Re: why format procedure produce error?

[Linas Vepstas <linasvepstas@gmail.com>]

2009/11/11 Changying Li <lchangying@gmail.com>:
> in the guile manual:
>  -- Scheme Procedure: format dest fmt [args...]
>     Write output specified by the FMT string to DEST.  DEST can be an
>     output port, `#t' for `current-output-port' (*note Default
>     Ports::), a number for `current-error-port', or `#f' to return the
>     output as a string.
>
> what's the meaning of NUMBER?
> I want to write things to error port, so I write
> (format 1 "hello")
>
> standard input:5:1: In procedure simple-format in expression (format 1 "hello"):
> standard input:5:1: Wrong type argument in position 1: 1
> ABORT: (wrong-type-arg)
>
>
> it work when I use (format (current-error-port) "hello")
>
> Is there something wrong in the guile manual ?


That would be my guess.  I assume that once upon a time,
an integer was interpreted as a file or socket number, but
that this code was later disabled, and the documentation
was not changed.  I guess that supporting fileno would have
made an mswindows version difficult -- besides, raw fileno
numbers are kind of a bad idea in this day and age.

--linas