Re: Emacs Lisp and Guile

[Richard Stallman]

    I think we might agree anyway: from a general, low-level Scheme
    implementation point of view, Elisp variables require 'arbitrary' code
    to be run when they are accessed.

They don't require this--there are other ways to implement this
feature in and on Guile.

It is true that if Guile supports running arbitrary code for variable
access, that would provide a basis on which to implement the Emacs
Lisp variable features.  But I think that running arbitrary code is not
good design--variables should be variables, not act like functions.

Can you look for some way to implement forwarding facilities in Guile?

      If I remember correctly, TCL can sent out
    notifications when the value of a variable changes.

That feature can be useful, but it is not sufficient for this job.
When a variable is forwarded to C code, the idea is that C code can
change the value at any time.  Each reference to the Scheme variable
needs to look in the C variable.