I am using the Nix package manager under macOS to install much of my software, including dynamic libraries. And I would like to make them accessible to CFFI. That means adding a path to cffi:*foreign-library-directories*. Fine, but how can I do this
globally for my system (should work for packages loaded via Quicklisp, for example)
without loading CFFI every time I start sbcl?
Ignoring the second criterion, I can just add a few lines to ~/.sbclrc:
(ql:quickload "CFFI")
(pushnew (merge-pathnames ".nix-profile/lib/" (user-homedir-pathname))
cffi:*foreign-library-directories*
:test #'equal)
What I am looking for is a way to add the path after CFFI is loaded. A bit like eval-after-load in Emacs Lisp. Is that possible?
I think that you should try to use the mechanisms of the underlying system instead, i. e. on Linux ldconfig (resp. ld.so.conf), on MacOS DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH. The CFFI manual says that the *foreign-library-directories* are only used as a fallback if the system mechanism fails.
Related
When I create a new project with quickprojects, and then load it with asdf:load-system, everything works fine.
But when I come back to emacs after it has been closed and a run (asdf:load-system "system-name"), I get an error:
Component "next" not found
[Condition of type ASDF/FIND-COMPONENT:MISSING-COMPONENT]
I understood the package system to be like a project management system where I can load a package from the repl when I choose.
Which mistake am I making?
In quickproject.lisp, there is the following line:
(pushnew *default-pathname-defaults* asdf:*central-registry*
:test 'equal)
Which is the reason why the system can be loaded: the path to your new project is pushed into ASDF's *central-registry*, which acts like the PATH environment variable in POSIX to indicate where to look for systems.
This change is not persisted and the next time you start Lisp, the variable is set to its default value and the path is not set. I think Quickproject should at least warn that this is happening because it is not very intuitive1
Usually you should add your projects in a path that is visible by ASDF, as explained in 4.1 Configuring ASDF to find your systems. Pushing to *central-registry* works but is old style: 4.2 Configuring ASDF to find your systems — old style.
When using Quicklisp you can also define your projects in ~/quicklisp/local-projects/ (either directly or by using symlinks), which is a place that Quicklisp makes also visible by ASDF.
You can temporarily bind *default-pathname-defaults* to one of these known locations when creating your projects, so that it can be found again when restarting your environment:
(let ((*default-pathname-defaults*
(merge-pathnames "quicklisp/local-projects/"
(user-homedir-pathname)))
(quickproject:make-project "test-project"))
1. To Quickproject's defense, this is explained in the second sentence of the documentation:
Quickproject provides a quick way to make a Common Lisp project. After creating a project, it extends the ASDF registry so the project may be immediately loaded.
I have a SBCL package called frosty.
I am using SLIME with emacs. When I close emacs for the day, and then open it the next day, it's as if I am "starting again".
All my quicklisp packages need to be reloaded. And my frosty package needs to be compiled manually.
Is there a way to have the REPL automatically understand the packages/QL packages from the start?
Thanks
You can define a system to group your files as a unit that can be compiled as a whole, and once it is compiled once, the resulting object files are stored in cache and loaded faster the next time (without compilation).
defsystem
At the root of your frosty directory, you can add an ASDF system definition. It contains the following at minimum:
(defsystem "frosty"
;; system dependencies:
;; those are system names, not package names; they often are
;; identical but in general a system can define zero, one or
;; more packages
:depends-on ("alexandria"
"cl-ppcre"
;; etc.
)
;; this declares a list of component, here there is a single entry,
;; namely (:file "frosty") which represents a Lisp source file.
;; If you organized your files differently, e.g. under a src/ directory,
;; you need to add a :pathname option.
;; See https://asdf.common-lisp.dev/asdf.html#The-defsystem-grammar
:components ((:file "frosty"))
)
What we want to do is be able to call:
(ql:quickload "frosty")
And have Quicklisp install all the dependencies and your own system.
In order for quicklisp to know about your .asd file, your project needs to be visible in the quicklisp/local-projects directory. Alternatively, you can choose to link your project under ~/common-lisp/ directory, or any other directory searched by the ASDF central registry (see documentation).
.sbclrc
In your ~/.sbclrc init file, you can add expressions to be evaluated, and in particular you can write (ql:quickload "frosty") here so that it is executed each time SBCL is started.
One of the following will work.
Don't quit the running lisp / emacs. Only an option if you're able to leave processes running overnight on the machine you're using, but that usually is the case now.
Save a core image and restart that: See here and the --core option.
Write a little Lisp source file which just reloads everything, perhaps by using a system definition.
The first two are superficially attractive but have the consequence that, over time, you end up running in a world which you only may be able to recreate and which gradually becomes infested by elves (anyone who has used d machines seriously will remember this problem). The last option means you know how to recreate the state of the world, but you have to pay the cost of doing so.
Once upon a time when computers were slower most people did one of the first two. Now they're quick the last seems preferable in many cases.
I am writing a (SBCL) Common Lisp program that has the following line at the top of the file:
(defpackage :my-package
(:use :cl :cl-who :hunchentoot :parenscript))
I am running Emacs 25, SBCL and SLIME on MacOS.
Whenever I evaluate the line above, I always get this error at first:
The name "CL-WHO" does not designate any package.
[Condition of type SB-KERNEL:SIMPLE-PACKAGE-ERROR]
Then, I run (ql:quickload "cl-who") and watch the CL-WHO package install. I repeat for the other two packages. Once I have done that, the form can be evaluated successfully.
The problem is that I need to do this each time I restart the Emacs (or Lisp process, which I assume is roughly equivalent in this case). Why is it that when I install something with Quicklisp it is not "remembered" for the next session? Am I doing something wrong?
Is this a problem with configurations or a general misunderstanding of how it is supposed to work?
Then, I run (ql:quickload "cl-who") and watch the CL-WHO package install. I repeat for the other two packages. Once I have done that, the form can be evaluated successfully.
You can quickload more than one system at once:
(ql:quickload '(:cl-who :hunchentoot :parenscript))
[...] each time I restart the Emacs (or Lisp process, which I assume is roughly equivalent in this case).
That's the case here, but notice that you can start a Lisp process from the shell and connect to it from Emacs. In that case, you could exit and restart Emacs without killing the Lisp process.
Start a new REPL from the shell and create a server:
(ql:quickload :swank)
(swank:create-server :port 5000)
And then, call slime-connect from Emacs (with localhost and 5000 for the host and port parameters). That can be used also to monitor a running application.
Why is it that when I install something with Quicklisp it is not "remembered" for the next session?
The system is fetched, compiled and installed on your machine, which explains why the second time you quickload a project, it is faster. But a system is only loaded in your environment when you request it, either with Quicklisp or ASDF.
Define a system
See §6. Defining systems with defsystem for an introduction on how to define a system. Suppose you name your system stackoverflow. The simplest way to get started is to create the following file:
~/quicklisp/local-projects/stackoverflow/stackoverflow.asd
which contains:
(defsystem "stackoverflow"
:depends-on ("cl-who" "hunchentoot" "parenscript"))
When you execute (ql:quickload "stackoverflow"), Quicklisp will load all its dependencies.
Instead of loading all the required systems, you only need to load a single one.
Either automatically load this system...
Lisp implementations can execute code at startup. One possible way for this is to execute the code from a configuration file: [.]ccl-init.lisp, .eclrc, .lispworks, .sbclrc (your case), etc. Execute quickload only if Quicklisp itself is available:
#+quicklisp
(ql:quickload "stackoverflow")
... or dump an image with all systems preloaded
You can also load all the required systems, and dump an executable image.
Start a fresh SBCL from a terminal (not from Slime), call (ql:quickload "stackoverflow"), and then:
(sb-ext:save-lisp-and-die "my-env"
:executable t
:compression 9)
(compression is optional)
Then, an executable file named "my-env" should be created in the same directory. Each time you start it, you have a fresh Lisp environment containing the systems you loaded before saving the image.
I'm using quicklisp as the package management tool for SBCL.
However, sometimes I found it's not very convenient to install a package to the HOME directory of current user by ql:quickload. (For example, if I use (ql:quickload "xmls") to install xmls, other users can't use it.)
What's worse, I'd like to run the lisp code as a script. So when I use the package installed by quicklisp, I need to add the absolute path of that package uncomfortably, such as:
#!/usr/bin/sbcl --script
(require 'xmls "..../quicklisp/dists/quicklisp/software/xmls-1.4/xmls")
If I use (require 'xmls), the compiler will not work because it cannot find that package if I use the --script options.
Does anyone knows how to solve the problem so that I can use --script and require(no need to add absolute path) at the same time？
I don't know of a good solution to this problem. The solution I use is to not write scripts with Common Lisp; I usually write applications that I use interactively from CL sessions. When I do want to run things from the command-line, I use buildapp for it, and use ql:write-asdf-manifest-file to create a file to pass to --manifest-file for buildapp.
I sometimes wish there was a better solution, but it'll probably take some work by someone (hopefully not me).
I just do sudo sbcl and this way it'll be installed for every user on my PC - it's OK, because it's my home PC, so there's no danger.
One thing I could think of is maybe symlinking the directory where ql installs stuff to something that is easier to access, like $HOME/packages -> .../quicklisp/software or something?
I'm trying to install cffi package into sbcl.
First, I tried clbuild that is recommended on the cffi installation page.
When I tried to run :
clbuild quickload cffi
I was given an error saying :
The function ASDF::SOURCE-REGISTRY is undefined.
I then tried asdf-install, it end up complaining about
Component "cffi-examples" not found
Any help on this would be appreciated.
UPDATE
For asdf-install, I'm running sbcl with slime. It seems that whenever it complains about a component that is missing, that component is actually installed. I just have to abort the debugger and restart Emacs, start slime, and do that install again, and it will finish successfully. If I don't run it with slime, just running it inside sbcl prompt in terminal, it will keep complaining about the component missing nonstop.
So to get cffi installed with asdf-install, I had to restart Emacs for about 4-5 times.
I'm not sure if there is configuration issue with sbcl?
I suppose I should ask this question in different thread.
It's pretty easy with Quicklisp. To install Quicklisp:
Download http://beta.quicklisp.org/quicklisp.lisp
sbcl --load quicklisp.lisp
(quicklisp-quickstart:install)
(ql:add-to-init-file)
Then you can install and load CFFI like so:
(ql:quickload "cffi")
I wrote a bit about how I manage small projects and their required libraries at Making a small Lisp project with quickproject and Quicklisp.
Here are the exact steps for manual installation under Windows 7:
First, download and install SBCL from:
http://www.sbcl.org/platform-table.html
Then download and untar (tar xzf ...) babel, alexandria, trivial-features, and cffi.
Then, start SBCL, load ASDF, and add the paths to these systems to asdf:*central-registry*:
C:\Program Files\Steel Bank Common Lisp\1.0.49>sbcl.exe --core sbcl.core
This is SBCL 1.0.49, an implementation of ANSI Common Lisp.
More information about SBCL is available at <http://www.sbcl.org/>.
SBCL is free software, provided as is, with absolutely no warranty.
It is mostly in the public domain; some portions are provided under
BSD-style licenses. See the CREDITS and COPYING files in the
distribution for more information.
This is experimental prerelease support for the Windows platform: use
at your own risk. "Your Kitten of Death awaits!"
* (load "asdf/asdf")
T
* (push "C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/babel_0.3.0/" asdf:*central-registry*)
("C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/babel_0.3.0/")
* (push "C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/alexandria/" asdf:*central-registry*)
("C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/alexandria/" "C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/babel_0.3.0/")
* (push "C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/trivial-features_0.6/" asdf:*central-registry*)
("C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/trivial-features_0.6/"
"C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/alexandria/" "C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/babel_0.3.0/")
* (push "C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/cffi_0.10.6/" asdf:*central-registry*)
("C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/cffi_0.10.6/"
"C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/trivial-features_0.6/"
"C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/alexandria/" "C:/Users/dhl/build/asdf/babel_0.3.0/")
*
(Of course, you'd have to give your paths to the libraries instead of `"C:/Users/dhl/...")
Then, you can load CFFI:
* (asdf:load-system 'cffi)
[much compilation output]
T
*
Now, that's pretty much the bare bones way to install systems for Common Lisp. Nowadays, there is Quicklisp, which is easy to use and covered by Xach's answer. Also, note that there are better ways to register your systems with asdf, like symlinking the asd-files to a single directory on platforms that support symlinking, and ASDF 2 provides a source-registry facility, so you won't have to deal with asdf:*central-registry* at all (I still like it for REPL use).
All in all, I guess Xach's answer provides the easiest way to get a working installation of CFFI, so I recommend his answer and will vote it up, but I already started writing my article before he posted it, and maybe its of some use to you to know how to do things manually.