GCL(1L) 																   GCL(1L)

NAME

       gcl - GCL Common Lisp interpreter/compiler, CVS snapshot

SYNOPSIS

       gcl [ options ]

DESCRIPTION

       The  program  gcl  is an implementation of a subset of the Common Lisp Ansi standard.  It is written in C and in Common Lisp, and is highly
       portable.   It includes those features in the original definition of Common Lisp, (Guy Steele version 1.), as well as  some  features  from
       the proposed new standard.

       The  best  documentation  is  available	in  texinfo/info form, with there being three groups of information.  gcl-si for basic common lisp
       descriptions, and features unique to gcl The gcl-tk info refers to the connection with tk window system, allowing  all  the  power  of  the
       tcl/tk  interaction  system  to be used from lisp.  The third info file gcl details the Ansi standard for common lisp, to which this subset
       tries to adhere.   It is highly recommended to write programs, which will be in the intersection of gcl and  ansi  common  lisp.   Unfortu-
       nately the Ansi standard is huge, and will require a substantial effort, and increase in the size of gcl, to include all of it.

       When  gcl  is  invoked  from  the shell, the variable si::*command-args* is set to the list of command line arguments.  Various options are
       understood:

       -eval command
	       Call read and then eval on the command passed in.

       -load pathname
	       Load the file whose pathname is specified after -load.

       -f     Replace si::*command-args* by the the list starting after -f.  Open the file following -fforinput,skipthefirstline,and then read and
	      eval the rest of the forms in the file.	This can be used as with the shells to write small shell programs:

       #!/usr/local/bin/gcl.exe -f
       (format t "hello world ~a~%" (nth 1 si::*command-args*))

	The value si::*command-args* will have the appropriate value.  Thus if the above 2 line file is made executable and called foo then

       tutorial% foo billy
       hello world billy

	 NOTE:	 On many systems (eg SunOs) the first line of an executable script file such as:  #!/usr/local/bin/gcl.exe -f only reads the first
       32 characters!	So if your pathname where the executable together with the '-f' amount to more than 32 characters the  file  will  not	be
       recognized.    Also the executable must be the actual large binary file, [or a link to it], and not just a /bin/sh script.   In latter case
       the /bin/sh interpreter would get invoked on the file.

       Alternately one could invoke the file foo without making it executable:

       tutorial% gcl -f foo "from bill"
       hello world from bill

       -batch  Do not enter the command print loop.  Useful if the other command line arguments do  something.	 Do  not  print  the  License  and
	      acknowledgement  information.   Note  if	your  program does print any License information, it must print the GCL header information
	      also.

       -dir    Directory where the executable binary that is running is located.  Needed by save and friends.  This gets set as si::*system-direc-
	      tory*

       -libdir
	       -libdir /d/wfs/gcl-2.0/

	      would  mean  that  the  files  like  gcl-tk/tk.o would be found by concatting the path to the libdir path, ie in /d/wfs/gcl-2.0/gcl-
	      tk/tk.o

       -compile
	       Invoke the compiler on the filename following -compile Other flags affect compilation.

       -o-file
	       If nil follows -o-file then do not produce an .o file.

       -c-file
	       If -c-file is specified, leave the intermediate .c file there.

       -h-file
	      If -h-file is specified, leave the intermediate .h file there.

       -data-file
	      If -data-file is specified, leave the intermediate .data file there.

       -system-p
	      If -system-p is specified then invoke compile-file with the :system-p t keyword argument, meaning that the C init function will bear
	      a name based on the name of the file, so that it may be invoked by name by C code.

	      This  GNU package should not be confused with the proprietary program distributed by FRANZ, Inc.	Nor should it be confused with any
	      public domain or proprietary lisp system.

	      For anything other than program development, use of the lisp compiler is strongly recommended in preference to  use  of  the  inter-
	      preter, due to much higher speed.

FILES

       /usr/bin/gcl
	      executable shell script wrapper

       /usr/lib/gcl-version/unixport/saved[_flavor]_gcl
	      executable lisp images

SEE ALSO

       Common LISP: The Language, Guy L. Steele, Jr., Digital Press, Bedford, MA, 1984.

       Common LISPcraft, Robert Wilensky, W. W. Norton & Co., New York, 1984.

AUTHORS

       The GCL system contains C and Lisp source files to build a Common Lisp sytem.  CGL is derived from Kyoto Common LISP (kcl), which was writ-
       ten in 1984 by T. Yuasa and M. Hagiya (working under Professor R. Nakajima at the Research Institute for Mathematical Sciences, Kyoto  Uni-
       versity).   The AKCL system work was begun in 1987 by William Schelter at the University of Texas, Austin,  and continued through 1994.	In
       1994 AKCL was released as GCL (GNU Common Lisp) under the GNU public library license.

								   17 March 1997							   GCL(1L)