Commit | Line | Data |
---|---|---|
cad4775f MV |
1 | We are pleased to announce the release of Guile 1.7.1. This is a |
2 | 'technology preview' for the upcoming Guile 1.8. | |
3 | ||
4 | This version is guaranteed to contain serious bugs, and the publically | |
5 | visible interface will almost certainly change before 1.8 is released. | |
6 | The 1.7 releases might be termed "selected snapshots". | |
7 | ||
8 | We are releasing it anyway to start testing the new features, and to | |
9 | get feedback about how difficult or tedious it is to switch from Guile | |
10 | 1.6 to this series. | |
11 | ||
12 | Ideally, you should be able to just link your program with Guile 1.7.1 | |
13 | instead of with Guile 1.6.x. You will get many warnings about | |
14 | deprecated features, but your program should nevertheless run | |
15 | correctly. If you find that this is not the case (which is quite | |
16 | likely) please do not change your program yet. Instead, report the | |
17 | problem to <bug-guile@gnu.org>. | |
18 | ||
19 | The shared library major versions have been bumped compared to the 1.6 | |
20 | series, but they will not be bumped on binary incompatible changes | |
21 | within the 1.7 series. | |
22 | ||
23 | ||
24 | The NEWS file is quite long. Here are the most spectacular entries in | |
25 | a condensed form: | |
26 | ||
27 | Changes since the 1.6.x series: | |
28 | ||
29 | - Guile is now licensed with the GNU Lesser General Public License. | |
30 | ||
31 | - The manual is now licensed with the GNU Free Documentation License. | |
32 | ||
33 | - We now use GNU MP for bignums. | |
34 | ||
35 | - We now use native POSIX threads for real concurrent threads. | |
36 | ||
37 | - There is now support for copy-on-write substrings and | |
38 | mutation-sharing substrings. | |
39 | ||
40 | - We now have exact rationals, such as 1/3. | |
41 | ||
42 | - A new family of functions for converting between C values and | |
43 | Scheme values has been added that is future-proof and thread-safe. | |
44 | ||
45 | - The INUM macros like SCM_MAKINUM have been deprecated. | |
46 | ||
47 | - The macros SCM_STRINGP, SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_STRING_LENGTH, | |
48 | SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, and SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH have been deprecated. | |
49 | ||
50 | - There is a new way to deal with non-local exits and re-entries in | |
51 | C code, which is nicer than scm_internal_dynamic_wind. | |
52 | ||
53 | - There are new malloc-like functions that work better than | |
54 | scm_must_malloc, etc. | |
55 | ||
56 | and most importantly | |
57 | ||
58 | - call-with-current-continuation is now also available under the name | |
59 | call/cc. | |
60 | ||
61 | See NEWS and the manual for more details. |