X-Git-Url: http://wien.tomnetworks.com/gitweb/?p=hs-boehmgc.git;a=blobdiff_plain;f=gc-7.2%2Fdoc%2FREADME.cords;fp=gc-7.2%2Fdoc%2FREADME.cords;h=d6a2cda92b6bef770bd84b829185f32db4ac43d5;hp=0000000000000000000000000000000000000000;hb=324587ba93dc77f37406d41fd2a20d0e0d94fb1d;hpb=2a4ea609491b225a1ceb06da70396e93916f137a diff --git a/gc-7.2/doc/README.cords b/gc-7.2/doc/README.cords new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d6a2cda --- /dev/null +++ b/gc-7.2/doc/README.cords @@ -0,0 +1,52 @@ +Copyright (c) 1993-1994 by Xerox Corporation. All rights reserved. + +THIS MATERIAL IS PROVIDED AS IS, WITH ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY EXPRESSED +OR IMPLIED. ANY USE IS AT YOUR OWN RISK. + +Permission is hereby granted to use or copy this program +for any purpose, provided the above notices are retained on all copies. +Permission to modify the code and to distribute modified code is granted, +provided the above notices are retained, and a notice that the code was +modified is included with the above copyright notice. + +Please send bug reports to Hans-J. Boehm (Hans.Boehm@hp.com) or, +preferred, to GC mailing list (gc@linux.hpl.hp.com). + +This is a string packages that uses a tree-based representation. +See cord.h for a description of the functions provided. Ec.h describes +"extensible cords", which are essentially output streams that write +to a cord. These allow for efficient construction of cords without +requiring a bound on the size of a cord. + +More details on the data structure can be found in + +Boehm, Atkinson, and Plass, "Ropes: An Alternative to Strings", +Software Practice and Experience 25, 12, December 1995, pp. 1315-1330. + +A fundamentally similar "rope" data structure is also part of SGI's standard +template library implementation, and its descendents, which include the +GNU C++ library. That uses reference counting by default. +There is a short description of that data structure at +http://reality.sgi.com/boehm/ropeimpl.html . (The more official location +http://www.sgi.com/tech/stl/ropeimpl.html is missing a figure.) + +All of these are descendents of the "ropes" in Xerox Cedar. + +de.c is a very dumb text editor that illustrates the use of cords. +It maintains a list of file versions. Each version is simply a +cord representing the file contents. Nonetheless, standard +editing operations are efficient, even on very large files. +(Its 3 line "user manual" can be obtained by invoking it without +arguments. Note that ^R^N and ^R^P move the cursor by +almost a screen. It does not understand tabs, which will show +up as highlighred "I"s. Use the UNIX "expand" program first.) +To build the editor, type "make cord/de" in the gc directory. + +This package assumes an ANSI C compiler such as gcc. It will +not compile with an old-style K&R compiler. + +Note that CORD_printf iand friends use C functions with variable numbers +of arguments in non-standard-conforming ways. This code is known to +break on some platforms, notably PowerPC. It should be possible to +build the remainder of the library (everything but cordprnt.c) on +any platform that supports the collector.