GNU Guile 1.8.5 released

[Ludovic Courtès]

We are pleased to announce GNU Guile release 1.8.5.  This is the next
maintenance release for the 1.8 stable series.  It provides a number of
portability improvements, bug fixes, as well as several new features.

You can find it here:

  ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/guile/guile-1.8.5.tar.gz
  SHA1 hash: 3ef611cf5c4998a5bdfc7935765bb68730038614

A GPG detached signature of the package is available at:

  ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/guile/guile-1.8.5.tar.gz.sig

The Guile web page is located at http://www.gnu.org/software/guile/, and
among other things, it contains a link to the Guile FAQ and pointers to
the mailing lists.

Guile is an interpreter for the Scheme programming language, with
support for many SRFIs, packaged for use in a wide variety of
environments.  In addition to implementing the R5RS Scheme standard,
Guile includes a module system, full access to POSIX system calls,
networking support, multiple threads, dynamic linking, a foreign
function call interface, and powerful string processing.

Guile can run interactively or as a script interpreter, and is also
packaged as a library so that applications can easily incorporate a
complete Scheme interpreter.  An application can use Guile as an
extension language, a clean and powerful configuration language, or as
multi-purpose "glue" to connect primitives provided by the application.
It is easy to call Scheme code from C code and vice versa.  Applications
can add new functions, data types, control structures, and even syntax
to Guile, to create a domain-specific language tailored to the task at
hand.

This is primarily a bugfix release.  Here are the highlights, taken from
the `NEWS' file:

  - Infrastructure changes

    - Guile repository switched from CVS to Git
    - Add support for `pkg-config'

  - New modules (see the manual for details)

    - `(srfi srfi-88)'

  - New features (see the manual for details)

    - New `postfix' read option, for SRFI-88 keyword syntax
    - Some I/O primitives have been inlined, which improves I/O performance
    - New object-based traps infrastructure
    - New support for working on Guile code from within Emacs

  - Bugs fixed

    - `scm_add_slot ()' no longer segfaults (fixes bug #22369)
    - Fixed `(ice-9 match)' for patterns like `((_ ...) ...)'
    - `(oop goops describe)' now properly provides the `describe' feature
    - Fixed `args-fold' from `(srfi srfi-37)'
    - `(srfi srfi-35)' is now visible through `cond-expand'
    - Fixed type-checking for the second argument of `eval'
    - Fixed type-checking for SRFI-1 `partition'
    - Fixed `struct-ref' and `struct-set!' on "light structs"
    - Honor struct field access rights in GOOPS
    - Changed the storage strategy of source properties, which fixes
      a deadlock
    - Allow compilation of Guile-using programs in C99 mode with GCC 4.3
      and later
    - Fixed build issue for GNU/Linux on IA64
    - Fixed build issues on NetBSD 1.6
    - Fixed build issue on Solaris 2.10 x86_64
    - Fixed build issue with DEC/Compaq/HP's compiler
    - Fixed `scm_from_complex_double' build issue on FreeBSD
    - Fixed `alloca' build issue on FreeBSD 6
    - Removed use of non-portable makefile constructs
    - Fixed shadowing of libc's <random.h> on Tru64, which broke compilation
    - Make sure all tests honor `$TMPDIR'

  - Changes to the distribution

    - New FAQ


Any bugs found in this release will be addressed by further bugfix
releases numbered 1.8.*.

You can follow Guile development in the Git repository and on the Guile
mailing lists.  Guile builds from the `master' branch of Git will have
version number 1.9.0.

Guile versions with an odd middle number, e.g., 1.9.*, are unstable
development versions.  Even middle numbers indicate stable versions.
This has been the case since the 1.3.* series.

Please report bugs through the Savannah bug tracker:

  https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?group=guile

Alternatively, bug reports can be sent to address@hidden'.  We also
welcome reports of successful builds, which can be sent to the same
email address.


Ludovic Courtès, on behalf of the Guile team.