Hello Ryan,

I was able to solve.

Giovanni Biscuolo <g@xelera.eu> writes:

> unfortunately guix-emacs never worked for me too, in the last couple of
> years

actually, some command worked some time ago (e.g. profiles list) but I
was never able to use guix-emacs to view packages, for exemple

I have updated today, now my version is:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---

GNU Guix eb34ff16cc9038880e87e1a58a93331fca37ad92
Emacs-Guix 0.5.2

--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

but I doubt the issue was version related since the emacs-guix package
version is the same

[...]

> Running the same command "guix-packages-by-name", I also get the
> (almost) same error (from *Messages* buffer):
>
> --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
>
> Starting Guix REPL ... [5 times]
> guix-geiser-eval: Error in evaluating guile expression: ice-9/boot-9.scm:1685:16: In procedure raise-exception:
> error: package-names*: unbound variable
>
> Entering a new prompt.  Type `,bt' for a backtrace or `,q' to continue.
> scheme@(emacs-guix) [1]> 
>
> --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

The most similar upstream bug is this one:
https://gitlab.com/emacs-guix/emacs-guix/-/issues/23

In that thread Adam Porter points to this comment that explains how to
start Guix REPL instead of Guile REPL, from emacs-guix:
https://gitlab.com/emacs-guix/emacs-guix/-/issues/19#note_559028370

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---

(with-eval-after-load 'guix-repl
    (setq guix-guile-program  '("guix" "repl")
          guix-config-scheme-compiled-directory  nil
          guix-repl-use-latest  nil
          guix-repl-use-server  nil))

--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

Evaluating the above code /before/ starting any emacs-guix command (thus
before starting Guile REPL) all is working well now!

I repeat, I'm using emacs-guix on a foreing distro, I don't know if on
Guix System this workaround is not needed.

[...]

HTH! Ciao, Gio'

-- 
Giovanni Biscuolo

Xelera IT Infrastructures