--- /dev/null
+Most of the atomic_ops functionality is available under Win32 with
+the Microsoft tools, but the build process currently is considerably more
+primitive than on Linux/Unix platforms.
+
+To build:
+
+1) Go to the src directory in the distribution.
+2) Make sure the Microsoft command-line tools (e.g. nmake) are available.
+3) Run "nmake -f Makefile.msft". This should run some tests, which
+may print warnings about the types of the "Interlocked" functions.
+I haven't been able to make all versions of VC++ happy. If you know
+how to, please send a patch.
+4) To compile applications, you will need to retain or copy the following
+pieces from the resulting src directory contents:
+ "atomic_ops.h" - Header file defining low-level primitives. This
+ includes files from:
+ "atomic_ops"- Subdirectory containing implementation header files.
+ "atomic_ops_stack.h" - Header file describing almost lock-free stack.
+ "atomic_ops_malloc.h" - Header file describing almost lock-free malloc.
+ "libatomic_ops_gpl.lib" - Library containing implementation of the
+ above two. The atomic_ops.h implementation
+ is entirely in the header files in Win32.
+
+Most clients of atomic_ops.h will need to define AO_ASSUME_WINDOWS98 before
+including it. Compare_and_swap is otherwise not available.
+
+Note that the library is covered by the GNU General Public License, while
+the top 2 of these pieces allow use in proprietary code.