--- gforth/NEWS 2003/03/09 22:13:50 1.15 +++ gforth/NEWS 2008/11/02 17:38:44 1.32 @@ -1,3 +1,120 @@ +User-visible changes between 0.6.2 and 0.7.0: + +Requirements: + At run-time requires libtool and gcc (for the libcc C interface) and + gdb (for the disassembler (SEE)) on some platforms. +Installation: + support for DESTDIR, POST_INSTALL, INSTALL_SCRIPT + automatic performance tuning on building (--enable-force-reg unnecessary) + report performance and functionality problems at end of "make" + autogen.sh now exists +License: + Changed to GPLv3 +Bug fixes + Now works with address-space randomization. + The single-step debugger works again in some engines. + Many others. +Ports: + AMD64, ARM, IA-64 (Itanium): better performance + PPC, PPC64: disassembler and assembler + Gforth EC: R8C, 4stack, misc, 8086 work + MacOS X: better support +Invocation: + New flags --ignore-async-signals, --vm-commit (default overcommit) + --print-sequences +Forth 200x: + X:extension-query: produce true for all implemented extensions + X:required REQUIRED etc. (not new) + X:defined: [DEFINED] and [UNDEFINED] + X:parse-name: PARSE-NAME (new name) + X:deferred: deferred words (new: DEFER@ DEFER! ACTION-OF) + X:structures: +FIELD FIELD: FFIELD: CFIELD: etc. + X:ekeys: new: EKEY>FKEY K-SHIFT-MASK K-CTRL-MASK K-ALT-MASK K-F1...K-F12 + X:fp-stack (not new) + X:number-prefixes (partially new, see below) +Number prefixes: + 0x is a hex prefix: 0xff and 0XfF now produces (decimal) 255 + # is a decimal prefix: #10 now produces (decimal) 10 + Signs after the number prefix are now accepted, e.g, #-50. + ' now only handles a single (x)char: 'ab is no longer accepted, + 'a' now produces (decimal) 97 +Unicode support (currently supports only uniform encoding): + added xchars words for dealing with variable-width multi-byte characters + provide 8bit (ISO Latin 1) and UTF-8 support for xchars +New words: + \C C-FUNCTION C-LIBRARY END-C-LIBRARY C-LIBRARY-NAME (libcc C interface) + LIB-ERROR (complements OPEN-LIB) + OUTFILE-EXECUTE INFILE-EXECUTE BASE-EXECUTE (limited change of global state) + 16-bit and 32-bit memory acces: UW@ UL@ SW@ SL@ W! L! W@ L@ /W /L + NEXT-ARG SHIFT-ARGS (OS command-line argument processing) + NOTHROW (for backtrace control) + FTRUNC FMOD (undocumented) + SEE-CODE SEE-CODE-RANGE (show generated dynamic native code) +Improvements/changes of existing words: + S\", .\" now support \l, \m, \z, and limits hex and octal character specs. + OPEN-FILE with W/O no longer creates or truncates files (no compat. file) + OPEN-LIB now understands ~ at the start, like OPEN-FILE. + TRY...ENDTRY changed significantly, compatibility files available (see docs). + The disassembler (DISCODE) can now use gdb to disassemble code + Uninitialized defered words now give a warning when executed + Division is floored (disable with "configure --enable-force-cdiv") + Gforth (not gforth-fast) reports division by zero and overflow on division + on all platforms. +Newly documented words: + S>NUMBER? S>UNUMBER? + EKEY keypress names: K-LEFT K-RIGHT K-UP K-DOWN K-HOME K-END K-PRIOR + K-NEXT K-INSERT K-DELETE + CLEARSTACKS + FORM +Environment variable GFORTHSYSTEMPREFIX (used by word SYSTEM and friends) +C interface: + exported symbols now start with "gforth_" (for referencing them from C code) + libcc C function call interface (requires libtool and gcc at run-time) + alternative: undocumented libffi-based interface +Libraries: + depth-changes.fs: report stack depth changes during interpretation + ans-report.fs now reports CfV extensions + fsl-util.4th: FSL support files (undocumented) + regexp.fs for regular expressions (undocumented) + complex.fs for complex numbers (undocumented) + fft.fs for Fast Fourier Transform (undocumented) + wf.fs, a Wiki implementation (undocumented) + httpd.fs, a web server (undocumented) + status.fs, show interpreter status in separate xterm (undocumented) + profile.fs for profiling (undocumented, incomplete) + endtry-iferror.fs, recover-endtry.fs to ease the TRY change transition + test/tester.fs: Now works with FP numbers (undocumented) + test/ttester.fs: Version of tester.fs with improved interface (T{...}T). + compat library: + compat/execute-parsing.fs +Speed improvements: + automatic performance tuning on building + static stack caching (good speedup on PPC) + mixed-precision division is now faster + support for int128 types on AMD64 + workarounds for gcc performance bugs (in particular, PR 15242) + branch target alignment (good speedup on Alpha). + + +User-visible changes between 0.6.1 and 0.6.2: + +Bug fixes (in particular, gforth-0.6.2 compiles with gcc-3.3) +New words: LATEST, LATESTXT (LASTXT deprecated) +Operating environment: Added optional support for a C interface built + on the ffcall libraries (more portable and powerful than the old + one, but still not documented). To use it, the ffcall libraries + have to be installed before building Gforth (see INSTALL). +Miscellaneous: Gforth-fast now uses static superinstructions (some + speedup on some platforms); generally this is transparent (apart + from the speedup), but there are lots of command-line options for + controlling the static superinstruction generation. + + +User-visible changes between 0.6.0 and 0.6.1: + +Bug fixes (installation on big-endian machines sometimes did not work) + + User-visible changes between 0.5.0 and 0.6.0: Changes in behaviour: @@ -9,8 +126,8 @@ New threaded code execution method: prim following), hybrid direct/indirect threaded (easier portability), with dynamic superinstructions (typical speedup on Athlon: factor 2). New engine gforth-itc for dealing with some potential - backwards-compatibility problems (see "Invoking Gforth" in the - manual). + backwards-compatibility problems (see "Direct or Indirect Threaded?" + in the manual). Operating environment: @@ -28,7 +145,7 @@ Keyboard input: EDIT-LINE K-PRIOR K-NEXT File input: SLURP-FILE SLURP-FID Programming tools: ID. .ID WORDLIST-WORDS SIMPLE-SEE Conditional execution: [DEFINED] [UNDEFINED] -Defining Words: CONST-DOES> +Defining Words: CONST-DOES> ]] Input stream: PARSE-WORD EXECUTE-PARSING EXECUTE-PARSING-FILE String comparison: STR= STR< STRING-PREFIX? String literals: S\" .\" \"-PARSE @@ -218,13 +335,13 @@ $?) added (SYSTEM) ( c_addr u -- wretva ' and ['] now give an error for compile-only words. ----- -Copyright (C) 1995,1996,1997,1998,2000,2003 Free Software Foundation, Inc. +Copyright (C) 1995,1996,1997,1998,2000,2003,2006,2007,2008 Free Software Foundation, Inc. This file is part of Gforth. Gforth is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License -as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 +as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, @@ -233,8 +350,7 @@ MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICU GNU General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License -along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software -Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111, USA. +along with this program. If not, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/. % Local Variables: