chickadee » chicken » special-forms » require-library

This form does all the necessary steps to make the libraries or extensions given in ID ... available. It loads syntactic extensions, if needed and generates code for loading/linking with core library modules or separately installed extensions.

During interpretation/evaluation require-library performs one of the following:

• If ID names a built-in feature chicken srfi-0 srfi-2 srfi-6 srfi-8 srfi-9 srfi-10 srfi-17 srfi-23 srfi-30 srfi-39 srfi-55, then nothing is done.
• If ID names one of the syntactic extensions chicken-syntax chicken-ffi-syntax, then this extension will be loaded.
• If ID names one of the core library units shipped with CHICKEN, then a (load-library 'ID) will be performed.
• If ID names an installed extension with the syntax or require-at-runtime attribute, then the extensions is loaded at compile-time, probably doing a run-time (require ...) for any run-time requirements.
• Otherwise, (require-library ID) is equivalent to (require 'ID).

During compilation, one of the following happens instead:

• If ID names a built-in feature chicken srfi-0 srfi-2 srfi-6 srfi-8 srfi-9 srfi-10 srfi-17 srfi-23 srfi-30 srfi-39 srfi-55, then nothing is done.
• If ID names one of the syntactic extensions chicken-syntax chicken-ffi-syntax, then this extension will be loaded at compile-time, making the syntactic extensions available in compiled code.
• If ID names one of the core library units shipped with CHICKEN, or if the option -uses ID has been passed to the compiler, then a (declare (uses ID)) is generated.
• If ID names an installed extension with the syntax or require-at-runtime attribute, then the extension is loaded at compile-time, and code is emitted to (require ...) any needed run-time requirements.
• Otherwise (require-library ID) is equivalent to (require 'ID).

ID should be a pure extension name and should not contain any path prefixes (for example dir/lib... is illegal).

ID may also be a list that designates an extension-specifier. Currently the following extension specifiers are defined:

• (srfi NUMBER ...) is required for SRFI-55 compatibility and is fully implemented
• (version ID NUMBER) is equivalent to ID, but checks at compile-time whether the extension named ID is installed and whether its version is equal or higher than NUMBER. NUMBER may be a string or a number, the comparison is done lexicographically (using string>=?).