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<h1>The Isabelle System Distribution</h1>
<h2>Version information</h2>
This is the internal repository version of Isabelle. Starting with
Isabelle98, the current line of Isabelle introduces many new features,
but also some imcompatibilities with Isabelle94-XX. See the
<tt>NEWS</tt> file in the distribution for more details.
<h2>System requirements</h2>
Isabelle requires a real Unix box with sufficient resources. Fun
starts at about 32MB of memory (somewhat depending on your ML system),
with several tens of MB disk space and a relatively fast CPU.
<p>
Furthermore, it needs the following software, which is not part of the
distribution:
<ul>
<li> A full Standard ML Compiler (e.g. Poly/ML or SML of New Jersey).
<li> The GNU bash shell (version 1.x or 2.x).
<li> Perl 5.x - the Pathologically Eclectic Rubbish Lister.
</ul>
<p>
The following ML system and platform combinations are known to work
quite well:
<ul>
<li> Poly/ML versions 2.x and 3.1 on Suns.
<li> SML/NJ 0.93 on Suns and SGIs. There seem to be several
problems with Linux and HP-UX.
<li> SML/NJ 110 on Suns, Linux, etc.
</ul>
<p>
<a
href="http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/what/smlnj/software.html">SML/NJ</a>
needs lots of store and disk space, but it is free. The current
official release is 110, working versions 109.27 to 109.33 should also
work. We also still support the old 0.93 release.
<p>
<a href="http://www.ahl.co.uk/poly-ml.html">Poly/ML</a> is a
commercial product and costs money, but it is stable and efficient. It
requires relatively little memory (starting at about 16MB) and disk
space (about 60MB for all distributed object logics).
<p>
<a href="http://www.harlequin.com/products/ads/ml/">MLWorks</a> is a
commercial ML programming environment. Isabelle on MLWorks should be
still considered experimental!
<p>
<h2>Installation</h2>
See file <tt>INSTALL</tt> in the Isabelle sources on how to build the
system. Further background information may be found in the
<em>Isabelle System Manual</em>, distributed as <tt>dvi</tt> with the
sources.
<h2>Interfaces</h2>
The distribution includes only a very primitive interface based on
ordinary terminal sessions.<p>
<a href="ftp://ftp.dcs.ed.ac.uk/pub/da/Isamode.tar.gz">Isamode</a> by
David Aspinall is a more elaborate interface for Isabelle. It runs
under recent versions of GNU Emacs and XEmacs, the latter being
recommended. It's useful to both novices and experts.
<h2>Other sources of information</h2>
<h3>Mailing list</h3>
The electronic mailing list <tt>isabelle-users@cl.cam.ac.uk</tt>
provides a forum for Isabelle users to discuss problems and exchange
information. To join, send a message to
<tt>isabelle-users-request@cl.cam.ac.uk</tt>.
<h3>Personal mail</h3>
<a href="http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/users/lcp/">Lawrence C Paulson</a><br>
Computer Laboratory<br>
University of Cambridge<br>
Pembroke Street<br>
Cambridge CB2 3QG<br>
England<br>
<br>
E-mail: lcp@cl.cam.ac.uk<br>
Phone: +44-223-334600<br>
Fax: +44-223-334748<br>
<p>
or
<p>
<a href="http://www.in.tum.de/~nipkow/">Tobias Nipkow</a><br>
Institut fuer Informatik<br>
T. U. Muenchen<br>
D-80290 Muenchen<br>
Germany<br>
<br>
E-mail: nipkow@www.in.tum.de<br>
Phone: +49-89-289-22690<br>
Fax: +49-89-289-28183<br>
<p>
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Please report any problems you encounter. While we shall try to be
helpful, we can accept no responsibility for the deficiences of
Isabelle and their consequences.
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