bug#36682: Error in Guile scripting examples

[Hans-Werner Roitzsch]

Hello GNU Team!

I wish to report a bug in either Guile's documentation or Guile's code with regard to running scripts.

There are some examples of that given in Guile's documentation at:

https://www.gnu.org/software/guile/manual/html_node/Scripting-Examples.html#Scripting-Examples

In the following I will describe the problem.

I have the file `modules.scm` with the following code:

----8<----start-of-code---->8----
#!/usr/bin/env sh
exec guile -l fact.scm -e '(@ (my-module) main)' -s "$0" "$@"
!#

;; Explanation:
;; -e (my-module)
;; If run as a script run the `my-module` module's `main`.
;; (Use `@@` to reference not exported procedures.)
;; -s
;; Run the script.

(define-module (my-module)
  #:export (main))

;; Create a module named `fac`.
;; Export the `main` procedure as part of `fac`.

(define (n-choose-k n k)
  (/ (fact n)
     (* (fact k)
        (fact (- n k)))))

(define (main args)
  (let ((n (string->number (cadr args)))
        (k (string->number (caddr args))))
    (display (n-choose-k n k))
    (newline)))
----8<----end-of-code---->8----

And I have the following `fact.scm`:

----8<----start-of-code---->8----
#!/usr/local/bin/guile \
-e main -s
!#

;; How to run this program?
;; Example:
;; guile -e main -s factorial-script.scm 50
;; Explanation:
;; -e specifies the procedure to run
;; -s specifies to run this as a script
;; 50 is the number we take as input to the script

(define (fact n)
  (if (zero? n) 1
      (* n (fact (- n 1)))))

(define (main args)
  (display (fact (string->number (cadr args))))
  (newline))
----8<----end-of-code---->8----

The script is made executable by doing:

chmod +x modules.scm

Then I call the script as follows:

./modules.scm 10 3

This results in the error:

----8<----start-of-code---->8----
Backtrace:
           4 (apply-smob/1 #<catch-closure 119cb80>)
In ice-9/boot-9.scm:
    705:2  3 (call-with-prompt ("prompt") #<procedure 11aa8e0 at ice-9/eval.scm:330:13 ()> #<procedure default-prom…>)
In ice-9/eval.scm:
    619:8  2 (_ #(#(#<directory (guile-user) 1233140>)))
In /home/xiaolong/development/Guile/scripting/./modules.scm:
    26:13  1 (main _)
     18:0  0 (n-choose-k _ _)

/home/xiaolong/development/Guile/scripting/./modules.scm:18:0: In procedure n-choose-k:
In procedure module-lookup: Unbound variable: fact
----8<----end-of-code---->8----

According to my understanding of the tutorial in the Guile documentation that I linked to above this code should work.

I also described the problem some time ago at:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/50272618/guile-scheme-scripting-tutorial-loading-scripts

My Guile version is:

guile (GNU Guile) 2.2.4

Best regards,

Hans-Werner Roitzsch