1 Guile NEWS --- history of user-visible changes.
2 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
3 See the end for copying conditions.
5 Please send Guile bug reports to bug-guile@gnu.org.
7 Each release reports the NEWS in the following sections:
9 * Changes to the distribution
10 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
11 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
12 * Changes to the C interface
15 Changes since the 1.6.x series:
17 * Changes to the distribution
19 ** Guile is now licensed with the GNU Lesser General Public License.
21 ** The manual is now licensed with the GNU Free Documentation License.
23 ** Guile now requires GNU MP (http://swox.com/gmp).
25 Guile now uses the GNU MP library for arbitrary precision arithmetic.
27 ** Guile now has separate private and public configuration headers.
29 That is, things like HAVE_STRING_H no longer leak from Guile's
32 ** Guile now provides and uses an "effective" version number.
34 Guile now provides scm_effective_version and effective-version
35 functions which return the "effective" version number. This is just
36 the normal full version string without the final micro-version number,
37 so the current effective-version is "1.7". The effective version
38 should remain unchanged during a stable series, and should be used for
39 items like the versioned share directory name
40 i.e. /usr/share/guile/1.7.
42 Providing an unchanging version number during a stable release for
43 things like the versioned share directory can be particularly
44 important for Guile "add-on" packages, since it provides a directory
45 that they can install to that won't be changed out from under them
46 with each micro release during a stable series.
48 ** Thread implementation has changed.
50 When you configure "--with-threads=null", you will get the usual
51 threading API (call-with-new-thread, make-mutex, etc), but you can't
52 actually create new threads. Also, "--with-threads=no" is now
53 equivalent to "--with-threads=null". This means that the thread API
54 is always present, although you might not be able to create new
57 When you configure "--with-threads=pthreads" or "--with-threads=yes",
58 you will get threads that are implemented with the portable POSIX
59 threads. These threads can run concurrently (unlike the previous
60 "coop" thread implementation), but need to cooperate for things like
61 the GC. See the manual for details. [XXX - write this.]
63 The default is "pthreads", unless your platform doesn't have pthreads,
64 in which case "null" threads are used.
66 ** New module (ice-9 serialize):
68 (serialize FORM1 ...) and (parallelize FORM1 ...) are useful when
69 you don't trust the thread safety of most of your program, but
70 where you have some section(s) of code which you consider can run
71 in parallel to other sections.
73 ### move rest to manual
75 They "flag" (with dynamic extent) sections of code to be of
76 "serial" or "parallel" nature and have the single effect of
77 preventing a serial section from being run in parallel with any
78 serial section (including itself).
80 Both serialize and parallelize can be nested. If so, the
81 inner-most construct is in effect.
83 NOTE 1: A serial section can run in parallel with a parallel
86 NOTE 2: If a serial section S is "interrupted" by a parallel
87 section P in the following manner: S = S1 P S2, S2 is not
88 guaranteed to be resumed by the same thread that previously
91 WARNING: Spawning new threads within a serial section have
92 undefined effects. It is OK, though, to spawn threads in unflagged
93 sections of code where neither serialize or parallelize is in
96 A typical usage is when Guile is used as scripting language in some
97 application doing heavy computations. If each thread is
98 encapsulated with a serialize form, you can then put a parallelize
99 form around the code performing the heavy computations (typically a
100 C code primitive), enabling the computations to run in parallel
101 while the scripting code runs single-threadedly.
103 ** New module (srfi srfi-26)
105 This is an implementation of SRFI-26.
107 ** New module (srfi srfi-31)
109 This is an implementation of SRFI-31 which provides a special form
110 `rec' for recursive evaluation.
112 ** The modules (srfi srfi-13) and (srfi srfi-14) have been merged with
113 the core, making their functionality always available.
115 The modules are still available, tho, and you could use them together
116 with a renaming import, for example.
118 ** Guile now includes its own version of libltdl.
120 We now use a modified version of libltdl that allows us to make
121 improvements to it without having to rely on libtool releases.
123 ** The --enable-htmldoc option has been removed from 'configure'.
125 Support for translating the documentation into HTML is now always
126 provided. Use 'make html'.
128 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
130 ** New command line option `-L'.
132 This option adds a directory to the front of the load path.
134 ** New command line option `--no-debug'.
136 Specifying `--no-debug' on the command line will keep the debugging
137 evaluator turned off, even for interactive sessions.
139 ** User-init file ~/.guile is now loaded with the debugging evaluator.
141 Previously, the normal evaluator would have been used. Using the
142 debugging evaluator gives better error messages.
144 ** The '-e' option now 'read's its argument.
146 This is to allow the new '(@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME)' construct to
147 be used with '-e'. For example, you can now write a script like
150 exec guile -e '(@ (demo) main)' -s "$0" "$@"
153 (define-module (demo)
157 (format #t "Demo: ~a~%" args))
160 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
162 ** There is now support for copy-on-write substrings, mutation-sharing
163 substrings and read-only strings.
165 Three new procedures are related to this: substring/shared,
166 substring/copy, and substring/read-only. See the manual for more
169 ** String literals are now read-only.
171 Use string-copy or similar to make a copy if you really want to modify
174 ** 'gettext' support for internationalization has been added.
176 See the manual for details.
178 ** New syntax '@' and '@@':
180 You can now directly refer to variables exported from a module by
183 (@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME)
185 For example (@ (ice-9 pretty-print) pretty-print) will directly access
186 the pretty-print variable exported from the (ice-9 pretty-print)
187 module. You don't need to 'use' that module first. You can also use
188 '@' as a target of 'set!', as in (set! (@ mod var) val).
190 The related syntax (@@ MODULE-NAME VARIABLE-NAME) works just like '@',
191 but it can also access variables that have not been exported. It is
192 intended only for kluges and temporary fixes and for debugging, not
195 ** 'while' now provides 'break' and 'continue'
197 break and continue were previously bound in a while loop, but not
198 documented, and continue didn't quite work properly. The undocumented
199 parameter to break which gave a return value for the while has been
202 ** 'call-with-current-continuation' is now also available under the name
205 ** The module system now checks for duplicate bindings.
207 The module system now can check for name conflicts among imported
210 The behavior can be controlled by specifying one or more 'duplicates'
211 handlers. For example, to make Guile return an error for every name
219 The new default behavior of the module system when a name collision
220 has been detected is to
222 1. Give priority to bindings marked as a replacement.
223 2. Issue a warning (different warning if overriding core binding).
224 3. Give priority to the last encountered binding (this corresponds to
227 If you want the old behavior back without replacements or warnings you
230 (default-duplicate-binding-handler 'last)
232 to your .guile init file.
234 ### move rest to manual
236 The syntax for the :duplicates option is:
238 :duplicates HANDLER-NAME | (HANDLER1-NAME HANDLER2-NAME ...)
240 Specifying multiple handlers is useful since some handlers (such as
241 replace) can defer conflict resolution to others. Each handler is
242 tried until a binding is selected.
244 Currently available duplicates handlers are:
246 check report an error for bindings with a common name
247 warn issue a warning for bindings with a common name
248 replace replace bindings which have an imported replacement
249 warn-override-core issue a warning for imports which override core bindings
250 and accept the override
251 first select the first encountered binding (override)
252 last select the last encountered binding (override)
254 These two are provided by the (oop goops) module:
256 merge-generics merge generic functions with a common name
257 into an <extended-generic>
258 merge-accessors merge accessors with a common name
260 The default duplicates handler is:
262 (replace warn-override-core warn last)
264 A recommended handler (which is likely to correspond to future Guile
265 behavior) can be installed with:
267 (default-duplicate-binding-handler '(replace warn-override-core check))
269 ** New define-module option: :replace
271 :replace works as :export, but, in addition, marks the binding as a
274 A typical example is `format' in (ice-9 format) which is a replacement
275 for the core binding `format'.
277 ** Adding prefixes to imported bindings in the module system
279 There is now a new :use-module option :prefix. It can be used to add
280 a prefix to all imported bindings.
283 :use-module ((bar) :prefix bar:))
285 will import all bindings exported from bar, but rename them by adding
288 ** Conflicting generic functions can be automatically merged.
290 When two imported bindings conflict and they are both generic
291 functions, the two functions can now be merged automatically. This is
292 activated with the 'duplicates' handler 'merge-generics'.
294 ### move the rest to the manual
296 It is sometimes tempting to use GOOPS accessors with short names.
297 For example, it is tempting to use the name `x' for the x-coordinate
300 Assume that we work with a graphical package which needs to use two
301 independent vector packages for 2D and 3D vectors respectively. If
302 both packages export `x' we will encounter a name collision.
304 This can now be resolved automagically with the duplicates handler
305 `merge-generics' which gives the module system license to merge all
306 generic functions sharing a common name:
308 (define-module (math 2D-vectors)
309 :use-module (oop goops)
312 (define-module (math 3D-vectors)
313 :use-module (oop goops)
316 (define-module (my-module)
317 :use-module (math 2D-vectors)
318 :use-module (math 3D-vectors)
319 :duplicates merge-generics)
321 x in (my-module) will now share methods with x in both imported
324 There will, in fact, now be three distinct generic functions named
325 `x': x in (2D-vectors), x in (3D-vectors), and x in (my-module). The
326 last function will be an <extended-generic>, extending the previous
329 Let's call the imported generic functions the "ancestor functions". x
330 in (my-module) is, in turn, a "descendant function" of the imported
331 functions, extending its ancestors.
333 For any generic function G, the applicable methods are selected from
334 the union of the methods of the descendant functions, the methods of G
335 itself and the methods of the ancestor functions.
337 This, ancestor functions share methods with their descendants and vice
338 versa. This implies that x in (math 2D-vectors) can will share the
339 methods of x in (my-module) and vice versa, while x in (math 2D-vectors)
340 doesn't share the methods of x in (math 3D-vectors), thus preserving
343 Sharing is dynamic, so that adding new methods to a descendant implies
344 adding it to the ancestor.
346 If duplicates checking is desired in the above example, the following
347 form of the :duplicates option can be used instead:
349 :duplicates (merge-generics check)
351 ** New function: effective-version
353 Returns the "effective" version number. This is just the normal full
354 version string without the final micro-version number. See "Changes
355 to the distribution" above.
357 ** New feature, 'futures': future, make-future, future-ref
359 Futures are like promises, but begin execution immediately in a new
360 thread. See the "Futures" section in the reference manual.
362 ** New threading functions: parallel, letpar, par-map, and friends
364 These are convenient ways to run calculations in parallel in new
365 threads. See "Parallel forms" in the manual for details.
367 ** Fair mutexes and condition variables
369 Fair mutexes and condition variables have been added. The fairness
370 means that scheduling is arranged to give as equal time shares as
371 possible and that threads are awakened in a first-in-first-out
372 manner. This is not guaranteed with standard mutexes and condition
375 In addition, fair mutexes are recursive. Locking a fair mutex that
376 you have already locked will succeed. Every call to lock-mutex must
377 be matched with a call to unlock-mutex. Only the last call to
378 unlock-mutex will actually unlock the mutex.
380 A fair condition variable must be used together with a fair mutex,
381 just as a standard condition variable must be used together with a
384 *** New functions: make-fair-mutex, make-fair-condition-variable'
386 Make a new fair mutex and a new fair condition variable respectively.
388 ** New function 'try-mutex'.
390 This function will attempt to lock a mutex but will return immediately
391 instead if blocking and indicate failure.
393 ** Waiting on a condition variable can have a timeout.
395 The funtion 'wait-condition-variable' now takes a third, optional
396 argument that specifies the point in time where the waiting should be
399 ** New function 'broadcast-condition-variable'.
401 ** New functions 'all-threads' and 'current-thread'.
403 ** Signals and system asyncs work better with threads.
405 The function 'sigaction' now takes a fourth, optional, argument that
406 specifies the thread that the handler should run in. When the
407 argument is omitted, the handler will run in the thread that called
410 Likewise, 'system-async-mark' takes a second, optional, argument that
411 specifies the thread that the async should run in. When it is
412 omitted, the async will run in the thread that called
415 C code can use the new functions scm_sigaction_for_thread and
416 scm_system_async_mark_for_thread to pass the new thread argument.
418 ** The function 'system-async' is deprecated.
420 You can now pass any zero-argument procedure to 'system-async-mark'.
421 The function 'system-async' will just return its argument unchanged
424 ** New functions 'call-with-blocked-asyncs' and
425 'call-with-unblocked-asyncs'
427 The expression (call-with-blocked-asyncs PROC) will call PROC and will
428 block execution of system asyncs for the current thread by one level
429 while PROC runs. Likewise, call-with-unblocked-asyncs will call a
430 procedure and will unblock the execution of system asyncs by one
431 level for the current thread.
433 Only system asyncs are affected by these functions.
435 ** The functions 'mask-signals' and 'unmask-signals' are deprecated.
437 Use 'call-with-blocked-asyncs' or 'call-with-unblocked-asyncs'
438 instead. Those functions are easier to use correctly and can be
441 ** New function 'unsetenv'.
443 ** New macro 'define-syntax-public'.
445 It works like 'define-syntax' and also exports the defined macro (but
448 ** There is support for Infinity and NaNs.
450 Following PLT Scheme, Guile can now work with infinite numbers, and
453 There is new syntax for numbers: "+inf.0" (infinity), "-inf.0"
454 (negative infinity), "+nan.0" (not-a-number), and "-nan.0" (same as
455 "+nan.0"). These numbers are inexact and have no exact counterpart.
457 Dividing by an inexact zero returns +inf.0 or -inf.0, depending on the
458 sign of the dividend. The infinities are integers, and they answer #t
459 for both 'even?' and 'odd?'. The +nan.0 value is not an integer and is
460 not '=' to itself, but '+nan.0' is 'eqv?' to itself.
471 ERROR: Numerical overflow
473 Two new predicates 'inf?' and 'nan?' can be used to test for the
476 ** Inexact zero can have a sign.
478 Guile can now distinguish between plus and minus inexact zero, if your
479 platform supports this, too. The two zeros are equal according to
480 '=', but not according to 'eqv?'. For example
491 ** Guile now has exact rationals.
493 Guile can now represent fractions such as 1/3 exactly. Computing with
494 them is also done exactly, of course:
499 ** 'floor', 'ceiling', 'round' and 'truncate' now return exact numbers
502 For example: (floor 2) now returns an exact 2 where in the past it
503 returned an inexact 2.0. Likewise, (floor 5/4) returns an exact 1.
505 ** inexact->exact no longer returns only integers.
507 Without exact rationals, the closest exact number was always an
508 integer, but now inexact->exact returns the fraction that is exactly
509 equal to a floating point number. For example:
511 (inexact->exact 1.234)
512 => 694680242521899/562949953421312
514 When you want the old behavior, use 'round' explicitely:
516 (inexact->exact (round 1.234))
519 ** New function 'rationalize'.
521 This function finds a simple fraction that is close to a given real
522 number. For example (and compare with inexact->exact above):
524 (rationalize (inexact->exact 1.234) 1/2000)
527 Note that, as required by R5RS, rationalize returns only then an exact
528 result when both its arguments are exact.
530 ** 'odd?' and 'even?' work also for inexact integers.
532 Previously, (odd? 1.0) would signal an error since only exact integers
533 were recognized as integers. Now (odd? 1.0) returns #t, (odd? 2.0)
534 returns #f and (odd? 1.5) signals an error.
536 ** Guile now has uninterned symbols.
538 The new function 'make-symbol' will return an uninterned symbol. This
539 is a symbol that is unique and is guaranteed to remain unique.
540 However, uninterned symbols can not yet be read back in.
542 Use the new function 'symbol-interned?' to check whether a symbol is
545 ** pretty-print has more options.
547 The function pretty-print from the (ice-9 pretty-print) module can now
548 also be invoked with keyword arguments that control things like
549 maximum output width. See the manual for details.
551 ** Variables have no longer a special behavior for `equal?'.
553 Previously, comparing two variables with `equal?' would recursivly
554 compare their values. This is no longer done. Variables are now only
555 `equal?' if they are `eq?'.
557 ** `(begin)' is now valid.
559 You can now use an empty `begin' form. It will yield #<unspecified>
560 when evaluated and simply be ignored in a definition context.
562 ** Deprecated: procedure->macro
564 Change your code to use 'define-macro' or r5rs macros. Also, be aware
565 that macro expansion will not be done during evaluation, but prior to
568 ** Soft ports now allow a `char-ready?' procedure
570 The vector argument to `make-soft-port' can now have a length of
571 either 5 or 6. (Previously the length had to be 5.) The optional 6th
572 element is interpreted as an `input-waiting' thunk -- i.e. a thunk
573 that returns the number of characters that can be read immediately
574 without the soft port blocking.
576 ** New debugging feature: breakpoints.
578 Guile now has breakpoints. For details see the `Debugging Features'
579 chapter in the reference manual.
581 ** Deprecated: undefine
583 There is no replacement for undefine.
586 * Changes to the C interface
588 ** There is the new notion of 'discouraged' features.
590 This is a milder form of deprecation.
592 Things that are discouraged should not be used in new code, but it is
593 OK to leave them in old code for now. When a discouraged feature is
594 used, no warning message is printed like there is for 'deprecated'
595 features. Also, things that are merely discouraged are nevertheless
596 implemented efficiently, while deprecated features can be very slow.
598 You can omit discouraged features from libguile by configuring it with
599 the '--disable-discouraged' option.
601 ** A new family of functions for converting between C values and
602 Scheme values has been added.
604 These functions follow a common naming scheme and are designed to be
605 easier to use, thread-safe and more future-proof than the older
610 These are predicates that return a C boolean: 1 or 0. Instead of
611 SCM_NFALSEP, you can now use scm_is_true, for example.
613 - <type> scm_to_<type> (SCM val, ...)
615 These are functions that convert a Scheme value into an appropriate
616 C value. For example, you can use scm_to_int to safely convert from
619 - SCM scm_from_<type>) (<type> val, ...)
621 These functions convert from a C type to a SCM value; for example,
622 scm_from_int for ints.
624 There is a huge number of these functions, for numbers, strings,
625 symbols, vectors, etc. They are documented in the reference manual in
626 the API section together with the types that they apply to.
628 ** New functions for dealing with complex numbers in C have been added.
630 The new functions are scm_c_make_rectangular, scm_c_make_polar,
631 scm_c_real_part, scm_c_imag_part, scm_c_magnitude and scm_c_angle.
632 They work like scm_make_rectangular etc but take or return doubles
635 ** The function scm_make_complex has been discouraged.
637 Use scm_c_make_rectangular instead.
639 ** The INUM macros have been deprecated.
641 A lot of code uses these macros to do general integer conversions,
642 although the macros only work correctly with fixnums. Use the
643 following alternatives.
645 SCM_INUMP -> scm_is_integer or similar
646 SCM_NINUMP -> !scm_is_integer or similar
647 SCM_MAKINUM -> scm_from_int or similar
648 SCM_INUM -> scm_to_int or similar
650 SCM_VALIDATE_INUM_* -> Do not use these; scm_to_int, etc. will
651 do the validating for you.
653 ** The scm_num2<type> and scm_<type>2num functions and scm_make_real
654 have been discouraged.
656 Use the newer scm_to_<type> and scm_from_<type> functions instead for
657 new code. The functions have been discouraged since they don't fit
660 ** The 'boolean' macros SCM_FALSEP etc have been discouraged.
662 They have strange names, especially SCM_NFALSEP, and SCM_BOOLP
663 evaluates its argument twice. Use scm_is_true, etc. instead for new
666 ** The macro SCM_EQ_P has been discouraged.
668 Use scm_is_eq for new code, which fits better into the naming
671 ** The macros SCM_CONSP, SCM_NCONSP, SCM_NULLP, and SCM_NNULLP have
674 Use the function scm_is_pair or scm_is_null instead.
676 ** The functions scm_round and scm_truncate have been deprecated and
677 are now available as scm_c_round and scm_c_truncate, respectively.
679 These functions occupy the names that scm_round_number and
680 scm_truncate_number should have.
682 ** The functions scm_c_string2str, scm_c_substring2str, and
683 scm_c_symbol2str have been deprecated.
685 Use scm_to_locale_stringbuf or similar instead, maybe together with
688 ** New functions scm_c_make_string, scm_c_string_length,
689 scm_c_string_ref, scm_c_string_set_x, scm_c_substring,
690 scm_c_substring_shared, scm_c_substring_copy.
692 These are like scm_make_string, scm_length, etc. but are slightly
693 easier to use from C.
695 ** The macros SCM_STRINGP, SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_STRING_LENGTH,
696 SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, and SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH have been deprecated.
698 They export too many assumptions about the implementation of strings
699 and symbols that are no longer true in the presence of
700 mutation-sharing substrings and when Guile switches to some form of
703 When working with strings, it is often best to use the normal string
704 functions provided by Guile, such as scm_c_string_ref,
705 scm_c_string_set_x, scm_string_append, etc. Be sure to look in the
706 manual since many more such functions are now provided than
709 When you want to convert a SCM string to a C string, use the
710 scm_to_locale_string function or similar instead. For symbols, use
711 scm_symbol_to_string and then work with that string. Because of the
712 new string representation, scm_symbol_to_string does not need to copy
713 and is thus quite efficient.
715 ** Some string and symbol functions have been discouraged.
717 They don't fit into the uniform naming scheme and are not explicit
718 about the character encoding.
720 Replace according to the following table:
722 scm_allocate_string -> scm_c_make_string
723 scm_take_str -> scm_take_locale_stringn
724 scm_take0str -> scm_take_locale_string
725 scm_mem2string -> scm_from_locale_stringn
726 scm_str2string -> scm_from_locale_string
727 scm_makfrom0str -> scm_from_locale_string
728 scm_mem2symbol -> scm_from_locale_symboln
729 scm_mem2uninterned_symbol -> scm_from_locale_stringn + scm_make_symbol
730 scm_str2symbol -> scm_from_locale_symbol
732 SCM_SYMBOL_HASH -> scm_hashq
733 SCM_SYMBOL_INTERNED_P -> scm_symbol_interned_p
735 ** SCM_CELL_WORD_LOC has been deprecated.
737 Use the new macro SCM_CELL_OBJECT_LOC instead, which returns a pointer
738 to a SCM, as opposed to a pointer to a scm_t_bits.
740 This was done to allow the correct use of pointers into the Scheme
741 heap. Previously, the heap words were of type scm_t_bits and local
742 variables and function arguments were of type SCM, making it
743 non-standards-conformant to have a pointer that can point to both.
745 ** New macros SCM_SMOB_DATA_2, SCM_SMOB_DATA_3, etc.
747 These macros should be used instead of SCM_CELL_WORD_2/3 to access the
748 second and third words of double smobs. Likewise for
749 SCM_SET_SMOB_DATA_2 and SCM_SET_SMOB_DATA_3.
751 Also, there is SCM_SMOB_FLAGS and SCM_SET_SMOB_FLAGS that should be
752 used to get and set the 16 exra bits in the zeroth word of a smob.
754 And finally, there is SCM_SMOB_OBJECT and SCM_SMOB_SET_OBJECT for
755 accesing the first immediate word of a smob as a SCM value, and there
756 is SCM_SMOB_OBJECT_LOC for getting a pointer to the first immediate
757 smob word. Like wise for SCM_SMOB_OBJECT_2, etc.
759 ** New way to deal with non-local exits and re-entries.
761 There is a new set of functions that essentially do what
762 scm_internal_dynamic_wind does, but in a way that is more convenient
763 for C code in some situations. Here is a quick example of how to
764 prevent a potential memory leak:
773 mem = scm_malloc (100);
774 scm_frame_unwind_handler (free, mem, SCM_F_WIND_EXPLICITELY);
776 /* MEM would leak if BAR throws an error.
777 SCM_FRAME_UNWIND_HANDLER frees it nevertheless.
784 /* Because of SCM_F_WIND_EXPLICITELY, MEM will be freed by
785 SCM_FRAME_END as well.
789 For full documentation, see the node "Frames" in the manual.
791 ** New function scm_frame_free
793 This function calls 'free' on a given pointer when a frame is left.
794 Thus the call to scm_frame_unwind_handler above could be replaced with
795 simply scm_frame_free (mem).
797 ** New way to block and unblock asyncs
799 In addition to scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs you can now also use
800 scm_frame_block_asyncs in a 'frame' (see above). Likewise for
801 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs and scm_frame_unblock_asyncs.
803 ** New way to temporarily set the current input, output or error ports
805 C code can now use scm_frame_current_<foo>_port in a 'frame' (see
806 above). <foo> is one of "input", "output" or "error".
808 ** New way to temporarily set fluids
810 C code can now use scm_frame_fluid in a 'frame' (see
811 above) to temporarily set the value of a fluid.
813 ** New types scm_t_intmax and scm_t_uintmax.
815 On platforms that have them, these types are identical to intmax_t and
816 uintmax_t, respectively. On other platforms, they are identical to
817 the largest integer types that Guile knows about.
819 ** The functions scm_unmemocopy and scm_unmemoize have been removed.
821 You should not have used them.
823 ** Many public #defines with generic names have been made private.
825 #defines with generic names like HAVE_FOO or SIZEOF_FOO have been made
826 private or renamed with a more suitable public name.
828 ** The macro SCM_TYP16S has been deprecated.
830 This macro is not intended for public use.
832 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_INEXACTP has been deprecated.
834 Use scm_is_true (scm_inexact_p (...)) instead.
836 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_REALP has been deprecated.
838 Use scm_is_real instead.
840 ** The macro SCM_SLOPPY_COMPLEXP has been deprecated.
842 Use scm_is_complex instead.
844 ** Some preprocessor defines have been deprecated.
846 These defines indicated whether a certain feature was present in Guile
847 or not. Going forward, assume that the features are always present.
849 The macros are: USE_THREADS, GUILE_ISELECT, READER_EXTENSIONS,
850 DEBUG_EXTENSIONS, DYNAMIC_LINKING.
852 The following macros have been removed completely: MEMOIZE_LOCALS,
853 SCM_RECKLESS, SCM_CAUTIOUS.
855 ** The preprocessor define STACK_DIRECTION has been deprecated.
857 There should be no need to know about the stack direction for ordinary
860 ** New function: scm_effective_version
862 Returns the "effective" version number. This is just the normal full
863 version string without the final micro-version number. See "Changes
864 to the distribution" above.
866 ** The function scm_call_with_new_thread has a new prototype.
868 Instead of taking a list with the thunk and handler, these two
869 arguments are now passed directly:
871 SCM scm_call_with_new_thread (SCM thunk, SCM handler);
873 This is an incompatible change.
875 ** The value 'scm_mask_ints' is no longer writable.
877 Previously, you could set scm_mask_ints directly. This is no longer
878 possible. Use scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs and
879 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs instead.
881 ** New functions scm_c_call_with_blocked_asyncs and
882 scm_c_call_with_unblocked_asyncs
884 Like scm_call_with_blocked_asyncs etc. but for C functions.
886 ** New snarfer macro SCM_DEFINE_PUBLIC.
888 This is like SCM_DEFINE, but also calls scm_c_export for the defined
889 function in the init section.
891 ** The snarfer macro SCM_SNARF_INIT is now officially supported.
893 ** New macros SCM_VECTOR_REF and SCM_VECTOR_SET.
895 Use these in preference to SCM_VELTS.
897 ** The SCM_VELTS macros now returns a read-only vector. For writing,
898 use the new macros SCM_WRITABLE_VELTS or SCM_VECTOR_SET. The use of
899 SCM_WRITABLE_VELTS is discouraged, though.
901 ** Garbage collector rewrite.
903 The garbage collector is cleaned up a lot, and now uses lazy
904 sweeping. This is reflected in the output of (gc-stats); since cells
905 are being freed when they are allocated, the cells-allocated field
906 stays roughly constant.
908 For malloc related triggers, the behavior is changed. It uses the same
909 heuristic as the cell-triggered collections. It may be tuned with the
910 environment variables GUILE_MIN_YIELD_MALLOC. This is the percentage
911 for minimum yield of malloc related triggers. The default is 40.
912 GUILE_INIT_MALLOC_LIMIT sets the initial trigger for doing a GC. The
915 Debugging operations for the freelist have been deprecated, along with
916 the C variables that control garbage collection. The environment
917 variables GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE, GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_2,
918 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_1, and GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2 should be used.
920 ** The function scm_definedp has been renamed to scm_defined_p
922 The name scm_definedp is deprecated.
924 ** The struct scm_cell type has been renamed to scm_t_cell
926 This is in accordance to Guile's naming scheme for types. Note that
927 the name scm_cell is now used for a function that allocates and
928 initializes a new cell (see below).
930 ** New functions for memory management
932 A new set of functions for memory management has been added since the
933 old way (scm_must_malloc, scm_must_free, etc) was error prone and
934 indeed, Guile itself contained some long standing bugs that could
935 cause aborts in long running programs.
937 The new functions are more symmetrical and do not need cooperation
938 from smob free routines, among other improvements.
940 The new functions are scm_malloc, scm_realloc, scm_calloc, scm_strdup,
941 scm_strndup, scm_gc_malloc, scm_gc_calloc, scm_gc_realloc,
942 scm_gc_free, scm_gc_register_collectable_memory, and
943 scm_gc_unregister_collectable_memory. Refer to the manual for more
944 details and for upgrading instructions.
946 The old functions for memory management have been deprecated. They
947 are: scm_must_malloc, scm_must_realloc, scm_must_free,
948 scm_must_strdup, scm_must_strndup, scm_done_malloc, scm_done_free.
950 ** Declarations of exported features are marked with SCM_API.
952 Every declaration of a feature that belongs to the exported Guile API
953 has been marked by adding the macro "SCM_API" to the start of the
954 declaration. This macro can expand into different things, the most
955 common of which is just "extern" for Unix platforms. On Win32, it can
956 be used to control which symbols are exported from a DLL.
958 If you `#define SCM_IMPORT' before including <libguile.h>, SCM_API
959 will expand into "__declspec (dllimport) extern", which is needed for
960 linking to the Guile DLL in Windows.
962 There are also SCM_RL_IMPORT, SCM_SRFI1314_IMPORT, and
963 SCM_SRFI4_IMPORT, for the corresponding libraries.
965 ** SCM_NEWCELL and SCM_NEWCELL2 have been deprecated.
967 Use the new functions scm_cell and scm_double_cell instead. The old
968 macros had problems because with them allocation and initialization
969 was separated and the GC could sometimes observe half initialized
970 cells. Only careful coding by the user of SCM_NEWCELL and
971 SCM_NEWCELL2 could make this safe and efficient.
973 ** CHECK_ENTRY, CHECK_APPLY and CHECK_EXIT have been deprecated.
975 Use the variables scm_check_entry_p, scm_check_apply_p and scm_check_exit_p
978 ** SRCBRKP has been deprecated.
980 Use scm_c_source_property_breakpoint_p instead.
982 ** Deprecated: scm_makmacro
984 Change your code to use either scm_makmmacro or to define macros in
985 Scheme, using 'define-macro'.
987 ** New function scm_c_port_for_each.
989 This function is like scm_port_for_each but takes a pointer to a C
990 function as the callback instead of a SCM value.
992 ** Many definitions have been removed that were previously deprecated.
994 scm_lisp_nil, scm_lisp_t, s_nil_ify, scm_m_nil_ify, s_t_ify,
995 scm_m_t_ify, s_0_cond, scm_m_0_cond, s_0_ify, scm_m_0_ify, s_1_ify,
996 scm_m_1_ify, scm_debug_newcell, scm_debug_newcell2,
997 scm_tc16_allocated, SCM_SET_SYMBOL_HASH, SCM_IM_NIL_IFY, SCM_IM_T_IFY,
998 SCM_IM_0_COND, SCM_IM_0_IFY, SCM_IM_1_IFY, SCM_GC_SET_ALLOCATED,
999 scm_debug_newcell, scm_debug_newcell2, SCM_HUP_SIGNAL, SCM_INT_SIGNAL,
1000 SCM_FPE_SIGNAL, SCM_BUS_SIGNAL, SCM_SEGV_SIGNAL, SCM_ALRM_SIGNAL,
1001 SCM_GC_SIGNAL, SCM_TICK_SIGNAL, SCM_SIG_ORD, SCM_ORD_SIG,
1002 SCM_NUM_SIGS, scm_top_level_lookup_closure_var,
1003 *top-level-lookup-closure*, scm_system_transformer, scm_eval_3,
1004 scm_eval2, root_module_lookup_closure, SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP,
1005 SCM_RWSTRINGP, scm_read_only_string_p, scm_make_shared_substring,
1006 scm_tc7_substring, sym_huh, SCM_VARVCELL, SCM_UDVARIABLEP,
1007 SCM_DEFVARIABLEP, scm_mkbig, scm_big2inum, scm_adjbig, scm_normbig,
1008 scm_copybig, scm_2ulong2big, scm_dbl2big, scm_big2dbl, SCM_FIXNUM_BIT,
1009 SCM_SETCHARS, SCM_SLOPPY_SUBSTRP, SCM_SUBSTR_STR, SCM_SUBSTR_OFFSET,
1010 SCM_LENGTH_MAX, SCM_SETLENGTH, SCM_ROSTRINGP, SCM_ROLENGTH,
1011 SCM_ROCHARS, SCM_ROUCHARS, SCM_SUBSTRP, SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR,
1012 scm_sym2vcell, scm_intern, scm_intern0, scm_sysintern, scm_sysintern0,
1013 scm_sysintern0_no_module_lookup, scm_init_symbols_deprecated,
1014 scm_vector_set_length_x, scm_contregs, scm_debug_info,
1015 scm_debug_frame, SCM_DSIDEVAL, SCM_CONST_LONG, SCM_VCELL,
1016 SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL, SCM_VCELL_INIT, SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL_INIT,
1017 SCM_HUGE_LENGTH, SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR, SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING,
1018 SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING_COPY, SCM_VALIDATE_NULLORROSTRING_COPY,
1019 SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING, DIGITS, scm_small_istr2int, scm_istr2int,
1020 scm_istr2flo, scm_istring2number, scm_istr2int, scm_istr2flo,
1021 scm_istring2number, scm_vtable_index_vcell, scm_si_vcell, SCM_ECONSP,
1022 SCM_NECONSP, SCM_GLOC_VAR, SCM_GLOC_VAL, SCM_GLOC_SET_VAL,
1023 SCM_GLOC_VAL_LOC, scm_make_gloc, scm_gloc_p, scm_tc16_variable,
1024 SCM_CHARS, SCM_LENGTH, SCM_SET_STRING_CHARS, SCM_SET_STRING_LENGTH.
1027 Changes since Guile 1.4:
1029 * Changes to the distribution
1031 ** A top-level TODO file is included.
1033 ** Guile now uses a versioning scheme similar to that of the Linux kernel.
1035 Guile now always uses three numbers to represent the version,
1036 i.e. "1.6.5". The first number, 1, is the major version number, the
1037 second number, 6, is the minor version number, and the third number,
1038 5, is the micro version number. Changes in major version number
1039 indicate major changes in Guile.
1041 Minor version numbers that are even denote stable releases, and odd
1042 minor version numbers denote development versions (which may be
1043 unstable). The micro version number indicates a minor sub-revision of
1044 a given MAJOR.MINOR release.
1046 In keeping with the new scheme, (minor-version) and scm_minor_version
1047 no longer return everything but the major version number. They now
1048 just return the minor version number. Two new functions
1049 (micro-version) and scm_micro_version have been added to report the
1050 micro version number.
1052 In addition, ./GUILE-VERSION now defines GUILE_MICRO_VERSION.
1054 ** New preprocessor definitions are available for checking versions.
1056 version.h now #defines SCM_MAJOR_VERSION, SCM_MINOR_VERSION, and
1057 SCM_MICRO_VERSION to the appropriate integer values.
1059 ** Guile now actively warns about deprecated features.
1061 The new configure option `--enable-deprecated=LEVEL' and the
1062 environment variable GUILE_WARN_DEPRECATED control this mechanism.
1063 See INSTALL and README for more information.
1065 ** Guile is much more likely to work on 64-bit architectures.
1067 Guile now compiles and passes "make check" with only two UNRESOLVED GC
1068 cases on Alpha and ia64 based machines now. Thanks to John Goerzen
1069 for the use of a test machine, and thanks to Stefan Jahn for ia64
1072 ** New functions: setitimer and getitimer.
1074 These implement a fairly direct interface to the libc functions of the
1077 ** The #. reader extension is now disabled by default.
1079 For safety reasons, #. evaluation is disabled by default. To
1080 re-enable it, set the fluid read-eval? to #t. For example:
1082 (fluid-set! read-eval? #t)
1084 but make sure you realize the potential security risks involved. With
1085 read-eval? enabled, reading a data file from an untrusted source can
1088 ** New SRFI modules have been added:
1090 SRFI-0 `cond-expand' is now supported in Guile, without requiring
1093 (srfi srfi-1) is a library containing many useful pair- and list-processing
1096 (srfi srfi-2) exports and-let*.
1098 (srfi srfi-4) implements homogeneous numeric vector datatypes.
1100 (srfi srfi-6) is a dummy module for now, since guile already provides
1101 all of the srfi-6 procedures by default: open-input-string,
1102 open-output-string, get-output-string.
1104 (srfi srfi-8) exports receive.
1106 (srfi srfi-9) exports define-record-type.
1108 (srfi srfi-10) exports define-reader-ctor and implements the reader
1111 (srfi srfi-11) exports let-values and let*-values.
1113 (srfi srfi-13) implements the SRFI String Library.
1115 (srfi srfi-14) implements the SRFI Character-Set Library.
1117 (srfi srfi-17) implements setter and getter-with-setter and redefines
1118 some accessor procedures as procedures with getters. (such as car,
1119 cdr, vector-ref etc.)
1121 (srfi srfi-19) implements the SRFI Time/Date Library.
1123 ** New scripts / "executable modules"
1125 Subdirectory "scripts" contains Scheme modules that are packaged to
1126 also be executable as scripts. At this time, these scripts are available:
1135 See README there for more info.
1137 These scripts can be invoked from the shell with the new program
1138 "guile-tools", which keeps track of installation directory for you.
1141 $ guile-tools display-commentary srfi/*.scm
1143 guile-tools is copied to the standard $bindir on "make install".
1145 ** New module (ice-9 stack-catch):
1147 stack-catch is like catch, but saves the current state of the stack in
1148 the fluid the-last-stack. This fluid can be useful when using the
1149 debugger and when re-throwing an error.
1151 ** The module (ice-9 and-let*) has been renamed to (ice-9 and-let-star)
1153 This has been done to prevent problems on lesser operating systems
1154 that can't tolerate `*'s in file names. The exported macro continues
1155 to be named `and-let*', of course.
1157 On systems that support it, there is also a compatibility module named
1158 (ice-9 and-let*). It will go away in the next release.
1160 ** New modules (oop goops) etc.:
1163 (oop goops describe)
1165 (oop goops active-slot)
1166 (oop goops composite-slot)
1168 The Guile Object Oriented Programming System (GOOPS) has been
1169 integrated into Guile. For further information, consult the GOOPS
1170 manual and tutorial in the `doc' directory.
1172 ** New module (ice-9 rdelim).
1174 This exports the following procedures which were previously defined
1175 in the default environment:
1177 read-line read-line! read-delimited read-delimited! %read-delimited!
1178 %read-line write-line
1180 For backwards compatibility the definitions are still imported into the
1181 default environment in this version of Guile. However you should add:
1183 (use-modules (ice-9 rdelim))
1185 to any program which uses the definitions, since this may change in
1188 Alternatively, if guile-scsh is installed, the (scsh rdelim) module
1189 can be used for similar functionality.
1191 ** New module (ice-9 rw)
1193 This is a subset of the (scsh rw) module from guile-scsh. Currently
1194 it defines two procedures:
1196 *** New function: read-string!/partial str [port_or_fdes [start [end]]]
1198 Read characters from a port or file descriptor into a string STR.
1199 A port must have an underlying file descriptor -- a so-called
1200 fport. This procedure is scsh-compatible and can efficiently read
1203 *** New function: write-string/partial str [port_or_fdes [start [end]]]
1205 Write characters from a string STR to a port or file descriptor.
1206 A port must have an underlying file descriptor -- a so-called
1207 fport. This procedure is mostly compatible and can efficiently
1208 write large strings.
1210 ** New module (ice-9 match)
1212 This module includes Andrew K. Wright's pattern matcher. See
1213 ice-9/match.scm for brief description or
1215 http://www.star-lab.com/wright/code.html
1217 for complete documentation.
1219 ** New module (ice-9 buffered-input)
1221 This module provides procedures to construct an input port from an
1222 underlying source of input that reads and returns its input in chunks.
1223 The underlying input source is a Scheme procedure, specified by the
1224 caller, which the port invokes whenever it needs more input.
1226 This is useful when building an input port whose back end is Readline
1227 or a UI element such as the GtkEntry widget.
1231 The reference and tutorial documentation that was previously
1232 distributed separately, as `guile-doc', is now included in the core
1233 Guile distribution. The documentation consists of the following
1236 - The Guile Tutorial (guile-tut.texi) contains a tutorial introduction
1239 - The Guile Reference Manual (guile.texi) contains (or is intended to
1240 contain) reference documentation on all aspects of Guile.
1242 - The GOOPS Manual (goops.texi) contains both tutorial-style and
1243 reference documentation for using GOOPS, Guile's Object Oriented
1246 - The Revised^5 Report on the Algorithmic Language Scheme
1249 See the README file in the `doc' directory for more details.
1251 ** There are a couple of examples in the examples/ directory now.
1253 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
1255 ** New command line option `--use-srfi'
1257 Using this option, SRFI modules can be loaded on startup and be
1258 available right from the beginning. This makes programming portable
1259 Scheme programs easier.
1261 The option `--use-srfi' expects a comma-separated list of numbers,
1262 each representing a SRFI number to be loaded into the interpreter
1263 before starting evaluating a script file or the REPL. Additionally,
1264 the feature identifier for the loaded SRFIs is recognized by
1265 `cond-expand' when using this option.
1268 $ guile --use-srfi=8,13
1269 guile> (receive (x z) (values 1 2) (+ 1 2))
1271 guile> (string-pad "bla" 20)
1274 ** Guile now always starts up in the `(guile-user)' module.
1276 Previously, scripts executed via the `-s' option would run in the
1277 `(guile)' module and the repl would run in the `(guile-user)' module.
1278 Now every user action takes place in the `(guile-user)' module by
1281 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
1283 ** Character classifiers work for non-ASCII characters.
1285 The predicates `char-alphabetic?', `char-numeric?',
1286 `char-whitespace?', `char-lower?', `char-upper?' and `char-is-both?'
1287 no longer check whether their arguments are ASCII characters.
1288 Previously, a character would only be considered alphabetic when it
1289 was also ASCII, for example.
1291 ** Previously deprecated Scheme functions have been removed:
1293 tag - no replacement.
1294 fseek - replaced by seek.
1295 list* - replaced by cons*.
1297 ** It's now possible to create modules with controlled environments
1301 (use-modules (ice-9 safe))
1302 (define m (make-safe-module))
1303 ;;; m will now be a module containing only a safe subset of R5RS
1304 (eval '(+ 1 2) m) --> 3
1305 (eval 'load m) --> ERROR: Unbound variable: load
1307 ** Evaluation of "()", the empty list, is now an error.
1309 Previously, the expression "()" evaluated to the empty list. This has
1310 been changed to signal a "missing expression" error. The correct way
1311 to write the empty list as a literal constant is to use quote: "'()".
1313 ** New concept of `Guile Extensions'.
1315 A Guile Extension is just a ordinary shared library that can be linked
1316 at run-time. We found it advantageous to give this simple concept a
1317 dedicated name to distinguish the issues related to shared libraries
1318 from the issues related to the module system.
1320 *** New function: load-extension
1322 Executing (load-extension lib init) is mostly equivalent to
1324 (dynamic-call init (dynamic-link lib))
1326 except when scm_register_extension has been called previously.
1327 Whenever appropriate, you should use `load-extension' instead of
1328 dynamic-link and dynamic-call.
1330 *** New C function: scm_c_register_extension
1332 This function registers a initialization function for use by
1333 `load-extension'. Use it when you don't want specific extensions to
1334 be loaded as shared libraries (for example on platforms that don't
1335 support dynamic linking).
1337 ** Auto-loading of compiled-code modules is deprecated.
1339 Guile used to be able to automatically find and link a shared
1340 library to satisfy requests for a module. For example, the module
1341 `(foo bar)' could be implemented by placing a shared library named
1342 "foo/libbar.so" (or with a different extension) in a directory on the
1345 This has been found to be too tricky, and is no longer supported. The
1346 shared libraries are now called "extensions". You should now write a
1347 small Scheme file that calls `load-extension' to load the shared
1348 library and initialize it explicitely.
1350 The shared libraries themselves should be installed in the usual
1351 places for shared libraries, with names like "libguile-foo-bar".
1353 For example, place this into a file "foo/bar.scm"
1355 (define-module (foo bar))
1357 (load-extension "libguile-foo-bar" "foobar_init")
1359 ** Backward incompatible change: eval EXP ENVIRONMENT-SPECIFIER
1361 `eval' is now R5RS, that is it takes two arguments.
1362 The second argument is an environment specifier, i.e. either
1364 (scheme-report-environment 5)
1365 (null-environment 5)
1366 (interaction-environment)
1372 ** The module system has been made more disciplined.
1374 The function `eval' will save and restore the current module around
1375 the evaluation of the specified expression. While this expression is
1376 evaluated, `(current-module)' will now return the right module, which
1377 is the module specified as the second argument to `eval'.
1379 A consequence of this change is that `eval' is not particularly
1380 useful when you want allow the evaluated code to change what module is
1381 designated as the current module and have this change persist from one
1382 call to `eval' to the next. The read-eval-print-loop is an example
1383 where `eval' is now inadequate. To compensate, there is a new
1384 function `primitive-eval' that does not take a module specifier and
1385 that does not save/restore the current module. You should use this
1386 function together with `set-current-module', `current-module', etc
1387 when you want to have more control over the state that is carried from
1388 one eval to the next.
1390 Additionally, it has been made sure that forms that are evaluated at
1391 the top level are always evaluated with respect to the current module.
1392 Previously, subforms of top-level forms such as `begin', `case',
1393 etc. did not respect changes to the current module although these
1394 subforms are at the top-level as well.
1396 To prevent strange behavior, the forms `define-module',
1397 `use-modules', `use-syntax', and `export' have been restricted to only
1398 work on the top level. The forms `define-public' and
1399 `defmacro-public' only export the new binding on the top level. They
1400 behave just like `define' and `defmacro', respectively, when they are
1401 used in a lexical environment.
1403 Also, `export' will no longer silently re-export bindings imported
1404 from a used module. It will emit a `deprecation' warning and will
1405 cease to perform any re-export in the next version. If you actually
1406 want to re-export bindings, use the new `re-export' in place of
1407 `export'. The new `re-export' will not make copies of variables when
1408 rexporting them, as `export' did wrongly.
1410 ** Module system now allows selection and renaming of imported bindings
1412 Previously, when using `use-modules' or the `#:use-module' clause in
1413 the `define-module' form, all the bindings (association of symbols to
1414 values) for imported modules were added to the "current module" on an
1415 as-is basis. This has been changed to allow finer control through two
1416 new facilities: selection and renaming.
1418 You can now select which of the imported module's bindings are to be
1419 visible in the current module by using the `:select' clause. This
1420 clause also can be used to rename individual bindings. For example:
1422 ;; import all bindings no questions asked
1423 (use-modules (ice-9 common-list))
1425 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them;
1426 ;; the current module sees: every some zonk-y zonk-n
1427 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1429 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1430 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))))
1432 You can also programmatically rename all selected bindings using the
1433 `:renamer' clause, which specifies a proc that takes a symbol and
1434 returns another symbol. Because it is common practice to use a prefix,
1435 we now provide the convenience procedure `symbol-prefix-proc'. For
1438 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them specifically,
1439 ;; and all four w/ prefix "CL:";
1440 ;; the current module sees: CL:every CL:some CL:zonk-y CL:zonk-n
1441 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1443 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1444 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))
1445 :renamer (symbol-prefix-proc 'CL:)))
1447 ;; import four bindings, renaming two of them specifically,
1448 ;; and all four by upcasing.
1449 ;; the current module sees: EVERY SOME ZONK-Y ZONK-N
1450 (define (upcase-symbol sym)
1451 (string->symbol (string-upcase (symbol->string sym))))
1453 (use-modules ((ice-9 common-list)
1455 (remove-if . zonk-y)
1456 (remove-if-not . zonk-n))
1457 :renamer upcase-symbol))
1459 Note that programmatic renaming is done *after* individual renaming.
1460 Also, the above examples show `use-modules', but the same facilities are
1461 available for the `#:use-module' clause of `define-module'.
1463 See manual for more info.
1465 ** The semantics of guardians have changed.
1467 The changes are for the most part compatible. An important criterion
1468 was to keep the typical usage of guardians as simple as before, but to
1469 make the semantics safer and (as a result) more useful.
1471 *** All objects returned from guardians are now properly alive.
1473 It is now guaranteed that any object referenced by an object returned
1474 from a guardian is alive. It's now impossible for a guardian to
1475 return a "contained" object before its "containing" object.
1477 One incompatible (but probably not very important) change resulting
1478 from this is that it is no longer possible to guard objects that
1479 indirectly reference themselves (i.e. are parts of cycles). If you do
1480 so accidentally, you'll get a warning.
1482 *** There are now two types of guardians: greedy and sharing.
1484 If you call (make-guardian #t) or just (make-guardian), you'll get a
1485 greedy guardian, and for (make-guardian #f) a sharing guardian.
1487 Greedy guardians are the default because they are more "defensive".
1488 You can only greedily guard an object once. If you guard an object
1489 more than once, once in a greedy guardian and the rest of times in
1490 sharing guardians, then it is guaranteed that the object won't be
1491 returned from sharing guardians as long as it is greedily guarded
1494 Guardians returned by calls to `make-guardian' can now take one more
1495 optional parameter, which says whether to throw an error in case an
1496 attempt is made to greedily guard an object that is already greedily
1497 guarded. The default is true, i.e. throw an error. If the parameter
1498 is false, the guardian invocation returns #t if guarding was
1499 successful and #f if it wasn't.
1501 Also, since greedy guarding is, in effect, a side-effecting operation
1502 on objects, a new function is introduced: `destroy-guardian!'.
1503 Invoking this function on a guardian renders it unoperative and, if
1504 the guardian is greedy, clears the "greedily guarded" property of the
1505 objects that were guarded by it, thus undoing the side effect.
1507 Note that all this hair is hardly very important, since guardian
1508 objects are usually permanent.
1510 ** Continuations created by call-with-current-continuation now accept
1511 any number of arguments, as required by R5RS.
1513 ** New function `issue-deprecation-warning'
1515 This function is used to display the deprecation messages that are
1516 controlled by GUILE_WARN_DEPRECATION as explained in the README.
1519 (issue-deprecation-warning "`id' is deprecated. Use `identity' instead.")
1523 ;; `id' is deprecated. Use `identity' instead.
1528 ** New syntax `begin-deprecated'
1530 When deprecated features are included (as determined by the configure
1531 option --enable-deprecated), `begin-deprecated' is identical to
1532 `begin'. When deprecated features are excluded, it always evaluates
1533 to `#f', ignoring the body forms.
1535 ** New function `make-object-property'
1537 This function returns a new `procedure with setter' P that can be used
1538 to attach a property to objects. When calling P as
1542 where `obj' is any kind of object, it attaches `val' to `obj' in such
1543 a way that it can be retrieved by calling P as
1547 This function will replace procedure properties, symbol properties and
1548 source properties eventually.
1550 ** Module (ice-9 optargs) now uses keywords instead of `#&'.
1552 Instead of #&optional, #&key, etc you should now use #:optional,
1553 #:key, etc. Since #:optional is a keyword, you can write it as just
1554 :optional when (read-set! keywords 'prefix) is active.
1556 The old reader syntax `#&' is still supported, but deprecated. It
1557 will be removed in the next release.
1559 ** New define-module option: pure
1561 Tells the module system not to include any bindings from the root
1566 (define-module (totally-empty-module)
1569 ** New define-module option: export NAME1 ...
1571 Export names NAME1 ...
1573 This option is required if you want to be able to export bindings from
1574 a module which doesn't import one of `define-public' or `export'.
1578 (define-module (foo)
1580 :use-module (ice-9 r5rs)
1583 ;;; Note that we're pure R5RS below this point!
1588 ** New function: object->string OBJ
1590 Return a Scheme string obtained by printing a given object.
1592 ** New function: port? X
1594 Returns a boolean indicating whether X is a port. Equivalent to
1595 `(or (input-port? X) (output-port? X))'.
1597 ** New function: file-port?
1599 Determines whether a given object is a port that is related to a file.
1601 ** New function: port-for-each proc
1603 Apply PROC to each port in the Guile port table in turn. The return
1604 value is unspecified. More specifically, PROC is applied exactly once
1605 to every port that exists in the system at the time PORT-FOR-EACH is
1606 invoked. Changes to the port table while PORT-FOR-EACH is running
1607 have no effect as far as PORT-FOR-EACH is concerned.
1609 ** New function: dup2 oldfd newfd
1611 A simple wrapper for the `dup2' system call. Copies the file
1612 descriptor OLDFD to descriptor number NEWFD, replacing the
1613 previous meaning of NEWFD. Both OLDFD and NEWFD must be integers.
1614 Unlike for dup->fdes or primitive-move->fdes, no attempt is made
1615 to move away ports which are using NEWFD. The return value is
1618 ** New function: close-fdes fd
1620 A simple wrapper for the `close' system call. Close file
1621 descriptor FD, which must be an integer. Unlike close (*note
1622 close: Ports and File Descriptors.), the file descriptor will be
1623 closed even if a port is using it. The return value is
1626 ** New function: crypt password salt
1628 Encrypts `password' using the standard unix password encryption
1631 ** New function: chroot path
1633 Change the root directory of the running process to `path'.
1635 ** New functions: getlogin, cuserid
1637 Return the login name or the user name of the current effective user
1640 ** New functions: getpriority which who, setpriority which who prio
1642 Get or set the priority of the running process.
1644 ** New function: getpass prompt
1646 Read a password from the terminal, first displaying `prompt' and
1649 ** New function: flock file operation
1651 Set/remove an advisory shared or exclusive lock on `file'.
1653 ** New functions: sethostname name, gethostname
1655 Set or get the hostname of the machine the current process is running
1658 ** New function: mkstemp! tmpl
1660 mkstemp creates a new unique file in the file system and returns a
1661 new buffered port open for reading and writing to the file. TMPL
1662 is a string specifying where the file should be created: it must
1663 end with `XXXXXX' and will be changed in place to return the name
1664 of the temporary file.
1666 ** New function: open-input-string string
1668 Return an input string port which delivers the characters from
1669 `string'. This procedure, together with `open-output-string' and
1670 `get-output-string' implements SRFI-6.
1672 ** New function: open-output-string
1674 Return an output string port which collects all data written to it.
1675 The data can then be retrieved by `get-output-string'.
1677 ** New function: get-output-string
1679 Return the contents of an output string port.
1681 ** New function: identity
1683 Return the argument.
1685 ** socket, connect, accept etc., now have support for IPv6. IPv6 addresses
1686 are represented in Scheme as integers with normal host byte ordering.
1688 ** New function: inet-pton family address
1690 Convert a printable string network address into an integer. Note that
1691 unlike the C version of this function, the result is an integer with
1692 normal host byte ordering. FAMILY can be `AF_INET' or `AF_INET6'.
1695 (inet-pton AF_INET "127.0.0.1") => 2130706433
1696 (inet-pton AF_INET6 "::1") => 1
1698 ** New function: inet-ntop family address
1700 Convert an integer network address into a printable string. Note that
1701 unlike the C version of this function, the input is an integer with
1702 normal host byte ordering. FAMILY can be `AF_INET' or `AF_INET6'.
1705 (inet-ntop AF_INET 2130706433) => "127.0.0.1"
1706 (inet-ntop AF_INET6 (- (expt 2 128) 1)) =>
1707 ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff
1711 Use `identity' instead.
1717 ** Deprecated: return-it
1721 ** Deprecated: string-character-length
1723 Use `string-length' instead.
1725 ** Deprecated: flags
1727 Use `logior' instead.
1729 ** Deprecated: close-all-ports-except.
1731 This was intended for closing ports in a child process after a fork,
1732 but it has the undesirable side effect of flushing buffers.
1733 port-for-each is more flexible.
1735 ** The (ice-9 popen) module now attempts to set up file descriptors in
1736 the child process from the current Scheme ports, instead of using the
1737 current values of file descriptors 0, 1, and 2 in the parent process.
1739 ** Removed function: builtin-weak-bindings
1741 There is no such concept as a weak binding any more.
1743 ** Removed constants: bignum-radix, scm-line-incrementors
1745 ** define-method: New syntax mandatory.
1747 The new method syntax is now mandatory:
1749 (define-method (NAME ARG-SPEC ...) BODY ...)
1750 (define-method (NAME ARG-SPEC ... . REST-ARG) BODY ...)
1752 ARG-SPEC ::= ARG-NAME | (ARG-NAME TYPE)
1753 REST-ARG ::= ARG-NAME
1755 If you have old code using the old syntax, import
1756 (oop goops old-define-method) before (oop goops) as in:
1758 (use-modules (oop goops old-define-method) (oop goops))
1760 ** Deprecated function: builtin-variable
1761 Removed function: builtin-bindings
1763 There is no longer a distinction between builtin or other variables.
1764 Use module system operations for all variables.
1766 ** Lazy-catch handlers are no longer allowed to return.
1768 That is, a call to `throw', `error', etc is now guaranteed to not
1771 ** Bugfixes for (ice-9 getopt-long)
1773 This module is now tested using test-suite/tests/getopt-long.test.
1774 The following bugs have been fixed:
1776 *** Parsing for options that are specified to have `optional' args now checks
1777 if the next element is an option instead of unconditionally taking it as the
1780 *** An error is now thrown for `--opt=val' when the option description
1781 does not specify `(value #t)' or `(value optional)'. This condition used to
1782 be accepted w/o error, contrary to the documentation.
1784 *** The error message for unrecognized options is now more informative.
1785 It used to be "not a record", an artifact of the implementation.
1787 *** The error message for `--opt' terminating the arg list (no value), when
1788 `(value #t)' is specified, is now more informative. It used to be "not enough
1791 *** "Clumped" single-char args now preserve trailing string, use it as arg.
1792 The expansion used to be like so:
1794 ("-abc5d" "--xyz") => ("-a" "-b" "-c" "--xyz")
1796 Note that the "5d" is dropped. Now it is like so:
1798 ("-abc5d" "--xyz") => ("-a" "-b" "-c" "5d" "--xyz")
1800 This enables single-char options to have adjoining arguments as long as their
1801 constituent characters are not potential single-char options.
1803 ** (ice-9 session) procedure `arity' now works with (ice-9 optargs) `lambda*'
1805 The `lambda*' and derivative forms in (ice-9 optargs) now set a procedure
1806 property `arglist', which can be retrieved by `arity'. The result is that
1807 `arity' can give more detailed information than before:
1811 guile> (use-modules (ice-9 optargs))
1812 guile> (define* (foo #:optional a b c) a)
1814 0 or more arguments in `lambda*:G0'.
1819 3 optional arguments: `a', `b' and `c'.
1820 guile> (define* (bar a b #:key c d #:allow-other-keys) a)
1822 2 required arguments: `a' and `b', 2 keyword arguments: `c'
1823 and `d', other keywords allowed.
1824 guile> (define* (baz a b #:optional c #:rest r) a)
1826 2 required arguments: `a' and `b', 1 optional argument: `c',
1829 * Changes to the C interface
1831 ** Types have been renamed from scm_*_t to scm_t_*.
1833 This has been done for POSIX sake. It reserves identifiers ending
1834 with "_t". What a concept.
1836 The old names are still available with status `deprecated'.
1838 ** scm_t_bits (former scm_bits_t) is now a unsigned type.
1840 ** Deprecated features have been removed.
1844 SCM_INPORTP, SCM_OUTPORTP SCM_ICHRP, SCM_ICHR, SCM_MAKICHR
1845 SCM_SETJMPBUF SCM_NSTRINGP SCM_NRWSTRINGP SCM_NVECTORP SCM_DOUBLE_CELLP
1847 *** C Functions removed
1849 scm_sysmissing scm_tag scm_tc16_flo scm_tc_flo
1850 scm_fseek - replaced by scm_seek.
1851 gc-thunk - replaced by after-gc-hook.
1852 gh_int2scmb - replaced by gh_bool2scm.
1853 scm_tc_dblr - replaced by scm_tc16_real.
1854 scm_tc_dblc - replaced by scm_tc16_complex.
1855 scm_list_star - replaced by scm_cons_star.
1857 ** Deprecated: scm_makfromstr
1859 Use scm_mem2string instead.
1861 ** Deprecated: scm_make_shared_substring
1863 Explicit shared substrings will disappear from Guile.
1865 Instead, "normal" strings will be implemented using sharing
1866 internally, combined with a copy-on-write strategy.
1868 ** Deprecated: scm_read_only_string_p
1870 The concept of read-only strings will disappear in next release of
1873 ** Deprecated: scm_sloppy_memq, scm_sloppy_memv, scm_sloppy_member
1875 Instead, use scm_c_memq or scm_memq, scm_memv, scm_member.
1877 ** New functions: scm_call_0, scm_call_1, scm_call_2, scm_call_3
1879 Call a procedure with the indicated number of arguments. See "Fly
1880 Evaluation" in the manual.
1882 ** New functions: scm_apply_0, scm_apply_1, scm_apply_2, scm_apply_3
1884 Call a procedure with the indicated number of arguments and a list of
1885 further arguments. See "Fly Evaluation" in the manual.
1887 ** New functions: scm_list_1, scm_list_2, scm_list_3, scm_list_4, scm_list_5
1889 Create a list of the given number of elements. See "List
1890 Constructors" in the manual.
1892 ** Renamed function: scm_listify has been replaced by scm_list_n.
1894 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_LIST0, SCM_LIST1, SCM_LIST2, SCM_LIST3, SCM_LIST4,
1895 SCM_LIST5, SCM_LIST6, SCM_LIST7, SCM_LIST8, SCM_LIST9.
1897 Use functions scm_list_N instead.
1899 ** New function: scm_c_read (SCM port, void *buffer, scm_sizet size)
1901 Used by an application to read arbitrary number of bytes from a port.
1902 Same semantics as libc read, except that scm_c_read only returns less
1903 than SIZE bytes if at end-of-file.
1905 Warning: Doesn't update port line and column counts!
1907 ** New function: scm_c_write (SCM port, const void *ptr, scm_sizet size)
1909 Used by an application to write arbitrary number of bytes to an SCM
1910 port. Similar semantics as libc write. However, unlike libc
1911 write, scm_c_write writes the requested number of bytes and has no
1914 Warning: Doesn't update port line and column counts!
1916 ** New function: scm_init_guile ()
1918 In contrast to scm_boot_guile, scm_init_guile will return normally
1919 after initializing Guile. It is not available on all systems, tho.
1921 ** New functions: scm_str2symbol, scm_mem2symbol
1923 The function scm_str2symbol takes a const char* pointing to a zero-terminated
1924 field of characters and creates a scheme symbol object from that C string.
1925 The function scm_mem2symbol takes a const char* and a number of characters and
1926 creates a symbol from the characters in that memory area.
1928 ** New functions: scm_primitive_make_property
1929 scm_primitive_property_ref
1930 scm_primitive_property_set_x
1931 scm_primitive_property_del_x
1933 These functions implement a new way to deal with object properties.
1934 See libguile/properties.c for their documentation.
1936 ** New function: scm_done_free (long size)
1938 This function is the inverse of scm_done_malloc. Use it to report the
1939 amount of smob memory you free. The previous method, which involved
1940 calling scm_done_malloc with negative argument, was somewhat
1941 unintuitive (and is still available, of course).
1943 ** New function: scm_c_memq (SCM obj, SCM list)
1945 This function provides a fast C level alternative for scm_memq for the case
1946 that the list parameter is known to be a proper list. The function is a
1947 replacement for scm_sloppy_memq, but is stricter in its requirements on its
1948 list input parameter, since for anything else but a proper list the function's
1949 behaviour is undefined - it may even crash or loop endlessly. Further, for
1950 the case that the object is not found in the list, scm_c_memq returns #f which
1951 is similar to scm_memq, but different from scm_sloppy_memq's behaviour.
1953 ** New functions: scm_remember_upto_here_1, scm_remember_upto_here_2,
1954 scm_remember_upto_here
1956 These functions replace the function scm_remember.
1958 ** Deprecated function: scm_remember
1960 Use one of the new functions scm_remember_upto_here_1,
1961 scm_remember_upto_here_2 or scm_remember_upto_here instead.
1963 ** New function: scm_allocate_string
1965 This function replaces the function scm_makstr.
1967 ** Deprecated function: scm_makstr
1969 Use the new function scm_allocate_string instead.
1971 ** New global variable scm_gc_running_p introduced.
1973 Use this variable to find out if garbage collection is being executed. Up to
1974 now applications have used scm_gc_heap_lock to test if garbage collection was
1975 running, which also works because of the fact that up to know only the garbage
1976 collector has set this variable. But, this is an implementation detail that
1977 may change. Further, scm_gc_heap_lock is not set throughout gc, thus the use
1978 of this variable is (and has been) not fully safe anyway.
1980 ** New macros: SCM_BITVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_MAX_LENGTH
1982 Use these instead of SCM_LENGTH_MAX.
1984 ** New macros: SCM_CONTINUATION_LENGTH, SCM_CCLO_LENGTH, SCM_STACK_LENGTH,
1985 SCM_STRING_LENGTH, SCM_SYMBOL_LENGTH, SCM_UVECTOR_LENGTH,
1986 SCM_BITVECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_VECTOR_LENGTH.
1988 Use these instead of SCM_LENGTH.
1990 ** New macros: SCM_SET_CONTINUATION_LENGTH, SCM_SET_STRING_LENGTH,
1991 SCM_SET_SYMBOL_LENGTH, SCM_SET_VECTOR_LENGTH, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_LENGTH,
1992 SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_LENGTH
1994 Use these instead of SCM_SETLENGTH
1996 ** New macros: SCM_STRING_CHARS, SCM_SYMBOL_CHARS, SCM_CCLO_BASE,
1997 SCM_VECTOR_BASE, SCM_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_BITVECTOR_BASE, SCM_COMPLEX_MEM,
2000 Use these instead of SCM_CHARS, SCM_UCHARS, SCM_ROCHARS, SCM_ROUCHARS or
2003 ** New macros: SCM_SET_BIGNUM_BASE, SCM_SET_STRING_CHARS,
2004 SCM_SET_SYMBOL_CHARS, SCM_SET_UVECTOR_BASE, SCM_SET_BITVECTOR_BASE,
2007 Use these instead of SCM_SETCHARS.
2009 ** New macro: SCM_BITVECTOR_P
2011 ** New macro: SCM_STRING_COERCE_0TERMINATION_X
2013 Use instead of SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR.
2015 ** New macros: SCM_DIR_OPEN_P, SCM_DIR_FLAG_OPEN
2017 For directory objects, use these instead of SCM_OPDIRP and SCM_OPN.
2019 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_OUTOFRANGE, SCM_NALLOC, SCM_HUP_SIGNAL,
2020 SCM_INT_SIGNAL, SCM_FPE_SIGNAL, SCM_BUS_SIGNAL, SCM_SEGV_SIGNAL,
2021 SCM_ALRM_SIGNAL, SCM_GC_SIGNAL, SCM_TICK_SIGNAL, SCM_SIG_ORD,
2022 SCM_ORD_SIG, SCM_NUM_SIGS, SCM_SYMBOL_SLOTS, SCM_SLOTS, SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP,
2023 SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR, SCM_FREEP, SCM_NFREEP, SCM_CHARS, SCM_UCHARS,
2024 SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING, SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING_COPY,
2025 SCM_VALIDATE_NULLORROSTRING_COPY, SCM_ROLENGTH, SCM_LENGTH, SCM_HUGE_LENGTH,
2026 SCM_SUBSTRP, SCM_SUBSTR_STR, SCM_SUBSTR_OFFSET, SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR,
2027 SCM_ROSTRINGP, SCM_RWSTRINGP, SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING, SCM_ROCHARS,
2028 SCM_ROUCHARS, SCM_SETLENGTH, SCM_SETCHARS, SCM_LENGTH_MAX, SCM_GC8MARKP,
2029 SCM_SETGC8MARK, SCM_CLRGC8MARK, SCM_GCTYP16, SCM_GCCDR, SCM_SUBR_DOC,
2030 SCM_OPDIRP, SCM_VALIDATE_OPDIR, SCM_WTA, RETURN_SCM_WTA, SCM_CONST_LONG,
2031 SCM_WNA, SCM_FUNC_NAME, SCM_VALIDATE_NUMBER_COPY,
2032 SCM_VALIDATE_NUMBER_DEF_COPY, SCM_SLOPPY_CONSP, SCM_SLOPPY_NCONSP,
2033 SCM_SETAND_CDR, SCM_SETOR_CDR, SCM_SETAND_CAR, SCM_SETOR_CAR
2035 Use SCM_ASSERT_RANGE or SCM_VALIDATE_XXX_RANGE instead of SCM_OUTOFRANGE.
2036 Use scm_memory_error instead of SCM_NALLOC.
2037 Use SCM_STRINGP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_STRINGP.
2038 Use SCM_VALIDATE_STRING instead of SCM_VALIDATE_STRINGORSUBSTR.
2039 Use SCM_FREE_CELL_P instead of SCM_FREEP/SCM_NFREEP
2040 Use a type specific accessor macro instead of SCM_CHARS/SCM_UCHARS.
2041 Use a type specific accessor instead of SCM(_|_RO|_HUGE_)LENGTH.
2042 Use SCM_VALIDATE_(SYMBOL|STRING) instead of SCM_VALIDATE_ROSTRING.
2043 Use SCM_STRING_COERCE_0TERMINATION_X instead of SCM_COERCE_SUBSTR.
2044 Use SCM_STRINGP or SCM_SYMBOLP instead of SCM_ROSTRINGP.
2045 Use SCM_STRINGP instead of SCM_RWSTRINGP.
2046 Use SCM_VALIDATE_STRING instead of SCM_VALIDATE_RWSTRING.
2047 Use SCM_STRING_CHARS instead of SCM_ROCHARS.
2048 Use SCM_STRING_UCHARS instead of SCM_ROUCHARS.
2049 Use a type specific setter macro instead of SCM_SETLENGTH.
2050 Use a type specific setter macro instead of SCM_SETCHARS.
2051 Use a type specific length macro instead of SCM_LENGTH_MAX.
2052 Use SCM_GCMARKP instead of SCM_GC8MARKP.
2053 Use SCM_SETGCMARK instead of SCM_SETGC8MARK.
2054 Use SCM_CLRGCMARK instead of SCM_CLRGC8MARK.
2055 Use SCM_TYP16 instead of SCM_GCTYP16.
2056 Use SCM_CDR instead of SCM_GCCDR.
2057 Use SCM_DIR_OPEN_P instead of SCM_OPDIRP.
2058 Use SCM_MISC_ERROR or SCM_WRONG_TYPE_ARG instead of SCM_WTA.
2059 Use SCM_MISC_ERROR or SCM_WRONG_TYPE_ARG instead of RETURN_SCM_WTA.
2060 Use SCM_VCELL_INIT instead of SCM_CONST_LONG.
2061 Use SCM_WRONG_NUM_ARGS instead of SCM_WNA.
2062 Use SCM_CONSP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_CONSP.
2063 Use !SCM_CONSP instead of SCM_SLOPPY_NCONSP.
2065 ** Removed function: scm_struct_init
2067 ** Removed variable: scm_symhash_dim
2069 ** Renamed function: scm_make_cont has been replaced by
2070 scm_make_continuation, which has a different interface.
2072 ** Deprecated function: scm_call_catching_errors
2074 Use scm_catch or scm_lazy_catch from throw.[ch] instead.
2076 ** Deprecated function: scm_strhash
2078 Use scm_string_hash instead.
2080 ** Deprecated function: scm_vector_set_length_x
2082 Instead, create a fresh vector of the desired size and copy the contents.
2084 ** scm_gensym has changed prototype
2086 scm_gensym now only takes one argument.
2088 ** Deprecated type tags: scm_tc7_ssymbol, scm_tc7_msymbol, scm_tcs_symbols,
2091 There is now only a single symbol type scm_tc7_symbol.
2092 The tag scm_tc7_lvector was not used anyway.
2094 ** Deprecated function: scm_make_smob_type_mfpe, scm_set_smob_mfpe.
2096 Use scm_make_smob_type and scm_set_smob_XXX instead.
2098 ** New function scm_set_smob_apply.
2100 This can be used to set an apply function to a smob type.
2102 ** Deprecated function: scm_strprint_obj
2104 Use scm_object_to_string instead.
2106 ** Deprecated function: scm_wta
2108 Use scm_wrong_type_arg, or another appropriate error signalling function
2111 ** Explicit support for obarrays has been deprecated.
2113 Use `scm_str2symbol' and the generic hashtable functions instead.
2115 ** The concept of `vcells' has been deprecated.
2117 The data type `variable' is now used exclusively. `Vcells' have been
2118 a low-level concept so you are likely not affected by this change.
2120 *** Deprecated functions: scm_sym2vcell, scm_sysintern,
2121 scm_sysintern0, scm_symbol_value0, scm_intern, scm_intern0.
2123 Use scm_c_define or scm_c_lookup instead, as appropriate.
2125 *** New functions: scm_c_module_lookup, scm_c_lookup,
2126 scm_c_module_define, scm_c_define, scm_module_lookup, scm_lookup,
2127 scm_module_define, scm_define.
2129 These functions work with variables instead of with vcells.
2131 ** New functions for creating and defining `subr's and `gsubr's.
2133 The new functions more clearly distinguish between creating a subr (or
2134 gsubr) object and adding it to the current module.
2136 These new functions are available: scm_c_make_subr, scm_c_define_subr,
2137 scm_c_make_subr_with_generic, scm_c_define_subr_with_generic,
2138 scm_c_make_gsubr, scm_c_define_gsubr, scm_c_make_gsubr_with_generic,
2139 scm_c_define_gsubr_with_generic.
2141 ** Deprecated functions: scm_make_subr, scm_make_subr_opt,
2142 scm_make_subr_with_generic, scm_make_gsubr,
2143 scm_make_gsubr_with_generic.
2145 Use the new ones from above instead.
2147 ** C interface to the module system has changed.
2149 While we suggest that you avoid as many explicit module system
2150 operations from C as possible for the time being, the C interface has
2151 been made more similar to the high-level Scheme module system.
2153 *** New functions: scm_c_define_module, scm_c_use_module,
2154 scm_c_export, scm_c_resolve_module.
2156 They mostly work like their Scheme namesakes. scm_c_define_module
2157 takes a function that is called a context where the new module is
2160 *** Deprecated functions: scm_the_root_module, scm_make_module,
2161 scm_ensure_user_module, scm_load_scheme_module.
2163 Use the new functions instead.
2165 ** Renamed function: scm_internal_with_fluids becomes
2168 scm_internal_with_fluids is available as a deprecated function.
2170 ** New function: scm_c_with_fluid.
2172 Just like scm_c_with_fluids, but takes one fluid and one value instead
2175 ** Deprecated typedefs: long_long, ulong_long.
2177 They are of questionable utility and they pollute the global
2180 ** Deprecated typedef: scm_sizet
2182 It is of questionable utility now that Guile requires ANSI C, and is
2185 ** Deprecated typedefs: scm_port_rw_active, scm_port,
2186 scm_ptob_descriptor, scm_debug_info, scm_debug_frame, scm_fport,
2187 scm_option, scm_rstate, scm_rng, scm_array, scm_array_dim.
2189 Made more compliant with the naming policy by adding a _t at the end.
2191 ** Deprecated functions: scm_mkbig, scm_big2num, scm_adjbig,
2192 scm_normbig, scm_copybig, scm_2ulong2big, scm_dbl2big, scm_big2dbl
2194 With the exception of the mysterious scm_2ulong2big, they are still
2195 available under new names (scm_i_mkbig etc). These functions are not
2196 intended to be used in user code. You should avoid dealing with
2197 bignums directly, and should deal with numbers in general (which can
2200 ** Change in behavior: scm_num2long, scm_num2ulong
2202 The scm_num2[u]long functions don't any longer accept an inexact
2203 argument. This change in behavior is motivated by concordance with
2204 R5RS: It is more common that a primitive doesn't want to accept an
2205 inexact for an exact.
2207 ** New functions: scm_short2num, scm_ushort2num, scm_int2num,
2208 scm_uint2num, scm_size2num, scm_ptrdiff2num, scm_num2short,
2209 scm_num2ushort, scm_num2int, scm_num2uint, scm_num2ptrdiff,
2212 These are conversion functions between the various ANSI C integral
2213 types and Scheme numbers. NOTE: The scm_num2xxx functions don't
2214 accept an inexact argument.
2216 ** New functions: scm_float2num, scm_double2num,
2217 scm_num2float, scm_num2double.
2219 These are conversion functions between the two ANSI C float types and
2222 ** New number validation macros:
2223 SCM_NUM2{SIZE,PTRDIFF,SHORT,USHORT,INT,UINT}[_DEF]
2227 ** New functions: scm_gc_protect_object, scm_gc_unprotect_object
2229 These are just nicer-named old scm_protect_object and
2230 scm_unprotect_object.
2232 ** Deprecated functions: scm_protect_object, scm_unprotect_object
2234 ** New functions: scm_gc_[un]register_root, scm_gc_[un]register_roots
2236 These functions can be used to register pointers to locations that
2239 ** Deprecated function: scm_create_hook.
2241 Its sins are: misleading name, non-modularity and lack of general
2245 Changes since Guile 1.3.4:
2247 * Changes to the distribution
2249 ** Trees from nightly snapshots and CVS now require you to run autogen.sh.
2251 We've changed the way we handle generated files in the Guile source
2252 repository. As a result, the procedure for building trees obtained
2253 from the nightly FTP snapshots or via CVS has changed:
2254 - You must have appropriate versions of autoconf, automake, and
2255 libtool installed on your system. See README for info on how to
2256 obtain these programs.
2257 - Before configuring the tree, you must first run the script
2258 `autogen.sh' at the top of the source tree.
2260 The Guile repository used to contain not only source files, written by
2261 humans, but also some generated files, like configure scripts and
2262 Makefile.in files. Even though the contents of these files could be
2263 derived mechanically from other files present, we thought it would
2264 make the tree easier to build if we checked them into CVS.
2266 However, this approach means that minor differences between
2267 developer's installed tools and habits affected the whole team.
2268 So we have removed the generated files from the repository, and
2269 added the autogen.sh script, which will reconstruct them
2273 ** configure now has experimental options to remove support for certain
2276 --disable-arrays omit array and uniform array support
2277 --disable-posix omit posix interfaces
2278 --disable-networking omit networking interfaces
2279 --disable-regex omit regular expression interfaces
2281 These are likely to become separate modules some day.
2283 ** New configure option --enable-debug-freelist
2285 This enables a debugging version of SCM_NEWCELL(), and also registers
2286 an extra primitive, the setter `gc-set-debug-check-freelist!'.
2288 Configure with the --enable-debug-freelist option to enable
2289 the gc-set-debug-check-freelist! primitive, and then use:
2291 (gc-set-debug-check-freelist! #t) # turn on checking of the freelist
2292 (gc-set-debug-check-freelist! #f) # turn off checking
2294 Checking of the freelist forces a traversal of the freelist and
2295 a garbage collection before each allocation of a cell. This can
2296 slow down the interpreter dramatically, so the setter should be used to
2297 turn on this extra processing only when necessary.
2299 ** New configure option --enable-debug-malloc
2301 Include code for debugging of calls to scm_must_malloc/realloc/free.
2305 1. objects freed by scm_must_free has been mallocated by scm_must_malloc
2306 2. objects reallocated by scm_must_realloc has been allocated by
2308 3. reallocated objects are reallocated with the same what string
2310 But, most importantly, it records the number of allocated objects of
2311 each kind. This is useful when searching for memory leaks.
2313 A Guile compiled with this option provides the primitive
2314 `malloc-stats' which returns an alist with pairs of kind and the
2315 number of objects of that kind.
2317 ** All includes are now referenced relative to the root directory
2319 Since some users have had problems with mixups between Guile and
2320 system headers, we have decided to always refer to Guile headers via
2321 their parent directories. This essentially creates a "private name
2322 space" for Guile headers. This means that the compiler only is given
2323 -I options for the root build and root source directory.
2325 ** Header files kw.h and genio.h have been removed.
2327 ** The module (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style) has been removed.
2329 ** New module (ice-9 documentation)
2331 Implements the interface to documentation strings associated with
2334 ** New module (ice-9 time)
2336 Provides a macro `time', which displays execution time of a given form.
2338 ** New module (ice-9 history)
2340 Loading this module enables value history in the repl.
2342 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
2344 ** New command line option --debug
2346 Start Guile with debugging evaluator and backtraces enabled.
2348 This is useful when debugging your .guile init file or scripts.
2350 ** New help facility
2352 Usage: (help NAME) gives documentation about objects named NAME (a symbol)
2353 (help REGEXP) ditto for objects with names matching REGEXP (a string)
2354 (help 'NAME) gives documentation for NAME, even if it is not an object
2355 (help ,EXPR) gives documentation for object returned by EXPR
2356 (help (my module)) gives module commentary for `(my module)'
2357 (help) gives this text
2359 `help' searches among bindings exported from loaded modules, while
2360 `apropos' searches among bindings visible from the "current" module.
2362 Examples: (help help)
2364 (help "output-string")
2366 ** `help' and `apropos' now prints full module names
2368 ** Dynamic linking now uses libltdl from the libtool package.
2370 The old system dependent code for doing dynamic linking has been
2371 replaced with calls to the libltdl functions which do all the hairy
2374 The major improvement is that you can now directly pass libtool
2375 library names like "libfoo.la" to `dynamic-link' and `dynamic-link'
2376 will be able to do the best shared library job you can get, via
2379 The way dynamic libraries are found has changed and is not really
2380 portable across platforms, probably. It is therefore recommended to
2381 use absolute filenames when possible.
2383 If you pass a filename without an extension to `dynamic-link', it will
2384 try a few appropriate ones. Thus, the most platform ignorant way is
2385 to specify a name like "libfoo", without any directories and
2388 ** Guile COOP threads are now compatible with LinuxThreads
2390 Previously, COOP threading wasn't possible in applications linked with
2391 Linux POSIX threads due to their use of the stack pointer to find the
2392 thread context. This has now been fixed with a workaround which uses
2393 the pthreads to allocate the stack.
2395 ** New primitives: `pkgdata-dir', `site-dir', `library-dir'
2397 ** Positions of erring expression in scripts
2399 With version 1.3.4, the location of the erring expression in Guile
2400 scipts is no longer automatically reported. (This should have been
2401 documented before the 1.3.4 release.)
2403 You can get this information by enabling recording of positions of
2404 source expressions and running the debugging evaluator. Put this at
2405 the top of your script (or in your "site" file):
2407 (read-enable 'positions)
2408 (debug-enable 'debug)
2410 ** Backtraces in scripts
2412 It is now possible to get backtraces in scripts.
2416 (debug-enable 'debug 'backtrace)
2418 at the top of the script.
2420 (The first options enables the debugging evaluator.
2421 The second enables backtraces.)
2423 ** Part of module system symbol lookup now implemented in C
2425 The eval closure of most modules is now implemented in C. Since this
2426 was one of the bottlenecks for loading speed, Guile now loads code
2427 substantially faster than before.
2429 ** Attempting to get the value of an unbound variable now produces
2430 an exception with a key of 'unbound-variable instead of 'misc-error.
2432 ** The initial default output port is now unbuffered if it's using a
2433 tty device. Previously in this situation it was line-buffered.
2435 ** New hook: after-gc-hook
2437 after-gc-hook takes over the role of gc-thunk. This hook is run at
2438 the first SCM_TICK after a GC. (Thus, the code is run at the same
2439 point during evaluation as signal handlers.)
2441 Note that this hook should be used only for diagnostic and debugging
2442 purposes. It is not certain that it will continue to be well-defined
2443 when this hook is run in the future.
2445 C programmers: Note the new C level hooks scm_before_gc_c_hook,
2446 scm_before_sweep_c_hook, scm_after_gc_c_hook.
2448 ** Improvements to garbage collector
2450 Guile 1.4 has a new policy for triggering heap allocation and
2451 determining the sizes of heap segments. It fixes a number of problems
2454 1. The new policy can handle two separate pools of cells
2455 (2-word/4-word) better. (The old policy would run wild, allocating
2456 more and more memory for certain programs.)
2458 2. The old code would sometimes allocate far too much heap so that the
2459 Guile process became gigantic. The new code avoids this.
2461 3. The old code would sometimes allocate too little so that few cells
2462 were freed at GC so that, in turn, too much time was spent in GC.
2464 4. The old code would often trigger heap allocation several times in a
2465 row. (The new scheme predicts how large the segments needs to be
2466 in order not to need further allocation.)
2468 All in all, the new GC policy will make larger applications more
2471 The new GC scheme also is prepared for POSIX threading. Threads can
2472 allocate private pools of cells ("clusters") with just a single
2473 function call. Allocation of single cells from such a cluster can
2474 then proceed without any need of inter-thread synchronization.
2476 ** New environment variables controlling GC parameters
2478 GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE Maximal segment size
2481 Allocation of 2-word cell heaps:
2483 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_1 Size of initial heap segment in bytes
2486 GUILE_MIN_YIELD_1 Minimum number of freed cells at each
2487 GC in percent of total heap size
2490 Allocation of 4-word cell heaps
2491 (used for real numbers and misc other objects):
2493 GUILE_INIT_SEGMENT_SIZE_2, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2
2495 (See entry "Way for application to customize GC parameters" under
2496 section "Changes to the scm_ interface" below.)
2498 ** Guile now implements reals using 4-word cells
2500 This speeds up computation with reals. (They were earlier allocated
2501 with `malloc'.) There is still some room for optimizations, however.
2503 ** Some further steps toward POSIX thread support have been taken
2505 *** Guile's critical sections (SCM_DEFER/ALLOW_INTS)
2506 don't have much effect any longer, and many of them will be removed in
2510 are only handled at the top of the evaluator loop, immediately after
2511 I/O, and in scm_equalp.
2513 *** The GC can allocate thread private pools of pairs.
2515 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
2517 ** close-input-port and close-output-port are now R5RS
2519 These procedures have been turned into primitives and have R5RS behaviour.
2521 ** New procedure: simple-format PORT MESSAGE ARG1 ...
2523 (ice-9 boot) makes `format' an alias for `simple-format' until possibly
2524 extended by the more sophisticated version in (ice-9 format)
2526 (simple-format port message . args)
2527 Write MESSAGE to DESTINATION, defaulting to `current-output-port'.
2528 MESSAGE can contain ~A (was %s) and ~S (was %S) escapes. When printed,
2529 the escapes are replaced with corresponding members of ARGS:
2530 ~A formats using `display' and ~S formats using `write'.
2531 If DESTINATION is #t, then use the `current-output-port',
2532 if DESTINATION is #f, then return a string containing the formatted text.
2533 Does not add a trailing newline."
2535 ** string-ref: the second argument is no longer optional.
2537 ** string, list->string: no longer accept strings in their arguments,
2538 only characters, for compatibility with R5RS.
2540 ** New procedure: port-closed? PORT
2541 Returns #t if PORT is closed or #f if it is open.
2543 ** Deprecated: list*
2545 The list* functionality is now provided by cons* (SRFI-1 compliant)
2547 ** New procedure: cons* ARG1 ARG2 ... ARGn
2549 Like `list', but the last arg provides the tail of the constructed list,
2550 returning (cons ARG1 (cons ARG2 (cons ... ARGn))).
2552 Requires at least one argument. If given one argument, that argument
2553 is returned as result.
2555 This function is called `list*' in some other Schemes and in Common LISP.
2557 ** Removed deprecated: serial-map, serial-array-copy!, serial-array-map!
2559 ** New procedure: object-documentation OBJECT
2561 Returns the documentation string associated with OBJECT. The
2562 procedure uses a caching mechanism so that subsequent lookups are
2565 Exported by (ice-9 documentation).
2567 ** module-name now returns full names of modules
2569 Previously, only the last part of the name was returned (`session' for
2570 `(ice-9 session)'). Ex: `(ice-9 session)'.
2572 * Changes to the gh_ interface
2574 ** Deprecated: gh_int2scmb
2576 Use gh_bool2scm instead.
2578 * Changes to the scm_ interface
2580 ** Guile primitives now carry docstrings!
2582 Thanks to Greg Badros!
2584 ** Guile primitives are defined in a new way: SCM_DEFINE/SCM_DEFINE1/SCM_PROC
2586 Now Guile primitives are defined using the SCM_DEFINE/SCM_DEFINE1/SCM_PROC
2587 macros and must contain a docstring that is extracted into foo.doc using a new
2588 guile-doc-snarf script (that uses guile-doc-snarf.awk).
2590 However, a major overhaul of these macros is scheduled for the next release of
2593 ** Guile primitives use a new technique for validation of arguments
2595 SCM_VALIDATE_* macros are defined to ease the redundancy and improve
2596 the readability of argument checking.
2598 ** All (nearly?) K&R prototypes for functions replaced with ANSI C equivalents.
2600 ** New macros: SCM_PACK, SCM_UNPACK
2602 Compose/decompose an SCM value.
2604 The SCM type is now treated as an abstract data type and may be defined as a
2605 long, a void* or as a struct, depending on the architecture and compile time
2606 options. This makes it easier to find several types of bugs, for example when
2607 SCM values are treated as integers without conversion. Values of the SCM type
2608 should be treated as "atomic" values. These macros are used when
2609 composing/decomposing an SCM value, either because you want to access
2610 individual bits, or because you want to treat it as an integer value.
2612 E.g., in order to set bit 7 in an SCM value x, use the expression
2614 SCM_PACK (SCM_UNPACK (x) | 0x80)
2616 ** The name property of hooks is deprecated.
2617 Thus, the use of SCM_HOOK_NAME and scm_make_hook_with_name is deprecated.
2619 You can emulate this feature by using object properties.
2621 ** Deprecated macros: SCM_INPORTP, SCM_OUTPORTP, SCM_CRDY, SCM_ICHRP,
2622 SCM_ICHR, SCM_MAKICHR, SCM_SETJMPBUF, SCM_NSTRINGP, SCM_NRWSTRINGP,
2625 These macros will be removed in a future release of Guile.
2627 ** The following types, functions and macros from numbers.h are deprecated:
2628 scm_dblproc, SCM_UNEGFIXABLE, SCM_FLOBUFLEN, SCM_INEXP, SCM_CPLXP, SCM_REAL,
2629 SCM_IMAG, SCM_REALPART, scm_makdbl, SCM_SINGP, SCM_NUM2DBL, SCM_NO_BIGDIG
2631 ** Port internals: the rw_random variable in the scm_port structure
2632 must be set to non-zero in any random access port. In recent Guile
2633 releases it was only set for bidirectional random-access ports.
2635 ** Port internals: the seek ptob procedure is now responsible for
2636 resetting the buffers if required. The change was made so that in the
2637 special case of reading the current position (i.e., seek p 0 SEEK_CUR)
2638 the fport and strport ptobs can avoid resetting the buffers,
2639 in particular to avoid discarding unread chars. An existing port
2640 type can be fixed by adding something like the following to the
2641 beginning of the ptob seek procedure:
2643 if (pt->rw_active == SCM_PORT_READ)
2644 scm_end_input (object);
2645 else if (pt->rw_active == SCM_PORT_WRITE)
2646 ptob->flush (object);
2648 although to actually avoid resetting the buffers and discard unread
2649 chars requires further hacking that depends on the characteristics
2652 ** Deprecated functions: scm_fseek, scm_tag
2654 These functions are no longer used and will be removed in a future version.
2656 ** The scm_sysmissing procedure is no longer used in libguile.
2657 Unless it turns out to be unexpectedly useful to somebody, it will be
2658 removed in a future version.
2660 ** The format of error message strings has changed
2662 The two C procedures: scm_display_error and scm_error, as well as the
2663 primitive `scm-error', now use scm_simple_format to do their work.
2664 This means that the message strings of all code must be updated to use
2665 ~A where %s was used before, and ~S where %S was used before.
2667 During the period when there still are a lot of old Guiles out there,
2668 you might want to support both old and new versions of Guile.
2670 There are basically two methods to achieve this. Both methods use
2673 AC_CHECK_FUNCS(scm_simple_format)
2675 in your configure.in.
2677 Method 1: Use the string concatenation features of ANSI C's
2682 #ifdef HAVE_SCM_SIMPLE_FORMAT
2688 Then represent each of your error messages using a preprocessor macro:
2690 #define E_SPIDER_ERROR "There's a spider in your " ## FMT_S ## "!!!"
2694 (define fmt-s (if (defined? 'simple-format) "~S" "%S"))
2695 (define make-message string-append)
2697 (define e-spider-error (make-message "There's a spider in your " fmt-s "!!!"))
2699 Method 2: Use the oldfmt function found in doc/oldfmt.c.
2703 scm_misc_error ("picnic", scm_c_oldfmt0 ("There's a spider in your ~S!!!"),
2708 (scm-error 'misc-error "picnic" (oldfmt "There's a spider in your ~S!!!")
2712 ** Deprecated: coop_mutex_init, coop_condition_variable_init
2714 Don't use the functions coop_mutex_init and
2715 coop_condition_variable_init. They will change.
2717 Use scm_mutex_init and scm_cond_init instead.
2719 ** New function: int scm_cond_timedwait (scm_cond_t *COND, scm_mutex_t *MUTEX, const struct timespec *ABSTIME)
2720 `scm_cond_timedwait' atomically unlocks MUTEX and waits on
2721 COND, as `scm_cond_wait' does, but it also bounds the duration
2722 of the wait. If COND has not been signaled before time ABSTIME,
2723 the mutex MUTEX is re-acquired and `scm_cond_timedwait'
2724 returns the error code `ETIMEDOUT'.
2726 The ABSTIME parameter specifies an absolute time, with the same
2727 origin as `time' and `gettimeofday': an ABSTIME of 0 corresponds
2728 to 00:00:00 GMT, January 1, 1970.
2730 ** New function: scm_cond_broadcast (scm_cond_t *COND)
2731 `scm_cond_broadcast' restarts all the threads that are waiting
2732 on the condition variable COND. Nothing happens if no threads are
2735 ** New function: scm_key_create (scm_key_t *KEY, void (*destr_function) (void *))
2736 `scm_key_create' allocates a new TSD key. The key is stored in
2737 the location pointed to by KEY. There is no limit on the number
2738 of keys allocated at a given time. The value initially associated
2739 with the returned key is `NULL' in all currently executing threads.
2741 The DESTR_FUNCTION argument, if not `NULL', specifies a destructor
2742 function associated with the key. When a thread terminates,
2743 DESTR_FUNCTION is called on the value associated with the key in
2744 that thread. The DESTR_FUNCTION is not called if a key is deleted
2745 with `scm_key_delete' or a value is changed with
2746 `scm_setspecific'. The order in which destructor functions are
2747 called at thread termination time is unspecified.
2749 Destructors are not yet implemented.
2751 ** New function: scm_setspecific (scm_key_t KEY, const void *POINTER)
2752 `scm_setspecific' changes the value associated with KEY in the
2753 calling thread, storing the given POINTER instead.
2755 ** New function: scm_getspecific (scm_key_t KEY)
2756 `scm_getspecific' returns the value currently associated with
2757 KEY in the calling thread.
2759 ** New function: scm_key_delete (scm_key_t KEY)
2760 `scm_key_delete' deallocates a TSD key. It does not check
2761 whether non-`NULL' values are associated with that key in the
2762 currently executing threads, nor call the destructor function
2763 associated with the key.
2765 ** New function: scm_c_hook_init (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, void *HOOK_DATA, scm_c_hook_type_t TYPE)
2767 Initialize a C level hook HOOK with associated HOOK_DATA and type
2768 TYPE. (See scm_c_hook_run ().)
2770 ** New function: scm_c_hook_add (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, scm_c_hook_function_t FUNC, void *FUNC_DATA, int APPENDP)
2772 Add hook function FUNC with associated FUNC_DATA to HOOK. If APPENDP
2773 is true, add it last, otherwise first. The same FUNC can be added
2774 multiple times if FUNC_DATA differ and vice versa.
2776 ** New function: scm_c_hook_remove (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, scm_c_hook_function_t FUNC, void *FUNC_DATA)
2778 Remove hook function FUNC with associated FUNC_DATA from HOOK. A
2779 function is only removed if both FUNC and FUNC_DATA matches.
2781 ** New function: void *scm_c_hook_run (scm_c_hook_t *HOOK, void *DATA)
2783 Run hook HOOK passing DATA to the hook functions.
2785 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_NORMAL, all hook functions are run. The value
2786 returned is undefined.
2788 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_OR, hook functions are run until a function
2789 returns a non-NULL value. This value is returned as the result of
2790 scm_c_hook_run. If all functions return NULL, NULL is returned.
2792 If TYPE is SCM_C_HOOK_AND, hook functions are run until a function
2793 returns a NULL value, and NULL is returned. If all functions returns
2794 a non-NULL value, the last value is returned.
2796 ** New C level GC hooks
2798 Five new C level hooks has been added to the garbage collector.
2800 scm_before_gc_c_hook
2803 are run before locking and after unlocking the heap. The system is
2804 thus in a mode where evaluation can take place. (Except that
2805 scm_before_gc_c_hook must not allocate new cells.)
2807 scm_before_mark_c_hook
2808 scm_before_sweep_c_hook
2809 scm_after_sweep_c_hook
2811 are run when the heap is locked. These are intended for extension of
2812 the GC in a modular fashion. Examples are the weaks and guardians
2815 ** Way for application to customize GC parameters
2817 The application can set up other default values for the GC heap
2818 allocation parameters
2820 GUILE_INIT_HEAP_SIZE_1, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_1,
2821 GUILE_INIT_HEAP_SIZE_2, GUILE_MIN_YIELD_2,
2822 GUILE_MAX_SEGMENT_SIZE,
2826 scm_default_init_heap_size_1, scm_default_min_yield_1,
2827 scm_default_init_heap_size_2, scm_default_min_yield_2,
2828 scm_default_max_segment_size
2830 respectively before callong scm_boot_guile.
2832 (See entry "New environment variables ..." in section
2833 "Changes to the stand-alone interpreter" above.)
2835 ** scm_protect_object/scm_unprotect_object now nest
2837 This means that you can call scm_protect_object multiple times on an
2838 object and count on the object being protected until
2839 scm_unprotect_object has been call the same number of times.
2841 The functions also have better time complexity.
2843 Still, it is usually possible to structure the application in a way
2844 that you don't need to use these functions. For example, if you use a
2845 protected standard Guile list to keep track of live objects rather
2846 than some custom data type, objects will die a natural death when they
2847 are no longer needed.
2849 ** Deprecated type tags: scm_tc16_flo, scm_tc_flo, scm_tc_dblr, scm_tc_dblc
2851 Guile does not provide the float representation for inexact real numbers any
2852 more. Now, only doubles are used to represent inexact real numbers. Further,
2853 the tag names scm_tc_dblr and scm_tc_dblc have been changed to scm_tc16_real
2854 and scm_tc16_complex, respectively.
2856 ** Removed deprecated type scm_smobfuns
2858 ** Removed deprecated function scm_newsmob
2860 ** Warning: scm_make_smob_type_mfpe might become deprecated in a future release
2862 There is an ongoing discussion among the developers whether to
2863 deprecate `scm_make_smob_type_mfpe' or not. Please use the current
2864 standard interface (scm_make_smob_type, scm_set_smob_XXX) in new code
2865 until this issue has been settled.
2867 ** Removed deprecated type tag scm_tc16_kw
2869 ** Added type tag scm_tc16_keyword
2871 (This was introduced already in release 1.3.4 but was not documented
2874 ** gdb_print now prints "*** Guile not initialized ***" until Guile initialized
2876 * Changes to system call interfaces:
2878 ** The "select" procedure now tests port buffers for the ability to
2879 provide input or accept output. Previously only the underlying file
2880 descriptors were checked.
2882 ** New variable PIPE_BUF: the maximum number of bytes that can be
2883 atomically written to a pipe.
2885 ** If a facility is not available on the system when Guile is
2886 compiled, the corresponding primitive procedure will not be defined.
2887 Previously it would have been defined but would throw a system-error
2888 exception if called. Exception handlers which catch this case may
2889 need minor modification: an error will be thrown with key
2890 'unbound-variable instead of 'system-error. Alternatively it's
2891 now possible to use `defined?' to check whether the facility is
2894 ** Procedures which depend on the timezone should now give the correct
2895 result on systems which cache the TZ environment variable, even if TZ
2896 is changed without calling tzset.
2898 * Changes to the networking interfaces:
2900 ** New functions: htons, ntohs, htonl, ntohl: for converting short and
2901 long integers between network and host format. For now, it's not
2902 particularly convenient to do this kind of thing, but consider:
2904 (define write-network-long
2905 (lambda (value port)
2906 (let ((v (make-uniform-vector 1 1 0)))
2907 (uniform-vector-set! v 0 (htonl value))
2908 (uniform-vector-write v port))))
2910 (define read-network-long
2912 (let ((v (make-uniform-vector 1 1 0)))
2913 (uniform-vector-read! v port)
2914 (ntohl (uniform-vector-ref v 0)))))
2916 ** If inet-aton fails, it now throws an error with key 'misc-error
2917 instead of 'system-error, since errno is not relevant.
2919 ** Certain gethostbyname/gethostbyaddr failures now throw errors with
2920 specific keys instead of 'system-error. The latter is inappropriate
2921 since errno will not have been set. The keys are:
2922 'host-not-found, 'try-again, 'no-recovery and 'no-data.
2924 ** sethostent, setnetent, setprotoent, setservent: now take an
2925 optional argument STAYOPEN, which specifies whether the database
2926 remains open after a database entry is accessed randomly (e.g., using
2927 gethostbyname for the hosts database.) The default is #f. Previously
2931 Changes since Guile 1.3.2:
2933 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
2937 An initial version of the Guile debugger written by Chris Hanson has
2938 been added. The debugger is still under development but is included
2939 in the distribution anyway since it is already quite useful.
2945 after an error to enter the debugger. Type `help' inside the debugger
2946 for a description of available commands.
2948 If you prefer to have stack frames numbered and printed in
2949 anti-chronological order and prefer up in the stack to be down on the
2950 screen as is the case in gdb, you can put
2952 (debug-enable 'backwards)
2954 in your .guile startup file. (However, this means that Guile can't
2955 use indentation to indicate stack level.)
2957 The debugger is autoloaded into Guile at the first use.
2959 ** Further enhancements to backtraces
2961 There is a new debug option `width' which controls the maximum width
2962 on the screen of printed stack frames. Fancy printing parameters
2963 ("level" and "length" as in Common LISP) are adaptively adjusted for
2964 each stack frame to give maximum information while still fitting
2965 within the bounds. If the stack frame can't be made to fit by
2966 adjusting parameters, it is simply cut off at the end. This is marked
2969 ** Some modules are now only loaded when the repl is started
2971 The modules (ice-9 debug), (ice-9 session), (ice-9 threads) and (ice-9
2972 regex) are now loaded into (guile-user) only if the repl has been
2973 started. The effect is that the startup time for scripts has been
2974 reduced to 30% of what it was previously.
2976 Correctly written scripts load the modules they require at the top of
2977 the file and should not be affected by this change.
2979 ** Hooks are now represented as smobs
2981 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
2983 ** Readline support has changed again.
2985 The old (readline-activator) module is gone. Use (ice-9 readline)
2986 instead, which now contains all readline functionality. So the code
2987 to activate readline is now
2989 (use-modules (ice-9 readline))
2992 This should work at any time, including from the guile prompt.
2994 To avoid confusion about the terms of Guile's license, please only
2995 enable readline for your personal use; please don't make it the
2996 default for others. Here is why we make this rather odd-sounding
2999 Guile is normally licensed under a weakened form of the GNU General
3000 Public License, which allows you to link code with Guile without
3001 placing that code under the GPL. This exception is important to some
3004 However, since readline is distributed under the GNU General Public
3005 License, when you link Guile with readline, either statically or
3006 dynamically, you effectively change Guile's license to the strict GPL.
3007 Whenever you link any strictly GPL'd code into Guile, uses of Guile
3008 which are normally permitted become forbidden. This is a rather
3009 non-obvious consequence of the licensing terms.
3011 So, to make sure things remain clear, please let people choose for
3012 themselves whether to link GPL'd libraries like readline with Guile.
3014 ** regexp-substitute/global has changed slightly, but incompatibly.
3016 If you include a function in the item list, the string of the match
3017 object it receives is the same string passed to
3018 regexp-substitute/global, not some suffix of that string.
3019 Correspondingly, the match's positions are relative to the entire
3020 string, not the suffix.
3022 If the regexp can match the empty string, the way matches are chosen
3023 from the string has changed. regexp-substitute/global recognizes the
3024 same set of matches that list-matches does; see below.
3026 ** New function: list-matches REGEXP STRING [FLAGS]
3028 Return a list of match objects, one for every non-overlapping, maximal
3029 match of REGEXP in STRING. The matches appear in left-to-right order.
3030 list-matches only reports matches of the empty string if there are no
3031 other matches which begin on, end at, or include the empty match's
3034 If present, FLAGS is passed as the FLAGS argument to regexp-exec.
3036 ** New function: fold-matches REGEXP STRING INIT PROC [FLAGS]
3038 For each match of REGEXP in STRING, apply PROC to the match object,
3039 and the last value PROC returned, or INIT for the first call. Return
3040 the last value returned by PROC. We apply PROC to the matches as they
3041 appear from left to right.
3043 This function recognizes matches according to the same criteria as
3046 Thus, you could define list-matches like this:
3048 (define (list-matches regexp string . flags)
3049 (reverse! (apply fold-matches regexp string '() cons flags)))
3051 If present, FLAGS is passed as the FLAGS argument to regexp-exec.
3055 *** New function: hook? OBJ
3057 Return #t if OBJ is a hook, otherwise #f.
3059 *** New function: make-hook-with-name NAME [ARITY]
3061 Return a hook with name NAME and arity ARITY. The default value for
3062 ARITY is 0. The only effect of NAME is that it will appear when the
3063 hook object is printed to ease debugging.
3065 *** New function: hook-empty? HOOK
3067 Return #t if HOOK doesn't contain any procedures, otherwise #f.
3069 *** New function: hook->list HOOK
3071 Return a list of the procedures that are called when run-hook is
3074 ** `map' signals an error if its argument lists are not all the same length.
3076 This is the behavior required by R5RS, so this change is really a bug
3077 fix. But it seems to affect a lot of people's code, so we're
3078 mentioning it here anyway.
3080 ** Print-state handling has been made more transparent
3082 Under certain circumstances, ports are represented as a port with an
3083 associated print state. Earlier, this pair was represented as a pair
3084 (see "Some magic has been added to the printer" below). It is now
3085 indistinguishable (almost; see `get-print-state') from a port on the
3088 *** New function: port-with-print-state OUTPUT-PORT PRINT-STATE
3090 Return a new port with the associated print state PRINT-STATE.
3092 *** New function: get-print-state OUTPUT-PORT
3094 Return the print state associated with this port if it exists,
3095 otherwise return #f.
3097 *** New function: directory-stream? OBJECT
3099 Returns true iff OBJECT is a directory stream --- the sort of object
3100 returned by `opendir'.
3102 ** New function: using-readline?
3104 Return #t if readline is in use in the current repl.
3106 ** structs will be removed in 1.4
3108 Structs will be replaced in Guile 1.4. We will merge GOOPS into Guile
3109 and use GOOPS objects as the fundamental record type.
3111 * Changes to the scm_ interface
3113 ** structs will be removed in 1.4
3115 The entire current struct interface (struct.c, struct.h) will be
3116 replaced in Guile 1.4. We will merge GOOPS into libguile and use
3117 GOOPS objects as the fundamental record type.
3119 ** The internal representation of subr's has changed
3121 Instead of giving a hint to the subr name, the CAR field of the subr
3122 now contains an index to a subr entry in scm_subr_table.
3124 *** New variable: scm_subr_table
3126 An array of subr entries. A subr entry contains the name, properties
3127 and documentation associated with the subr. The properties and
3128 documentation slots are not yet used.
3130 ** A new scheme for "forwarding" calls to a builtin to a generic function
3132 It is now possible to extend the functionality of some Guile
3133 primitives by letting them defer a call to a GOOPS generic function on
3134 argument mismatch. This means that there is no loss of efficiency in
3139 (use-modules (oop goops)) ; Must be GOOPS version 0.2.
3140 (define-method + ((x <string>) (y <string>))
3141 (string-append x y))
3143 + will still be as efficient as usual in numerical calculations, but
3144 can also be used for concatenating strings.
3146 Who will be the first one to extend Guile's numerical tower to
3147 rationals? :) [OK, there a few other things to fix before this can
3148 be made in a clean way.]
3150 *** New snarf macros for defining primitives: SCM_GPROC, SCM_GPROC1
3152 New macro: SCM_GPROC (CNAME, SNAME, REQ, OPT, VAR, CFUNC, GENERIC)
3154 New macro: SCM_GPROC1 (CNAME, SNAME, TYPE, CFUNC, GENERIC)
3156 These do the same job as SCM_PROC and SCM_PROC1, but they also define
3157 a variable GENERIC which can be used by the dispatch macros below.
3159 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3161 *** New macros for forwarding control to a generic on arg type error
3163 New macro: SCM_WTA_DISPATCH_1 (GENERIC, ARG1, POS, SUBR)
3165 New macro: SCM_WTA_DISPATCH_2 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, POS, SUBR)
3167 These correspond to the scm_wta function call, and have the same
3168 behaviour until the user has called the GOOPS primitive
3169 `enable-primitive-generic!'. After that, these macros will apply the
3170 generic function GENERIC to the argument(s) instead of calling
3173 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3175 *** New macros for argument testing with generic dispatch
3177 New macro: SCM_GASSERT1 (COND, GENERIC, ARG1, POS, SUBR)
3179 New macro: SCM_GASSERT2 (COND, GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, POS, SUBR)
3181 These correspond to the SCM_ASSERT macro, but will defer control to
3182 GENERIC on error after `enable-primitive-generic!' has been called.
3184 [This is experimental code which may change soon.]
3186 ** New function: SCM scm_eval_body (SCM body, SCM env)
3188 Evaluates the body of a special form.
3190 ** The internal representation of struct's has changed
3192 Previously, four slots were allocated for the procedure(s) of entities
3193 and operators. The motivation for this representation had to do with
3194 the structure of the evaluator, the wish to support tail-recursive
3195 generic functions, and efficiency. Since the generic function
3196 dispatch mechanism has changed, there is no longer a need for such an
3197 expensive representation, and the representation has been simplified.
3199 This should not make any difference for most users.
3201 ** GOOPS support has been cleaned up.
3203 Some code has been moved from eval.c to objects.c and code in both of
3204 these compilation units has been cleaned up and better structured.
3206 *** New functions for applying generic functions
3208 New function: SCM scm_apply_generic (GENERIC, ARGS)
3209 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_0 (GENERIC)
3210 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_1 (GENERIC, ARG1)
3211 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_2 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2)
3212 New function: SCM scm_call_generic_3 (GENERIC, ARG1, ARG2, ARG3)
3214 ** Deprecated function: scm_make_named_hook
3216 It is now replaced by:
3218 ** New function: SCM scm_create_hook (const char *name, int arity)
3220 Creates a hook in the same way as make-hook above but also
3221 binds a variable named NAME to it.
3223 This is the typical way of creating a hook from C code.
3225 Currently, the variable is created in the "current" module.
3226 This might change when we get the new module system.
3228 [The behaviour is identical to scm_make_named_hook.]
3232 Changes since Guile 1.3:
3234 * Changes to mailing lists
3236 ** Some of the Guile mailing lists have moved to sourceware.cygnus.com.
3238 See the README file to find current addresses for all the Guile
3241 * Changes to the distribution
3243 ** Readline support is no longer included with Guile by default.
3245 Based on the different license terms of Guile and Readline, we
3246 concluded that Guile should not *by default* cause the linking of
3247 Readline into an application program. Readline support is now offered
3248 as a separate module, which is linked into an application only when
3249 you explicitly specify it.
3251 Although Guile is GNU software, its distribution terms add a special
3252 exception to the usual GNU General Public License (GPL). Guile's
3253 license includes a clause that allows you to link Guile with non-free
3254 programs. We add this exception so as not to put Guile at a
3255 disadvantage vis-a-vis other extensibility packages that support other
3258 In contrast, the GNU Readline library is distributed under the GNU
3259 General Public License pure and simple. This means that you may not
3260 link Readline, even dynamically, into an application unless it is
3261 distributed under a free software license that is compatible the GPL.
3263 Because of this difference in distribution terms, an application that
3264 can use Guile may not be able to use Readline. Now users will be
3265 explicitly offered two independent decisions about the use of these
3268 You can activate the readline support by issuing
3270 (use-modules (readline-activator))
3273 from your ".guile" file, for example.
3275 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
3277 ** All builtins now print as primitives.
3278 Previously builtin procedures not belonging to the fundamental subr
3279 types printed as #<compiled closure #<primitive-procedure gsubr-apply>>.
3280 Now, they print as #<primitive-procedure NAME>.
3282 ** Backtraces slightly more intelligible.
3283 gsubr-apply and macro transformer application frames no longer appear
3286 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
3288 ** Guile now correctly handles internal defines by rewriting them into
3289 their equivalent letrec. Previously, internal defines would
3290 incrementally add to the innermost environment, without checking
3291 whether the restrictions specified in RnRS were met. This lead to the
3292 correct behaviour when these restriction actually were met, but didn't
3293 catch all illegal uses. Such an illegal use could lead to crashes of
3294 the Guile interpreter or or other unwanted results. An example of
3295 incorrect internal defines that made Guile behave erratically:
3307 The problem with this example is that the definition of `c' uses the
3308 value of `b' directly. This confuses the meoization machine of Guile
3309 so that the second call of `b' (this time in a larger environment that
3310 also contains bindings for `c' and `d') refers to the binding of `c'
3311 instead of `a'. You could also make Guile crash with a variation on
3316 (define (b flag) (if flag a 1))
3317 (define c (1+ (b flag)))
3325 From now on, Guile will issue an `Unbound variable: b' error message
3330 A hook contains a list of functions which should be called on
3331 particular occasions in an existing program. Hooks are used for
3334 A window manager might have a hook before-window-map-hook. The window
3335 manager uses the function run-hooks to call all functions stored in
3336 before-window-map-hook each time a window is mapped. The user can
3337 store functions in the hook using add-hook!.
3339 In Guile, hooks are first class objects.
3341 *** New function: make-hook [N_ARGS]
3343 Return a hook for hook functions which can take N_ARGS arguments.
3344 The default value for N_ARGS is 0.
3346 (See also scm_make_named_hook below.)
3348 *** New function: add-hook! HOOK PROC [APPEND_P]
3350 Put PROC at the beginning of the list of functions stored in HOOK.
3351 If APPEND_P is supplied, and non-false, put PROC at the end instead.
3353 PROC must be able to take the number of arguments specified when the
3356 If PROC already exists in HOOK, then remove it first.
3358 *** New function: remove-hook! HOOK PROC
3360 Remove PROC from the list of functions in HOOK.
3362 *** New function: reset-hook! HOOK
3364 Clear the list of hook functions stored in HOOK.
3366 *** New function: run-hook HOOK ARG1 ...
3368 Run all hook functions stored in HOOK with arguments ARG1 ... .
3369 The number of arguments supplied must correspond to the number given
3370 when the hook was created.
3372 ** The function `dynamic-link' now takes optional keyword arguments.
3373 The only keyword argument that is currently defined is `:global
3374 BOOL'. With it, you can control whether the shared library will be
3375 linked in global mode or not. In global mode, the symbols from the
3376 linked library can be used to resolve references from other
3377 dynamically linked libraries. In non-global mode, the linked
3378 library is essentially invisible and can only be accessed via
3379 `dynamic-func', etc. The default is now to link in global mode.
3380 Previously, the default has been non-global mode.
3382 The `#:global' keyword is only effective on platforms that support
3383 the dlopen family of functions.
3385 ** New function `provided?'
3387 - Function: provided? FEATURE
3388 Return true iff FEATURE is supported by this installation of
3389 Guile. FEATURE must be a symbol naming a feature; the global
3390 variable `*features*' is a list of available features.
3392 ** Changes to the module (ice-9 expect):
3394 *** The expect-strings macro now matches `$' in a regular expression
3395 only at a line-break or end-of-file by default. Previously it would
3396 match the end of the string accumulated so far. The old behaviour
3397 can be obtained by setting the variable `expect-strings-exec-flags'
3400 *** The expect-strings macro now uses a variable `expect-strings-exec-flags'
3401 for the regexp-exec flags. If `regexp/noteol' is included, then `$'
3402 in a regular expression will still match before a line-break or
3403 end-of-file. The default is `regexp/noteol'.
3405 *** The expect-strings macro now uses a variable
3406 `expect-strings-compile-flags' for the flags to be supplied to
3407 `make-regexp'. The default is `regexp/newline', which was previously
3410 *** The expect macro now supplies two arguments to a match procedure:
3411 the current accumulated string and a flag to indicate whether
3412 end-of-file has been reached. Previously only the string was supplied.
3413 If end-of-file is reached, the match procedure will be called an
3414 additional time with the same accumulated string as the previous call
3415 but with the flag set.
3417 ** New module (ice-9 format), implementing the Common Lisp `format' function.
3419 This code, and the documentation for it that appears here, was
3420 borrowed from SLIB, with minor adaptations for Guile.
3422 - Function: format DESTINATION FORMAT-STRING . ARGUMENTS
3423 An almost complete implementation of Common LISP format description
3424 according to the CL reference book `Common LISP' from Guy L.
3425 Steele, Digital Press. Backward compatible to most of the
3426 available Scheme format implementations.
3428 Returns `#t', `#f' or a string; has side effect of printing
3429 according to FORMAT-STRING. If DESTINATION is `#t', the output is
3430 to the current output port and `#t' is returned. If DESTINATION
3431 is `#f', a formatted string is returned as the result of the call.
3432 NEW: If DESTINATION is a string, DESTINATION is regarded as the
3433 format string; FORMAT-STRING is then the first argument and the
3434 output is returned as a string. If DESTINATION is a number, the
3435 output is to the current error port if available by the
3436 implementation. Otherwise DESTINATION must be an output port and
3439 FORMAT-STRING must be a string. In case of a formatting error
3440 format returns `#f' and prints a message on the current output or
3441 error port. Characters are output as if the string were output by
3442 the `display' function with the exception of those prefixed by a
3443 tilde (~). For a detailed description of the FORMAT-STRING syntax
3444 please consult a Common LISP format reference manual. For a test
3445 suite to verify this format implementation load `formatst.scm'.
3446 Please send bug reports to `lutzeb@cs.tu-berlin.de'.
3448 Note: `format' is not reentrant, i.e. only one `format'-call may
3449 be executed at a time.
3452 *** Format Specification (Format version 3.0)
3454 Please consult a Common LISP format reference manual for a detailed
3455 description of the format string syntax. For a demonstration of the
3456 implemented directives see `formatst.scm'.
3458 This implementation supports directive parameters and modifiers (`:'
3459 and `@' characters). Multiple parameters must be separated by a comma
3460 (`,'). Parameters can be numerical parameters (positive or negative),
3461 character parameters (prefixed by a quote character (`''), variable
3462 parameters (`v'), number of rest arguments parameter (`#'), empty and
3463 default parameters. Directive characters are case independent. The
3464 general form of a directive is:
3466 DIRECTIVE ::= ~{DIRECTIVE-PARAMETER,}[:][@]DIRECTIVE-CHARACTER
3468 DIRECTIVE-PARAMETER ::= [ [-|+]{0-9}+ | 'CHARACTER | v | # ]
3470 *** Implemented CL Format Control Directives
3472 Documentation syntax: Uppercase characters represent the
3473 corresponding control directive characters. Lowercase characters
3474 represent control directive parameter descriptions.
3477 Any (print as `display' does).
3481 `~MINCOL,COLINC,MINPAD,PADCHARA'
3485 S-expression (print as `write' does).
3489 `~MINCOL,COLINC,MINPAD,PADCHARS'
3495 print number sign always.
3498 print comma separated.
3500 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARD'
3506 print number sign always.
3509 print comma separated.
3511 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARX'
3517 print number sign always.
3520 print comma separated.
3522 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARO'
3528 print number sign always.
3531 print comma separated.
3533 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARB'
3538 `~N,MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHARR'
3542 print a number as a Roman numeral.
3545 print a number as an "old fashioned" Roman numeral.
3548 print a number as an ordinal English number.
3551 print a number as a cardinal English number.
3556 prints `y' and `ies'.
3559 as `~P but jumps 1 argument backward.'
3562 as `~@P but jumps 1 argument backward.'
3567 prints a character as the reader can understand it (i.e. `#\'
3571 prints a character as emacs does (eg. `^C' for ASCII 03).
3574 Fixed-format floating-point (prints a flonum like MMM.NNN).
3575 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHARF'
3577 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
3580 Exponential floating-point (prints a flonum like MMM.NNN`E'EE).
3581 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,EXPONENTDIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHAR,EXPONENTCHARE'
3583 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
3586 General floating-point (prints a flonum either fixed or
3588 `~WIDTH,DIGITS,EXPONENTDIGITS,SCALE,OVERFLOWCHAR,PADCHAR,EXPONENTCHARG'
3590 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
3593 Dollars floating-point (prints a flonum in fixed with signs
3595 `~DIGITS,SCALE,WIDTH,PADCHAR$'
3597 If the number is positive a plus sign is printed.
3600 A sign is always printed and appears before the padding.
3603 The sign appears before the padding.
3611 print newline if not at the beginning of the output line.
3613 prints `~&' and then N-1 newlines.
3618 print N page separators.
3628 newline is ignored, white space left.
3631 newline is left, white space ignored.
3636 relative tabulation.
3642 Indirection (expects indirect arguments as a list).
3644 extracts indirect arguments from format arguments.
3647 Case conversion (converts by `string-downcase').
3649 converts by `string-capitalize'.
3652 converts by `string-capitalize-first'.
3655 converts by `string-upcase'.
3658 Argument Jumping (jumps 1 argument forward).
3660 jumps N arguments forward.
3663 jumps 1 argument backward.
3666 jumps N arguments backward.
3669 jumps to the 0th argument.
3672 jumps to the Nth argument (beginning from 0)
3674 `~[STR0~;STR1~;...~;STRN~]'
3675 Conditional Expression (numerical clause conditional).
3677 take argument from N.
3680 true test conditional.
3683 if-else-then conditional.
3689 default clause follows.
3692 Iteration (args come from the next argument (a list)).
3694 at most N iterations.
3697 args from next arg (a list of lists).
3700 args from the rest of arguments.
3703 args from the rest args (lists).
3714 aborts if N <= M <= K
3716 *** Not Implemented CL Format Control Directives
3719 print `#f' as an empty list (see below).
3722 print `#f' as an empty list (see below).
3728 (sorry I don't understand its semantics completely)
3730 *** Extended, Replaced and Additional Control Directives
3732 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHD'
3733 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHX'
3734 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHO'
3735 `~MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHB'
3736 `~N,MINCOL,PADCHAR,COMMACHAR,COMMAWIDTHR'
3737 COMMAWIDTH is the number of characters between two comma
3741 print a R4RS complex number as `~F~@Fi' with passed parameters for
3745 Pretty print formatting of an argument for scheme code lists.
3751 Flushes the output if format DESTINATION is a port.
3754 Print a `#\space' character
3756 print N `#\space' characters.
3759 Print a `#\tab' character
3761 print N `#\tab' characters.
3764 Takes N as an integer representation for a character. No arguments
3765 are consumed. N is converted to a character by `integer->char'. N
3766 must be a positive decimal number.
3769 Print out readproof. Prints out internal objects represented as
3770 `#<...>' as strings `"#<...>"' so that the format output can always
3771 be processed by `read'.
3774 Print out readproof. Prints out internal objects represented as
3775 `#<...>' as strings `"#<...>"' so that the format output can always
3776 be processed by `read'.
3779 Prints information and a copyright notice on the format
3782 prints format version.
3785 may also print number strings, i.e. passing a number as a string
3786 and format it accordingly.
3788 *** Configuration Variables
3790 The format module exports some configuration variables to suit the
3791 systems and users needs. There should be no modification necessary for
3792 the configuration that comes with Guile. Format detects automatically
3793 if the running scheme system implements floating point numbers and
3796 format:symbol-case-conv
3797 Symbols are converted by `symbol->string' so the case type of the
3798 printed symbols is implementation dependent.
3799 `format:symbol-case-conv' is a one arg closure which is either
3800 `#f' (no conversion), `string-upcase', `string-downcase' or
3801 `string-capitalize'. (default `#f')
3803 format:iobj-case-conv
3804 As FORMAT:SYMBOL-CASE-CONV but applies for the representation of
3805 implementation internal objects. (default `#f')
3808 The character prefixing the exponent value in `~E' printing.
3811 *** Compatibility With Other Format Implementations
3817 Downward compatible except for padding support and `~A', `~S',
3818 `~P', `~X' uppercase printing. SLIB format 1.4 uses C-style
3819 `printf' padding support which is completely replaced by the CL
3820 `format' padding style.
3823 Downward compatible except for `~', which is not documented
3824 (ignores all characters inside the format string up to a newline
3825 character). (7.1 implements `~a', `~s', ~NEWLINE, `~~', `~%',
3826 numerical and variable parameters and `:/@' modifiers in the CL
3830 Downward compatible except for `~A' and `~S' which print in
3831 uppercase. (Elk implements `~a', `~s', `~~', and `~%' (no
3832 directive parameters or modifiers)).
3835 Downward compatible except for an optional destination parameter:
3836 S2C accepts a format call without a destination which returns a
3837 formatted string. This is equivalent to a #f destination in S2C.
3838 (S2C implements `~a', `~s', `~c', `~%', and `~~' (no directive
3839 parameters or modifiers)).
3842 ** Changes to string-handling functions.
3844 These functions were added to support the (ice-9 format) module, above.
3846 *** New function: string-upcase STRING
3847 *** New function: string-downcase STRING
3849 These are non-destructive versions of the existing string-upcase! and
3850 string-downcase! functions.
3852 *** New function: string-capitalize! STRING
3853 *** New function: string-capitalize STRING
3855 These functions convert the first letter of each word in the string to
3858 (string-capitalize "howdy there")
3861 As with the other functions, string-capitalize! modifies the string in
3862 place, while string-capitalize returns a modified copy of its argument.
3864 *** New function: string-ci->symbol STRING
3866 Return a symbol whose name is STRING, but having the same case as if
3867 the symbol had be read by `read'.
3869 Guile can be configured to be sensitive or insensitive to case
3870 differences in Scheme identifiers. If Guile is case-insensitive, all
3871 symbols are converted to lower case on input. The `string-ci->symbol'
3872 function returns a symbol whose name in STRING, transformed as Guile
3873 would if STRING were input.
3875 *** New function: substring-move! STRING1 START END STRING2 START
3877 Copy the substring of STRING1 from START (inclusive) to END
3878 (exclusive) to STRING2 at START. STRING1 and STRING2 may be the same
3879 string, and the source and destination areas may overlap; in all
3880 cases, the function behaves as if all the characters were copied
3883 *** Extended functions: substring-move-left! substring-move-right!
3885 These functions now correctly copy arbitrarily overlapping substrings;
3886 they are both synonyms for substring-move!.
3889 ** New module (ice-9 getopt-long), with the function `getopt-long'.
3891 getopt-long is a function for parsing command-line arguments in a
3892 manner consistent with other GNU programs.
3894 (getopt-long ARGS GRAMMAR)
3895 Parse the arguments ARGS according to the argument list grammar GRAMMAR.
3897 ARGS should be a list of strings. Its first element should be the
3898 name of the program; subsequent elements should be the arguments
3899 that were passed to the program on the command line. The
3900 `program-arguments' procedure returns a list of this form.
3902 GRAMMAR is a list of the form:
3903 ((OPTION (PROPERTY VALUE) ...) ...)
3905 Each OPTION should be a symbol. `getopt-long' will accept a
3906 command-line option named `--OPTION'.
3907 Each option can have the following (PROPERTY VALUE) pairs:
3909 (single-char CHAR) --- Accept `-CHAR' as a single-character
3910 equivalent to `--OPTION'. This is how to specify traditional
3912 (required? BOOL) --- If BOOL is true, the option is required.
3913 getopt-long will raise an error if it is not found in ARGS.
3914 (value BOOL) --- If BOOL is #t, the option accepts a value; if
3915 it is #f, it does not; and if it is the symbol
3916 `optional', the option may appear in ARGS with or
3918 (predicate FUNC) --- If the option accepts a value (i.e. you
3919 specified `(value #t)' for this option), then getopt
3920 will apply FUNC to the value, and throw an exception
3921 if it returns #f. FUNC should be a procedure which
3922 accepts a string and returns a boolean value; you may
3923 need to use quasiquotes to get it into GRAMMAR.
3925 The (PROPERTY VALUE) pairs may occur in any order, but each
3926 property may occur only once. By default, options do not have
3927 single-character equivalents, are not required, and do not take
3930 In ARGS, single-character options may be combined, in the usual
3931 Unix fashion: ("-x" "-y") is equivalent to ("-xy"). If an option
3932 accepts values, then it must be the last option in the
3933 combination; the value is the next argument. So, for example, using
3934 the following grammar:
3935 ((apples (single-char #\a))
3936 (blimps (single-char #\b) (value #t))
3937 (catalexis (single-char #\c) (value #t)))
3938 the following argument lists would be acceptable:
3939 ("-a" "-b" "bang" "-c" "couth") ("bang" and "couth" are the values
3940 for "blimps" and "catalexis")
3941 ("-ab" "bang" "-c" "couth") (same)
3942 ("-ac" "couth" "-b" "bang") (same)
3943 ("-abc" "couth" "bang") (an error, since `-b' is not the
3944 last option in its combination)
3946 If an option's value is optional, then `getopt-long' decides
3947 whether it has a value by looking at what follows it in ARGS. If
3948 the next element is a string, and it does not appear to be an
3949 option itself, then that string is the option's value.
3951 The value of a long option can appear as the next element in ARGS,
3952 or it can follow the option name, separated by an `=' character.
3953 Thus, using the same grammar as above, the following argument lists
3955 ("--apples" "Braeburn" "--blimps" "Goodyear")
3956 ("--apples=Braeburn" "--blimps" "Goodyear")
3957 ("--blimps" "Goodyear" "--apples=Braeburn")
3959 If the option "--" appears in ARGS, argument parsing stops there;
3960 subsequent arguments are returned as ordinary arguments, even if
3961 they resemble options. So, in the argument list:
3962 ("--apples" "Granny Smith" "--" "--blimp" "Goodyear")
3963 `getopt-long' will recognize the `apples' option as having the
3964 value "Granny Smith", but it will not recognize the `blimp'
3965 option; it will return the strings "--blimp" and "Goodyear" as
3966 ordinary argument strings.
3968 The `getopt-long' function returns the parsed argument list as an
3969 assocation list, mapping option names --- the symbols from GRAMMAR
3970 --- onto their values, or #t if the option does not accept a value.
3971 Unused options do not appear in the alist.
3973 All arguments that are not the value of any option are returned
3974 as a list, associated with the empty list.
3976 `getopt-long' throws an exception if:
3977 - it finds an unrecognized option in ARGS
3978 - a required option is omitted
3979 - an option that requires an argument doesn't get one
3980 - an option that doesn't accept an argument does get one (this can
3981 only happen using the long option `--opt=value' syntax)
3982 - an option predicate fails
3987 `((lockfile-dir (required? #t)
3990 (predicate ,file-is-directory?))
3991 (verbose (required? #f)
3994 (x-includes (single-char #\x))
3995 (rnet-server (single-char #\y)
3996 (predicate ,string?))))
3998 (getopt-long '("my-prog" "-vk" "/tmp" "foo1" "--x-includes=/usr/include"
3999 "--rnet-server=lamprod" "--" "-fred" "foo2" "foo3")
4001 => ((() "foo1" "-fred" "foo2" "foo3")
4002 (rnet-server . "lamprod")
4003 (x-includes . "/usr/include")
4004 (lockfile-dir . "/tmp")
4007 ** The (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style) module is obsolete; use (ice-9 getopt-long).
4009 It will be removed in a few releases.
4011 ** New syntax: lambda*
4012 ** New syntax: define*
4013 ** New syntax: define*-public
4014 ** New syntax: defmacro*
4015 ** New syntax: defmacro*-public
4016 Guile now supports optional arguments.
4018 `lambda*', `define*', `define*-public', `defmacro*' and
4019 `defmacro*-public' are identical to the non-* versions except that
4020 they use an extended type of parameter list that has the following BNF
4021 syntax (parentheses are literal, square brackets indicate grouping,
4022 and `*', `+' and `?' have the usual meaning):
4024 ext-param-list ::= ( [identifier]* [#&optional [ext-var-decl]+]?
4025 [#&key [ext-var-decl]+ [#&allow-other-keys]?]?
4026 [[#&rest identifier]|[. identifier]]? ) | [identifier]
4028 ext-var-decl ::= identifier | ( identifier expression )
4030 The semantics are best illustrated with the following documentation
4031 and examples for `lambda*':
4034 lambda extended for optional and keyword arguments
4036 lambda* creates a procedure that takes optional arguments. These
4037 are specified by putting them inside brackets at the end of the
4038 paramater list, but before any dotted rest argument. For example,
4039 (lambda* (a b #&optional c d . e) '())
4040 creates a procedure with fixed arguments a and b, optional arguments c
4041 and d, and rest argument e. If the optional arguments are omitted
4042 in a call, the variables for them are unbound in the procedure. This
4043 can be checked with the bound? macro.
4045 lambda* can also take keyword arguments. For example, a procedure
4047 (lambda* (#&key xyzzy larch) '())
4048 can be called with any of the argument lists (#:xyzzy 11)
4049 (#:larch 13) (#:larch 42 #:xyzzy 19) (). Whichever arguments
4050 are given as keywords are bound to values.
4052 Optional and keyword arguments can also be given default values
4053 which they take on when they are not present in a call, by giving a
4054 two-item list in place of an optional argument, for example in:
4055 (lambda* (foo #&optional (bar 42) #&key (baz 73)) (list foo bar baz))
4056 foo is a fixed argument, bar is an optional argument with default
4057 value 42, and baz is a keyword argument with default value 73.
4058 Default value expressions are not evaluated unless they are needed
4059 and until the procedure is called.
4061 lambda* now supports two more special parameter list keywords.
4063 lambda*-defined procedures now throw an error by default if a
4064 keyword other than one of those specified is found in the actual
4065 passed arguments. However, specifying #&allow-other-keys
4066 immediately after the kyword argument declarations restores the
4067 previous behavior of ignoring unknown keywords. lambda* also now
4068 guarantees that if the same keyword is passed more than once, the
4069 last one passed is the one that takes effect. For example,
4070 ((lambda* (#&key (heads 0) (tails 0)) (display (list heads tails)))
4071 #:heads 37 #:tails 42 #:heads 99)
4072 would result in (99 47) being displayed.
4074 #&rest is also now provided as a synonym for the dotted syntax rest
4075 argument. The argument lists (a . b) and (a #&rest b) are equivalent in
4076 all respects to lambda*. This is provided for more similarity to DSSSL,
4077 MIT-Scheme and Kawa among others, as well as for refugees from other
4080 Further documentation may be found in the optargs.scm file itself.
4082 The optional argument module also exports the macros `let-optional',
4083 `let-optional*', `let-keywords', `let-keywords*' and `bound?'. These
4084 are not documented here because they may be removed in the future, but
4085 full documentation is still available in optargs.scm.
4087 ** New syntax: and-let*
4088 Guile now supports the `and-let*' form, described in the draft SRFI-2.
4090 Syntax: (land* (<clause> ...) <body> ...)
4091 Each <clause> should have one of the following forms:
4092 (<variable> <expression>)
4095 Each <variable> or <bound-variable> should be an identifier. Each
4096 <expression> should be a valid expression. The <body> should be a
4097 possibly empty sequence of expressions, like the <body> of a
4100 Semantics: A LAND* expression is evaluated by evaluating the
4101 <expression> or <bound-variable> of each of the <clause>s from
4102 left to right. The value of the first <expression> or
4103 <bound-variable> that evaluates to a false value is returned; the
4104 remaining <expression>s and <bound-variable>s are not evaluated.
4105 The <body> forms are evaluated iff all the <expression>s and
4106 <bound-variable>s evaluate to true values.
4108 The <expression>s and the <body> are evaluated in an environment
4109 binding each <variable> of the preceding (<variable> <expression>)
4110 clauses to the value of the <expression>. Later bindings
4111 shadow earlier bindings.
4113 Guile's and-let* macro was contributed by Michael Livshin.
4115 ** New sorting functions
4117 *** New function: sorted? SEQUENCE LESS?
4118 Returns `#t' when the sequence argument is in non-decreasing order
4119 according to LESS? (that is, there is no adjacent pair `... x y
4120 ...' for which `(less? y x)').
4122 Returns `#f' when the sequence contains at least one out-of-order
4123 pair. It is an error if the sequence is neither a list nor a
4126 *** New function: merge LIST1 LIST2 LESS?
4127 LIST1 and LIST2 are sorted lists.
4128 Returns the sorted list of all elements in LIST1 and LIST2.
4130 Assume that the elements a and b1 in LIST1 and b2 in LIST2 are "equal"
4131 in the sense that (LESS? x y) --> #f for x, y in {a, b1, b2},
4132 and that a < b1 in LIST1. Then a < b1 < b2 in the result.
4133 (Here "<" should read "comes before".)
4135 *** New procedure: merge! LIST1 LIST2 LESS?
4136 Merges two lists, re-using the pairs of LIST1 and LIST2 to build
4137 the result. If the code is compiled, and LESS? constructs no new
4138 pairs, no pairs at all will be allocated. The first pair of the
4139 result will be either the first pair of LIST1 or the first pair of
4142 *** New function: sort SEQUENCE LESS?
4143 Accepts either a list or a vector, and returns a new sequence
4144 which is sorted. The new sequence is the same type as the input.
4145 Always `(sorted? (sort sequence less?) less?)'. The original
4146 sequence is not altered in any way. The new sequence shares its
4147 elements with the old one; no elements are copied.
4149 *** New procedure: sort! SEQUENCE LESS
4150 Returns its sorted result in the original boxes. No new storage is
4151 allocated at all. Proper usage: (set! slist (sort! slist <))
4153 *** New function: stable-sort SEQUENCE LESS?
4154 Similar to `sort' but stable. That is, if "equal" elements are
4155 ordered a < b in the original sequence, they will have the same order
4158 *** New function: stable-sort! SEQUENCE LESS?
4159 Similar to `sort!' but stable.
4160 Uses temporary storage when sorting vectors.
4162 *** New functions: sort-list, sort-list!
4163 Added for compatibility with scsh.
4165 ** New built-in random number support
4167 *** New function: random N [STATE]
4168 Accepts a positive integer or real N and returns a number of the
4169 same type between zero (inclusive) and N (exclusive). The values
4170 returned have a uniform distribution.
4172 The optional argument STATE must be of the type produced by
4173 `copy-random-state' or `seed->random-state'. It defaults to the value
4174 of the variable `*random-state*'. This object is used to maintain the
4175 state of the pseudo-random-number generator and is altered as a side
4176 effect of the `random' operation.
4178 *** New variable: *random-state*
4179 Holds a data structure that encodes the internal state of the
4180 random-number generator that `random' uses by default. The nature
4181 of this data structure is implementation-dependent. It may be
4182 printed out and successfully read back in, but may or may not
4183 function correctly as a random-number state object in another
4186 *** New function: copy-random-state [STATE]
4187 Returns a new object of type suitable for use as the value of the
4188 variable `*random-state*' and as a second argument to `random'.
4189 If argument STATE is given, a copy of it is returned. Otherwise a
4190 copy of `*random-state*' is returned.
4192 *** New function: seed->random-state SEED
4193 Returns a new object of type suitable for use as the value of the
4194 variable `*random-state*' and as a second argument to `random'.
4195 SEED is a string or a number. A new state is generated and
4196 initialized using SEED.
4198 *** New function: random:uniform [STATE]
4199 Returns an uniformly distributed inexact real random number in the
4200 range between 0 and 1.
4202 *** New procedure: random:solid-sphere! VECT [STATE]
4203 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers the sum of whose
4204 squares is less than 1.0. Thinking of VECT as coordinates in
4205 space of dimension N = `(vector-length VECT)', the coordinates are
4206 uniformly distributed within the unit N-shere. The sum of the
4207 squares of the numbers is returned. VECT can be either a vector
4208 or a uniform vector of doubles.
4210 *** New procedure: random:hollow-sphere! VECT [STATE]
4211 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers the sum of whose squares
4212 is equal to 1.0. Thinking of VECT as coordinates in space of
4213 dimension n = `(vector-length VECT)', the coordinates are uniformly
4214 distributed over the surface of the unit n-shere. VECT can be either
4215 a vector or a uniform vector of doubles.
4217 *** New function: random:normal [STATE]
4218 Returns an inexact real in a normal distribution with mean 0 and
4219 standard deviation 1. For a normal distribution with mean M and
4220 standard deviation D use `(+ M (* D (random:normal)))'.
4222 *** New procedure: random:normal-vector! VECT [STATE]
4223 Fills VECT with inexact real random numbers which are independent and
4224 standard normally distributed (i.e., with mean 0 and variance 1).
4225 VECT can be either a vector or a uniform vector of doubles.
4227 *** New function: random:exp STATE
4228 Returns an inexact real in an exponential distribution with mean 1.
4229 For an exponential distribution with mean U use (* U (random:exp)).
4231 ** The range of logand, logior, logxor, logtest, and logbit? have changed.
4233 These functions now operate on numbers in the range of a C unsigned
4236 These functions used to operate on numbers in the range of a C signed
4237 long; however, this seems inappropriate, because Guile integers don't
4240 ** New function: make-guardian
4241 This is an implementation of guardians as described in
4242 R. Kent Dybvig, Carl Bruggeman, and David Eby (1993) "Guardians in a
4243 Generation-Based Garbage Collector" ACM SIGPLAN Conference on
4244 Programming Language Design and Implementation, June 1993
4245 ftp://ftp.cs.indiana.edu/pub/scheme-repository/doc/pubs/guardians.ps.gz
4247 ** New functions: delq1!, delv1!, delete1!
4248 These procedures behave similar to delq! and friends but delete only
4249 one object if at all.
4251 ** New function: unread-string STRING PORT
4252 Unread STRING to PORT, that is, push it back onto the port so that
4253 next read operation will work on the pushed back characters.
4255 ** unread-char can now be called multiple times
4256 If unread-char is called multiple times, the unread characters will be
4257 read again in last-in first-out order.
4259 ** the procedures uniform-array-read! and uniform-array-write! now
4260 work on any kind of port, not just ports which are open on a file.
4262 ** Now 'l' in a port mode requests line buffering.
4264 ** The procedure truncate-file now works on string ports as well
4265 as file ports. If the size argument is omitted, the current
4266 file position is used.
4268 ** new procedure: seek PORT/FDES OFFSET WHENCE
4269 The arguments are the same as for the old fseek procedure, but it
4270 works on string ports as well as random-access file ports.
4272 ** the fseek procedure now works on string ports, since it has been
4273 redefined using seek.
4275 ** the setvbuf procedure now uses a default size if mode is _IOFBF and
4276 size is not supplied.
4278 ** the newline procedure no longer flushes the port if it's not
4279 line-buffered: previously it did if it was the current output port.
4281 ** open-pipe and close-pipe are no longer primitive procedures, but
4282 an emulation can be obtained using `(use-modules (ice-9 popen))'.
4284 ** the freopen procedure has been removed.
4286 ** new procedure: drain-input PORT
4287 Drains PORT's read buffers (including any pushed-back characters)
4288 and returns the contents as a single string.
4290 ** New function: map-in-order PROC LIST1 LIST2 ...
4291 Version of `map' which guarantees that the procedure is applied to the
4292 lists in serial order.
4294 ** Renamed `serial-array-copy!' and `serial-array-map!' to
4295 `array-copy-in-order!' and `array-map-in-order!'. The old names are
4296 now obsolete and will go away in release 1.5.
4298 ** New syntax: collect BODY1 ...
4299 Version of `begin' which returns a list of the results of the body
4300 forms instead of the result of the last body form. In contrast to
4301 `begin', `collect' allows an empty body.
4303 ** New functions: read-history FILENAME, write-history FILENAME
4304 Read/write command line history from/to file. Returns #t on success
4305 and #f if an error occured.
4307 ** `ls' and `lls' in module (ice-9 ls) now handle no arguments.
4309 These procedures return a list of definitions available in the specified
4310 argument, a relative module reference. In the case of no argument,
4311 `(current-module)' is now consulted for definitions to return, instead
4312 of simply returning #f, the former behavior.
4314 ** The #/ syntax for lists is no longer supported.
4316 Earlier versions of Scheme accepted this syntax, but printed a
4319 ** Guile no longer consults the SCHEME_LOAD_PATH environment variable.
4321 Instead, you should set GUILE_LOAD_PATH to tell Guile where to find
4324 * Changes to the gh_ interface
4328 Now takes a second argument which is the result array. If this
4329 pointer is NULL, a new array is malloced (the old behaviour).
4331 ** gh_chars2byvect, gh_shorts2svect, gh_floats2fvect, gh_scm2chars,
4332 gh_scm2shorts, gh_scm2longs, gh_scm2floats
4336 * Changes to the scm_ interface
4338 ** Function: scm_make_named_hook (char* name, int n_args)
4340 Creates a hook in the same way as make-hook above but also
4341 binds a variable named NAME to it.
4343 This is the typical way of creating a hook from C code.
4345 Currently, the variable is created in the "current" module. This
4346 might change when we get the new module system.
4348 ** The smob interface
4350 The interface for creating smobs has changed. For documentation, see
4351 data-rep.info (made from guile-core/doc/data-rep.texi).
4353 *** Deprecated function: SCM scm_newsmob (scm_smobfuns *)
4355 >>> This function will be removed in 1.3.4. <<<
4359 *** Function: SCM scm_make_smob_type (const char *name, scm_sizet size)
4360 This function adds a new smob type, named NAME, with instance size
4361 SIZE to the system. The return value is a tag that is used in
4362 creating instances of the type. If SIZE is 0, then no memory will
4363 be allocated when instances of the smob are created, and nothing
4364 will be freed by the default free function.
4366 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_mark (long tc, SCM (*mark) (SCM))
4367 This function sets the smob marking procedure for the smob type
4368 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4369 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4371 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_free (long tc, SCM (*mark) (SCM))
4372 This function sets the smob freeing procedure for the smob type
4373 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4374 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4376 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_print (tc, print)
4378 - Function: void scm_set_smob_print (long tc,
4379 scm_sizet (*print) (SCM,
4383 This function sets the smob printing procedure for the smob type
4384 specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4385 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4387 *** Function: void scm_set_smob_equalp (long tc, SCM (*equalp) (SCM, SCM))
4388 This function sets the smob equality-testing predicate for the
4389 smob type specified by the tag TC. TC is the tag returned by
4390 `scm_make_smob_type'.
4392 *** Macro: void SCM_NEWSMOB (SCM var, long tc, void *data)
4393 Make VALUE contain a smob instance of the type with type code TC and
4394 smob data DATA. VALUE must be previously declared as C type `SCM'.
4396 *** Macro: fn_returns SCM_RETURN_NEWSMOB (long tc, void *data)
4397 This macro expands to a block of code that creates a smob instance
4398 of the type with type code TC and smob data DATA, and returns that
4399 `SCM' value. It should be the last piece of code in a block.
4401 ** The interfaces for using I/O ports and implementing port types
4402 (ptobs) have changed significantly. The new interface is based on
4403 shared access to buffers and a new set of ptob procedures.
4405 *** scm_newptob has been removed
4409 *** Function: SCM scm_make_port_type (type_name, fill_buffer, write_flush)
4411 - Function: SCM scm_make_port_type (char *type_name,
4412 int (*fill_buffer) (SCM port),
4413 void (*write_flush) (SCM port));
4415 Similarly to the new smob interface, there is a set of function
4416 setters by which the user can customize the behaviour of his port
4417 type. See ports.h (scm_set_port_XXX).
4419 ** scm_strport_to_string: New function: creates a new string from
4420 a string port's buffer.
4422 ** Plug in interface for random number generators
4423 The variable `scm_the_rng' in random.c contains a value and three
4424 function pointers which together define the current random number
4425 generator being used by the Scheme level interface and the random
4426 number library functions.
4428 The user is free to replace the default generator with the generator
4431 *** Variable: size_t scm_the_rng.rstate_size
4432 The size of the random state type used by the current RNG
4435 *** Function: unsigned long scm_the_rng.random_bits (scm_rstate *STATE)
4436 Given the random STATE, return 32 random bits.
4438 *** Function: void scm_the_rng.init_rstate (scm_rstate *STATE, chars *S, int N)
4439 Seed random state STATE using string S of length N.
4441 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_the_rng.copy_rstate (scm_rstate *STATE)
4442 Given random state STATE, return a malloced copy.
4445 The default RNG is the MWC (Multiply With Carry) random number
4446 generator described by George Marsaglia at the Department of
4447 Statistics and Supercomputer Computations Research Institute, The
4448 Florida State University (http://stat.fsu.edu/~geo).
4450 It uses 64 bits, has a period of 4578426017172946943 (4.6e18), and
4451 passes all tests in the DIEHARD test suite
4452 (http://stat.fsu.edu/~geo/diehard.html). The generation of 32 bits
4453 costs one multiply and one add on platforms which either supports long
4454 longs (gcc does this on most systems) or have 64 bit longs. The cost
4455 is four multiply on other systems but this can be optimized by writing
4456 scm_i_uniform32 in assembler.
4458 These functions are provided through the scm_the_rng interface for use
4459 by libguile and the application.
4461 *** Function: unsigned long scm_i_uniform32 (scm_i_rstate *STATE)
4462 Given the random STATE, return 32 random bits.
4463 Don't use this function directly. Instead go through the plugin
4464 interface (see "Plug in interface" above).
4466 *** Function: void scm_i_init_rstate (scm_i_rstate *STATE, char *SEED, int N)
4467 Initialize STATE using SEED of length N.
4469 *** Function: scm_i_rstate *scm_i_copy_rstate (scm_i_rstate *STATE)
4470 Return a malloc:ed copy of STATE. This function can easily be re-used
4471 in the interfaces to other RNGs.
4473 ** Random number library functions
4474 These functions use the current RNG through the scm_the_rng interface.
4475 It might be a good idea to use these functions from your C code so
4476 that only one random generator is used by all code in your program.
4478 The default random state is stored in:
4480 *** Variable: SCM scm_var_random_state
4481 Contains the vcell of the Scheme variable "*random-state*" which is
4482 used as default state by all random number functions in the Scheme
4487 double x = scm_c_uniform01 (SCM_RSTATE (SCM_CDR (scm_var_random_state)));
4489 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_c_default_rstate (void)
4490 This is a convenience function which returns the value of
4491 scm_var_random_state. An error message is generated if this value
4492 isn't a random state.
4494 *** Function: scm_rstate *scm_c_make_rstate (char *SEED, int LENGTH)
4495 Make a new random state from the string SEED of length LENGTH.
4497 It is generally not a good idea to use multiple random states in a
4498 program. While subsequent random numbers generated from one random
4499 state are guaranteed to be reasonably independent, there is no such
4500 guarantee for numbers generated from different random states.
4502 *** Macro: unsigned long scm_c_uniform32 (scm_rstate *STATE)
4503 Return 32 random bits.
4505 *** Function: double scm_c_uniform01 (scm_rstate *STATE)
4506 Return a sample from the uniform(0,1) distribution.
4508 *** Function: double scm_c_normal01 (scm_rstate *STATE)
4509 Return a sample from the normal(0,1) distribution.
4511 *** Function: double scm_c_exp1 (scm_rstate *STATE)
4512 Return a sample from the exp(1) distribution.
4514 *** Function: unsigned long scm_c_random (scm_rstate *STATE, unsigned long M)
4515 Return a sample from the discrete uniform(0,M) distribution.
4517 *** Function: SCM scm_c_random_bignum (scm_rstate *STATE, SCM M)
4518 Return a sample from the discrete uniform(0,M) distribution.
4519 M must be a bignum object. The returned value may be an INUM.
4523 Changes in Guile 1.3 (released Monday, October 19, 1998):
4525 * Changes to the distribution
4527 ** We renamed the SCHEME_LOAD_PATH environment variable to GUILE_LOAD_PATH.
4528 To avoid conflicts, programs should name environment variables after
4529 themselves, except when there's a common practice establishing some
4532 For now, Guile supports both GUILE_LOAD_PATH and SCHEME_LOAD_PATH,
4533 giving the former precedence, and printing a warning message if the
4534 latter is set. Guile 1.4 will not recognize SCHEME_LOAD_PATH at all.
4536 ** The header files related to multi-byte characters have been removed.
4537 They were: libguile/extchrs.h and libguile/mbstrings.h. Any C code
4538 which referred to these explicitly will probably need to be rewritten,
4539 since the support for the variant string types has been removed; see
4542 ** The header files append.h and sequences.h have been removed. These
4543 files implemented non-R4RS operations which would encourage
4544 non-portable programming style and less easy-to-read code.
4546 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
4548 ** New procedures have been added to implement a "batch mode":
4550 *** Function: batch-mode?
4552 Returns a boolean indicating whether the interpreter is in batch
4555 *** Function: set-batch-mode?! ARG
4557 If ARG is true, switches the interpreter to batch mode. The `#f'
4558 case has not been implemented.
4560 ** Guile now provides full command-line editing, when run interactively.
4561 To use this feature, you must have the readline library installed.
4562 The Guile build process will notice it, and automatically include
4565 The readline library is available via anonymous FTP from any GNU
4566 mirror site; the canonical location is "ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu".
4568 ** the-last-stack is now a fluid.
4570 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
4572 ** You can now use the `guile-config' utility to build programs that use Guile.
4574 Guile now includes a command-line utility called `guile-config', which
4575 can provide information about how to compile and link programs that
4578 *** `guile-config compile' prints any C compiler flags needed to use Guile.
4579 You should include this command's output on the command line you use
4580 to compile C or C++ code that #includes the Guile header files. It's
4581 usually just a `-I' flag to help the compiler find the Guile headers.
4584 *** `guile-config link' prints any linker flags necessary to link with Guile.
4586 This command writes to its standard output a list of flags which you
4587 must pass to the linker to link your code against the Guile library.
4588 The flags include '-lguile' itself, any other libraries the Guile
4589 library depends upon, and any `-L' flags needed to help the linker
4590 find those libraries.
4592 For example, here is a Makefile rule that builds a program named 'foo'
4593 from the object files ${FOO_OBJECTS}, and links them against Guile:
4596 ${CC} ${CFLAGS} ${FOO_OBJECTS} `guile-config link` -o foo
4598 Previous Guile releases recommended that you use autoconf to detect
4599 which of a predefined set of libraries were present on your system.
4600 It is more robust to use `guile-config', since it records exactly which
4601 libraries the installed Guile library requires.
4603 This was originally called `build-guile', but was renamed to
4604 `guile-config' before Guile 1.3 was released, to be consistent with
4605 the analogous script for the GTK+ GUI toolkit, which is called
4609 ** Use the GUILE_FLAGS macro in your configure.in file to find Guile.
4611 If you are using the GNU autoconf package to configure your program,
4612 you can use the GUILE_FLAGS autoconf macro to call `guile-config'
4613 (described above) and gather the necessary values for use in your
4616 The GUILE_FLAGS macro expands to configure script code which runs the
4617 `guile-config' script, to find out where Guile's header files and
4618 libraries are installed. It sets two variables, marked for
4619 substitution, as by AC_SUBST.
4621 GUILE_CFLAGS --- flags to pass to a C or C++ compiler to build
4622 code that uses Guile header files. This is almost always just a
4625 GUILE_LDFLAGS --- flags to pass to the linker to link a
4626 program against Guile. This includes `-lguile' for the Guile
4627 library itself, any libraries that Guile itself requires (like
4628 -lqthreads), and so on. It may also include a -L flag to tell the
4629 compiler where to find the libraries.
4631 GUILE_FLAGS is defined in the file guile.m4, in the top-level
4632 directory of the Guile distribution. You can copy it into your
4633 package's aclocal.m4 file, and then use it in your configure.in file.
4635 If you are using the `aclocal' program, distributed with GNU automake,
4636 to maintain your aclocal.m4 file, the Guile installation process
4637 installs guile.m4 where aclocal will find it. All you need to do is
4638 use GUILE_FLAGS in your configure.in file, and then run `aclocal';
4639 this will copy the definition of GUILE_FLAGS into your aclocal.m4
4643 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
4645 ** Multi-byte strings have been removed, as have multi-byte and wide
4646 ports. We felt that these were the wrong approach to
4647 internationalization support.
4649 ** New function: readline [PROMPT]
4650 Read a line from the terminal, and allow the user to edit it,
4651 prompting with PROMPT. READLINE provides a large set of Emacs-like
4652 editing commands, lets the user recall previously typed lines, and
4653 works on almost every kind of terminal, including dumb terminals.
4655 READLINE assumes that the cursor is at the beginning of the line when
4656 it is invoked. Thus, you can't print a prompt yourself, and then call
4657 READLINE; you need to package up your prompt as a string, pass it to
4658 the function, and let READLINE print the prompt itself. This is
4659 because READLINE needs to know the prompt's screen width.
4661 For Guile to provide this function, you must have the readline
4662 library, version 2.1 or later, installed on your system. Readline is
4663 available via anonymous FTP from prep.ai.mit.edu in pub/gnu, or from
4664 any GNU mirror site.
4666 See also ADD-HISTORY function.
4668 ** New function: add-history STRING
4669 Add STRING as the most recent line in the history used by the READLINE
4670 command. READLINE does not add lines to the history itself; you must
4671 call ADD-HISTORY to make previous input available to the user.
4673 ** The behavior of the read-line function has changed.
4675 This function now uses standard C library functions to read the line,
4676 for speed. This means that it doesn not respect the value of
4677 scm-line-incrementors; it assumes that lines are delimited with
4680 (Note that this is read-line, the function that reads a line of text
4681 from a port, not readline, the function that reads a line from a
4682 terminal, providing full editing capabilities.)
4684 ** New module (ice-9 getopt-gnu-style): Parse command-line arguments.
4686 This module provides some simple argument parsing. It exports one
4689 Function: getopt-gnu-style ARG-LS
4690 Parse a list of program arguments into an alist of option
4693 Each item in the list of program arguments is examined to see if
4694 it meets the syntax of a GNU long-named option. An argument like
4695 `--MUMBLE' produces an element of the form (MUMBLE . #t) in the
4696 returned alist, where MUMBLE is a keyword object with the same
4697 name as the argument. An argument like `--MUMBLE=FROB' produces
4698 an element of the form (MUMBLE . FROB), where FROB is a string.
4700 As a special case, the returned alist also contains a pair whose
4701 car is the symbol `rest'. The cdr of this pair is a list
4702 containing all the items in the argument list that are not options
4703 of the form mentioned above.
4705 The argument `--' is treated specially: all items in the argument
4706 list appearing after such an argument are not examined, and are
4707 returned in the special `rest' list.
4709 This function does not parse normal single-character switches.
4710 You will need to parse them out of the `rest' list yourself.
4712 ** The read syntax for byte vectors and short vectors has changed.
4714 Instead of #bytes(...), write #y(...).
4716 Instead of #short(...), write #h(...).
4718 This may seem nutty, but, like the other uniform vectors, byte vectors
4719 and short vectors want to have the same print and read syntax (and,
4720 more basic, want to have read syntax!). Changing the read syntax to
4721 use multiple characters after the hash sign breaks with the
4722 conventions used in R5RS and the conventions used for the other
4723 uniform vectors. It also introduces complexity in the current reader,
4724 both on the C and Scheme levels. (The Right solution is probably to
4725 change the syntax and prototypes for uniform vectors entirely.)
4728 ** The new module (ice-9 session) provides useful interactive functions.
4730 *** New procedure: (apropos REGEXP OPTION ...)
4732 Display a list of top-level variables whose names match REGEXP, and
4733 the modules they are imported from. Each OPTION should be one of the
4736 value --- Show the value of each matching variable.
4737 shadow --- Show bindings shadowed by subsequently imported modules.
4738 full --- Same as both `shadow' and `value'.
4742 guile> (apropos "trace" 'full)
4743 debug: trace #<procedure trace args>
4744 debug: untrace #<procedure untrace args>
4745 the-scm-module: display-backtrace #<compiled-closure #<primitive-procedure gsubr-apply>>
4746 the-scm-module: before-backtrace-hook ()
4747 the-scm-module: backtrace #<primitive-procedure backtrace>
4748 the-scm-module: after-backtrace-hook ()
4749 the-scm-module: has-shown-backtrace-hint? #f
4752 ** There are new functions and syntax for working with macros.
4754 Guile implements macros as a special object type. Any variable whose
4755 top-level binding is a macro object acts as a macro. The macro object
4756 specifies how the expression should be transformed before evaluation.
4758 *** Macro objects now print in a reasonable way, resembling procedures.
4760 *** New function: (macro? OBJ)
4761 True iff OBJ is a macro object.
4763 *** New function: (primitive-macro? OBJ)
4764 Like (macro? OBJ), but true only if OBJ is one of the Guile primitive
4765 macro transformers, implemented in eval.c rather than Scheme code.
4767 Why do we have this function?
4768 - For symmetry with procedure? and primitive-procedure?,
4769 - to allow custom print procedures to tell whether a macro is
4770 primitive, and display it differently, and
4771 - to allow compilers and user-written evaluators to distinguish
4772 builtin special forms from user-defined ones, which could be
4775 *** New function: (macro-type OBJ)
4776 Return a value indicating what kind of macro OBJ is. Possible return
4779 The symbol `syntax' --- a macro created by procedure->syntax.
4780 The symbol `macro' --- a macro created by procedure->macro.
4781 The symbol `macro!' --- a macro created by procedure->memoizing-macro.
4782 The boolean #f --- if OBJ is not a macro object.
4784 *** New function: (macro-name MACRO)
4785 Return the name of the macro object MACRO's procedure, as returned by
4788 *** New function: (macro-transformer MACRO)
4789 Return the transformer procedure for MACRO.
4791 *** New syntax: (use-syntax MODULE ... TRANSFORMER)
4793 Specify a new macro expander to use in the current module. Each
4794 MODULE is a module name, with the same meaning as in the `use-modules'
4795 form; each named module's exported bindings are added to the current
4796 top-level environment. TRANSFORMER is an expression evaluated in the
4797 resulting environment which must yield a procedure to use as the
4798 module's eval transformer: every expression evaluated in this module
4799 is passed to this function, and the result passed to the Guile
4802 *** macro-eval! is removed. Use local-eval instead.
4804 ** Some magic has been added to the printer to better handle user
4805 written printing routines (like record printers, closure printers).
4807 The problem is that these user written routines must have access to
4808 the current `print-state' to be able to handle fancy things like
4809 detection of circular references. These print-states have to be
4810 passed to the builtin printing routines (display, write, etc) to
4811 properly continue the print chain.
4813 We didn't want to change all existing print code so that it
4814 explicitly passes thru a print state in addition to a port. Instead,
4815 we extented the possible values that the builtin printing routines
4816 accept as a `port'. In addition to a normal port, they now also take
4817 a pair of a normal port and a print-state. Printing will go to the
4818 port and the print-state will be used to control the detection of
4819 circular references, etc. If the builtin function does not care for a
4820 print-state, it is simply ignored.
4822 User written callbacks are now called with such a pair as their
4823 `port', but because every function now accepts this pair as a PORT
4824 argument, you don't have to worry about that. In fact, it is probably
4825 safest to not check for these pairs.
4827 However, it is sometimes necessary to continue a print chain on a
4828 different port, for example to get a intermediate string
4829 representation of the printed value, mangle that string somehow, and
4830 then to finally print the mangled string. Use the new function
4832 inherit-print-state OLD-PORT NEW-PORT
4834 for this. It constructs a new `port' that prints to NEW-PORT but
4835 inherits the print-state of OLD-PORT.
4837 ** struct-vtable-offset renamed to vtable-offset-user
4839 ** New constants: vtable-index-layout, vtable-index-vtable, vtable-index-printer
4841 ** There is now a third optional argument to make-vtable-vtable
4842 (and fourth to make-struct) when constructing new types (vtables).
4843 This argument initializes field vtable-index-printer of the vtable.
4845 ** The detection of circular references has been extended to structs.
4846 That is, a structure that -- in the process of being printed -- prints
4847 itself does not lead to infinite recursion.
4849 ** There is now some basic support for fluids. Please read
4850 "libguile/fluid.h" to find out more. It is accessible from Scheme with
4851 the following functions and macros:
4853 Function: make-fluid
4855 Create a new fluid object. Fluids are not special variables or
4856 some other extension to the semantics of Scheme, but rather
4857 ordinary Scheme objects. You can store them into variables (that
4858 are still lexically scoped, of course) or into any other place you
4859 like. Every fluid has a initial value of `#f'.
4861 Function: fluid? OBJ
4863 Test whether OBJ is a fluid.
4865 Function: fluid-ref FLUID
4866 Function: fluid-set! FLUID VAL
4868 Access/modify the fluid FLUID. Modifications are only visible
4869 within the current dynamic root (that includes threads).
4871 Function: with-fluids* FLUIDS VALUES THUNK
4873 FLUIDS is a list of fluids and VALUES a corresponding list of
4874 values for these fluids. Before THUNK gets called the values are
4875 installed in the fluids and the old values of the fluids are
4876 saved in the VALUES list. When the flow of control leaves THUNK
4877 or reenters it, the values get swapped again. You might think of
4878 this as a `safe-fluid-excursion'. Note that the VALUES list is
4879 modified by `with-fluids*'.
4881 Macro: with-fluids ((FLUID VALUE) ...) FORM ...
4883 The same as `with-fluids*' but with a different syntax. It looks
4884 just like `let', but both FLUID and VALUE are evaluated. Remember,
4885 fluids are not special variables but ordinary objects. FLUID
4886 should evaluate to a fluid.
4888 ** Changes to system call interfaces:
4890 *** close-port, close-input-port and close-output-port now return a
4891 boolean instead of an `unspecified' object. #t means that the port
4892 was successfully closed, while #f means it was already closed. It is
4893 also now possible for these procedures to raise an exception if an
4894 error occurs (some errors from write can be delayed until close.)
4896 *** the first argument to chmod, fcntl, ftell and fseek can now be a
4899 *** the third argument to fcntl is now optional.
4901 *** the first argument to chown can now be a file descriptor or a port.
4903 *** the argument to stat can now be a port.
4905 *** The following new procedures have been added (most use scsh
4908 *** procedure: close PORT/FD
4909 Similar to close-port (*note close-port: Closing Ports.), but also
4910 works on file descriptors. A side effect of closing a file
4911 descriptor is that any ports using that file descriptor are moved
4912 to a different file descriptor and have their revealed counts set
4915 *** procedure: port->fdes PORT
4916 Returns the integer file descriptor underlying PORT. As a side
4917 effect the revealed count of PORT is incremented.
4919 *** procedure: fdes->ports FDES
4920 Returns a list of existing ports which have FDES as an underlying
4921 file descriptor, without changing their revealed counts.
4923 *** procedure: fdes->inport FDES
4924 Returns an existing input port which has FDES as its underlying
4925 file descriptor, if one exists, and increments its revealed count.
4926 Otherwise, returns a new input port with a revealed count of 1.
4928 *** procedure: fdes->outport FDES
4929 Returns an existing output port which has FDES as its underlying
4930 file descriptor, if one exists, and increments its revealed count.
4931 Otherwise, returns a new output port with a revealed count of 1.
4933 The next group of procedures perform a `dup2' system call, if NEWFD
4934 (an integer) is supplied, otherwise a `dup'. The file descriptor to be
4935 duplicated can be supplied as an integer or contained in a port. The
4936 type of value returned varies depending on which procedure is used.
4938 All procedures also have the side effect when performing `dup2' that
4939 any ports using NEWFD are moved to a different file descriptor and have
4940 their revealed counts set to zero.
4942 *** procedure: dup->fdes PORT/FD [NEWFD]
4943 Returns an integer file descriptor.
4945 *** procedure: dup->inport PORT/FD [NEWFD]
4946 Returns a new input port using the new file descriptor.
4948 *** procedure: dup->outport PORT/FD [NEWFD]
4949 Returns a new output port using the new file descriptor.
4951 *** procedure: dup PORT/FD [NEWFD]
4952 Returns a new port if PORT/FD is a port, with the same mode as the
4953 supplied port, otherwise returns an integer file descriptor.
4955 *** procedure: dup->port PORT/FD MODE [NEWFD]
4956 Returns a new port using the new file descriptor. MODE supplies a
4957 mode string for the port (*note open-file: File Ports.).
4959 *** procedure: setenv NAME VALUE
4960 Modifies the environment of the current process, which is also the
4961 default environment inherited by child processes.
4963 If VALUE is `#f', then NAME is removed from the environment.
4964 Otherwise, the string NAME=VALUE is added to the environment,
4965 replacing any existing string with name matching NAME.
4967 The return value is unspecified.
4969 *** procedure: truncate-file OBJ SIZE
4970 Truncates the file referred to by OBJ to at most SIZE bytes. OBJ
4971 can be a string containing a file name or an integer file
4972 descriptor or port open for output on the file. The underlying
4973 system calls are `truncate' and `ftruncate'.
4975 The return value is unspecified.
4977 *** procedure: setvbuf PORT MODE [SIZE]
4978 Set the buffering mode for PORT. MODE can be:
4986 block buffered, using a newly allocated buffer of SIZE bytes.
4987 However if SIZE is zero or unspecified, the port will be made
4990 This procedure should not be used after I/O has been performed with
4993 Ports are usually block buffered by default, with a default buffer
4994 size. Procedures e.g., *Note open-file: File Ports, which accept a
4995 mode string allow `0' to be added to request an unbuffered port.
4997 *** procedure: fsync PORT/FD
4998 Copies any unwritten data for the specified output file descriptor
4999 to disk. If PORT/FD is a port, its buffer is flushed before the
5000 underlying file descriptor is fsync'd. The return value is
5003 *** procedure: open-fdes PATH FLAGS [MODES]
5004 Similar to `open' but returns a file descriptor instead of a port.
5006 *** procedure: execle PATH ENV [ARG] ...
5007 Similar to `execl', but the environment of the new process is
5008 specified by ENV, which must be a list of strings as returned by
5009 the `environ' procedure.
5011 This procedure is currently implemented using the `execve' system
5012 call, but we call it `execle' because of its Scheme calling
5015 *** procedure: strerror ERRNO
5016 Returns the Unix error message corresponding to ERRNO, an integer.
5018 *** procedure: primitive-exit [STATUS]
5019 Terminate the current process without unwinding the Scheme stack.
5020 This is would typically be useful after a fork. The exit status
5021 is STATUS if supplied, otherwise zero.
5023 *** procedure: times
5024 Returns an object with information about real and processor time.
5025 The following procedures accept such an object as an argument and
5026 return a selected component:
5029 The current real time, expressed as time units relative to an
5033 The CPU time units used by the calling process.
5036 The CPU time units used by the system on behalf of the
5040 The CPU time units used by terminated child processes of the
5041 calling process, whose status has been collected (e.g., using
5045 Similarly, the CPU times units used by the system on behalf of
5046 terminated child processes.
5048 ** Removed: list-length
5049 ** Removed: list-append, list-append!
5050 ** Removed: list-reverse, list-reverse!
5052 ** array-map renamed to array-map!
5054 ** serial-array-map renamed to serial-array-map!
5056 ** catch doesn't take #f as first argument any longer
5058 Previously, it was possible to pass #f instead of a key to `catch'.
5059 That would cause `catch' to pass a jump buffer object to the procedure
5060 passed as second argument. The procedure could then use this jump
5061 buffer objekt as an argument to throw.
5063 This mechanism has been removed since its utility doesn't motivate the
5064 extra complexity it introduces.
5066 ** The `#/' notation for lists now provokes a warning message from Guile.
5067 This syntax will be removed from Guile in the near future.
5069 To disable the warning message, set the GUILE_HUSH environment
5070 variable to any non-empty value.
5072 ** The newline character now prints as `#\newline', following the
5073 normal Scheme notation, not `#\nl'.
5075 * Changes to the gh_ interface
5077 ** The gh_enter function now takes care of loading the Guile startup files.
5078 gh_enter works by calling scm_boot_guile; see the remarks below.
5080 ** Function: void gh_write (SCM x)
5082 Write the printed representation of the scheme object x to the current
5083 output port. Corresponds to the scheme level `write'.
5085 ** gh_list_length renamed to gh_length.
5087 ** vector handling routines
5089 Several major changes. In particular, gh_vector() now resembles
5090 (vector ...) (with a caveat -- see manual), and gh_make_vector() now
5091 exists and behaves like (make-vector ...). gh_vset() and gh_vref()
5092 have been renamed gh_vector_set_x() and gh_vector_ref(). Some missing
5093 vector-related gh_ functions have been implemented.
5095 ** pair and list routines
5097 Implemented several of the R4RS pair and list functions that were
5100 ** gh_scm2doubles, gh_doubles2scm, gh_doubles2dvect
5102 New function. Converts double arrays back and forth between Scheme
5105 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5107 ** The function scm_boot_guile now takes care of loading the startup files.
5109 Guile's primary initialization function, scm_boot_guile, now takes
5110 care of loading `boot-9.scm', in the `ice-9' module, to initialize
5111 Guile, define the module system, and put together some standard
5112 bindings. It also loads `init.scm', which is intended to hold
5113 site-specific initialization code.
5115 Since Guile cannot operate properly until boot-9.scm is loaded, there
5116 is no reason to separate loading boot-9.scm from Guile's other
5117 initialization processes.
5119 This job used to be done by scm_compile_shell_switches, which didn't
5120 make much sense; in particular, it meant that people using Guile for
5121 non-shell-like applications had to jump through hoops to get Guile
5122 initialized properly.
5124 ** The function scm_compile_shell_switches no longer loads the startup files.
5125 Now, Guile always loads the startup files, whenever it is initialized;
5126 see the notes above for scm_boot_guile and scm_load_startup_files.
5128 ** Function: scm_load_startup_files
5129 This new function takes care of loading Guile's initialization file
5130 (`boot-9.scm'), and the site initialization file, `init.scm'. Since
5131 this is always called by the Guile initialization process, it's
5132 probably not too useful to call this yourself, but it's there anyway.
5134 ** The semantics of smob marking have changed slightly.
5136 The smob marking function (the `mark' member of the scm_smobfuns
5137 structure) is no longer responsible for setting the mark bit on the
5138 smob. The generic smob handling code in the garbage collector will
5139 set this bit. The mark function need only ensure that any other
5140 objects the smob refers to get marked.
5142 Note that this change means that the smob's GC8MARK bit is typically
5143 already set upon entry to the mark function. Thus, marking functions
5144 which look like this:
5147 if (SCM_GC8MARKP (ptr))
5149 SCM_SETGC8MARK (ptr);
5150 ... mark objects to which the smob refers ...
5153 are now incorrect, since they will return early, and fail to mark any
5154 other objects the smob refers to. Some code in the Guile library used
5157 ** The semantics of the I/O port functions in scm_ptobfuns have changed.
5159 If you have implemented your own I/O port type, by writing the
5160 functions required by the scm_ptobfuns and then calling scm_newptob,
5161 you will need to change your functions slightly.
5163 The functions in a scm_ptobfuns structure now expect the port itself
5164 as their argument; they used to expect the `stream' member of the
5165 port's scm_port_table structure. This allows functions in an
5166 scm_ptobfuns structure to easily access the port's cell (and any flags
5167 it its CAR), and the port's scm_port_table structure.
5169 Guile now passes the I/O port itself as the `port' argument in the
5170 following scm_ptobfuns functions:
5172 int (*free) (SCM port);
5173 int (*fputc) (int, SCM port);
5174 int (*fputs) (char *, SCM port);
5175 scm_sizet (*fwrite) SCM_P ((char *ptr,
5179 int (*fflush) (SCM port);
5180 int (*fgetc) (SCM port);
5181 int (*fclose) (SCM port);
5183 The interfaces to the `mark', `print', `equalp', and `fgets' methods
5186 If you have existing code which defines its own port types, it is easy
5187 to convert your code to the new interface; simply apply SCM_STREAM to
5188 the port argument to yield the value you code used to expect.
5190 Note that since both the port and the stream have the same type in the
5191 C code --- they are both SCM values --- the C compiler will not remind
5192 you if you forget to update your scm_ptobfuns functions.
5195 ** Function: int scm_internal_select (int fds,
5199 struct timeval *timeout);
5201 This is a replacement for the `select' function provided by the OS.
5202 It enables I/O blocking and sleeping to happen for one cooperative
5203 thread without blocking other threads. It also avoids busy-loops in
5204 these situations. It is intended that all I/O blocking and sleeping
5205 will finally go through this function. Currently, this function is
5206 only available on systems providing `gettimeofday' and `select'.
5208 ** Function: SCM scm_internal_stack_catch (SCM tag,
5209 scm_catch_body_t body,
5211 scm_catch_handler_t handler,
5214 A new sibling to the other two C level `catch' functions
5215 scm_internal_catch and scm_internal_lazy_catch. Use it if you want
5216 the stack to be saved automatically into the variable `the-last-stack'
5217 (scm_the_last_stack_var) on error. This is necessary if you want to
5218 use advanced error reporting, such as calling scm_display_error and
5219 scm_display_backtrace. (They both take a stack object as argument.)
5221 ** Function: SCM scm_spawn_thread (scm_catch_body_t body,
5223 scm_catch_handler_t handler,
5226 Spawns a new thread. It does a job similar to
5227 scm_call_with_new_thread but takes arguments more suitable when
5228 spawning threads from application C code.
5230 ** The hook scm_error_callback has been removed. It was originally
5231 intended as a way for the user to install his own error handler. But
5232 that method works badly since it intervenes between throw and catch,
5233 thereby changing the semantics of expressions like (catch #t ...).
5234 The correct way to do it is to use one of the C level catch functions
5235 in throw.c: scm_internal_catch/lazy_catch/stack_catch.
5237 ** Removed functions:
5239 scm_obj_length, scm_list_length, scm_list_append, scm_list_append_x,
5240 scm_list_reverse, scm_list_reverse_x
5242 ** New macros: SCM_LISTn where n is one of the integers 0-9.
5244 These can be used for pretty list creation from C. The idea is taken
5245 from Erick Gallesio's STk.
5247 ** scm_array_map renamed to scm_array_map_x
5249 ** mbstrings are now removed
5251 This means that the type codes scm_tc7_mb_string and
5252 scm_tc7_mb_substring has been removed.
5254 ** scm_gen_putc, scm_gen_puts, scm_gen_write, and scm_gen_getc have changed.
5256 Since we no longer support multi-byte strings, these I/O functions
5257 have been simplified, and renamed. Here are their old names, and
5258 their new names and arguments:
5260 scm_gen_putc -> void scm_putc (int c, SCM port);
5261 scm_gen_puts -> void scm_puts (char *s, SCM port);
5262 scm_gen_write -> void scm_lfwrite (char *ptr, scm_sizet size, SCM port);
5263 scm_gen_getc -> void scm_getc (SCM port);
5266 ** The macros SCM_TYP7D and SCM_TYP7SD has been removed.
5268 ** The macro SCM_TYP7S has taken the role of the old SCM_TYP7D
5270 SCM_TYP7S now masks away the bit which distinguishes substrings from
5273 ** scm_catch_body_t: Backward incompatible change!
5275 Body functions to scm_internal_catch and friends do not any longer
5276 take a second argument. This is because it is no longer possible to
5277 pass a #f arg to catch.
5279 ** Calls to scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect now nest properly.
5281 The function scm_protect_object protects its argument from being freed
5282 by the garbage collector. scm_unprotect_object removes that
5285 These functions now nest properly. That is, for every object O, there
5286 is a counter which scm_protect_object(O) increments and
5287 scm_unprotect_object(O) decrements, if the counter is greater than
5288 zero. Every object's counter is zero when it is first created. If an
5289 object's counter is greater than zero, the garbage collector will not
5290 reclaim its storage.
5292 This allows you to use scm_protect_object in your code without
5293 worrying that some other function you call will call
5294 scm_unprotect_object, and allow it to be freed. Assuming that the
5295 functions you call are well-behaved, and unprotect only those objects
5296 they protect, you can follow the same rule and have confidence that
5297 objects will be freed only at appropriate times.
5300 Changes in Guile 1.2 (released Tuesday, June 24 1997):
5302 * Changes to the distribution
5304 ** Nightly snapshots are now available from ftp.red-bean.com.
5305 The old server, ftp.cyclic.com, has been relinquished to its rightful
5308 Nightly snapshots of the Guile development sources are now available via
5309 anonymous FTP from ftp.red-bean.com, as /pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz.
5311 Via the web, that's: ftp://ftp.red-bean.com/pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz
5312 For getit, that's: ftp.red-bean.com:/pub/guile/guile-snap.tar.gz
5314 ** To run Guile without installing it, the procedure has changed a bit.
5316 If you used a separate build directory to compile Guile, you'll need
5317 to include the build directory in SCHEME_LOAD_PATH, as well as the
5318 source directory. See the `INSTALL' file for examples.
5320 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
5322 ** The standard Guile load path for Scheme code now includes
5323 $(datadir)/guile (usually /usr/local/share/guile). This means that
5324 you can install your own Scheme files there, and Guile will find them.
5325 (Previous versions of Guile only checked a directory whose name
5326 contained the Guile version number, so you had to re-install or move
5327 your Scheme sources each time you installed a fresh version of Guile.)
5329 The load path also includes $(datadir)/guile/site; we recommend
5330 putting individual Scheme files there. If you want to install a
5331 package with multiple source files, create a directory for them under
5334 ** Guile 1.2 will now use the Rx regular expression library, if it is
5335 installed on your system. When you are linking libguile into your own
5336 programs, this means you will have to link against -lguile, -lqt (if
5337 you configured Guile with thread support), and -lrx.
5339 If you are using autoconf to generate configuration scripts for your
5340 application, the following lines should suffice to add the appropriate
5341 libraries to your link command:
5343 ### Find Rx, quickthreads and libguile.
5344 AC_CHECK_LIB(rx, main)
5345 AC_CHECK_LIB(qt, main)
5346 AC_CHECK_LIB(guile, scm_shell)
5348 The Guile 1.2 distribution does not contain sources for the Rx
5349 library, as Guile 1.0 did. If you want to use Rx, you'll need to
5350 retrieve it from a GNU FTP site and install it separately.
5352 * Changes to Scheme functions and syntax
5354 ** The dynamic linking features of Guile are now enabled by default.
5355 You can disable them by giving the `--disable-dynamic-linking' option
5358 (dynamic-link FILENAME)
5360 Find the object file denoted by FILENAME (a string) and link it
5361 into the running Guile application. When everything works out,
5362 return a Scheme object suitable for representing the linked object
5363 file. Otherwise an error is thrown. How object files are
5364 searched is system dependent.
5366 (dynamic-object? VAL)
5368 Determine whether VAL represents a dynamically linked object file.
5370 (dynamic-unlink DYNOBJ)
5372 Unlink the indicated object file from the application. DYNOBJ
5373 should be one of the values returned by `dynamic-link'.
5375 (dynamic-func FUNCTION DYNOBJ)
5377 Search the C function indicated by FUNCTION (a string or symbol)
5378 in DYNOBJ and return some Scheme object that can later be used
5379 with `dynamic-call' to actually call this function. Right now,
5380 these Scheme objects are formed by casting the address of the
5381 function to `long' and converting this number to its Scheme
5384 (dynamic-call FUNCTION DYNOBJ)
5386 Call the C function indicated by FUNCTION and DYNOBJ. The
5387 function is passed no arguments and its return value is ignored.
5388 When FUNCTION is something returned by `dynamic-func', call that
5389 function and ignore DYNOBJ. When FUNCTION is a string (or symbol,
5390 etc.), look it up in DYNOBJ; this is equivalent to
5392 (dynamic-call (dynamic-func FUNCTION DYNOBJ) #f)
5394 Interrupts are deferred while the C function is executing (with
5395 SCM_DEFER_INTS/SCM_ALLOW_INTS).
5397 (dynamic-args-call FUNCTION DYNOBJ ARGS)
5399 Call the C function indicated by FUNCTION and DYNOBJ, but pass it
5400 some arguments and return its return value. The C function is
5401 expected to take two arguments and return an `int', just like
5404 int c_func (int argc, char **argv);
5406 ARGS must be a list of strings and is converted into an array of
5407 `char *'. The array is passed in ARGV and its size in ARGC. The
5408 return value is converted to a Scheme number and returned from the
5409 call to `dynamic-args-call'.
5411 When dynamic linking is disabled or not supported on your system,
5412 the above functions throw errors, but they are still available.
5414 Here is a small example that works on GNU/Linux:
5416 (define libc-obj (dynamic-link "libc.so"))
5417 (dynamic-args-call 'rand libc-obj '())
5419 See the file `libguile/DYNAMIC-LINKING' for additional comments.
5421 ** The #/ syntax for module names is depreciated, and will be removed
5422 in a future version of Guile. Instead of
5430 The latter syntax is more consistent with existing Lisp practice.
5432 ** Guile now does fancier printing of structures. Structures are the
5433 underlying implementation for records, which in turn are used to
5434 implement modules, so all of these object now print differently and in
5435 a more informative way.
5437 The Scheme printer will examine the builtin variable *struct-printer*
5438 whenever it needs to print a structure object. When this variable is
5439 not `#f' it is deemed to be a procedure and will be applied to the
5440 structure object and the output port. When *struct-printer* is `#f'
5441 or the procedure return `#f' the structure object will be printed in
5442 the boring #<struct 80458270> form.
5444 This hook is used by some routines in ice-9/boot-9.scm to implement
5445 type specific printing routines. Please read the comments there about
5448 One of the more specific uses of structs are records. The printing
5449 procedure that could be passed to MAKE-RECORD-TYPE is now actually
5450 called. It should behave like a *struct-printer* procedure (described
5453 ** Guile now supports a new R4RS-compliant syntax for keywords. A
5454 token of the form #:NAME, where NAME has the same syntax as a Scheme
5455 symbol, is the external representation of the keyword named NAME.
5456 Keyword objects print using this syntax as well, so values containing
5457 keyword objects can be read back into Guile. When used in an
5458 expression, keywords are self-quoting objects.
5460 Guile suports this read syntax, and uses this print syntax, regardless
5461 of the current setting of the `keyword' read option. The `keyword'
5462 read option only controls whether Guile recognizes the `:NAME' syntax,
5463 which is incompatible with R4RS. (R4RS says such token represent
5466 ** Guile has regular expression support again. Guile 1.0 included
5467 functions for matching regular expressions, based on the Rx library.
5468 In Guile 1.1, the Guile/Rx interface was removed to simplify the
5469 distribution, and thus Guile had no regular expression support. Guile
5470 1.2 again supports the most commonly used functions, and supports all
5471 of SCSH's regular expression functions.
5473 If your system does not include a POSIX regular expression library,
5474 and you have not linked Guile with a third-party regexp library such as
5475 Rx, these functions will not be available. You can tell whether your
5476 Guile installation includes regular expression support by checking
5477 whether the `*features*' list includes the `regex' symbol.
5479 *** regexp functions
5481 By default, Guile supports POSIX extended regular expressions. That
5482 means that the characters `(', `)', `+' and `?' are special, and must
5483 be escaped if you wish to match the literal characters.
5485 This regular expression interface was modeled after that implemented
5486 by SCSH, the Scheme Shell. It is intended to be upwardly compatible
5487 with SCSH regular expressions.
5489 **** Function: string-match PATTERN STR [START]
5490 Compile the string PATTERN into a regular expression and compare
5491 it with STR. The optional numeric argument START specifies the
5492 position of STR at which to begin matching.
5494 `string-match' returns a "match structure" which describes what,
5495 if anything, was matched by the regular expression. *Note Match
5496 Structures::. If STR does not match PATTERN at all,
5497 `string-match' returns `#f'.
5499 Each time `string-match' is called, it must compile its PATTERN
5500 argument into a regular expression structure. This operation is
5501 expensive, which makes `string-match' inefficient if the same regular
5502 expression is used several times (for example, in a loop). For better
5503 performance, you can compile a regular expression in advance and then
5504 match strings against the compiled regexp.
5506 **** Function: make-regexp STR [FLAGS]
5507 Compile the regular expression described by STR, and return the
5508 compiled regexp structure. If STR does not describe a legal
5509 regular expression, `make-regexp' throws a
5510 `regular-expression-syntax' error.
5512 FLAGS may be the bitwise-or of one or more of the following:
5514 **** Constant: regexp/extended
5515 Use POSIX Extended Regular Expression syntax when interpreting
5516 STR. If not set, POSIX Basic Regular Expression syntax is used.
5517 If the FLAGS argument is omitted, we assume regexp/extended.
5519 **** Constant: regexp/icase
5520 Do not differentiate case. Subsequent searches using the
5521 returned regular expression will be case insensitive.
5523 **** Constant: regexp/newline
5524 Match-any-character operators don't match a newline.
5526 A non-matching list ([^...]) not containing a newline matches a
5529 Match-beginning-of-line operator (^) matches the empty string
5530 immediately after a newline, regardless of whether the FLAGS
5531 passed to regexp-exec contain regexp/notbol.
5533 Match-end-of-line operator ($) matches the empty string
5534 immediately before a newline, regardless of whether the FLAGS
5535 passed to regexp-exec contain regexp/noteol.
5537 **** Function: regexp-exec REGEXP STR [START [FLAGS]]
5538 Match the compiled regular expression REGEXP against `str'. If
5539 the optional integer START argument is provided, begin matching
5540 from that position in the string. Return a match structure
5541 describing the results of the match, or `#f' if no match could be
5544 FLAGS may be the bitwise-or of one or more of the following:
5546 **** Constant: regexp/notbol
5547 The match-beginning-of-line operator always fails to match (but
5548 see the compilation flag regexp/newline above) This flag may be
5549 used when different portions of a string are passed to
5550 regexp-exec and the beginning of the string should not be
5551 interpreted as the beginning of the line.
5553 **** Constant: regexp/noteol
5554 The match-end-of-line operator always fails to match (but see the
5555 compilation flag regexp/newline above)
5557 **** Function: regexp? OBJ
5558 Return `#t' if OBJ is a compiled regular expression, or `#f'
5561 Regular expressions are commonly used to find patterns in one string
5562 and replace them with the contents of another string.
5564 **** Function: regexp-substitute PORT MATCH [ITEM...]
5565 Write to the output port PORT selected contents of the match
5566 structure MATCH. Each ITEM specifies what should be written, and
5567 may be one of the following arguments:
5569 * A string. String arguments are written out verbatim.
5571 * An integer. The submatch with that number is written.
5573 * The symbol `pre'. The portion of the matched string preceding
5574 the regexp match is written.
5576 * The symbol `post'. The portion of the matched string
5577 following the regexp match is written.
5579 PORT may be `#f', in which case nothing is written; instead,
5580 `regexp-substitute' constructs a string from the specified ITEMs
5583 **** Function: regexp-substitute/global PORT REGEXP TARGET [ITEM...]
5584 Similar to `regexp-substitute', but can be used to perform global
5585 substitutions on STR. Instead of taking a match structure as an
5586 argument, `regexp-substitute/global' takes two string arguments: a
5587 REGEXP string describing a regular expression, and a TARGET string
5588 which should be matched against this regular expression.
5590 Each ITEM behaves as in REGEXP-SUBSTITUTE, with the following
5593 * A function may be supplied. When this function is called, it
5594 will be passed one argument: a match structure for a given
5595 regular expression match. It should return a string to be
5596 written out to PORT.
5598 * The `post' symbol causes `regexp-substitute/global' to recurse
5599 on the unmatched portion of STR. This *must* be supplied in
5600 order to perform global search-and-replace on STR; if it is
5601 not present among the ITEMs, then `regexp-substitute/global'
5602 will return after processing a single match.
5604 *** Match Structures
5606 A "match structure" is the object returned by `string-match' and
5607 `regexp-exec'. It describes which portion of a string, if any, matched
5608 the given regular expression. Match structures include: a reference to
5609 the string that was checked for matches; the starting and ending
5610 positions of the regexp match; and, if the regexp included any
5611 parenthesized subexpressions, the starting and ending positions of each
5614 In each of the regexp match functions described below, the `match'
5615 argument must be a match structure returned by a previous call to
5616 `string-match' or `regexp-exec'. Most of these functions return some
5617 information about the original target string that was matched against a
5618 regular expression; we will call that string TARGET for easy reference.
5620 **** Function: regexp-match? OBJ
5621 Return `#t' if OBJ is a match structure returned by a previous
5622 call to `regexp-exec', or `#f' otherwise.
5624 **** Function: match:substring MATCH [N]
5625 Return the portion of TARGET matched by subexpression number N.
5626 Submatch 0 (the default) represents the entire regexp match. If
5627 the regular expression as a whole matched, but the subexpression
5628 number N did not match, return `#f'.
5630 **** Function: match:start MATCH [N]
5631 Return the starting position of submatch number N.
5633 **** Function: match:end MATCH [N]
5634 Return the ending position of submatch number N.
5636 **** Function: match:prefix MATCH
5637 Return the unmatched portion of TARGET preceding the regexp match.
5639 **** Function: match:suffix MATCH
5640 Return the unmatched portion of TARGET following the regexp match.
5642 **** Function: match:count MATCH
5643 Return the number of parenthesized subexpressions from MATCH.
5644 Note that the entire regular expression match itself counts as a
5645 subexpression, and failed submatches are included in the count.
5647 **** Function: match:string MATCH
5648 Return the original TARGET string.
5650 *** Backslash Escapes
5652 Sometimes you will want a regexp to match characters like `*' or `$'
5653 exactly. For example, to check whether a particular string represents
5654 a menu entry from an Info node, it would be useful to match it against
5655 a regexp like `^* [^:]*::'. However, this won't work; because the
5656 asterisk is a metacharacter, it won't match the `*' at the beginning of
5657 the string. In this case, we want to make the first asterisk un-magic.
5659 You can do this by preceding the metacharacter with a backslash
5660 character `\'. (This is also called "quoting" the metacharacter, and
5661 is known as a "backslash escape".) When Guile sees a backslash in a
5662 regular expression, it considers the following glyph to be an ordinary
5663 character, no matter what special meaning it would ordinarily have.
5664 Therefore, we can make the above example work by changing the regexp to
5665 `^\* [^:]*::'. The `\*' sequence tells the regular expression engine
5666 to match only a single asterisk in the target string.
5668 Since the backslash is itself a metacharacter, you may force a
5669 regexp to match a backslash in the target string by preceding the
5670 backslash with itself. For example, to find variable references in a
5671 TeX program, you might want to find occurrences of the string `\let\'
5672 followed by any number of alphabetic characters. The regular expression
5673 `\\let\\[A-Za-z]*' would do this: the double backslashes in the regexp
5674 each match a single backslash in the target string.
5676 **** Function: regexp-quote STR
5677 Quote each special character found in STR with a backslash, and
5678 return the resulting string.
5680 *Very important:* Using backslash escapes in Guile source code (as
5681 in Emacs Lisp or C) can be tricky, because the backslash character has
5682 special meaning for the Guile reader. For example, if Guile encounters
5683 the character sequence `\n' in the middle of a string while processing
5684 Scheme code, it replaces those characters with a newline character.
5685 Similarly, the character sequence `\t' is replaced by a horizontal tab.
5686 Several of these "escape sequences" are processed by the Guile reader
5687 before your code is executed. Unrecognized escape sequences are
5688 ignored: if the characters `\*' appear in a string, they will be
5689 translated to the single character `*'.
5691 This translation is obviously undesirable for regular expressions,
5692 since we want to be able to include backslashes in a string in order to
5693 escape regexp metacharacters. Therefore, to make sure that a backslash
5694 is preserved in a string in your Guile program, you must use *two*
5695 consecutive backslashes:
5697 (define Info-menu-entry-pattern (make-regexp "^\\* [^:]*"))
5699 The string in this example is preprocessed by the Guile reader before
5700 any code is executed. The resulting argument to `make-regexp' is the
5701 string `^\* [^:]*', which is what we really want.
5703 This also means that in order to write a regular expression that
5704 matches a single backslash character, the regular expression string in
5705 the source code must include *four* backslashes. Each consecutive pair
5706 of backslashes gets translated by the Guile reader to a single
5707 backslash, and the resulting double-backslash is interpreted by the
5708 regexp engine as matching a single backslash character. Hence:
5710 (define tex-variable-pattern (make-regexp "\\\\let\\\\=[A-Za-z]*"))
5712 The reason for the unwieldiness of this syntax is historical. Both
5713 regular expression pattern matchers and Unix string processing systems
5714 have traditionally used backslashes with the special meanings described
5715 above. The POSIX regular expression specification and ANSI C standard
5716 both require these semantics. Attempting to abandon either convention
5717 would cause other kinds of compatibility problems, possibly more severe
5718 ones. Therefore, without extending the Scheme reader to support
5719 strings with different quoting conventions (an ungainly and confusing
5720 extension when implemented in other languages), we must adhere to this
5721 cumbersome escape syntax.
5723 * Changes to the gh_ interface
5725 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5727 * Changes to system call interfaces:
5729 ** The value returned by `raise' is now unspecified. It throws an exception
5732 *** A new procedure `sigaction' can be used to install signal handlers
5734 (sigaction signum [action] [flags])
5736 signum is the signal number, which can be specified using the value
5739 If action is omitted, sigaction returns a pair: the CAR is the current
5740 signal hander, which will be either an integer with the value SIG_DFL
5741 (default action) or SIG_IGN (ignore), or the Scheme procedure which
5742 handles the signal, or #f if a non-Scheme procedure handles the
5743 signal. The CDR contains the current sigaction flags for the handler.
5745 If action is provided, it is installed as the new handler for signum.
5746 action can be a Scheme procedure taking one argument, or the value of
5747 SIG_DFL (default action) or SIG_IGN (ignore), or #f to restore
5748 whatever signal handler was installed before sigaction was first used.
5749 Flags can optionally be specified for the new handler (SA_RESTART is
5750 always used if the system provides it, so need not be specified.) The
5751 return value is a pair with information about the old handler as
5754 This interface does not provide access to the "signal blocking"
5755 facility. Maybe this is not needed, since the thread support may
5756 provide solutions to the problem of consistent access to data
5759 *** A new procedure `flush-all-ports' is equivalent to running
5760 `force-output' on every port open for output.
5762 ** Guile now provides information on how it was built, via the new
5763 global variable, %guile-build-info. This variable records the values
5764 of the standard GNU makefile directory variables as an assocation
5765 list, mapping variable names (symbols) onto directory paths (strings).
5766 For example, to find out where the Guile link libraries were
5767 installed, you can say:
5769 guile -c "(display (assq-ref %guile-build-info 'libdir)) (newline)"
5772 * Changes to the scm_ interface
5774 ** The new function scm_handle_by_message_noexit is just like the
5775 existing scm_handle_by_message function, except that it doesn't call
5776 exit to terminate the process. Instead, it prints a message and just
5777 returns #f. This might be a more appropriate catch-all handler for
5778 new dynamic roots and threads.
5781 Changes in Guile 1.1 (released Friday, May 16 1997):
5783 * Changes to the distribution.
5785 The Guile 1.0 distribution has been split up into several smaller
5787 guile-core --- the Guile interpreter itself.
5788 guile-tcltk --- the interface between the Guile interpreter and
5789 Tcl/Tk; Tcl is an interpreter for a stringy language, and Tk
5790 is a toolkit for building graphical user interfaces.
5791 guile-rgx-ctax --- the interface between Guile and the Rx regular
5792 expression matcher, and the translator for the Ctax
5793 programming language. These are packaged together because the
5794 Ctax translator uses Rx to parse Ctax source code.
5796 This NEWS file describes the changes made to guile-core since the 1.0
5799 We no longer distribute the documentation, since it was either out of
5800 date, or incomplete. As soon as we have current documentation, we
5805 * Changes to the stand-alone interpreter
5807 ** guile now accepts command-line arguments compatible with SCSH, Olin
5808 Shivers' Scheme Shell.
5810 In general, arguments are evaluated from left to right, but there are
5811 exceptions. The following switches stop argument processing, and
5812 stash all remaining command-line arguments as the value returned by
5813 the (command-line) function.
5814 -s SCRIPT load Scheme source code from FILE, and exit
5815 -c EXPR evalute Scheme expression EXPR, and exit
5816 -- stop scanning arguments; run interactively
5818 The switches below are processed as they are encountered.
5819 -l FILE load Scheme source code from FILE
5820 -e FUNCTION after reading script, apply FUNCTION to
5821 command line arguments
5822 -ds do -s script at this point
5823 --emacs enable Emacs protocol (experimental)
5824 -h, --help display this help and exit
5825 -v, --version display version information and exit
5826 \ read arguments from following script lines
5828 So, for example, here is a Guile script named `ekko' (thanks, Olin)
5829 which re-implements the traditional "echo" command:
5831 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
5834 (map (lambda (arg) (display arg) (display " "))
5838 (main (command-line))
5840 Suppose we invoke this script as follows:
5842 ekko a speckled gecko
5844 Through the magic of Unix script processing (triggered by the `#!'
5845 token at the top of the file), /usr/local/bin/guile receives the
5846 following list of command-line arguments:
5848 ("-s" "./ekko" "a" "speckled" "gecko")
5850 Unix inserts the name of the script after the argument specified on
5851 the first line of the file (in this case, "-s"), and then follows that
5852 with the arguments given to the script. Guile loads the script, which
5853 defines the `main' function, and then applies it to the list of
5854 remaining command-line arguments, ("a" "speckled" "gecko").
5856 In Unix, the first line of a script file must take the following form:
5858 #!INTERPRETER ARGUMENT
5860 where INTERPRETER is the absolute filename of the interpreter
5861 executable, and ARGUMENT is a single command-line argument to pass to
5864 You may only pass one argument to the interpreter, and its length is
5865 limited. These restrictions can be annoying to work around, so Guile
5866 provides a general mechanism (borrowed from, and compatible with,
5867 SCSH) for circumventing them.
5869 If the ARGUMENT in a Guile script is a single backslash character,
5870 `\', Guile will open the script file, parse arguments from its second
5871 and subsequent lines, and replace the `\' with them. So, for example,
5872 here is another implementation of the `ekko' script:
5874 #!/usr/local/bin/guile \
5878 (for-each (lambda (arg) (display arg) (display " "))
5882 If the user invokes this script as follows:
5884 ekko a speckled gecko
5886 Unix expands this into
5888 /usr/local/bin/guile \ ekko a speckled gecko
5890 When Guile sees the `\' argument, it replaces it with the arguments
5891 read from the second line of the script, producing:
5893 /usr/local/bin/guile -e main -s ekko a speckled gecko
5895 This tells Guile to load the `ekko' script, and apply the function
5896 `main' to the argument list ("a" "speckled" "gecko").
5898 Here is how Guile parses the command-line arguments:
5899 - Each space character terminates an argument. This means that two
5900 spaces in a row introduce an empty-string argument.
5901 - The tab character is not permitted (unless you quote it with the
5902 backslash character, as described below), to avoid confusion.
5903 - The newline character terminates the sequence of arguments, and will
5904 also terminate a final non-empty argument. (However, a newline
5905 following a space will not introduce a final empty-string argument;
5906 it only terminates the argument list.)
5907 - The backslash character is the escape character. It escapes
5908 backslash, space, tab, and newline. The ANSI C escape sequences
5909 like \n and \t are also supported. These produce argument
5910 constituents; the two-character combination \n doesn't act like a
5911 terminating newline. The escape sequence \NNN for exactly three
5912 octal digits reads as the character whose ASCII code is NNN. As
5913 above, characters produced this way are argument constituents.
5914 Backslash followed by other characters is not allowed.
5916 * Changes to the procedure for linking libguile with your programs
5918 ** Guile now builds and installs a shared guile library, if your
5919 system support shared libraries. (It still builds a static library on
5920 all systems.) Guile automatically detects whether your system
5921 supports shared libraries. To prevent Guile from buildisg shared
5922 libraries, pass the `--disable-shared' flag to the configure script.
5924 Guile takes longer to compile when it builds shared libraries, because
5925 it must compile every file twice --- once to produce position-
5926 independent object code, and once to produce normal object code.
5928 ** The libthreads library has been merged into libguile.
5930 To link a program against Guile, you now need only link against
5931 -lguile and -lqt; -lthreads is no longer needed. If you are using
5932 autoconf to generate configuration scripts for your application, the
5933 following lines should suffice to add the appropriate libraries to
5936 ### Find quickthreads and libguile.
5937 AC_CHECK_LIB(qt, main)
5938 AC_CHECK_LIB(guile, scm_shell)
5940 * Changes to Scheme functions
5942 ** Guile Scheme's special syntax for keyword objects is now optional,
5943 and disabled by default.
5945 The syntax variation from R4RS made it difficult to port some
5946 interesting packages to Guile. The routines which accepted keyword
5947 arguments (mostly in the module system) have been modified to also
5948 accept symbols whose names begin with `:'.
5950 To change the keyword syntax, you must first import the (ice-9 debug)
5952 (use-modules (ice-9 debug))
5954 Then you can enable the keyword syntax as follows:
5955 (read-set! keywords 'prefix)
5957 To disable keyword syntax, do this:
5958 (read-set! keywords #f)
5960 ** Many more primitive functions accept shared substrings as
5961 arguments. In the past, these functions required normal, mutable
5962 strings as arguments, although they never made use of this
5965 ** The uniform array functions now operate on byte vectors. These
5966 functions are `array-fill!', `serial-array-copy!', `array-copy!',
5967 `serial-array-map', `array-map', `array-for-each', and
5970 ** The new functions `trace' and `untrace' implement simple debugging
5971 support for Scheme functions.
5973 The `trace' function accepts any number of procedures as arguments,
5974 and tells the Guile interpreter to display each procedure's name and
5975 arguments each time the procedure is invoked. When invoked with no
5976 arguments, `trace' returns the list of procedures currently being
5979 The `untrace' function accepts any number of procedures as arguments,
5980 and tells the Guile interpreter not to trace them any more. When
5981 invoked with no arguments, `untrace' untraces all curretly traced
5984 The tracing in Guile has an advantage over most other systems: we
5985 don't create new procedure objects, but mark the procedure objects
5986 themselves. This means that anonymous and internal procedures can be
5989 ** The function `assert-repl-prompt' has been renamed to
5990 `set-repl-prompt!'. It takes one argument, PROMPT.
5991 - If PROMPT is #f, the Guile read-eval-print loop will not prompt.
5992 - If PROMPT is a string, we use it as a prompt.
5993 - If PROMPT is a procedure accepting no arguments, we call it, and
5994 display the result as a prompt.
5995 - Otherwise, we display "> ".
5997 ** The new function `eval-string' reads Scheme expressions from a
5998 string and evaluates them, returning the value of the last expression
5999 in the string. If the string contains no expressions, it returns an
6002 ** The new function `thunk?' returns true iff its argument is a
6003 procedure of zero arguments.
6005 ** `defined?' is now a builtin function, instead of syntax. This
6006 means that its argument should be quoted. It returns #t iff its
6007 argument is bound in the current module.
6009 ** The new syntax `use-modules' allows you to add new modules to your
6010 environment without re-typing a complete `define-module' form. It
6011 accepts any number of module names as arguments, and imports their
6012 public bindings into the current module.
6014 ** The new function (module-defined? NAME MODULE) returns true iff
6015 NAME, a symbol, is defined in MODULE, a module object.
6017 ** The new function `builtin-bindings' creates and returns a hash
6018 table containing copies of all the root module's bindings.
6020 ** The new function `builtin-weak-bindings' does the same as
6021 `builtin-bindings', but creates a doubly-weak hash table.
6023 ** The `equal?' function now considers variable objects to be
6024 equivalent if they have the same name and the same value.
6026 ** The new function `command-line' returns the command-line arguments
6027 given to Guile, as a list of strings.
6029 When using guile as a script interpreter, `command-line' returns the
6030 script's arguments; those processed by the interpreter (like `-s' or
6031 `-c') are omitted. (In other words, you get the normal, expected
6032 behavior.) Any application that uses scm_shell to process its
6033 command-line arguments gets this behavior as well.
6035 ** The new function `load-user-init' looks for a file called `.guile'
6036 in the user's home directory, and loads it if it exists. This is
6037 mostly for use by the code generated by scm_compile_shell_switches,
6038 but we thought it might also be useful in other circumstances.
6040 ** The new function `log10' returns the base-10 logarithm of its
6043 ** Changes to I/O functions
6045 *** The functions `read', `primitive-load', `read-and-eval!', and
6046 `primitive-load-path' no longer take optional arguments controlling
6047 case insensitivity and a `#' parser.
6049 Case sensitivity is now controlled by a read option called
6050 `case-insensitive'. The user can add new `#' syntaxes with the
6051 `read-hash-extend' function (see below).
6053 *** The new function `read-hash-extend' allows the user to change the
6054 syntax of Guile Scheme in a somewhat controlled way.
6056 (read-hash-extend CHAR PROC)
6057 When parsing S-expressions, if we read a `#' character followed by
6058 the character CHAR, use PROC to parse an object from the stream.
6059 If PROC is #f, remove any parsing procedure registered for CHAR.
6061 The reader applies PROC to two arguments: CHAR and an input port.
6063 *** The new functions read-delimited and read-delimited! provide a
6064 general mechanism for doing delimited input on streams.
6066 (read-delimited DELIMS [PORT HANDLE-DELIM])
6067 Read until we encounter one of the characters in DELIMS (a string),
6068 or end-of-file. PORT is the input port to read from; it defaults to
6069 the current input port. The HANDLE-DELIM parameter determines how
6070 the terminating character is handled; it should be one of the
6073 'trim omit delimiter from result
6074 'peek leave delimiter character in input stream
6075 'concat append delimiter character to returned value
6076 'split return a pair: (RESULT . TERMINATOR)
6078 HANDLE-DELIM defaults to 'peek.
6080 (read-delimited! DELIMS BUF [PORT HANDLE-DELIM START END])
6081 A side-effecting variant of `read-delimited'.
6083 The data is written into the string BUF at the indices in the
6084 half-open interval [START, END); the default interval is the whole
6085 string: START = 0 and END = (string-length BUF). The values of
6086 START and END must specify a well-defined interval in BUF, i.e.
6087 0 <= START <= END <= (string-length BUF).
6089 It returns NBYTES, the number of bytes read. If the buffer filled
6090 up without a delimiter character being found, it returns #f. If the
6091 port is at EOF when the read starts, it returns the EOF object.
6093 If an integer is returned (i.e., the read is successfully terminated
6094 by reading a delimiter character), then the HANDLE-DELIM parameter
6095 determines how to handle the terminating character. It is described
6096 above, and defaults to 'peek.
6098 (The descriptions of these functions were borrowed from the SCSH
6099 manual, by Olin Shivers and Brian Carlstrom.)
6101 *** The `%read-delimited!' function is the primitive used to implement
6102 `read-delimited' and `read-delimited!'.
6104 (%read-delimited! DELIMS BUF GOBBLE? [PORT START END])
6106 This returns a pair of values: (TERMINATOR . NUM-READ).
6107 - TERMINATOR describes why the read was terminated. If it is a
6108 character or the eof object, then that is the value that terminated
6109 the read. If it is #f, the function filled the buffer without finding
6110 a delimiting character.
6111 - NUM-READ is the number of characters read into BUF.
6113 If the read is successfully terminated by reading a delimiter
6114 character, then the gobble? parameter determines what to do with the
6115 terminating character. If true, the character is removed from the
6116 input stream; if false, the character is left in the input stream
6117 where a subsequent read operation will retrieve it. In either case,
6118 the character is also the first value returned by the procedure call.
6120 (The descriptions of this function was borrowed from the SCSH manual,
6121 by Olin Shivers and Brian Carlstrom.)
6123 *** The `read-line' and `read-line!' functions have changed; they now
6124 trim the terminator by default; previously they appended it to the
6125 returned string. For the old behavior, use (read-line PORT 'concat).
6127 *** The functions `uniform-array-read!' and `uniform-array-write!' now
6128 take new optional START and END arguments, specifying the region of
6129 the array to read and write.
6131 *** The `ungetc-char-ready?' function has been removed. We feel it's
6132 inappropriate for an interface to expose implementation details this
6135 ** Changes to the Unix library and system call interface
6137 *** The new fcntl function provides access to the Unix `fcntl' system
6140 (fcntl PORT COMMAND VALUE)
6141 Apply COMMAND to PORT's file descriptor, with VALUE as an argument.
6142 Values for COMMAND are:
6144 F_DUPFD duplicate a file descriptor
6145 F_GETFD read the descriptor's close-on-exec flag
6146 F_SETFD set the descriptor's close-on-exec flag to VALUE
6147 F_GETFL read the descriptor's flags, as set on open
6148 F_SETFL set the descriptor's flags, as set on open to VALUE
6149 F_GETOWN return the process ID of a socket's owner, for SIGIO
6150 F_SETOWN set the process that owns a socket to VALUE, for SIGIO
6151 FD_CLOEXEC not sure what this is
6153 For details, see the documentation for the fcntl system call.
6155 *** The arguments to `select' have changed, for compatibility with
6156 SCSH. The TIMEOUT parameter may now be non-integral, yielding the
6157 expected behavior. The MILLISECONDS parameter has been changed to
6158 MICROSECONDS, to more closely resemble the underlying system call.
6159 The RVEC, WVEC, and EVEC arguments can now be vectors; the type of the
6160 corresponding return set will be the same.
6162 *** The arguments to the `mknod' system call have changed. They are
6165 (mknod PATH TYPE PERMS DEV)
6166 Create a new file (`node') in the file system. PATH is the name of
6167 the file to create. TYPE is the kind of file to create; it should
6168 be 'fifo, 'block-special, or 'char-special. PERMS specifies the
6169 permission bits to give the newly created file. If TYPE is
6170 'block-special or 'char-special, DEV specifies which device the
6171 special file refers to; its interpretation depends on the kind of
6172 special file being created.
6174 *** The `fork' function has been renamed to `primitive-fork', to avoid
6175 clashing with various SCSH forks.
6177 *** The `recv' and `recvfrom' functions have been renamed to `recv!'
6178 and `recvfrom!'. They no longer accept a size for a second argument;
6179 you must pass a string to hold the received value. They no longer
6180 return the buffer. Instead, `recv' returns the length of the message
6181 received, and `recvfrom' returns a pair containing the packet's length
6182 and originating address.
6184 *** The file descriptor datatype has been removed, as have the
6185 `read-fd', `write-fd', `close', `lseek', and `dup' functions.
6186 We plan to replace these functions with a SCSH-compatible interface.
6188 *** The `create' function has been removed; it's just a special case
6191 *** There are new functions to break down process termination status
6192 values. In the descriptions below, STATUS is a value returned by
6195 (status:exit-val STATUS)
6196 If the child process exited normally, this function returns the exit
6197 code for the child process (i.e., the value passed to exit, or
6198 returned from main). If the child process did not exit normally,
6199 this function returns #f.
6201 (status:stop-sig STATUS)
6202 If the child process was suspended by a signal, this function
6203 returns the signal that suspended the child. Otherwise, it returns
6206 (status:term-sig STATUS)
6207 If the child process terminated abnormally, this function returns
6208 the signal that terminated the child. Otherwise, this function
6211 POSIX promises that exactly one of these functions will return true on
6212 a valid STATUS value.
6214 These functions are compatible with SCSH.
6216 *** There are new accessors and setters for the broken-out time vectors
6217 returned by `localtime', `gmtime', and that ilk. They are:
6219 Component Accessor Setter
6220 ========================= ============ ============
6221 seconds tm:sec set-tm:sec
6222 minutes tm:min set-tm:min
6223 hours tm:hour set-tm:hour
6224 day of the month tm:mday set-tm:mday
6225 month tm:mon set-tm:mon
6226 year tm:year set-tm:year
6227 day of the week tm:wday set-tm:wday
6228 day in the year tm:yday set-tm:yday
6229 daylight saving time tm:isdst set-tm:isdst
6230 GMT offset, seconds tm:gmtoff set-tm:gmtoff
6231 name of time zone tm:zone set-tm:zone
6233 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `uname',
6234 describing the host system:
6237 ============================================== ================
6238 name of the operating system implementation utsname:sysname
6239 network name of this machine utsname:nodename
6240 release level of the operating system utsname:release
6241 version level of the operating system utsname:version
6242 machine hardware platform utsname:machine
6244 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getpw',
6245 `getpwnam', `getpwuid', and `getpwent', describing entries from the
6246 system's user database:
6249 ====================== =================
6250 user name passwd:name
6251 user password passwd:passwd
6254 real name passwd:gecos
6255 home directory passwd:dir
6256 shell program passwd:shell
6258 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getgr',
6259 `getgrnam', `getgrgid', and `getgrent', describing entries from the
6260 system's group database:
6263 ======================= ============
6264 group name group:name
6265 group password group:passwd
6267 group members group:mem
6269 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `gethost',
6270 `gethostbyaddr', `gethostbyname', and `gethostent', describing
6274 ========================= ===============
6275 official name of host hostent:name
6276 alias list hostent:aliases
6277 host address type hostent:addrtype
6278 length of address hostent:length
6279 list of addresses hostent:addr-list
6281 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getnet',
6282 `getnetbyaddr', `getnetbyname', and `getnetent', describing internet
6286 ========================= ===============
6287 official name of net netent:name
6288 alias list netent:aliases
6289 net number type netent:addrtype
6290 net number netent:net
6292 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getproto',
6293 `getprotobyname', `getprotobynumber', and `getprotoent', describing
6297 ========================= ===============
6298 official protocol name protoent:name
6299 alias list protoent:aliases
6300 protocol number protoent:proto
6302 *** There are new accessors for the vectors returned by `getserv',
6303 `getservbyname', `getservbyport', and `getservent', describing
6307 ========================= ===============
6308 official service name servent:name
6309 alias list servent:aliases
6310 port number servent:port
6311 protocol to use servent:proto
6313 *** There are new accessors for the sockaddr structures returned by
6314 `accept', `getsockname', `getpeername', `recvfrom!':
6317 ======================================== ===============
6318 address format (`family') sockaddr:fam
6319 path, for file domain addresses sockaddr:path
6320 address, for internet domain addresses sockaddr:addr
6321 TCP or UDP port, for internet sockaddr:port
6323 *** The `getpwent', `getgrent', `gethostent', `getnetent',
6324 `getprotoent', and `getservent' functions now return #f at the end of
6325 the user database. (They used to throw an exception.)
6327 Note that calling MUMBLEent function is equivalent to calling the
6328 corresponding MUMBLE function with no arguments.
6330 *** The `setpwent', `setgrent', `sethostent', `setnetent',
6331 `setprotoent', and `setservent' routines now take no arguments.
6333 *** The `gethost', `getproto', `getnet', and `getserv' functions now
6334 provide more useful information when they throw an exception.
6336 *** The `lnaof' function has been renamed to `inet-lnaof'.
6338 *** Guile now claims to have the `current-time' feature.
6340 *** The `mktime' function now takes an optional second argument ZONE,
6341 giving the time zone to use for the conversion. ZONE should be a
6342 string, in the same format as expected for the "TZ" environment variable.
6344 *** The `strptime' function now returns a pair (TIME . COUNT), where
6345 TIME is the parsed time as a vector, and COUNT is the number of
6346 characters from the string left unparsed. This function used to
6347 return the remaining characters as a string.
6349 *** The `gettimeofday' function has replaced the old `time+ticks' function.
6350 The return value is now (SECONDS . MICROSECONDS); the fractional
6351 component is no longer expressed in "ticks".
6353 *** The `ticks/sec' constant has been removed, in light of the above change.
6355 * Changes to the gh_ interface
6357 ** gh_eval_str() now returns an SCM object which is the result of the
6360 ** gh_scm2str() now copies the Scheme data to a caller-provided C
6363 ** gh_scm2newstr() now makes a C array, copies the Scheme data to it,
6364 and returns the array
6366 ** gh_scm2str0() is gone: there is no need to distinguish
6367 null-terminated from non-null-terminated, since gh_scm2newstr() allows
6368 the user to interpret the data both ways.
6370 * Changes to the scm_ interface
6372 ** The new function scm_symbol_value0 provides an easy way to get a
6373 symbol's value from C code:
6375 SCM scm_symbol_value0 (char *NAME)
6376 Return the value of the symbol named by the null-terminated string
6377 NAME in the current module. If the symbol named NAME is unbound in
6378 the current module, return SCM_UNDEFINED.
6380 ** The new function scm_sysintern0 creates new top-level variables,
6381 without assigning them a value.
6383 SCM scm_sysintern0 (char *NAME)
6384 Create a new Scheme top-level variable named NAME. NAME is a
6385 null-terminated string. Return the variable's value cell.
6387 ** The function scm_internal_catch is the guts of catch. It handles
6388 all the mechanics of setting up a catch target, invoking the catch
6389 body, and perhaps invoking the handler if the body does a throw.
6391 The function is designed to be usable from C code, but is general
6392 enough to implement all the semantics Guile Scheme expects from throw.
6394 TAG is the catch tag. Typically, this is a symbol, but this function
6395 doesn't actually care about that.
6397 BODY is a pointer to a C function which runs the body of the catch;
6398 this is the code you can throw from. We call it like this:
6399 BODY (BODY_DATA, JMPBUF)
6401 BODY_DATA is just the BODY_DATA argument we received; we pass it
6402 through to BODY as its first argument. The caller can make
6403 BODY_DATA point to anything useful that BODY might need.
6404 JMPBUF is the Scheme jmpbuf object corresponding to this catch,
6405 which we have just created and initialized.
6407 HANDLER is a pointer to a C function to deal with a throw to TAG,
6408 should one occur. We call it like this:
6409 HANDLER (HANDLER_DATA, THROWN_TAG, THROW_ARGS)
6411 HANDLER_DATA is the HANDLER_DATA argument we recevied; it's the
6412 same idea as BODY_DATA above.
6413 THROWN_TAG is the tag that the user threw to; usually this is
6414 TAG, but it could be something else if TAG was #t (i.e., a
6415 catch-all), or the user threw to a jmpbuf.
6416 THROW_ARGS is the list of arguments the user passed to the THROW
6419 BODY_DATA is just a pointer we pass through to BODY. HANDLER_DATA
6420 is just a pointer we pass through to HANDLER. We don't actually
6421 use either of those pointers otherwise ourselves. The idea is
6422 that, if our caller wants to communicate something to BODY or
6423 HANDLER, it can pass a pointer to it as MUMBLE_DATA, which BODY and
6424 HANDLER can then use. Think of it as a way to make BODY and
6425 HANDLER closures, not just functions; MUMBLE_DATA points to the
6428 Of course, it's up to the caller to make sure that any data a
6429 MUMBLE_DATA needs is protected from GC. A common way to do this is
6430 to make MUMBLE_DATA a pointer to data stored in an automatic
6431 structure variable; since the collector must scan the stack for
6432 references anyway, this assures that any references in MUMBLE_DATA
6435 ** The new function scm_internal_lazy_catch is exactly like
6436 scm_internal_catch, except:
6438 - It does not unwind the stack (this is the major difference).
6439 - If handler returns, its value is returned from the throw.
6440 - BODY always receives #f as its JMPBUF argument (since there's no
6441 jmpbuf associated with a lazy catch, because we don't unwind the
6444 ** scm_body_thunk is a new body function you can pass to
6445 scm_internal_catch if you want the body to be like Scheme's `catch'
6446 --- a thunk, or a function of one argument if the tag is #f.
6448 BODY_DATA is a pointer to a scm_body_thunk_data structure, which
6449 contains the Scheme procedure to invoke as the body, and the tag
6450 we're catching. If the tag is #f, then we pass JMPBUF (created by
6451 scm_internal_catch) to the body procedure; otherwise, the body gets
6454 ** scm_handle_by_proc is a new handler function you can pass to
6455 scm_internal_catch if you want the handler to act like Scheme's catch
6456 --- call a procedure with the tag and the throw arguments.
6458 If the user does a throw to this catch, this function runs a handler
6459 procedure written in Scheme. HANDLER_DATA is a pointer to an SCM
6460 variable holding the Scheme procedure object to invoke. It ought to
6461 be a pointer to an automatic variable (i.e., one living on the stack),
6462 or the procedure object should be otherwise protected from GC.
6464 ** scm_handle_by_message is a new handler function to use with
6465 `scm_internal_catch' if you want Guile to print a message and die.
6466 It's useful for dealing with throws to uncaught keys at the top level.
6468 HANDLER_DATA, if non-zero, is assumed to be a char * pointing to a
6469 message header to print; if zero, we use "guile" instead. That
6470 text is followed by a colon, then the message described by ARGS.
6472 ** The return type of scm_boot_guile is now void; the function does
6473 not return a value, and indeed, never returns at all.
6475 ** The new function scm_shell makes it easy for user applications to
6476 process command-line arguments in a way that is compatible with the
6477 stand-alone guile interpreter (which is in turn compatible with SCSH,
6480 To use the scm_shell function, first initialize any guile modules
6481 linked into your application, and then call scm_shell with the values
6482 of ARGC and ARGV your `main' function received. scm_shell will add
6483 any SCSH-style meta-arguments from the top of the script file to the
6484 argument vector, and then process the command-line arguments. This
6485 generally means loading a script file or starting up an interactive
6486 command interpreter. For details, see "Changes to the stand-alone
6489 ** The new functions scm_get_meta_args and scm_count_argv help you
6490 implement the SCSH-style meta-argument, `\'.
6492 char **scm_get_meta_args (int ARGC, char **ARGV)
6493 If the second element of ARGV is a string consisting of a single
6494 backslash character (i.e. "\\" in Scheme notation), open the file
6495 named by the following argument, parse arguments from it, and return
6496 the spliced command line. The returned array is terminated by a
6499 For details of argument parsing, see above, under "guile now accepts
6500 command-line arguments compatible with SCSH..."
6502 int scm_count_argv (char **ARGV)
6503 Count the arguments in ARGV, assuming it is terminated by a null
6506 For an example of how these functions might be used, see the source
6507 code for the function scm_shell in libguile/script.c.
6509 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
6512 ** The new function scm_compile_shell_switches turns an array of
6513 command-line arguments into Scheme code to carry out the actions they
6514 describe. Given ARGC and ARGV, it returns a Scheme expression to
6515 evaluate, and calls scm_set_program_arguments to make any remaining
6516 command-line arguments available to the Scheme code. For example,
6517 given the following arguments:
6519 -e main -s ekko a speckled gecko
6521 scm_set_program_arguments will return the following expression:
6523 (begin (load "ekko") (main (command-line)) (quit))
6525 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
6528 ** The function scm_shell_usage prints a usage message appropriate for
6529 an interpreter that uses scm_compile_shell_switches to handle its
6530 command-line arguments.
6532 void scm_shell_usage (int FATAL, char *MESSAGE)
6533 Print a usage message to the standard error output. If MESSAGE is
6534 non-zero, write it before the usage message, followed by a newline.
6535 If FATAL is non-zero, exit the process, using FATAL as the
6536 termination status. (If you want to be compatible with Guile,
6537 always use 1 as the exit status when terminating due to command-line
6540 You will usually want to use scm_shell instead of calling this
6543 ** scm_eval_0str now returns SCM_UNSPECIFIED if the string contains no
6544 expressions. It used to return SCM_EOL. Earth-shattering.
6546 ** The macros for declaring scheme objects in C code have been
6547 rearranged slightly. They are now:
6549 SCM_SYMBOL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
6550 Declare a static SCM variable named C_NAME, and initialize it to
6551 point to the Scheme symbol whose name is SCHEME_NAME. C_NAME should
6552 be a C identifier, and SCHEME_NAME should be a C string.
6554 SCM_GLOBAL_SYMBOL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
6555 Just like SCM_SYMBOL, but make C_NAME globally visible.
6557 SCM_VCELL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
6558 Create a global variable at the Scheme level named SCHEME_NAME.
6559 Declare a static SCM variable named C_NAME, and initialize it to
6560 point to the Scheme variable's value cell.
6562 SCM_GLOBAL_VCELL (C_NAME, SCHEME_NAME)
6563 Just like SCM_VCELL, but make C_NAME globally visible.
6565 The `guile-snarf' script writes initialization code for these macros
6566 to its standard output, given C source code as input.
6568 The SCM_GLOBAL macro is gone.
6570 ** The scm_read_line and scm_read_line_x functions have been replaced
6571 by Scheme code based on the %read-delimited! procedure (known to C
6572 code as scm_read_delimited_x). See its description above for more
6575 ** The function scm_sys_open has been renamed to scm_open. It now
6576 returns a port instead of an FD object.
6578 * The dynamic linking support has changed. For more information, see
6579 libguile/DYNAMIC-LINKING.
6584 User-visible changes from Thursday, September 5, 1996 until Guile 1.0
6587 * Changes to the 'guile' program:
6589 ** Guile now loads some new files when it starts up. Guile first
6590 searches the load path for init.scm, and loads it if found. Then, if
6591 Guile is not being used to execute a script, and the user's home
6592 directory contains a file named `.guile', Guile loads that.
6594 ** You can now use Guile as a shell script interpreter.
6596 To paraphrase the SCSH manual:
6598 When Unix tries to execute an executable file whose first two
6599 characters are the `#!', it treats the file not as machine code to
6600 be directly executed by the native processor, but as source code
6601 to be executed by some interpreter. The interpreter to use is
6602 specified immediately after the #! sequence on the first line of
6603 the source file. The kernel reads in the name of the interpreter,
6604 and executes that instead. It passes the interpreter the source
6605 filename as its first argument, with the original arguments
6606 following. Consult the Unix man page for the `exec' system call
6607 for more information.
6609 Now you can use Guile as an interpreter, using a mechanism which is a
6610 compatible subset of that provided by SCSH.
6612 Guile now recognizes a '-s' command line switch, whose argument is the
6613 name of a file of Scheme code to load. It also treats the two
6614 characters `#!' as the start of a comment, terminated by `!#'. Thus,
6615 to make a file of Scheme code directly executable by Unix, insert the
6616 following two lines at the top of the file:
6618 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
6621 Guile treats the argument of the `-s' command-line switch as the name
6622 of a file of Scheme code to load, and treats the sequence `#!' as the
6623 start of a block comment, terminated by `!#'.
6625 For example, here's a version of 'echo' written in Scheme:
6627 #!/usr/local/bin/guile -s
6629 (let loop ((args (cdr (program-arguments))))
6632 (display (car args))
6633 (if (pair? (cdr args))
6635 (loop (cdr args)))))
6638 Why does `#!' start a block comment terminated by `!#', instead of the
6639 end of the line? That is the notation SCSH uses, and although we
6640 don't yet support the other SCSH features that motivate that choice,
6641 we would like to be backward-compatible with any existing Guile
6642 scripts once we do. Furthermore, if the path to Guile on your system
6643 is too long for your kernel, you can start the script with this
6647 exec /really/long/path/to/guile -s "$0" ${1+"$@"}
6650 Note that some very old Unix systems don't support the `#!' syntax.
6653 ** You can now run Guile without installing it.
6655 Previous versions of the interactive Guile interpreter (`guile')
6656 couldn't start up unless Guile's Scheme library had been installed;
6657 they used the value of the environment variable `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH'
6658 later on in the startup process, but not to find the startup code
6659 itself. Now Guile uses `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH' in all searches for Scheme
6662 To run Guile without installing it, build it in the normal way, and
6663 then set the environment variable `SCHEME_LOAD_PATH' to a
6664 colon-separated list of directories, including the top-level directory
6665 of the Guile sources. For example, if you unpacked Guile so that the
6666 full filename of this NEWS file is /home/jimb/guile-1.0b3/NEWS, then
6669 export SCHEME_LOAD_PATH=/home/jimb/my-scheme:/home/jimb/guile-1.0b3
6672 ** Guile's read-eval-print loop no longer prints #<unspecified>
6673 results. If the user wants to see this, she can evaluate the
6674 expression (assert-repl-print-unspecified #t), perhaps in her startup
6677 ** Guile no longer shows backtraces by default when an error occurs;
6678 however, it does display a message saying how to get one, and how to
6679 request that they be displayed by default. After an error, evaluate
6681 to see a backtrace, and
6682 (debug-enable 'backtrace)
6683 to see them by default.
6687 * Changes to Guile Scheme:
6689 ** Guile now distinguishes between #f and the empty list.
6691 This is for compatibility with the IEEE standard, the (possibly)
6692 upcoming Revised^5 Report on Scheme, and many extant Scheme
6695 Guile used to have #f and '() denote the same object, to make Scheme's
6696 type system more compatible with Emacs Lisp's. However, the change
6697 caused too much trouble for Scheme programmers, and we found another
6698 way to reconcile Emacs Lisp with Scheme that didn't require this.
6701 ** Guile's delq, delv, delete functions, and their destructive
6702 counterparts, delq!, delv!, and delete!, now remove all matching
6703 elements from the list, not just the first. This matches the behavior
6704 of the corresponding Emacs Lisp functions, and (I believe) the Maclisp
6705 functions which inspired them.
6707 I recognize that this change may break code in subtle ways, but it
6708 seems best to make the change before the FSF's first Guile release,
6712 ** The compiled-library-path function has been deleted from libguile.
6714 ** The facilities for loading Scheme source files have changed.
6716 *** The variable %load-path now tells Guile which directories to search
6717 for Scheme code. Its value is a list of strings, each of which names
6720 *** The variable %load-extensions now tells Guile which extensions to
6721 try appending to a filename when searching the load path. Its value
6722 is a list of strings. Its default value is ("" ".scm").
6724 *** (%search-load-path FILENAME) searches the directories listed in the
6725 value of the %load-path variable for a Scheme file named FILENAME,
6726 with all the extensions listed in %load-extensions. If it finds a
6727 match, then it returns its full filename. If FILENAME is absolute, it
6728 returns it unchanged. Otherwise, it returns #f.
6730 %search-load-path will not return matches that refer to directories.
6732 *** (primitive-load FILENAME :optional CASE-INSENSITIVE-P SHARP)
6733 uses %seach-load-path to find a file named FILENAME, and loads it if
6734 it finds it. If it can't read FILENAME for any reason, it throws an
6737 The arguments CASE-INSENSITIVE-P and SHARP are interpreted as by the
6740 *** load uses the same searching semantics as primitive-load.
6742 *** The functions %try-load, try-load-with-path, %load, load-with-path,
6743 basic-try-load-with-path, basic-load-with-path, try-load-module-with-
6744 path, and load-module-with-path have been deleted. The functions
6745 above should serve their purposes.
6747 *** If the value of the variable %load-hook is a procedure,
6748 `primitive-load' applies its value to the name of the file being
6749 loaded (without the load path directory name prepended). If its value
6750 is #f, it is ignored. Otherwise, an error occurs.
6752 This is mostly useful for printing load notification messages.
6755 ** The function `eval!' is no longer accessible from the scheme level.
6756 We can't allow operations which introduce glocs into the scheme level,
6757 because Guile's type system can't handle these as data. Use `eval' or
6758 `read-and-eval!' (see below) as replacement.
6760 ** The new function read-and-eval! reads an expression from PORT,
6761 evaluates it, and returns the result. This is more efficient than
6762 simply calling `read' and `eval', since it is not necessary to make a
6763 copy of the expression for the evaluator to munge.
6765 Its optional arguments CASE_INSENSITIVE_P and SHARP are interpreted as
6766 for the `read' function.
6769 ** The function `int?' has been removed; its definition was identical
6770 to that of `integer?'.
6772 ** The functions `<?', `<?', `<=?', `=?', `>?', and `>=?'. Code should
6773 use the R4RS names for these functions.
6775 ** The function object-properties no longer returns the hash handle;
6776 it simply returns the object's property list.
6778 ** Many functions have been changed to throw errors, instead of
6779 returning #f on failure. The point of providing exception handling in
6780 the language is to simplify the logic of user code, but this is less
6781 useful if Guile's primitives don't throw exceptions.
6783 ** The function `fileno' has been renamed from `%fileno'.
6785 ** The function primitive-mode->fdes returns #t or #f now, not 1 or 0.
6788 * Changes to Guile's C interface:
6790 ** The library's initialization procedure has been simplified.
6791 scm_boot_guile now has the prototype:
6793 void scm_boot_guile (int ARGC,
6795 void (*main_func) (),
6798 scm_boot_guile calls MAIN_FUNC, passing it CLOSURE, ARGC, and ARGV.
6799 MAIN_FUNC should do all the work of the program (initializing other
6800 packages, reading user input, etc.) before returning. When MAIN_FUNC
6801 returns, call exit (0); this function never returns. If you want some
6802 other exit value, MAIN_FUNC may call exit itself.
6804 scm_boot_guile arranges for program-arguments to return the strings
6805 given by ARGC and ARGV. If MAIN_FUNC modifies ARGC/ARGV, should call
6806 scm_set_program_arguments with the final list, so Scheme code will
6807 know which arguments have been processed.
6809 scm_boot_guile establishes a catch-all catch handler which prints an
6810 error message and exits the process. This means that Guile exits in a
6811 coherent way when system errors occur and the user isn't prepared to
6812 handle it. If the user doesn't like this behavior, they can establish
6813 their own universal catcher in MAIN_FUNC to shadow this one.
6815 Why must the caller do all the real work from MAIN_FUNC? The garbage
6816 collector assumes that all local variables of type SCM will be above
6817 scm_boot_guile's stack frame on the stack. If you try to manipulate
6818 SCM values after this function returns, it's the luck of the draw
6819 whether the GC will be able to find the objects you allocate. So,
6820 scm_boot_guile function exits, rather than returning, to discourage
6821 people from making that mistake.
6823 The IN, OUT, and ERR arguments were removed; there are other
6824 convenient ways to override these when desired.
6826 The RESULT argument was deleted; this function should never return.
6828 The BOOT_CMD argument was deleted; the MAIN_FUNC argument is more
6832 ** Guile's header files should no longer conflict with your system's
6835 In order to compile code which #included <libguile.h>, previous
6836 versions of Guile required you to add a directory containing all the
6837 Guile header files to your #include path. This was a problem, since
6838 Guile's header files have names which conflict with many systems'
6841 Now only <libguile.h> need appear in your #include path; you must
6842 refer to all Guile's other header files as <libguile/mumble.h>.
6843 Guile's installation procedure puts libguile.h in $(includedir), and
6844 the rest in $(includedir)/libguile.
6847 ** Two new C functions, scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect_object,
6848 have been added to the Guile library.
6850 scm_protect_object (OBJ) protects OBJ from the garbage collector.
6851 OBJ will not be freed, even if all other references are dropped,
6852 until someone does scm_unprotect_object (OBJ). Both functions
6855 Note that calls to scm_protect_object do not nest. You can call
6856 scm_protect_object any number of times on a given object, and the
6857 next call to scm_unprotect_object will unprotect it completely.
6859 Basically, scm_protect_object and scm_unprotect_object just
6860 maintain a list of references to things. Since the GC knows about
6861 this list, all objects it mentions stay alive. scm_protect_object
6862 adds its argument to the list; scm_unprotect_object remove its
6863 argument from the list.
6866 ** scm_eval_0str now returns the value of the last expression
6869 ** The new function scm_read_0str reads an s-expression from a
6870 null-terminated string, and returns it.
6872 ** The new function `scm_stdio_to_port' converts a STDIO file pointer
6873 to a Scheme port object.
6875 ** The new function `scm_set_program_arguments' allows C code to set
6876 the value returned by the Scheme `program-arguments' function.
6881 * Guile no longer includes sophisticated Tcl/Tk support.
6883 The old Tcl/Tk support was unsatisfying to us, because it required the
6884 user to link against the Tcl library, as well as Tk and Guile. The
6885 interface was also un-lispy, in that it preserved Tcl/Tk's practice of
6886 referring to widgets by names, rather than exporting widgets to Scheme
6887 code as a special datatype.
6889 In the Usenix Tk Developer's Workshop held in July 1996, the Tcl/Tk
6890 maintainers described some very interesting changes in progress to the
6891 Tcl/Tk internals, which would facilitate clean interfaces between lone
6892 Tk and other interpreters --- even for garbage-collected languages
6893 like Scheme. They expected the new Tk to be publicly available in the
6896 Since it seems that Guile might soon have a new, cleaner interface to
6897 lone Tk, and that the old Guile/Tk glue code would probably need to be
6898 completely rewritten, we (Jim Blandy and Richard Stallman) have
6899 decided not to support the old code. We'll spend the time instead on
6900 a good interface to the newer Tk, as soon as it is available.
6902 Until then, gtcltk-lib provides trivial, low-maintenance functionality.
6905 Copyright information:
6907 Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
6909 Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim copies
6910 of this document as received, in any medium, provided that the
6911 copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved,
6912 thus giving the recipient permission to redistribute in turn.
6914 Permission is granted to distribute modified versions
6915 of this document, or of portions of it,
6916 under the above conditions, provided also that they
6917 carry prominent notices stating who last changed them.
6922 paragraph-separate: "[
\f]*$"