Re: Killing off scm_init_guile for Guile 2.0 ?

[Neil Jerram <neiljerram@googlemail.com>]

2009/1/16 Linas Vepstas <linasvepstas@gmail.com>:
> I feel obligated to respond, having made all sorts of noise.
>
> 2009/1/15 Neil Jerram <neiljerram@googlemail.com>:
>
>> whether people think that scm_init_guile is really needed.
>
> kill it. there seem to be perfectly adequate ways of
> living without it.  Unfortunately, the current documentation
> describing how to use guile with threads is confusing.
> It is certainly the case that, for naive, new users,
> scm_init_guile seems to be the easiest way to
> get guile going in a thread. This makes it a popular
> choice.  Its not until you dig in deeply, and discover
> how guile actually works (and then think about it a bit),
> that you discover that perhaps scm_init_guile wasn't
> the right choice. And then you have to refactor your
> code ... possibly in large ways ...
>
> So, the real question is -- how many existing guile
> apps call scm_init_guile()?

A good handful, apparently.

> On the other hand, breaking them by removing
> scm_init_guile is possibly a good thing ... it will
> probably cause them to fix bugs that were lurking
> and waiting to bite.

I'm not sure... if the bugs aren't apparent in any way, they're not a
problem.  If the bugs are apparent, then I agree that moving away from
scm_init_guile could be part of the solution.

Assuming that we move to using BDW-GC, we can easily keep
scm_init_guile, and so I think we should.  We should also look at the
manual, though, to try to promote other ways in new projects.

Regards,
        Neil