erv@everest.TANDEM.COM (E. Videki) (05/02/91)
OBERON-M(tm) version 1.1 ANNOUNCEMENT This is to announce the immediate availability of Oberon-M version 1.1. This package presents the Oberon programming language for the MSDOS environment, on Intel 80x86 processors. Version 1.1 has some language changes to keep pace with Niklaus Wirth's Oberon revisions (see below). Documentation has been increased, and a mature modular example of Oberon's unique features has been added. Oberon, as you may already know, is a second-generation language past Pascal with most (maybe all) of the clumsiness of its ancestors removed, with the added power of type extension and object oriented programming features available. This release contains the following items: compiler, library modules, updated documention, language report, new/old examples, utility programs If you are moving to this release from version 1.0, you must erase all your reference files and recompile your source files under this new release. CHANGES IN VERSION 1.1 COMPILER: three minor changes to match language details in Niklaus Wirth's recent revised languge report: 1) SYSTEM is an alias to the machine- dependent module SYS; SYSTEM is the preferred name from now on. 2) BYTE has been moved into SYSTEM, formerly being a general predefined type. 3) SIZE is now available outside of SYSTEM as a general predefined procedure. One bug was fixed along the way. I have never heard of anyone encountering it. It relates to an incorrect symbolic reference file sometimes being generated for multiplicities of exported, complex, recursive data types. The compiler is still only about 78KB on disk. DOCUMENTATION: the language report is formatted better. The README file contains more background about Oberon-M and has important technical details. EXAMPLE FILES: a new, robust set of five modules are included to illustrate Oberon's unique type extension and object oriented programming features. They make a fairly good teaching tool about Oberon's strengths. The well-received Abu program and the original library modules are still present. HOW TO GET Oberon-M version 1.1 The locations below have the new Oberon-M package. It can be obtained by anonymous FTP, or by mail-message glue-and-uudecode, depending on the location. *FTP formats* The package file name on an FTP location is either oberonm - self unzipping .EXE file oberonmz - zip files (not self-unzipping) Either must be fetched using FTP in BINARY mode. Once downloaded to an MSDOS machine, put the following file name extensions on the respective file you obtained: oberonm ---> oberonm.exe (run it to unzip) oberonmz ---> oberonmz.zip (use PKZIP on it) The oberonmz form is provided for those distribution locations that prefer zip data files versus executable ones. Both files otherwise are identical. *MAIL MESSAGE FORMATS* For locations that have the package in mail-like ASCII files ( 6 files), you must use an editor to concatenate all the files where shown, use uudecode to bring it back into a binary image, then download and use PKZIP (or an equivalent utility) to unpack all the files of the Oberon-M package. Only the zip-data form of the package is included in the mail-like format (ie: it is the oberonmz file mentioned above). *LOCATIONS TO OBTAIN THE PACKAGE* 1) SIMTEL20 machine name: WSMR-SIMTEL20.ARMY.MIL Internet address: 26.2.0.74, 192.88.110.20 subdirectory: pd1:<msdos.pgmutl> file names: OBRONM11.ZIP (* NOTE special form of name here*) fetch how: anonymous FTP unpack how: PKZIP under MSDOS 2) UCSD machine name: ucsd, ucsd.edu, pop.ucsd.edu Internet address: 128.54.16.1 subdirectory: pub file names: oberonm.exe fetch how: anonymous FTP unpack how: For oberonm.exe: binary transfer to MSDOS, then execute (self unzipping files) 3) ETH Zurich machine name: neptune.inf.ethz.ch Internet address: 129.132.101.33 subdirectory: Oberon/80186 file names: oberonm.exe, oberonm.info fetch how: anonymous FTP unpack how: For oberonm.exe: binary transfer to MSDOS, then execute (self unzipping files) For oberonm.info: ascii transfer for human reading *** Note: ETH has not tested this package extensively and does not claim or disclaim its validity relative to the ETH Oberon System. Keeping the files here is only being done as a courtesy to European users who want to fetch it from a closer location. 4) comp.binaries.ibm.pc machine name: Usenet newsgroup Internet address: N/A file formats: 6 uuencoded "mail" messages fetch how: capture the messages unpack how: Instructions are at the head of the first message. 5) alt.sources (same as in comp.binaries.ibm.pc , but available here also by request from many users) 6) wuarchive machine name: wuarchive.wustl.edu Internet address: 128.252.135.4 subdirectory: /mirrors/msdos/pgmutl file names: obronm11.zip (* NOTE special form of name here*) fetch how: anonymous FTP unpack how: binary transfer to MSDOS, then unzip/decompress using PKZIP or equivalent. 7) University of Ulm machine name: titania.mathematik.uni-ulm.de Internet address: 134.60.66.21 subdirectory: soft/oberon/oberonm file names: oberonm.exe, oberonm.info fetch how: anonymous FTP unpack how: For oberonm.exe: binary transfer to MSDOS, then execute (self unzipping files) For oberonm.info: ascii transfer for human reading -- E. R. Videki erv@k2.everest.tandem.com IP address 130.252.59.153