(generalized-equal? obj1 obj2 . comparator-list)
Compares obj1 and obj2 for equality. A comparator is a procedure that is given two arguments to compare. It returns #t if its arguments are to be considered equal, #f if they are to be considered unequal, and the symbol pass if it cannot decide. The third argument passed to a comparator is comparator-list, to be used in recursive calls to generalized-equal?.
First, each element of comparator-list is invoked on obj1 and obj2, passing comparator-list as its third argument. If the comparator returns #t or #f, that is the result.
If all comparators in the list have been invoked with a pass result, then generalized-equal? determines if both obj1 and obj2 are ordered containers of the same type. This determination is partly implementation-dependent, but pairs, strings, vectors, and bytevectors must be treated as ordered containers of distinct types. If they are not both ordered containers of the same type, then generalized-equal? returns what eqv? returns on obj1 and obj2.
Otherwise, if the containers have different numbers of elements, the result is #f. Otherwise, generalized-equal? invokes itself recursively on each corresponding element of the containers, passing itself the same comparators. If any recursive call returns #f, that is the result; if all recursive calls return #t, that is the result.
(make-atomic-comparator type-predicate compare-predicate)
Returns a comparator that invokes type-predicate on its first and its second arguments. If they both return #t, then they are assumed to be of the same type, and compare-predicate is invoked on the first and second arguments together. If the result is #t or #f, then the comparator returns #t or #f respectively. If they are not of the same type, a third value is returned. The resulting comparator always ignores its third argument.
(numeric-comparator obj1 obj2 comparators-list)
A comparator that returns #t if obj1 and obj2 are numbers that are equal by =, #f if they are not equal by =, and a third value otherwise. The comparators-list argument is ignored.
(char-ci-comparator obj1 obj2 comparators-list)
A comparator that returns #t if obj1 and obj2 are both characters that are equal by char-ci=?, #f if they are not equal by char-ci=?, and a third value otherwise. The comparators-list argument is ignored.
(string-ci-comparator obj1 obj2 comparators-list)
A comparator that returns #t if obj1 and obj2 are both strings that are equal by string-ci=?, #f if they are not equal by string-ci=?, and a third value otherwise. The comparators-list argument is ignored.
Should the third value be specified? As designed, if a badly written comparator returns nonsense, it's just ignored rather than giving the implementation of generalized-equal? a chance to report an error. The symbol pass has been suggested.