I seem to have trashed about a dozen recent e-mail messages, including this one, but here's a reply:

Are these declarations documented anywhere, I can't seem to find it in gambits distributed docs.

...

See also (declare (core)) and (declare (not core)).

Use The Source, Luke. Marc, these really should be documented unless you think they're a hack and will be eliminated in the near future.

In gsc/_ptree1.scm, we find:

; - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ; ; Declarations. <stuff omitted> ; Compilation strategy declarations: ; ; (block) global vars defined are only mutated by code in the current file ; (separate) global vars defined can be mutated by other code ; ; (core) toplevel expressions and definitions must be compiled to code ; (not core) toplevel expressions and definitions belong to another module

And see how it's used in the compiler. For example, there's _envadt.scm, which defines Abstract Data Types for use in _env.scm, but which are also used in other files. So in _env.scm we find

_env.scm:(include "_envadt.scm")

while in other files that use the accessors, setters, etc., defined in _envadt.scm we find

_back.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _env.scm:(include "_envadt.scm") _front.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _gvm.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _ptree1.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _ptree2.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _source.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _t-c-1.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _t-c-2.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _t-c-3.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm") _utils.scm:(include-adt "_envadt.scm")

while include-adt is defined by

(##define-macro (include-adt filename) `(begin (##declare (not core)) (##include ,(string-append "../gsc/" filename)) (##declare (core))))

So the definitions in files included with "include-adt" can be inlined, etc., in the surrounding source files, which is important for speed, but code for these standalone accessors will be defined only in _env.scm.

Brad