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Output-to-file

Redirecting output to a file

For a general discussion of ACL2 input/output and of the ACL2 read-eval-print loop, see io and see ld (respectively). Here we use an example to illustrate how to use some of the options provided by ld to redirect ACL2 output to a file, other than the printing of the prompt (which continues to go to the terminal).

There are two ld specials that control output from the ld command: proofs-co for proof output and standard-co for other output. The following example shows how to use these to redirect output to a file "tmp.out". The following command opens a character output channel to the file "tmp.out" and redirects proof output to that channel, i.e., to file "tmp.out".

(mv-let (chan state)
        (open-output-channel "tmp.out" :character state)
        (set-proofs-co chan state))

Next, we redirect standard output to that same channel.

(set-standard-co (proofs-co state) state)

Now we can load an input file, in this case file "tmp.lisp", and output will be redirected to file "tmp.out". (The use of :ld-pre-eval-print t is optional; see ld.)

(ld "tmp.lisp" :ld-pre-eval-print t)

Having completed our load operation, we restore both proof output and standard output to the terminal, as follows.

(set-standard-co *standard-co* state)
(close-output-channel (proofs-co state) state)
(set-proofs-co *standard-co* state)

The following variant of the above example shows how to redirect output as above except without changing the global settings of the two ld specials, proofs-co and standard-co. This approach uses a notion of ``global variables'' stored in the ACL2 state; see assign and see @.

(mv-let (chan state)
        (open-output-channel "tmp.out" :character state)
        (assign tmp-channel chan))
(ld "tmp.lisp" :ld-pre-eval-print t
               :proofs-co (@ tmp-channel)
               :standard-co (@ tmp-channel))
(close-output-channel (@ tmp-channel) state)