      README file for the `IO' GAP4 package (Max Neunhoeffer)
        
To get the newest version of this GAP 4 package download one of the
archive files
    io-x.x.tar.gz
    io-x.x.zoo
    io-x.x.tar.bz2
    io-x.x.zip
and unpack it using 
    gunzip io-x.x.tar.gz; tar xvf io-x.x.tar
respectively
    unzoo -x io-x.x.zoo
and so on.

(Note that if you use a browser like `netscape' for downloading the
archive file the `gunzip' step above may already be done by the browser,
although the name of your file may still have the misleading `.gz'
extension.)

Do this preferably (but not necessarily) inside the `pkg' subdirectory
of your GAP 4 installation. It creates a subdirectory called `io'.

To install this package do

    cd io
    ./configure [path]

where `path' is a path to the main GAP root directory (if not given the
default `../..' is assumed).

Afterwards call `make' to compile a binary file.

If you installed GAP on several architectures, you must execute this
configure/make step on each of the architectures immediately after
configuring GAP itself on this architecture.

The package  will not work without  this  step.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
STATIC LINKING: This might be interesting for M$ Windows users, as
dynamic loading of binary modules does not work there.

You can also create a new statically linked `gap' binary as follows:
Go into the main GAP directory and then into `bin/..bindir..'. Here
..bindir.. means the directory containing the `gap' executable after
compiling `gap'. This directory also contains the GAP compiler script
`gac'. Assuming IO in the standard location you can then say

   ./gac -o gap-static -p "-DIOSTATIC" -P "-static" ../../pkg/io/src/io.c

Then copy your `gap' start script to, say, `gapbig' and change the
references to the GAP binary to `gap-static'. On my Linux system with
2GB RAM and kernel compiled with 4GB memory support I can nicely run
`gapbig -m 1800m -K 1800m' and after loading IO.

If you want to install more than one package with a C-part like this
package, you can still create a statically linked GAP executable by
combining all the compile and link options and all the .c files as
in the ./gac command above. For the IO package, you have to add
  -DIOSTATIC
to the string of the -p option and the file
  ../../pkg/io/src/io.c
somewhere on the command line.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Recompiling the documentation is possible by the command `gap makedoc.g'
in the IO directory. But this should not be necessary.

E-mail me if there are any questions, remarks, suggestions. Also, I
would like to hear about applications of this package.


Max Neunhoeffer, e-mail: max.neunhoeffer@math.rwth-aachen.de 
