SBCL VLIME use CFFI

Question

I'm trying to learn common lisp but am having a very difficult time setting up my environment.

I'm trying to wrap a c library using cffi but I can't seem to get sbcl to find the cffi package. I have previously installed it using (ql:quickload :cffi).

I'm using vlime.

I've tried the following:

(defpackage my-package
  (:use :cl :cffi))
(in-package :my-package)

in which case I get the following error:

The name "CFFI" does not designate any package.

when I try to compile the file using \of in vlime.

This error persists if I add (ql:quickload :cffi) or (asdf:load-system :cffi) before or after the previous code. In addition, it seems to put vlime into an unrecoverable state.

If I remove :cffi from :use then I get the error

Package CFFI does not exist.

The error persists when trying to use ql as well.

I've also tried using (require :cffi) and all permutations of combinations with the ql and asdf imports.

I'm very close to giving up on common lisp. What am I doing wrong?

EDIT:

I also have :depends-on (:cffi) in my asd file.

Answer 1

You need to ensure that CFFI is loaded at compile time. A single-file solution is

(eval-when (:compile-toplevel :load-toplevel :execute)
  (ql:quickload :cffi))

...

(defpackage :foo
  (:use :cl :cffi)
  ...)

If you are using ASDF (which is more scalable) then make your system depend on CFFI and compile and load the system in the first instance.