals an error if its argument lists are not all the same length.
5705 This is the behavior required by R5RS, so this change is really a bug
5706 fix. But it seems to affect a lot of people's code, so we're
5707 mentioning it here anyway.
5709 ** Print-state handling has been made more transparent
5711 Under certain circumstances, ports are represented as a port with an
5712 associated print state. Earlier, this pair was represented as a pair
5713 (see "Some magic has been added to the printer" below). It is now
5714 indistinguishable (almost; see `get-print-state') from a port on the
5717 *** New function: port-with-print-state OUTPUT-PORT PRINT-STATE
5719 Return a new port with the associated print state PRINT-STATE.
5721 *** New function: get-print-state OUTPUT-PORT
5723 Return the print state associated with this port if it exists,
5724 otherwise return #f.
5726 *** New function: directory-stream? OBJECT
5728 Returns true iff OBJECT is a directory stream --- the sort of object
5729 returned by `opendir'.
5731 ** New function: using-readline?
5733 Return #t if readline is in use in the current repl.
5735 ** structs will be removed in 1.4
5737 Structs will be replaced in Guile 1.4. We will merge GOOPS into Guile
5738 and use GOOPS objects as the fundamental record type.
5740 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5742 ** structs will be removed in 1.4
5744 The entire current struct interface (struct.c, struct.h) will be
5745 replaced in Guile 1.4. We will merge GOOPS into libguile and use
5746 GOOPS objects as the fundamental record type.
5748 ** The internal representation of subr's has changed
5750 Instead of giving a hint to the subr name, the CAR field of the subr
5751 now contains an index to a subr entry in scm_subr_table.
5753 *** New variable: scm_subr_table
5755 An array of subr entries. A subr entry contains the name, properties
5756 and documentation associated with the subr. The properties and
5757 documentation slots are not yet used.
5759 ** A new scheme for "forwarding" calls to a builtin to a generic function
5761 It is now possible to extend the functionality of some Guile
5762 primitives by letting them defer a call to a GOOPS generic function on
5763 argument mismatch. This means that there is no loss of efficiency in
5768 (use-modules (oop goops)) ; Must be GOOPS version 0.2.
5769 (define-method + ((x <string>) (y <string>))
5770 (string-append x y))
5772 + will still be as efficient as usual in numerical calculations, but
5773 can also be used for concatenating strings.
5775 Who will be the first one to extend Guile's numerical tower to
5776 rationals? :) [OK, there a few other things to fix before this can
5777 be made in a clean way.]
5779 *** New snarf macros for defining primitives: SCM_GPROC, SCM_GPROC1
5781 New macro: SCM_GPROC (CNAME, SNAME, REQ, OPT, VAR, CFUNC, GENERIC)
5783 New macro: SCM_GPROC1 (CNAME, SNAME, TYPE, CFUNC, GENERIC)
5785 These do the same job as SCM_PROC and SCM_PROC1, but they also define
5786 a variable GENERIC which can be used by the dispatch macros below.
5788 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
5790 *** New macros for forwarding control to a generic on arg type error
5792 New macro: SCM_WTA_DISPATCH_1 (GENERIC, ARG1, POS, SUBR)
5794 New macro: SCM_WTA_DISPATCH_2 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, POS, SUBR)
5796 These correspond to the scm_wta function call, and have the same
5797 behaviour until the user has called the GOOPS primitive
5798 `enable-primitive-generic!'. After that, these macros will apply the
5799 generic function GENERIC to the argument(s) instead of calling
5802 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
5804 *** New macros for argument testing with generic dispatch
5806 New macro: SCM_GASSERT1 (COND, GENERIC, ARG1, POS, SUBR)
5808 New macro: SCM_GASSERT2 (COND, GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, POS, SUBR)
5810 These correspond to the SCM_ASSERT macro, but will defer control to
5811 GENERIC on error after `enable-primitive-generic!' has been called.
5813 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
5815 ** New function: SCM scm_eval_body (SCM body, SCM env)
5817 Evaluates the body of a special form.
5819 ** The internal representation of struct's has changed
5821 Previously, four slots were allocated for the procedure(s) of entities
5822 and operators. The motivation for this representation had to do with
5823 the structure of the evaluator, the wish to support tail-recursive
5824 generic functions, and efficiency. Since the generic function
5825 dispatch mechanism has changed, there is no longer a need for such an
5826 expensive representation, and the representation has been simplified.
5828 This should not make any difference for most users.
5830 ** GOOPS support has been cleaned up.
5832 Some code has been moved from eval.c to objects.c and code in both of
5833 these compilation units has been cleaned up and better structured.
5835 *** New functions for applying generic functions
5837 New function: SCM scm_apply_generic (GENERIC, ARGS)
5838 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_0 (GENERIC)
5839 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_1 (GENERIC, ARG1)
5840 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_2 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2)
5841 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_3 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, ARG3)
5843 ** Deprecated function: scm_make_named_hook
5845 It is now replaced by:
5847 ** New function: SCM scm_create_hook (const char *name, int arity)
5849 Creates a hook in the same way as make-hook above but also
5850 binds a variable named NAME to it.
5852 This is the typical way of creating a hook from C code.
5854 Currently, the variable is created in the "current" module.
5855 This might change when we get the new module system.
5857 [The behaviour is identical to scm_make_named_hook.]
5861 Changes since Guile 1.3:
5863 * Changes to mailing lists
5865 ** Some of the Guile mailing lists have moved to sourceware.cygnus.com.
5867 See the README file to find current addresses for all the Guile
5870 * Changes to the distribution
5872 ** Readline support is no longer included with Guile by default.
5874 Based on the different license terms of Guile and Readline, we
5875 concluded that Guile should not *by default* cause the linking of
5876 Readline into an application program. Readline support is now offered
5877 as a separate module, which is linked into an application only when
5878 you explicitly specify it.
5880 Although Guile is GNU software, its distribution terms add a special
5881 exception to the usual GNU General Public License (GPL). Guile's
5882 license includes a clause that allows you to link Guile with non-free
5883 programs. We add this exception so as not to put Guile at a
5884 disadvantage vis-a-vis other extensibility packages that support other
5887 In contrast, the GNU Readline library is distributed under the GNU
5888 General Public License pure and simple. This means that you may not
5889 link Readline, even dynamically, into an application unless it is
5890 distributed under a free software license that is compatible the GPL.
5892 Because of this difference in distribution terms, an application that
5893 can use Guile may not be able to use Readline. Now users will be
5894 explicitly offered two independent decisions about the use of these
5897 You can activate the readline support by issuing
5899 (use-modules (readline-activator))
5902 from your ".guile" file, for example.
5904 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
5906 ** All builtins now print as primitives.
5907 Previously builtin procedures not belonging to the fundamental subr
5908 types printed as #<compiled closure #<primitive-procedure gsubr-apply>>.
5909 Now, they print as #<primitive-procedure NAME>.
5911 ** Backtraces slightly more intelligible.
5912 gsubr-apply and macro transformer application frames no longer appear
5915 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
5917 ** Guile now correctly handles internal defines by rewriting them into
5918 their equivalent letrec. Previously, internal defines would
5919 incrementally add to the innermost environment, without checking
5920 whether the restrictions specified in RnRS were met. This lead to the
5921 correct behaviour when these restriction actually were met, but didn't
5922 catch all illegal uses. Such an illegal use could lead to crashes of
5923 the Guile interpreter or or other unwanted results. An example of
5924 incorrect internal defines that made Guile behave erratically:
5936 The problem with this example is that the definition of `c' uses the
5937 value of `b' directly. This confuses the meoization machine of Guile
5938 so that the second call of `b' (this time in a larger environment that
5939 also contains bindings for `c' and `d') refers to the binding of `c'
5940 instead of `a'. You could also make Guile crash with a variation on
5945 (define (b flag) (if flag a 1))
5946 (define c (1+ (b flag)))
5954 From now on, Guile will issue an `Unbound variable: b' error message
5959 A hook contains a list of functions which should be called on
5960 particular occasions in an existing program. Hooks are used for
5963 A window manager might have a hook before-window-map-hook. The window
5964 manager uses the function run-hooks to call all functions stored in
5965 before-window-map-hook each time a window is mapped. The user can
5966 store functions in the hook using add-hook!.
5968 In Guile, hooks are first class objects.
5970 *** New function: make-hook [N_ARGS]
5972 Return a hook for hook functions which can take N_ARGS arguments.
5973 The default value for N_ARGS is 0.
5975 (See also scm_make_named_hook below.)
5977 *** New function: add-hook! HOOK PROC [APPEND_P]
5979 Put PROC at the beginning of the list of functions stored in HOOK.
5980 If APPEND_P is supplied, and non-false, put PROC at the end instead.
5982 PROC must be able to take the number of arguments specified when the
5985 If PROC already exists in HOOK, then remove it first.
5987 *** New function: remove-hook! HOOK PROC
5989 Remove PROC from the list of functions in HOOK.
5991 *** New function: reset-hook! HOOK
5993 Clear the list of hook functions stored in HOOK.
5995 *** New function: run-hook HOOK ARG1 ...
5997 Run all hook functions stored in HOOK with arguments ARG1 ... .
5998 The number of arguments supplied must correspond to the number given
5999 when the hook was created.
6001 ** The function `dynamic-link' now takes optional keyword arguments.
6002 The only keyword argument that is currently defined is `:global
6003 BOOL'. With it, you can control whether the shared library will be
6004 linked in global mode or not. In global mode, the symbols from the
6005 linked library can be used to resolve references from other
6006 dynamically linked libraries. In non-global mode, the linked
6007 library is essentially invisible and can only be accessed via
6008 `dynamic-func', etc. The default is now to link in global mode.
6009 Previously, the default has been non-global mode.
6011 The `#:global' keyword is only effective on platforms that support
6012 the dlopen family of functions.
6014 ** New function `provided?'
6016 - Function: provided? FEATURE
6017 Return true iff FEATURE is supported by this installation of
6018 Guile. FEATURE must be a symbol naming a feature; the global
6019 variable `*features*' is a list of available features.
6021 ** Changes to the module (ice-9 expect):
6023 *** The expect-strings macro now matches `$' in a regular expression
6024 only at a line-break or end-of-file by default. Previously it would
6025 match the end of the string accumulated so far. The old behaviour
6026 can be obtained by setting the variable `expect-strings-exec-flags'
6029 *** The expect-strings macro now uses a variable `expect-strings-exec-flags'
6030 for the regexp-exec flags. If `regexp/noteol' is included, then `$'
6031 in a regular expression will still match before a line-break or
6032 end-of-file. The default is `regexp/noteol'.
6034 *** The expect-strings macro now uses a variable
6035 `expect-strings-compile-flags' for the flags to be supplied to
6036 `make-regexp'. The default is `regexp/newline', which was previously
6039 *** The expect macro now supplies two arguments to a match procedure:
6040 the current accumulated string and a flag to indicate whether
6041 end-of-file has been reached. Previously only the string was supplied.
6042 If end-of-file is reached, the match procedure will be called an
6043 additional time with the same accumulated string as the previous call
6044 but with the flag set.
6046 ** New module (ice-9 format), implementing the Common Lisp `format' function.
6048 This code, and the documentation for it that appears here, was
6049 borrowed from SLIB, with minor adaptations for Guile.
6051 - Function: format DESTINATION FORMAT-STRING . ARGUMENTS
6052 An almost complete implementation of Common LISP format description
6053 according to the CL reference book `Common LISP' from Guy L.
6054 Steele, Digital Press. Backward compatible to most of the
6055 available Scheme format implementations.
6057 Returns `#t', `#f' or a string; has side effect of printing
6058 according to FORMAT-STRING. If DESTINATION is `#t', the output is
6059 to the current output port and `#t' is returned. If DESTINATION
6060 is `#f', a formatted string is returned as the result of the call.
6061 NEW: If DESTINATION is a string, DESTINATION is regarded as the
6062 format string; FORMAT-STRING is then the first argument and the
6063 output is returned as a string. If DESTINATION is a number, the
6064 output is to the current error port if available by the
6065 implementation. Otherwise DESTINATION must be an output port and
6068 FORMAT-STRING must be a string. In case of a formatting error
6069 format returns `#f' and prints a message on the current output or
6070 error port. Characters are output as if the string were output by
6071 the `display' function with the exception of those prefixed by a
6072 tilde (~). For a detailed description of the FORMAT-STRING syntax
6073 please consult a Common LISP format reference manual. For a test
6074 suite to verify this format implementation load `formatst.scm'.
6075 Please send bug reports to `lutzeb@cs.tu-berlin.de'.
6077 Note: `format' is not reentrant, i.e. only one `format'-call may
6078 be executed at a time.
6081 *** Format Specification (Format version 3.0)
6083 Please consult a Common LISP format reference manual for a detailed
6084 description of the format string syntax. For a demonstration of the
6085 implemented directives see `formatst.scm'.
6087 This implementation supports directive parameters and modifiers (`:'
6088 and `@' characters). Multiple parameters must be separated by a comma
6089 (`,'). Parameters can be numerical parameters (positive or negative),
6090 character parameters (prefixed by a quote character (`''), variable
6091 parameters (`v'), number of rest arguments parameter (`#'), empty and
6092 default parameters. Directive characters are case independent. The
6093 general form of a directive is:
6095 DIRECTIVE ::= ~{DIRECTIVE-PARAMETER,}[:][@]DIRECTIVE-CHARACTER
6097 DIRECTIVE-PARAMETER ::= [ [-|+]{0-9}+ | 'CHARACTER | v | # ]
6099 *** Implemented CL Format Control Directives
6101 Documentation syntax: Uppercase characters represent the
6102 corresponding control directive characters. Lowercase characters
6103 represent control directive parameter descriptions.
6106 Any (print as `display' does).
6110 `~MINCOL,COLINC,MINPAD,PADCHARA'
6114 S-expression (print as `write' does).
6118 `~MINCOL,COLINC,MINPAD,PADCHARS'
6124 print number sign always.
6127 print comma separated.
6129 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARD'
6135 print number sign always.
6138 print comma separated.
6140 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARX'
6146 print number sign always.
6149 print comma separated.
6151 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARO'
6157 print number sign always.
6160 print comma separated.
6162 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARB'
6167 `~N,MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARR'
6171 print a number as a Roman numeral.
6174 print a number as an "old fashioned" Roman numeral.
6177 print a number as an ordinal English number.
6180 print a number as a cardinal English number.
6185 prints `y' and `ies'.
6188 as `~P but jumps 1 argument backward.'
6191 as `~@P but jumps 1 argument backward.'
6196 prints a character as the reader can understand it (i.e. `#\'
6200 prints a character as emacs does (eg. `^C' for ASCII 03).
6203 Fixed-format floating-point (prints a flonum like MMM.NNN).
6204 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHARF'
6206 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
6209 Exponential floating-point (prints a flonum like MMM.NNN`E'EE).
6210 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,EXPONENTDIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHAR,EXPONENTCHARE'
6212 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
6215 General floating-point (prints a flonum either fixed or
6217 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,EXPONENTDIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHAR,EXPONENTCHARG'
6219 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
6222 Dollars floating-point (prints a flonum in fixed with signs
6224 `~DIGITS,SCALE,WIDTH,PADCHAR$'
6226 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
6229 A sign is always printed and appears before the padding.
6232 The sign appears before the padding.
6240 print newline if not at the beginning of the output line.
6242 prints `~&' and then N-1 newlines.
6247 print N page separators.
6257 newline is ignored, white space left.
6260 newline is left, white space ignored.
6265 relative tabulation.
6271 Indirection (expects indirect arguments as a list).
6273 extracts indirect arguments from format arguments.
6276 Case conversion (converts by `string-downcase').
6278 converts by `string-capitalize'.
6281 converts by `string-capitalize-first'.
6284 converts by `string-upcase'.
6287 Argument Jumping (jumps 1 argument forward).
6289 jumps N arguments forward.
6292 jumps 1 argument backward.
6295 jumps N arguments backward.
6298 jumps to the 0th argument.
6301 jumps to the Nth argument (beginning from 0)
6303 `~[STR0~;STR1~;...~;STRN~]'
6304 Conditional Expression (numerical clause conditional).
6306 take argument from N.
6309 true test conditional.
6312 if-else-then conditional.
6318 default clause follows.
6321 Iteration (args come from the next argument (a list)).
6323 at most N iterations.
6326 args from next arg (a list of lists).
6329 args from the rest of arguments.
6332 args from the rest args (lists).
6343 aborts if N <= M <= K
6345 *** Not Implemented CL Format Control Directives
6348 print `#f' as an empty list (see below).
6351 print `#f' as an empty list (see below).
6357 (sorry I don't understand its semantics completely)
6359 *** Extended, Replaced and Additional Control Directives
6361 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHD'
6362 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHX'
6363 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHO'
6364 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHB'
6365 `~N,MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHR'
6366 COMMAWIDTH is the number of characters between two comma
6370 print a R4RS complex number as `~F~@Fi' with passed parameters for
6374 Pretty print formatting of an argument for scheme code lists.
6380 Flushes the output if format DESTINATION is a port.
6383 Print a `#\space' character
6385 print N `#\space' characters.
6388 Print a `#\tab' character
6390 print N `#\tab' characters.
6393 Takes N as an integer representation for a character. No arguments
6394 are consumed. N is converted to a character by `integer->char'. N
6395 must be a positive decimal number.
6398 Print out readproof. Prints out internal objects represented as
6399 `#<...>' as strings `"#<...>"' so that the format output can always
6400 be processed by `read'.
6403 Print out readproof. Prints out internal objects represented as
6404 `#<...>' as strings `"#<...>"' so that the format output can always
6405 be processed by `read'.
6408 Prints information and a copyright notice on the format
6411 prints format version.
6414 may also print number strings, i.e. passing a number as a string
6415 and format it accordingly.
6417 *** Configuration Variables
6419 The format module exports some configuration variables to suit the
6420 systems and users needs. There should be no modification necessary for
6421 the configuration that comes with Guile. Format detects automatically
6422 if the running scheme system implements floating point numbers and
6425 format:symbol-case-conv
6426 Symbols are converted by `symbol->string' so the case type of the
6427 printed symbols is implementation dependent.
6428 `format:symbol-case-conv' is a one arg closure which is either
6429 `#f' (no conversion), `string-upcase', `string-downcase' or
6430 `string-capitalize'. (default `#f')
6432 format:iobj-case-conv
6433 As FORMAT:SYMBOL-CASE-CONV but applies for the representation of
6434 implementation internal objects. (default `#f')
6437 The character prefixing the exponent value in `~E' printing.
6440 *** Compatibility With Other Format Implementations
6446 Downward compatible except for padding support and `~A', `~S',
6447 `~P', `~X' uppercase printing. SLIB format 1.4 uses C-style
6448 `printf' padding support which is completely replaced by the CL
6449 `format' padding style.
6452 Downward compatible except for `~', which is not documented
6453 (ignores all characters inside the format string up to a newline
6454 character). (7.1 implements `~a', `~s', ~NEWLINE, `~~', `~%',
6455 numerical and variable parameters and `:/@' modifiers in the CL
6459 Downward compatible except for `~A' and `~S' which print in
6460 uppercase. (Elk implements `~a', `~s', `~~', and `~%' (no
6461 directive parameters or modifiers)).
6464 Downward compatible except for an optional destination parameter:
6465 S2C accepts a format call without a destination which returns a
6466 formatted string. This is equivalent to a #f destination in S2C.
6467 (S2C implements `~a', `~s', `~c', `~%', and `~~' (no directive
6468 parameters or modifiers)).
6471 ** Changes to string-handling functions.
6473 These functions were added to support the (ice-9 format) module, above.
6475 *** New function: string-upcase STRING
6476 *** New function: string-downcase STRING
6478 These are non-destructive versions of the existing string-upcase! and
6479 string-downcase! functions.
6481 *** New function: string-capitalize! STRING
6482 *** New function: string-capitalize STRING
6484 These functions convert the first letter of each word in the string to
6487 (string-capitalize "howdy there")
6490 As with the other functions, string-capitalize! modifies the string in
6491 place, while string-capitalize returns a modified copy of its argument.
6493 *** New function: string-ci->symbol STRING
6495 Return a symbol whose name is STRING, but having the same case as if
6496 the symbol had be read by `read'.
6498 Guile can be configured to be sensitive or insensitive to case
6499 differences in Scheme identifiers. If Guile is case-insensitive, all
6500 symbols are converted to lower case on input. The `string-ci->symbol'
6501 function returns a symbol whose name in STRING, transformed as Guile
6502 would if STRING were input.
6504 *** New function: substring-move! STRING1 START END STRING2 START
6506 Copy the substring of STRING1 from START (inclusive) to END
6507 (exclusive) to STRING2 at START. STRING1 and STRING2 may be the same
6508 string, and the source and destination areas may overlap; in all
6509 cases, the function behaves as if all the characters were copied
6512 *** Extended functions: substring-move-left! substring-move-right!
6514 These functions now correctly copy arbitrarily overlapping substrings;
6515 they are both synonyms for substring-move!.
6518 ** New module (ice-9 getopt-long), with the function `getopt-long'.
6520 getopt-long is a function for parsing command-line arguments in a
6521 manner consistent with other GNU programs.
6523 (getopt-long ARGS GRAMMAR)
6524 Parse the arguments ARGS according to the argument list grammar GRAMMAR.
6526 ARGS should be a list of strings. Its first element should be the
6527 name of the program; subsequent elements should be the arguments
6528 that were passed to the program on the command line. The
6529 `program-arguments' procedure returns a list of this form.
6531 GRAMMAR is a list of the form:
6532 ((OPTION (PROPERTY VALUE) ...) ...)
6534 Each OPTION should be a symbol. `getopt-long' will accept a
6535 command-line option named `--OPTION'.
6536 Each option can have the following (PROPERTY VALUE) pairs:
6538 (single-char CHAR) --- Accept `-CHAR' as a single-character
6539 equivalent to `--OPTION'. This is how to specify traditional
6541 (required? BOOL) --- If BOOL is true, the option is required.
6542 getopt-long will raise an error if it is not found in ARGS.
6543 (value BOOL) --- If BOOL is #t, the option accepts a value; if
6544 it is #f, it does not; and if it is the symbol
6545 `optional', the option may appear in ARGS with or
6547 (predicate FUNC) --- If the option accepts a value (i.e. you
6548 specified `(value #t)' for this option), then getopt
6549 will apply FUNC to the value, and throw an exception
6550 if it returns #f. FUNC should be a procedure which
6551 accepts a string and returns a boolean value; you may
6552 need to use quasiquotes to get it into GRAMMAR.
6554 The (PROPERTY VALUE) pairs may occur in any order, but each
6555 property may occur only once. By default, options do not have
6556 single-character equivalents, are not required, and do not take
6559 In ARGS, single-character options may be combined, in the usual
6560 Unix fashion: ("-x" "-y") is equivalent to ("-xy"). If an option
6561 accepts values, then it must be the last option in the
6562 combination; the value is the next argument. So, for example, using
6563 the following grammar:
6564 ((apples (single-char #\a))
6565 (blimps (single-char #\b) (value #t))
6566 (catalexis (single-char #\c) (value #t)))
6567 the following argument lists would be acceptable:
6568 ("-a" "-b" "bang" "-c" "couth") ("bang" and "couth" are the values
6569 for "blimps" and "catalexis")
6570 ("-ab" "bang" "-c" "couth") (same)
6571 ("-ac" "couth" "-b" "bang") (same)
6572 ("-abc" "couth" "bang") (an error, since `-b' is not the
6573 last option in its combination)
6575 If an option's value is optional, then `getopt-long' decides
6576 whether it has a value by looking at what follows it in ARGS. If
6577 the next element is a string, and it does not appear to be an
6578 option itself, then that string is the option's value.
6580 The value of a long option can appear as the next element in ARGS,
6581 or it can follow the option name, separated by an `=' character.
6582 Thus, using the same grammar as above, the following argument lists
6584 ("--apples" "Braeburn" "--blimps" "Goodyear")
6585 ("--apples=Braeburn" "--blimps" "Goodyear")
6586 ("--blimps" "Goodyear" "--apples=Braeburn")
6588 If the option "--" appears in ARGS, argument parsing stops there;
6589 subsequent arguments are returned as ordinary arguments, even if
6590 they resemble options. So, in the argument list:
6591 ("--apples" "Granny Smith" "--" "--blimp" "Goodyear")
6592 `getopt-long' will recognize the `apples' option as having the
6593 value "Granny Smith", but it will not recognize the `blimp'
6594 option; it will return the strings "--blimp" and "Goodyear" as
6595 ordinary argument strings.
6597 The `getopt-long' function returns the parsed argument list as an
6598 assocation list, mapping option names --- the symbols from GRAMMAR
6599 --- onto their values, or #t if the option does not accept a value.
6600 Unused options do not appear in the alist.
6602 All arguments that are not the value of any option are returned
6603 as a list, associated with the empty list.
6605 `getopt-long' throws an exception if:
6606 - it finds an unrecognized option in ARGS
6607 - a required option is omitted
6608 - an option that requires an argument doesn't get one
6609 - an option that doesn't accept an argument does get one (this can
6610 only happen using the long option `--opt=value' syntax)
6611 - an option predicate fails
6616 `((lockfile-dir (required? #t)
6619 (predicate ,file-is-directory?))
6620 (verbose (required? #f)
6623 (x-includes (single-char #\x))
6624 (rnet-server (single-char #\y)
6625 (predicate ,string?))))
6627 (getopt-long '("my-prog" "-vk" "/tmp" "foo1" "--x-includes=/usr/include"
6628 "--rnet-server=lamprod" "--" "-fred" "foo2" "foo3")
6630 => ((() "foo1" "-fred" "foo2" "foo3")
6631 (rnet-server . "lamprod")
6632 (x-includes . "/usr/include")
6633 (lockfile-dir . "/tmp")
6636 ** The (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style) module is obsolete; use (ice-9 getopt-long).
6638 It will be removed in a few releases.
6640 ** New syntax: lambda*
6641 ** New syntax: define*
6642 ** New syntax: define*-public
6643 ** New syntax: defmacro*
6644 ** New syntax: defmacro*-public
6645 Guile now supports optional arguments.
6647 `lambda*', `define*', `define*-public', `defmacro*' and
6648 `defmacro*-public' are identical to the non-* versions except that
6649 they use an extended type of parameter list that has the following BNF
6650 syntax (parentheses are literal, square brackets indicate grouping,
6651 and `*', `+' and `?' have the usual meaning):
6653 ext-param-list ::= ( [identifier]* [#&optional [ext-var-decl]+]?
6654 [#&key [ext-var-decl]+ [#&allow-other-keys]?]?
6655 [[#&rest identifier]|[. identifier]]? ) | [identifier]
6657 ext-var-decl ::= identifier | ( identifier expression )
6659 The semantics are best illustrated with the following documentation
6660 and examples for `lambda*':
6663 lambda extended for optional and keyword arguments
6665 lambda* creates a procedure that takes optional arguments. These
6666 are specified by putting them inside brackets at the end of the
6667 paramater list, but before any dotted rest argument. For example,
6668 (lambda* (a b #&optional c d . e) '())
6669 creates a procedure with fixed arguments a and b, optional arguments c
6670 and d, and rest argument e. If the optional arguments are omitted
6671 in a call, the variables for them are unbound in the procedure. This
6672 can be checked with the bound? macro.
6674 lambda* can also take keyword arguments. For example, a procedure
6676 (lambda* (#&key xyzzy larch) '())
6677 can be called with any of the argument lists (#:xyzzy 11)
6678 (#:larch 13) (#:larch 42 #:xyzzy 19) (). Whichever arguments
6679 are given as keywords are bound to values.
6681 Optional and keyword arguments can also be given default values
6682 which they take on when they are not present in a call, by giving a
6683 two-item list in place of an optional argument, for example in:
6684 (lambda* (foo #&optional (bar 42) #&key (baz 73)) (list foo bar baz))
6685 foo is a fixed argument, bar is an optional argument with default
6686 value 42, and baz is a keyword argument with default value 73.
6687 Default value expressions are not evaluated unless they are needed
6688 and until the procedure is called.
6690 lambda* now supports two more special parameter list keywords.
6692 lambda*-defined procedures now throw an error by default if a
6693 keyword other than one of those specified is found in the actual
6694 passed arguments. However, specifying #&allow-other-keys
6695 immediately after the kyword argument declarations restores the
6696 previous behavior of ignoring unknown keywords. lambda* also now
6697 guarantees that if the same keyword is passed more than once, the
6698 last one passed is the one that takes effect. For example,
6699 ((lambda* (#&key (heads 0) (tails 0)) (display (list heads tails)))
6700 #:heads 37 #:tails 42 #:heads 99)
6701 would result in (99 47) being displayed.
6703 #&rest is also now provided as a synonym for the dotted syntax rest
6704 argument. The argument lists (a . b) and (a #&rest b) are equivalent in
6705 all respects to lambda*. This is provided for more similarity to DSSSL,
6706 MIT-Scheme and Kawa among others, as well as for refugees from other
6709 Further documentation may be found in the optargs.scm file itself.
6711 The optional argument module also exports the macros `let-optional',
6712 `let-optional*', `let-keywords', `let-keywords*' and `bound?'. These
6713 are not documented here because they may be removed in the future, but
6714 full documentation is still available in optargs.scm.
6716 ** New syntax: and-let*
6717 Guile now supports the `and-let*' form, described in the draft SRFI-2.
6719 Syntax: (land* (<clause> ...) <body> ...)
6720 Each <clause> should have one of the following forms:
6721 (<variable> <expression>)
6724 Each <variable> or <bound-variable> should be an identifier. Each
6725 <expression> should be a valid expression. The <body> should be a
6726 possibly empty sequence of expressions, like the <body> of a
6729 Semantics: A LAND* expression is evaluated by evaluating the
6730 <expression> or <bound-variable> of each of the <clause>s from
6731 left to right. The value of the first <expression> or
6732 <bound-variable> that evaluates to a false value is returned; the
6733 remaining <expression>s and <bound-variable>s are not evaluated.
6734 The <body> forms are evaluated iff all the <expression>s and
6735 <bound-variable>s evaluate to true values.
6737 The <expression>s and the <body> are evaluated in an environment
6738 binding each <variable> of the preceding (<variable> <expression>)
6739 clauses to the value of the <expression>. Later bindings
6740 shadow earlier bindings.
6742 Guile's and-let* macro was contributed by Michael Livshin.
6744 ** New sorting functions
6746 *** New function: sorted? SEQUENCE LESS?
6747 Returns `#t' when the sequence argument is in non-decreasing order
6748 according to LESS? (that is, there is no adjacent pair `... x y
6749 ...' for which `(less? y x)').
6751 Returns `#f' when the sequence contains at least one out-of-order
6752 pair. It is an error if the sequence is neither a list nor a
6755 *** New function: merge LIST1 LIST2 LESS?
6756 LIST1 and LIST2 are sorted lists.
6757 Returns the sorted list of all elements in LIST1 and LIST2.
6759 Assume that the elements a and b1 in LIST1 and b2 in LIST2 are "equal"
6760 in the sense that (LESS? x y) --> #f for x, y in {a, b1, b2},
6761 and that a < b1 in LIST1. Then a < b1 < b2 in the result.
6762 (Here "<" should read "comes before".)
6764 *** New procedure: merge! LIST1 LIST2 LESS?
6765 Merges two lists, re-using the pairs of LIST1 and LIST2 to build
6766 the result. If the code is compiled, and LESS? constructs no new
6767 pairs, no pairs at all will be allocated. The first pair of the
6768 result will be either the first pair of LIST1 or the first pair of
6771 *** New function: sort SEQUENCE LESS?
6772 Accepts either a list or a vector, and returns a new sequence
6773 which is sorted. The new sequence is the same type as the input.
6774 Always `(sorted? (sort sequence less?) less?)'. The original
6775 sequence is not altered in any way. The new sequence shares its
6776 elements with the old one; no elements are copied.
6778 *** New procedure: sort! SEQUENCE LESS
6779 Returns its sorted result in the original boxes. No new storage is
6780 allocated at all. Proper usage: (set! slist (sort! slist <))
6782 *** New function: stable-sort SEQUENCE LESS?
6783 Similar to `sort' but stable. That is, if "equal" elements are
6784 ordered a < b in the original sequence, they will have the same order
6787 *** New function: stable-sort! SEQUENCE LESS?
6788 Similar to `sort!' but stable.
6789 Uses temporary storage when sorting vectors.
6791 *** New functions: sort-list, sort-list!
6792 Added for compatibility with scsh.
6794 ** New built-in random number support
6796 *** New function: random N [STATE]
6797 Accepts a positive integer or real N and returns a number of the
6798 same type between zero (inclusive) and N (exclusive). The values
6799 returned have a uniform distribution.
6801 The optional argument STATE must be of the type produced by
6802 `copy-random-state' or `seed->random-state'. It defaults to the value
6803 of the variable `*random-state*'. This object is used to maintain the
6804 state of the pseudo-random-number generator and is altered as a side
6805 effect of the `random' operation.
6807 *** New variable: *random-state*
6808 Holds a data structure that encodes the internal state of the
6809 random-number generator that `random' uses by default. The nature
6810 of this data structure is implementation-dependent. It may be
6811 printed out and successfully read back in, but may or may not
6812 function correctly as a random-number state object in another
6815 *** New function: copy-random-state [STATE]
6816 Returns a new object of type suitable for use as the value of the
6817 variable `*random-state*' and as a second argument to `random'.
6818 If argument STATE is given, a copy of it is returned. Otherwise a
6819 copy of `*random-state*' is returned.
6821 *** New function: seed->random-state SEED
6822 Returns a new object of type suitable for use as the value of the
6823 variable `*random-state*' and as a second argument to `random'.
6824 SEED is a string or a number. A new state is generated and
6825 initialized using SEED.
6827 *** New function: random:uniform [STATE]
6828 Returns an uniformly distributed inexact real random number in the
6829 range between 0 and 1.
6831 *** New procedure: random:solid-sphere! VECT [STATE]
6832 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers the sum of whose
6833 squares is less than 1.0. Thinking of VECT as coordinates in
6834 space of dimension N = `(vector-length VECT)', the coordinates are
6835 uniformly distributed within the unit N-shere. The sum of the
6836 squares of the numbers is returned. VECT can be either a vector
6837 or a uniform vector of doubles.
6839 *** New procedure: random:hollow-sphere! VECT [STATE]
6840 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers the sum of whose squares
6841 is equal to 1.0. Thinking of VECT as coordinates in space of
6842 dimension n = `(vector-length VECT)', the coordinates are uniformly
6843 distributed over the surface of the unit n-shere. VECT can be either
6844 a vector or a uniform vector of doubles.
6846 *** New function: random:normal [STATE]
6847 Returns an inexact real in a normal distribution with mean 0 and
6848 standard deviation 1. For a normal distribution with mean M and
6849 standard deviation D use `(+ M (* D (random:normal)))'.
6851 *** New procedure: random:normal-vector! VECT [STATE]
6852 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers which are independent and
6853 standard normally distributed (i.e., with mean 0 and variance 1).
6854 VECT can be either a vector or a uniform vector of doubles.
6856 *** New function: random:exp STATE
6857 Returns an inexact real in an exponential distribution with mean 1.
6858 For an exponential distribution with mean U use (* U (random:exp)).
6860 ** The range of logand, logior, logxor, logtest, and logbit? have changed.
6862 These functions now operate on numbers in the range of a C unsigned
6865 These functions used to operate on numbers in the range of a C signed
6866 long; however, this seems inappropriate, because Guile integers don't
6869 ** New function: make-guardian
6870 This is an implementation of guardians as described in
6871 R. Kent Dybvig, Carl Bruggeman, and David Eby (1993) "Guardians in a
6872 Generation-Based Garbage Collector" ACM SIGPLAN Conference on
6873 Programming Language Design and Implementation, June 1993
6874 ftp://ftp.cs.indiana.edu/pub/scheme-repository/doc/pubs/guardians.ps.gz
6876 ** New functions: delq1!, delv1!, delete1!
6877 These procedures behave similar to delq! and friends but delete only
6878 one object if at all.
6880 ** New function: unread-string STRING PORT
6881 Unread STRING to PORT, that is, push it back onto the port so that
6882 next read operation will work on the pushed back characters.
6884 ** unread-char can now be called multiple times
6885 If unread-char is called multiple times, the unread characters will be
6886 read again in last-in first-out order.
6888 ** the procedures uniform-array-read! and uniform-array-write! now
6889 work on any kind of port, not just ports which are open on a file.
6891 ** Now 'l' in a port mode requests line buffering.
6893 ** The procedure truncate-file now works on string ports as well
6894 as file ports. If the size argument is omitted, the current
6895 file position is used.
6897 ** new procedure: seek PORT/FDES OFFSET WHENCE
6898 The arguments are the same as for the old fseek procedure, but it
6899 works on string ports as well as random-access file ports.
6901 ** the fseek procedure now works on string ports, since it has been
6902 redefined using seek.
6904 ** the setvbuf procedure now uses a default size if mode is _IOFBF and
6905 size is not supplied.
6907 ** the newline procedure no longer flushes the port if it's not
6908 line-buffered: previously it did if it was the current output port.
6910 ** open-pipe and close-pipe are no longer primitive procedures, but
6911 an emulation can be obtained using `(use-modules (ice-9 popen))'.
6913 ** the freopen procedure has been removed.
6915 ** new procedure: drain-input PORT
6916 Drains PORT's read buffers (including any pushed-back characters)
6917 and returns the contents as a single string.
6919 ** New function: map-in-order PROC LIST1 LIST2 ...
6920 Version of `map' which guarantees that the procedure is applied to the
6921 lists in serial order.
6923 ** Renamed `serial-array-copy!' and `serial-array-map!' to
6924 `array-copy-in-order!' and `array-map-in-order!'. The old names are
6925 now obsolete and will go away in release 1.5.
6927 ** New syntax: collect BODY1 ...
6928 Version of `begin' which returns a list of the results of the body
6929 forms instead of the result of the last body form. In contrast to
6930 `begin', `collect' allows an empty body.
6932 ** New functions: read-history FILENAME, write-history FILENAME
6933 Read/write command line history from/to file. Returns #t on success
6934 and #f if an error occured.
6936 ** `ls' and `lls' in module (ice-9 ls) now handle no arguments.
6938 These procedures return a list of definitions available in the specified
6939 argument, a relative module reference. In the case of no argument,
6940 `(current-module)' is now consulted for definitions to return, instead
6941 of simply returning #f, the former behavior.
6943 ** The #/ syntax for lists is no longer supported.
6945 Earlier versions of Scheme accepted this syntax, but printed a
6948 ** Guile no longer consults the SCHEME_LOAD_PATH environment variable.
6950 Instead, you should set GUILE_LOAD_PATH to tell Guile where to find
6953 * Changes to the gh_ interface
6957 Now takes a second argument which is the result array. If this
6958 pointer is NULL, a new array is malloced (the old behaviour).
6960 ** gh_chars2byvect, gh_shorts2svect, gh_floats2fvect, gh_scm2chars,
6961 gh_scm2shorts, gh_scm2longs, gh_scm2floats
6965 * Changes to the scm_ interface
6967 ** Function: scm_make_named_hook (char* name, int n_args)
6969 Creates a hook in the same way as make-hook above but also
6970 binds a variable named NAME to it.
6972 This is the typical way of creating a hook from C code.
6974 Currently, the variable is created in the "current" module. This
6975 might change when we get the new module system.
6977 ** The smob interface
6979 The interface for creating smobs has changed. For documentation, see
6980 data-rep.info (made from guile-core/doc/data-rep.texi).
6982 *** Deprecated function: SCM scm_newsmob (scm_smobfuns *)
6984 >>> This function will be removed in 1.3.4. <<<
6988 *** Function: SCM scm_make_smob_type (const char *name, scm_sizet size)
6989 This function adds a new smob type, named NAME, with instance size
6990 SIZE to the system. The return value is a tag that is used in
6991 creating instances of the type. If SIZE is 0, then no memory will
6992 be allocated when instances of the smob are created, and nothing
6993 will be freed by the default free function.
6995 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_mark (long tc, SCM (*mark) (SCM))
6996 This function sets the smob marking procedure for the smob type
6997 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
6998 `scm_make_smob_type'.
7000 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_free (long tc, SCM (*mark) (SCM))
7001 This function sets the smob freeing procedure for the smob type
7002 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
7003 `scm_make_smob_type'.
7005 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_print (tc, print)
7007 - Function: void scm_set_smob_print (long tc,
7008 scm_sizet (*print) (SCM,
7012 This function sets the smob printing procedure for the smob type
7013 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
7014 `scm_make_smob_type'.
7016 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_equalp (long tc, SCM (*equalp) (SCM, SCM))
7017 This function sets the smob equality-testing predicate for the
7018 smob type specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
7019 `scm_make_smob_type'.
7021 *** Macro: void SCM_NEWSMOB (SCM var, long tc, void *data)
7022 Make VALUE contain a smob instance of the type with type code TC and
7023 smob data DATA. VALUE must be previously declared as C type `SCM'.
7025 *** Macro: fn_returns SCM_RETURN_NEWSMOB (long tc, void *data)
7026 This macro expands to a block of code that creates a smob instance
7027 of the type with type code TC and smob data DATA, and returns that
7028 `SCM' value. It should be the last piece of code in a block.
7030 ** The interfaces for using I/O ports and implementing port types
7031 (ptobs) have changed significantly. The new interface is based on
7032 shared access to buffers and a new set of ptob procedures.
7034 *** scm_newptob has been removed
7038 *** Function: SCM scm_make_port_type (type_name, fill_buffer, write_flush)
7040 - Function: SCM scm_make_port_type (char *type_name,
7041 int (*fill_buffer) (SCM port),
7042 void (*write_flush) (SCM port));
7044 Similarly to the new smob interface, there is a set of function
7045 setters by which the user can customize the behaviour of his port
7046 type. See ports.h (scm_set_port_XXX).
7048 ** scm_strport_to_string: New function: creates a new string from
7049 a string port's buffer.
7051 ** Plug in interface for random number generators
7052 The variable `scm_the_rng' in random.c contains a value and three
7053 function pointers which together define the current random number
7054 generator being used by the Scheme level interface and the random
7055 number library functions.
7057 The user is free to replace the default generator with the generator
7060 *** Variable: size_t scm_the_rng.rstate_size
7061 The size of the random state type used by the current RNG
7064 *** Function: unsigned long scm_the_rng.random_bits (scm_rstate *STATE)
7065 Given the random STATE, return 32 random bits.
7067 *** Function: void scm_the_rng.init_rstate (scm_rstate *STATE, chars *S, int N)
7068 Seed random state STATE using string S of length N.
7070 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_the_rng.copy_rstate (scm_rstate *STATE)
7071 Given random state STATE, return a malloced copy.
7074 The default RNG is the MWC (Multiply With Carry) random number
7075 generator described by George Marsaglia at the Department of
7076 Statistics and Supercomputer Computations Research Institute, The
7077 Florida State University (http://stat.fsu.edu/~geo).
7079 It uses 64 bits, has a period of 4578426017172946943 (4.6e18), and
7080 passes all tests in the DIEHARD test suite
7081 (http://stat.fsu.edu/~geo/diehard.html). The generation of 32 bits
7082 costs one multiply and one add on platforms which either supports long
7083 longs (gcc does this on most systems) or have 64 bit longs. The cost
7084 is four multiply on other systems but this can be optimized by writing
7085 scm_i_uniform32 in assembler.
7087 These functions are provided through the scm_the_rng interface for use
7088 by libguile and the application.
7090 *** Function: unsigned long scm_i_uniform32 (scm_i_rstate *STATE)
7091 Given the random STATE, return 32 random bits.
7092 Don't use this function directly. Instead go through the plugin
7093 interface (see "Plug in interface" above).
7095 *** Function: void scm_i_init_rstate (scm_i_rstate *STATE, char *SEED, int N)
7096 Initialize STATE using SEED of length N.
7098 *** Function: scm_i_rstate *scm_i_copy_rstate (scm_i_rstate *STATE)
7099 Return a malloc:ed copy of STATE. This function can easily be re-used
7100 in the interfaces to other RNGs.
7102 ** Random number library functions
7103 These functions use the current RNG through the scm_the_rng interface.
7104 It might be a good idea to use these functions from your C code so
7105 that only one random generator is used by all code in your program.
7107 The default random state is stored in:
7109 *** Variable: SCM scm_var_random_state
7110 Contains the vcell of the Scheme variable "*random-state*" which is
7111 used as default state by all random number functions in the Scheme
7116 double x = scm_c_uniform01 (SCM_RSTATE (SCM_CDR (scm_var_random_state)));
7118 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_c_default_rstate (void)
7119 This is a convenience function which returns the value of
7120 scm_var_random_state. An error message is generated if this value
7121 isn't a random state.
7123 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_c_make_rstate (char *SEED, int LENGTH)
7124 Make a new random state from the string SEED of length LENGTH.
7126 It is generally not a good idea to use multiple random states in a
7127 program. While subsequent random numbers generated from one random
7128 state are guaranteed to be reasonably independent, there is no such
7129 guarantee for numbers generated from different random states.
7131 *** Macro: unsigned long scm_c_uniform32 (scm_rstate *STATE)
7132 Return 32 random bits.
7134 *** Function: double scm_c_uniform01 (scm_rstate *STATE)
7135 Return a sample from the uniform(0,1) distribution.
7137 *** Function: double scm_c_normal01 (scm_rstate *STATE)
7138 Return a sample from the normal(0,1) distribution.
7140 *** Function: double scm_c_exp1 (scm_rstate *STATE)
7141 Return a sample from the exp(1) distribution.
7143 *** Function: unsigned long scm_c_random (scm_rstate *STATE, unsigned long M)
7144 Return a sample from the discrete uniform(0,M) distribution.
7146 *** Function: SCM scm_c_random_bignum (scm_rstate *STATE, SCM M)
7147 Return a sample from the discrete uniform(0,M) distribution.
7148 M must be a bignum object. The returned value may be an INUM.
7152 Changes in Guile 1.3 (released Monday, October 19, 1998):
7154 * Changes to the distribution
7156 ** We renamed the SCHEME_LOAD_PATH environment variable to GUILE_LOAD_PATH.
7157 To avoid conflicts, programs should name environment variables after
7158 themselves, except when there's a common practice establishing some
7161 For now, Guile supports both GUILE_LOAD_PATH and SCHEME_LOAD_PATH,
7162 giving the former precedence, and printing a warning message if the
7163 latter is set. Guile 1.4 will not recognize SCHEME_LOAD_PATH at all.
7165 ** The header files related to multi-byte characters have been removed.
7166 They were: libguile/extchrs.h and libguile/mbstrings.h. Any C code
7167 which referred to these explicitly will probably need to be rewritten,
7168 since the support for the variant string types has been removed; see
7171 ** The header files append.h and sequences.h have been removed. These
7172 files implemented non-R4RS operations which would encourage
7173 non-portable programming style and less easy-to-read code.
7175 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
7177 ** New procedures have been added to implement a "batch mode":
7179 *** Function: batch-mode?
7181 Returns a boolean indicating whether the interpreter is in batch
7184 *** Function: set-batch-mode?! ARG
7186 If ARG is true, switches the interpreter to batch mode. The `#f'
7187 case has not been implemented.
7189 ** Guile now provides full command-line editing, when run interactively.
7190 To use this feature, you must have the readline library installed.
7191 The Guile build process will notice it, and automatically include
7194 The readline library is available via anonymous FTP from any GNU
7195 mirror site; the canonical location is "ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu".
7197 ** the-last-stack is now a fluid.
7199 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
7201 ** You can now use the `guile-config' utility to build programs that use Guile.
7203 Guile now includes a command-line utility called `guile-config', which
7204 can provide information about how to compile and link programs that
7207 *** `guile-config compile' prints any C compiler flags needed to use Guile.
7208 You should include this command's output on the command line you use
7209 to compile C or C++ code that #includes the Guile header files. It's
7210 usually just a `-I' flag to help the compiler find the Guile headers.
7213 *** `guile-config link' prints any linker flags necessary to link with Guile.
7215 This command writes to its standard output a list of flags which you
7216 must pass to the linker to link your code against the Guile library.
7217 The flags include '-lguile' itself, any other libraries the Guile
7218 library depends upon, and any `-L' flags needed to help the linker
7219 find those libraries.
7221 For example, here is a Makefile rule that builds a program named 'foo'
7222 from the object files ${FOO_OBJECTS}, and links them against Guile:
7225 ${CC} ${CFLAGS} ${FOO_OBJECTS} `guile-config link` -o foo
7227 Previous Guile releases recommended that you use autoconf to detect
7228 which of a predefined set of libraries were present on your system.
7229 It is more robust to use `guile-config', since it records exactly which
7230 libraries the installed Guile library requires.
7232 This was originally called `build-guile', but was renamed to
7233 `guile-config' before Guile 1.3 was released, to be consistent with
7234 the analogous script for the GTK+ GUI toolkit, which is called
7238 ** Use the GUILE_FLAGS macro in your configure.in file to find Guile.
7240 If you are using the GNU autoconf package to configure your program,
7241 you can use the GUILE_FLAGS autoconf macro to call `guile-config'
7242 (described above) and gather the necessary values for use in your
7245 The GUILE_FLAGS macro expands to configure script code which runs the
7246 `guile-config' script, to find out where Guile's header files and
7247 libraries are installed. It sets two variables, marked for
7248 substitution, as by AC_SUBST.
7250 GUILE_CFLAGS --- flags to pass to a C or C++ compiler to build
7251 code that uses Guile header files. This is almost always just a
7254 GUILE_LDFLAGS --- flags to pass to the linker to link a
7255 program against Guile. This includes `-lguile' for the Guile
7256 library itself, any libraries that Guile itself requires (like
7257 -lqthreads), and so on. It may also include a -L flag to tell the
7258 compiler where to find the libraries.
7260 GUILE_FLAGS is defined in the file guile.m4, in the top-level
7261 directory of the Guile distribution. You can copy it into your
7262 package's aclocal.m4 file, and then use it in your configure.in file.
7264 If you are using the `aclocal' program, distributed with GNU automake,
7265 to maintain your aclocal.m4 file, the Guile installation process
7266 installs guile.m4 where aclocal will find it. All you need to do is
7267 use GUILE_FLAGS in your configure.in file, and then run `aclocal';
7268 this will copy the definition of GUILE_FLAGS into your aclocal.m4
7272 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
7274 ** Multi-byte strings have been removed, as have multi-byte and wide
7275 ports. We felt that these were the wrong approach to
7276 internationalization support.
7278 ** New function: readline [PROMPT]
7279 Read a line from the terminal, and allow the user to edit it,
7280 prompting with PROMPT. READLINE provides a large set of Emacs-like
7281 editing commands, lets the user recall previously typed lines, and
7282 works on almost every kind of terminal, including dumb terminals.
7284 READLINE assumes that the cursor is at the beginning of the line when
7285 it is invoked. Thus, you can't print a prompt yourself, and then call
7286 READLINE; you need to package up your prompt as a string, pass it to
7287 the function, and let READLINE print the prompt itself. This is
7288 because READLINE needs to know the prompt's screen width.
7290 For Guile to provide this function, you must have the readline
7291 library, version 2.1 or later, installed on your system. Readline is
7292 available via anonymous FTP from prep.ai.mit.edu in pub/gnu, or from
7293 any GNU mirror site.
7295 See also ADD-HISTORY function.
7297 ** New function: add-history STRING
7298 Add STRING as the most recent line in the history used by the READLINE
7299 command. READLINE does not add lines to the history itself; you must
7300 call ADD-HISTORY to make previous input available to the user.
7302 ** The behavior of the read-line function has changed.
7304 This function now uses standard C library functions to read the line,
7305 for speed. This means that it doesn not respect the value of
7306 scm-line-incrementors; it assumes that lines are delimited with
7309 (Note that this is read-line, the function that reads a line of text
7310 from a port, not readline, the function that reads a line from a
7311 terminal, providing full editing capabilities.)
7313 ** New module (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style): Parse command-line arguments.
7315 This module provides some simple argument parsing. It exports one
7318 Function: getopt-gnu-style ARG-LS
7319 Parse a list of program arguments into an alist of option
7322 Each item in the list of program arguments is examined to see if
7323 it meets the syntax of a GNU long-named option. An argument like
7324 `--MUMBLE' produces an element of the form (MUMBLE . #t) in the
7325 returned alist, where MUMBLE is a keyword object with the same
7326 name as the argument. An argument like `--MUMBLE=FROB' produces
7327 an element of the form (MUMBLE . FROB), where FROB is a string.
7329 As a special case, the returned alist also contains a pair whose
7330 car is the symbol `rest'. The cdr of this pair is a list
7331 containing all the items in the argument list that are not options
7332 of the form mentioned above.
7334 The argument `--' is treated specially: all items in the argument
7335 list appearing after such an argument are not examined, and are
7336 returned in the special `rest' list.
7338 This function does not parse normal single-character switches.
7339 You will need to parse them out of the `rest' list yourself.
7341 ** The read syntax for byte vectors and short vectors has changed.
7343 Instead of #bytes(...), write #y(...).
7345 Instead of #short(...), write #h(...).
7347 This may seem nutty, but, like the other uniform vectors, byte vectors
7348 and short vectors want to have the same print and read syntax (and,
7349 more basic, want to have read syntax!). Changing the read syntax to
7350 use multiple characters after the hash sign breaks with the
7351 conventions used in R5RS and the conventions used for the other
7352 uniform vectors. It also introduces complexity in the current reader,
7353 both on the C and Scheme levels. (The Right solution is probably to
7354 change the syntax and prototypes for uniform vectors entirely.)
7357 ** The new module (ice-9 session) provides useful interactive functions.
7359 *** New procedure: (apropos REGEXP OPTION ...)
7361 Display a list of top-level variables whose names match REGEXP, and
7362 the modules they are imported from. Each OPTION should be one of the
7365 value --- Show the value of each matching variable.
7366 shadow --- Show bindings shadowed by subsequently imported modules.
7367 full --- Same as both `shadow' and `value'.
7371 guile> (apropos "trace" 'full)
7372 debug: trace #<procedure trace args>
7373 debug: untrace #<procedure untrace args>
7374 the-scm-module: display-backtrace #<compiled-closure #<primitive-procedure gsubr-apply>>
7375 the-scm-module: before-backtrace-hook ()
7376 the-scm-module: backtrace #<primitive-procedure backtrace>
7377 the-scm-module: after-backtrace-hook ()
7378 the-scm-module: has-shown-backtrace-hint? #f
7381 ** There are new functions and syntax for working with macros.
7383 Guile implements macros as a special object type. Any variable whose
7384 top-level binding is a macro object acts as a macro. The macro object
7385 specifies how the expression should be transformed before evaluation.
7387 *** Macro objects now print in a reasonable way, resembling procedures.
7389 *** New function: (macro? OBJ)
7390 True iff OBJ is a macro object.
7392 *** New function: (primitive-macro? OBJ)
7393 Like (macro? OBJ), but true only if OBJ is one of the Guile primitive
7394 macro transformers, implemented in eval.c rather than Scheme code.
7396 Why do we have this function?
7397 - For symmetry with procedure? and primitive-procedure?,
7398 - to allow custom print procedures to tell whether a macro is
7399 primitive, and display it differently, and
7400 - to allow compilers and user-written evaluators to distinguish
7401 builtin special forms from user-defined ones, which could be
7404 *** New function: (macro-type OBJ)
7405 Return a value indicating what kind of macro OBJ is. Possible return
7408 The symbol `syntax' --- a macro created by procedure->syntax.
7409 The symbol `macro' --- a macro created by procedure->macro.
7410 The symbol `macro!' --- a macro created by procedure->memoizing-macro.
7411 The boolean #f --- if OBJ is not a macro object.
7413 *** New function: (macro-name MACRO)
7414 Return the name of the macro object MACRO's procedure, as returned by
7417 *** New function: (macro-transformer MACRO)
7418 Return the transformer procedure for MACRO.
7420 *** New syntax: (use-syntax MODULE ... TRANSFORMER)
7422 Specify a new macro expander to use in the current module. Each
7423 MODULE is a module name, with the same meaning as in the `use-modules'
7424 form; each named module's exported bindings are added to the current
7425 top-level environment. TRANSFORMER is an expression evaluated in the
7426 resulting environment which must yield a procedure to use as the
7427 module's eval transformer: every expression evaluated in this module
7428 is passed to this function, and the result passed to the Guile
7431 *** macro-eval! is removed. Use local-eval instead.
7433 ** Some magic has been added to the printer to better handle user
7434 written printing routines (like record printers, closure printers).
7436 The problem is that these user written routines must have access to
7437 the current `print-state' to be able to handle fancy things like
7438 detection of circular references. These print-states have to be
7439 passed to the builtin printing routines (display, write, etc) to
7440 properly continue the print chain.
7442 We didn't want to change all existing print code so that it
7443 explicitly passes thru a print state in addition to a port. Instead,
7444 we extented the possible values that the builtin printing routines
7445 accept as a `port'. In addition to a normal port, they now also take
7446 a pair of a normal port and a print-state. Printing will go to the
7447 port and the print-state will be used to control the detection of
7448 circular references, etc. If the builtin function does not care for a
7449 print-state, it is simply ignored.
7451 User written callbacks are now called with such a pair as their
7452 `port', but because every function now accepts this pair as a PORT
7453 argument, you don't have to worry about that. In fact, it is probably
7454 safest to not check for these pairs.
7456 However, it is sometimes necessary to continue a print chain on a
7457 different port, for example to get a intermediate string
7458 representation of the printed value, mangle that string somehow, and
7459 then to finally print the mangled string. Use the new function
7461 inherit-print-state OLD-PORT NEW-PORT
7463 for this. It constructs a new `port' that prints to NEW-PORT but
7464 inherits the print-state of OLD-PORT.
7466 ** struct-vtable-offset renamed to vtable-offset-user
7468 ** New constants: vtable-index-layout, vtable-index-vtable, vtable-index-printer
7470 ** There is now a third optional argument to make-vtable-vtable
7471 (and fourth to make-struct) when constructing new types (vtables).
7472 This argument initializes field vtable-index-printer of the vtable.
7474 ** The detection of circular references has been extended to structs.
7475 That is, a structure that -- in the process of being printed -- prints
7476 itself does not lead to infinite recursion.
7478 ** There is now some basic support for fluids. Please read
7479 "libguile/fluid.h" to find out more. It is accessible from Scheme with
7480 the following functions and macros:
7482 Function: make-fluid
7484 Create a new fluid object. Fluids are not special variables or
7485 some other extension to the semantics of Scheme, but rather
7486 ordinary Scheme objects. You can store them into variables (that
7487 are still lexically scoped, of course) or into any other place you
7488 like. Every fluid has a initial value of `#f'.
7490 Function: fluid? OBJ
7492 Test whether OBJ is a fluid.
7494 Function: fluid-ref FLUID
7495 Function: fluid-set! FLUID VAL
7497 Access/modify the fluid FLUID. Modifications are only visible
7498 within the current dynamic root (that includes threads).
7500 Function: with-fluids* FLUIDS VALUES THUNK
7502 FLUIDS is a list of fluids and VALUES a corresponding list of
7503 values for these fluids. Before THUNK gets called the values are
7504 installed in the fluids and the old values of the fluids are
7505 saved in the VALUES list. When the flow of control leaves THUNK
7506 or reenters it, the values get swapped again. You might think of
7507 this as a `safe-fluid-excursion'. Note that the VALUES list is
7508 modified by `with-fluids*'.
7510 Macro: with-fluids ((FLUID VALUE) ...) FORM ...
7512 The same as `with-fluids*' but with a different syntax. It looks
7513 just like `let', but both FLUID and VALUE are evaluated. Remember,
7514 fluids are not special variables but ordinary objects. FLUID
7515 should evaluate to a fluid.
7517 ** Changes to system call interfaces:
7519 *** close-port, close-input-port and close-output-port now return a
7520 boolean instead of an `unspecified' object. #t means that the port
7521 was successfully closed, while #f means it was already closed. It is
7522 also now possible for these procedures to raise an exception if an
7523 error occurs (some errors from write can be delayed until close.)
7525 *** the first argument to chmod, fcntl, ftell and fseek can now be a
7528 *** the third argument to fcntl is now optional.
7530 *** the first argument to chown can now be a file descriptor or a port.
7532 *** the argument to stat can now be a port.
7534 *** The following new procedures have been added (most use scsh
7537 *** procedure: close PORT/FD
7538 Similar to close-port (*note close-port: Closing Ports.), but also
7539 works on file descriptors. A side effect of closing a file
7540 descriptor is that any ports using that file descriptor are moved
7541 to a different file descriptor and have their revealed counts set
7544 *** procedure: port->fdes PORT
7545 Returns the integer file descriptor underlying PORT. As a side
7546 effect the revealed count of PORT is incremented.
7548 *** procedure: fdes->ports FDES
7549 Returns a list of existing ports which have FDES as an underlying
7550 file descriptor, without changing their revealed counts.
7552 *** procedure: fdes->inport FDES
7553 Returns an existing input port which has FDES as its underlying
7554 file descriptor, if one exists, and increments its revealed count.
7555 Otherwise, returns a new input port with a revealed count of 1.
7557 *** procedure: fdes->outport FDES
7558 Returns an existing output port which has FDES as its underlying
7559 file descriptor, if one exists, and increments its revealed count.
7560 Otherwise, returns a new output port with a revealed count of 1.
7562 The next group of procedures perform a `dup2' system call, if NEWFD
7563 (an integer) is supplied, otherwise a `dup'. The file descriptor to be
7564 duplicated can be supplied as an integer or contained in a port. The
7565 type of value returned varies depending on which procedure is used.
7567 All procedures also have the side effect when performing `dup2' that
7568 any ports using NEWFD are moved to a different file descriptor and have
7569 their revealed counts set to zero.
7571 *** procedure: dup->fdes PORT/FD [NEWFD]
7572 Returns an integer file descriptor.
7574 *** procedure: dup->inport PORT/FD [NEWFD]
7575 Returns a new input port using the new file descriptor.
7577 *** procedure: dup->outport PORT/FD [NEWFD]
7578 Returns a new output port using the new file descriptor.
7580 *** procedure: dup PORT/FD [NEWFD]
7581 Returns a new port if PORT/FD is a port, with the same mode as the
7582 supplied port, otherwise returns an integer file descriptor.
7584 *** procedure: dup->port PORT/FD MODE [NEWFD]
7585 Returns a new port using the new file descriptor. MODE supplies a
7586 mode string for the port (*note open-file: File Ports.).
7588 *** procedure: setenv NAME VALUE
7589 Modifies the environment of the current process, which is also the
7590 default environment inherited by child processes.
7592 If VALUE is `#f', then NAME is removed from the environment.
7593 Otherwise, the string NAME=VALUE is added to the environment,
7594 replacing any existing string with name matching NAME.
7596 The return value is unspecified.
7598 *** procedure: truncate-file OBJ SIZE
7599 Truncates the file referred to by OBJ to at most SIZE bytes. OBJ
7600 can be a string containing a file name or an integer file
7601 descriptor or port open for output on the file. The underlying
7602 system calls are `truncate' and `ftruncate'.
7604 The return value is unspecified.
7606 *** procedure: setvbuf PORT MODE [SIZE]
7607 Set the buffering mode for PORT. MODE can be:
7615 block buffered, using a newly allocated buffer of SIZE bytes.
7616 However if SIZE is zero or unspecified, the port will be made
7619 This procedure should not be used after I/O has been performed with
7622 Ports are usually block buffered by default, with a default buffer
7623 size. Procedures e.g., *Note open-file: File Ports, which accept a
7624 mode string allow `0' to be added to request an unbuffered port.
7626 *** procedure: fsync PORT/FD
7627 Copies any unwritten data for the specified output file descriptor
7628 to disk. If PORT/FD is a port, its buffer is flushed before the
7629 underlying file descriptor is fsync'd. The return value is
7632 *** procedure: open-fdes PATH FLAGS [MODES]
7633 Similar to `open' but returns a file descriptor instead of a port.
7635 *** procedure: execle PATH ENV [ARG] ...
7636 Similar to `execl', but the environment of the new process is
7637 specified by ENV, which must be a list of strings as returned by
7638 the `environ' procedure.
7640 This procedure is currently implemented using the `execve' system
7641 call, but we call it `execle' because of its Scheme calling
7644 *** procedure: strerror ERRNO
7645 Returns the Unix error message corresponding to ERRNO, an integer.
7647 *** procedure: primitive-exit [STATUS]
7648 Terminate the current process without unwinding the Scheme stack.
7649 This is would typically be useful after a fork. The exit status
7650 is STATUS if supplied, otherwise zero.
7652 *** procedure: times
7653 Returns an object with information about real and processor time.
7654 The following procedures accept such an object as an argument and
7655 return a selected component:
7658 The current real time, expressed as time units relative to an
7662 The CPU time units used by the calling process.
7665 The CPU time units used by the system on behalf of the
7669 The CPU time units used by terminated child processes of the
7670 calling process, whose status has been collected (e.g., using
7674 Similarly, the CPU times units used by the system on behalf of
7675 terminated child processes.
7677 ** Removed: list-length
7678 ** Removed: list-append, list-append!
7679 ** Removed: list-reverse, list-reverse!
7681 ** array-map renamed to array-map!
7683 ** serial-array-map renamed to serial-array-map!
7685 ** catch doesn't take #f as first argument any longer
7687 Previously, it was possible to pass #f instead of a key to `catch'.
7688 That would cause `catch' to pass a jump buffer object to the procedure
7689 passed as second argument. The procedure could then use this jump
7690 buffer objekt as an argument to throw.
7692 This mechanism has been removed since its utility doesn't motivate the
7693 extra complexity it introduces.
7695 ** The `#/' notation for lists now provokes a warning message from Guile.
7696 This syntax will be removed from Guile in the near future.
7698 To disable the warning message, set the GUILE_HUSH environment
7699 variable to any non-empty value.
7701 ** The newline character now prints as `#\newline', following the
7702 normal Scheme notation, not `#\nl'.
7704 * Changes to the gh_ interface
7706 ** The gh_enter function now takes care of loading the Guile startup files.
7707 gh_enter works by calling scm_boot_guile; see the remarks below.
7709 ** Function: void gh_write (SCM x)
7711 Write the printed representation of the scheme object x to the current
7712 output port. Corresponds to the scheme level `write'.
7714 ** gh_list_length renamed to gh_length.
7716 ** vector handling routines
7718 Several major changes. In particular, gh_vector() now resembles
7719 (vector ...) (with a caveat -- see manual), and gh_make_vector() now
7720 exists and behaves like (make-vector ...). gh_vset() and gh_vref()
7721 have been renamed gh_vector_set_x() and gh_vector_ref(). Some missing
7722 vector-related gh_ functions have been implemented.
7724 ** pair and list routines
7726 Implemented several of the R4RS pair and list functions that were
7729 ** gh_scm2doubles, gh_doubles2scm, gh_doubles2dvect
7731 New function. Converts double arrays back and forth between Scheme
7734 * Changes to the scm_ interface
7736 ** The function scm_boot_guile now takes care of loading the startup files.
7738 Guile's primary initialization function, scm_boot_guile, now takes
7739 care of loading `boot-9.scm', in the `ice-9' module, to initialize
7740 Guile, define the module system, and put together some standard
7741 bindings. It also loads `init.scm', which is intended to hold
7742 site-specific initialization code.
7744 Since Guile cannot operate properly until boot-9.scm is loaded, there
7745 is no reason to separate loading boot-9.scm from Guile's other
7746 initialization processes.
7748 This job used to be done by scm_compile_shell_switches, which didn't
7749 make much sense; in particular, it meant that people using Guile for
7750 non-shell-like applications had to jump through hoops to get Guile
7751 initialized properly.
7753 ** The function scm_compile_shell_switches no longer loads the startup files.
7754 Now, Guile always loads the startup files, whenever it is initialized;
7755 see the notes above for scm_boot_guile and scm_load_startup_files.
7757 ** Function: scm_load_startup_files
7758 This new function takes care of loading Guile's initialization file
7759 (`boot-9.scm'), and the site initialization file, `init.scm'. Since
7760 this is always called by the Guile initialization process, it's
7761 probably not too useful to call this yourself, but it's there anyway.
7763 ** The semantics of smob marking have changed slightly.
7765 The smob marking function (the `mark' member of the scm_smobfuns
7766 structure) is no longer responsible for setting the mark bit on the
7767 smob. The generic smob handling code in the garbage collector will
7768 set this bit. The mark function need only ensure that any other
7769 objects the smob refers to get marked.
7771 Note that this change means that the smob's GC8MARK bit is typically
7772 already set upon entry to the mark function. Thus, marking functions
7773 which look like this:
7776 if (SCM_GC8MARKP (ptr))
7778 SCM_SETGC8MARK (ptr);
7779 ... mark objects to which the smob refers ...
7782 are now incorrect, since they will return early, and fail to mark any
7783 other objects the smob refers to. Some code in the Guile library used
7786 ** The semantics of the I/O port functions in scm_ptobfuns have changed.
7788 If you have implemented your own I/O port type, by writing the
7789 functions required by the scm_ptobfuns and then calling scm_newptob,
7790 you will need to change your functions slightly.
7792 The functions in a scm_ptobfuns structure now expect the port itself
7793 as their argument; they used to expect the `stream' member of the
7794 port's scm_port_table structure. This allows functions in an
7795 scm_ptobfuns structure to easily access the port's cell (and any flags
7796 it its CAR), and the port's scm_port_table structure.
7798 Guile now passes the I/O port itself as the `port' argument in the
7799 following scm_ptobfuns functions:
7801 int (*free) (SCM port);
7802 int (*fputc) (int, SCM port);
7803 int (*fputs) (char *, SCM port);
7804 scm_sizet (*fwrite) SCM_P ((char *ptr,
7808 int (*fflush) (SCM port);
7809 int (*fgetc) (SCM port);
7810 int (*fclose) (SCM port);
7812 The interfaces to the `mark', `print', `equalp', and `fgets' methods
7815 If you have existing code which defines its own port types, it is easy
7816 to convert your code to the new interface; simply apply SCM_STREAM to
7817 the port argument to yield the value you code used to expect.
7819 Note that since both the port and the stream have the same type in the
7820 C code --- they are both SCM values --- the C compiler will not remind
7821 you if you forget to update your scm_ptobfuns functions.
7824 ** Function: int scm_internal_select (int fds,
7828 struct timeval *timeout);
7830 This is a replacement for the `select' function provided by the OS.
7831 It enables I/O blocking and sleeping to happen for one cooperative
7832 thread without blocking other threads. It also avoids busy-loops in
7833 these situations. It is intended that all I/O blocking and sleeping
7834 will finally go through this function. Currently, this function is
7835 only available on systems providing `gettimeofday' and `select'.
7837 ** Function: SCM scm_internal_stack_catch (SCM tag,
7838 scm_catch_body_t body,
7840 scm_catch_handler_t handler,
7843 A new sibling to the other two C level `catch' functions
7844 scm_internal_catch and scm_internal_lazy_catch. Use it if you want
7845 the stack to be saved automatically into the variable `the-last-stack'
7846 (scm_the_last_stack_var) on error. This is necessary if you want to
7847 use advanced error reporting, such as calling scm_display_error and
7848 scm_display_backtrace. (They both take a stack object as argument.)
7850 ** Function: SCM scm_spawn_thread (scm_catch_body_t body,
7852 scm_catch_handler_t handler,
7855 Spawns a new thread. It does a job similar to
7856 scm_call_with_new_thread but takes arguments more suitable when
7857 spawning threads from application C code.
7859 ** The hook scm_error_callback has been removed. It was originally
7860 intended as a way for the user to install his own error handler. But
7861 that method works badly since it intervenes between throw and catch,
7862 thereby changing the semantics of expressions like (catch #t ...).
7863 The correct way to do it is to use one of the C level catch functions
7864 in throw.c: scm_internal_catch/lazy_catch/stack_catch.
7866 ** Removed functions:
7868 scm_obj_length, scm_list_length, scm_list_append, scm_list_append_x,
7869 scm_list_reverse, scm_list_reverse_x
7871 ** New macros: SCM_LISTn where n is one of the integers 0-9.
7873 These can be used for pretty list creation from C. The idea is taken
7874 from Erick Gallesio's STk.
7876 ** scm_array_map renamed to scm_array_map_x
7878 ** mbstrings are now removed
7880 This means that the type codes scm_tc7_mb_string and
7881 scm_tc7_mb_substring has been removed.
7883 ** scm_gen_putc, scm_gen_puts, scm_gen_write, and scm_gen_getc have changed.
7885 Since we no longer support multi-byte strings, these I/O functions
7886 have been simplified, and renamed. Here are their old names, and
7887 their new names and arguments:
7889 scm_gen_putc -> void scm_putc (int c, SCM port);
7890 scm_gen_puts -> void scm_puts (char *s, SCM port);
7891 scm_gen_write -> void scm_lfwrite (char *ptr, scm_sizet size, SCM port);
7892 scm_gen_getc -> void scm_getc (SCM port);
7895 ** The macros SCM_TYP7D and SCM_TYP7SD has been removed.
7897 ** The macro SCM_TYP7S has taken the role of the old SCM_TYP7D
7899 SCM_TYP7S now masks away the bit which distinguishes substrings from
7902 ** scm_catch_body_t: Backward incompatible change!
7904 Body functions to scm_internal_catch and friends do not any longer
7905 take a second argument. This is because it is no longer possible to
7906 pass a #f arg to catch.
7908 ** Calls to scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect now nest properly.
7910 The function scm_protect_object protects its argument from being freed
7911 by the garbage collector. scm_unprotect_object removes that
7914 These functions now nest properly. That is, for every object O, there
7915 is a counter which scm_protect_object(O) increments and
7916 scm_unprotect_object(O) decrements, if the counter is greater than
7917 zero. Every object's counter is zero when it is first created. If an
7918 object's counter is greater than zero, the garbage collector will not
7919 reclaim its storage.
7921 This allows you to use scm_protect_object in your code without
7922 worrying that some other function you call will call
7923 scm_unprotect_object, and allow it to be freed. Assuming that the
7924 functions you call are well-behaved, and unprotect only those objects
7925 they protect, you can follow the same rule and have confidence that
7926 objects will be freed only at appropriate times.
7929 Changes in Guile 1.2 (released Tuesday, June 24 1997):
7931 * Changes to the distribution
7933 ** Nightly snapshots are now available from ftp.red-bean.com.
7934 The old server, ftp.cyclic.com, has been relinquished to its rightful
7937 Nightly snapshots of the Guile development sources are now available via
7938 anonymous FTP from ftp.red-bean.com, as /pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz.
7940 Via the web, that's: ftp://ftp.red-bean.com/pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz
7941 For getit, that's: ftp.red-bean.com:/pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz
7943 ** To run Guile without installing it, the procedure has changed a bit.
7945 If you used a separate build directory to compile Guile, you'll need
7946 to include the build directory in SCHEME_LOAD_PATH, as well as the
7947 source directory. See the `INSTALL' file for examples.
7949 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
7951 ** The standard Guile load path for Scheme code now includes
7952 $(datadir)/guile (usually /usr/local/share/guile). This means that
7953 you can install your own Scheme files there, and Guile will find them.
7954 (Previous versions of Guile only checked a directory whose name
7955 contained the Guile version number, so you had to re-install or move
7956 your Scheme sources each time you installed a fresh version of Guile.)
7958 The load path also includes $(datadir)/guile/site; we recommend
7959 putting individual Scheme files there. If you want to install a
7960 package with multiple source files, create a directory for them under
7963 ** Guile 1.2 will now use the Rx regular expression library, if it is
7964 installed on your system. When you are linking libguile into your own
7965 programs, this means you will have to link against -lguile, -lqt (if
7966 you configured Guile with thread support), and -lrx.
7968 If you are using autoconf to generate configuration scripts for your
7969 application, the following lines should suffice to add the appropriate
7970 libraries to your link command:
7972 ### Find Rx, quickthreads and libguile.
7973 AC_CHECK_LIB(rx, main)
7974 AC_CHECK_LIB(qt, main)
7975 AC_CHECK_LIB(guile, scm_shell)
7977 The Guile 1.2 distribution does not contain sources for the Rx
7978 library, as Guile 1.0 did. If you want to use Rx, you'll need to
7979 retrieve it from a GNU FTP site and install it separately.
7981 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
7983 ** The dynamic linking features of Guile are now enabled by default.
7984 You can disable them by giving the `--disable-dynamic-linking' option
7987 (dynamic-link FILENAME)
7989 Find the object file denoted by FILENAME (a string) and link it
7990 into the running Guile application. When everything works out,
7991 return a Scheme object suitable for representing the linked object
7992 file. Otherwise an error is thrown. How object files are
7993 searched is system dependent.
7995 (dynamic-object? VAL)
7997 Determine whether VAL represents a dynamically linked object file.
7999 (dynamic-unlink DYNOBJ)
8001 Unlink the indicated object file from the application. DYNOBJ
8002 should be one of the values returned by `dynamic-link'.
8004 (dynamic-func FUNCTION DYNOBJ)
8006 Search the C function indicated by FUNCTION (a string or symbol)
8007 in DYNOBJ and return some Scheme object that can later be used
8008 with `dynamic-call' to actually call this function. Right now,
8009 these Scheme objects are formed by casting the address of the
8010 function to `long' and converting this number to its Scheme
8013 (dynamic-call FUNCTION DYNOBJ)
8015 Call the C function indicated by FUNCTION and DYNOBJ. The
8016 function is passed no arguments and its return value is ignored.
8017 When FUNCTION is something returned by `dynamic-func', call that
8018 function and ignore DYNOBJ. When FUNCTION is a string (or symbol,
8019 etc.), look it up in DYNOBJ; this is equivalent to
8021 (dynamic-call (dynamic-func FUNCTION DYNOBJ) #f)
8023 Interrupts are deferred while the C function is executing (with
8024 SCM_DEFER_INTS/SCM_ALLOW_INTS).
8026 (dynamic-args-call FUNCTION DYNOBJ ARGS)
8028 Call the C function indicated by FUNCTION and DYNOBJ, but pass it
8029 some arguments and return its return value. The C function is
8030 expected to take two arguments and return an `int', just like
8033 int c_func (int argc, char **argv);
8035 ARGS must be a list of strings and is converted into an array of
8036 `char *'. The array is passed in ARGV and its size in ARGC. The
8037 return value is converted to a Scheme number and returned from the
8038 call to `dynamic-args-call'.
8040 When dynamic linking is disabled or not supported on your system,
8041 the above functions throw errors, but they are still available.
8043 Here is a small example that works on GNU/Linux:
8045 (define libc-obj (dynamic-link "libc.so"))
8046 (dynamic-args-call 'rand libc-obj '())
8048 See the file `libguile/DYNAMIC-LINKING' for additional comments.
8050 ** The #/ syntax for module names is depreciated, and will be removed
8051 in a future version of Guile. Instead of
8059 The latter syntax is more consistent with existing Lisp practice.
8061 ** Guile now does fancier printing of structures. Structures are the
8062 underlying implementation for records, which in turn are used to
8063 implement modules, so all of these object now print differently and in
8064 a more informative way.
8066 The Scheme printer will examine the builtin variable *struct-printer*
8067 whenever it needs to print a structure object. When this variable is
8068 not `#f' it is deemed to be a procedure and will be applied to the
8069 structure object and the output port. When *struct-printer* is `#f'
8070 or the procedure return `#f' the structure object will be printed in
8071 the boring #<struct 80458270> form.
8073 This hook is used by some routines in ice-9/boot-9.scm to implement
8074 type specific printing routines. Please read the comments there about
8077 One of the more specific uses of structs are records. The printing
8078 procedure that could be passed to MAKE-RECORD-TYPE is now actually
8079 called. It should behave like a *struct-printer* procedure (described
8082 ** Guile now supports a new R4RS-compliant syntax for keywords. A
8083 token of the form #:NAME, where NAME has the same syntax as a Scheme
8084 symbol, is the external representation of the keyword named NAME.
8085 Keyword objects print using this syntax as well, so values containing
8086 keyword objects can be read back into Guile. When used in an
8087 expression, keywords are self-quoting objects.
8089 Guile suports this read syntax, and uses this print syntax, regardless
8090 of the current setting of the `keyword' read option. The `keyword'
8091 read option only controls whether Guile recognizes the `:NAME' syntax,
8092 which is incompatible with R4RS. (R4RS says such token represent
8095 ** Guile has regular expression support again. Guile 1.0 included
8096 functions for matching regular expressions, based on the Rx library.
8097 In Guile 1.1, the Guile/Rx interface was removed to simplify the
8098 distribution, and thus Guile had no regular expression support. Guile
8099 1.2 again supports the most commonly used functions, and supports all
8100 of SCSH's regular expression functions.
8102 If your system does not include a POSIX regular expression library,
8103 and you have not linked Guile with a third-party regexp library such as
8104 Rx, these functions will not be available. You can tell whether your
8105 Guile installation includes regular expression support by checking
8106 whether the `*features*' list includes the `regex' symbol.
8108 *** regexp functions
8110 By default, Guile supports POSIX extended regular expressions. That
8111 means that the characters `(', `)', `+' and `?' are special, and must
8112 be escaped if you wish to match the literal characters.
8114 This regular expression interface was modeled after that implemented
8115 by SCSH, the Scheme Shell. It is intended to be upwardly compatible
8116 with SCSH regular expressions.
8118 **** Function: string-match PATTERN STR [START]
8119 Compile the string PATTERN into a regular expression and compare
8120 it with STR. The optional numeric argument START specifies the
8121 position of STR at which to begin matching.
8123 `string-match' returns a "match structure" which describes what,
8124 if anything, was matched by the regular expression. *Note Match
8125 Structures::. If STR does not match PATTERN at all,
8126 `string-match' returns `#f'.
8128 Each time `string-match' is called, it must compile its PATTERN
8129 argument into a regular expression structure. This operation is
8130 expensive, which makes `string-match' inefficient if the same regular
8131 expression is used several times (for example, in a loop). For better
8132 performance, you can compile a regular expression in advance and then
8133 match strings against the compiled regexp.
8135 **** Function: make-regexp STR [FLAGS]
8136 Compile the regular expression described by STR, and return the
8137 compiled regexp structure. If STR does not describe a legal
8138 regular expression, `make-regexp' throws a
8139 `regular-expression-syntax' error.
8141 FLAGS may be the bitwise-or of one or more of the following:
8143 **** Constant: regexp/extended
8144 Use POSIX Extended Regular Expression syntax when interpreting
8145 STR. If not set, POSIX Basic Regular Expression syntax is used.
8146 If the FLAGS argument is omitted, we assume regexp/extended.
8148 **** Constant: regexp/icase
8149 Do not differentiate case. Subsequent searches using the
8150 returned regular expression will be case insensitive.
8152 **** Constant: regexp/newline
8153 Match-any-character operators don't match a newline.
8155 A non-matching list ([^...]) not containing a newline matches a
8158 Match-beginning-of-line operator (^) matches the empty string
8159 immediately after a newline, regardless of whether the FLAGS
8160 passed to regexp-exec contain regexp/notbol.
8162 Match-end-of-line operator ($) matches the empty string
8163 immediately before a newline, regardless of whether the FLAGS
8164 passed to regexp-exec contain regexp/noteol.
8166 **** Function: regexp-exec REGEXP STR [START [FLAGS]]
8167 Match the compiled regular expression REGEXP against `str'. If
8168 the optional integer START argument is provided, begin matching
8169 from that position in the string. Return a match structure
8170 describing the results of the match, or `#f' if no match could be
8173 FLAGS may be the bitwise-or of one or more of the following:
8175 **** Constant: regexp/notbol
8176 The match-beginning-of-line operator always fails to match (but
8177 see the compilation flag regexp/newline above) This flag may be
8178 used when different portions of a string are passed to
8179 regexp-exec and the beginning of the string should not be
8180 interpreted as the beginning of the line.
8182 **** Constant: regexp/noteol
8183 The match-end-of-line operator always fails to match (but see the
8184 compilation flag regexp/newline above)
8186 **** Function: regexp? OBJ
8187 Return `#t' if OBJ is a compiled regular expression, or `#f'
8190 Regular expressions are commonly used to find patterns in one string
8191 and replace them with the contents of another string.
8193 **** Function: regexp-substitute PORT MATCH [ITEM...]
8194 Write to the output port PORT selected contents of the match
8195 structure MATCH. Each ITEM specifies what should be written, and
8196 may be one of the following arguments:
8198 * A string. String arguments are written out verbatim.
8200 * An integer. The submatch with that number is written.
8202 * The symbol `pre'. The portion of the matched string preceding
8203 the regexp match is written.
8205 * The symbol `post'. The portion of the matched string
8206 following the regexp match is written.
8208 PORT may be `#f', in which case nothing is written; instead,
8209 `regexp-substitute' constructs a string from the specified ITEMs
8212 **** Function: regexp-substitute/global PORT REGEXP TARGET [ITEM...]
8213 Similar to `regexp-substitute', but can be used to perform global
8214 substitutions on STR. Instead of taking a match structure as an
8215 argument, `regexp-substitute/global' takes two string arguments: a
8216 REGEXP string describing a regular expression, and a TARGET string
8217 which should be matched against this regular expression.
8219 Each ITEM behaves as in REGEXP-SUBSTITUTE, with the following
8222 * A function may be supplied. When this function is called, it
8223 will be passed one argument: a match structure for a given
8224 regular expression match. It should return a string to be
8225 written out to PORT.
8227 * The `post' symbol causes `regexp-substitute/global' to recurse
8228 on the unmatched portion of STR. This *must* be supplied in
8229 order to perform global search-and-replace on STR; if it is
8230 not present among the ITEMs, then `regexp-substitute/global'
8231 will return after processing a single match.
8233 *** Match Structures
8235 A "match structure" is the object returned by `string-match' and
8236 `regexp-exec'. It describes which portion of a string, if any, matched
8237 the given regular expression. Match structures include: a reference to
8238 the string that was checked for matches; the starting and ending
8239 positions of the regexp match; and, if the regexp included any
8240 parenthesized subexpressions, the starting and ending positions of each
8243 In each of the regexp match functions described below, the `match'
8244 argument must be a match structure returned by a previous call to
8245 `string-match' or `regexp-exec'. Most of these functions return some
8246 information about the original target string that was matched against a
8247 regular expression; we will call that string TARGET for easy reference.
8249 **** Function: regexp-match? OBJ
8250 Return `#t' if OBJ is a match structure returned by a previous
8251 call to `regexp-exec', or `#f' otherwise.
8253 **** Function: match:substring MATCH [N]
8254 Return the portion of TARGET matched by subexpression number N.
8255 Submatch 0 (the default) represents the entire regexp match. If
8256 the regular expression as a whole matched, but the subexpression
8257 number N did not match, return `#f'.
8259 **** Function: match:start MATCH [N]
8260 Return the starting position of submatch number N.
8262 **** Function: match:end MATCH [N]
8263 Return the ending position of submatch number N.
8265 **** Function: match:prefix MATCH
8266 Return the unmatched portion of TARGET preceding the regexp match.
8268 **** Function: match:suffix MATCH
8269 Return the unmatched portion of TARGET following the regexp match.
8271 **** Function: match:count MATCH
8272 Return the number of parenthesized subexpressions from MATCH.
8273 Note that the entire regular expression match itself counts as a
8274 subexpression, and failed submatches are included in the count.
8276 **** Function: match:string MATCH
8277 Return the original TARGET string.
8279 *** Backslash Escapes
8281 Sometimes you will want a regexp to match characters like `*' or `$'
8282 exactly. For example, to check whether a particular string represents
8283 a menu entry from an Info node, it would be useful to match it against
8284 a regexp like `^* [^:]*::'. However, this won't work; because the
8285 asterisk is a metacharacter, it won't match the `*' at the beginning of
8286 the string. In this case, we want to make the first asterisk un-magic.
8288 You can do this by preceding the metacharacter with a backslash
8289 character `\'. (This is also called "quoting" the metacharacter, and
8290 is known as a "backslash escape".) When Guile sees a backslash in a
8291 regular expression, it considers the following glyph to be an ordinary
8292 character, no matter what special meaning it would ordinarily have.
8293 Therefore, we can make the above example work by changing the regexp to
8294 `^\* [^:]*::'. The `\*' sequence tells the regular expression engine
8295 to match only a single asterisk in the target string.
8297 Since the backslash is itself a metacharacter, you may force a
8298 regexp to match a backslash in the target string by preceding the
8299 backslash with itself. For example, to find variable references in a
8300 TeX program, you might want to find occurrences of the string `\let\'
8301 followed by any number of alphabetic characters. The regular expression
8302 `\\let\\[A-Za-z]*' would do this: the double backslashes in the regexp
8303 each match a single backslash in the target string.
8305 **** Function: regexp-quote STR
8306 Quote each special character found in STR with a backslash, and
8307 return the resulting string.
8309 *Very important:* Using backslash escapes in Guile source code (as
8310 in Emacs Lisp or C) can be tricky, because the backslash character has
8311 special meaning for the Guile reader. For example, if Guile encounters
8312 the character sequence `\n' in the middle of a string while processing
8313 Scheme code, it replaces those characters with a newline character.
8314 Similarly, the character sequence `\t' is replaced by a horizontal tab.
8315 Several of these "escape sequences" are processed by the Guile reader
8316 before your code is executed. Unrecognized escape sequences are
8317 ignored: if the characters `\*' appear in a string, they will be
8318 translated to the single character `*'.
8320 This translation is obviously undesirable for regular expressions,
8321 since we want to be able to include backslashes in a string in order to
8322 escape regexp metacharacters. Therefore, to make sure that a backslash
8323 is preserved in a string in your Guile program, you must use *two*
8324 consecutive backslashes:
8326 (define Info-menu-entry-pattern (make-regexp "^\\* [^:]*"))
8328 The string in this example is preprocessed by the Guile reader before
8329 any code is executed. The resulting argument to `make-regexp' is the
8330 string `^\* [^:]*', which is what we really want.
8332 This also means that in order to write a regular expression that
8333 matches a single backslash character, the regular expression string in
8334 the source code must include *four* backslashes. Each consecutive pair
8335 of backslashes gets translated by the Guile reader to a single
8336 backslash, and the resulting double-backslash is interpreted by the
8337 regexp engine as matching a single backslash character. Hence:
8339 (define tex-variable-pattern (make-regexp "\\\\let\\\\=[A-Za-z]*"))
8341 The reason for the unwieldiness of this syntax is historical. Both
8342 regular expression pattern matchers and Unix string processing systems
8343 have traditionally used backslashes with the special meanings described
8344 above. The POSIX regular expression specification and ANSI C standard
8345 both require these semantics. Attempting to abandon either convention
8346 would cause other kinds of compatibility problems, possibly more severe
8347 ones. Therefore, without extending the Scheme reader to support
8348 strings with different quoting conventions (an ungainly and confusing
8349 extension when implemented in other languages), we must adhere to this
8350 cumbersome escape syntax.
8352 * Changes to the gh_ interface
8354 * Changes to the scm_ interface
8356 * Changes to system call interfaces:
8358 ** The value returned by `raise' is now unspecified. It throws an exception
8361 *** A new procedure `sigaction' can be used to install signal handlers
8363 (sigaction signum [action] [flags])
8365 signum is the signal number, which can be specified using the value
8368 If action is omitted, sigaction returns a pair: the CAR is the current
8369 signal hander, which will be either an integer with the value SIG_DFL
8370 (default action) or SIG_IGN (ignore), or the Scheme procedure which
8371 handles the signal, or #f if a non-Scheme procedure handles the
8372 signal. The CDR contains the current sigaction flags for the handler.
8374 If action is provided, it is installed as the new handler for signum.
8375 action can be a Scheme procedure taking one argument, or the value of
8376 SIG_DFL (default action) or SIG_IGN (ignore), or #f to restore
8377 whatever signal handler was installed before sigaction was first used.
8378 Flags can optionally be specified for the new handler (SA_RESTART is
8379 always used if the system provides it, so need not be specified.) The
8380 return value is a pair with information about the old handler as
8383 This interface does not provide access to the "signal blocking"
8384 facility. Maybe this is not needed, since the thread support may
8385 provide solutions to the problem of consistent access to data
8388 *** A new procedure `flush-all-ports' is equivalent to running
8389 `force-output' on every port open for output.
8391 ** Guile now provides information on how it was built, via the new
8392 global variable, %guile-build-info. This variable records the values
8393 of the standard GNU makefile directory variables as an assocation
8394 list, mapping variable names (symbols) onto directory paths (strings).
8395 For example, to find out where the Guile link libraries were
8396 installed, you can say:
8398 guile -c "(display (assq-ref %guile-build-info 'libdir)) (newline)"
8401 * Changes to the scm_ interface
8403 ** The new function scm_handle_by_message_noexit is just like the
8404 existing scm_handle_by_message function, except that it doesn't call
8405 exit to terminate the process. Instead, it prints a message and just
8406 returns #f. This might be a more appropriate catch-all handler for
8407 new dynamic roots and threads.
8410 Changes in Guile 1.1 (released Friday, May 16 1997):
8412 * Changes to the distribution.
8414 The Guile 1.0 distribution has been split up into several smaller
8416 guile-core --- the Guile interpreter itself.
8417 guile-tcltk --- the interface between the Guile interpreter and
8418 Tcl/Tk; Tcl is an interpreter for a stringy language, and Tk
8419 is a toolkit for building graphical user interfaces.
8420 guile-rgx-ctax --- the interface between Guile and the Rx regular
8421 expression matcher, and the translator for the Ctax
8422 programming language. These are packaged together because the
8423 Ctax translator uses Rx to parse Ctax source code.
8425 This NEWS file describes the changes made to guile-core since the 1.0
8428 We no longer distribute the documentation, since it was either out of
8429 date, or incomplete. As soon as we have current documentation, we
8434 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
8436 ** guile now accepts command-line arguments compatible with SCSH, Olin
8437 Shivers' Scheme Shell.
8439 In general, arguments are evaluated from left to right, but there are
8440 exceptions. The following switches stop argument processing, and
8441 stash all remaining command-line arguments as the value returned by
8442 the (command-line) function.
8443 -s SCRIPT load Scheme source code from FILE, and exit
8444 -c EXPR evalute Scheme expression EXPR, and exit
8445 -- stop scanning arguments; run interactively
8447 The switches below are processed as they are encountered.
8448 -l FILE load Scheme source code from FILE
8449 -e FUNCTION after reading script, apply FUNCTION to
8450 command line arguments
8451 -ds do -s script at this point
8452 --emacs enable Emacs protocol (experimental)
8453 -h, --help display this help and exit
8454 -v, --version display version information and exit
8455 \ read arguments from following script lines
8457 So, for example, here is a Guile script named `ekko' (thanks, Olin)
8458 which re-implements the traditional "echo" command:
8460 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
8463 (map (lambda (arg) (display arg) (display " "))
8467 (main (command-line))
8469 Suppose we invoke this script as follows:
8471 ekko a speckled gecko
8473 Through the magic of Unix script processing (triggered by the `#!'
8474 token at the top of the file), /usr/local/bin/guile receives the
8475 following list of command-line arguments:
8477 ("-s" "./ekko" "a" "speckled" "gecko")
8479 Unix inserts the name of the script after the argument specified on
8480 the first line of the file (in this case, "-s"), and then follows that
8481 with the arguments given to the script. Guile loads the script, which
8482 defines the `main' function, and then applies it to the list of
8483 remaining command-line arguments, ("a" "speckled" "gecko").
8485 In Unix, the first line of a script file must take the following form:
8487 #!INTERPRETER ARGUMENT
8489 where INTERPRETER is the absolute filename of the interpreter
8490 executable, and ARGUMENT is a single command-line argument to pass to
8493 You may only pass one argument to the interpreter, and its length is
8494 limited. These restrictions can be annoying to work around, so Guile
8495 provides a general mechanism (borrowed from, and compatible with,
8496 SCSH) for circumventing them.
8498 If the ARGUMENT in a Guile script is a single backslash character,
8499 `\', Guile will open the script file, parse arguments from its second
8500 and subsequent lines, and replace the `\' with them. So, for example,
8501 here is another implementation of the `ekko' script:
8503 #!/usr/local/bin/guile \
8507 (for-each (lambda (arg) (display arg) (display " "))
8511 If the user invokes this script as follows:
8513 ekko a speckled gecko
8515 Unix expands this into
8517 /usr/local/bin/guile \ ekko a speckled gecko
8519 When Guile sees the `\' argument, it replaces it with the arguments
8520 read from the second line of the script, producing:
8522 /usr/local/bin/guile -e main -s ekko a speckled gecko
8524 This tells Guile to load the `ekko' script, and apply the function
8525 `main' to the argument list ("a" "speckled" "gecko").
8527 Here is how Guile parses the command-line arguments:
8528 - Each space character terminates an argument. This means that two
8529 spaces in a row introduce an empty-string argument.
8530 - The tab character is not permitted (unless you quote it with the
8531 backslash character, as described below), to avoid confusion.
8532 - The newline character terminates the sequence of arguments, and will
8533 also terminate a final non-empty argument. (However, a newline
8534 following a space will not introduce a final empty-string argument;
8535 it only terminates the argument list.)
8536 - The backslash character is the escape character. It escapes
8537 backslash, space, tab, and newline. The ANSI C escape sequences
8538 like \n and \t are also supported. These produce argument
8539 constituents; the two-character combination \n doesn't act like a
8540 terminating newline. The escape sequence \NNN for exactly three
8541 octal digits reads as the character whose ASCII code is NNN. As
8542 above, characters produced this way are argument constituents.
8543 Backslash followed by other characters is not allowed.
8545 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
8547 ** Guile now builds and installs a shared guile library, if your
8548 system support shared libraries. (It still builds a static library on
8549 all systems.) Guile automatically detects whether your system
8550 supports shared libraries. To prevent Guile from buildisg shared
8551 libraries, pass the `--disable-shared' flag to the configure script.
8553 Guile takes longer to compile when it builds shared libraries, because
8554 it must compile every file twice --- once to produce position-
8555 independent object code, and once to produce normal object code.
8557 ** The libthreads library has been merged into libguile.
8559 To link a program against Guile, you now need only link against
8560 -lguile and -lqt; -lthreads is no longer needed. If you are using
8561 autoconf to generate configuration scripts for your application, the
8562 following lines should suffice to add the appropriate libraries to
8565 ### Find quickthreads and libguile.
8566 AC_CHECK_LIB(qt, main)
8567 AC_CHECK_LIB(guile, scm_shell)
8569 * Changes to Scheme functions
8571 ** Guile Scheme's special syntax for keyword objects is now optional,
8572 and disabled by default.
8574 The syntax variation from R4RS made it difficult to port some
8575 interesting packages to Guile. The routines which accepted keyword
8576 arguments (mostly in the module system) have been modified to also
8577 accept symbols whose names begin with `:'.
8579 To change the keyword syntax, you must first import the (ice-9 debug)
8581 (use-modules (ice-9 debug))
8583 Then you can enable the keyword syntax as follows:
8584 (read-set! keywords 'prefix)
8586 To disable keyword syntax, do this:
8587 (read-set! keywords #f)
8589 ** Many more primitive functions accept shared substrings as
8590 arguments. In the past, these functions required normal, mutable
8591 strings as arguments, although they never made use of this
8594 ** The uniform array functions now operate on byte vectors. These
8595 functions are `array-fill!', `serial-array-copy!', `array-copy!',
8596 `serial-array-map', `array-map', `array-for-each', and
8599 ** The new functions `trace' and `untrace' implement simple debugging
8600 support for Scheme functions.
8602 The `trace' function accepts any number of procedures as arguments,
8603 and tells the Guile interpreter to display each procedure's name and
8604 arguments each time the procedure is invoked. When invoked with no
8605 arguments, `trace' returns the list of procedures currently being
8608 The `untrace' function accepts any number of procedures as arguments,
8609 and tells the Guile interpreter not to trace them any more. When
8610 invoked with no arguments, `untrace' untraces all curretly traced
8613 The tracing in Guile has an advantage over most other systems: we
8614 don't create new procedure objects, but mark the procedure objects
8615 themselves. This means that anonymous and internal procedures can be
8618 ** The function `assert-repl-prompt' has been renamed to
8619 `set-repl-prompt!'. It takes one argument, PROMPT.
8620 - If PROMPT is #f, the Guile read-eval-print loop will not prompt.
8621 - If PROMPT is a string, we use it as a prompt.
8622 - If PROMPT is a procedure accepting no arguments, we call it, and
8623 display the result as a prompt.
8624 - Otherwise, we display "> ".
8626 ** The new function `eval-string' reads Scheme expressions from a
8627 string and evaluates them, returning the value of the last expression
8628 in the string. If the string contains no expressions, it returns an
8631 ** The new function `thunk?' returns true iff its argument is a
8632 procedure of zero arguments.
8634 ** `defined?' is now a builtin function, instead of syntax. This
8635 means that its argument should be quoted. It returns #t iff its
8636 argument is bound in the current module.
8638 ** The new syntax `use-modules' allows you to add new modules to your
8639 environment without re-typing a complete `define-module' form. It
8640 accepts any number of module names as arguments, and imports their
8641 public bindings into the current module.
8643 ** The new function (module-defined? NAME MODULE) returns true iff
8644 NAME, a symbol, is defined in MODULE, a module object.
8646 ** The new function `builtin-bindings' creates and returns a hash
8647 table containing copies of all the root module's bindings.
8649 ** The new function `builtin-weak-bindings' does the same as
8650 `builtin-bindings', but creates a doubly-weak hash table.
8652 ** The `equal?' function now considers variable objects to be
8653 equivalent if they have the same name and the same value.
8655 ** The new function `command-line' returns the command-line arguments
8656 given to Guile, as a list of strings.
8658 When using guile as a script interpreter, `command-line' returns the
8659 script's arguments; those processed by the interpreter (like `-s' or
8660 `-c') are omitted. (In other words, you get the normal, expected
8661 behavior.) Any application that uses scm_shell to process its
8662 command-line arguments gets this behavior as well.
8664 ** The new function `load-user-init' looks for a file called `.guile'
8665 in the user's home directory, and loads it if it exists. This is
8666 mostly for use by the code generated by scm_compile_shell_switches,
8667 but we thought it might also be useful in other circumstances.
8669 ** The new function `log10' returns the base-10 logarithm of its
8672 ** Changes to I/O functions
8674 *** The functions `read', `primitive-load', `read-and-eval!', and
8675 `primitive-load-path' no longer take optional arguments controlling
8676 case insensitivity and a `#' parser.
8678 Case sensitivity is now controlled by a read option called
8679 `case-insensitive'. The user can add new `#' syntaxes with the
8680 `read-hash-extend' function (see below).
8682 *** The new function `read-hash-extend' allows the user to change the
8683 syntax of Guile Scheme in a somewhat controlled way.
8685 (read-hash-extend CHAR PROC)
8686 When parsing S-expressions, if we read a `#' character followed by
8687 the character CHAR, use PROC to parse an object from the stream.
8688 If PROC is #f, remove any parsing procedure registered for CHAR.
8690 The reader applies PROC to two arguments: CHAR and an input port.
8692 *** The new functions read-delimited and read-delimited! provide a
8693 general mechanism for doing delimited input on streams.
8695 (read-delimited DELIMS [PORT HANDLE-DELIM])
8696 Read until we encounter one of the characters in DELIMS (a string),
8697 or end-of-file. PORT is the input port to read from; it defaults to
8698 the current input port. The HANDLE-DELIM parameter determines how
8699 the terminating character is handled; it should be one of the
8702 'trim omit delimiter from result
8703 'peek leave delimiter character in input stream
8704 'concat append delimiter character to returned value
8705 'split return a pair: (RESULT . TERMINATOR)
8707 HANDLE-DELIM defaults to 'peek.
8709 (read-delimited! DELIMS BUF [PORT HANDLE-DELIM START END])
8710 A side-effecting variant of `read-delimited'.
8712 The data is written into the string BUF at the indices in the
8713 half-open interval [START, END); the default interval is the whole
8714 string: START = 0 and END = (string-length BUF). The values of
8715 START and END must specify a well-defined interval in BUF, i.e.
8716 0 <= START <= END <= (string-length BUF).
8718 It returns NBYTES, the number of bytes read. If the buffer filled
8719 up without a delimiter character being found, it returns #f. If the
8720 port is at EOF when the read starts, it returns the EOF object.
8722 If an integer is returned (i.e., the read is successfully terminated
8723 by reading a delimiter character), then the HANDLE-DELIM parameter
8724 determines how to handle the terminating character. It is described
8725 above, and defaults to 'peek.
8727 (The descriptions of these functions were borrowed from the SCSH
8728 manual, by Olin Shivers and Brian Carlstrom.)
8730 *** The `%read-delimited!' function is the primitive used to implement
8731 `read-delimited' and `read-delimited!'.
8733 (%read-delimited! DELIMS BUF GOBBLE? [PORT START END])
8735 This returns a pair of values: (TERMINATOR . NUM-READ).
8736 - TERMINATOR describes why the read was terminated. If it is a
8737 character or the eof object, then that is the value that terminated
8738 the read. If it is #f, the function filled the buffer without finding
8739 a delimiting character.
8740 - NUM-READ is the number of characters read into BUF.
8742 If the read is successfully terminated by reading a delimiter
8743 character, then the gobble? parameter determines what to do with the
8744 terminating character. If true, the character is removed from the
8745 input stream; if false, the character is left in the input stream
8746 where a subsequent read operation will retrieve it. In either case,
8747 the character is also the first value returned by the procedure call.
8749 (The descriptions of this function was borrowed from the SCSH manual,
8750 by Olin Shivers and Brian Carlstrom.)
8752 *** The `read-line' and `read-line!' functions have changed; they now
8753 trim the terminator by default; previously they appended it to the
8754 returned string. For the old behavior, use (read-line PORT 'concat).
8756 *** The functions `uniform-array-read!' and `uniform-array-write!' now
8757 take new optional START and END arguments, specifying the region of
8758 the array to read and write.
8760 *** The `ungetc-char-ready?' function has been removed. We feel it's
8761 inappropriate for an interface to expose implementation details this
8764 ** Changes to the Unix library and system call interface
8766 *** The new fcntl function provides access to the Unix `fcntl' system
8769 (fcntl PORT COMMAND VALUE)
8770 Apply COMMAND to PORT's file descriptor, with VALUE as an argument.
8771 Values for COMMAND are:
8773 F_DUPFD duplicate a file descriptor
8774 F_GETFD read the descriptor's close-on-exec flag
8775 F_SETFD set the descriptor's close-on-exec flag to VALUE
8776 F_GETFL read the descriptor's flags, as set on open
8777 F_SETFL set the descriptor's flags, as set on open to VALUE
8778 F_GETOWN return the process ID of a socket's owner, for SIGIO
8779 F_SETOWN set the process that owns a socket to VALUE, for SIGIO
8780 FD_CLOEXEC not sure what this is
8782 For details, see the documentation for the fcntl system call.
8784 *** The arguments to `select' have changed, for compatibility with
8785 SCSH. The TIMEOUT parameter may now be non-integral, yielding the
8786 expected behavior. The MILLISECONDS parameter has been changed to
8787 MICROSECONDS, to more closely resemble the underlying system call.
8788 The RVEC, WVEC, and EVEC arguments can now be vectors; the type of the
8789 corresponding return set will be the same.
8791 *** The arguments to the `mknod' system call have changed. They are
8794 (mknod PATH TYPE PERMS DEV)
8795 Create a new file (`node') in the file system. PATH is the name of
8796 the file to create. TYPE is the kind of file to create; it should
8797 be 'fifo, 'block-special, or 'char-special. PERMS specifies the
8798 permission bits to give the newly created file. If TYPE is
8799 'block-special or 'char-special, DEV specifies which device the
8800 special file refers to; its interpretation depends on the kind of
8801 special file being created.
8803 *** The `fork' function has been renamed to `primitive-fork', to avoid
8804 clashing with various SCSH forks.
8806 *** The `recv' and `recvfrom' functions have been renamed to `recv!'
8807 and `recvfrom!'. They no longer accept a size for a second argument;
8808 you must pass a string to hold the received value. They no longer
8809 return the buffer. Instead, `recv' returns the length of the message
8810 received, and `recvfrom' returns a pair containing the packet's length
8811 and originating address.
8813 *** The file descriptor datatype has been removed, as have the
8814 `read-fd', `write-fd', `close', `lseek', and `dup' functions.
8815 We plan to replace these functions with a SCSH-compatible interface.
8817 *** The `create' function has been removed; it's just a special case
8820 *** There are new functions to break down process termination status
8821 values. In the descriptions below, STATUS is a value returned by
8824 (status:exit-val STATUS)
8825 If the child process exited normally, this function returns the exit
8826 code for the child process (i.e., the value passed to exit, or
8827 returned from main). If the child process did not exit normally,
8828 this function returns #f.
8830 (status:stop-sig STATUS)
8831 If the child process was suspended by a signal, this function
8832 returns the signal that suspended the child. Otherwise, it returns
8835 (status:term-sig STATUS)
8836 If the child process terminated abnormally, this function returns
8837 the signal that terminated the child. Otherwise, this function
8840 POSIX promises that exactly one of these functions will return true on
8841 a valid STATUS value.
8843 These functions are compatible with SCSH.
8845 *** There are new accessors and setters for the broken-out time vectors
8846 returned by `localtime', `gmtime', and that ilk. They are:
8848 Component Accessor Setter
8849 ========================= ============ ============
8850 seconds tm:sec set-tm:sec
8851 minutes tm:min set-tm:min
8852 hours tm:hour set-tm:hour
8853 day of the month tm:mday set-tm:mday
8854 month tm:mon set-tm:mon
8855 year tm:year set-tm:year
8856 day of the week tm:wday set-tm:wday
8857 day in the year tm:yday set-tm:yday
8858 daylight saving time tm:isdst set-tm:isdst
8859 GMT offset, seconds tm:gmtoff set-tm:gmtoff
8860 name of time zone tm:zone set-tm:zone
8862 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `uname',
8863 describing the host system:
8866 ============================================== ================
8867 name of the operating system implementation utsname:sysname
8868 network name of this machine utsname:nodename
8869 release level of the operating system utsname:release
8870 version level of the operating system utsname:version
8871 machine hardware platform utsname:machine
8873 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getpw',
8874 `getpwnam', `getpwuid', and `getpwent', describing entries from the
8875 system's user database:
8878 ====================== =================
8879 user name passwd:name
8880 user password passwd:passwd
8883 real name passwd:gecos
8884 home directory passwd:dir
8885 shell program passwd:shell
8887 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getgr',
8888 `getgrnam', `getgrgid', and `getgrent', describing entries from the
8889 system's group database:
8892 ======================= ============
8893 group name group:name
8894 group password group:passwd
8896 group members group:mem
8898 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `gethost',
8899 `gethostbyaddr', `gethostbyname', and `gethostent', describing
8903 ========================= ===============
8904 official name of host hostent:name
8905 alias list hostent:aliases
8906 host address type hostent:addrtype
8907 length of address hostent:length
8908 list of addresses hostent:addr-list
8910 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getnet',
8911 `getnetbyaddr', `getnetbyname', and `getnetent', describing internet
8915 ========================= ===============
8916 official name of net netent:name
8917 alias list netent:aliases
8918 net number type netent:addrtype
8919 net number netent:net
8921 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getproto',
8922 `getprotobyname', `getprotobynumber', and `getprotoent', describing
8926 ========================= ===============
8927 official protocol name protoent:name
8928 alias list protoent:aliases
8929 protocol number protoent:proto
8931 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getserv',
8932 `getservbyname', `getservbyport', and `getservent', describing
8936 ========================= ===============
8937 official service name servent:name
8938 alias list servent:aliases
8939 port number servent:port
8940 protocol to use servent:proto
8942 *** There are new accessors for the sockaddr structures returned by
8943 `accept', `getsockname', `getpeername', `recvfrom!':
8946 ======================================== ===============
8947 address format (`family') sockaddr:fam
8948 path, for file domain addresses sockaddr:path
8949 address, for internet domain addresses sockaddr:addr
8950 TCP or UDP port, for internet sockaddr:port
8952 *** The `getpwent', `getgrent', `gethostent', `getnetent',
8953 `getprotoent', and `getservent' functions now return #f at the end of
8954 the user database. (They used to throw an exception.)
8956 Note that calling MUMBLEent function is equivalent to calling the
8957 corresponding MUMBLE function with no arguments.
8959 *** The `setpwent', `setgrent', `sethostent', `setnetent',
8960 `setprotoent', and `setservent' routines now take no arguments.
8962 *** The `gethost', `getproto', `getnet', and `getserv' functions now
8963 provide more useful information when they throw an exception.
8965 *** The `lnaof' function has been renamed to `inet-lnaof'.
8967 *** Guile now claims to have the `current-time' feature.
8969 *** The `mktime' function now takes an optional second argument ZONE,
8970 giving the time zone to use for the conversion. ZONE should be a
8971 string, in the same format as expected for the "TZ" environment variable.
8973 *** The `strptime' function now returns a pair (TIME . COUNT), where
8974 TIME is the parsed time as a vector, and COUNT is the number of
8975 characters from the string left unparsed. This function used to
8976 return the remaining characters as a string.
8978 *** The `gettimeofday' function has replaced the old `time+ticks' function.
8979 The return value is now (SECONDS . MICROSECONDS); the fractional
8980 component is no longer expressed in "ticks".
8982 *** The `ticks/sec' constant has been removed, in light of the above change.
8984 * Changes to the gh_ interface
8986 ** gh_eval_str() now returns an SCM object which is the result of the
8989 ** gh_scm2str() now copies the Scheme data to a caller-provided C
8992 ** gh_scm2newstr() now makes a C array, copies the Scheme data to it,
8993 and returns the array
8995 ** gh_scm2str0() is gone: there is no need to distinguish
8996 null-terminated from non-null-terminated, since gh_scm2newstr() allows
8997 the user to interpret the data both ways.
8999 * Changes to the scm_ interface
9001 ** The new function scm_symbol_value0 provides an easy way to get a
9002 symbol's value from C code:
9004 SCM scm_symbol_value0 (char *NAME)
9005 Return the value of the symbol named by the null-terminated string
9006 NAME in the current module. If the symbol named NAME is unbound in
9007 the current module, return SCM_UNDEFINED.
9009 ** The new function scm_sysintern0 creates new top-level variables,
9010 without assigning them a value.
9012 SCM scm_sysintern0 (char *NAME)
9013 Create a new Scheme top-level variable named NAME. NAME is a
9014 null-terminated string. Return the variable's value cell.
9016 ** The function scm_internal_catch is the guts of catch. It handles
9017 all the mechanics of setting up a catch target, invoking the catch
9018 body, and perhaps invoking the handler if the body does a throw.
9020 The function is designed to be usable from C code, but is general
9021 enough to implement all the semantics Guile Scheme expects from throw.
9023 TAG is the catch tag. Typically, this is a symbol, but this function
9024 doesn't actually care about that.
9026 BODY is a pointer to a C function which runs the body of the catch;
9027 this is the code you can throw from. We call it like this:
9028 BODY (BODY_DATA, JMPBUF)
9030 BODY_DATA is just the BODY_DATA argument we received; we pass it
9031 through to BODY as its first argument. The caller can make
9032 BODY_DATA point to anything useful that BODY might need.
9033 JMPBUF is the Scheme jmpbuf object corresponding to this catch,
9034 which we have just created and initialized.
9036 HANDLER is a pointer to a C function to deal with a throw to TAG,
9037 should one occur. We call it like this:
9038 HANDLER (HANDLER_DATA, THROWN_TAG, THROW_ARGS)
9040 HANDLER_DATA is the HANDLER_DATA argument we recevied; it's the
9041 same idea as BODY_DATA above.
9042 THROWN_TAG is the tag that the user threw to; usually this is
9043 TAG, but it could be something else if TAG was #t (i.e., a
9044 catch-all), or the user threw to a jmpbuf.
9045 THROW_ARGS is the list of arguments the user passed to the THROW
9048 BODY_DATA is just a pointer we pass through to BODY. HANDLER_DATA
9049 is just a pointer we pass through to HANDLER. We don't actually
9050 use either of those pointers otherwise ourselves. The idea is
9051 that, if our caller wants to communicate something to BODY or
9052 HANDLER, it can pass a pointer to it as MUMBLE_DATA, which BODY and
9053 HANDLER can then use. Think of it as a way to make BODY and
9054 HANDLER closures, not just functions; MUMBLE_DATA points to the
9057 Of course, it's up to the caller to make sure that any data a
9058 MUMBLE_DATA needs is protected from GC. A common way to do this is
9059 to make MUMBLE_DATA a pointer to data stored in an automatic
9060 structure variable; since the collector must scan the stack for
9061 references anyway, this assures that any references in MUMBLE_DATA
9064 ** The new function scm_internal_lazy_catch is exactly like
9065 scm_internal_catch, except:
9067 - It does not unwind the stack (this is the major difference).
9068 - If handler returns, its value is returned from the throw.
9069 - BODY always receives #f as its JMPBUF argument (since there's no
9070 jmpbuf associated with a lazy catch, because we don't unwind the
9073 ** scm_body_thunk is a new body function you can pass to
9074 scm_internal_catch if you want the body to be like Scheme's `catch'
9075 --- a thunk, or a function of one argument if the tag is #f.
9077 BODY_DATA is a pointer to a scm_body_thunk_data structure, which
9078 contains the Scheme procedure to invoke as the body, and the tag
9079 we're catching. If the tag is #f, then we pass JMPBUF (created by
9080 scm_internal_catch) to the body procedure; otherwise, the body gets
9083 ** scm_handle_by_proc is a new handler function you can pass to
9084 scm_internal_catch if you want the handler to act like Scheme's catch
9085 --- call a procedure with the tag and the throw arguments.
9087 If the user does a throw to this catch, this function runs a handler
9088 procedure written in Scheme. HANDLER_DATA is a pointer to an SCM
9089 variable holding the Scheme procedure object to invoke. It ought to
9090 be a pointer to an automatic variable (i.e., one living on the stack),
9091 or the procedure object should be otherwise protected from GC.
9093 ** scm_handle_by_message is a new handler function to use with
9094 `scm_internal_catch' if you want Guile to print a message and die.
9095 It's useful for dealing with throws to uncaught keys at the top level.
9097 HANDLER_DATA, if non-zero, is assumed to be a char * pointing to a
9098 message header to print; if zero, we use "guile" instead. That
9099 text is followed by a colon, then the message described by ARGS.
9101 ** The return type of scm_boot_guile is now void; the function does
9102 not return a value, and indeed, never returns at all.
9104 ** The new function scm_shell makes it easy for user applications to
9105 process command-line arguments in a way that is compatible with the
9106 stand-alone guile interpreter (which is in turn compatible with SCSH,
9109 To use the scm_shell function, first initialize any guile modules
9110 linked into your application, and then call scm_shell with the values
9111 of ARGC and ARGV your `main' function received. scm_shell will add
9112 any SCSH-style meta-arguments from the top of the script file to the
9113 argument vector, and then process the command-line arguments. This
9114 generally means loading a script file or starting up an interactive
9115 command interpreter. For details, see "Changes to the stand-alone
9118 ** The new functions scm_get_meta_args and scm_count_argv help you
9119 implement the SCSH-style meta-argument, `\'.
9121 char **scm_get_meta_args (int ARGC, char **ARGV)
9122 If the second element of ARGV is a string consisting of a single
9123 backslash character (i.e. "\\" in Scheme notation), open the file
9124 named by the following argument, parse arguments from it, and return
9125 the spliced command line. The returned array is terminated by a
9128 For details of argument parsing, see above, under "guile now accepts
9129 command-line arguments compatible with SCSH..."
9131 int scm_count_argv (char **ARGV)
9132 Count the arguments in ARGV, assuming it is terminated by a null
9135 For an example of how these functions might be used, see the source
9136 code for the function scm_shell in libguile/script.c.
9138 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
9141 ** The new function scm_compile_shell_switches turns an array of
9142 command-line arguments into Scheme code to carry out the actions they
9143 describe. Given ARGC and ARGV, it returns a Scheme expression to
9144 evaluate, and calls scm_set_program_arguments to make any remaining
9145 command-line arguments available to the Scheme code. For example,
9146 given the following arguments:
9148 -e main -s ekko a speckled gecko
9150 scm_set_program_arguments will return the following expression:
9152 (begin (load "ekko") (main (command-line)) (quit))
9154 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
9157 ** The function scm_shell_usage prints a usage message appropriate for
9158 an interpreter that uses scm_compile_shell_switches to handle its
9159 command-line arguments.
9161 void scm_shell_usage (int FATAL, char *MESSAGE)
9162 Print a usage message to the standard error output. If MESSAGE is
9163 non-zero, write it before the usage message, followed by a newline.
9164 If FATAL is non-zero, exit the process, using FATAL as the
9165 termination status. (If you want to be compatible with Guile,
9166 always use 1 as the exit status when terminating due to command-line
9169 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
9172 ** scm_eval_0str now returns SCM_UNSPECIFIED if the string contains no
9173 expressions. It used to return SCM_EOL. Earth-shattering.
9175 ** The macros for declaring scheme objects in C code have been
9176 rearranged slightly. They are now:
9178 SCM_SYMBOL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
9179 Declare a static SCM variable named C_NAME, and initialize it to
9180 point to the Scheme symbol whose name is SCHEME_NAME. C_NAME should
9181 be a C identifier, and SCHEME_NAME should be a C string.
9183 SCM_GLOBAL_SYMBOL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
9184 Just like SCM_SYMBOL, but make C_NAME globally visible.
9186 SCM_VCELL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
9187 Create a global variable at the Scheme level named SCHEME_NAME.
9188 Declare a static SCM variable named C_NAME, and initialize it to
9189 point to the Scheme variable's value cell.
9191 SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
9192 Just like SCM_VCELL, but make C_NAME globally visible.
9194 The `guile-snarf' script writes initialization code for these macros
9195 to its standard output, given C source code as input.
9197 The SCM_GLOBAL macro is gone.
9199 ** The scm_read_line and scm_read_line_x functions have been replaced
9200 by Scheme code based on the %read-delimited! procedure (known to C
9201 code as scm_read_delimited_x). See its description above for more
9204 ** The function scm_sys_open has been renamed to scm_open. It now
9205 returns a port instead of an FD object.
9207 * The dynamic linking support has changed. For more information, see
9208 libguile/DYNAMIC-LINKING.
9213 User-visible changes from Thursday, September 5, 1996 until Guile 1.0
9216 * Changes to the 'guile' program:
9218 ** Guile now loads some new files when it starts up. Guile first
9219 searches the load path for init.scm, and loads it if found. Then, if
9220 Guile is not being used to execute a script, and the user's home
9221 directory contains a file named `.guile', Guile loads that.
9223 ** You can now use Guile as a shell script interpreter.
9225 To paraphrase the SCSH manual:
9227 When Unix tries to execute an executable file whose first two
9228 characters are the `#!', it treats the file not as machine code to
9229 be directly executed by the native processor, but as source code
9230 to be executed by some interpreter. The interpreter to use is
9231 specified immediately after the #! sequence on the first line of
9232 the source file. The kernel reads in the name of the interpreter,
9233 and executes that instead. It passes the interpreter the source
9234 filename as its first argument, with the original arguments
9235 following. Consult the Unix man page for the `exec' system call
9236 for more information.
9238 Now you can use Guile as an interpreter, using a mechanism which is a
9239 compatible subset of that provided by SCSH.
9241 Guile now recognizes a '-s' command line switch, whose argument is the
9242 name of a file of Scheme code to load. It also treats the two
9243 characters `#!' as the start of a comment, terminated by `!#'. Thus,
9244 to make a file of Scheme code directly executable by Unix, insert the
9245 following two lines at the top of the file:
9247 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
9250 Guile treats the argument of the `-s' command-line switch as the name
9251 of a file of Scheme code to load, and treats the sequence `#!' as the
9252 start of a block comment, terminated by `!#'.
9254 For example, here's a version of 'echo' written in Scheme:
9256 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
9258 (let loop ((args (cdr (program-arguments))))
9261 (display (car args))
9262 (if (pair? (cdr args))
9264 (loop (cdr args)))))
9267 Why does `#!' start a block comment terminated by `!#', instead of the
9268 end of the line? That is the notation SCSH uses, and although we
9269 don't yet support the other SCSH features that motivate that choice,
9270 we would like to be backward-compatible with any existing Guile
9271 scripts once we do. Furthermore, if the path to Guile on your system
9272 is too long for your kernel, you can start the script with this
9276 exec /really/long/path/to/guile -s "$0" ${1+"$@"}
9279 Note that some very old Unix systems don't support the `#!' syntax.
9282 ** You can now run Guile without installing it.
9284 Previous versions of the interactive Guile interpreter (`guile')
9285 couldn't start up unless Guile's Scheme library had been installed;
9286 they used the value of the environment variable `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH'
9287 later on in the startup process, but not to find the startup code
9288 itself. Now Guile uses `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH' in all searches for Scheme
9291 To run Guile without installing it, build it in the normal way, and
9292 then set the environment variable `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH' to a
9293 colon-separated list of directories, including the top-level directory
9294 of the Guile sources. For example, if you unpacked Guile so that the
9295 full filename of this NEWS file is /home/jimb/guile-1.0b3/NEWS, then
9298 export SCHEME_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/my-scheme:/home/jimb/guile-1.0b3
9301 ** Guile's read-eval-print loop no longer prints #<unspecified>
9302 results. If the user wants to see this, she can evaluate the
9303 expression (assert-repl-print-unspecified #t), perhaps in her startup
9306 ** Guile no longer shows backtraces by default when an error occurs;
9307 however, it does display a message saying how to get one, and how to
9308 request that they be displayed by default. After an error, evaluate
9310 to see a backtrace, and
9311 (debug-enable 'backtrace)
9312 to see them by default.
9316 * Changes to Guile Scheme:
9318 ** Guile now distinguishes between #f and the empty list.
9320 This is for compatibility with the IEEE standard, the (possibly)
9321 upcoming Revised^5 Report on Scheme, and many extant Scheme
9324 Guile used to have #f and '() denote the same object, to make Scheme's
9325 type system more compatible with Emacs Lisp's. However, the change
9326 caused too much trouble for Scheme programmers, and we found another
9327 way to reconcile Emacs Lisp with Scheme that didn't require this.
9330 ** Guile's delq, delv, delete functions, and their destructive
9331 counterparts, delq!, delv!, and delete!, now remove all matching
9332 elements from the list, not just the first. This matches the behavior
9333 of the corresponding Emacs Lisp functions, and (I believe) the Maclisp
9334 functions which inspired them.
9336 I recognize that this change may break code in subtle ways, but it
9337 seems best to make the change before the FSF's first Guile release,
9341 ** The compiled-library-path function has been deleted from libguile.
9343 ** The facilities for loading Scheme source files have changed.
9345 *** The variable %load-path now tells Guile which directories to search
9346 for Scheme code. Its value is a list of strings, each of which names
9349 *** The variable %load-extensions now tells Guile which extensions to
9350 try appending to a filename when searching the load path. Its value
9351 is a list of strings. Its default value is ("" ".scm").
9353 *** (%search-load-path FILENAME) searches the directories listed in the
9354 value of the %load-path variable for a Scheme file named FILENAME,
9355 with all the extensions listed in %load-extensions. If it finds a
9356 match, then it returns its full filename. If FILENAME is absolute, it
9357 returns it unchanged. Otherwise, it returns #f.
9359 %search-load-path will not return matches that refer to directories.
9361 *** (primitive-load FILENAME :optional CASE-INSENSITIVE-P SHARP)
9362 uses %seach-load-path to find a file named FILENAME, and loads it if
9363 it finds it. If it can't read FILENAME for any reason, it throws an
9366 The arguments CASE-INSENSITIVE-P and SHARP are interpreted as by the
9369 *** load uses the same searching semantics as primitive-load.
9371 *** The functions %try-load, try-load-with-path, %load, load-with-path,
9372 basic-try-load-with-path, basic-load-with-path, try-load-module-with-
9373 path, and load-module-with-path have been deleted. The functions
9374 above should serve their purposes.
9376 *** If the value of the variable %load-hook is a procedure,
9377 `primitive-load' applies its value to the name of the file being
9378 loaded (without the load path directory name prepended). If its value
9379 is #f, it is ignored. Otherwise, an error occurs.
9381 This is mostly useful for printing load notification messages.
9384 ** The function `eval!' is no longer accessible from the scheme level.
9385 We can't allow operations which introduce glocs into the scheme level,
9386 because Guile's type system can't handle these as data. Use `eval' or
9387 `read-and-eval!' (see below) as replacement.
9389 ** The new function read-and-eval! reads an expression from PORT,
9390 evaluates it, and returns the result. This is more efficient than
9391 simply calling `read' and `eval', since it is not necessary to make a
9392 copy of the expression for the evaluator to munge.
9394 Its optional arguments CASE_INSENSITIVE_P and SHARP are interpreted as
9395 for the `read' function.
9398 ** The function `int?' has been removed; its definition was identical
9399 to that of `integer?'.
9401 ** The functions `<?', `<?', `<=?', `=?', `>?', and `>=?'. Code should
9402 use the R4RS names for these functions.
9404 ** The function object-properties no longer returns the hash handle;
9405 it simply returns the object's property list.
9407 ** Many functions have been changed to throw errors, instead of
9408 returning #f on failure. The point of providing exception handling in
9409 the language is to simplify the logic of user code, but this is less
9410 useful if Guile's primitives don't throw exceptions.
9412 ** The function `fileno' has been renamed from `%fileno'.
9414 ** The function primitive-mode->fdes returns #t or #f now, not 1 or 0.
9417 * Changes to Guile's C interface:
9419 ** The library's initialization procedure has been simplified.
9420 scm_boot_guile now has the prototype:
9422 void scm_boot_guile (int ARGC,
9424 void (*main_func) (),
9427 scm_boot_guile calls MAIN_FUNC, passing it CLOSURE, ARGC, and ARGV.
9428 MAIN_FUNC should do all the work of the program (initializing other
9429 packages, reading user input, etc.) before returning. When MAIN_FUNC
9430 returns, call exit (0); this function never returns. If you want some
9431 other exit value, MAIN_FUNC may call exit itself.
9433 scm_boot_guile arranges for program-arguments to return the strings
9434 given by ARGC and ARGV. If MAIN_FUNC modifies ARGC/ARGV, should call
9435 scm_set_program_arguments with the final list, so Scheme code will
9436 know which arguments have been processed.
9438 scm_boot_guile establishes a catch-all catch handler which prints an
9439 error message and exits the process. This means that Guile exits in a
9440 coherent way when system errors occur and the user isn't prepared to
9441 handle it. If the user doesn't like this behavior, they can establish
9442 their own universal catcher in MAIN_FUNC to shadow this one.
9444 Why must the caller do all the real work from MAIN_FUNC? The garbage
9445 collector assumes that all local variables of type SCM will be above
9446 scm_boot_guile's stack frame on the stack. If you try to manipulate
9447 SCM values after this function returns, it's the luck of the draw
9448 whether the GC will be able to find the objects you allocate. So,
9449 scm_boot_guile function exits, rather than returning, to discourage
9450 people from making that mistake.
9452 The IN, OUT, and ERR arguments were removed; there are other
9453 convenient ways to override these when desired.
9455 The RESULT argument was deleted; this function should never return.
9457 The BOOT_CMD argument was deleted; the MAIN_FUNC argument is more
9461 ** Guile's header files should no longer conflict with your system's
9464 In order to compile code which #included <libguile.h>, previous
9465 versions of Guile required you to add a directory containing all the
9466 Guile header files to your #include path. This was a problem, since
9467 Guile's header files have names which conflict with many systems'
9470 Now only <libguile.h> need appear in your #include path; you must
9471 refer to all Guile's other header files as <libguile/mumble.h>.
9472 Guile's installation procedure puts libguile.h in $(includedir), and
9473 the rest in $(includedir)/libguile.
9476 ** Two new C functions, scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect_object,
9477 have been added to the Guile library.
9479 scm_protect_object (OBJ) protects OBJ from the garbage collector.
9480 OBJ will not be freed, even if all other references are dropped,
9481 until someone does scm_unprotect_object (OBJ). Both functions
9484 Note that calls to scm_protect_object do not nest. You can call
9485 scm_protect_object any number of times on a given object, and the
9486 next call to scm_unprotect_object will unprotect it completely.
9488 Basically, scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect_object just
9489 maintain a list of references to things. Since the GC knows about
9490 this list, all objects it mentions stay alive. scm_protect_object
9491 adds its argument to the list; scm_unprotect_object remove its
9492 argument from the list.
9495 ** scm_eval_0str now returns the value of the last expression
9498 ** The new function scm_read_0str reads an s-expression from a
9499 null-terminated string, and returns it.
9501 ** The new function `scm_stdio_to_port' converts a STDIO file pointer
9502 to a Scheme port object.
9504 ** The new function `scm_set_program_arguments' allows C code to set
9505 the value returned by the Scheme `program-arguments' function.
9510 * Guile no longer includes sophisticated Tcl/Tk support.
9512 The old Tcl/Tk support was unsatisfying to us, because it required the
9513 user to link against the Tcl library, as well as Tk and Guile. The
9514 interface was also un-lispy, in that it preserved Tcl/Tk's practice of
9515 referring to widgets by names, rather than exporting widgets to Scheme
9516 code as a special datatype.
9518 In the Usenix Tk Developer's Workshop held in July 1996, the Tcl/Tk
9519 maintainers described some very interesting changes in progress to the
9520 Tcl/Tk internals, which would facilitate clean interfaces between lone
9521 Tk and other interpreters --- even for garbage-collected languages
9522 like Scheme. They expected the new Tk to be publicly available in the
9525 Since it seems that Guile might soon have a new, cleaner interface to
9526 lone Tk, and that the old Guile/Tk glue code would probably need to be
9527 completely rewritten, we (Jim Blandy and Richard Stallman) have
9528 decided not to support the old code. We'll spend the time instead on
9529 a good interface to the newer Tk, as soon as it is available.
9531 Until then, gtcltk-lib provides trivial, low-maintenance functionality.
9534 Copyright information:
9536 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
9538 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
9539 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
9540 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
9541 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
9543 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
9544 of this document, or of portions of it,
9545 under the above conditions, provided also that they
9546 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
9551 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"