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Date: Thu, 4 Apr 1996 14:57:40 +0200 (MET DST)
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From: Jan Wielemaker <jan@swi.psy.uva.nl>
Subject: SWI-Prolog *ALPHA* 2.6.0 for Unix
To: prolog@swi.psy.uva.nl
Phone: +31 - 20 - 525 6786
Content-Type: text
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Status: RO

Hi,

I'm happy to announce version 2.6.0 of SWI-Prolog. The main new
features are:

	* 32-bit integer arithmetic and full double precision float
	  arithmetic.

	* Much faster arithmetic, specially when using -O

	* Single-file executables using qsave_program/2

	* Easy single-file embedded executables using a new utility
	  called plld

Where
=====

	ftp://swi.psy.uva.nl/pub/SWI-Prolog/ALPHA/pl-2.6.0.tar.gz

Status
======

As the new float and integer format required some serious redefinitions
in the data-representation, and arithmetic function interface, don't
be surprised if anything goes wrong.  The most likely problems are:
bugs in individual arithmetic functions (should anyone feel like
writing a comprehensive test-set, ask me for a skeleton), bugs handling
strings or numbers and related garbage-collection problems. 

I've ran a good deal of existing applications through it without
experiencing any problems though.

Win32
=====

I had plans to distribute this together with a similar version for
Win32, but Microsoft doesn't like applications using tagged data
representation, causing the Prolog kernel to behave a bit weird when put
in a DLL. Should anyone know there is a way to tell Win32 where (about)
a DLL is loaded in memory I'd be happy to hear about it.

XPCE
====

If you need the enhanced arithmetic, you can run the versions of XPCE
designed for SWI-Prolog 2.5.x with this version.

	Regards --- Jan