1 Guile NEWS --- history of user-visible changes.
2 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3 See the end for copying conditions.
5 Please send Guile bug reports to bug-guile@gnu.org.
10 * New modules (see the manual for details)
12 ** `(srfi srfi-18)', multithreading support
13 ** The `(ice-9 i18n)' module provides internationalization support
15 * Changes to the distribution
17 ** Guile now uses Gnulib as a portability aid
19 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
20 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
22 ** A new 'memoize-symbol evaluator trap has been added. This trap can
23 be used for efficiently implementing a Scheme code coverage.
25 ** Duplicate bindings among used modules are resolved lazily.
26 This slightly improves program startup times.
28 ** New thread cancellation and thread cleanup API
29 See `cancel-thread', `set-thread-cleanup!', and `thread-cleanup'.
31 * Changes to the C interface
33 ** The GH interface (deprecated in version 1.6, 2001) was removed.
35 ** Internal `scm_i_' functions now have "hidden" linkage with GCC/ELF
37 This makes these internal functions technically not callable from
40 ** Functions for handling `scm_option' now no longer require an argument
41 indicating length of the `scm_t_option' array.
43 ** Primitive procedures (aka. "subrs") are now stored in double cells
44 This removes the subr table and simplifies the code.
46 ** Primitive procedures with more than 3 arguments (aka. "gsubrs") are
47 no longer implemented using the "compiled closure" mechanism. This
48 simplifies code and reduces both the storage and run-time overhead.
51 Changes in 1.8.7 (since 1.8.6)
55 ** Fix compilation with `--disable-deprecated'
56 ** Fix %fast-slot-ref/set!, to avoid possible segmentation fault
57 ** Fix MinGW build problem caused by HAVE_STRUCT_TIMESPEC confusion
58 ** Fix build problem when scm_t_timespec is different from struct timespec
59 ** Fix build when compiled with -Wundef -Werror
60 ** More build fixes for `alphaev56-dec-osf5.1b' (Tru64)
62 ** Allow @ macro to work with (ice-9 syncase)
64 Previously, use of the @ macro in a module whose code is being
65 transformed by (ice-9 syncase) would cause an "Invalid syntax" error.
66 Now it works as you would expect (giving the value of the specified
69 ** Have `scm_take_locale_symbol ()' return an interned symbol (bug #25865)
72 Changes in 1.8.6 (since 1.8.5)
74 * New features (see the manual for details)
76 ** New convenience function `scm_c_symbol_length ()'
78 ** Single stepping through code from Emacs
80 When you use GDS to evaluate Scheme code from Emacs, you can now use
81 `C-u' to indicate that you want to single step through that code. See
82 `Evaluating Scheme Code' in the manual for more details.
84 ** New "guile(1)" man page!
86 * Changes to the distribution
88 ** Automake's `AM_MAINTAINER_MODE' is no longer used
90 Thus, the `--enable-maintainer-mode' configure option is no longer
91 available: Guile is now always configured in "maintainer mode".
93 ** `ChangeLog' files are no longer updated
95 Instead, changes are detailed in the version control system's logs. See
96 the top-level `ChangeLog' files for details.
101 ** `symbol->string' now returns a read-only string, as per R5RS
102 ** Fix incorrect handling of the FLAGS argument of `fold-matches'
103 ** `guile-config link' now prints `-L$libdir' before `-lguile'
104 ** Fix memory corruption involving GOOPS' `class-redefinition'
105 ** Fix possible deadlock in `mutex-lock'
106 ** Fix build issue on Tru64 and ia64-hp-hpux11.23 (`SCM_UNPACK' macro)
107 ** Fix build issue on mips, mipsel, powerpc and ia64 (stack direction)
108 ** Fix build issue on hppa2.0w-hp-hpux11.11 (`dirent64' and `readdir64_r')
109 ** Fix build issue on i386-unknown-freebsd7.0 ("break strict-aliasing rules")
110 ** Fix misleading output from `(help rationalize)'
111 ** Fix build failure on Debian hppa architecture (bad stack growth detection)
112 ** Fix `gcd' when called with a single, negative argument.
113 ** Fix `Stack overflow' errors seen when building on some platforms
114 ** Fix bug when `scm_with_guile ()' was called several times from the
116 ** The handler of SRFI-34 `with-exception-handler' is now invoked in the
117 dynamic environment of the call to `raise'
118 ** Fix potential deadlock in `make-struct'
119 ** Fix compilation problem with libltdl from Libtool 2.2.x
120 ** Fix sloppy bound checking in `string-{ref,set!}' with the empty string
123 Changes in 1.8.5 (since 1.8.4)
125 * Infrastructure changes
127 ** Guile repository switched from CVS to Git
129 The new repository can be accessed using
130 "git-clone git://git.sv.gnu.org/guile.git", or can be browsed on-line at
131 http://git.sv.gnu.org/gitweb/?p=guile.git . See `README' for details.
133 ** Add support for `pkg-config'
135 See "Autoconf Support" in the manual for details.
137 * New modules (see the manual for details)
141 * New features (see the manual for details)
143 ** New `postfix' read option, for SRFI-88 keyword syntax
144 ** Some I/O primitives have been inlined, which improves I/O performance
145 ** New object-based traps infrastructure
147 This is a GOOPS-based infrastructure that builds on Guile's low-level
148 evaluator trap calls and facilitates the development of debugging
149 features like single-stepping, breakpoints, tracing and profiling.
150 See the `Traps' node of the manual for details.
152 ** New support for working on Guile code from within Emacs
154 Guile now incorporates the `GDS' library (previously distributed
155 separately) for working on Guile code from within Emacs. See the
156 `Using Guile In Emacs' node of the manual for details.
160 ** `scm_add_slot ()' no longer segfaults (fixes bug #22369)
161 ** Fixed `(ice-9 match)' for patterns like `((_ ...) ...)'
163 Previously, expressions like `(match '((foo) (bar)) (((_ ...) ...) #t))'
164 would trigger an unbound variable error for `match:andmap'.
166 ** `(oop goops describe)' now properly provides the `describe' feature
167 ** Fixed `args-fold' from `(srfi srfi-37)'
169 Previously, parsing short option names of argument-less options would
170 lead to a stack overflow.
172 ** `(srfi srfi-35)' is now visible through `cond-expand'
173 ** Fixed type-checking for the second argument of `eval'
174 ** Fixed type-checking for SRFI-1 `partition'
175 ** Fixed `struct-ref' and `struct-set!' on "light structs"
176 ** Honor struct field access rights in GOOPS
177 ** Changed the storage strategy of source properties, which fixes a deadlock
178 ** Allow compilation of Guile-using programs in C99 mode with GCC 4.3 and later
179 ** Fixed build issue for GNU/Linux on IA64
180 ** Fixed build issues on NetBSD 1.6
181 ** Fixed build issue on Solaris 2.10 x86_64
182 ** Fixed build issue with DEC/Compaq/HP's compiler
183 ** Fixed `scm_from_complex_double' build issue on FreeBSD
184 ** Fixed `alloca' build issue on FreeBSD 6
185 ** Removed use of non-portable makefile constructs
186 ** Fixed shadowing of libc's <random.h> on Tru64, which broke compilation
187 ** Make sure all tests honor `$TMPDIR'
189 * Changes to the distribution
193 We've started collecting Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ), and will
194 distribute these (with answers!) in future Guile releases.
197 Changes in 1.8.4 (since 1.8.3)
201 ** CR (ASCII 0x0d) is (again) recognized as a token delimiter by the reader
202 ** Fixed a segmentation fault which occurred when displaying the
203 backtrace of a stack with a promise object (made by `delay') in it.
204 ** Make `accept' leave guile mode while blocking
205 ** `scm_c_read ()' and `scm_c_write ()' now type-check their port argument
206 ** Fixed a build problem on AIX (use of func_data identifier)
207 ** Fixed a segmentation fault which occurred when hashx-ref or hashx-set! was
208 called with an associator proc that returns neither a pair nor #f.
209 ** Secondary threads now always return a valid module for (current-module).
210 ** Avoid MacOS build problems caused by incorrect combination of "64"
211 system and library calls.
212 ** `guile-snarf' now honors `$TMPDIR'
213 ** `guile-config compile' now reports CPPFLAGS used at compile-time
214 ** Fixed build with Sun Studio (Solaris 9)
215 ** Fixed wrong-type-arg errors when creating zero length SRFI-4
216 uniform vectors on AIX.
217 ** Fixed a deadlock that occurs upon GC with multiple threads.
218 ** Fixed compile problem with GCC on Solaris and AIX (use of _Complex_I)
219 ** Fixed autotool-derived build problems on AIX 6.1.
220 ** Fixed NetBSD/alpha support
221 ** Fixed MacOS build problem caused by use of rl_get_keymap(_name)
223 * New modules (see the manual for details)
227 * Documentation fixes and improvements
229 ** Removed premature breakpoint documentation
231 The features described are not available in the series of 1.8.x
232 releases, so the documentation was misleading and has been removed.
234 ** More about Guile's default *random-state* variable
236 ** GOOPS: more about how to use `next-method'
238 * Changes to the distribution
240 ** Corrected a few files that referred incorrectly to the old GPL + special exception licence
242 In fact Guile since 1.8.0 has been licensed with the GNU Lesser
243 General Public License, and the few incorrect files have now been
244 fixed to agree with the rest of the Guile distribution.
246 ** Removed unnecessary extra copies of COPYING*
248 The distribution now contains a single COPYING.LESSER at its top level.
251 Changes in 1.8.3 (since 1.8.2)
253 * New modules (see the manual for details)
260 ** The `(ice-9 slib)' module now works as expected
261 ** Expressions like "(set! 'x #t)" no longer yield a crash
262 ** Warnings about duplicate bindings now go to stderr
263 ** A memory leak in `make-socket-address' was fixed
264 ** Alignment issues (e.g., on SPARC) in network routines were fixed
265 ** A threading issue that showed up at least on NetBSD was fixed
266 ** Build problems on Solaris and IRIX fixed
268 * Implementation improvements
270 ** The reader is now faster, which reduces startup time
271 ** Procedures returned by `record-accessor' and `record-modifier' are faster
274 Changes in 1.8.2 (since 1.8.1):
276 * New procedures (see the manual for details)
278 ** set-program-arguments
281 * Incompatible changes
283 ** The body of a top-level `define' no longer sees the binding being created
285 In a top-level `define', the binding being created is no longer visible
286 from the `define' body. This breaks code like
287 "(define foo (begin (set! foo 1) (+ foo 1)))", where `foo' is now
288 unbound in the body. However, such code was not R5RS-compliant anyway,
293 ** Fractions were not `equal?' if stored in unreduced form.
294 (A subtle problem, since printing a value reduced it, making it work.)
295 ** srfi-60 `copy-bit' failed on 64-bit systems
296 ** "guile --use-srfi" option at the REPL can replace core functions
297 (Programs run with that option were ok, but in the interactive REPL
298 the core bindings got priority, preventing SRFI replacements or
300 ** `regexp-exec' doesn't abort() on #\nul in the input or bad flags arg
301 ** `kill' on mingw throws an error for a PID other than oneself
302 ** Procedure names are attached to procedure-with-setters
303 ** Array read syntax works with negative lower bound
304 ** `array-in-bounds?' fix if an array has different lower bounds on each index
305 ** `*' returns exact 0 for "(* inexact 0)"
306 This follows what it always did for "(* 0 inexact)".
307 ** SRFI-19: Value returned by `(current-time time-process)' was incorrect
308 ** SRFI-19: `date->julian-day' did not account for timezone offset
309 ** `ttyname' no longer crashes when passed a non-tty argument
310 ** `inet-ntop' no longer crashes on SPARC when passed an `AF_INET' address
311 ** Small memory leaks have been fixed in `make-fluid' and `add-history'
312 ** GOOPS: Fixed a bug in `method-more-specific?'
313 ** Build problems on Solaris fixed
314 ** Build problems on HP-UX IA64 fixed
315 ** Build problems on MinGW fixed
318 Changes in 1.8.1 (since 1.8.0):
320 * LFS functions are now used to access 64-bit files on 32-bit systems.
322 * New procedures (see the manual for details)
324 ** primitive-_exit - [Scheme] the-root-module
325 ** scm_primitive__exit - [C]
326 ** make-completion-function - [Scheme] (ice-9 readline)
327 ** scm_c_locale_stringn_to_number - [C]
328 ** scm_srfi1_append_reverse [C]
329 ** scm_srfi1_append_reverse_x [C]
337 ** Build problems have been fixed on MacOS, SunOS, and QNX.
339 ** `strftime' fix sign of %z timezone offset.
341 ** A one-dimensional array can now be 'equal?' to a vector.
343 ** Structures, records, and SRFI-9 records can now be compared with `equal?'.
345 ** SRFI-14 standard char sets are recomputed upon a successful `setlocale'.
347 ** `record-accessor' and `record-modifier' now have strict type checks.
349 Record accessor and modifier procedures now throw an error if the
350 record type of the record they're given is not the type expected.
351 (Previously accessors returned #f and modifiers silently did nothing).
353 ** It is now OK to use both autoload and use-modules on a given module.
355 ** `apply' checks the number of arguments more carefully on "0 or 1" funcs.
357 Previously there was no checking on primatives like make-vector that
358 accept "one or two" arguments. Now there is.
360 ** The srfi-1 assoc function now calls its equality predicate properly.
362 Previously srfi-1 assoc would call the equality predicate with the key
363 last. According to the SRFI, the key should be first.
365 ** A bug in n-par-for-each and n-for-each-par-map has been fixed.
367 ** The array-set! procedure no longer segfaults when given a bit vector.
369 ** Bugs in make-shared-array have been fixed.
371 ** string<? and friends now follow char<? etc order on 8-bit chars.
373 ** The format procedure now handles inf and nan values for ~f correctly.
375 ** exact->inexact should no longer overflow when given certain large fractions.
377 ** srfi-9 accessor and modifier procedures now have strict record type checks.
379 This matches the srfi-9 specification.
381 ** (ice-9 ftw) procedures won't ignore different files with same inode number.
383 Previously the (ice-9 ftw) procedures would ignore any file that had
384 the same inode number as a file they had already seen, even if that
385 file was on a different device.
388 Changes in 1.8.0 (changes since the 1.6.x series):
390 * Changes to the distribution
392 ** Guile is now licensed with the GNU Lesser General Public License.
394 ** The manual is now licensed with the GNU Free Documentation License.
396 ** Guile now requires GNU MP (http://swox.com/gmp).
398 Guile now uses the GNU MP library for arbitrary precision arithmetic.
400 ** Guile now has separate private and public configuration headers.
402 That is, things like HAVE_STRING_H no longer leak from Guile's
405 ** Guile now provides and uses an "effective" version number.
407 Guile now provides scm_effective_version and effective-version
408 functions which return the "effective" version number. This is just
409 the normal full version string without the final micro-version number,
410 so the current effective-version is "1.8". The effective version
411 should remain unchanged during a stable series, and should be used for
412 items like the versioned share directory name
413 i.e. /usr/share/guile/1.8.
415 Providing an unchanging version number during a stable release for
416 things like the versioned share directory can be particularly
417 important for Guile "add-on" packages, since it provides a directory
418 that they can install to that won't be changed out from under them
419 with each micro release during a stable series.
421 ** Thread implementation has changed.
423 When you configure "--with-threads=null", you will get the usual
424 threading API (call-with-new-thread, make-mutex, etc), but you can't
425 actually create new threads. Also, "--with-threads=no" is now
426 equivalent to "--with-threads=null". This means that the thread API
427 is always present, although you might not be able to create new
430 When you configure "--with-threads=pthreads" or "--with-threads=yes",
431 you will get threads that are implemented with the portable POSIX
432 threads. These threads can run concurrently (unlike the previous
433 "coop" thread implementation), but need to cooperate for things like
436 The default is "pthreads", unless your platform doesn't have pthreads,
437 in which case "null" threads are used.
439 See the manual for details, nodes "Initialization", "Multi-Threading",
440 "Blocking", and others.
442 ** There is the new notion of 'discouraged' features.
444 This is a milder form of deprecation.
446 Things that are discouraged should not be used in new code, but it is
447 OK to leave them in old code for now. When a discouraged feature is
448 used, no warning message is printed like there is for 'deprecated'
449 features. Also, things that are merely discouraged are nevertheless
450 implemented efficiently, while deprecated features can be very slow.
452 You can omit discouraged features from libguile by configuring it with
453 the '--disable-discouraged' option.
455 ** Deprecation warnings can be controlled at run-time.
457 (debug-enable 'warn-deprecated) switches them on and (debug-disable
458 'warn-deprecated) switches them off.
460 ** Support for SRFI 61, extended cond syntax for multiple values has
463 This SRFI is always available.
465 ** Support for require-extension, SRFI-55, has been added.
467 The SRFI-55 special form `require-extension' has been added. It is
468 available at startup, and provides a portable way to load Scheme
469 extensions. SRFI-55 only requires support for one type of extension,
470 "srfi"; so a set of SRFIs may be loaded via (require-extension (srfi 1
473 ** New module (srfi srfi-26) provides support for `cut' and `cute'.
475 The (srfi srfi-26) module is an implementation of SRFI-26 which
476 provides the `cut' and `cute' syntax. These may be used to specialize
477 parameters without currying.
479 ** New module (srfi srfi-31)
481 This is an implementation of SRFI-31 which provides a special form
482 `rec' for recursive evaluation.
484 ** The modules (srfi srfi-13), (srfi srfi-14) and (srfi srfi-4) have
485 been merged with the core, making their functionality always
488 The modules are still available, tho, and you could use them together
489 with a renaming import, for example.
491 ** Guile no longer includes its own version of libltdl.
493 The official version is good enough now.
495 ** The --enable-htmldoc option has been removed from 'configure'.
497 Support for translating the documentation into HTML is now always
498 provided. Use 'make html'.
500 ** New module (ice-9 serialize):
502 (serialize FORM1 ...) and (parallelize FORM1 ...) are useful when you
503 don't trust the thread safety of most of your program, but where you
504 have some section(s) of code which you consider can run in parallel to
505 other sections. See ice-9/serialize.scm for more information.
507 ** The configure option '--disable-arrays' has been removed.
509 Support for arrays and uniform numeric arrays is now always included
512 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
514 ** New command line option `-L'.
516 This option adds a directory to the front of the load path.
518 ** New command line option `--no-debug'.
520 Specifying `--no-debug' on the command line will keep the debugging
521 evaluator turned off, even for interactive sessions.
523 ** User-init file ~/.guile is now loaded with the debugging evaluator.
525 Previously, the normal evaluator would have been used. Using the
526 debugging evaluator gives better error messages.
528 ** The '-e' option now 'read's its argument.
530 This is to allow the new '(@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME)' construct to
531 be used with '-e'. For example, you can now write a script like
534 exec guile -e '(@ (demo) main)' -s "$0" "$@"
537 (define-module (demo)
541 (format #t "Demo: ~a~%" args))
544 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
546 ** Guardians have changed back to their original semantics
548 Guardians now behave like described in the paper by Dybvig et al. In
549 particular, they no longer make guarantees about the order in which
550 they return objects, and they can no longer be greedy.
552 They no longer drop cyclic data structures.
554 The C function scm_make_guardian has been changed incompatibly and no
555 longer takes the 'greedy_p' argument.
557 ** New function hashx-remove!
559 This function completes the set of 'hashx' functions.
561 ** The concept of dynamic roots has been factored into continuation
562 barriers and dynamic states.
564 Each thread has a current dynamic state that carries the values of the
565 fluids. You can create and copy dynamic states and use them as the
566 second argument for 'eval'. See "Fluids and Dynamic States" in the
569 To restrict the influence that captured continuations can have on the
570 control flow, you can errect continuation barriers. See "Continuation
571 Barriers" in the manual.
573 The function call-with-dynamic-root now essentially temporarily
574 installs a new dynamic state and errects a continuation barrier.
576 ** The default load path no longer includes "." at the end.
578 Automatically loading modules from the current directory should not
579 happen by default. If you want to allow it in a more controlled
580 manner, set the environment variable GUILE_LOAD_PATH or the Scheme
583 ** The uniform vector and array support has been overhauled.
585 It now complies with SRFI-4 and the weird prototype based uniform
586 array creation has been deprecated. See the manual for more details.
588 Some non-compatible changes have been made:
589 - characters can no longer be stored into byte arrays.
590 - strings and bit vectors are no longer considered to be uniform numeric
592 - array-rank throws an error for non-arrays instead of returning zero.
593 - array-ref does no longer accept non-arrays when no indices are given.
595 There is the new notion of 'generalized vectors' and corresponding
596 procedures like 'generalized-vector-ref'. Generalized vectors include
597 strings, bitvectors, ordinary vectors, and uniform numeric vectors.
599 Arrays use generalized vectors as their storage, so that you still
600 have arrays of characters, bits, etc. However, uniform-array-read!
601 and uniform-array-write can no longer read/write strings and
604 ** There is now support for copy-on-write substrings, mutation-sharing
605 substrings and read-only strings.
607 Three new procedures are related to this: substring/shared,
608 substring/copy, and substring/read-only. See the manual for more
611 ** Backtraces will now highlight the value that caused the error.
613 By default, these values are enclosed in "{...}", such as in this
622 <unnamed port>:1:1: In procedure car in expression (car (quote a)):
623 <unnamed port>:1:1: Wrong type (expecting pair): a
624 ABORT: (wrong-type-arg)
626 The prefix and suffix used for highlighting can be set via the two new
627 printer options 'highlight-prefix' and 'highlight-suffix'. For
628 example, putting this into ~/.guile will output the bad value in bold
631 (print-set! highlight-prefix "\x1b[1m")
632 (print-set! highlight-suffix "\x1b[22m")
635 ** 'gettext' support for internationalization has been added.
637 See the manual for details.
639 ** New syntax '@' and '@@':
641 You can now directly refer to variables exported from a module by
644 (@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME)
646 For example (@ (ice-9 pretty-print) pretty-print) will directly access
647 the pretty-print variable exported from the (ice-9 pretty-print)
648 module. You don't need to 'use' that module first. You can also use
649 '@' as a target of 'set!', as in (set! (@ mod var) val).
651 The related syntax (@@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME) works just like '@',
652 but it can also access variables that have not been exported. It is
653 intended only for kluges and temporary fixes and for debugging, not
656 ** Keyword syntax has been made more disciplined.
658 Previously, the name of a keyword was read as a 'token' but printed as
659 a symbol. Now, it is read as a general Scheme datum which must be a
670 ERROR: In expression (a b c):
674 ERROR: Unbound variable: foo
679 ERROR: Wrong type (expecting symbol): 12
683 ERROR: Wrong type (expecting symbol): (a b c)
687 ** The printing of symbols that might look like keywords can be
690 The new printer option 'quote-keywordish-symbols' controls how symbols
691 are printed that have a colon as their first or last character. The
692 default now is to only quote a symbol with #{...}# when the read
693 option 'keywords' is not '#f'. Thus:
695 guile> (define foo (string->symbol ":foo"))
696 guile> (read-set! keywords #f)
699 guile> (read-set! keywords 'prefix)
702 guile> (print-set! quote-keywordish-symbols #f)
706 ** 'while' now provides 'break' and 'continue'
708 break and continue were previously bound in a while loop, but not
709 documented, and continue didn't quite work properly. The undocumented
710 parameter to break which gave a return value for the while has been
713 ** 'call-with-current-continuation' is now also available under the name
716 ** The module system now checks for duplicate bindings.
718 The module system now can check for name conflicts among imported
721 The behavior can be controlled by specifying one or more 'duplicates'
722 handlers. For example, to make Guile return an error for every name
730 The new default behavior of the module system when a name collision
731 has been detected is to
733 1. Give priority to bindings marked as a replacement.
734 2. Issue a warning (different warning if overriding core binding).
735 3. Give priority to the last encountered binding (this corresponds to
738 If you want the old behavior back without replacements or warnings you
741 (default-duplicate-binding-handler 'last)
743 to your .guile init file.
745 ** New define-module option: :replace
747 :replace works as :export, but, in addition, marks the binding as a
750 A typical example is `format' in (ice-9 format) which is a replacement
751 for the core binding `format'.
753 ** Adding prefixes to imported bindings in the module system
755 There is now a new :use-module option :prefix. It can be used to add
756 a prefix to all imported bindings.
759 :use-module ((bar) :prefix bar:))
761 will import all bindings exported from bar, but rename them by adding
764 ** Conflicting generic functions can be automatically merged.
766 When two imported bindings conflict and they are both generic
767 functions, the two functions can now be merged automatically. This is
768 activated with the 'duplicates' handler 'merge-generics'.
770 ** New function: effective-version
772 Returns the "effective" version number. This is just the normal full
773 version string without the final micro-version number. See "Changes
774 to the distribution" above.
776 ** New threading functions: parallel, letpar, par-map, and friends
778 These are convenient ways to run calculations in parallel in new
779 threads. See "Parallel forms" in the manual for details.
781 ** New function 'try-mutex'.
783 This function will attempt to lock a mutex but will return immediately
784 instead of blocking and indicate failure.
786 ** Waiting on a condition variable can have a timeout.
788 The function 'wait-condition-variable' now takes a third, optional
789 argument that specifies the point in time where the waiting should be
792 ** New function 'broadcast-condition-variable'.
794 ** New functions 'all-threads' and 'current-thread'.
796 ** Signals and system asyncs work better with threads.
798 The function 'sigaction' now takes a fourth, optional, argument that
799 specifies the thread that the handler should run in. When the
800 argument is omitted, the handler will run in the thread that called
803 Likewise, 'system-async-mark' takes a second, optional, argument that
804 specifies the thread that the async should run in. When it is
805 omitted, the async will run in the thread that called
808 C code can use the new functions scm_sigaction_for_thread and
809 scm_system_async_mark_for_thread to pass the new thread argument.
811 When a thread blocks on a mutex, a condition variable or is waiting
812 for IO to be possible, it will still execute system asyncs. This can
813 be used to interrupt such a thread by making it execute a 'throw', for
816 ** The function 'system-async' is deprecated.
818 You can now pass any zero-argument procedure to 'system-async-mark'.
819 The function 'system-async' will just return its argument unchanged
822 ** New functions 'call-with-blocked-asyncs' and
823 'call-with-unblocked-asyncs'
825 The expression (call-with-blocked-asyncs PROC) will call PROC and will
826 block execution of system asyncs for the current thread by one level
827 while PROC runs. Likewise, call-with-unblocked-asyncs will call a
828 procedure and will unblock the execution of system asyncs by one
829 level for the current thread.
831 Only system asyncs are affected by these functions.
833 ** The functions 'mask-signals' and 'unmask-signals' are deprecated.
835 Use 'call-with-blocked-asyncs' or 'call-with-unblocked-asyncs'
836 instead. Those functions are easier to use correctly and can be
839 ** New function 'unsetenv'.
841 ** New macro 'define-syntax-public'.
843 It works like 'define-syntax' and also exports the defined macro (but
846 ** There is support for Infinity and NaNs.
848 Following PLT Scheme, Guile can now work with infinite numbers, and
851 There is new syntax for numbers: "+inf.0" (infinity), "-inf.0"
852 (negative infinity), "+nan.0" (not-a-number), and "-nan.0" (same as
853 "+nan.0"). These numbers are inexact and have no exact counterpart.
855 Dividing by an inexact zero returns +inf.0 or -inf.0, depending on the
856 sign of the dividend. The infinities are integers, and they answer #t
857 for both 'even?' and 'odd?'. The +nan.0 value is not an integer and is
858 not '=' to itself, but '+nan.0' is 'eqv?' to itself.
869 ERROR: Numerical overflow
871 Two new predicates 'inf?' and 'nan?' can be used to test for the
874 ** Inexact zero can have a sign.
876 Guile can now distinguish between plus and minus inexact zero, if your
877 platform supports this, too. The two zeros are equal according to
878 '=', but not according to 'eqv?'. For example
889 ** Guile now has exact rationals.
891 Guile can now represent fractions such as 1/3 exactly. Computing with
892 them is also done exactly, of course:
897 ** 'floor', 'ceiling', 'round' and 'truncate' now return exact numbers
900 For example: (floor 2) now returns an exact 2 where in the past it
901 returned an inexact 2.0. Likewise, (floor 5/4) returns an exact 1.
903 ** inexact->exact no longer returns only integers.
905 Without exact rationals, the closest exact number was always an
906 integer, but now inexact->exact returns the fraction that is exactly
907 equal to a floating point number. For example:
909 (inexact->exact 1.234)
910 => 694680242521899/562949953421312
912 When you want the old behavior, use 'round' explicitly:
914 (inexact->exact (round 1.234))
917 ** New function 'rationalize'.
919 This function finds a simple fraction that is close to a given real
920 number. For example (and compare with inexact->exact above):
922 (rationalize (inexact->exact 1.234) 1/2000)
925 Note that, as required by R5RS, rationalize returns only then an exact
926 result when both its arguments are exact.
928 ** 'odd?' and 'even?' work also for inexact integers.
930 Previously, (odd? 1.0) would signal an error since only exact integers
931 were recognized as integers. Now (odd? 1.0) returns #t, (odd? 2.0)
932 returns #f and (odd? 1.5) signals an error.
934 ** Guile now has uninterned symbols.
936 The new function 'make-symbol' will return an uninterned symbol. This
937 is a symbol that is unique and is guaranteed to remain unique.
938 However, uninterned symbols can not yet be read back in.
940 Use the new function 'symbol-interned?' to check whether a symbol is
943 ** pretty-print has more options.
945 The function pretty-print from the (ice-9 pretty-print) module can now
946 also be invoked with keyword arguments that control things like
947 maximum output width. See the manual for details.
949 ** Variables have no longer a special behavior for `equal?'.
951 Previously, comparing two variables with `equal?' would recursivly
952 compare their values. This is no longer done. Variables are now only
953 `equal?' if they are `eq?'.
955 ** `(begin)' is now valid.
957 You can now use an empty `begin' form. It will yield #<unspecified>
958 when evaluated and simply be ignored in a definition context.
960 ** Deprecated: procedure->macro
962 Change your code to use 'define-macro' or r5rs macros. Also, be aware
963 that macro expansion will not be done during evaluation, but prior to
966 ** Soft ports now allow a `char-ready?' procedure
968 The vector argument to `make-soft-port' can now have a length of
969 either 5 or 6. (Previously the length had to be 5.) The optional 6th
970 element is interpreted as an `input-waiting' thunk -- i.e. a thunk
971 that returns the number of characters that can be read immediately
972 without the soft port blocking.
974 ** Deprecated: undefine
976 There is no replacement for undefine.
978 ** The functions make-keyword-from-dash-symbol and keyword-dash-symbol
979 have been discouraged.
981 They are relics from a time where a keyword like #:foo was used
982 directly as a Tcl option "-foo" and thus keywords were internally
983 stored as a symbol with a starting dash. We now store a symbol
986 Use symbol->keyword and keyword->symbol instead.
988 ** The `cheap' debug option is now obsolete
990 Evaluator trap calls are now unconditionally "cheap" - in other words,
991 they pass a debug object to the trap handler rather than a full
992 continuation. The trap handler code can capture a full continuation
993 by using `call-with-current-continuation' in the usual way, if it so
996 The `cheap' option is retained for now so as not to break existing
997 code which gets or sets it, but setting it now has no effect. It will
998 be removed in the next major Guile release.
1000 ** Evaluator trap calls now support `tweaking'
1002 `Tweaking' means that the trap handler code can modify the Scheme
1003 expression that is about to be evaluated (in the case of an
1004 enter-frame trap) or the value that is being returned (in the case of
1005 an exit-frame trap). The trap handler code indicates that it wants to
1006 do this by returning a pair whose car is the symbol 'instead and whose
1007 cdr is the modified expression or return value.
1009 * Changes to the C interface
1011 ** The functions scm_hash_fn_remove_x and scm_hashx_remove_x no longer
1012 take a 'delete' function argument.
1014 This argument makes no sense since the delete function is used to
1015 remove a pair from an alist, and this must not be configurable.
1017 This is an incompatible change.
1019 ** The GH interface is now subject to the deprecation mechanism
1021 The GH interface has been deprecated for quite some time but now it is
1022 actually removed from Guile when it is configured with
1023 --disable-deprecated.
1025 See the manual "Transitioning away from GH" for more information.
1027 ** A new family of functions for converting between C values and
1028 Scheme values has been added.
1030 These functions follow a common naming scheme and are designed to be
1031 easier to use, thread-safe and more future-proof than the older
1034 - int scm_is_* (...)
1036 These are predicates that return a C boolean: 1 or 0. Instead of
1037 SCM_NFALSEP, you can now use scm_is_true, for example.
1039 - <type> scm_to_<type> (SCM val, ...)
1041 These are functions that convert a Scheme value into an appropriate
1042 C value. For example, you can use scm_to_int to safely convert from
1045 - SCM scm_from_<type> (<type> val, ...)
1047 These functions convert from a C type to a SCM value; for example,
1048 scm_from_int for ints.
1050 There is a huge number of these functions, for numbers, strings,
1051 symbols, vectors, etc. They are documented in the reference manual in
1052 the API section together with the types that they apply to.
1054 ** New functions for dealing with complex numbers in C have been added.
1056 The new functions are scm_c_make_rectangular, scm_c_make_polar,
1057 scm_c_real_part, scm_c_imag_part, scm_c_magnitude and scm_c_angle.
1058 They work like scm_make_rectangular etc but take or return doubles
1061 ** The function scm_make_complex has been discouraged.
1063 Use scm_c_make_rectangular instead.
1065 ** The INUM macros have been deprecated.
1067 A lot of code uses these macros to do general integer conversions,
1068 although the macros only work correctly with fixnums. Use the
1069 following alternatives.
1071 SCM_INUMP -> scm_is_integer or similar
1072 SCM_NINUMP -> !scm_is_integer or similar
1073 SCM_MAKINUM -> scm_from_int or similar
1074 SCM_INUM -> scm_to_int or similar
1076 SCM_VALIDATE_INUM_* -> Do not use these; scm_to_int, etc. will
1077 do the validating for you.
1079 ** The scm_num2<type> and scm_<type>2num functions and scm_make_real
1080 have been discouraged.
1082 Use the newer scm_to_<type> and scm_from_<type> functions instead for
1083 new code. The functions have been discouraged since they don't fit
1086 ** The 'boolean' macros SCM_FALSEP etc have been discouraged.
1088 They have strange names, especially SCM_NFALSEP, and SCM_BOOLP
1089 evaluates its argument twice. Use scm_is_true, etc. instead for new
1092 ** The macro SCM_EQ_P has been discouraged.
1094 Use scm_is_eq for new code, which fits better into the naming
1097 ** The macros SCM_CONSP, SCM_NCONSP, SCM_NULLP, and SCM_NNULLP have
1100 Use the function scm_is_pair or scm_is_null instead.
1102 ** The functions scm_round and scm_truncate have been deprecated and
1103 are now available as scm_c_round and scm_c_truncate, respectively.
1105 These functions occupy the names that scm_round_number and
1106 scm_truncate_number should have.
1108 ** The functions scm_c_string2str, scm_c_substring2str, and
1109 scm_c_symbol2str have been deprecated.
1111 Use scm_to_locale_stringbuf or similar instead, maybe together with
1114 ** New functions scm_c_make_string, scm_c_string_length,
1115 scm_c_string_ref, scm_c_string_set_x, scm_c_substring,
1116 scm_c_substring_shared, scm_c_substring_copy.
1118 These are like scm_make_string, scm_length, etc. but are slightly
1119 easier to use from C.
1121 ** The macros SCM_STRINGP, SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_STRING_LENGTH,
1122 SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, and SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH have been deprecated.
1124 They export too many assumptions about the implementation of strings
1125 and symbols that are no longer true in the presence of
1126 mutation-sharing substrings and when Guile switches to some form of
1129 When working with strings, it is often best to use the normal string
1130 functions provided by Guile, such as scm_c_string_ref,
1131 scm_c_string_set_x, scm_string_append, etc. Be sure to look in the
1132 manual since many more such functions are now provided than
1135 When you want to convert a SCM string to a C string, use the
1136 scm_to_locale_string function or similar instead. For symbols, use
1137 scm_symbol_to_string and then work with that string. Because of the
1138 new string representation, scm_symbol_to_string does not need to copy
1139 and is thus quite efficient.
1141 ** Some string, symbol and keyword functions have been discouraged.
1143 They don't fit into the uniform naming scheme and are not explicit
1144 about the character encoding.
1146 Replace according to the following table:
1148 scm_allocate_string -> scm_c_make_string
1149 scm_take_str -> scm_take_locale_stringn
1150 scm_take0str -> scm_take_locale_string
1151 scm_mem2string -> scm_from_locale_stringn
1152 scm_str2string -> scm_from_locale_string
1153 scm_makfrom0str -> scm_from_locale_string
1154 scm_mem2symbol -> scm_from_locale_symboln
1155 scm_mem2uninterned_symbol -> scm_from_locale_stringn + scm_make_symbol
1156 scm_str2symbol -> scm_from_locale_symbol
1158 SCM_SYMBOL_HASH -> scm_hashq
1159 SCM_SYMBOL_INTERNED_P -> scm_symbol_interned_p
1161 scm_c_make_keyword -> scm_from_locale_keyword
1163 ** The functions scm_keyword_to_symbol and sym_symbol_to_keyword are
1164 now also available to C code.
1166 ** SCM_KEYWORDP and SCM_KEYWORDSYM have been deprecated.
1168 Use scm_is_keyword and scm_keyword_to_symbol instead, but note that
1169 the latter returns the true name of the keyword, not the 'dash name',
1170 as SCM_KEYWORDSYM used to do.
1172 ** A new way to access arrays in a thread-safe and efficient way has
1175 See the manual, node "Accessing Arrays From C".
1177 ** The old uniform vector and bitvector implementations have been
1178 unceremoniously removed.
1180 This implementation exposed the details of the tagging system of
1181 Guile. Use the new C API explained in the manual in node "Uniform
1182 Numeric Vectors" and "Bit Vectors", respectively.
1184 The following macros are gone: SCM_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_BASE,
1185 SCM_UVECTOR_MAXLENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_MAKE_UVECTOR_TAG,
1186 SCM_SET_UVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_BITVECTOR_P, SCM_BITVECTOR_BASE,
1187 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_BASE, SCM_BITVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH,
1188 SCM_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_MAKE_BITVECTOR_TAG,
1189 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_BITVEC_REF, SCM_BITVEC_SET,
1192 ** The macros dealing with vectors have been deprecated.
1194 Use the new functions scm_is_vector, scm_vector_elements,
1195 scm_vector_writable_elements, etc, or scm_is_simple_vector,
1196 SCM_SIMPLE_VECTOR_REF, SCM_SIMPLE_VECTOR_SET, etc instead. See the
1197 manual for more details.
1199 Deprecated are SCM_VECTORP, SCM_VELTS, SCM_VECTOR_MAX_LENGTH,
1200 SCM_VECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_VECTOR_REF, SCM_VECTOR_SET, SCM_WRITABLE_VELTS.
1202 The following macros have been removed: SCM_VECTOR_BASE,
1203 SCM_SET_VECTOR_BASE, SCM_MAKE_VECTOR_TAG, SCM_SET_VECTOR_LENGTH,
1204 SCM_VELTS_AS_STACKITEMS, SCM_SETVELTS, SCM_GC_WRITABLE_VELTS.
1206 ** Some C functions and macros related to arrays have been deprecated.
1208 Migrate according to the following table:
1210 scm_make_uve -> scm_make_typed_array, scm_make_u8vector etc.
1211 scm_make_ra -> scm_make_array
1212 scm_shap2ra -> scm_make_array
1213 scm_cvref -> scm_c_generalized_vector_ref
1214 scm_ra_set_contp -> do not use
1215 scm_aind -> scm_array_handle_pos
1216 scm_raprin1 -> scm_display or scm_write
1218 SCM_ARRAYP -> scm_is_array
1219 SCM_ARRAY_NDIM -> scm_c_array_rank
1220 SCM_ARRAY_DIMS -> scm_array_handle_dims
1221 SCM_ARRAY_CONTP -> do not use
1222 SCM_ARRAY_MEM -> do not use
1223 SCM_ARRAY_V -> scm_array_handle_elements or similar
1224 SCM_ARRAY_BASE -> do not use
1226 ** SCM_CELL_WORD_LOC has been deprecated.
1228 Use the new macro SCM_CELL_OBJECT_LOC instead, which returns a pointer
1229 to a SCM, as opposed to a pointer to a scm_t_bits.
1231 This was done to allow the correct use of pointers into the Scheme
1232 heap. Previously, the heap words were of type scm_t_bits and local
1233 variables and function arguments were of type SCM, making it
1234 non-standards-conformant to have a pointer that can point to both.
1236 ** New macros SCM_SMOB_DATA_2, SCM_SMOB_DATA_3, etc.
1238 These macros should be used instead of SCM_CELL_WORD_2/3 to access the
1239 second and third words of double smobs. Likewise for
1240 SCM_SET_SMOB_DATA_2 and SCM_SET_SMOB_DATA_3.
1242 Also, there is SCM_SMOB_FLAGS and SCM_SET_SMOB_FLAGS that should be
1243 used to get and set the 16 exra bits in the zeroth word of a smob.
1245 And finally, there is SCM_SMOB_OBJECT and SCM_SMOB_SET_OBJECT for
1246 accesing the first immediate word of a smob as a SCM value, and there
1247 is SCM_SMOB_OBJECT_LOC for getting a pointer to the first immediate
1248 smob word. Like wise for SCM_SMOB_OBJECT_2, etc.
1250 ** New way to deal with non-local exits and re-entries.
1252 There is a new set of functions that essentially do what
1253 scm_internal_dynamic_wind does, but in a way that is more convenient
1254 for C code in some situations. Here is a quick example of how to
1255 prevent a potential memory leak:
1262 scm_dynwind_begin (0);
1264 mem = scm_malloc (100);
1265 scm_dynwind_unwind_handler (free, mem, SCM_F_WIND_EXPLICITLY);
1267 /* MEM would leak if BAR throws an error.
1268 SCM_DYNWIND_UNWIND_HANDLER frees it nevertheless.
1275 /* Because of SCM_F_WIND_EXPLICITLY, MEM will be freed by
1276 SCM_DYNWIND_END as well.
1280 For full documentation, see the node "Dynamic Wind" in the manual.
1282 ** New function scm_dynwind_free
1284 This function calls 'free' on a given pointer when a dynwind context
1285 is left. Thus the call to scm_dynwind_unwind_handler above could be
1286 replaced with simply scm_dynwind_free (mem).
1288 ** New functions scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs and
1289 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs
1291 Like scm_call_with_blocked_asyncs etc. but for C functions.
1293 ** New functions scm_dynwind_block_asyncs and scm_dynwind_unblock_asyncs
1295 In addition to scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs you can now also use
1296 scm_dynwind_block_asyncs in a 'dynwind context' (see above). Likewise for
1297 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs and scm_dynwind_unblock_asyncs.
1299 ** The macros SCM_DEFER_INTS, SCM_ALLOW_INTS, SCM_REDEFER_INTS,
1300 SCM_REALLOW_INTS have been deprecated.
1302 They do no longer fulfill their original role of blocking signal
1303 delivery. Depending on what you want to achieve, replace a pair of
1304 SCM_DEFER_INTS and SCM_ALLOW_INTS with a dynwind context that locks a
1305 mutex, blocks asyncs, or both. See node "Critical Sections" in the
1308 ** The value 'scm_mask_ints' is no longer writable.
1310 Previously, you could set scm_mask_ints directly. This is no longer
1311 possible. Use scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs and
1312 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs instead.
1314 ** New way to temporarily set the current input, output or error ports
1316 C code can now use scm_dynwind_current_<foo>_port in a 'dynwind
1317 context' (see above). <foo> is one of "input", "output" or "error".
1319 ** New way to temporarily set fluids
1321 C code can now use scm_dynwind_fluid in a 'dynwind context' (see
1322 above) to temporarily set the value of a fluid.
1324 ** New types scm_t_intmax and scm_t_uintmax.
1326 On platforms that have them, these types are identical to intmax_t and
1327 uintmax_t, respectively. On other platforms, they are identical to
1328 the largest integer types that Guile knows about.
1330 ** The functions scm_unmemocopy and scm_unmemoize have been removed.
1332 You should not have used them.
1334 ** Many public #defines with generic names have been made private.
1336 #defines with generic names like HAVE_FOO or SIZEOF_FOO have been made
1337 private or renamed with a more suitable public name.
1339 ** The macro SCM_TYP16S has been deprecated.
1341 This macro is not intended for public use.
1343 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_INEXACTP has been deprecated.
1345 Use scm_is_true (scm_inexact_p (...)) instead.
1347 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_REALP has been deprecated.
1349 Use scm_is_real instead.
1351 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_COMPLEXP has been deprecated.
1353 Use scm_is_complex instead.
1355 ** Some preprocessor defines have been deprecated.
1357 These defines indicated whether a certain feature was present in Guile
1358 or not. Going forward, assume that the features are always present.
1360 The macros are: USE_THREADS, GUILE_ISELECT, READER_EXTENSIONS,
1361 DEBUG_EXTENSIONS, DYNAMIC_LINKING.
1363 The following macros have been removed completely: MEMOIZE_LOCALS,
1364 SCM_RECKLESS, SCM_CAUTIOUS.
1366 ** The preprocessor define STACK_DIRECTION has been deprecated.
1368 There should be no need to know about the stack direction for ordinary
1371 ** New function: scm_effective_version
1373 Returns the "effective" version number. This is just the normal full
1374 version string without the final micro-version number. See "Changes
1375 to the distribution" above.
1377 ** The function scm_call_with_new_thread has a new prototype.
1379 Instead of taking a list with the thunk and handler, these two
1380 arguments are now passed directly:
1382 SCM scm_call_with_new_thread (SCM thunk, SCM handler);
1384 This is an incompatible change.
1386 ** New snarfer macro SCM_DEFINE_PUBLIC.
1388 This is like SCM_DEFINE, but also calls scm_c_export for the defined
1389 function in the init section.
1391 ** The snarfer macro SCM_SNARF_INIT is now officially supported.
1393 ** Garbage collector rewrite.
1395 The garbage collector is cleaned up a lot, and now uses lazy
1396 sweeping. This is reflected in the output of (gc-stats); since cells
1397 are being freed when they are allocated, the cells-allocated field
1398 stays roughly constant.
1400 For malloc related triggers, the behavior is changed. It uses the same
1401 heuristic as the cell-triggered collections. It may be tuned with the
1402 environment variables GUILE_MIN_YIELD_MALLOC. This is the percentage
1403 for minimum yield of malloc related triggers. The default is 40.
1404 GUILE_INIT_MALLOC_LIMIT sets the initial trigger for doing a GC. The
1407 Debugging operations for the freelist have been deprecated, along with
1408 the C variables that control garbage collection. The environment
1409 variables GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE, GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_2,
1410 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_1, and GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2 should be used.
1412 For understanding the memory usage of a GUILE program, the routine
1413 gc-live-object-stats returns an alist containing the number of live
1414 objects for every type.
1417 ** The function scm_definedp has been renamed to scm_defined_p
1419 The name scm_definedp is deprecated.
1421 ** The struct scm_cell type has been renamed to scm_t_cell
1423 This is in accordance to Guile's naming scheme for types. Note that
1424 the name scm_cell is now used for a function that allocates and
1425 initializes a new cell (see below).
1427 ** New functions for memory management
1429 A new set of functions for memory management has been added since the
1430 old way (scm_must_malloc, scm_must_free, etc) was error prone and
1431 indeed, Guile itself contained some long standing bugs that could
1432 cause aborts in long running programs.
1434 The new functions are more symmetrical and do not need cooperation
1435 from smob free routines, among other improvements.
1437 The new functions are scm_malloc, scm_realloc, scm_calloc, scm_strdup,
1438 scm_strndup, scm_gc_malloc, scm_gc_calloc, scm_gc_realloc,
1439 scm_gc_free, scm_gc_register_collectable_memory, and
1440 scm_gc_unregister_collectable_memory. Refer to the manual for more
1441 details and for upgrading instructions.
1443 The old functions for memory management have been deprecated. They
1444 are: scm_must_malloc, scm_must_realloc, scm_must_free,
1445 scm_must_strdup, scm_must_strndup, scm_done_malloc, scm_done_free.
1447 ** Declarations of exported features are marked with SCM_API.
1449 Every declaration of a feature that belongs to the exported Guile API
1450 has been marked by adding the macro "SCM_API" to the start of the
1451 declaration. This macro can expand into different things, the most
1452 common of which is just "extern" for Unix platforms. On Win32, it can
1453 be used to control which symbols are exported from a DLL.
1455 If you `#define SCM_IMPORT' before including <libguile.h>, SCM_API
1456 will expand into "__declspec (dllimport) extern", which is needed for
1457 linking to the Guile DLL in Windows.
1459 There are also SCM_RL_IMPORT, SCM_SRFI1314_IMPORT, and
1460 SCM_SRFI4_IMPORT, for the corresponding libraries.
1462 ** SCM_NEWCELL and SCM_NEWCELL2 have been deprecated.
1464 Use the new functions scm_cell and scm_double_cell instead. The old
1465 macros had problems because with them allocation and initialization
1466 was separated and the GC could sometimes observe half initialized
1467 cells. Only careful coding by the user of SCM_NEWCELL and
1468 SCM_NEWCELL2 could make this safe and efficient.
1470 ** CHECK_ENTRY, CHECK_APPLY and CHECK_EXIT have been deprecated.
1472 Use the variables scm_check_entry_p, scm_check_apply_p and scm_check_exit_p
1475 ** SRCBRKP has been deprecated.
1477 Use scm_c_source_property_breakpoint_p instead.
1479 ** Deprecated: scm_makmacro
1481 Change your code to use either scm_makmmacro or to define macros in
1482 Scheme, using 'define-macro'.
1484 ** New function scm_c_port_for_each.
1486 This function is like scm_port_for_each but takes a pointer to a C
1487 function as the callback instead of a SCM value.
1489 ** The names scm_internal_select, scm_thread_sleep, and
1490 scm_thread_usleep have been discouraged.
1492 Use scm_std_select, scm_std_sleep, scm_std_usleep instead.
1494 ** The GC can no longer be blocked.
1496 The global flags scm_gc_heap_lock and scm_block_gc have been removed.
1497 The GC can now run (partially) concurrently with other code and thus
1498 blocking it is not well defined.
1500 ** Many definitions have been removed that were previously deprecated.
1502 scm_lisp_nil, scm_lisp_t, s_nil_ify, scm_m_nil_ify, s_t_ify,
1503 scm_m_t_ify, s_0_cond, scm_m_0_cond, s_0_ify, scm_m_0_ify, s_1_ify,
1504 scm_m_1_ify, scm_debug_newcell, scm_debug_newcell2,
1505 scm_tc16_allocated, SCM_SET_SYMBOL_HASH, SCM_IM_NIL_IFY, SCM_IM_T_IFY,
1506 SCM_IM_0_COND, SCM_IM_0_IFY, SCM_IM_1_IFY, SCM_GC_SET_ALLOCATED,
1507 scm_debug_newcell, scm_debug_newcell2, SCM_HUP_SIGNAL, SCM_INT_SIGNAL,
1508 SCM_FPE_SIGNAL, SCM_BUS_SIGNAL, SCM_SEGV_SIGNAL, SCM_ALRM_SIGNAL,
1509 SCM_GC_SIGNAL, SCM_TICK_SIGNAL, SCM_SIG_ORD, SCM_ORD_SIG,
1510 SCM_NUM_SIGS, scm_top_level_lookup_closure_var,
1511 *top-level-lookup-closure*, scm_system_transformer, scm_eval_3,
1512 scm_eval2, root_module_lookup_closure, SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP,
1513 SCM_RWSTRINGP, scm_read_only_string_p, scm_make_shared_substring,
1514 scm_tc7_substring, sym_huh, SCM_VARVCELL, SCM_UDVARIABLEP,
1515 SCM_DEFVARIABLEP, scm_mkbig, scm_big2inum, scm_adjbig, scm_normbig,
1516 scm_copybig, scm_2ulong2big, scm_dbl2big, scm_big2dbl, SCM_FIXNUM_BIT,
1517 SCM_SETCHARS, SCM_SLOPPY_SUBSTRP, SCM_SUBSTR_STR, SCM_SUBSTR_OFFSET,
1518 SCM_LENGTH_MAX, SCM_SETLENGTH, SCM_ROSTRINGP, SCM_ROLENGTH,
1519 SCM_ROCHARS, SCM_ROUCHARS, SCM_SUBSTRP, SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR,
1520 scm_sym2vcell, scm_intern, scm_intern0, scm_sysintern, scm_sysintern0,
1521 scm_sysintern0_no_module_lookup, scm_init_symbols_deprecated,
1522 scm_vector_set_length_x, scm_contregs, scm_debug_info,
1523 scm_debug_frame, SCM_DSIDEVAL, SCM_CONST_LONG, SCM_VCELL,
1524 SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL, SCM_VCELL_INIT, SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL_INIT,
1525 SCM_HUGE_LENGTH, SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR, SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING,
1526 SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING_COPY, SCM_VALIDATE_NULLORROSTRING_COPY,
1527 SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING, DIGITS, scm_small_istr2int, scm_istr2int,
1528 scm_istr2flo, scm_istring2number, scm_istr2int, scm_istr2flo,
1529 scm_istring2number, scm_vtable_index_vcell, scm_si_vcell, SCM_ECONSP,
1530 SCM_NECONSP, SCM_GLOC_VAR, SCM_GLOC_VAL, SCM_GLOC_SET_VAL,
1531 SCM_GLOC_VAL_LOC, scm_make_gloc, scm_gloc_p, scm_tc16_variable,
1532 SCM_CHARS, SCM_LENGTH, SCM_SET_STRING_CHARS, SCM_SET_STRING_LENGTH.
1534 * Changes to bundled modules
1538 Using the (ice-9 debug) module no longer automatically switches Guile
1539 to use the debugging evaluator. If you want to switch to the
1540 debugging evaluator (which is needed for backtrace information if you
1541 hit an error), please add an explicit "(debug-enable 'debug)" to your
1542 code just after the code to use (ice-9 debug).
1545 Changes since Guile 1.4:
1547 * Changes to the distribution
1549 ** A top-level TODO file is included.
1551 ** Guile now uses a versioning scheme similar to that of the Linux kernel.
1553 Guile now always uses three numbers to represent the version,
1554 i.e. "1.6.5". The first number, 1, is the major version number, the
1555 second number, 6, is the minor version number, and the third number,
1556 5, is the micro version number. Changes in major version number
1557 indicate major changes in Guile.
1559 Minor version numbers that are even denote stable releases, and odd
1560 minor version numbers denote development versions (which may be
1561 unstable). The micro version number indicates a minor sub-revision of
1562 a given MAJOR.MINOR release.
1564 In keeping with the new scheme, (minor-version) and scm_minor_version
1565 no longer return everything but the major version number. They now
1566 just return the minor version number. Two new functions
1567 (micro-version) and scm_micro_version have been added to report the
1568 micro version number.
1570 In addition, ./GUILE-VERSION now defines GUILE_MICRO_VERSION.
1572 ** New preprocessor definitions are available for checking versions.
1574 version.h now #defines SCM_MAJOR_VERSION, SCM_MINOR_VERSION, and
1575 SCM_MICRO_VERSION to the appropriate integer values.
1577 ** Guile now actively warns about deprecated features.
1579 The new configure option `--enable-deprecated=LEVEL' and the
1580 environment variable GUILE_WARN_DEPRECATED control this mechanism.
1581 See INSTALL and README for more information.
1583 ** Guile is much more likely to work on 64-bit architectures.
1585 Guile now compiles and passes "make check" with only two UNRESOLVED GC
1586 cases on Alpha and ia64 based machines now. Thanks to John Goerzen
1587 for the use of a test machine, and thanks to Stefan Jahn for ia64
1590 ** New functions: setitimer and getitimer.
1592 These implement a fairly direct interface to the libc functions of the
1595 ** The #. reader extension is now disabled by default.
1597 For safety reasons, #. evaluation is disabled by default. To
1598 re-enable it, set the fluid read-eval? to #t. For example:
1600 (fluid-set! read-eval? #t)
1602 but make sure you realize the potential security risks involved. With
1603 read-eval? enabled, reading a data file from an untrusted source can
1606 ** New SRFI modules have been added:
1608 SRFI-0 `cond-expand' is now supported in Guile, without requiring
1611 (srfi srfi-1) is a library containing many useful pair- and list-processing
1614 (srfi srfi-2) exports and-let*.
1616 (srfi srfi-4) implements homogeneous numeric vector datatypes.
1618 (srfi srfi-6) is a dummy module for now, since guile already provides
1619 all of the srfi-6 procedures by default: open-input-string,
1620 open-output-string, get-output-string.
1622 (srfi srfi-8) exports receive.
1624 (srfi srfi-9) exports define-record-type.
1626 (srfi srfi-10) exports define-reader-ctor and implements the reader
1629 (srfi srfi-11) exports let-values and let*-values.
1631 (srfi srfi-13) implements the SRFI String Library.
1633 (srfi srfi-14) implements the SRFI Character-Set Library.
1635 (srfi srfi-17) implements setter and getter-with-setter and redefines
1636 some accessor procedures as procedures with getters. (such as car,
1637 cdr, vector-ref etc.)
1639 (srfi srfi-19) implements the SRFI Time/Date Library.
1641 ** New scripts / "executable modules"
1643 Subdirectory "scripts" contains Scheme modules that are packaged to
1644 also be executable as scripts. At this time, these scripts are available:
1653 See README there for more info.
1655 These scripts can be invoked from the shell with the new program
1656 "guile-tools", which keeps track of installation directory for you.
1659 $ guile-tools display-commentary srfi/*.scm
1661 guile-tools is copied to the standard $bindir on "make install".
1663 ** New module (ice-9 stack-catch):
1665 stack-catch is like catch, but saves the current state of the stack in
1666 the fluid the-last-stack. This fluid can be useful when using the
1667 debugger and when re-throwing an error.
1669 ** The module (ice-9 and-let*) has been renamed to (ice-9 and-let-star)
1671 This has been done to prevent problems on lesser operating systems
1672 that can't tolerate `*'s in file names. The exported macro continues
1673 to be named `and-let*', of course.
1675 On systems that support it, there is also a compatibility module named
1676 (ice-9 and-let*). It will go away in the next release.
1678 ** New modules (oop goops) etc.:
1681 (oop goops describe)
1683 (oop goops active-slot)
1684 (oop goops composite-slot)
1686 The Guile Object Oriented Programming System (GOOPS) has been
1687 integrated into Guile. For further information, consult the GOOPS
1688 manual and tutorial in the `doc' directory.
1690 ** New module (ice-9 rdelim).
1692 This exports the following procedures which were previously defined
1693 in the default environment:
1695 read-line read-line! read-delimited read-delimited! %read-delimited!
1696 %read-line write-line
1698 For backwards compatibility the definitions are still imported into the
1699 default environment in this version of Guile. However you should add:
1701 (use-modules (ice-9 rdelim))
1703 to any program which uses the definitions, since this may change in
1706 Alternatively, if guile-scsh is installed, the (scsh rdelim) module
1707 can be used for similar functionality.
1709 ** New module (ice-9 rw)
1711 This is a subset of the (scsh rw) module from guile-scsh. Currently
1712 it defines two procedures:
1714 *** New function: read-string!/partial str [port_or_fdes [start [end]]]
1716 Read characters from a port or file descriptor into a string STR.
1717 A port must have an underlying file descriptor -- a so-called
1718 fport. This procedure is scsh-compatible and can efficiently read
1721 *** New function: write-string/partial str [port_or_fdes [start [end]]]
1723 Write characters from a string STR to a port or file descriptor.
1724 A port must have an underlying file descriptor -- a so-called
1725 fport. This procedure is mostly compatible and can efficiently
1726 write large strings.
1728 ** New module (ice-9 match)
1730 This module includes Andrew K. Wright's pattern matcher. See
1731 ice-9/match.scm for brief description or
1733 http://www.star-lab.com/wright/code.html
1735 for complete documentation.
1737 ** New module (ice-9 buffered-input)
1739 This module provides procedures to construct an input port from an
1740 underlying source of input that reads and returns its input in chunks.
1741 The underlying input source is a Scheme procedure, specified by the
1742 caller, which the port invokes whenever it needs more input.
1744 This is useful when building an input port whose back end is Readline
1745 or a UI element such as the GtkEntry widget.
1749 The reference and tutorial documentation that was previously
1750 distributed separately, as `guile-doc', is now included in the core
1751 Guile distribution. The documentation consists of the following
1754 - The Guile Tutorial (guile-tut.texi) contains a tutorial introduction
1757 - The Guile Reference Manual (guile.texi) contains (or is intended to
1758 contain) reference documentation on all aspects of Guile.
1760 - The GOOPS Manual (goops.texi) contains both tutorial-style and
1761 reference documentation for using GOOPS, Guile's Object Oriented
1764 - The Revised^5 Report on the Algorithmic Language Scheme
1767 See the README file in the `doc' directory for more details.
1769 ** There are a couple of examples in the examples/ directory now.
1771 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
1773 ** New command line option `--use-srfi'
1775 Using this option, SRFI modules can be loaded on startup and be
1776 available right from the beginning. This makes programming portable
1777 Scheme programs easier.
1779 The option `--use-srfi' expects a comma-separated list of numbers,
1780 each representing a SRFI number to be loaded into the interpreter
1781 before starting evaluating a script file or the REPL. Additionally,
1782 the feature identifier for the loaded SRFIs is recognized by
1783 `cond-expand' when using this option.
1786 $ guile --use-srfi=8,13
1787 guile> (receive (x z) (values 1 2) (+ 1 2))
1789 guile> (string-pad "bla" 20)
1792 ** Guile now always starts up in the `(guile-user)' module.
1794 Previously, scripts executed via the `-s' option would run in the
1795 `(guile)' module and the repl would run in the `(guile-user)' module.
1796 Now every user action takes place in the `(guile-user)' module by
1799 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
1801 ** Character classifiers work for non-ASCII characters.
1803 The predicates `char-alphabetic?', `char-numeric?',
1804 `char-whitespace?', `char-lower?', `char-upper?' and `char-is-both?'
1805 no longer check whether their arguments are ASCII characters.
1806 Previously, a character would only be considered alphabetic when it
1807 was also ASCII, for example.
1809 ** Previously deprecated Scheme functions have been removed:
1811 tag - no replacement.
1812 fseek - replaced by seek.
1813 list* - replaced by cons*.
1815 ** It's now possible to create modules with controlled environments
1819 (use-modules (ice-9 safe))
1820 (define m (make-safe-module))
1821 ;;; m will now be a module containing only a safe subset of R5RS
1822 (eval '(+ 1 2) m) --> 3
1823 (eval 'load m) --> ERROR: Unbound variable: load
1825 ** Evaluation of "()", the empty list, is now an error.
1827 Previously, the expression "()" evaluated to the empty list. This has
1828 been changed to signal a "missing expression" error. The correct way
1829 to write the empty list as a literal constant is to use quote: "'()".
1831 ** New concept of `Guile Extensions'.
1833 A Guile Extension is just a ordinary shared library that can be linked
1834 at run-time. We found it advantageous to give this simple concept a
1835 dedicated name to distinguish the issues related to shared libraries
1836 from the issues related to the module system.
1838 *** New function: load-extension
1840 Executing (load-extension lib init) is mostly equivalent to
1842 (dynamic-call init (dynamic-link lib))
1844 except when scm_register_extension has been called previously.
1845 Whenever appropriate, you should use `load-extension' instead of
1846 dynamic-link and dynamic-call.
1848 *** New C function: scm_c_register_extension
1850 This function registers a initialization function for use by
1851 `load-extension'. Use it when you don't want specific extensions to
1852 be loaded as shared libraries (for example on platforms that don't
1853 support dynamic linking).
1855 ** Auto-loading of compiled-code modules is deprecated.
1857 Guile used to be able to automatically find and link a shared
1858 library to satisfy requests for a module. For example, the module
1859 `(foo bar)' could be implemented by placing a shared library named
1860 "foo/libbar.so" (or with a different extension) in a directory on the
1863 This has been found to be too tricky, and is no longer supported. The
1864 shared libraries are now called "extensions". You should now write a
1865 small Scheme file that calls `load-extension' to load the shared
1866 library and initialize it explicitly.
1868 The shared libraries themselves should be installed in the usual
1869 places for shared libraries, with names like "libguile-foo-bar".
1871 For example, place this into a file "foo/bar.scm"
1873 (define-module (foo bar))
1875 (load-extension "libguile-foo-bar" "foobar_init")
1877 ** Backward incompatible change: eval EXP ENVIRONMENT-SPECIFIER
1879 `eval' is now R5RS, that is it takes two arguments.
1880 The second argument is an environment specifier, i.e. either
1882 (scheme-report-environment 5)
1883 (null-environment 5)
1884 (interaction-environment)
1890 ** The module system has been made more disciplined.
1892 The function `eval' will save and restore the current module around
1893 the evaluation of the specified expression. While this expression is
1894 evaluated, `(current-module)' will now return the right module, which
1895 is the module specified as the second argument to `eval'.
1897 A consequence of this change is that `eval' is not particularly
1898 useful when you want allow the evaluated code to change what module is
1899 designated as the current module and have this change persist from one
1900 call to `eval' to the next. The read-eval-print-loop is an example
1901 where `eval' is now inadequate. To compensate, there is a new
1902 function `primitive-eval' that does not take a module specifier and
1903 that does not save/restore the current module. You should use this
1904 function together with `set-current-module', `current-module', etc
1905 when you want to have more control over the state that is carried from
1906 one eval to the next.
1908 Additionally, it has been made sure that forms that are evaluated at
1909 the top level are always evaluated with respect to the current module.
1910 Previously, subforms of top-level forms such as `begin', `case',
1911 etc. did not respect changes to the current module although these
1912 subforms are at the top-level as well.
1914 To prevent strange behavior, the forms `define-module',
1915 `use-modules', `use-syntax', and `export' have been restricted to only
1916 work on the top level. The forms `define-public' and
1917 `defmacro-public' only export the new binding on the top level. They
1918 behave just like `define' and `defmacro', respectively, when they are
1919 used in a lexical environment.
1921 Also, `export' will no longer silently re-export bindings imported
1922 from a used module. It will emit a `deprecation' warning and will
1923 cease to perform any re-export in the next version. If you actually
1924 want to re-export bindings, use the new `re-export' in place of
1925 `export'. The new `re-export' will not make copies of variables when
1926 rexporting them, as `export' did wrongly.
1928 ** Module system now allows selection and renaming of imported bindings
1930 Previously, when using `use-modules' or the `#:use-module' clause in
1931 the `define-module' form, all the bindings (association of symbols to
1932 values) for imported modules were added to the "current module" on an
1933 as-is basis. This has been changed to allow finer control through two
1934 new facilities: selection and renaming.
1936 You can now select which of the imported module's bindings are to be
1937 visible in the current module by using the `:select' clause. This
1938 clause also can be used to rename individual bindings. For example:
1940 ;; import all bindings no questions asked
1941 (use-modules (ice-9 common-list))
1943 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them;
1944 ;; the current module sees: every some zonk-y zonk-n
1945 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1947 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1948 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))))
1950 You can also programmatically rename all selected bindings using the
1951 `:renamer' clause, which specifies a proc that takes a symbol and
1952 returns another symbol. Because it is common practice to use a prefix,
1953 we now provide the convenience procedure `symbol-prefix-proc'. For
1956 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them specifically,
1957 ;; and all four w/ prefix "CL:";
1958 ;; the current module sees: CL:every CL:some CL:zonk-y CL:zonk-n
1959 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1961 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1962 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))
1963 :renamer (symbol-prefix-proc 'CL:)))
1965 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them specifically,
1966 ;; and all four by upcasing.
1967 ;; the current module sees: EVERY SOME ZONK-Y ZONK-N
1968 (define (upcase-symbol sym)
1969 (string->symbol (string-upcase (symbol->string sym))))
1971 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1973 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1974 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))
1975 :renamer upcase-symbol))
1977 Note that programmatic renaming is done *after* individual renaming.
1978 Also, the above examples show `use-modules', but the same facilities are
1979 available for the `#:use-module' clause of `define-module'.
1981 See manual for more info.
1983 ** The semantics of guardians have changed.
1985 The changes are for the most part compatible. An important criterion
1986 was to keep the typical usage of guardians as simple as before, but to
1987 make the semantics safer and (as a result) more useful.
1989 *** All objects returned from guardians are now properly alive.
1991 It is now guaranteed that any object referenced by an object returned
1992 from a guardian is alive. It's now impossible for a guardian to
1993 return a "contained" object before its "containing" object.
1995 One incompatible (but probably not very important) change resulting
1996 from this is that it is no longer possible to guard objects that
1997 indirectly reference themselves (i.e. are parts of cycles). If you do
1998 so accidentally, you'll get a warning.
2000 *** There are now two types of guardians: greedy and sharing.
2002 If you call (make-guardian #t) or just (make-guardian), you'll get a
2003 greedy guardian, and for (make-guardian #f) a sharing guardian.
2005 Greedy guardians are the default because they are more "defensive".
2006 You can only greedily guard an object once. If you guard an object
2007 more than once, once in a greedy guardian and the rest of times in
2008 sharing guardians, then it is guaranteed that the object won't be
2009 returned from sharing guardians as long as it is greedily guarded
2012 Guardians returned by calls to `make-guardian' can now take one more
2013 optional parameter, which says whether to throw an error in case an
2014 attempt is made to greedily guard an object that is already greedily
2015 guarded. The default is true, i.e. throw an error. If the parameter
2016 is false, the guardian invocation returns #t if guarding was
2017 successful and #f if it wasn't.
2019 Also, since greedy guarding is, in effect, a side-effecting operation
2020 on objects, a new function is introduced: `destroy-guardian!'.
2021 Invoking this function on a guardian renders it unoperative and, if
2022 the guardian is greedy, clears the "greedily guarded" property of the
2023 objects that were guarded by it, thus undoing the side effect.
2025 Note that all this hair is hardly very important, since guardian
2026 objects are usually permanent.
2028 ** Continuations created by call-with-current-continuation now accept
2029 any number of arguments, as required by R5RS.
2031 ** New function `issue-deprecation-warning'
2033 This function is used to display the deprecation messages that are
2034 controlled by GUILE_WARN_DEPRECATION as explained in the README.
2037 (issue-deprecation-warning "`id' is deprecated. Use `identity' instead.")
2041 ;; `id' is deprecated. Use `identity' instead.
2046 ** New syntax `begin-deprecated'
2048 When deprecated features are included (as determined by the configure
2049 option --enable-deprecated), `begin-deprecated' is identical to
2050 `begin'. When deprecated features are excluded, it always evaluates
2051 to `#f', ignoring the body forms.
2053 ** New function `make-object-property'
2055 This function returns a new `procedure with setter' P that can be used
2056 to attach a property to objects. When calling P as
2060 where `obj' is any kind of object, it attaches `val' to `obj' in such
2061 a way that it can be retrieved by calling P as
2065 This function will replace procedure properties, symbol properties and
2066 source properties eventually.
2068 ** Module (ice-9 optargs) now uses keywords instead of `#&'.
2070 Instead of #&optional, #&key, etc you should now use #:optional,
2071 #:key, etc. Since #:optional is a keyword, you can write it as just
2072 :optional when (read-set! keywords 'prefix) is active.
2074 The old reader syntax `#&' is still supported, but deprecated. It
2075 will be removed in the next release.
2077 ** New define-module option: pure
2079 Tells the module system not to include any bindings from the root
2084 (define-module (totally-empty-module)
2087 ** New define-module option: export NAME1 ...
2089 Export names NAME1 ...
2091 This option is required if you want to be able to export bindings from
2092 a module which doesn't import one of `define-public' or `export'.
2096 (define-module (foo)
2098 :use-module (ice-9 r5rs)
2101 ;;; Note that we're pure R5RS below this point!
2106 ** New function: object->string OBJ
2108 Return a Scheme string obtained by printing a given object.
2110 ** New function: port? X
2112 Returns a boolean indicating whether X is a port. Equivalent to
2113 `(or (input-port? X) (output-port? X))'.
2115 ** New function: file-port?
2117 Determines whether a given object is a port that is related to a file.
2119 ** New function: port-for-each proc
2121 Apply PROC to each port in the Guile port table in turn. The return
2122 value is unspecified. More specifically, PROC is applied exactly once
2123 to every port that exists in the system at the time PORT-FOR-EACH is
2124 invoked. Changes to the port table while PORT-FOR-EACH is running
2125 have no effect as far as PORT-FOR-EACH is concerned.
2127 ** New function: dup2 oldfd newfd
2129 A simple wrapper for the `dup2' system call. Copies the file
2130 descriptor OLDFD to descriptor number NEWFD, replacing the
2131 previous meaning of NEWFD. Both OLDFD and NEWFD must be integers.
2132 Unlike for dup->fdes or primitive-move->fdes, no attempt is made
2133 to move away ports which are using NEWFD. The return value is
2136 ** New function: close-fdes fd
2138 A simple wrapper for the `close' system call. Close file
2139 descriptor FD, which must be an integer. Unlike close (*note
2140 close: Ports and File Descriptors.), the file descriptor will be
2141 closed even if a port is using it. The return value is
2144 ** New function: crypt password salt
2146 Encrypts `password' using the standard unix password encryption
2149 ** New function: chroot path
2151 Change the root directory of the running process to `path'.
2153 ** New functions: getlogin, cuserid
2155 Return the login name or the user name of the current effective user
2158 ** New functions: getpriority which who, setpriority which who prio
2160 Get or set the priority of the running process.
2162 ** New function: getpass prompt
2164 Read a password from the terminal, first displaying `prompt' and
2167 ** New function: flock file operation
2169 Set/remove an advisory shared or exclusive lock on `file'.
2171 ** New functions: sethostname name, gethostname
2173 Set or get the hostname of the machine the current process is running
2176 ** New function: mkstemp! tmpl
2178 mkstemp creates a new unique file in the file system and returns a
2179 new buffered port open for reading and writing to the file. TMPL
2180 is a string specifying where the file should be created: it must
2181 end with `XXXXXX' and will be changed in place to return the name
2182 of the temporary file.
2184 ** New function: open-input-string string
2186 Return an input string port which delivers the characters from
2187 `string'. This procedure, together with `open-output-string' and
2188 `get-output-string' implements SRFI-6.
2190 ** New function: open-output-string
2192 Return an output string port which collects all data written to it.
2193 The data can then be retrieved by `get-output-string'.
2195 ** New function: get-output-string
2197 Return the contents of an output string port.
2199 ** New function: identity
2201 Return the argument.
2203 ** socket, connect, accept etc., now have support for IPv6. IPv6 addresses
2204 are represented in Scheme as integers with normal host byte ordering.
2206 ** New function: inet-pton family address
2208 Convert a printable string network address into an integer. Note that
2209 unlike the C version of this function, the result is an integer with
2210 normal host byte ordering. FAMILY can be `AF_INET' or `AF_INET6'.
2213 (inet-pton AF_INET "127.0.0.1") => 2130706433
2214 (inet-pton AF_INET6 "::1") => 1
2216 ** New function: inet-ntop family address
2218 Convert an integer network address into a printable string. Note that
2219 unlike the C version of this function, the input is an integer with
2220 normal host byte ordering. FAMILY can be `AF_INET' or `AF_INET6'.
2223 (inet-ntop AF_INET 2130706433) => "127.0.0.1"
2224 (inet-ntop AF_INET6 (- (expt 2 128) 1)) =>
2225 ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff
2229 Use `identity' instead.
2235 ** Deprecated: return-it
2239 ** Deprecated: string-character-length
2241 Use `string-length' instead.
2243 ** Deprecated: flags
2245 Use `logior' instead.
2247 ** Deprecated: close-all-ports-except.
2249 This was intended for closing ports in a child process after a fork,
2250 but it has the undesirable side effect of flushing buffers.
2251 port-for-each is more flexible.
2253 ** The (ice-9 popen) module now attempts to set up file descriptors in
2254 the child process from the current Scheme ports, instead of using the
2255 current values of file descriptors 0, 1, and 2 in the parent process.
2257 ** Removed function: builtin-weak-bindings
2259 There is no such concept as a weak binding any more.
2261 ** Removed constants: bignum-radix, scm-line-incrementors
2263 ** define-method: New syntax mandatory.
2265 The new method syntax is now mandatory:
2267 (define-method (NAME ARG-SPEC ...) BODY ...)
2268 (define-method (NAME ARG-SPEC ... . REST-ARG) BODY ...)
2270 ARG-SPEC ::= ARG-NAME | (ARG-NAME TYPE)
2271 REST-ARG ::= ARG-NAME
2273 If you have old code using the old syntax, import
2274 (oop goops old-define-method) before (oop goops) as in:
2276 (use-modules (oop goops old-define-method) (oop goops))
2278 ** Deprecated function: builtin-variable
2279 Removed function: builtin-bindings
2281 There is no longer a distinction between builtin or other variables.
2282 Use module system operations for all variables.
2284 ** Lazy-catch handlers are no longer allowed to return.
2286 That is, a call to `throw', `error', etc is now guaranteed to not
2289 ** Bugfixes for (ice-9 getopt-long)
2291 This module is now tested using test-suite/tests/getopt-long.test.
2292 The following bugs have been fixed:
2294 *** Parsing for options that are specified to have `optional' args now checks
2295 if the next element is an option instead of unconditionally taking it as the
2298 *** An error is now thrown for `--opt=val' when the option description
2299 does not specify `(value #t)' or `(value optional)'. This condition used to
2300 be accepted w/o error, contrary to the documentation.
2302 *** The error message for unrecognized options is now more informative.
2303 It used to be "not a record", an artifact of the implementation.
2305 *** The error message for `--opt' terminating the arg list (no value), when
2306 `(value #t)' is specified, is now more informative. It used to be "not enough
2309 *** "Clumped" single-char args now preserve trailing string, use it as arg.
2310 The expansion used to be like so:
2312 ("-abc5d" "--xyz") => ("-a" "-b" "-c" "--xyz")
2314 Note that the "5d" is dropped. Now it is like so:
2316 ("-abc5d" "--xyz") => ("-a" "-b" "-c" "5d" "--xyz")
2318 This enables single-char options to have adjoining arguments as long as their
2319 constituent characters are not potential single-char options.
2321 ** (ice-9 session) procedure `arity' now works with (ice-9 optargs) `lambda*'
2323 The `lambda*' and derivative forms in (ice-9 optargs) now set a procedure
2324 property `arglist', which can be retrieved by `arity'. The result is that
2325 `arity' can give more detailed information than before:
2329 guile> (use-modules (ice-9 optargs))
2330 guile> (define* (foo #:optional a b c) a)
2332 0 or more arguments in `lambda*:G0'.
2337 3 optional arguments: `a', `b' and `c'.
2338 guile> (define* (bar a b #:key c d #:allow-other-keys) a)
2340 2 required arguments: `a' and `b', 2 keyword arguments: `c'
2341 and `d', other keywords allowed.
2342 guile> (define* (baz a b #:optional c #:rest r) a)
2344 2 required arguments: `a' and `b', 1 optional argument: `c',
2347 * Changes to the C interface
2349 ** Types have been renamed from scm_*_t to scm_t_*.
2351 This has been done for POSIX sake. It reserves identifiers ending
2352 with "_t". What a concept.
2354 The old names are still available with status `deprecated'.
2356 ** scm_t_bits (former scm_bits_t) is now a unsigned type.
2358 ** Deprecated features have been removed.
2362 SCM_INPORTP, SCM_OUTPORTP SCM_ICHRP, SCM_ICHR, SCM_MAKICHR
2363 SCM_SETJMPBUF SCM_NSTRINGP SCM_NRWSTRINGP SCM_NVECTORP SCM_DOUBLE_CELLP
2365 *** C Functions removed
2367 scm_sysmissing scm_tag scm_tc16_flo scm_tc_flo
2368 scm_fseek - replaced by scm_seek.
2369 gc-thunk - replaced by after-gc-hook.
2370 gh_int2scmb - replaced by gh_bool2scm.
2371 scm_tc_dblr - replaced by scm_tc16_real.
2372 scm_tc_dblc - replaced by scm_tc16_complex.
2373 scm_list_star - replaced by scm_cons_star.
2375 ** Deprecated: scm_makfromstr
2377 Use scm_mem2string instead.
2379 ** Deprecated: scm_make_shared_substring
2381 Explicit shared substrings will disappear from Guile.
2383 Instead, "normal" strings will be implemented using sharing
2384 internally, combined with a copy-on-write strategy.
2386 ** Deprecated: scm_read_only_string_p
2388 The concept of read-only strings will disappear in next release of
2391 ** Deprecated: scm_sloppy_memq, scm_sloppy_memv, scm_sloppy_member
2393 Instead, use scm_c_memq or scm_memq, scm_memv, scm_member.
2395 ** New functions: scm_call_0, scm_call_1, scm_call_2, scm_call_3
2397 Call a procedure with the indicated number of arguments. See "Fly
2398 Evaluation" in the manual.
2400 ** New functions: scm_apply_0, scm_apply_1, scm_apply_2, scm_apply_3
2402 Call a procedure with the indicated number of arguments and a list of
2403 further arguments. See "Fly Evaluation" in the manual.
2405 ** New functions: scm_list_1, scm_list_2, scm_list_3, scm_list_4, scm_list_5
2407 Create a list of the given number of elements. See "List
2408 Constructors" in the manual.
2410 ** Renamed function: scm_listify has been replaced by scm_list_n.
2412 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_LIST0, SCM_LIST1, SCM_LIST2, SCM_LIST3, SCM_LIST4,
2413 SCM_LIST5, SCM_LIST6, SCM_LIST7, SCM_LIST8, SCM_LIST9.
2415 Use functions scm_list_N instead.
2417 ** New function: scm_c_read (SCM port, void *buffer, scm_sizet size)
2419 Used by an application to read arbitrary number of bytes from a port.
2420 Same semantics as libc read, except that scm_c_read only returns less
2421 than SIZE bytes if at end-of-file.
2423 Warning: Doesn't update port line and column counts!
2425 ** New function: scm_c_write (SCM port, const void *ptr, scm_sizet size)
2427 Used by an application to write arbitrary number of bytes to an SCM
2428 port. Similar semantics as libc write. However, unlike libc
2429 write, scm_c_write writes the requested number of bytes and has no
2432 Warning: Doesn't update port line and column counts!
2434 ** New function: scm_init_guile ()
2436 In contrast to scm_boot_guile, scm_init_guile will return normally
2437 after initializing Guile. It is not available on all systems, tho.
2439 ** New functions: scm_str2symbol, scm_mem2symbol
2441 The function scm_str2symbol takes a const char* pointing to a zero-terminated
2442 field of characters and creates a scheme symbol object from that C string.
2443 The function scm_mem2symbol takes a const char* and a number of characters and
2444 creates a symbol from the characters in that memory area.
2446 ** New functions: scm_primitive_make_property
2447 scm_primitive_property_ref
2448 scm_primitive_property_set_x
2449 scm_primitive_property_del_x
2451 These functions implement a new way to deal with object properties.
2452 See libguile/properties.c for their documentation.
2454 ** New function: scm_done_free (long size)
2456 This function is the inverse of scm_done_malloc. Use it to report the
2457 amount of smob memory you free. The previous method, which involved
2458 calling scm_done_malloc with negative argument, was somewhat
2459 unintuitive (and is still available, of course).
2461 ** New function: scm_c_memq (SCM obj, SCM list)
2463 This function provides a fast C level alternative for scm_memq for the case
2464 that the list parameter is known to be a proper list. The function is a
2465 replacement for scm_sloppy_memq, but is stricter in its requirements on its
2466 list input parameter, since for anything else but a proper list the function's
2467 behaviour is undefined - it may even crash or loop endlessly. Further, for
2468 the case that the object is not found in the list, scm_c_memq returns #f which
2469 is similar to scm_memq, but different from scm_sloppy_memq's behaviour.
2471 ** New functions: scm_remember_upto_here_1, scm_remember_upto_here_2,
2472 scm_remember_upto_here
2474 These functions replace the function scm_remember.
2476 ** Deprecated function: scm_remember
2478 Use one of the new functions scm_remember_upto_here_1,
2479 scm_remember_upto_here_2 or scm_remember_upto_here instead.
2481 ** New function: scm_allocate_string
2483 This function replaces the function scm_makstr.
2485 ** Deprecated function: scm_makstr
2487 Use the new function scm_allocate_string instead.
2489 ** New global variable scm_gc_running_p introduced.
2491 Use this variable to find out if garbage collection is being executed. Up to
2492 now applications have used scm_gc_heap_lock to test if garbage collection was
2493 running, which also works because of the fact that up to know only the garbage
2494 collector has set this variable. But, this is an implementation detail that
2495 may change. Further, scm_gc_heap_lock is not set throughout gc, thus the use
2496 of this variable is (and has been) not fully safe anyway.
2498 ** New macros: SCM_BITVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH
2500 Use these instead of SCM_LENGTH_MAX.
2502 ** New macros: SCM_CONTINUATION_LENGTH, SCM_CCLO_LENGTH, SCM_STACK_LENGTH,
2503 SCM_STRING_LENGTH, SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_LENGTH,
2504 SCM_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_VECTOR_LENGTH.
2506 Use these instead of SCM_LENGTH.
2508 ** New macros: SCM_SET_CONTINUATION_LENGTH, SCM_SET_STRING_LENGTH,
2509 SCM_SET_SYMBOL_LENGTH, SCM_SET_VECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_LENGTH,
2510 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_LENGTH
2512 Use these instead of SCM_SETLENGTH
2514 ** New macros: SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, SCM_CCLO_BASE,
2515 SCM_VECTOR_BASE, SCM_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_BITVECTOR_BASE, SCM_COMPLEX_MEM,
2518 Use these instead of SCM_CHARS, SCM_UCHARS, SCM_ROCHARS, SCM_ROUCHARS or
2521 ** New macros: SCM_SET_BIGNUM_BASE, SCM_SET_STRING_CHARS,
2522 SCM_SET_SYMBOL_CHARS, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_BASE,
2525 Use these instead of SCM_SETCHARS.
2527 ** New macro: SCM_BITVECTOR_P
2529 ** New macro: SCM_STRING_COERCE_0TERMINATION_X
2531 Use instead of SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR.
2533 ** New macros: SCM_DIR_OPEN_P, SCM_DIR_FLAG_OPEN
2535 For directory objects, use these instead of SCM_OPDIRP and SCM_OPN.
2537 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_OUTOFRANGE, SCM_NALLOC, SCM_HUP_SIGNAL,
2538 SCM_INT_SIGNAL, SCM_FPE_SIGNAL, SCM_BUS_SIGNAL, SCM_SEGV_SIGNAL,
2539 SCM_ALRM_SIGNAL, SCM_GC_SIGNAL, SCM_TICK_SIGNAL, SCM_SIG_ORD,
2540 SCM_ORD_SIG, SCM_NUM_SIGS, SCM_SYMBOL_SLOTS, SCM_SLOTS, SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP,
2541 SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR, SCM_FREEP, SCM_NFREEP, SCM_CHARS, SCM_UCHARS,
2542 SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING, SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING_COPY,
2543 SCM_VALIDATE_NULLORROSTRING_COPY, SCM_ROLENGTH, SCM_LENGTH, SCM_HUGE_LENGTH,
2544 SCM_SUBSTRP, SCM_SUBSTR_STR, SCM_SUBSTR_OFFSET, SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR,
2545 SCM_ROSTRINGP, SCM_RWSTRINGP, SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING, SCM_ROCHARS,
2546 SCM_ROUCHARS, SCM_SETLENGTH, SCM_SETCHARS, SCM_LENGTH_MAX, SCM_GC8MARKP,
2547 SCM_SETGC8MARK, SCM_CLRGC8MARK, SCM_GCTYP16, SCM_GCCDR, SCM_SUBR_DOC,
2548 SCM_OPDIRP, SCM_VALIDATE_OPDIR, SCM_WTA, RETURN_SCM_WTA, SCM_CONST_LONG,
2549 SCM_WNA, SCM_FUNC_NAME, SCM_VALIDATE_NUMBER_COPY,
2550 SCM_VALIDATE_NUMBER_DEF_COPY, SCM_SLOPPY_CONSP, SCM_SLOPPY_NCONSP,
2551 SCM_SETAND_CDR, SCM_SETOR_CDR, SCM_SETAND_CAR, SCM_SETOR_CAR
2553 Use SCM_ASSERT_RANGE or SCM_VALIDATE_XXX_RANGE instead of SCM_OUTOFRANGE.
2554 Use scm_memory_error instead of SCM_NALLOC.
2555 Use SCM_STRINGP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP.
2556 Use SCM_VALIDATE_STRING instead of SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR.
2557 Use SCM_FREE_CELL_P instead of SCM_FREEP/SCM_NFREEP
2558 Use a type specific accessor macro instead of SCM_CHARS/SCM_UCHARS.
2559 Use a type specific accessor instead of SCM(_|_RO|_HUGE_)LENGTH.
2560 Use SCM_VALIDATE_(SYMBOL|STRING) instead of SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING.
2561 Use SCM_STRING_COERCE_0TERMINATION_X instead of SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR.
2562 Use SCM_STRINGP or SCM_SYMBOLP instead of SCM_ROSTRINGP.
2563 Use SCM_STRINGP instead of SCM_RWSTRINGP.
2564 Use SCM_VALIDATE_STRING instead of SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING.
2565 Use SCM_STRING_CHARS instead of SCM_ROCHARS.
2566 Use SCM_STRING_UCHARS instead of SCM_ROUCHARS.
2567 Use a type specific setter macro instead of SCM_SETLENGTH.
2568 Use a type specific setter macro instead of SCM_SETCHARS.
2569 Use a type specific length macro instead of SCM_LENGTH_MAX.
2570 Use SCM_GCMARKP instead of SCM_GC8MARKP.
2571 Use SCM_SETGCMARK instead of SCM_SETGC8MARK.
2572 Use SCM_CLRGCMARK instead of SCM_CLRGC8MARK.
2573 Use SCM_TYP16 instead of SCM_GCTYP16.
2574 Use SCM_CDR instead of SCM_GCCDR.
2575 Use SCM_DIR_OPEN_P instead of SCM_OPDIRP.
2576 Use SCM_MISC_ERROR or SCM_WRONG_TYPE_ARG instead of SCM_WTA.
2577 Use SCM_MISC_ERROR or SCM_WRONG_TYPE_ARG instead of RETURN_SCM_WTA.
2578 Use SCM_VCELL_INIT instead of SCM_CONST_LONG.
2579 Use SCM_WRONG_NUM_ARGS instead of SCM_WNA.
2580 Use SCM_CONSP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_CONSP.
2581 Use !SCM_CONSP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_NCONSP.
2583 ** Removed function: scm_struct_init
2585 ** Removed variable: scm_symhash_dim
2587 ** Renamed function: scm_make_cont has been replaced by
2588 scm_make_continuation, which has a different interface.
2590 ** Deprecated function: scm_call_catching_errors
2592 Use scm_catch or scm_lazy_catch from throw.[ch] instead.
2594 ** Deprecated function: scm_strhash
2596 Use scm_string_hash instead.
2598 ** Deprecated function: scm_vector_set_length_x
2600 Instead, create a fresh vector of the desired size and copy the contents.
2602 ** scm_gensym has changed prototype
2604 scm_gensym now only takes one argument.
2606 ** Deprecated type tags: scm_tc7_ssymbol, scm_tc7_msymbol, scm_tcs_symbols,
2609 There is now only a single symbol type scm_tc7_symbol.
2610 The tag scm_tc7_lvector was not used anyway.
2612 ** Deprecated function: scm_make_smob_type_mfpe, scm_set_smob_mfpe.
2614 Use scm_make_smob_type and scm_set_smob_XXX instead.
2616 ** New function scm_set_smob_apply.
2618 This can be used to set an apply function to a smob type.
2620 ** Deprecated function: scm_strprint_obj
2622 Use scm_object_to_string instead.
2624 ** Deprecated function: scm_wta
2626 Use scm_wrong_type_arg, or another appropriate error signalling function
2629 ** Explicit support for obarrays has been deprecated.
2631 Use `scm_str2symbol' and the generic hashtable functions instead.
2633 ** The concept of `vcells' has been deprecated.
2635 The data type `variable' is now used exclusively. `Vcells' have been
2636 a low-level concept so you are likely not affected by this change.
2638 *** Deprecated functions: scm_sym2vcell, scm_sysintern,
2639 scm_sysintern0, scm_symbol_value0, scm_intern, scm_intern0.
2641 Use scm_c_define or scm_c_lookup instead, as appropriate.
2643 *** New functions: scm_c_module_lookup, scm_c_lookup,
2644 scm_c_module_define, scm_c_define, scm_module_lookup, scm_lookup,
2645 scm_module_define, scm_define.
2647 These functions work with variables instead of with vcells.
2649 ** New functions for creating and defining `subr's and `gsubr's.
2651 The new functions more clearly distinguish between creating a subr (or
2652 gsubr) object and adding it to the current module.
2654 These new functions are available: scm_c_make_subr, scm_c_define_subr,
2655 scm_c_make_subr_with_generic, scm_c_define_subr_with_generic,
2656 scm_c_make_gsubr, scm_c_define_gsubr, scm_c_make_gsubr_with_generic,
2657 scm_c_define_gsubr_with_generic.
2659 ** Deprecated functions: scm_make_subr, scm_make_subr_opt,
2660 scm_make_subr_with_generic, scm_make_gsubr,
2661 scm_make_gsubr_with_generic.
2663 Use the new ones from above instead.
2665 ** C interface to the module system has changed.
2667 While we suggest that you avoid as many explicit module system
2668 operations from C as possible for the time being, the C interface has
2669 been made more similar to the high-level Scheme module system.
2671 *** New functions: scm_c_define_module, scm_c_use_module,
2672 scm_c_export, scm_c_resolve_module.
2674 They mostly work like their Scheme namesakes. scm_c_define_module
2675 takes a function that is called a context where the new module is
2678 *** Deprecated functions: scm_the_root_module, scm_make_module,
2679 scm_ensure_user_module, scm_load_scheme_module.
2681 Use the new functions instead.
2683 ** Renamed function: scm_internal_with_fluids becomes
2686 scm_internal_with_fluids is available as a deprecated function.
2688 ** New function: scm_c_with_fluid.
2690 Just like scm_c_with_fluids, but takes one fluid and one value instead
2693 ** Deprecated typedefs: long_long, ulong_long.
2695 They are of questionable utility and they pollute the global
2698 ** Deprecated typedef: scm_sizet
2700 It is of questionable utility now that Guile requires ANSI C, and is
2703 ** Deprecated typedefs: scm_port_rw_active, scm_port,
2704 scm_ptob_descriptor, scm_debug_info, scm_debug_frame, scm_fport,
2705 scm_option, scm_rstate, scm_rng, scm_array, scm_array_dim.
2707 Made more compliant with the naming policy by adding a _t at the end.
2709 ** Deprecated functions: scm_mkbig, scm_big2num, scm_adjbig,
2710 scm_normbig, scm_copybig, scm_2ulong2big, scm_dbl2big, scm_big2dbl
2712 With the exception of the mysterious scm_2ulong2big, they are still
2713 available under new names (scm_i_mkbig etc). These functions are not
2714 intended to be used in user code. You should avoid dealing with
2715 bignums directly, and should deal with numbers in general (which can
2718 ** Change in behavior: scm_num2long, scm_num2ulong
2720 The scm_num2[u]long functions don't any longer accept an inexact
2721 argument. This change in behavior is motivated by concordance with
2722 R5RS: It is more common that a primitive doesn't want to accept an
2723 inexact for an exact.
2725 ** New functions: scm_short2num, scm_ushort2num, scm_int2num,
2726 scm_uint2num, scm_size2num, scm_ptrdiff2num, scm_num2short,
2727 scm_num2ushort, scm_num2int, scm_num2uint, scm_num2ptrdiff,
2730 These are conversion functions between the various ANSI C integral
2731 types and Scheme numbers. NOTE: The scm_num2xxx functions don't
2732 accept an inexact argument.
2734 ** New functions: scm_float2num, scm_double2num,
2735 scm_num2float, scm_num2double.
2737 These are conversion functions between the two ANSI C float types and
2740 ** New number validation macros:
2741 SCM_NUM2{SIZE,PTRDIFF,SHORT,USHORT,INT,UINT}[_DEF]
2745 ** New functions: scm_gc_protect_object, scm_gc_unprotect_object
2747 These are just nicer-named old scm_protect_object and
2748 scm_unprotect_object.
2750 ** Deprecated functions: scm_protect_object, scm_unprotect_object
2752 ** New functions: scm_gc_[un]register_root, scm_gc_[un]register_roots
2754 These functions can be used to register pointers to locations that
2757 ** Deprecated function: scm_create_hook.
2759 Its sins are: misleading name, non-modularity and lack of general
2763 Changes since Guile 1.3.4:
2765 * Changes to the distribution
2767 ** Trees from nightly snapshots and CVS now require you to run autogen.sh.
2769 We've changed the way we handle generated files in the Guile source
2770 repository. As a result, the procedure for building trees obtained
2771 from the nightly FTP snapshots or via CVS has changed:
2772 - You must have appropriate versions of autoconf, automake, and
2773 libtool installed on your system. See README for info on how to
2774 obtain these programs.
2775 - Before configuring the tree, you must first run the script
2776 `autogen.sh' at the top of the source tree.
2778 The Guile repository used to contain not only source files, written by
2779 humans, but also some generated files, like configure scripts and
2780 Makefile.in files. Even though the contents of these files could be
2781 derived mechanically from other files present, we thought it would
2782 make the tree easier to build if we checked them into CVS.
2784 However, this approach means that minor differences between
2785 developer's installed tools and habits affected the whole team.
2786 So we have removed the generated files from the repository, and
2787 added the autogen.sh script, which will reconstruct them
2791 ** configure now has experimental options to remove support for certain
2794 --disable-arrays omit array and uniform array support
2795 --disable-posix omit posix interfaces
2796 --disable-networking omit networking interfaces
2797 --disable-regex omit regular expression interfaces
2799 These are likely to become separate modules some day.
2801 ** New configure option --enable-debug-freelist
2803 This enables a debugging version of SCM_NEWCELL(), and also registers
2804 an extra primitive, the setter `gc-set-debug-check-freelist!'.
2806 Configure with the --enable-debug-freelist option to enable
2807 the gc-set-debug-check-freelist! primitive, and then use:
2809 (gc-set-debug-check-freelist! #t) # turn on checking of the freelist
2810 (gc-set-debug-check-freelist! #f) # turn off checking
2812 Checking of the freelist forces a traversal of the freelist and
2813 a garbage collection before each allocation of a cell. This can
2814 slow down the interpreter dramatically, so the setter should be used to
2815 turn on this extra processing only when necessary.
2817 ** New configure option --enable-debug-malloc
2819 Include code for debugging of calls to scm_must_malloc/realloc/free.
2823 1. objects freed by scm_must_free has been mallocated by scm_must_malloc
2824 2. objects reallocated by scm_must_realloc has been allocated by
2826 3. reallocated objects are reallocated with the same what string
2828 But, most importantly, it records the number of allocated objects of
2829 each kind. This is useful when searching for memory leaks.
2831 A Guile compiled with this option provides the primitive
2832 `malloc-stats' which returns an alist with pairs of kind and the
2833 number of objects of that kind.
2835 ** All includes are now referenced relative to the root directory
2837 Since some users have had problems with mixups between Guile and
2838 system headers, we have decided to always refer to Guile headers via
2839 their parent directories. This essentially creates a "private name
2840 space" for Guile headers. This means that the compiler only is given
2841 -I options for the root build and root source directory.
2843 ** Header files kw.h and genio.h have been removed.
2845 ** The module (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style) has been removed.
2847 ** New module (ice-9 documentation)
2849 Implements the interface to documentation strings associated with
2852 ** New module (ice-9 time)
2854 Provides a macro `time', which displays execution time of a given form.
2856 ** New module (ice-9 history)
2858 Loading this module enables value history in the repl.
2860 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
2862 ** New command line option --debug
2864 Start Guile with debugging evaluator and backtraces enabled.
2866 This is useful when debugging your .guile init file or scripts.
2868 ** New help facility
2870 Usage: (help NAME) gives documentation about objects named NAME (a symbol)
2871 (help REGEXP) ditto for objects with names matching REGEXP (a string)
2872 (help 'NAME) gives documentation for NAME, even if it is not an object
2873 (help ,EXPR) gives documentation for object returned by EXPR
2874 (help (my module)) gives module commentary for `(my module)'
2875 (help) gives this text
2877 `help' searches among bindings exported from loaded modules, while
2878 `apropos' searches among bindings visible from the "current" module.
2880 Examples: (help help)
2882 (help "output-string")
2884 ** `help' and `apropos' now prints full module names
2886 ** Dynamic linking now uses libltdl from the libtool package.
2888 The old system dependent code for doing dynamic linking has been
2889 replaced with calls to the libltdl functions which do all the hairy
2892 The major improvement is that you can now directly pass libtool
2893 library names like "libfoo.la" to `dynamic-link' and `dynamic-link'
2894 will be able to do the best shared library job you can get, via
2897 The way dynamic libraries are found has changed and is not really
2898 portable across platforms, probably. It is therefore recommended to
2899 use absolute filenames when possible.
2901 If you pass a filename without an extension to `dynamic-link', it will
2902 try a few appropriate ones. Thus, the most platform ignorant way is
2903 to specify a name like "libfoo", without any directories and
2906 ** Guile COOP threads are now compatible with LinuxThreads
2908 Previously, COOP threading wasn't possible in applications linked with
2909 Linux POSIX threads due to their use of the stack pointer to find the
2910 thread context. This has now been fixed with a workaround which uses
2911 the pthreads to allocate the stack.
2913 ** New primitives: `pkgdata-dir', `site-dir', `library-dir'
2915 ** Positions of erring expression in scripts
2917 With version 1.3.4, the location of the erring expression in Guile
2918 scipts is no longer automatically reported. (This should have been
2919 documented before the 1.3.4 release.)
2921 You can get this information by enabling recording of positions of
2922 source expressions and running the debugging evaluator. Put this at
2923 the top of your script (or in your "site" file):
2925 (read-enable 'positions)
2926 (debug-enable 'debug)
2928 ** Backtraces in scripts
2930 It is now possible to get backtraces in scripts.
2934 (debug-enable 'debug 'backtrace)
2936 at the top of the script.
2938 (The first options enables the debugging evaluator.
2939 The second enables backtraces.)
2941 ** Part of module system symbol lookup now implemented in C
2943 The eval closure of most modules is now implemented in C. Since this
2944 was one of the bottlenecks for loading speed, Guile now loads code
2945 substantially faster than before.
2947 ** Attempting to get the value of an unbound variable now produces
2948 an exception with a key of 'unbound-variable instead of 'misc-error.
2950 ** The initial default output port is now unbuffered if it's using a
2951 tty device. Previously in this situation it was line-buffered.
2953 ** New hook: after-gc-hook
2955 after-gc-hook takes over the role of gc-thunk. This hook is run at
2956 the first SCM_TICK after a GC. (Thus, the code is run at the same
2957 point during evaluation as signal handlers.)
2959 Note that this hook should be used only for diagnostic and debugging
2960 purposes. It is not certain that it will continue to be well-defined
2961 when this hook is run in the future.
2963 C programmers: Note the new C level hooks scm_before_gc_c_hook,
2964 scm_before_sweep_c_hook, scm_after_gc_c_hook.
2966 ** Improvements to garbage collector
2968 Guile 1.4 has a new policy for triggering heap allocation and
2969 determining the sizes of heap segments. It fixes a number of problems
2972 1. The new policy can handle two separate pools of cells
2973 (2-word/4-word) better. (The old policy would run wild, allocating
2974 more and more memory for certain programs.)
2976 2. The old code would sometimes allocate far too much heap so that the
2977 Guile process became gigantic. The new code avoids this.
2979 3. The old code would sometimes allocate too little so that few cells
2980 were freed at GC so that, in turn, too much time was spent in GC.
2982 4. The old code would often trigger heap allocation several times in a
2983 row. (The new scheme predicts how large the segments needs to be
2984 in order not to need further allocation.)
2986 All in all, the new GC policy will make larger applications more
2989 The new GC scheme also is prepared for POSIX threading. Threads can
2990 allocate private pools of cells ("clusters") with just a single
2991 function call. Allocation of single cells from such a cluster can
2992 then proceed without any need of inter-thread synchronization.
2994 ** New environment variables controlling GC parameters
2996 GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE Maximal segment size
2999 Allocation of 2-word cell heaps:
3001 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_1 Size of initial heap segment in bytes
3004 GUILE_MIN_YIELD_1 Minimum number of freed cells at each
3005 GC in percent of total heap size
3008 Allocation of 4-word cell heaps
3009 (used for real numbers and misc other objects):
3011 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_2, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2
3013 (See entry "Way for application to customize GC parameters" under
3014 section "Changes to the scm_ interface" below.)
3016 ** Guile now implements reals using 4-word cells
3018 This speeds up computation with reals. (They were earlier allocated
3019 with `malloc'.) There is still some room for optimizations, however.
3021 ** Some further steps toward POSIX thread support have been taken
3023 *** Guile's critical sections (SCM_DEFER/ALLOW_INTS)
3024 don't have much effect any longer, and many of them will be removed in
3028 are only handled at the top of the evaluator loop, immediately after
3029 I/O, and in scm_equalp.
3031 *** The GC can allocate thread private pools of pairs.
3033 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
3035 ** close-input-port and close-output-port are now R5RS
3037 These procedures have been turned into primitives and have R5RS behaviour.
3039 ** New procedure: simple-format PORT MESSAGE ARG1 ...
3041 (ice-9 boot) makes `format' an alias for `simple-format' until possibly
3042 extended by the more sophisticated version in (ice-9 format)
3044 (simple-format port message . args)
3045 Write MESSAGE to DESTINATION, defaulting to `current-output-port'.
3046 MESSAGE can contain ~A (was %s) and ~S (was %S) escapes. When printed,
3047 the escapes are replaced with corresponding members of ARGS:
3048 ~A formats using `display' and ~S formats using `write'.
3049 If DESTINATION is #t, then use the `current-output-port',
3050 if DESTINATION is #f, then return a string containing the formatted text.
3051 Does not add a trailing newline."
3053 ** string-ref: the second argument is no longer optional.
3055 ** string, list->string: no longer accept strings in their arguments,
3056 only characters, for compatibility with R5RS.
3058 ** New procedure: port-closed? PORT
3059 Returns #t if PORT is closed or #f if it is open.
3061 ** Deprecated: list*
3063 The list* functionality is now provided by cons* (SRFI-1 compliant)
3065 ** New procedure: cons* ARG1 ARG2 ... ARGn
3067 Like `list', but the last arg provides the tail of the constructed list,
3068 returning (cons ARG1 (cons ARG2 (cons ... ARGn))).
3070 Requires at least one argument. If given one argument, that argument
3071 is returned as result.
3073 This function is called `list*' in some other Schemes and in Common LISP.
3075 ** Removed deprecated: serial-map, serial-array-copy!, serial-array-map!
3077 ** New procedure: object-documentation OBJECT
3079 Returns the documentation string associated with OBJECT. The
3080 procedure uses a caching mechanism so that subsequent lookups are
3083 Exported by (ice-9 documentation).
3085 ** module-name now returns full names of modules
3087 Previously, only the last part of the name was returned (`session' for
3088 `(ice-9 session)'). Ex: `(ice-9 session)'.
3090 * Changes to the gh_ interface
3092 ** Deprecated: gh_int2scmb
3094 Use gh_bool2scm instead.
3096 * Changes to the scm_ interface
3098 ** Guile primitives now carry docstrings!
3100 Thanks to Greg Badros!
3102 ** Guile primitives are defined in a new way: SCM_DEFINE/SCM_DEFINE1/SCM_PROC
3104 Now Guile primitives are defined using the SCM_DEFINE/SCM_DEFINE1/SCM_PROC
3105 macros and must contain a docstring that is extracted into foo.doc using a new
3106 guile-doc-snarf script (that uses guile-doc-snarf.awk).
3108 However, a major overhaul of these macros is scheduled for the next release of
3111 ** Guile primitives use a new technique for validation of arguments
3113 SCM_VALIDATE_* macros are defined to ease the redundancy and improve
3114 the readability of argument checking.
3116 ** All (nearly?) K&R prototypes for functions replaced with ANSI C equivalents.
3118 ** New macros: SCM_PACK, SCM_UNPACK
3120 Compose/decompose an SCM value.
3122 The SCM type is now treated as an abstract data type and may be defined as a
3123 long, a void* or as a struct, depending on the architecture and compile time
3124 options. This makes it easier to find several types of bugs, for example when
3125 SCM values are treated as integers without conversion. Values of the SCM type
3126 should be treated as "atomic" values. These macros are used when
3127 composing/decomposing an SCM value, either because you want to access
3128 individual bits, or because you want to treat it as an integer value.
3130 E.g., in order to set bit 7 in an SCM value x, use the expression
3132 SCM_PACK (SCM_UNPACK (x) | 0x80)
3134 ** The name property of hooks is deprecated.
3135 Thus, the use of SCM_HOOK_NAME and scm_make_hook_with_name is deprecated.
3137 You can emulate this feature by using object properties.
3139 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_INPORTP, SCM_OUTPORTP, SCM_CRDY, SCM_ICHRP,
3140 SCM_ICHR, SCM_MAKICHR, SCM_SETJMPBUF, SCM_NSTRINGP, SCM_NRWSTRINGP,
3143 These macros will be removed in a future release of Guile.
3145 ** The following types, functions and macros from numbers.h are deprecated:
3146 scm_dblproc, SCM_UNEGFIXABLE, SCM_FLOBUFLEN, SCM_INEXP, SCM_CPLXP, SCM_REAL,
3147 SCM_IMAG, SCM_REALPART, scm_makdbl, SCM_SINGP, SCM_NUM2DBL, SCM_NO_BIGDIG
3149 ** Port internals: the rw_random variable in the scm_port structure
3150 must be set to non-zero in any random access port. In recent Guile
3151 releases it was only set for bidirectional random-access ports.
3153 ** Port internals: the seek ptob procedure is now responsible for
3154 resetting the buffers if required. The change was made so that in the
3155 special case of reading the current position (i.e., seek p 0 SEEK_CUR)
3156 the fport and strport ptobs can avoid resetting the buffers,
3157 in particular to avoid discarding unread chars. An existing port
3158 type can be fixed by adding something like the following to the
3159 beginning of the ptob seek procedure:
3161 if (pt->rw_active == SCM_PORT_READ)
3162 scm_end_input (object);
3163 else if (pt->rw_active == SCM_PORT_WRITE)
3164 ptob->flush (object);
3166 although to actually avoid resetting the buffers and discard unread
3167 chars requires further hacking that depends on the characteristics
3170 ** Deprecated functions: scm_fseek, scm_tag
3172 These functions are no longer used and will be removed in a future version.
3174 ** The scm_sysmissing procedure is no longer used in libguile.
3175 Unless it turns out to be unexpectedly useful to somebody, it will be
3176 removed in a future version.
3178 ** The format of error message strings has changed
3180 The two C procedures: scm_display_error and scm_error, as well as the
3181 primitive `scm-error', now use scm_simple_format to do their work.
3182 This means that the message strings of all code must be updated to use
3183 ~A where %s was used before, and ~S where %S was used before.
3185 During the period when there still are a lot of old Guiles out there,
3186 you might want to support both old and new versions of Guile.
3188 There are basically two methods to achieve this. Both methods use
3191 AC_CHECK_FUNCS(scm_simple_format)
3193 in your configure.in.
3195 Method 1: Use the string concatenation features of ANSI C's
3200 #ifdef HAVE_SCM_SIMPLE_FORMAT
3206 Then represent each of your error messages using a preprocessor macro:
3208 #define E_SPIDER_ERROR "There's a spider in your " ## FMT_S ## "!!!"
3212 (define fmt-s (if (defined? 'simple-format) "~S" "%S"))
3213 (define make-message string-append)
3215 (define e-spider-error (make-message "There's a spider in your " fmt-s "!!!"))
3217 Method 2: Use the oldfmt function found in doc/oldfmt.c.
3221 scm_misc_error ("picnic", scm_c_oldfmt0 ("There's a spider in your ~S!!!"),
3226 (scm-error 'misc-error "picnic" (oldfmt "There's a spider in your ~S!!!")
3230 ** Deprecated: coop_mutex_init, coop_condition_variable_init
3232 Don't use the functions coop_mutex_init and
3233 coop_condition_variable_init. They will change.
3235 Use scm_mutex_init and scm_cond_init instead.
3237 ** New function: int scm_cond_timedwait (scm_cond_t *COND, scm_mutex_t *MUTEX, const struct timespec *ABSTIME)
3238 `scm_cond_timedwait' atomically unlocks MUTEX and waits on
3239 COND, as `scm_cond_wait' does, but it also bounds the duration
3240 of the wait. If COND has not been signaled before time ABSTIME,
3241 the mutex MUTEX is re-acquired and `scm_cond_timedwait'
3242 returns the error code `ETIMEDOUT'.
3244 The ABSTIME parameter specifies an absolute time, with the same
3245 origin as `time' and `gettimeofday': an ABSTIME of 0 corresponds
3246 to 00:00:00 GMT, January 1, 1970.
3248 ** New function: scm_cond_broadcast (scm_cond_t *COND)
3249 `scm_cond_broadcast' restarts all the threads that are waiting
3250 on the condition variable COND. Nothing happens if no threads are
3253 ** New function: scm_key_create (scm_key_t *KEY, void (*destr_function) (void *))
3254 `scm_key_create' allocates a new TSD key. The key is stored in
3255 the location pointed to by KEY. There is no limit on the number
3256 of keys allocated at a given time. The value initially associated
3257 with the returned key is `NULL' in all currently executing threads.
3259 The DESTR_FUNCTION argument, if not `NULL', specifies a destructor
3260 function associated with the key. When a thread terminates,
3261 DESTR_FUNCTION is called on the value associated with the key in
3262 that thread. The DESTR_FUNCTION is not called if a key is deleted
3263 with `scm_key_delete' or a value is changed with
3264 `scm_setspecific'. The order in which destructor functions are
3265 called at thread termination time is unspecified.
3267 Destructors are not yet implemented.
3269 ** New function: scm_setspecific (scm_key_t KEY, const void *POINTER)
3270 `scm_setspecific' changes the value associated with KEY in the
3271 calling thread, storing the given POINTER instead.
3273 ** New function: scm_getspecific (scm_key_t KEY)
3274 `scm_getspecific' returns the value currently associated with
3275 KEY in the calling thread.
3277 ** New function: scm_key_delete (scm_key_t KEY)
3278 `scm_key_delete' deallocates a TSD key. It does not check
3279 whether non-`NULL' values are associated with that key in the
3280 currently executing threads, nor call the destructor function
3281 associated with the key.
3283 ** New function: scm_c_hook_init (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, void *HOOK_DATA, scm_c_hook_type_t TYPE)
3285 Initialize a C level hook HOOK with associated HOOK_DATA and type
3286 TYPE. (See scm_c_hook_run ().)
3288 ** New function: scm_c_hook_add (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, scm_c_hook_function_t FUNC, void *FUNC_DATA, int APPENDP)
3290 Add hook function FUNC with associated FUNC_DATA to HOOK. If APPENDP
3291 is true, add it last, otherwise first. The same FUNC can be added
3292 multiple times if FUNC_DATA differ and vice versa.
3294 ** New function: scm_c_hook_remove (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, scm_c_hook_function_t FUNC, void *FUNC_DATA)
3296 Remove hook function FUNC with associated FUNC_DATA from HOOK. A
3297 function is only removed if both FUNC and FUNC_DATA matches.
3299 ** New function: void *scm_c_hook_run (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, void *DATA)
3301 Run hook HOOK passing DATA to the hook functions.
3303 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_NORMAL, all hook functions are run. The value
3304 returned is undefined.
3306 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_OR, hook functions are run until a function
3307 returns a non-NULL value. This value is returned as the result of
3308 scm_c_hook_run. If all functions return NULL, NULL is returned.
3310 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_AND, hook functions are run until a function
3311 returns a NULL value, and NULL is returned. If all functions returns
3312 a non-NULL value, the last value is returned.
3314 ** New C level GC hooks
3316 Five new C level hooks has been added to the garbage collector.
3318 scm_before_gc_c_hook
3321 are run before locking and after unlocking the heap. The system is
3322 thus in a mode where evaluation can take place. (Except that
3323 scm_before_gc_c_hook must not allocate new cells.)
3325 scm_before_mark_c_hook
3326 scm_before_sweep_c_hook
3327 scm_after_sweep_c_hook
3329 are run when the heap is locked. These are intended for extension of
3330 the GC in a modular fashion. Examples are the weaks and guardians
3333 ** Way for application to customize GC parameters
3335 The application can set up other default values for the GC heap
3336 allocation parameters
3338 GUILE_INIT_HEAP_SIZE_1, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_1,
3339 GUILE_INIT_HEAP_SIZE_2, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2,
3340 GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE,
3344 scm_default_init_heap_size_1, scm_default_min_yield_1,
3345 scm_default_init_heap_size_2, scm_default_min_yield_2,
3346 scm_default_max_segment_size
3348 respectively before callong scm_boot_guile.
3350 (See entry "New environment variables ..." in section
3351 "Changes to the stand-alone interpreter" above.)
3353 ** scm_protect_object/scm_unprotect_object now nest
3355 This means that you can call scm_protect_object multiple times on an
3356 object and count on the object being protected until
3357 scm_unprotect_object has been call the same number of times.
3359 The functions also have better time complexity.
3361 Still, it is usually possible to structure the application in a way
3362 that you don't need to use these functions. For example, if you use a
3363 protected standard Guile list to keep track of live objects rather
3364 than some custom data type, objects will die a natural death when they
3365 are no longer needed.
3367 ** Deprecated type tags: scm_tc16_flo, scm_tc_flo, scm_tc_dblr, scm_tc_dblc
3369 Guile does not provide the float representation for inexact real numbers any
3370 more. Now, only doubles are used to represent inexact real numbers. Further,
3371 the tag names scm_tc_dblr and scm_tc_dblc have been changed to scm_tc16_real
3372 and scm_tc16_complex, respectively.
3374 ** Removed deprecated type scm_smobfuns
3376 ** Removed deprecated function scm_newsmob
3378 ** Warning: scm_make_smob_type_mfpe might become deprecated in a future release
3380 There is an ongoing discussion among the developers whether to
3381 deprecate `scm_make_smob_type_mfpe' or not. Please use the current
3382 standard interface (scm_make_smob_type, scm_set_smob_XXX) in new code
3383 until this issue has been settled.
3385 ** Removed deprecated type tag scm_tc16_kw
3387 ** Added type tag scm_tc16_keyword
3389 (This was introduced already in release 1.3.4 but was not documented
3392 ** gdb_print now prints "*** Guile not initialized ***" until Guile initialized
3394 * Changes to system call interfaces:
3396 ** The "select" procedure now tests port buffers for the ability to
3397 provide input or accept output. Previously only the underlying file
3398 descriptors were checked.
3400 ** New variable PIPE_BUF: the maximum number of bytes that can be
3401 atomically written to a pipe.
3403 ** If a facility is not available on the system when Guile is
3404 compiled, the corresponding primitive procedure will not be defined.
3405 Previously it would have been defined but would throw a system-error
3406 exception if called. Exception handlers which catch this case may
3407 need minor modification: an error will be thrown with key
3408 'unbound-variable instead of 'system-error. Alternatively it's
3409 now possible to use `defined?' to check whether the facility is
3412 ** Procedures which depend on the timezone should now give the correct
3413 result on systems which cache the TZ environment variable, even if TZ
3414 is changed without calling tzset.
3416 * Changes to the networking interfaces:
3418 ** New functions: htons, ntohs, htonl, ntohl: for converting short and
3419 long integers between network and host format. For now, it's not
3420 particularly convenient to do this kind of thing, but consider:
3422 (define write-network-long
3423 (lambda (value port)
3424 (let ((v (make-uniform-vector 1 1 0)))
3425 (uniform-vector-set! v 0 (htonl value))
3426 (uniform-vector-write v port))))
3428 (define read-network-long
3430 (let ((v (make-uniform-vector 1 1 0)))
3431 (uniform-vector-read! v port)
3432 (ntohl (uniform-vector-ref v 0)))))
3434 ** If inet-aton fails, it now throws an error with key 'misc-error
3435 instead of 'system-error, since errno is not relevant.
3437 ** Certain gethostbyname/gethostbyaddr failures now throw errors with
3438 specific keys instead of 'system-error. The latter is inappropriate
3439 since errno will not have been set. The keys are:
3440 'host-not-found, 'try-again, 'no-recovery and 'no-data.
3442 ** sethostent, setnetent, setprotoent, setservent: now take an
3443 optional argument STAYOPEN, which specifies whether the database
3444 remains open after a database entry is accessed randomly (e.g., using
3445 gethostbyname for the hosts database.) The default is #f. Previously
3449 Changes since Guile 1.3.2:
3451 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
3455 An initial version of the Guile debugger written by Chris Hanson has
3456 been added. The debugger is still under development but is included
3457 in the distribution anyway since it is already quite useful.
3463 after an error to enter the debugger. Type `help' inside the debugger
3464 for a description of available commands.
3466 If you prefer to have stack frames numbered and printed in
3467 anti-chronological order and prefer up in the stack to be down on the
3468 screen as is the case in gdb, you can put
3470 (debug-enable 'backwards)
3472 in your .guile startup file. (However, this means that Guile can't
3473 use indentation to indicate stack level.)
3475 The debugger is autoloaded into Guile at the first use.
3477 ** Further enhancements to backtraces
3479 There is a new debug option `width' which controls the maximum width
3480 on the screen of printed stack frames. Fancy printing parameters
3481 ("level" and "length" as in Common LISP) are adaptively adjusted for
3482 each stack frame to give maximum information while still fitting
3483 within the bounds. If the stack frame can't be made to fit by
3484 adjusting parameters, it is simply cut off at the end. This is marked
3487 ** Some modules are now only loaded when the repl is started
3489 The modules (ice-9 debug), (ice-9 session), (ice-9 threads) and (ice-9
3490 regex) are now loaded into (guile-user) only if the repl has been
3491 started. The effect is that the startup time for scripts has been
3492 reduced to 30% of what it was previously.
3494 Correctly written scripts load the modules they require at the top of
3495 the file and should not be affected by this change.
3497 ** Hooks are now represented as smobs
3499 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
3501 ** Readline support has changed again.
3503 The old (readline-activator) module is gone. Use (ice-9 readline)
3504 instead, which now contains all readline functionality. So the code
3505 to activate readline is now
3507 (use-modules (ice-9 readline))
3510 This should work at any time, including from the guile prompt.
3512 To avoid confusion about the terms of Guile's license, please only
3513 enable readline for your personal use; please don't make it the
3514 default for others. Here is why we make this rather odd-sounding
3517 Guile is normally licensed under a weakened form of the GNU General
3518 Public License, which allows you to link code with Guile without
3519 placing that code under the GPL. This exception is important to some
3522 However, since readline is distributed under the GNU General Public
3523 License, when you link Guile with readline, either statically or
3524 dynamically, you effectively change Guile's license to the strict GPL.
3525 Whenever you link any strictly GPL'd code into Guile, uses of Guile
3526 which are normally permitted become forbidden. This is a rather
3527 non-obvious consequence of the licensing terms.
3529 So, to make sure things remain clear, please let people choose for
3530 themselves whether to link GPL'd libraries like readline with Guile.
3532 ** regexp-substitute/global has changed slightly, but incompatibly.
3534 If you include a function in the item list, the string of the match
3535 object it receives is the same string passed to
3536 regexp-substitute/global, not some suffix of that string.
3537 Correspondingly, the match's positions are relative to the entire
3538 string, not the suffix.
3540 If the regexp can match the empty string, the way matches are chosen
3541 from the string has changed. regexp-substitute/global recognizes the
3542 same set of matches that list-matches does; see below.
3544 ** New function: list-matches REGEXP STRING [FLAGS]
3546 Return a list of match objects, one for every non-overlapping, maximal
3547 match of REGEXP in STRING. The matches appear in left-to-right order.
3548 list-matches only reports matches of the empty string if there are no
3549 other matches which begin on, end at, or include the empty match's
3552 If present, FLAGS is passed as the FLAGS argument to regexp-exec.
3554 ** New function: fold-matches REGEXP STRING INIT PROC [FLAGS]
3556 For each match of REGEXP in STRING, apply PROC to the match object,
3557 and the last value PROC returned, or INIT for the first call. Return
3558 the last value returned by PROC. We apply PROC to the matches as they
3559 appear from left to right.
3561 This function recognizes matches according to the same criteria as
3564 Thus, you could define list-matches like this:
3566 (define (list-matches regexp string . flags)
3567 (reverse! (apply fold-matches regexp string '() cons flags)))
3569 If present, FLAGS is passed as the FLAGS argument to regexp-exec.
3573 *** New function: hook? OBJ
3575 Return #t if OBJ is a hook, otherwise #f.
3577 *** New function: make-hook-with-name NAME [ARITY]
3579 Return a hook with name NAME and arity ARITY. The default value for
3580 ARITY is 0. The only effect of NAME is that it will appear when the
3581 hook object is printed to ease debugging.
3583 *** New function: hook-empty? HOOK
3585 Return #t if HOOK doesn't contain any procedures, otherwise #f.
3587 *** New function: hook->list HOOK
3589 Return a list of the procedures that are called when run-hook is
3592 ** `map' signals an error if its argument lists are not all the same length.
3594 This is the behavior required by R5RS, so this change is really a bug
3595 fix. But it seems to affect a lot of people's code, so we're
3596 mentioning it here anyway.
3598 ** Print-state handling has been made more transparent
3600 Under certain circumstances, ports are represented as a port with an
3601 associated print state. Earlier, this pair was represented as a pair
3602 (see "Some magic has been added to the printer" below). It is now
3603 indistinguishable (almost; see `get-print-state') from a port on the
3606 *** New function: port-with-print-state OUTPUT-PORT PRINT-STATE
3608 Return a new port with the associated print state PRINT-STATE.
3610 *** New function: get-print-state OUTPUT-PORT
3612 Return the print state associated with this port if it exists,
3613 otherwise return #f.
3615 *** New function: directory-stream? OBJECT
3617 Returns true iff OBJECT is a directory stream --- the sort of object
3618 returned by `opendir'.
3620 ** New function: using-readline?
3622 Return #t if readline is in use in the current repl.
3624 ** structs will be removed in 1.4
3626 Structs will be replaced in Guile 1.4. We will merge GOOPS into Guile
3627 and use GOOPS objects as the fundamental record type.
3629 * Changes to the scm_ interface
3631 ** structs will be removed in 1.4
3633 The entire current struct interface (struct.c, struct.h) will be
3634 replaced in Guile 1.4. We will merge GOOPS into libguile and use
3635 GOOPS objects as the fundamental record type.
3637 ** The internal representation of subr's has changed
3639 Instead of giving a hint to the subr name, the CAR field of the subr
3640 now contains an index to a subr entry in scm_subr_table.
3642 *** New variable: scm_subr_table
3644 An array of subr entries. A subr entry contains the name, properties
3645 and documentation associated with the subr. The properties and
3646 documentation slots are not yet used.
3648 ** A new scheme for "forwarding" calls to a builtin to a generic function
3650 It is now possible to extend the functionality of some Guile
3651 primitives by letting them defer a call to a GOOPS generic function on
3652 argument mismatch. This means that there is no loss of efficiency in
3657 (use-modules (oop goops)) ; Must be GOOPS version 0.2.
3658 (define-method + ((x <string>) (y <string>))
3659 (string-append x y))
3661 + will still be as efficient as usual in numerical calculations, but
3662 can also be used for concatenating strings.
3664 Who will be the first one to extend Guile's numerical tower to
3665 rationals? :) [OK, there a few other things to fix before this can
3666 be made in a clean way.]
3668 *** New snarf macros for defining primitives: SCM_GPROC, SCM_GPROC1
3670 New macro: SCM_GPROC (CNAME, SNAME, REQ, OPT, VAR, CFUNC, GENERIC)
3672 New macro: SCM_GPROC1 (CNAME, SNAME, TYPE, CFUNC, GENERIC)
3674 These do the same job as SCM_PROC and SCM_PROC1, but they also define
3675 a variable GENERIC which can be used by the dispatch macros below.
3677 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3679 *** New macros for forwarding control to a generic on arg type error
3681 New macro: SCM_WTA_DISPATCH_1 (GENERIC, ARG1, POS, SUBR)
3683 New macro: SCM_WTA_DISPATCH_2 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, POS, SUBR)
3685 These correspond to the scm_wta function call, and have the same
3686 behaviour until the user has called the GOOPS primitive
3687 `enable-primitive-generic!'. After that, these macros will apply the
3688 generic function GENERIC to the argument(s) instead of calling
3691 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3693 *** New macros for argument testing with generic dispatch
3695 New macro: SCM_GASSERT1 (COND, GENERIC, ARG1, POS, SUBR)
3697 New macro: SCM_GASSERT2 (COND, GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, POS, SUBR)
3699 These correspond to the SCM_ASSERT macro, but will defer control to
3700 GENERIC on error after `enable-primitive-generic!' has been called.
3702 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3704 ** New function: SCM scm_eval_body (SCM body, SCM env)
3706 Evaluates the body of a special form.
3708 ** The internal representation of struct's has changed
3710 Previously, four slots were allocated for the procedure(s) of entities
3711 and operators. The motivation for this representation had to do with
3712 the structure of the evaluator, the wish to support tail-recursive
3713 generic functions, and efficiency. Since the generic function
3714 dispatch mechanism has changed, there is no longer a need for such an
3715 expensive representation, and the representation has been simplified.
3717 This should not make any difference for most users.
3719 ** GOOPS support has been cleaned up.
3721 Some code has been moved from eval.c to objects.c and code in both of
3722 these compilation units has been cleaned up and better structured.
3724 *** New functions for applying generic functions
3726 New function: SCM scm_apply_generic (GENERIC, ARGS)
3727 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_0 (GENERIC)
3728 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_1 (GENERIC, ARG1)
3729 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_2 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2)
3730 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_3 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, ARG3)
3732 ** Deprecated function: scm_make_named_hook
3734 It is now replaced by:
3736 ** New function: SCM scm_create_hook (const char *name, int arity)
3738 Creates a hook in the same way as make-hook above but also
3739 binds a variable named NAME to it.
3741 This is the typical way of creating a hook from C code.
3743 Currently, the variable is created in the "current" module.
3744 This might change when we get the new module system.
3746 [The behaviour is identical to scm_make_named_hook.]
3750 Changes since Guile 1.3:
3752 * Changes to mailing lists
3754 ** Some of the Guile mailing lists have moved to sourceware.cygnus.com.
3756 See the README file to find current addresses for all the Guile
3759 * Changes to the distribution
3761 ** Readline support is no longer included with Guile by default.
3763 Based on the different license terms of Guile and Readline, we
3764 concluded that Guile should not *by default* cause the linking of
3765 Readline into an application program. Readline support is now offered
3766 as a separate module, which is linked into an application only when
3767 you explicitly specify it.
3769 Although Guile is GNU software, its distribution terms add a special
3770 exception to the usual GNU General Public License (GPL). Guile's
3771 license includes a clause that allows you to link Guile with non-free
3772 programs. We add this exception so as not to put Guile at a
3773 disadvantage vis-a-vis other extensibility packages that support other
3776 In contrast, the GNU Readline library is distributed under the GNU
3777 General Public License pure and simple. This means that you may not
3778 link Readline, even dynamically, into an application unless it is
3779 distributed under a free software license that is compatible the GPL.
3781 Because of this difference in distribution terms, an application that
3782 can use Guile may not be able to use Readline. Now users will be
3783 explicitly offered two independent decisions about the use of these
3786 You can activate the readline support by issuing
3788 (use-modules (readline-activator))
3791 from your ".guile" file, for example.
3793 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
3795 ** All builtins now print as primitives.
3796 Previously builtin procedures not belonging to the fundamental subr
3797 types printed as #<compiled closure #<primitive-procedure gsubr-apply>>.
3798 Now, they print as #<primitive-procedure NAME>.
3800 ** Backtraces slightly more intelligible.
3801 gsubr-apply and macro transformer application frames no longer appear
3804 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
3806 ** Guile now correctly handles internal defines by rewriting them into
3807 their equivalent letrec. Previously, internal defines would
3808 incrementally add to the innermost environment, without checking
3809 whether the restrictions specified in RnRS were met. This lead to the
3810 correct behaviour when these restriction actually were met, but didn't
3811 catch all illegal uses. Such an illegal use could lead to crashes of
3812 the Guile interpreter or or other unwanted results. An example of
3813 incorrect internal defines that made Guile behave erratically:
3825 The problem with this example is that the definition of `c' uses the
3826 value of `b' directly. This confuses the meoization machine of Guile
3827 so that the second call of `b' (this time in a larger environment that
3828 also contains bindings for `c' and `d') refers to the binding of `c'
3829 instead of `a'. You could also make Guile crash with a variation on
3834 (define (b flag) (if flag a 1))
3835 (define c (1+ (b flag)))
3843 From now on, Guile will issue an `Unbound variable: b' error message
3848 A hook contains a list of functions which should be called on
3849 particular occasions in an existing program. Hooks are used for
3852 A window manager might have a hook before-window-map-hook. The window
3853 manager uses the function run-hooks to call all functions stored in
3854 before-window-map-hook each time a window is mapped. The user can
3855 store functions in the hook using add-hook!.
3857 In Guile, hooks are first class objects.
3859 *** New function: make-hook [N_ARGS]
3861 Return a hook for hook functions which can take N_ARGS arguments.
3862 The default value for N_ARGS is 0.
3864 (See also scm_make_named_hook below.)
3866 *** New function: add-hook! HOOK PROC [APPEND_P]
3868 Put PROC at the beginning of the list of functions stored in HOOK.
3869 If APPEND_P is supplied, and non-false, put PROC at the end instead.
3871 PROC must be able to take the number of arguments specified when the
3874 If PROC already exists in HOOK, then remove it first.
3876 *** New function: remove-hook! HOOK PROC
3878 Remove PROC from the list of functions in HOOK.
3880 *** New function: reset-hook! HOOK
3882 Clear the list of hook functions stored in HOOK.
3884 *** New function: run-hook HOOK ARG1 ...
3886 Run all hook functions stored in HOOK with arguments ARG1 ... .
3887 The number of arguments supplied must correspond to the number given
3888 when the hook was created.
3890 ** The function `dynamic-link' now takes optional keyword arguments.
3891 The only keyword argument that is currently defined is `:global
3892 BOOL'. With it, you can control whether the shared library will be
3893 linked in global mode or not. In global mode, the symbols from the
3894 linked library can be used to resolve references from other
3895 dynamically linked libraries. In non-global mode, the linked
3896 library is essentially invisible and can only be accessed via
3897 `dynamic-func', etc. The default is now to link in global mode.
3898 Previously, the default has been non-global mode.
3900 The `#:global' keyword is only effective on platforms that support
3901 the dlopen family of functions.
3903 ** New function `provided?'
3905 - Function: provided? FEATURE
3906 Return true iff FEATURE is supported by this installation of
3907 Guile. FEATURE must be a symbol naming a feature; the global
3908 variable `*features*' is a list of available features.
3910 ** Changes to the module (ice-9 expect):
3912 *** The expect-strings macro now matches `$' in a regular expression
3913 only at a line-break or end-of-file by default. Previously it would
3914 match the end of the string accumulated so far. The old behaviour
3915 can be obtained by setting the variable `expect-strings-exec-flags'
3918 *** The expect-strings macro now uses a variable `expect-strings-exec-flags'
3919 for the regexp-exec flags. If `regexp/noteol' is included, then `$'
3920 in a regular expression will still match before a line-break or
3921 end-of-file. The default is `regexp/noteol'.
3923 *** The expect-strings macro now uses a variable
3924 `expect-strings-compile-flags' for the flags to be supplied to
3925 `make-regexp'. The default is `regexp/newline', which was previously
3928 *** The expect macro now supplies two arguments to a match procedure:
3929 the current accumulated string and a flag to indicate whether
3930 end-of-file has been reached. Previously only the string was supplied.
3931 If end-of-file is reached, the match procedure will be called an
3932 additional time with the same accumulated string as the previous call
3933 but with the flag set.
3935 ** New module (ice-9 format), implementing the Common Lisp `format' function.
3937 This code, and the documentation for it that appears here, was
3938 borrowed from SLIB, with minor adaptations for Guile.
3940 - Function: format DESTINATION FORMAT-STRING . ARGUMENTS
3941 An almost complete implementation of Common LISP format description
3942 according to the CL reference book `Common LISP' from Guy L.
3943 Steele, Digital Press. Backward compatible to most of the
3944 available Scheme format implementations.
3946 Returns `#t', `#f' or a string; has side effect of printing
3947 according to FORMAT-STRING. If DESTINATION is `#t', the output is
3948 to the current output port and `#t' is returned. If DESTINATION
3949 is `#f', a formatted string is returned as the result of the call.
3950 NEW: If DESTINATION is a string, DESTINATION is regarded as the
3951 format string; FORMAT-STRING is then the first argument and the
3952 output is returned as a string. If DESTINATION is a number, the
3953 output is to the current error port if available by the
3954 implementation. Otherwise DESTINATION must be an output port and
3957 FORMAT-STRING must be a string. In case of a formatting error
3958 format returns `#f' and prints a message on the current output or
3959 error port. Characters are output as if the string were output by
3960 the `display' function with the exception of those prefixed by a
3961 tilde (~). For a detailed description of the FORMAT-STRING syntax
3962 please consult a Common LISP format reference manual. For a test
3963 suite to verify this format implementation load `formatst.scm'.
3964 Please send bug reports to `lutzeb@cs.tu-berlin.de'.
3966 Note: `format' is not reentrant, i.e. only one `format'-call may
3967 be executed at a time.
3970 *** Format Specification (Format version 3.0)
3972 Please consult a Common LISP format reference manual for a detailed
3973 description of the format string syntax. For a demonstration of the
3974 implemented directives see `formatst.scm'.
3976 This implementation supports directive parameters and modifiers (`:'
3977 and `@' characters). Multiple parameters must be separated by a comma
3978 (`,'). Parameters can be numerical parameters (positive or negative),
3979 character parameters (prefixed by a quote character (`''), variable
3980 parameters (`v'), number of rest arguments parameter (`#'), empty and
3981 default parameters. Directive characters are case independent. The
3982 general form of a directive is:
3984 DIRECTIVE ::= ~{DIRECTIVE-PARAMETER,}[:][@]DIRECTIVE-CHARACTER
3986 DIRECTIVE-PARAMETER ::= [ [-|+]{0-9}+ | 'CHARACTER | v | # ]
3988 *** Implemented CL Format Control Directives
3990 Documentation syntax: Uppercase characters represent the
3991 corresponding control directive characters. Lowercase characters
3992 represent control directive parameter descriptions.
3995 Any (print as `display' does).
3999 `~MINCOL,COLINC,MINPAD,PADCHARA'
4003 S-expression (print as `write' does).
4007 `~MINCOL,COLINC,MINPAD,PADCHARS'
4013 print number sign always.
4016 print comma separated.
4018 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARD'
4024 print number sign always.
4027 print comma separated.
4029 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARX'
4035 print number sign always.
4038 print comma separated.
4040 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARO'
4046 print number sign always.
4049 print comma separated.
4051 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARB'
4056 `~N,MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARR'
4060 print a number as a Roman numeral.
4063 print a number as an "old fashioned" Roman numeral.
4066 print a number as an ordinal English number.
4069 print a number as a cardinal English number.
4074 prints `y' and `ies'.
4077 as `~P but jumps 1 argument backward.'
4080 as `~@P but jumps 1 argument backward.'
4085 prints a character as the reader can understand it (i.e. `#\'
4089 prints a character as emacs does (eg. `^C' for ASCII 03).
4092 Fixed-format floating-point (prints a flonum like MMM.NNN).
4093 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHARF'
4095 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
4098 Exponential floating-point (prints a flonum like MMM.NNN`E'EE).
4099 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,EXPONENTDIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHAR,EXPONENTCHARE'
4101 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
4104 General floating-point (prints a flonum either fixed or
4106 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,EXPONENTDIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHAR,EXPONENTCHARG'
4108 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
4111 Dollars floating-point (prints a flonum in fixed with signs
4113 `~DIGITS,SCALE,WIDTH,PADCHAR$'
4115 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
4118 A sign is always printed and appears before the padding.
4121 The sign appears before the padding.
4129 print newline if not at the beginning of the output line.
4131 prints `~&' and then N-1 newlines.
4136 print N page separators.
4146 newline is ignored, white space left.
4149 newline is left, white space ignored.
4154 relative tabulation.
4160 Indirection (expects indirect arguments as a list).
4162 extracts indirect arguments from format arguments.
4165 Case conversion (converts by `string-downcase').
4167 converts by `string-capitalize'.
4170 converts by `string-capitalize-first'.
4173 converts by `string-upcase'.
4176 Argument Jumping (jumps 1 argument forward).
4178 jumps N arguments forward.
4181 jumps 1 argument backward.
4184 jumps N arguments backward.
4187 jumps to the 0th argument.
4190 jumps to the Nth argument (beginning from 0)
4192 `~[STR0~;STR1~;...~;STRN~]'
4193 Conditional Expression (numerical clause conditional).
4195 take argument from N.
4198 true test conditional.
4201 if-else-then conditional.
4207 default clause follows.
4210 Iteration (args come from the next argument (a list)).
4212 at most N iterations.
4215 args from next arg (a list of lists).
4218 args from the rest of arguments.
4221 args from the rest args (lists).
4232 aborts if N <= M <= K
4234 *** Not Implemented CL Format Control Directives
4237 print `#f' as an empty list (see below).
4240 print `#f' as an empty list (see below).
4246 (sorry I don't understand its semantics completely)
4248 *** Extended, Replaced and Additional Control Directives
4250 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHD'
4251 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHX'
4252 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHO'
4253 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHB'
4254 `~N,MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHR'
4255 COMMAWIDTH is the number of characters between two comma
4259 print a R4RS complex number as `~F~@Fi' with passed parameters for
4263 Pretty print formatting of an argument for scheme code lists.
4269 Flushes the output if format DESTINATION is a port.
4272 Print a `#\space' character
4274 print N `#\space' characters.
4277 Print a `#\tab' character
4279 print N `#\tab' characters.
4282 Takes N as an integer representation for a character. No arguments
4283 are consumed. N is converted to a character by `integer->char'. N
4284 must be a positive decimal number.
4287 Print out readproof. Prints out internal objects represented as
4288 `#<...>' as strings `"#<...>"' so that the format output can always
4289 be processed by `read'.
4292 Print out readproof. Prints out internal objects represented as
4293 `#<...>' as strings `"#<...>"' so that the format output can always
4294 be processed by `read'.
4297 Prints information and a copyright notice on the format
4300 prints format version.
4303 may also print number strings, i.e. passing a number as a string
4304 and format it accordingly.
4306 *** Configuration Variables
4308 The format module exports some configuration variables to suit the
4309 systems and users needs. There should be no modification necessary for
4310 the configuration that comes with Guile. Format detects automatically
4311 if the running scheme system implements floating point numbers and
4314 format:symbol-case-conv
4315 Symbols are converted by `symbol->string' so the case type of the
4316 printed symbols is implementation dependent.
4317 `format:symbol-case-conv' is a one arg closure which is either
4318 `#f' (no conversion), `string-upcase', `string-downcase' or
4319 `string-capitalize'. (default `#f')
4321 format:iobj-case-conv
4322 As FORMAT:SYMBOL-CASE-CONV but applies for the representation of
4323 implementation internal objects. (default `#f')
4326 The character prefixing the exponent value in `~E' printing.
4329 *** Compatibility With Other Format Implementations
4335 Downward compatible except for padding support and `~A', `~S',
4336 `~P', `~X' uppercase printing. SLIB format 1.4 uses C-style
4337 `printf' padding support which is completely replaced by the CL
4338 `format' padding style.
4341 Downward compatible except for `~', which is not documented
4342 (ignores all characters inside the format string up to a newline
4343 character). (7.1 implements `~a', `~s', ~NEWLINE, `~~', `~%',
4344 numerical and variable parameters and `:/@' modifiers in the CL
4348 Downward compatible except for `~A' and `~S' which print in
4349 uppercase. (Elk implements `~a', `~s', `~~', and `~%' (no
4350 directive parameters or modifiers)).
4353 Downward compatible except for an optional destination parameter:
4354 S2C accepts a format call without a destination which returns a
4355 formatted string. This is equivalent to a #f destination in S2C.
4356 (S2C implements `~a', `~s', `~c', `~%', and `~~' (no directive
4357 parameters or modifiers)).
4360 ** Changes to string-handling functions.
4362 These functions were added to support the (ice-9 format) module, above.
4364 *** New function: string-upcase STRING
4365 *** New function: string-downcase STRING
4367 These are non-destructive versions of the existing string-upcase! and
4368 string-downcase! functions.
4370 *** New function: string-capitalize! STRING
4371 *** New function: string-capitalize STRING
4373 These functions convert the first letter of each word in the string to
4376 (string-capitalize "howdy there")
4379 As with the other functions, string-capitalize! modifies the string in
4380 place, while string-capitalize returns a modified copy of its argument.
4382 *** New function: string-ci->symbol STRING
4384 Return a symbol whose name is STRING, but having the same case as if
4385 the symbol had be read by `read'.
4387 Guile can be configured to be sensitive or insensitive to case
4388 differences in Scheme identifiers. If Guile is case-insensitive, all
4389 symbols are converted to lower case on input. The `string-ci->symbol'
4390 function returns a symbol whose name in STRING, transformed as Guile
4391 would if STRING were input.
4393 *** New function: substring-move! STRING1 START END STRING2 START
4395 Copy the substring of STRING1 from START (inclusive) to END
4396 (exclusive) to STRING2 at START. STRING1 and STRING2 may be the same
4397 string, and the source and destination areas may overlap; in all
4398 cases, the function behaves as if all the characters were copied
4401 *** Extended functions: substring-move-left! substring-move-right!
4403 These functions now correctly copy arbitrarily overlapping substrings;
4404 they are both synonyms for substring-move!.
4407 ** New module (ice-9 getopt-long), with the function `getopt-long'.
4409 getopt-long is a function for parsing command-line arguments in a
4410 manner consistent with other GNU programs.
4412 (getopt-long ARGS GRAMMAR)
4413 Parse the arguments ARGS according to the argument list grammar GRAMMAR.
4415 ARGS should be a list of strings. Its first element should be the
4416 name of the program; subsequent elements should be the arguments
4417 that were passed to the program on the command line. The
4418 `program-arguments' procedure returns a list of this form.
4420 GRAMMAR is a list of the form:
4421 ((OPTION (PROPERTY VALUE) ...) ...)
4423 Each OPTION should be a symbol. `getopt-long' will accept a
4424 command-line option named `--OPTION'.
4425 Each option can have the following (PROPERTY VALUE) pairs:
4427 (single-char CHAR) --- Accept `-CHAR' as a single-character
4428 equivalent to `--OPTION'. This is how to specify traditional
4430 (required? BOOL) --- If BOOL is true, the option is required.
4431 getopt-long will raise an error if it is not found in ARGS.
4432 (value BOOL) --- If BOOL is #t, the option accepts a value; if
4433 it is #f, it does not; and if it is the symbol
4434 `optional', the option may appear in ARGS with or
4436 (predicate FUNC) --- If the option accepts a value (i.e. you
4437 specified `(value #t)' for this option), then getopt
4438 will apply FUNC to the value, and throw an exception
4439 if it returns #f. FUNC should be a procedure which
4440 accepts a string and returns a boolean value; you may
4441 need to use quasiquotes to get it into GRAMMAR.
4443 The (PROPERTY VALUE) pairs may occur in any order, but each
4444 property may occur only once. By default, options do not have
4445 single-character equivalents, are not required, and do not take
4448 In ARGS, single-character options may be combined, in the usual
4449 Unix fashion: ("-x" "-y") is equivalent to ("-xy"). If an option
4450 accepts values, then it must be the last option in the
4451 combination; the value is the next argument. So, for example, using
4452 the following grammar:
4453 ((apples (single-char #\a))
4454 (blimps (single-char #\b) (value #t))
4455 (catalexis (single-char #\c) (value #t)))
4456 the following argument lists would be acceptable:
4457 ("-a" "-b" "bang" "-c" "couth") ("bang" and "couth" are the values
4458 for "blimps" and "catalexis")
4459 ("-ab" "bang" "-c" "couth") (same)
4460 ("-ac" "couth" "-b" "bang") (same)
4461 ("-abc" "couth" "bang") (an error, since `-b' is not the
4462 last option in its combination)
4464 If an option's value is optional, then `getopt-long' decides
4465 whether it has a value by looking at what follows it in ARGS. If
4466 the next element is a string, and it does not appear to be an
4467 option itself, then that string is the option's value.
4469 The value of a long option can appear as the next element in ARGS,
4470 or it can follow the option name, separated by an `=' character.
4471 Thus, using the same grammar as above, the following argument lists
4473 ("--apples" "Braeburn" "--blimps" "Goodyear")
4474 ("--apples=Braeburn" "--blimps" "Goodyear")
4475 ("--blimps" "Goodyear" "--apples=Braeburn")
4477 If the option "--" appears in ARGS, argument parsing stops there;
4478 subsequent arguments are returned as ordinary arguments, even if
4479 they resemble options. So, in the argument list:
4480 ("--apples" "Granny Smith" "--" "--blimp" "Goodyear")
4481 `getopt-long' will recognize the `apples' option as having the
4482 value "Granny Smith", but it will not recognize the `blimp'
4483 option; it will return the strings "--blimp" and "Goodyear" as
4484 ordinary argument strings.
4486 The `getopt-long' function returns the parsed argument list as an
4487 assocation list, mapping option names --- the symbols from GRAMMAR
4488 --- onto their values, or #t if the option does not accept a value.
4489 Unused options do not appear in the alist.
4491 All arguments that are not the value of any option are returned
4492 as a list, associated with the empty list.
4494 `getopt-long' throws an exception if:
4495 - it finds an unrecognized option in ARGS
4496 - a required option is omitted
4497 - an option that requires an argument doesn't get one
4498 - an option that doesn't accept an argument does get one (this can
4499 only happen using the long option `--opt=value' syntax)
4500 - an option predicate fails
4505 `((lockfile-dir (required? #t)
4508 (predicate ,file-is-directory?))
4509 (verbose (required? #f)
4512 (x-includes (single-char #\x))
4513 (rnet-server (single-char #\y)
4514 (predicate ,string?))))
4516 (getopt-long '("my-prog" "-vk" "/tmp" "foo1" "--x-includes=/usr/include"
4517 "--rnet-server=lamprod" "--" "-fred" "foo2" "foo3")
4519 => ((() "foo1" "-fred" "foo2" "foo3")
4520 (rnet-server . "lamprod")
4521 (x-includes . "/usr/include")
4522 (lockfile-dir . "/tmp")
4525 ** The (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style) module is obsolete; use (ice-9 getopt-long).
4527 It will be removed in a few releases.
4529 ** New syntax: lambda*
4530 ** New syntax: define*
4531 ** New syntax: define*-public
4532 ** New syntax: defmacro*
4533 ** New syntax: defmacro*-public
4534 Guile now supports optional arguments.
4536 `lambda*', `define*', `define*-public', `defmacro*' and
4537 `defmacro*-public' are identical to the non-* versions except that
4538 they use an extended type of parameter list that has the following BNF
4539 syntax (parentheses are literal, square brackets indicate grouping,
4540 and `*', `+' and `?' have the usual meaning):
4542 ext-param-list ::= ( [identifier]* [#&optional [ext-var-decl]+]?
4543 [#&key [ext-var-decl]+ [#&allow-other-keys]?]?
4544 [[#&rest identifier]|[. identifier]]? ) | [identifier]
4546 ext-var-decl ::= identifier | ( identifier expression )
4548 The semantics are best illustrated with the following documentation
4549 and examples for `lambda*':
4552 lambda extended for optional and keyword arguments
4554 lambda* creates a procedure that takes optional arguments. These
4555 are specified by putting them inside brackets at the end of the
4556 paramater list, but before any dotted rest argument. For example,
4557 (lambda* (a b #&optional c d . e) '())
4558 creates a procedure with fixed arguments a and b, optional arguments c
4559 and d, and rest argument e. If the optional arguments are omitted
4560 in a call, the variables for them are unbound in the procedure. This
4561 can be checked with the bound? macro.
4563 lambda* can also take keyword arguments. For example, a procedure
4565 (lambda* (#&key xyzzy larch) '())
4566 can be called with any of the argument lists (#:xyzzy 11)
4567 (#:larch 13) (#:larch 42 #:xyzzy 19) (). Whichever arguments
4568 are given as keywords are bound to values.
4570 Optional and keyword arguments can also be given default values
4571 which they take on when they are not present in a call, by giving a
4572 two-item list in place of an optional argument, for example in:
4573 (lambda* (foo #&optional (bar 42) #&key (baz 73)) (list foo bar baz))
4574 foo is a fixed argument, bar is an optional argument with default
4575 value 42, and baz is a keyword argument with default value 73.
4576 Default value expressions are not evaluated unless they are needed
4577 and until the procedure is called.
4579 lambda* now supports two more special parameter list keywords.
4581 lambda*-defined procedures now throw an error by default if a
4582 keyword other than one of those specified is found in the actual
4583 passed arguments. However, specifying #&allow-other-keys
4584 immediately after the kyword argument declarations restores the
4585 previous behavior of ignoring unknown keywords. lambda* also now
4586 guarantees that if the same keyword is passed more than once, the
4587 last one passed is the one that takes effect. For example,
4588 ((lambda* (#&key (heads 0) (tails 0)) (display (list heads tails)))
4589 #:heads 37 #:tails 42 #:heads 99)
4590 would result in (99 47) being displayed.
4592 #&rest is also now provided as a synonym for the dotted syntax rest
4593 argument. The argument lists (a . b) and (a #&rest b) are equivalent in
4594 all respects to lambda*. This is provided for more similarity to DSSSL,
4595 MIT-Scheme and Kawa among others, as well as for refugees from other
4598 Further documentation may be found in the optargs.scm file itself.
4600 The optional argument module also exports the macros `let-optional',
4601 `let-optional*', `let-keywords', `let-keywords*' and `bound?'. These
4602 are not documented here because they may be removed in the future, but
4603 full documentation is still available in optargs.scm.
4605 ** New syntax: and-let*
4606 Guile now supports the `and-let*' form, described in the draft SRFI-2.
4608 Syntax: (land* (<clause> ...) <body> ...)
4609 Each <clause> should have one of the following forms:
4610 (<variable> <expression>)
4613 Each <variable> or <bound-variable> should be an identifier. Each
4614 <expression> should be a valid expression. The <body> should be a
4615 possibly empty sequence of expressions, like the <body> of a
4618 Semantics: A LAND* expression is evaluated by evaluating the
4619 <expression> or <bound-variable> of each of the <clause>s from
4620 left to right. The value of the first <expression> or
4621 <bound-variable> that evaluates to a false value is returned; the
4622 remaining <expression>s and <bound-variable>s are not evaluated.
4623 The <body> forms are evaluated iff all the <expression>s and
4624 <bound-variable>s evaluate to true values.
4626 The <expression>s and the <body> are evaluated in an environment
4627 binding each <variable> of the preceding (<variable> <expression>)
4628 clauses to the value of the <expression>. Later bindings
4629 shadow earlier bindings.
4631 Guile's and-let* macro was contributed by Michael Livshin.
4633 ** New sorting functions
4635 *** New function: sorted? SEQUENCE LESS?
4636 Returns `#t' when the sequence argument is in non-decreasing order
4637 according to LESS? (that is, there is no adjacent pair `... x y
4638 ...' for which `(less? y x)').
4640 Returns `#f' when the sequence contains at least one out-of-order
4641 pair. It is an error if the sequence is neither a list nor a
4644 *** New function: merge LIST1 LIST2 LESS?
4645 LIST1 and LIST2 are sorted lists.
4646 Returns the sorted list of all elements in LIST1 and LIST2.
4648 Assume that the elements a and b1 in LIST1 and b2 in LIST2 are "equal"
4649 in the sense that (LESS? x y) --> #f for x, y in {a, b1, b2},
4650 and that a < b1 in LIST1. Then a < b1 < b2 in the result.
4651 (Here "<" should read "comes before".)
4653 *** New procedure: merge! LIST1 LIST2 LESS?
4654 Merges two lists, re-using the pairs of LIST1 and LIST2 to build
4655 the result. If the code is compiled, and LESS? constructs no new
4656 pairs, no pairs at all will be allocated. The first pair of the
4657 result will be either the first pair of LIST1 or the first pair of
4660 *** New function: sort SEQUENCE LESS?
4661 Accepts either a list or a vector, and returns a new sequence
4662 which is sorted. The new sequence is the same type as the input.
4663 Always `(sorted? (sort sequence less?) less?)'. The original
4664 sequence is not altered in any way. The new sequence shares its
4665 elements with the old one; no elements are copied.
4667 *** New procedure: sort! SEQUENCE LESS
4668 Returns its sorted result in the original boxes. No new storage is
4669 allocated at all. Proper usage: (set! slist (sort! slist <))
4671 *** New function: stable-sort SEQUENCE LESS?
4672 Similar to `sort' but stable. That is, if "equal" elements are
4673 ordered a < b in the original sequence, they will have the same order
4676 *** New function: stable-sort! SEQUENCE LESS?
4677 Similar to `sort!' but stable.
4678 Uses temporary storage when sorting vectors.
4680 *** New functions: sort-list, sort-list!
4681 Added for compatibility with scsh.
4683 ** New built-in random number support
4685 *** New function: random N [STATE]
4686 Accepts a positive integer or real N and returns a number of the
4687 same type between zero (inclusive) and N (exclusive). The values
4688 returned have a uniform distribution.
4690 The optional argument STATE must be of the type produced by
4691 `copy-random-state' or `seed->random-state'. It defaults to the value
4692 of the variable `*random-state*'. This object is used to maintain the
4693 state of the pseudo-random-number generator and is altered as a side
4694 effect of the `random' operation.
4696 *** New variable: *random-state*
4697 Holds a data structure that encodes the internal state of the
4698 random-number generator that `random' uses by default. The nature
4699 of this data structure is implementation-dependent. It may be
4700 printed out and successfully read back in, but may or may not
4701 function correctly as a random-number state object in another
4704 *** New function: copy-random-state [STATE]
4705 Returns a new object of type suitable for use as the value of the
4706 variable `*random-state*' and as a second argument to `random'.
4707 If argument STATE is given, a copy of it is returned. Otherwise a
4708 copy of `*random-state*' is returned.
4710 *** New function: seed->random-state SEED
4711 Returns a new object of type suitable for use as the value of the
4712 variable `*random-state*' and as a second argument to `random'.
4713 SEED is a string or a number. A new state is generated and
4714 initialized using SEED.
4716 *** New function: random:uniform [STATE]
4717 Returns an uniformly distributed inexact real random number in the
4718 range between 0 and 1.
4720 *** New procedure: random:solid-sphere! VECT [STATE]
4721 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers the sum of whose
4722 squares is less than 1.0. Thinking of VECT as coordinates in
4723 space of dimension N = `(vector-length VECT)', the coordinates are
4724 uniformly distributed within the unit N-shere. The sum of the
4725 squares of the numbers is returned. VECT can be either a vector
4726 or a uniform vector of doubles.
4728 *** New procedure: random:hollow-sphere! VECT [STATE]
4729 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers the sum of whose squares
4730 is equal to 1.0. Thinking of VECT as coordinates in space of
4731 dimension n = `(vector-length VECT)', the coordinates are uniformly
4732 distributed over the surface of the unit n-shere. VECT can be either
4733 a vector or a uniform vector of doubles.
4735 *** New function: random:normal [STATE]
4736 Returns an inexact real in a normal distribution with mean 0 and
4737 standard deviation 1. For a normal distribution with mean M and
4738 standard deviation D use `(+ M (* D (random:normal)))'.
4740 *** New procedure: random:normal-vector! VECT [STATE]
4741 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers which are independent and
4742 standard normally distributed (i.e., with mean 0 and variance 1).
4743 VECT can be either a vector or a uniform vector of doubles.
4745 *** New function: random:exp STATE
4746 Returns an inexact real in an exponential distribution with mean 1.
4747 For an exponential distribution with mean U use (* U (random:exp)).
4749 ** The range of logand, logior, logxor, logtest, and logbit? have changed.
4751 These functions now operate on numbers in the range of a C unsigned
4754 These functions used to operate on numbers in the range of a C signed
4755 long; however, this seems inappropriate, because Guile integers don't
4758 ** New function: make-guardian
4759 This is an implementation of guardians as described in
4760 R. Kent Dybvig, Carl Bruggeman, and David Eby (1993) "Guardians in a
4761 Generation-Based Garbage Collector" ACM SIGPLAN Conference on
4762 Programming Language Design and Implementation, June 1993
4763 ftp://ftp.cs.indiana.edu/pub/scheme-repository/doc/pubs/guardians.ps.gz
4765 ** New functions: delq1!, delv1!, delete1!
4766 These procedures behave similar to delq! and friends but delete only
4767 one object if at all.
4769 ** New function: unread-string STRING PORT
4770 Unread STRING to PORT, that is, push it back onto the port so that
4771 next read operation will work on the pushed back characters.
4773 ** unread-char can now be called multiple times
4774 If unread-char is called multiple times, the unread characters will be
4775 read again in last-in first-out order.
4777 ** the procedures uniform-array-read! and uniform-array-write! now
4778 work on any kind of port, not just ports which are open on a file.
4780 ** Now 'l' in a port mode requests line buffering.
4782 ** The procedure truncate-file now works on string ports as well
4783 as file ports. If the size argument is omitted, the current
4784 file position is used.
4786 ** new procedure: seek PORT/FDES OFFSET WHENCE
4787 The arguments are the same as for the old fseek procedure, but it
4788 works on string ports as well as random-access file ports.
4790 ** the fseek procedure now works on string ports, since it has been
4791 redefined using seek.
4793 ** the setvbuf procedure now uses a default size if mode is _IOFBF and
4794 size is not supplied.
4796 ** the newline procedure no longer flushes the port if it's not
4797 line-buffered: previously it did if it was the current output port.
4799 ** open-pipe and close-pipe are no longer primitive procedures, but
4800 an emulation can be obtained using `(use-modules (ice-9 popen))'.
4802 ** the freopen procedure has been removed.
4804 ** new procedure: drain-input PORT
4805 Drains PORT's read buffers (including any pushed-back characters)
4806 and returns the contents as a single string.
4808 ** New function: map-in-order PROC LIST1 LIST2 ...
4809 Version of `map' which guarantees that the procedure is applied to the
4810 lists in serial order.
4812 ** Renamed `serial-array-copy!' and `serial-array-map!' to
4813 `array-copy-in-order!' and `array-map-in-order!'. The old names are
4814 now obsolete and will go away in release 1.5.
4816 ** New syntax: collect BODY1 ...
4817 Version of `begin' which returns a list of the results of the body
4818 forms instead of the result of the last body form. In contrast to
4819 `begin', `collect' allows an empty body.
4821 ** New functions: read-history FILENAME, write-history FILENAME
4822 Read/write command line history from/to file. Returns #t on success
4823 and #f if an error occured.
4825 ** `ls' and `lls' in module (ice-9 ls) now handle no arguments.
4827 These procedures return a list of definitions available in the specified
4828 argument, a relative module reference. In the case of no argument,
4829 `(current-module)' is now consulted for definitions to return, instead
4830 of simply returning #f, the former behavior.
4832 ** The #/ syntax for lists is no longer supported.
4834 Earlier versions of Scheme accepted this syntax, but printed a
4837 ** Guile no longer consults the SCHEME_LOAD_PATH environment variable.
4839 Instead, you should set GUILE_LOAD_PATH to tell Guile where to find
4842 * Changes to the gh_ interface
4846 Now takes a second argument which is the result array. If this
4847 pointer is NULL, a new array is malloced (the old behaviour).
4849 ** gh_chars2byvect, gh_shorts2svect, gh_floats2fvect, gh_scm2chars,
4850 gh_scm2shorts, gh_scm2longs, gh_scm2floats
4854 * Changes to the scm_ interface
4856 ** Function: scm_make_named_hook (char* name, int n_args)
4858 Creates a hook in the same way as make-hook above but also
4859 binds a variable named NAME to it.
4861 This is the typical way of creating a hook from C code.
4863 Currently, the variable is created in the "current" module. This
4864 might change when we get the new module system.
4866 ** The smob interface
4868 The interface for creating smobs has changed. For documentation, see
4869 data-rep.info (made from guile-core/doc/data-rep.texi).
4871 *** Deprecated function: SCM scm_newsmob (scm_smobfuns *)
4873 >>> This function will be removed in 1.3.4. <<<
4877 *** Function: SCM scm_make_smob_type (const char *name, scm_sizet size)
4878 This function adds a new smob type, named NAME, with instance size
4879 SIZE to the system. The return value is a tag that is used in
4880 creating instances of the type. If SIZE is 0, then no memory will
4881 be allocated when instances of the smob are created, and nothing
4882 will be freed by the default free function.
4884 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_mark (long tc, SCM (*mark) (SCM))
4885 This function sets the smob marking procedure for the smob type
4886 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4887 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4889 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_free (long tc, SCM (*mark) (SCM))
4890 This function sets the smob freeing procedure for the smob type
4891 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4892 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4894 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_print (tc, print)
4896 - Function: void scm_set_smob_print (long tc,
4897 scm_sizet (*print) (SCM,
4901 This function sets the smob printing procedure for the smob type
4902 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4903 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4905 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_equalp (long tc, SCM (*equalp) (SCM, SCM))
4906 This function sets the smob equality-testing predicate for the
4907 smob type specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4908 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4910 *** Macro: void SCM_NEWSMOB (SCM var, long tc, void *data)
4911 Make VALUE contain a smob instance of the type with type code TC and
4912 smob data DATA. VALUE must be previously declared as C type `SCM'.
4914 *** Macro: fn_returns SCM_RETURN_NEWSMOB (long tc, void *data)
4915 This macro expands to a block of code that creates a smob instance
4916 of the type with type code TC and smob data DATA, and returns that
4917 `SCM' value. It should be the last piece of code in a block.
4919 ** The interfaces for using I/O ports and implementing port types
4920 (ptobs) have changed significantly. The new interface is based on
4921 shared access to buffers and a new set of ptob procedures.
4923 *** scm_newptob has been removed
4927 *** Function: SCM scm_make_port_type (type_name, fill_buffer, write_flush)
4929 - Function: SCM scm_make_port_type (char *type_name,
4930 int (*fill_buffer) (SCM port),
4931 void (*write_flush) (SCM port));
4933 Similarly to the new smob interface, there is a set of function
4934 setters by which the user can customize the behaviour of his port
4935 type. See ports.h (scm_set_port_XXX).
4937 ** scm_strport_to_string: New function: creates a new string from
4938 a string port's buffer.
4940 ** Plug in interface for random number generators
4941 The variable `scm_the_rng' in random.c contains a value and three
4942 function pointers which together define the current random number
4943 generator being used by the Scheme level interface and the random
4944 number library functions.
4946 The user is free to replace the default generator with the generator
4949 *** Variable: size_t scm_the_rng.rstate_size
4950 The size of the random state type used by the current RNG
4953 *** Function: unsigned long scm_the_rng.random_bits (scm_rstate *STATE)
4954 Given the random STATE, return 32 random bits.
4956 *** Function: void scm_the_rng.init_rstate (scm_rstate *STATE, chars *S, int N)
4957 Seed random state STATE using string S of length N.
4959 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_the_rng.copy_rstate (scm_rstate *STATE)
4960 Given random state STATE, return a malloced copy.
4963 The default RNG is the MWC (Multiply With Carry) random number
4964 generator described by George Marsaglia at the Department of
4965 Statistics and Supercomputer Computations Research Institute, The
4966 Florida State University (http://stat.fsu.edu/~geo).
4968 It uses 64 bits, has a period of 4578426017172946943 (4.6e18), and
4969 passes all tests in the DIEHARD test suite
4970 (http://stat.fsu.edu/~geo/diehard.html). The generation of 32 bits
4971 costs one multiply and one add on platforms which either supports long
4972 longs (gcc does this on most systems) or have 64 bit longs. The cost
4973 is four multiply on other systems but this can be optimized by writing
4974 scm_i_uniform32 in assembler.
4976 These functions are provided through the scm_the_rng interface for use
4977 by libguile and the application.
4979 *** Function: unsigned long scm_i_uniform32 (scm_i_rstate *STATE)
4980 Given the random STATE, return 32 random bits.
4981 Don't use this function directly. Instead go through the plugin
4982 interface (see "Plug in interface" above).
4984 *** Function: void scm_i_init_rstate (scm_i_rstate *STATE, char *SEED, int N)
4985 Initialize STATE using SEED of length N.
4987 *** Function: scm_i_rstate *scm_i_copy_rstate (scm_i_rstate *STATE)
4988 Return a malloc:ed copy of STATE. This function can easily be re-used
4989 in the interfaces to other RNGs.
4991 ** Random number library functions
4992 These functions use the current RNG through the scm_the_rng interface.
4993 It might be a good idea to use these functions from your C code so
4994 that only one random generator is used by all code in your program.
4996 The default random state is stored in:
4998 *** Variable: SCM scm_var_random_state
4999 Contains the vcell of the Scheme variable "*random-state*" which is
5000 used as default state by all random number functions in the Scheme
5005 double x = scm_c_uniform01 (SCM_RSTATE (SCM_CDR (scm_var_random_state)));
5007 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_c_default_rstate (void)
5008 This is a convenience function which returns the value of
5009 scm_var_random_state. An error message is generated if this value
5010 isn't a random state.
5012 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_c_make_rstate (char *SEED, int LENGTH)
5013 Make a new random state from the string SEED of length LENGTH.
5015 It is generally not a good idea to use multiple random states in a
5016 program. While subsequent random numbers generated from one random
5017 state are guaranteed to be reasonably independent, there is no such
5018 guarantee for numbers generated from different random states.
5020 *** Macro: unsigned long scm_c_uniform32 (scm_rstate *STATE)
5021 Return 32 random bits.
5023 *** Function: double scm_c_uniform01 (scm_rstate *STATE)
5024 Return a sample from the uniform(0,1) distribution.
5026 *** Function: double scm_c_normal01 (scm_rstate *STATE)
5027 Return a sample from the normal(0,1) distribution.
5029 *** Function: double scm_c_exp1 (scm_rstate *STATE)
5030 Return a sample from the exp(1) distribution.
5032 *** Function: unsigned long scm_c_random (scm_rstate *STATE, unsigned long M)
5033 Return a sample from the discrete uniform(0,M) distribution.
5035 *** Function: SCM scm_c_random_bignum (scm_rstate *STATE, SCM M)
5036 Return a sample from the discrete uniform(0,M) distribution.
5037 M must be a bignum object. The returned value may be an INUM.
5041 Changes in Guile 1.3 (released Monday, October 19, 1998):
5043 * Changes to the distribution
5045 ** We renamed the SCHEME_LOAD_PATH environment variable to GUILE_LOAD_PATH.
5046 To avoid conflicts, programs should name environment variables after
5047 themselves, except when there's a common practice establishing some
5050 For now, Guile supports both GUILE_LOAD_PATH and SCHEME_LOAD_PATH,
5051 giving the former precedence, and printing a warning message if the
5052 latter is set. Guile 1.4 will not recognize SCHEME_LOAD_PATH at all.
5054 ** The header files related to multi-byte characters have been removed.
5055 They were: libguile/extchrs.h and libguile/mbstrings.h. Any C code
5056 which referred to these explicitly will probably need to be rewritten,
5057 since the support for the variant string types has been removed; see
5060 ** The header files append.h and sequences.h have been removed. These
5061 files implemented non-R4RS operations which would encourage
5062 non-portable programming style and less easy-to-read code.
5064 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
5066 ** New procedures have been added to implement a "batch mode":
5068 *** Function: batch-mode?
5070 Returns a boolean indicating whether the interpreter is in batch
5073 *** Function: set-batch-mode?! ARG
5075 If ARG is true, switches the interpreter to batch mode. The `#f'
5076 case has not been implemented.
5078 ** Guile now provides full command-line editing, when run interactively.
5079 To use this feature, you must have the readline library installed.
5080 The Guile build process will notice it, and automatically include
5083 The readline library is available via anonymous FTP from any GNU
5084 mirror site; the canonical location is "ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu".
5086 ** the-last-stack is now a fluid.
5088 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
5090 ** You can now use the `guile-config' utility to build programs that use Guile.
5092 Guile now includes a command-line utility called `guile-config', which
5093 can provide information about how to compile and link programs that
5096 *** `guile-config compile' prints any C compiler flags needed to use Guile.
5097 You should include this command's output on the command line you use
5098 to compile C or C++ code that #includes the Guile header files. It's
5099 usually just a `-I' flag to help the compiler find the Guile headers.
5102 *** `guile-config link' prints any linker flags necessary to link with Guile.
5104 This command writes to its standard output a list of flags which you
5105 must pass to the linker to link your code against the Guile library.
5106 The flags include '-lguile' itself, any other libraries the Guile
5107 library depends upon, and any `-L' flags needed to help the linker
5108 find those libraries.
5110 For example, here is a Makefile rule that builds a program named 'foo'
5111 from the object files ${FOO_OBJECTS}, and links them against Guile:
5114 ${CC} ${CFLAGS} ${FOO_OBJECTS} `guile-config link` -o foo
5116 Previous Guile releases recommended that you use autoconf to detect
5117 which of a predefined set of libraries were present on your system.
5118 It is more robust to use `guile-config', since it records exactly which
5119 libraries the installed Guile library requires.
5121 This was originally called `build-guile', but was renamed to
5122 `guile-config' before Guile 1.3 was released, to be consistent with
5123 the analogous script for the GTK+ GUI toolkit, which is called
5127 ** Use the GUILE_FLAGS macro in your configure.in file to find Guile.
5129 If you are using the GNU autoconf package to configure your program,
5130 you can use the GUILE_FLAGS autoconf macro to call `guile-config'
5131 (described above) and gather the necessary values for use in your
5134 The GUILE_FLAGS macro expands to configure script code which runs the
5135 `guile-config' script, to find out where Guile's header files and
5136 libraries are installed. It sets two variables, marked for
5137 substitution, as by AC_SUBST.
5139 GUILE_CFLAGS --- flags to pass to a C or C++ compiler to build
5140 code that uses Guile header files. This is almost always just a
5143 GUILE_LDFLAGS --- flags to pass to the linker to link a
5144 program against Guile. This includes `-lguile' for the Guile
5145 library itself, any libraries that Guile itself requires (like
5146 -lqthreads), and so on. It may also include a -L flag to tell the
5147 compiler where to find the libraries.
5149 GUILE_FLAGS is defined in the file guile.m4, in the top-level
5150 directory of the Guile distribution. You can copy it into your
5151 package's aclocal.m4 file, and then use it in your configure.in file.
5153 If you are using the `aclocal' program, distributed with GNU automake,
5154 to maintain your aclocal.m4 file, the Guile installation process
5155 installs guile.m4 where aclocal will find it. All you need to do is
5156 use GUILE_FLAGS in your configure.in file, and then run `aclocal';
5157 this will copy the definition of GUILE_FLAGS into your aclocal.m4
5161 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
5163 ** Multi-byte strings have been removed, as have multi-byte and wide
5164 ports. We felt that these were the wrong approach to
5165 internationalization support.
5167 ** New function: readline [PROMPT]
5168 Read a line from the terminal, and allow the user to edit it,
5169 prompting with PROMPT. READLINE provides a large set of Emacs-like
5170 editing commands, lets the user recall previously typed lines, and
5171 works on almost every kind of terminal, including dumb terminals.
5173 READLINE assumes that the cursor is at the beginning of the line when
5174 it is invoked. Thus, you can't print a prompt yourself, and then call
5175 READLINE; you need to package up your prompt as a string, pass it to
5176 the function, and let READLINE print the prompt itself. This is
5177 because READLINE needs to know the prompt's screen width.
5179 For Guile to provide this function, you must have the readline
5180 library, version 2.1 or later, installed on your system. Readline is
5181 available via anonymous FTP from prep.ai.mit.edu in pub/gnu, or from
5182 any GNU mirror site.
5184 See also ADD-HISTORY function.
5186 ** New function: add-history STRING
5187 Add STRING as the most recent line in the history used by the READLINE
5188 command. READLINE does not add lines to the history itself; you must
5189 call ADD-HISTORY to make previous input available to the user.
5191 ** The behavior of the read-line function has changed.
5193 This function now uses standard C library functions to read the line,
5194 for speed. This means that it doesn not respect the value of
5195 scm-line-incrementors; it assumes that lines are delimited with
5198 (Note that this is read-line, the function that reads a line of text
5199 from a port, not readline, the function that reads a line from a
5200 terminal, providing full editing capabilities.)
5202 ** New module (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style): Parse command-line arguments.
5204 This module provides some simple argument parsing. It exports one
5207 Function: getopt-gnu-style ARG-LS
5208 Parse a list of program arguments into an alist of option
5211 Each item in the list of program arguments is examined to see if
5212 it meets the syntax of a GNU long-named option. An argument like
5213 `--MUMBLE' produces an element of the form (MUMBLE . #t) in the
5214 returned alist, where MUMBLE is a keyword object with the same
5215 name as the argument. An argument like `--MUMBLE=FROB' produces
5216 an element of the form (MUMBLE . FROB), where FROB is a string.
5218 As a special case, the returned alist also contains a pair whose
5219 car is the symbol `rest'. The cdr of this pair is a list
5220 containing all the items in the argument list that are not options
5221 of the form mentioned above.
5223 The argument `--' is treated specially: all items in the argument
5224 list appearing after such an argument are not examined, and are
5225 returned in the special `rest' list.
5227 This function does not parse normal single-character switches.
5228 You will need to parse them out of the `rest' list yourself.
5230 ** The read syntax for byte vectors and short vectors has changed.
5232 Instead of #bytes(...), write #y(...).
5234 Instead of #short(...), write #h(...).
5236 This may seem nutty, but, like the other uniform vectors, byte vectors
5237 and short vectors want to have the same print and read syntax (and,
5238 more basic, want to have read syntax!). Changing the read syntax to
5239 use multiple characters after the hash sign breaks with the
5240 conventions used in R5RS and the conventions used for the other
5241 uniform vectors. It also introduces complexity in the current reader,
5242 both on the C and Scheme levels. (The Right solution is probably to
5243 change the syntax and prototypes for uniform vectors entirely.)
5246 ** The new module (ice-9 session) provides useful interactive functions.
5248 *** New procedure: (apropos REGEXP OPTION ...)
5250 Display a list of top-level variables whose names match REGEXP, and
5251 the modules they are imported from. Each OPTION should be one of the
5254 value --- Show the value of each matching variable.
5255 shadow --- Show bindings shadowed by subsequently imported modules.
5256 full --- Same as both `shadow' and `value'.
5260 guile> (apropos "trace" 'full)
5261 debug: trace #<procedure trace args>
5262 debug: untrace #<procedure untrace args>
5263 the-scm-module: display-backtrace #<compiled-closure #<primitive-procedure gsubr-apply>>
5264 the-scm-module: before-backtrace-hook ()
5265 the-scm-module: backtrace #<primitive-procedure backtrace>
5266 the-scm-module: after-backtrace-hook ()
5267 the-scm-module: has-shown-backtrace-hint? #f
5270 ** There are new functions and syntax for working with macros.
5272 Guile implements macros as a special object type. Any variable whose
5273 top-level binding is a macro object acts as a macro. The macro object
5274 specifies how the expression should be transformed before evaluation.
5276 *** Macro objects now print in a reasonable way, resembling procedures.
5278 *** New function: (macro? OBJ)
5279 True iff OBJ is a macro object.
5281 *** New function: (primitive-macro? OBJ)
5282 Like (macro? OBJ), but true only if OBJ is one of the Guile primitive
5283 macro transformers, implemented in eval.c rather than Scheme code.
5285 Why do we have this function?
5286 - For symmetry with procedure? and primitive-procedure?,
5287 - to allow custom print procedures to tell whether a macro is
5288 primitive, and display it differently, and
5289 - to allow compilers and user-written evaluators to distinguish
5290 builtin special forms from user-defined ones, which could be
5293 *** New function: (macro-type OBJ)
5294 Return a value indicating what kind of macro OBJ is. Possible return
5297 The symbol `syntax' --- a macro created by procedure->syntax.
5298 The symbol `macro' --- a macro created by procedure->macro.
5299 The symbol `macro!' --- a macro created by procedure->memoizing-macro.
5300 The boolean #f --- if OBJ is not a macro object.
5302 *** New function: (macro-name MACRO)
5303 Return the name of the macro object MACRO's procedure, as returned by
5306 *** New function: (macro-transformer MACRO)
5307 Return the transformer procedure for MACRO.
5309 *** New syntax: (use-syntax MODULE ... TRANSFORMER)
5311 Specify a new macro expander to use in the current module. Each
5312 MODULE is a module name, with the same meaning as in the `use-modules'
5313 form; each named module's exported bindings are added to the current
5314 top-level environment. TRANSFORMER is an expression evaluated in the
5315 resulting environment which must yield a procedure to use as the
5316 module's eval transformer: every expression evaluated in this module
5317 is passed to this function, and the result passed to the Guile
5320 *** macro-eval! is removed. Use local-eval instead.
5322 ** Some magic has been added to the printer to better handle user
5323 written printing routines (like record printers, closure printers).
5325 The problem is that these user written routines must have access to
5326 the current `print-state' to be able to handle fancy things like
5327 detection of circular references. These print-states have to be
5328 passed to the builtin printing routines (display, write, etc) to
5329 properly continue the print chain.
5331 We didn't want to change all existing print code so that it
5332 explicitly passes thru a print state in addition to a port. Instead,
5333 we extented the possible values that the builtin printing routines
5334 accept as a `port'. In addition to a normal port, they now also take
5335 a pair of a normal port and a print-state. Printing will go to the
5336 port and the print-state will be used to control the detection of
5337 circular references, etc. If the builtin function does not care for a
5338 print-state, it is simply ignored.
5340 User written callbacks are now called with such a pair as their
5341 `port', but because every function now accepts this pair as a PORT
5342 argument, you don't have to worry about that. In fact, it is probably
5343 safest to not check for these pairs.
5345 However, it is sometimes necessary to continue a print chain on a
5346 different port, for example to get a intermediate string
5347 representation of the printed value, mangle that string somehow, and
5348 then to finally print the mangled string. Use the new function
5350 inherit-print-state OLD-PORT NEW-PORT
5352 for this. It constructs a new `port' that prints to NEW-PORT but
5353 inherits the print-state of OLD-PORT.
5355 ** struct-vtable-offset renamed to vtable-offset-user
5357 ** New constants: vtable-index-layout, vtable-index-vtable, vtable-index-printer
5359 ** There is now a third optional argument to make-vtable-vtable
5360 (and fourth to make-struct) when constructing new types (vtables).
5361 This argument initializes field vtable-index-printer of the vtable.
5363 ** The detection of circular references has been extended to structs.
5364 That is, a structure that -- in the process of being printed -- prints
5365 itself does not lead to infinite recursion.
5367 ** There is now some basic support for fluids. Please read
5368 "libguile/fluid.h" to find out more. It is accessible from Scheme with
5369 the following functions and macros:
5371 Function: make-fluid
5373 Create a new fluid object. Fluids are not special variables or
5374 some other extension to the semantics of Scheme, but rather
5375 ordinary Scheme objects. You can store them into variables (that
5376 are still lexically scoped, of course) or into any other place you
5377 like. Every fluid has a initial value of `#f'.
5379 Function: fluid? OBJ
5381 Test whether OBJ is a fluid.
5383 Function: fluid-ref FLUID
5384 Function: fluid-set! FLUID VAL
5386 Access/modify the fluid FLUID. Modifications are only visible
5387 within the current dynamic root (that includes threads).
5389 Function: with-fluids* FLUIDS VALUES THUNK
5391 FLUIDS is a list of fluids and VALUES a corresponding list of
5392 values for these fluids. Before THUNK gets called the values are
5393 installed in the fluids and the old values of the fluids are
5394 saved in the VALUES list. When the flow of control leaves THUNK
5395 or reenters it, the values get swapped again. You might think of
5396 this as a `safe-fluid-excursion'. Note that the VALUES list is
5397 modified by `with-fluids*'.
5399 Macro: with-fluids ((FLUID VALUE) ...) FORM ...
5401 The same as `with-fluids*' but with a different syntax. It looks
5402 just like `let', but both FLUID and VALUE are evaluated. Remember,
5403 fluids are not special variables but ordinary objects. FLUID
5404 should evaluate to a fluid.
5406 ** Changes to system call interfaces:
5408 *** close-port, close-input-port and close-output-port now return a
5409 boolean instead of an `unspecified' object. #t means that the port
5410 was successfully closed, while #f means it was already closed. It is
5411 also now possible for these procedures to raise an exception if an
5412 error occurs (some errors from write can be delayed until close.)
5414 *** the first argument to chmod, fcntl, ftell and fseek can now be a
5417 *** the third argument to fcntl is now optional.
5419 *** the first argument to chown can now be a file descriptor or a port.
5421 *** the argument to stat can now be a port.
5423 *** The following new procedures have been added (most use scsh
5426 *** procedure: close PORT/FD
5427 Similar to close-port (*note close-port: Closing Ports.), but also
5428 works on file descriptors. A side effect of closing a file
5429 descriptor is that any ports using that file descriptor are moved
5430 to a different file descriptor and have their revealed counts set
5433 *** procedure: port->fdes PORT
5434 Returns the integer file descriptor underlying PORT. As a side
5435 effect the revealed count of PORT is incremented.
5437 *** procedure: fdes->ports FDES
5438 Returns a list of existing ports which have FDES as an underlying
5439 file descriptor, without changing their revealed counts.
5441 *** procedure: fdes->inport FDES
5442 Returns an existing input port which has FDES as its underlying
5443 file descriptor, if one exists, and increments its revealed count.
5444 Otherwise, returns a new input port with a revealed count of 1.
5446 *** procedure: fdes->outport FDES
5447 Returns an existing output port which has FDES as its underlying
5448 file descriptor, if one exists, and increments its revealed count.
5449 Otherwise, returns a new output port with a revealed count of 1.
5451 The next group of procedures perform a `dup2' system call, if NEWFD
5452 (an integer) is supplied, otherwise a `dup'. The file descriptor to be
5453 duplicated can be supplied as an integer or contained in a port. The
5454 type of value returned varies depending on which procedure is used.
5456 All procedures also have the side effect when performing `dup2' that
5457 any ports using NEWFD are moved to a different file descriptor and have
5458 their revealed counts set to zero.
5460 *** procedure: dup->fdes PORT/FD [NEWFD]
5461 Returns an integer file descriptor.
5463 *** procedure: dup->inport PORT/FD [NEWFD]
5464 Returns a new input port using the new file descriptor.
5466 *** procedure: dup->outport PORT/FD [NEWFD]
5467 Returns a new output port using the new file descriptor.
5469 *** procedure: dup PORT/FD [NEWFD]
5470 Returns a new port if PORT/FD is a port, with the same mode as the
5471 supplied port, otherwise returns an integer file descriptor.
5473 *** procedure: dup->port PORT/FD MODE [NEWFD]
5474 Returns a new port using the new file descriptor. MODE supplies a
5475 mode string for the port (*note open-file: File Ports.).
5477 *** procedure: setenv NAME VALUE
5478 Modifies the environment of the current process, which is also the
5479 default environment inherited by child processes.
5481 If VALUE is `#f', then NAME is removed from the environment.
5482 Otherwise, the string NAME=VALUE is added to the environment,
5483 replacing any existing string with name matching NAME.
5485 The return value is unspecified.
5487 *** procedure: truncate-file OBJ SIZE
5488 Truncates the file referred to by OBJ to at most SIZE bytes. OBJ
5489 can be a string containing a file name or an integer file
5490 descriptor or port open for output on the file. The underlying
5491 system calls are `truncate' and `ftruncate'.
5493 The return value is unspecified.
5495 *** procedure: setvbuf PORT MODE [SIZE]
5496 Set the buffering mode for PORT. MODE can be:
5504 block buffered, using a newly allocated buffer of SIZE bytes.
5505 However if SIZE is zero or unspecified, the port will be made
5508 This procedure should not be used after I/O has been performed with
5511 Ports are usually block buffered by default, with a default buffer
5512 size. Procedures e.g., *Note open-file: File Ports, which accept a
5513 mode string allow `0' to be added to request an unbuffered port.
5515 *** procedure: fsync PORT/FD
5516 Copies any unwritten data for the specified output file descriptor
5517 to disk. If PORT/FD is a port, its buffer is flushed before the
5518 underlying file descriptor is fsync'd. The return value is
5521 *** procedure: open-fdes PATH FLAGS [MODES]
5522 Similar to `open' but returns a file descriptor instead of a port.
5524 *** procedure: execle PATH ENV [ARG] ...
5525 Similar to `execl', but the environment of the new process is
5526 specified by ENV, which must be a list of strings as returned by
5527 the `environ' procedure.
5529 This procedure is currently implemented using the `execve' system
5530 call, but we call it `execle' because of its Scheme calling
5533 *** procedure: strerror ERRNO
5534 Returns the Unix error message corresponding to ERRNO, an integer.
5536 *** procedure: primitive-exit [STATUS]
5537 Terminate the current process without unwinding the Scheme stack.
5538 This is would typically be useful after a fork. The exit status
5539 is STATUS if supplied, otherwise zero.
5541 *** procedure: times
5542 Returns an object with information about real and processor time.
5543 The following procedures accept such an object as an argument and
5544 return a selected component:
5547 The current real time, expressed as time units relative to an
5551 The CPU time units used by the calling process.
5554 The CPU time units used by the system on behalf of the
5558 The CPU time units used by terminated child processes of the
5559 calling process, whose status has been collected (e.g., using
5563 Similarly, the CPU times units used by the system on behalf of
5564 terminated child processes.
5566 ** Removed: list-length
5567 ** Removed: list-append, list-append!
5568 ** Removed: list-reverse, list-reverse!
5570 ** array-map renamed to array-map!
5572 ** serial-array-map renamed to serial-array-map!
5574 ** catch doesn't take #f as first argument any longer
5576 Previously, it was possible to pass #f instead of a key to `catch'.
5577 That would cause `catch' to pass a jump buffer object to the procedure
5578 passed as second argument. The procedure could then use this jump
5579 buffer objekt as an argument to throw.
5581 This mechanism has been removed since its utility doesn't motivate the
5582 extra complexity it introduces.
5584 ** The `#/' notation for lists now provokes a warning message from Guile.
5585 This syntax will be removed from Guile in the near future.
5587 To disable the warning message, set the GUILE_HUSH environment
5588 variable to any non-empty value.
5590 ** The newline character now prints as `#\newline', following the
5591 normal Scheme notation, not `#\nl'.
5593 * Changes to the gh_ interface
5595 ** The gh_enter function now takes care of loading the Guile startup files.
5596 gh_enter works by calling scm_boot_guile; see the remarks below.
5598 ** Function: void gh_write (SCM x)
5600 Write the printed representation of the scheme object x to the current
5601 output port. Corresponds to the scheme level `write'.
5603 ** gh_list_length renamed to gh_length.
5605 ** vector handling routines
5607 Several major changes. In particular, gh_vector() now resembles
5608 (vector ...) (with a caveat -- see manual), and gh_make_vector() now
5609 exists and behaves like (make-vector ...). gh_vset() and gh_vref()
5610 have been renamed gh_vector_set_x() and gh_vector_ref(). Some missing
5611 vector-related gh_ functions have been implemented.
5613 ** pair and list routines
5615 Implemented several of the R4RS pair and list functions that were
5618 ** gh_scm2doubles, gh_doubles2scm, gh_doubles2dvect
5620 New function. Converts double arrays back and forth between Scheme
5623 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5625 ** The function scm_boot_guile now takes care of loading the startup files.
5627 Guile's primary initialization function, scm_boot_guile, now takes
5628 care of loading `boot-9.scm', in the `ice-9' module, to initialize
5629 Guile, define the module system, and put together some standard
5630 bindings. It also loads `init.scm', which is intended to hold
5631 site-specific initialization code.
5633 Since Guile cannot operate properly until boot-9.scm is loaded, there
5634 is no reason to separate loading boot-9.scm from Guile's other
5635 initialization processes.
5637 This job used to be done by scm_compile_shell_switches, which didn't
5638 make much sense; in particular, it meant that people using Guile for
5639 non-shell-like applications had to jump through hoops to get Guile
5640 initialized properly.
5642 ** The function scm_compile_shell_switches no longer loads the startup files.
5643 Now, Guile always loads the startup files, whenever it is initialized;
5644 see the notes above for scm_boot_guile and scm_load_startup_files.
5646 ** Function: scm_load_startup_files
5647 This new function takes care of loading Guile's initialization file
5648 (`boot-9.scm'), and the site initialization file, `init.scm'. Since
5649 this is always called by the Guile initialization process, it's
5650 probably not too useful to call this yourself, but it's there anyway.
5652 ** The semantics of smob marking have changed slightly.
5654 The smob marking function (the `mark' member of the scm_smobfuns
5655 structure) is no longer responsible for setting the mark bit on the
5656 smob. The generic smob handling code in the garbage collector will
5657 set this bit. The mark function need only ensure that any other
5658 objects the smob refers to get marked.
5660 Note that this change means that the smob's GC8MARK bit is typically
5661 already set upon entry to the mark function. Thus, marking functions
5662 which look like this:
5665 if (SCM_GC8MARKP (ptr))
5667 SCM_SETGC8MARK (ptr);
5668 ... mark objects to which the smob refers ...
5671 are now incorrect, since they will return early, and fail to mark any
5672 other objects the smob refers to. Some code in the Guile library used
5675 ** The semantics of the I/O port functions in scm_ptobfuns have changed.
5677 If you have implemented your own I/O port type, by writing the
5678 functions required by the scm_ptobfuns and then calling scm_newptob,
5679 you will need to change your functions slightly.
5681 The functions in a scm_ptobfuns structure now expect the port itself
5682 as their argument; they used to expect the `stream' member of the
5683 port's scm_port_table structure. This allows functions in an
5684 scm_ptobfuns structure to easily access the port's cell (and any flags
5685 it its CAR), and the port's scm_port_table structure.
5687 Guile now passes the I/O port itself as the `port' argument in the
5688 following scm_ptobfuns functions:
5690 int (*free) (SCM port);
5691 int (*fputc) (int, SCM port);
5692 int (*fputs) (char *, SCM port);
5693 scm_sizet (*fwrite) SCM_P ((char *ptr,
5697 int (*fflush) (SCM port);
5698 int (*fgetc) (SCM port);
5699 int (*fclose) (SCM port);
5701 The interfaces to the `mark', `print', `equalp', and `fgets' methods
5704 If you have existing code which defines its own port types, it is easy
5705 to convert your code to the new interface; simply apply SCM_STREAM to
5706 the port argument to yield the value you code used to expect.
5708 Note that since both the port and the stream have the same type in the
5709 C code --- they are both SCM values --- the C compiler will not remind
5710 you if you forget to update your scm_ptobfuns functions.
5713 ** Function: int scm_internal_select (int fds,
5717 struct timeval *timeout);
5719 This is a replacement for the `select' function provided by the OS.
5720 It enables I/O blocking and sleeping to happen for one cooperative
5721 thread without blocking other threads. It also avoids busy-loops in
5722 these situations. It is intended that all I/O blocking and sleeping
5723 will finally go through this function. Currently, this function is
5724 only available on systems providing `gettimeofday' and `select'.
5726 ** Function: SCM scm_internal_stack_catch (SCM tag,
5727 scm_catch_body_t body,
5729 scm_catch_handler_t handler,
5732 A new sibling to the other two C level `catch' functions
5733 scm_internal_catch and scm_internal_lazy_catch. Use it if you want
5734 the stack to be saved automatically into the variable `the-last-stack'
5735 (scm_the_last_stack_var) on error. This is necessary if you want to
5736 use advanced error reporting, such as calling scm_display_error and
5737 scm_display_backtrace. (They both take a stack object as argument.)
5739 ** Function: SCM scm_spawn_thread (scm_catch_body_t body,
5741 scm_catch_handler_t handler,
5744 Spawns a new thread. It does a job similar to
5745 scm_call_with_new_thread but takes arguments more suitable when
5746 spawning threads from application C code.
5748 ** The hook scm_error_callback has been removed. It was originally
5749 intended as a way for the user to install his own error handler. But
5750 that method works badly since it intervenes between throw and catch,
5751 thereby changing the semantics of expressions like (catch #t ...).
5752 The correct way to do it is to use one of the C level catch functions
5753 in throw.c: scm_internal_catch/lazy_catch/stack_catch.
5755 ** Removed functions:
5757 scm_obj_length, scm_list_length, scm_list_append, scm_list_append_x,
5758 scm_list_reverse, scm_list_reverse_x
5760 ** New macros: SCM_LISTn where n is one of the integers 0-9.
5762 These can be used for pretty list creation from C. The idea is taken
5763 from Erick Gallesio's STk.
5765 ** scm_array_map renamed to scm_array_map_x
5767 ** mbstrings are now removed
5769 This means that the type codes scm_tc7_mb_string and
5770 scm_tc7_mb_substring has been removed.
5772 ** scm_gen_putc, scm_gen_puts, scm_gen_write, and scm_gen_getc have changed.
5774 Since we no longer support multi-byte strings, these I/O functions
5775 have been simplified, and renamed. Here are their old names, and
5776 their new names and arguments:
5778 scm_gen_putc -> void scm_putc (int c, SCM port);
5779 scm_gen_puts -> void scm_puts (char *s, SCM port);
5780 scm_gen_write -> void scm_lfwrite (char *ptr, scm_sizet size, SCM port);
5781 scm_gen_getc -> void scm_getc (SCM port);
5784 ** The macros SCM_TYP7D and SCM_TYP7SD has been removed.
5786 ** The macro SCM_TYP7S has taken the role of the old SCM_TYP7D
5788 SCM_TYP7S now masks away the bit which distinguishes substrings from
5791 ** scm_catch_body_t: Backward incompatible change!
5793 Body functions to scm_internal_catch and friends do not any longer
5794 take a second argument. This is because it is no longer possible to
5795 pass a #f arg to catch.
5797 ** Calls to scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect now nest properly.
5799 The function scm_protect_object protects its argument from being freed
5800 by the garbage collector. scm_unprotect_object removes that
5803 These functions now nest properly. That is, for every object O, there
5804 is a counter which scm_protect_object(O) increments and
5805 scm_unprotect_object(O) decrements, if the counter is greater than
5806 zero. Every object's counter is zero when it is first created. If an
5807 object's counter is greater than zero, the garbage collector will not
5808 reclaim its storage.
5810 This allows you to use scm_protect_object in your code without
5811 worrying that some other function you call will call
5812 scm_unprotect_object, and allow it to be freed. Assuming that the
5813 functions you call are well-behaved, and unprotect only those objects
5814 they protect, you can follow the same rule and have confidence that
5815 objects will be freed only at appropriate times.
5818 Changes in Guile 1.2 (released Tuesday, June 24 1997):
5820 * Changes to the distribution
5822 ** Nightly snapshots are now available from ftp.red-bean.com.
5823 The old server, ftp.cyclic.com, has been relinquished to its rightful
5826 Nightly snapshots of the Guile development sources are now available via
5827 anonymous FTP from ftp.red-bean.com, as /pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz.
5829 Via the web, that's: ftp://ftp.red-bean.com/pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz
5830 For getit, that's: ftp.red-bean.com:/pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz
5832 ** To run Guile without installing it, the procedure has changed a bit.
5834 If you used a separate build directory to compile Guile, you'll need
5835 to include the build directory in SCHEME_LOAD_PATH, as well as the
5836 source directory. See the `INSTALL' file for examples.
5838 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
5840 ** The standard Guile load path for Scheme code now includes
5841 $(datadir)/guile (usually /usr/local/share/guile). This means that
5842 you can install your own Scheme files there, and Guile will find them.
5843 (Previous versions of Guile only checked a directory whose name
5844 contained the Guile version number, so you had to re-install or move
5845 your Scheme sources each time you installed a fresh version of Guile.)
5847 The load path also includes $(datadir)/guile/site; we recommend
5848 putting individual Scheme files there. If you want to install a
5849 package with multiple source files, create a directory for them under
5852 ** Guile 1.2 will now use the Rx regular expression library, if it is
5853 installed on your system. When you are linking libguile into your own
5854 programs, this means you will have to link against -lguile, -lqt (if
5855 you configured Guile with thread support), and -lrx.
5857 If you are using autoconf to generate configuration scripts for your
5858 application, the following lines should suffice to add the appropriate
5859 libraries to your link command:
5861 ### Find Rx, quickthreads and libguile.
5862 AC_CHECK_LIB(rx, main)
5863 AC_CHECK_LIB(qt, main)
5864 AC_CHECK_LIB(guile, scm_shell)
5866 The Guile 1.2 distribution does not contain sources for the Rx
5867 library, as Guile 1.0 did. If you want to use Rx, you'll need to
5868 retrieve it from a GNU FTP site and install it separately.
5870 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
5872 ** The dynamic linking features of Guile are now enabled by default.
5873 You can disable them by giving the `--disable-dynamic-linking' option
5876 (dynamic-link FILENAME)
5878 Find the object file denoted by FILENAME (a string) and link it
5879 into the running Guile application. When everything works out,
5880 return a Scheme object suitable for representing the linked object
5881 file. Otherwise an error is thrown. How object files are
5882 searched is system dependent.
5884 (dynamic-object? VAL)
5886 Determine whether VAL represents a dynamically linked object file.
5888 (dynamic-unlink DYNOBJ)
5890 Unlink the indicated object file from the application. DYNOBJ
5891 should be one of the values returned by `dynamic-link'.
5893 (dynamic-func FUNCTION DYNOBJ)
5895 Search the C function indicated by FUNCTION (a string or symbol)
5896 in DYNOBJ and return some Scheme object that can later be used
5897 with `dynamic-call' to actually call this function. Right now,
5898 these Scheme objects are formed by casting the address of the
5899 function to `long' and converting this number to its Scheme
5902 (dynamic-call FUNCTION DYNOBJ)
5904 Call the C function indicated by FUNCTION and DYNOBJ. The
5905 function is passed no arguments and its return value is ignored.
5906 When FUNCTION is something returned by `dynamic-func', call that
5907 function and ignore DYNOBJ. When FUNCTION is a string (or symbol,
5908 etc.), look it up in DYNOBJ; this is equivalent to
5910 (dynamic-call (dynamic-func FUNCTION DYNOBJ) #f)
5912 Interrupts are deferred while the C function is executing (with
5913 SCM_DEFER_INTS/SCM_ALLOW_INTS).
5915 (dynamic-args-call FUNCTION DYNOBJ ARGS)
5917 Call the C function indicated by FUNCTION and DYNOBJ, but pass it
5918 some arguments and return its return value. The C function is
5919 expected to take two arguments and return an `int', just like
5922 int c_func (int argc, char **argv);
5924 ARGS must be a list of strings and is converted into an array of
5925 `char *'. The array is passed in ARGV and its size in ARGC. The
5926 return value is converted to a Scheme number and returned from the
5927 call to `dynamic-args-call'.
5929 When dynamic linking is disabled or not supported on your system,
5930 the above functions throw errors, but they are still available.
5932 Here is a small example that works on GNU/Linux:
5934 (define libc-obj (dynamic-link "libc.so"))
5935 (dynamic-args-call 'rand libc-obj '())
5937 See the file `libguile/DYNAMIC-LINKING' for additional comments.
5939 ** The #/ syntax for module names is depreciated, and will be removed
5940 in a future version of Guile. Instead of
5948 The latter syntax is more consistent with existing Lisp practice.
5950 ** Guile now does fancier printing of structures. Structures are the
5951 underlying implementation for records, which in turn are used to
5952 implement modules, so all of these object now print differently and in
5953 a more informative way.
5955 The Scheme printer will examine the builtin variable *struct-printer*
5956 whenever it needs to print a structure object. When this variable is
5957 not `#f' it is deemed to be a procedure and will be applied to the
5958 structure object and the output port. When *struct-printer* is `#f'
5959 or the procedure return `#f' the structure object will be printed in
5960 the boring #<struct 80458270> form.
5962 This hook is used by some routines in ice-9/boot-9.scm to implement
5963 type specific printing routines. Please read the comments there about
5966 One of the more specific uses of structs are records. The printing
5967 procedure that could be passed to MAKE-RECORD-TYPE is now actually
5968 called. It should behave like a *struct-printer* procedure (described
5971 ** Guile now supports a new R4RS-compliant syntax for keywords. A
5972 token of the form #:NAME, where NAME has the same syntax as a Scheme
5973 symbol, is the external representation of the keyword named NAME.
5974 Keyword objects print using this syntax as well, so values containing
5975 keyword objects can be read back into Guile. When used in an
5976 expression, keywords are self-quoting objects.
5978 Guile suports this read syntax, and uses this print syntax, regardless
5979 of the current setting of the `keyword' read option. The `keyword'
5980 read option only controls whether Guile recognizes the `:NAME' syntax,
5981 which is incompatible with R4RS. (R4RS says such token represent
5984 ** Guile has regular expression support again. Guile 1.0 included
5985 functions for matching regular expressions, based on the Rx library.
5986 In Guile 1.1, the Guile/Rx interface was removed to simplify the
5987 distribution, and thus Guile had no regular expression support. Guile
5988 1.2 again supports the most commonly used functions, and supports all
5989 of SCSH's regular expression functions.
5991 If your system does not include a POSIX regular expression library,
5992 and you have not linked Guile with a third-party regexp library such as
5993 Rx, these functions will not be available. You can tell whether your
5994 Guile installation includes regular expression support by checking
5995 whether the `*features*' list includes the `regex' symbol.
5997 *** regexp functions
5999 By default, Guile supports POSIX extended regular expressions. That
6000 means that the characters `(', `)', `+' and `?' are special, and must
6001 be escaped if you wish to match the literal characters.
6003 This regular expression interface was modeled after that implemented
6004 by SCSH, the Scheme Shell. It is intended to be upwardly compatible
6005 with SCSH regular expressions.
6007 **** Function: string-match PATTERN STR [START]
6008 Compile the string PATTERN into a regular expression and compare
6009 it with STR. The optional numeric argument START specifies the
6010 position of STR at which to begin matching.
6012 `string-match' returns a "match structure" which describes what,
6013 if anything, was matched by the regular expression. *Note Match
6014 Structures::. If STR does not match PATTERN at all,
6015 `string-match' returns `#f'.
6017 Each time `string-match' is called, it must compile its PATTERN
6018 argument into a regular expression structure. This operation is
6019 expensive, which makes `string-match' inefficient if the same regular
6020 expression is used several times (for example, in a loop). For better
6021 performance, you can compile a regular expression in advance and then
6022 match strings against the compiled regexp.
6024 **** Function: make-regexp STR [FLAGS]
6025 Compile the regular expression described by STR, and return the
6026 compiled regexp structure. If STR does not describe a legal
6027 regular expression, `make-regexp' throws a
6028 `regular-expression-syntax' error.
6030 FLAGS may be the bitwise-or of one or more of the following:
6032 **** Constant: regexp/extended
6033 Use POSIX Extended Regular Expression syntax when interpreting
6034 STR. If not set, POSIX Basic Regular Expression syntax is used.
6035 If the FLAGS argument is omitted, we assume regexp/extended.
6037 **** Constant: regexp/icase
6038 Do not differentiate case. Subsequent searches using the
6039 returned regular expression will be case insensitive.
6041 **** Constant: regexp/newline
6042 Match-any-character operators don't match a newline.
6044 A non-matching list ([^...]) not containing a newline matches a
6047 Match-beginning-of-line operator (^) matches the empty string
6048 immediately after a newline, regardless of whether the FLAGS
6049 passed to regexp-exec contain regexp/notbol.
6051 Match-end-of-line operator ($) matches the empty string
6052 immediately before a newline, regardless of whether the FLAGS
6053 passed to regexp-exec contain regexp/noteol.
6055 **** Function: regexp-exec REGEXP STR [START [FLAGS]]
6056 Match the compiled regular expression REGEXP against `str'. If
6057 the optional integer START argument is provided, begin matching
6058 from that position in the string. Return a match structure
6059 describing the results of the match, or `#f' if no match could be
6062 FLAGS may be the bitwise-or of one or more of the following:
6064 **** Constant: regexp/notbol
6065 The match-beginning-of-line operator always fails to match (but
6066 see the compilation flag regexp/newline above) This flag may be
6067 used when different portions of a string are passed to
6068 regexp-exec and the beginning of the string should not be
6069 interpreted as the beginning of the line.
6071 **** Constant: regexp/noteol
6072 The match-end-of-line operator always fails to match (but see the
6073 compilation flag regexp/newline above)
6075 **** Function: regexp? OBJ
6076 Return `#t' if OBJ is a compiled regular expression, or `#f'
6079 Regular expressions are commonly used to find patterns in one string
6080 and replace them with the contents of another string.
6082 **** Function: regexp-substitute PORT MATCH [ITEM...]
6083 Write to the output port PORT selected contents of the match
6084 structure MATCH. Each ITEM specifies what should be written, and
6085 may be one of the following arguments:
6087 * A string. String arguments are written out verbatim.
6089 * An integer. The submatch with that number is written.
6091 * The symbol `pre'. The portion of the matched string preceding
6092 the regexp match is written.
6094 * The symbol `post'. The portion of the matched string
6095 following the regexp match is written.
6097 PORT may be `#f', in which case nothing is written; instead,
6098 `regexp-substitute' constructs a string from the specified ITEMs
6101 **** Function: regexp-substitute/global PORT REGEXP TARGET [ITEM...]
6102 Similar to `regexp-substitute', but can be used to perform global
6103 substitutions on STR. Instead of taking a match structure as an
6104 argument, `regexp-substitute/global' takes two string arguments: a
6105 REGEXP string describing a regular expression, and a TARGET string
6106 which should be matched against this regular expression.
6108 Each ITEM behaves as in REGEXP-SUBSTITUTE, with the following
6111 * A function may be supplied. When this function is called, it
6112 will be passed one argument: a match structure for a given
6113 regular expression match. It should return a string to be
6114 written out to PORT.
6116 * The `post' symbol causes `regexp-substitute/global' to recurse
6117 on the unmatched portion of STR. This *must* be supplied in
6118 order to perform global search-and-replace on STR; if it is
6119 not present among the ITEMs, then `regexp-substitute/global'
6120 will return after processing a single match.
6122 *** Match Structures
6124 A "match structure" is the object returned by `string-match' and
6125 `regexp-exec'. It describes which portion of a string, if any, matched
6126 the given regular expression. Match structures include: a reference to
6127 the string that was checked for matches; the starting and ending
6128 positions of the regexp match; and, if the regexp included any
6129 parenthesized subexpressions, the starting and ending positions of each
6132 In each of the regexp match functions described below, the `match'
6133 argument must be a match structure returned by a previous call to
6134 `string-match' or `regexp-exec'. Most of these functions return some
6135 information about the original target string that was matched against a
6136 regular expression; we will call that string TARGET for easy reference.
6138 **** Function: regexp-match? OBJ
6139 Return `#t' if OBJ is a match structure returned by a previous
6140 call to `regexp-exec', or `#f' otherwise.
6142 **** Function: match:substring MATCH [N]
6143 Return the portion of TARGET matched by subexpression number N.
6144 Submatch 0 (the default) represents the entire regexp match. If
6145 the regular expression as a whole matched, but the subexpression
6146 number N did not match, return `#f'.
6148 **** Function: match:start MATCH [N]
6149 Return the starting position of submatch number N.
6151 **** Function: match:end MATCH [N]
6152 Return the ending position of submatch number N.
6154 **** Function: match:prefix MATCH
6155 Return the unmatched portion of TARGET preceding the regexp match.
6157 **** Function: match:suffix MATCH
6158 Return the unmatched portion of TARGET following the regexp match.
6160 **** Function: match:count MATCH
6161 Return the number of parenthesized subexpressions from MATCH.
6162 Note that the entire regular expression match itself counts as a
6163 subexpression, and failed submatches are included in the count.
6165 **** Function: match:string MATCH
6166 Return the original TARGET string.
6168 *** Backslash Escapes
6170 Sometimes you will want a regexp to match characters like `*' or `$'
6171 exactly. For example, to check whether a particular string represents
6172 a menu entry from an Info node, it would be useful to match it against
6173 a regexp like `^* [^:]*::'. However, this won't work; because the
6174 asterisk is a metacharacter, it won't match the `*' at the beginning of
6175 the string. In this case, we want to make the first asterisk un-magic.
6177 You can do this by preceding the metacharacter with a backslash
6178 character `\'. (This is also called "quoting" the metacharacter, and
6179 is known as a "backslash escape".) When Guile sees a backslash in a
6180 regular expression, it considers the following glyph to be an ordinary
6181 character, no matter what special meaning it would ordinarily have.
6182 Therefore, we can make the above example work by changing the regexp to
6183 `^\* [^:]*::'. The `\*' sequence tells the regular expression engine
6184 to match only a single asterisk in the target string.
6186 Since the backslash is itself a metacharacter, you may force a
6187 regexp to match a backslash in the target string by preceding the
6188 backslash with itself. For example, to find variable references in a
6189 TeX program, you might want to find occurrences of the string `\let\'
6190 followed by any number of alphabetic characters. The regular expression
6191 `\\let\\[A-Za-z]*' would do this: the double backslashes in the regexp
6192 each match a single backslash in the target string.
6194 **** Function: regexp-quote STR
6195 Quote each special character found in STR with a backslash, and
6196 return the resulting string.
6198 *Very important:* Using backslash escapes in Guile source code (as
6199 in Emacs Lisp or C) can be tricky, because the backslash character has
6200 special meaning for the Guile reader. For example, if Guile encounters
6201 the character sequence `\n' in the middle of a string while processing
6202 Scheme code, it replaces those characters with a newline character.
6203 Similarly, the character sequence `\t' is replaced by a horizontal tab.
6204 Several of these "escape sequences" are processed by the Guile reader
6205 before your code is executed. Unrecognized escape sequences are
6206 ignored: if the characters `\*' appear in a string, they will be
6207 translated to the single character `*'.
6209 This translation is obviously undesirable for regular expressions,
6210 since we want to be able to include backslashes in a string in order to
6211 escape regexp metacharacters. Therefore, to make sure that a backslash
6212 is preserved in a string in your Guile program, you must use *two*
6213 consecutive backslashes:
6215 (define Info-menu-entry-pattern (make-regexp "^\\* [^:]*"))
6217 The string in this example is preprocessed by the Guile reader before
6218 any code is executed. The resulting argument to `make-regexp' is the
6219 string `^\* [^:]*', which is what we really want.
6221 This also means that in order to write a regular expression that
6222 matches a single backslash character, the regular expression string in
6223 the source code must include *four* backslashes. Each consecutive pair
6224 of backslashes gets translated by the Guile reader to a single
6225 backslash, and the resulting double-backslash is interpreted by the
6226 regexp engine as matching a single backslash character. Hence:
6228 (define tex-variable-pattern (make-regexp "\\\\let\\\\=[A-Za-z]*"))
6230 The reason for the unwieldiness of this syntax is historical. Both
6231 regular expression pattern matchers and Unix string processing systems
6232 have traditionally used backslashes with the special meanings described
6233 above. The POSIX regular expression specification and ANSI C standard
6234 both require these semantics. Attempting to abandon either convention
6235 would cause other kinds of compatibility problems, possibly more severe
6236 ones. Therefore, without extending the Scheme reader to support
6237 strings with different quoting conventions (an ungainly and confusing
6238 extension when implemented in other languages), we must adhere to this
6239 cumbersome escape syntax.
6241 * Changes to the gh_ interface
6243 * Changes to the scm_ interface
6245 * Changes to system call interfaces:
6247 ** The value returned by `raise' is now unspecified. It throws an exception
6250 *** A new procedure `sigaction' can be used to install signal handlers
6252 (sigaction signum [action] [flags])
6254 signum is the signal number, which can be specified using the value
6257 If action is omitted, sigaction returns a pair: the CAR is the current
6258 signal hander, which will be either an integer with the value SIG_DFL
6259 (default action) or SIG_IGN (ignore), or the Scheme procedure which
6260 handles the signal, or #f if a non-Scheme procedure handles the
6261 signal. The CDR contains the current sigaction flags for the handler.
6263 If action is provided, it is installed as the new handler for signum.
6264 action can be a Scheme procedure taking one argument, or the value of
6265 SIG_DFL (default action) or SIG_IGN (ignore), or #f to restore
6266 whatever signal handler was installed before sigaction was first used.
6267 Flags can optionally be specified for the new handler (SA_RESTART is
6268 always used if the system provides it, so need not be specified.) The
6269 return value is a pair with information about the old handler as
6272 This interface does not provide access to the "signal blocking"
6273 facility. Maybe this is not needed, since the thread support may
6274 provide solutions to the problem of consistent access to data
6277 *** A new procedure `flush-all-ports' is equivalent to running
6278 `force-output' on every port open for output.
6280 ** Guile now provides information on how it was built, via the new
6281 global variable, %guile-build-info. This variable records the values
6282 of the standard GNU makefile directory variables as an assocation
6283 list, mapping variable names (symbols) onto directory paths (strings).
6284 For example, to find out where the Guile link libraries were
6285 installed, you can say:
6287 guile -c "(display (assq-ref %guile-build-info 'libdir)) (newline)"
6290 * Changes to the scm_ interface
6292 ** The new function scm_handle_by_message_noexit is just like the
6293 existing scm_handle_by_message function, except that it doesn't call
6294 exit to terminate the process. Instead, it prints a message and just
6295 returns #f. This might be a more appropriate catch-all handler for
6296 new dynamic roots and threads.
6299 Changes in Guile 1.1 (released Friday, May 16 1997):
6301 * Changes to the distribution.
6303 The Guile 1.0 distribution has been split up into several smaller
6305 guile-core --- the Guile interpreter itself.
6306 guile-tcltk --- the interface between the Guile interpreter and
6307 Tcl/Tk; Tcl is an interpreter for a stringy language, and Tk
6308 is a toolkit for building graphical user interfaces.
6309 guile-rgx-ctax --- the interface between Guile and the Rx regular
6310 expression matcher, and the translator for the Ctax
6311 programming language. These are packaged together because the
6312 Ctax translator uses Rx to parse Ctax source code.
6314 This NEWS file describes the changes made to guile-core since the 1.0
6317 We no longer distribute the documentation, since it was either out of
6318 date, or incomplete. As soon as we have current documentation, we
6323 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
6325 ** guile now accepts command-line arguments compatible with SCSH, Olin
6326 Shivers' Scheme Shell.
6328 In general, arguments are evaluated from left to right, but there are
6329 exceptions. The following switches stop argument processing, and
6330 stash all remaining command-line arguments as the value returned by
6331 the (command-line) function.
6332 -s SCRIPT load Scheme source code from FILE, and exit
6333 -c EXPR evalute Scheme expression EXPR, and exit
6334 -- stop scanning arguments; run interactively
6336 The switches below are processed as they are encountered.
6337 -l FILE load Scheme source code from FILE
6338 -e FUNCTION after reading script, apply FUNCTION to
6339 command line arguments
6340 -ds do -s script at this point
6341 --emacs enable Emacs protocol (experimental)
6342 -h, --help display this help and exit
6343 -v, --version display version information and exit
6344 \ read arguments from following script lines
6346 So, for example, here is a Guile script named `ekko' (thanks, Olin)
6347 which re-implements the traditional "echo" command:
6349 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
6352 (map (lambda (arg) (display arg) (display " "))
6356 (main (command-line))
6358 Suppose we invoke this script as follows:
6360 ekko a speckled gecko
6362 Through the magic of Unix script processing (triggered by the `#!'
6363 token at the top of the file), /usr/local/bin/guile receives the
6364 following list of command-line arguments:
6366 ("-s" "./ekko" "a" "speckled" "gecko")
6368 Unix inserts the name of the script after the argument specified on
6369 the first line of the file (in this case, "-s"), and then follows that
6370 with the arguments given to the script. Guile loads the script, which
6371 defines the `main' function, and then applies it to the list of
6372 remaining command-line arguments, ("a" "speckled" "gecko").
6374 In Unix, the first line of a script file must take the following form:
6376 #!INTERPRETER ARGUMENT
6378 where INTERPRETER is the absolute filename of the interpreter
6379 executable, and ARGUMENT is a single command-line argument to pass to
6382 You may only pass one argument to the interpreter, and its length is
6383 limited. These restrictions can be annoying to work around, so Guile
6384 provides a general mechanism (borrowed from, and compatible with,
6385 SCSH) for circumventing them.
6387 If the ARGUMENT in a Guile script is a single backslash character,
6388 `\', Guile will open the script file, parse arguments from its second
6389 and subsequent lines, and replace the `\' with them. So, for example,
6390 here is another implementation of the `ekko' script:
6392 #!/usr/local/bin/guile \
6396 (for-each (lambda (arg) (display arg) (display " "))
6400 If the user invokes this script as follows:
6402 ekko a speckled gecko
6404 Unix expands this into
6406 /usr/local/bin/guile \ ekko a speckled gecko
6408 When Guile sees the `\' argument, it replaces it with the arguments
6409 read from the second line of the script, producing:
6411 /usr/local/bin/guile -e main -s ekko a speckled gecko
6413 This tells Guile to load the `ekko' script, and apply the function
6414 `main' to the argument list ("a" "speckled" "gecko").
6416 Here is how Guile parses the command-line arguments:
6417 - Each space character terminates an argument. This means that two
6418 spaces in a row introduce an empty-string argument.
6419 - The tab character is not permitted (unless you quote it with the
6420 backslash character, as described below), to avoid confusion.
6421 - The newline character terminates the sequence of arguments, and will
6422 also terminate a final non-empty argument. (However, a newline
6423 following a space will not introduce a final empty-string argument;
6424 it only terminates the argument list.)
6425 - The backslash character is the escape character. It escapes
6426 backslash, space, tab, and newline. The ANSI C escape sequences
6427 like \n and \t are also supported. These produce argument
6428 constituents; the two-character combination \n doesn't act like a
6429 terminating newline. The escape sequence \NNN for exactly three
6430 octal digits reads as the character whose ASCII code is NNN. As
6431 above, characters produced this way are argument constituents.
6432 Backslash followed by other characters is not allowed.
6434 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
6436 ** Guile now builds and installs a shared guile library, if your
6437 system support shared libraries. (It still builds a static library on
6438 all systems.) Guile automatically detects whether your system
6439 supports shared libraries. To prevent Guile from buildisg shared
6440 libraries, pass the `--disable-shared' flag to the configure script.
6442 Guile takes longer to compile when it builds shared libraries, because
6443 it must compile every file twice --- once to produce position-
6444 independent object code, and once to produce normal object code.
6446 ** The libthreads library has been merged into libguile.
6448 To link a program against Guile, you now need only link against
6449 -lguile and -lqt; -lthreads is no longer needed. If you are using
6450 autoconf to generate configuration scripts for your application, the
6451 following lines should suffice to add the appropriate libraries to
6454 ### Find quickthreads and libguile.
6455 AC_CHECK_LIB(qt, main)
6456 AC_CHECK_LIB(guile, scm_shell)
6458 * Changes to Scheme functions
6460 ** Guile Scheme's special syntax for keyword objects is now optional,
6461 and disabled by default.
6463 The syntax variation from R4RS made it difficult to port some
6464 interesting packages to Guile. The routines which accepted keyword
6465 arguments (mostly in the module system) have been modified to also
6466 accept symbols whose names begin with `:'.
6468 To change the keyword syntax, you must first import the (ice-9 debug)
6470 (use-modules (ice-9 debug))
6472 Then you can enable the keyword syntax as follows:
6473 (read-set! keywords 'prefix)
6475 To disable keyword syntax, do this:
6476 (read-set! keywords #f)
6478 ** Many more primitive functions accept shared substrings as
6479 arguments. In the past, these functions required normal, mutable
6480 strings as arguments, although they never made use of this
6483 ** The uniform array functions now operate on byte vectors. These
6484 functions are `array-fill!', `serial-array-copy!', `array-copy!',
6485 `serial-array-map', `array-map', `array-for-each', and
6488 ** The new functions `trace' and `untrace' implement simple debugging
6489 support for Scheme functions.
6491 The `trace' function accepts any number of procedures as arguments,
6492 and tells the Guile interpreter to display each procedure's name and
6493 arguments each time the procedure is invoked. When invoked with no
6494 arguments, `trace' returns the list of procedures currently being
6497 The `untrace' function accepts any number of procedures as arguments,
6498 and tells the Guile interpreter not to trace them any more. When
6499 invoked with no arguments, `untrace' untraces all curretly traced
6502 The tracing in Guile has an advantage over most other systems: we
6503 don't create new procedure objects, but mark the procedure objects
6504 themselves. This means that anonymous and internal procedures can be
6507 ** The function `assert-repl-prompt' has been renamed to
6508 `set-repl-prompt!'. It takes one argument, PROMPT.
6509 - If PROMPT is #f, the Guile read-eval-print loop will not prompt.
6510 - If PROMPT is a string, we use it as a prompt.
6511 - If PROMPT is a procedure accepting no arguments, we call it, and
6512 display the result as a prompt.
6513 - Otherwise, we display "> ".
6515 ** The new function `eval-string' reads Scheme expressions from a
6516 string and evaluates them, returning the value of the last expression
6517 in the string. If the string contains no expressions, it returns an
6520 ** The new function `thunk?' returns true iff its argument is a
6521 procedure of zero arguments.
6523 ** `defined?' is now a builtin function, instead of syntax. This
6524 means that its argument should be quoted. It returns #t iff its
6525 argument is bound in the current module.
6527 ** The new syntax `use-modules' allows you to add new modules to your
6528 environment without re-typing a complete `define-module' form. It
6529 accepts any number of module names as arguments, and imports their
6530 public bindings into the current module.
6532 ** The new function (module-defined? NAME MODULE) returns true iff
6533 NAME, a symbol, is defined in MODULE, a module object.
6535 ** The new function `builtin-bindings' creates and returns a hash
6536 table containing copies of all the root module's bindings.
6538 ** The new function `builtin-weak-bindings' does the same as
6539 `builtin-bindings', but creates a doubly-weak hash table.
6541 ** The `equal?' function now considers variable objects to be
6542 equivalent if they have the same name and the same value.
6544 ** The new function `command-line' returns the command-line arguments
6545 given to Guile, as a list of strings.
6547 When using guile as a script interpreter, `command-line' returns the
6548 script's arguments; those processed by the interpreter (like `-s' or
6549 `-c') are omitted. (In other words, you get the normal, expected
6550 behavior.) Any application that uses scm_shell to process its
6551 command-line arguments gets this behavior as well.
6553 ** The new function `load-user-init' looks for a file called `.guile'
6554 in the user's home directory, and loads it if it exists. This is
6555 mostly for use by the code generated by scm_compile_shell_switches,
6556 but we thought it might also be useful in other circumstances.
6558 ** The new function `log10' returns the base-10 logarithm of its
6561 ** Changes to I/O functions
6563 *** The functions `read', `primitive-load', `read-and-eval!', and
6564 `primitive-load-path' no longer take optional arguments controlling
6565 case insensitivity and a `#' parser.
6567 Case sensitivity is now controlled by a read option called
6568 `case-insensitive'. The user can add new `#' syntaxes with the
6569 `read-hash-extend' function (see below).
6571 *** The new function `read-hash-extend' allows the user to change the
6572 syntax of Guile Scheme in a somewhat controlled way.
6574 (read-hash-extend CHAR PROC)
6575 When parsing S-expressions, if we read a `#' character followed by
6576 the character CHAR, use PROC to parse an object from the stream.
6577 If PROC is #f, remove any parsing procedure registered for CHAR.
6579 The reader applies PROC to two arguments: CHAR and an input port.
6581 *** The new functions read-delimited and read-delimited! provide a
6582 general mechanism for doing delimited input on streams.
6584 (read-delimited DELIMS [PORT HANDLE-DELIM])
6585 Read until we encounter one of the characters in DELIMS (a string),
6586 or end-of-file. PORT is the input port to read from; it defaults to
6587 the current input port. The HANDLE-DELIM parameter determines how
6588 the terminating character is handled; it should be one of the
6591 'trim omit delimiter from result
6592 'peek leave delimiter character in input stream
6593 'concat append delimiter character to returned value
6594 'split return a pair: (RESULT . TERMINATOR)
6596 HANDLE-DELIM defaults to 'peek.
6598 (read-delimited! DELIMS BUF [PORT HANDLE-DELIM START END])
6599 A side-effecting variant of `read-delimited'.
6601 The data is written into the string BUF at the indices in the
6602 half-open interval [START, END); the default interval is the whole
6603 string: START = 0 and END = (string-length BUF). The values of
6604 START and END must specify a well-defined interval in BUF, i.e.
6605 0 <= START <= END <= (string-length BUF).
6607 It returns NBYTES, the number of bytes read. If the buffer filled
6608 up without a delimiter character being found, it returns #f. If the
6609 port is at EOF when the read starts, it returns the EOF object.
6611 If an integer is returned (i.e., the read is successfully terminated
6612 by reading a delimiter character), then the HANDLE-DELIM parameter
6613 determines how to handle the terminating character. It is described
6614 above, and defaults to 'peek.
6616 (The descriptions of these functions were borrowed from the SCSH
6617 manual, by Olin Shivers and Brian Carlstrom.)
6619 *** The `%read-delimited!' function is the primitive used to implement
6620 `read-delimited' and `read-delimited!'.
6622 (%read-delimited! DELIMS BUF GOBBLE? [PORT START END])
6624 This returns a pair of values: (TERMINATOR . NUM-READ).
6625 - TERMINATOR describes why the read was terminated. If it is a
6626 character or the eof object, then that is the value that terminated
6627 the read. If it is #f, the function filled the buffer without finding
6628 a delimiting character.
6629 - NUM-READ is the number of characters read into BUF.
6631 If the read is successfully terminated by reading a delimiter
6632 character, then the gobble? parameter determines what to do with the
6633 terminating character. If true, the character is removed from the
6634 input stream; if false, the character is left in the input stream
6635 where a subsequent read operation will retrieve it. In either case,
6636 the character is also the first value returned by the procedure call.
6638 (The descriptions of this function was borrowed from the SCSH manual,
6639 by Olin Shivers and Brian Carlstrom.)
6641 *** The `read-line' and `read-line!' functions have changed; they now
6642 trim the terminator by default; previously they appended it to the
6643 returned string. For the old behavior, use (read-line PORT 'concat).
6645 *** The functions `uniform-array-read!' and `uniform-array-write!' now
6646 take new optional START and END arguments, specifying the region of
6647 the array to read and write.
6649 *** The `ungetc-char-ready?' function has been removed. We feel it's
6650 inappropriate for an interface to expose implementation details this
6653 ** Changes to the Unix library and system call interface
6655 *** The new fcntl function provides access to the Unix `fcntl' system
6658 (fcntl PORT COMMAND VALUE)
6659 Apply COMMAND to PORT's file descriptor, with VALUE as an argument.
6660 Values for COMMAND are:
6662 F_DUPFD duplicate a file descriptor
6663 F_GETFD read the descriptor's close-on-exec flag
6664 F_SETFD set the descriptor's close-on-exec flag to VALUE
6665 F_GETFL read the descriptor's flags, as set on open
6666 F_SETFL set the descriptor's flags, as set on open to VALUE
6667 F_GETOWN return the process ID of a socket's owner, for SIGIO
6668 F_SETOWN set the process that owns a socket to VALUE, for SIGIO
6669 FD_CLOEXEC not sure what this is
6671 For details, see the documentation for the fcntl system call.
6673 *** The arguments to `select' have changed, for compatibility with
6674 SCSH. The TIMEOUT parameter may now be non-integral, yielding the
6675 expected behavior. The MILLISECONDS parameter has been changed to
6676 MICROSECONDS, to more closely resemble the underlying system call.
6677 The RVEC, WVEC, and EVEC arguments can now be vectors; the type of the
6678 corresponding return set will be the same.
6680 *** The arguments to the `mknod' system call have changed. They are
6683 (mknod PATH TYPE PERMS DEV)
6684 Create a new file (`node') in the file system. PATH is the name of
6685 the file to create. TYPE is the kind of file to create; it should
6686 be 'fifo, 'block-special, or 'char-special. PERMS specifies the
6687 permission bits to give the newly created file. If TYPE is
6688 'block-special or 'char-special, DEV specifies which device the
6689 special file refers to; its interpretation depends on the kind of
6690 special file being created.
6692 *** The `fork' function has been renamed to `primitive-fork', to avoid
6693 clashing with various SCSH forks.
6695 *** The `recv' and `recvfrom' functions have been renamed to `recv!'
6696 and `recvfrom!'. They no longer accept a size for a second argument;
6697 you must pass a string to hold the received value. They no longer
6698 return the buffer. Instead, `recv' returns the length of the message
6699 received, and `recvfrom' returns a pair containing the packet's length
6700 and originating address.
6702 *** The file descriptor datatype has been removed, as have the
6703 `read-fd', `write-fd', `close', `lseek', and `dup' functions.
6704 We plan to replace these functions with a SCSH-compatible interface.
6706 *** The `create' function has been removed; it's just a special case
6709 *** There are new functions to break down process termination status
6710 values. In the descriptions below, STATUS is a value returned by
6713 (status:exit-val STATUS)
6714 If the child process exited normally, this function returns the exit
6715 code for the child process (i.e., the value passed to exit, or
6716 returned from main). If the child process did not exit normally,
6717 this function returns #f.
6719 (status:stop-sig STATUS)
6720 If the child process was suspended by a signal, this function
6721 returns the signal that suspended the child. Otherwise, it returns
6724 (status:term-sig STATUS)
6725 If the child process terminated abnormally, this function returns
6726 the signal that terminated the child. Otherwise, this function
6729 POSIX promises that exactly one of these functions will return true on
6730 a valid STATUS value.
6732 These functions are compatible with SCSH.
6734 *** There are new accessors and setters for the broken-out time vectors
6735 returned by `localtime', `gmtime', and that ilk. They are:
6737 Component Accessor Setter
6738 ========================= ============ ============
6739 seconds tm:sec set-tm:sec
6740 minutes tm:min set-tm:min
6741 hours tm:hour set-tm:hour
6742 day of the month tm:mday set-tm:mday
6743 month tm:mon set-tm:mon
6744 year tm:year set-tm:year
6745 day of the week tm:wday set-tm:wday
6746 day in the year tm:yday set-tm:yday
6747 daylight saving time tm:isdst set-tm:isdst
6748 GMT offset, seconds tm:gmtoff set-tm:gmtoff
6749 name of time zone tm:zone set-tm:zone
6751 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `uname',
6752 describing the host system:
6755 ============================================== ================
6756 name of the operating system implementation utsname:sysname
6757 network name of this machine utsname:nodename
6758 release level of the operating system utsname:release
6759 version level of the operating system utsname:version
6760 machine hardware platform utsname:machine
6762 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getpw',
6763 `getpwnam', `getpwuid', and `getpwent', describing entries from the
6764 system's user database:
6767 ====================== =================
6768 user name passwd:name
6769 user password passwd:passwd
6772 real name passwd:gecos
6773 home directory passwd:dir
6774 shell program passwd:shell
6776 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getgr',
6777 `getgrnam', `getgrgid', and `getgrent', describing entries from the
6778 system's group database:
6781 ======================= ============
6782 group name group:name
6783 group password group:passwd
6785 group members group:mem
6787 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `gethost',
6788 `gethostbyaddr', `gethostbyname', and `gethostent', describing
6792 ========================= ===============
6793 official name of host hostent:name
6794 alias list hostent:aliases
6795 host address type hostent:addrtype
6796 length of address hostent:length
6797 list of addresses hostent:addr-list
6799 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getnet',
6800 `getnetbyaddr', `getnetbyname', and `getnetent', describing internet
6804 ========================= ===============
6805 official name of net netent:name
6806 alias list netent:aliases
6807 net number type netent:addrtype
6808 net number netent:net
6810 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getproto',
6811 `getprotobyname', `getprotobynumber', and `getprotoent', describing
6815 ========================= ===============
6816 official protocol name protoent:name
6817 alias list protoent:aliases
6818 protocol number protoent:proto
6820 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getserv',
6821 `getservbyname', `getservbyport', and `getservent', describing
6825 ========================= ===============
6826 official service name servent:name
6827 alias list servent:aliases
6828 port number servent:port
6829 protocol to use servent:proto
6831 *** There are new accessors for the sockaddr structures returned by
6832 `accept', `getsockname', `getpeername', `recvfrom!':
6835 ======================================== ===============
6836 address format (`family') sockaddr:fam
6837 path, for file domain addresses sockaddr:path
6838 address, for internet domain addresses sockaddr:addr
6839 TCP or UDP port, for internet sockaddr:port
6841 *** The `getpwent', `getgrent', `gethostent', `getnetent',
6842 `getprotoent', and `getservent' functions now return #f at the end of
6843 the user database. (They used to throw an exception.)
6845 Note that calling MUMBLEent function is equivalent to calling the
6846 corresponding MUMBLE function with no arguments.
6848 *** The `setpwent', `setgrent', `sethostent', `setnetent',
6849 `setprotoent', and `setservent' routines now take no arguments.
6851 *** The `gethost', `getproto', `getnet', and `getserv' functions now
6852 provide more useful information when they throw an exception.
6854 *** The `lnaof' function has been renamed to `inet-lnaof'.
6856 *** Guile now claims to have the `current-time' feature.
6858 *** The `mktime' function now takes an optional second argument ZONE,
6859 giving the time zone to use for the conversion. ZONE should be a
6860 string, in the same format as expected for the "TZ" environment variable.
6862 *** The `strptime' function now returns a pair (TIME . COUNT), where
6863 TIME is the parsed time as a vector, and COUNT is the number of
6864 characters from the string left unparsed. This function used to
6865 return the remaining characters as a string.
6867 *** The `gettimeofday' function has replaced the old `time+ticks' function.
6868 The return value is now (SECONDS . MICROSECONDS); the fractional
6869 component is no longer expressed in "ticks".
6871 *** The `ticks/sec' constant has been removed, in light of the above change.
6873 * Changes to the gh_ interface
6875 ** gh_eval_str() now returns an SCM object which is the result of the
6878 ** gh_scm2str() now copies the Scheme data to a caller-provided C
6881 ** gh_scm2newstr() now makes a C array, copies the Scheme data to it,
6882 and returns the array
6884 ** gh_scm2str0() is gone: there is no need to distinguish
6885 null-terminated from non-null-terminated, since gh_scm2newstr() allows
6886 the user to interpret the data both ways.
6888 * Changes to the scm_ interface
6890 ** The new function scm_symbol_value0 provides an easy way to get a
6891 symbol's value from C code:
6893 SCM scm_symbol_value0 (char *NAME)
6894 Return the value of the symbol named by the null-terminated string
6895 NAME in the current module. If the symbol named NAME is unbound in
6896 the current module, return SCM_UNDEFINED.
6898 ** The new function scm_sysintern0 creates new top-level variables,
6899 without assigning them a value.
6901 SCM scm_sysintern0 (char *NAME)
6902 Create a new Scheme top-level variable named NAME. NAME is a
6903 null-terminated string. Return the variable's value cell.
6905 ** The function scm_internal_catch is the guts of catch. It handles
6906 all the mechanics of setting up a catch target, invoking the catch
6907 body, and perhaps invoking the handler if the body does a throw.
6909 The function is designed to be usable from C code, but is general
6910 enough to implement all the semantics Guile Scheme expects from throw.
6912 TAG is the catch tag. Typically, this is a symbol, but this function
6913 doesn't actually care about that.
6915 BODY is a pointer to a C function which runs the body of the catch;
6916 this is the code you can throw from. We call it like this:
6917 BODY (BODY_DATA, JMPBUF)
6919 BODY_DATA is just the BODY_DATA argument we received; we pass it
6920 through to BODY as its first argument. The caller can make
6921 BODY_DATA point to anything useful that BODY might need.
6922 JMPBUF is the Scheme jmpbuf object corresponding to this catch,
6923 which we have just created and initialized.
6925 HANDLER is a pointer to a C function to deal with a throw to TAG,
6926 should one occur. We call it like this:
6927 HANDLER (HANDLER_DATA, THROWN_TAG, THROW_ARGS)
6929 HANDLER_DATA is the HANDLER_DATA argument we recevied; it's the
6930 same idea as BODY_DATA above.
6931 THROWN_TAG is the tag that the user threw to; usually this is
6932 TAG, but it could be something else if TAG was #t (i.e., a
6933 catch-all), or the user threw to a jmpbuf.
6934 THROW_ARGS is the list of arguments the user passed to the THROW
6937 BODY_DATA is just a pointer we pass through to BODY. HANDLER_DATA
6938 is just a pointer we pass through to HANDLER. We don't actually
6939 use either of those pointers otherwise ourselves. The idea is
6940 that, if our caller wants to communicate something to BODY or
6941 HANDLER, it can pass a pointer to it as MUMBLE_DATA, which BODY and
6942 HANDLER can then use. Think of it as a way to make BODY and
6943 HANDLER closures, not just functions; MUMBLE_DATA points to the
6946 Of course, it's up to the caller to make sure that any data a
6947 MUMBLE_DATA needs is protected from GC. A common way to do this is
6948 to make MUMBLE_DATA a pointer to data stored in an automatic
6949 structure variable; since the collector must scan the stack for
6950 references anyway, this assures that any references in MUMBLE_DATA
6953 ** The new function scm_internal_lazy_catch is exactly like
6954 scm_internal_catch, except:
6956 - It does not unwind the stack (this is the major difference).
6957 - If handler returns, its value is returned from the throw.
6958 - BODY always receives #f as its JMPBUF argument (since there's no
6959 jmpbuf associated with a lazy catch, because we don't unwind the
6962 ** scm_body_thunk is a new body function you can pass to
6963 scm_internal_catch if you want the body to be like Scheme's `catch'
6964 --- a thunk, or a function of one argument if the tag is #f.
6966 BODY_DATA is a pointer to a scm_body_thunk_data structure, which
6967 contains the Scheme procedure to invoke as the body, and the tag
6968 we're catching. If the tag is #f, then we pass JMPBUF (created by
6969 scm_internal_catch) to the body procedure; otherwise, the body gets
6972 ** scm_handle_by_proc is a new handler function you can pass to
6973 scm_internal_catch if you want the handler to act like Scheme's catch
6974 --- call a procedure with the tag and the throw arguments.
6976 If the user does a throw to this catch, this function runs a handler
6977 procedure written in Scheme. HANDLER_DATA is a pointer to an SCM
6978 variable holding the Scheme procedure object to invoke. It ought to
6979 be a pointer to an automatic variable (i.e., one living on the stack),
6980 or the procedure object should be otherwise protected from GC.
6982 ** scm_handle_by_message is a new handler function to use with
6983 `scm_internal_catch' if you want Guile to print a message and die.
6984 It's useful for dealing with throws to uncaught keys at the top level.
6986 HANDLER_DATA, if non-zero, is assumed to be a char * pointing to a
6987 message header to print; if zero, we use "guile" instead. That
6988 text is followed by a colon, then the message described by ARGS.
6990 ** The return type of scm_boot_guile is now void; the function does
6991 not return a value, and indeed, never returns at all.
6993 ** The new function scm_shell makes it easy for user applications to
6994 process command-line arguments in a way that is compatible with the
6995 stand-alone guile interpreter (which is in turn compatible with SCSH,
6998 To use the scm_shell function, first initialize any guile modules
6999 linked into your application, and then call scm_shell with the values
7000 of ARGC and ARGV your `main' function received. scm_shell will add
7001 any SCSH-style meta-arguments from the top of the script file to the
7002 argument vector, and then process the command-line arguments. This
7003 generally means loading a script file or starting up an interactive
7004 command interpreter. For details, see "Changes to the stand-alone
7007 ** The new functions scm_get_meta_args and scm_count_argv help you
7008 implement the SCSH-style meta-argument, `\'.
7010 char **scm_get_meta_args (int ARGC, char **ARGV)
7011 If the second element of ARGV is a string consisting of a single
7012 backslash character (i.e. "\\" in Scheme notation), open the file
7013 named by the following argument, parse arguments from it, and return
7014 the spliced command line. The returned array is terminated by a
7017 For details of argument parsing, see above, under "guile now accepts
7018 command-line arguments compatible with SCSH..."
7020 int scm_count_argv (char **ARGV)
7021 Count the arguments in ARGV, assuming it is terminated by a null
7024 For an example of how these functions might be used, see the source
7025 code for the function scm_shell in libguile/script.c.
7027 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
7030 ** The new function scm_compile_shell_switches turns an array of
7031 command-line arguments into Scheme code to carry out the actions they
7032 describe. Given ARGC and ARGV, it returns a Scheme expression to
7033 evaluate, and calls scm_set_program_arguments to make any remaining
7034 command-line arguments available to the Scheme code. For example,
7035 given the following arguments:
7037 -e main -s ekko a speckled gecko
7039 scm_set_program_arguments will return the following expression:
7041 (begin (load "ekko") (main (command-line)) (quit))
7043 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
7046 ** The function scm_shell_usage prints a usage message appropriate for
7047 an interpreter that uses scm_compile_shell_switches to handle its
7048 command-line arguments.
7050 void scm_shell_usage (int FATAL, char *MESSAGE)
7051 Print a usage message to the standard error output. If MESSAGE is
7052 non-zero, write it before the usage message, followed by a newline.
7053 If FATAL is non-zero, exit the process, using FATAL as the
7054 termination status. (If you want to be compatible with Guile,
7055 always use 1 as the exit status when terminating due to command-line
7058 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
7061 ** scm_eval_0str now returns SCM_UNSPECIFIED if the string contains no
7062 expressions. It used to return SCM_EOL. Earth-shattering.
7064 ** The macros for declaring scheme objects in C code have been
7065 rearranged slightly. They are now:
7067 SCM_SYMBOL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
7068 Declare a static SCM variable named C_NAME, and initialize it to
7069 point to the Scheme symbol whose name is SCHEME_NAME. C_NAME should
7070 be a C identifier, and SCHEME_NAME should be a C string.
7072 SCM_GLOBAL_SYMBOL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
7073 Just like SCM_SYMBOL, but make C_NAME globally visible.
7075 SCM_VCELL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
7076 Create a global variable at the Scheme level named SCHEME_NAME.
7077 Declare a static SCM variable named C_NAME, and initialize it to
7078 point to the Scheme variable's value cell.
7080 SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
7081 Just like SCM_VCELL, but make C_NAME globally visible.
7083 The `guile-snarf' script writes initialization code for these macros
7084 to its standard output, given C source code as input.
7086 The SCM_GLOBAL macro is gone.
7088 ** The scm_read_line and scm_read_line_x functions have been replaced
7089 by Scheme code based on the %read-delimited! procedure (known to C
7090 code as scm_read_delimited_x). See its description above for more
7093 ** The function scm_sys_open has been renamed to scm_open. It now
7094 returns a port instead of an FD object.
7096 * The dynamic linking support has changed. For more information, see
7097 libguile/DYNAMIC-LINKING.
7102 User-visible changes from Thursday, September 5, 1996 until Guile 1.0
7105 * Changes to the 'guile' program:
7107 ** Guile now loads some new files when it starts up. Guile first
7108 searches the load path for init.scm, and loads it if found. Then, if
7109 Guile is not being used to execute a script, and the user's home
7110 directory contains a file named `.guile', Guile loads that.
7112 ** You can now use Guile as a shell script interpreter.
7114 To paraphrase the SCSH manual:
7116 When Unix tries to execute an executable file whose first two
7117 characters are the `#!', it treats the file not as machine code to
7118 be directly executed by the native processor, but as source code
7119 to be executed by some interpreter. The interpreter to use is
7120 specified immediately after the #! sequence on the first line of
7121 the source file. The kernel reads in the name of the interpreter,
7122 and executes that instead. It passes the interpreter the source
7123 filename as its first argument, with the original arguments
7124 following. Consult the Unix man page for the `exec' system call
7125 for more information.
7127 Now you can use Guile as an interpreter, using a mechanism which is a
7128 compatible subset of that provided by SCSH.
7130 Guile now recognizes a '-s' command line switch, whose argument is the
7131 name of a file of Scheme code to load. It also treats the two
7132 characters `#!' as the start of a comment, terminated by `!#'. Thus,
7133 to make a file of Scheme code directly executable by Unix, insert the
7134 following two lines at the top of the file:
7136 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
7139 Guile treats the argument of the `-s' command-line switch as the name
7140 of a file of Scheme code to load, and treats the sequence `#!' as the
7141 start of a block comment, terminated by `!#'.
7143 For example, here's a version of 'echo' written in Scheme:
7145 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
7147 (let loop ((args (cdr (program-arguments))))
7150 (display (car args))
7151 (if (pair? (cdr args))
7153 (loop (cdr args)))))
7156 Why does `#!' start a block comment terminated by `!#', instead of the
7157 end of the line? That is the notation SCSH uses, and although we
7158 don't yet support the other SCSH features that motivate that choice,
7159 we would like to be backward-compatible with any existing Guile
7160 scripts once we do. Furthermore, if the path to Guile on your system
7161 is too long for your kernel, you can start the script with this
7165 exec /really/long/path/to/guile -s "$0" ${1+"$@"}
7168 Note that some very old Unix systems don't support the `#!' syntax.
7171 ** You can now run Guile without installing it.
7173 Previous versions of the interactive Guile interpreter (`guile')
7174 couldn't start up unless Guile's Scheme library had been installed;
7175 they used the value of the environment variable `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH'
7176 later on in the startup process, but not to find the startup code
7177 itself. Now Guile uses `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH' in all searches for Scheme
7180 To run Guile without installing it, build it in the normal way, and
7181 then set the environment variable `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH' to a
7182 colon-separated list of directories, including the top-level directory
7183 of the Guile sources. For example, if you unpacked Guile so that the
7184 full filename of this NEWS file is /home/jimb/guile-1.0b3/NEWS, then
7187 export SCHEME_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/my-scheme:/home/jimb/guile-1.0b3
7190 ** Guile's read-eval-print loop no longer prints #<unspecified>
7191 results. If the user wants to see this, she can evaluate the
7192 expression (assert-repl-print-unspecified #t), perhaps in her startup
7195 ** Guile no longer shows backtraces by default when an error occurs;
7196 however, it does display a message saying how to get one, and how to
7197 request that they be displayed by default. After an error, evaluate
7199 to see a backtrace, and
7200 (debug-enable 'backtrace)
7201 to see them by default.
7205 * Changes to Guile Scheme:
7207 ** Guile now distinguishes between #f and the empty list.
7209 This is for compatibility with the IEEE standard, the (possibly)
7210 upcoming Revised^5 Report on Scheme, and many extant Scheme
7213 Guile used to have #f and '() denote the same object, to make Scheme's
7214 type system more compatible with Emacs Lisp's. However, the change
7215 caused too much trouble for Scheme programmers, and we found another
7216 way to reconcile Emacs Lisp with Scheme that didn't require this.
7219 ** Guile's delq, delv, delete functions, and their destructive
7220 counterparts, delq!, delv!, and delete!, now remove all matching
7221 elements from the list, not just the first. This matches the behavior
7222 of the corresponding Emacs Lisp functions, and (I believe) the Maclisp
7223 functions which inspired them.
7225 I recognize that this change may break code in subtle ways, but it
7226 seems best to make the change before the FSF's first Guile release,
7230 ** The compiled-library-path function has been deleted from libguile.
7232 ** The facilities for loading Scheme source files have changed.
7234 *** The variable %load-path now tells Guile which directories to search
7235 for Scheme code. Its value is a list of strings, each of which names
7238 *** The variable %load-extensions now tells Guile which extensions to
7239 try appending to a filename when searching the load path. Its value
7240 is a list of strings. Its default value is ("" ".scm").
7242 *** (%search-load-path FILENAME) searches the directories listed in the
7243 value of the %load-path variable for a Scheme file named FILENAME,
7244 with all the extensions listed in %load-extensions. If it finds a
7245 match, then it returns its full filename. If FILENAME is absolute, it
7246 returns it unchanged. Otherwise, it returns #f.
7248 %search-load-path will not return matches that refer to directories.
7250 *** (primitive-load FILENAME :optional CASE-INSENSITIVE-P SHARP)
7251 uses %seach-load-path to find a file named FILENAME, and loads it if
7252 it finds it. If it can't read FILENAME for any reason, it throws an
7255 The arguments CASE-INSENSITIVE-P and SHARP are interpreted as by the
7258 *** load uses the same searching semantics as primitive-load.
7260 *** The functions %try-load, try-load-with-path, %load, load-with-path,
7261 basic-try-load-with-path, basic-load-with-path, try-load-module-with-
7262 path, and load-module-with-path have been deleted. The functions
7263 above should serve their purposes.
7265 *** If the value of the variable %load-hook is a procedure,
7266 `primitive-load' applies its value to the name of the file being
7267 loaded (without the load path directory name prepended). If its value
7268 is #f, it is ignored. Otherwise, an error occurs.
7270 This is mostly useful for printing load notification messages.
7273 ** The function `eval!' is no longer accessible from the scheme level.
7274 We can't allow operations which introduce glocs into the scheme level,
7275 because Guile's type system can't handle these as data. Use `eval' or
7276 `read-and-eval!' (see below) as replacement.
7278 ** The new function read-and-eval! reads an expression from PORT,
7279 evaluates it, and returns the result. This is more efficient than
7280 simply calling `read' and `eval', since it is not necessary to make a
7281 copy of the expression for the evaluator to munge.
7283 Its optional arguments CASE_INSENSITIVE_P and SHARP are interpreted as
7284 for the `read' function.
7287 ** The function `int?' has been removed; its definition was identical
7288 to that of `integer?'.
7290 ** The functions `<?', `<?', `<=?', `=?', `>?', and `>=?'. Code should
7291 use the R4RS names for these functions.
7293 ** The function object-properties no longer returns the hash handle;
7294 it simply returns the object's property list.
7296 ** Many functions have been changed to throw errors, instead of
7297 returning #f on failure. The point of providing exception handling in
7298 the language is to simplify the logic of user code, but this is less
7299 useful if Guile's primitives don't throw exceptions.
7301 ** The function `fileno' has been renamed from `%fileno'.
7303 ** The function primitive-mode->fdes returns #t or #f now, not 1 or 0.
7306 * Changes to Guile's C interface:
7308 ** The library's initialization procedure has been simplified.
7309 scm_boot_guile now has the prototype:
7311 void scm_boot_guile (int ARGC,
7313 void (*main_func) (),
7316 scm_boot_guile calls MAIN_FUNC, passing it CLOSURE, ARGC, and ARGV.
7317 MAIN_FUNC should do all the work of the program (initializing other
7318 packages, reading user input, etc.) before returning. When MAIN_FUNC
7319 returns, call exit (0); this function never returns. If you want some
7320 other exit value, MAIN_FUNC may call exit itself.
7322 scm_boot_guile arranges for program-arguments to return the strings
7323 given by ARGC and ARGV. If MAIN_FUNC modifies ARGC/ARGV, should call
7324 scm_set_program_arguments with the final list, so Scheme code will
7325 know which arguments have been processed.
7327 scm_boot_guile establishes a catch-all catch handler which prints an
7328 error message and exits the process. This means that Guile exits in a
7329 coherent way when system errors occur and the user isn't prepared to
7330 handle it. If the user doesn't like this behavior, they can establish
7331 their own universal catcher in MAIN_FUNC to shadow this one.
7333 Why must the caller do all the real work from MAIN_FUNC? The garbage
7334 collector assumes that all local variables of type SCM will be above
7335 scm_boot_guile's stack frame on the stack. If you try to manipulate
7336 SCM values after this function returns, it's the luck of the draw
7337 whether the GC will be able to find the objects you allocate. So,
7338 scm_boot_guile function exits, rather than returning, to discourage
7339 people from making that mistake.
7341 The IN, OUT, and ERR arguments were removed; there are other
7342 convenient ways to override these when desired.
7344 The RESULT argument was deleted; this function should never return.
7346 The BOOT_CMD argument was deleted; the MAIN_FUNC argument is more
7350 ** Guile's header files should no longer conflict with your system's
7353 In order to compile code which #included <libguile.h>, previous
7354 versions of Guile required you to add a directory containing all the
7355 Guile header files to your #include path. This was a problem, since
7356 Guile's header files have names which conflict with many systems'
7359 Now only <libguile.h> need appear in your #include path; you must
7360 refer to all Guile's other header files as <libguile/mumble.h>.
7361 Guile's installation procedure puts libguile.h in $(includedir), and
7362 the rest in $(includedir)/libguile.
7365 ** Two new C functions, scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect_object,
7366 have been added to the Guile library.
7368 scm_protect_object (OBJ) protects OBJ from the garbage collector.
7369 OBJ will not be freed, even if all other references are dropped,
7370 until someone does scm_unprotect_object (OBJ). Both functions
7373 Note that calls to scm_protect_object do not nest. You can call
7374 scm_protect_object any number of times on a given object, and the
7375 next call to scm_unprotect_object will unprotect it completely.
7377 Basically, scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect_object just
7378 maintain a list of references to things. Since the GC knows about
7379 this list, all objects it mentions stay alive. scm_protect_object
7380 adds its argument to the list; scm_unprotect_object remove its
7381 argument from the list.
7384 ** scm_eval_0str now returns the value of the last expression
7387 ** The new function scm_read_0str reads an s-expression from a
7388 null-terminated string, and returns it.
7390 ** The new function `scm_stdio_to_port' converts a STDIO file pointer
7391 to a Scheme port object.
7393 ** The new function `scm_set_program_arguments' allows C code to set
7394 the value returned by the Scheme `program-arguments' function.
7399 * Guile no longer includes sophisticated Tcl/Tk support.
7401 The old Tcl/Tk support was unsatisfying to us, because it required the
7402 user to link against the Tcl library, as well as Tk and Guile. The
7403 interface was also un-lispy, in that it preserved Tcl/Tk's practice of
7404 referring to widgets by names, rather than exporting widgets to Scheme
7405 code as a special datatype.
7407 In the Usenix Tk Developer's Workshop held in July 1996, the Tcl/Tk
7408 maintainers described some very interesting changes in progress to the
7409 Tcl/Tk internals, which would facilitate clean interfaces between lone
7410 Tk and other interpreters --- even for garbage-collected languages
7411 like Scheme. They expected the new Tk to be publicly available in the
7414 Since it seems that Guile might soon have a new, cleaner interface to
7415 lone Tk, and that the old Guile/Tk glue code would probably need to be
7416 completely rewritten, we (Jim Blandy and Richard Stallman) have
7417 decided not to support the old code. We'll spend the time instead on
7418 a good interface to the newer Tk, as soon as it is available.
7420 Until then, gtcltk-lib provides trivial, low-maintenance functionality.
7423 Copyright information:
7425 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
7427 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
7428 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
7429 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
7430 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
7432 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
7433 of this document, or of portions of it,
7434 under the above conditions, provided also that they
7435 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
7440 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"