30.2. Saving an Image

30.2. Saving an Image
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The function (EXT:SAVEINITMEM &OPTIONAL (filename "lispinit.mem") &KEY :KEEP-GLOBAL-HANDLERS :QUIET :INIT-FUNCTION :LOCKED-PACKAGES :START-PACKAGE :EXECUTABLE :NORC :SCRIPT :DOCUMENTATION) saves the running CLISP's memory to the file filename; extension #P".mem" is recommended (when filename does not have an extension, #P".mem" extension is automatically added unless the file being created is an executable).

:QUIET

If this argument is not NIL, the startup banner and the good-bye message will be suppressed, as if by -q.

This is not recommended for interactive application delivery, please append your banner to ours (using init function) instead of replacing it.

:NORC

If this argument is not NIL, the RC file loading will be suppressed, as if by -norc.

:INIT-FUNCTION

This argument specifies a function that will be executed at startup of the saved image, before entering the standard read-eval-print loop (but after all other initialization, see Section 30.1.1, “Cradle to Grave”); thus, if you want to avoid the read-eval-print loop, you have to call EXT:EXIT at the end of the init function yourself (this does not prevent CUSTOM:*FINI-HOOKS* from being run).

See the manual for passing command line arguments to this function.

:SCRIPT

This options determines the handling of positional arguments when the image is invoked.

If it is T, then the first positional argument is the script name and the rest is placed into EXT:*ARGS*, as described in Section 31.6.2, “Scripting with CLISP”.
It it is NIL, then all positional arguments are placed into EXT:*ARGS* to be handled by the init function.

This option defaults to T when init function is NIL and to NIL when init function is non-NIL.

:DOCUMENTATION

The description of what this image does, printed by the -help-image olption.

Defaults to (DOCUMENTATION init function 'FUNCTION)

:LOCKED-PACKAGES

This argument specifies the packages to lock before saving the image; this is convenient for application delivery, when you do not want your users to mess up your product. This argument defaults to CUSTOM:*SYSTEM-PACKAGE-LIST*.

:START-PACKAGE

This argument specifies the starting value of *PACKAGE* in the image being saved, and defaults to the current value of *PACKAGE*.

:KEEP-GLOBAL-HANDLERS

When non-NIL, the currently established global handlers (either with EXT:SET-GLOBAL-HANDLER or with -on-error) are inherited by the image. Defaults to NIL, so that

$ clisp -i myfile -x '(EXT:SAVEINITMEM)'

will produce an image without any global handlers inherited from the batch mode of the above command.

:EXECUTABLE

When non-NIL, the saved file will be an standalone executable. In this case, the #P".mem" extension is not added. On Win32 and Cygwin the extension #P".exe" is added instead.

You can use this memory image with the -M option. On UNIX systems, you may compress it with GNU gzip to save disk space.

Image Portability

Memory images are not portable across different platforms (in contrast with platform-independent #P".fas" files). They are not even portable across linking sets: image saved using the full linking set cannot be used with the base runtime:

$ clisp -K full -x '(EXT:SAVEINITMEM)'
$ clisp -K base -M lispinit.mem
base/lisp.run: initialization file `lispinit.mem' was not created by this version of CLISP runtime

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