Incompatibilities with Previous Versions

• The semantics of absolute_file_name/2 has changed slightly. It no longer looks for an existing file with a .pl extension if the given relative file name has no extension. The old behavior can be achieved with:

            old_absolute_file_name(RelFileSpec, AbsFileName) :-
               Options = [ file_type(source),
                           access(exist),
                           file_errors(fail) ],
               (  absolute_file_name(RelFileSpec, AbsFileName, Options)
               -> true
               ;  absolute_file_name(RelFileSpec, AbsFileName, [])
               ).
            

• The hook debugger_command_hook/2 takes a different first argument.
• The built-in predicate print_message/2 does not take a force/1 severity.
• The UNIX-specific built-in predicates stream_interrupt/3 and stream_select/3 were unsafe, and have been removed. The latter can be replaced by the following equivalent definition, which works for file descriptor streams under UNIX and, for socket streams, under Windows as well:

            :- use_module(library(sockets)).
            stream_select(Streams, TimeOut, ReadStream) :-
                    socket_select([], _, TimeOut, Streams, ReadStream).
            

• Exceptions in hooks are now caught locally instead of propagating into the calling code.
• The Prolog predicates for generating glue code for the foreign language interface are no longer available. The only supported method for generating foreign resources are splfr. The removed predicates are link_foreign_resource/6, are prepare_resource_table/2, and prepare_foreign_resource/3. See The Foreign Resource Linker, for details on using splfr.
• The predicate reinitialise/0 is gone.
• The --import flag to splfr is no longer supported.
• The CLPFD apply_bound/1 API for branch & bound search has been replaced by predicates called first_bound/2 and later_bound/2.
• The CLPFD constraints all_different/[1,2] and all_distinct/[1,2] require bounded domains.
• The CLPFD constraints serialized/[2,3] and cumulative/[4,5] only prune the bounds of domains, not inside them, unless the bounds_only(false) option is given.
• The Berkeley DB interface is now compatible with Berkeley DB 4.0.14 instead of 2.7.7.
• library(db) has been removed.
• library(xref) has been replaced.
• library(flinkage) is no longer supported. It is still present to help porting really old code.
• The header file <sicstus/sicstus.h> now uses stricter function type prototypes. This may expose problems in code that used to compile without warnings in previous versions of SICStus.
• Java foreign resources are no longer supported. Java foreign resources offer no advantages compared to jasper_call/4 introduced in SICStus 3.8.5 so you should migrate your code even if you are still using SICStus 3.8.
• Java now loads libspnative.so (spnative.dll under Windows) where it used to load libjasper.so. This will probably be invisible to most users.
• The Java methods in se.sics.jasper that operate on a SICStus object will now throw an error if called from a thread other than the one that created the SICStus object. This is similar to the behavior in early versions of 3.8.

  SICStus 3.9 introduces a new thread safe Jasper API, which is not backwards compatible with the Jasper API of 3.8. However, the old API has been amended to be compatible with the thread safe API, making it possible to write Java programs that can run in both modes.

• Signal handlers installed by SP_signal() are now deferred until Prolog can call them safely. This makes SP_signal() unsuitable for handling synchronous signals such as SIGSEGV. See Signal Handling.