Re: [Bug-mit-scheme] [bug #36429] Compiler mysteriously runs out of stack space

[Taylor R Campbell]

   Date: Mon, 07 May 2012 21:21:02 +0000
   From: Alexey Radul <address@hidden>

   Now, the enclosed file does contain a mistake: one of the procedures
   defined therein always recursively calls itself (and even not in
   tail position).  However, my attempts to produce a small example
   using this to cause the compiler to run out of stack failed.  I also
   got very confused when I tried to reduce the present example,
   because commenting out a form I would not have expected to have
   anything to do with anything caused the misbehavior to disappear.

Hitting C-c C-b at exactly the right moment reveals that the compiler
is deep into recursively generating debug data for an environment
hierarchy that an earlier pass has decided to put a cycle into.  (Some
hierarchy!)

As for how the cycle got there in the first place, well, have you read
the comment at the top of closan.scm?

I'm not sure it's worthwhile to spend many more brain cycles fixing
these bugs in LIAR, though; the code is too highly interrelated to
reason clearly about it or automatically any parts of it in isolation.