README.guile-vm

This is an attempt to revive the Guile-VM project by Keisuke Nishida
written back in the years 2000 and 2001.  Below are a few pointers to
relevant threads on Guile's development mailing list.

Enjoy!

Ludovic Courtès <ludovic.courtes@laas.fr>, Apr. 2005.


Pointers
--------

Status of the last release, 0.5
  http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guile-devel/2001-04/msg00266.html

The very first release, 0.0
  http://sources.redhat.com/ml/guile/2000-07/msg00418.html

Simple benchmark
  http://sources.redhat.com/ml/guile/2000-07/msg00425.html

Performance, portability, GNU Lightning
  http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guile-devel/2001-03/msg00132.html

Playing with GNU Lightning
  http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guile-devel/2001-03/msg00185.html

On things left to be done
  http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guile-devel/2001-03/msg00146.html


---8<---  Original README below.  -----------------------------------------

Installation
------------

1. Install the latest Guile from CVS.

2. Install Guile VM:

  % configure
  % make install
  % ln -s module/{guile,system,language} /usr/local/share/guile/

3. Add the following lines to your ~/.guile:

  (use-modules (system vm core)

  (cond ((string=? (car (command-line)) "guile-vm")
	 (use-modules (system repl repl))
	 (start-repl 'scheme)
	 (quit)))

Example Session
---------------

  % guile-vm
  Guile Scheme interpreter 0.5 on Guile 1.4.1
  Copyright (C) 2001 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

  Enter `,help' for help.
  scheme@guile-user> (+ 1 2)
  3
  scheme@guile-user> ,c -c (+ 1 2)	;; Compile into GLIL
  (@asm (0 1 0 0)
    (module-ref #f +)
    (const 1)
    (const 2)
    (tail-call 2))
  scheme@guile-user> ,c (+ 1 2)		;; Compile into object code
  Disassembly of #<objcode 403c5fb0>:

  nlocs = 0  nexts = 0

     0    link "+"                        ;; (+ . ???)
     3    variable-ref
     4    make-int8:1                     ;; 1
     5    make-int8 2                     ;; 2
     7    tail-call 2

  scheme@guile-user> (define (add x y) (+ x y))
  scheme@guile-user> (add 1 2)
  3
  scheme@guile-user> ,x add		;; Disassemble
  Disassembly of #<program add>:

  nargs = 2  nrest = 0  nlocs = 0  nexts = 0

  Bytecode:

     0    object-ref 0                    ;; (+ . #<primitive-procedure +>)
     2    variable-ref
     3    local-ref 0
     5    local-ref 1
     7    tail-call 2

  Objects:

     0    (+ . #<primitive-procedure +>)

  scheme@guile-user> 

Compile Modules
---------------

Use `guilec' to compile your modules:

  % cat fib.scm
  (define-module (fib) :export (fib))
  (define (fib n) (if (< n 2) 1 (+ (fib (- n 1)) (fib (- n 2)))))

  % guilec fib.scm
  Wrote fib.go
  % guile
  guile> (use-modules (fib))
  guile> (fib 8)
  34