                             dismal-mode
                             Release 0.94

                           Frank E. Ritter
                        ritter@psyc.nott.ac.uk
                              6-6-94

INTRODUCTION
------------

This is a manual for dismal (Dis' Mode Ain't lotus), a major mode in
GNU-emacs that implements a spreadsheet.  It includes how to load,
run, and use dismal and dismal spreadsheets.  Dismal provides the
basic spreadsheet functions.  Because it is based on GNU-emacs it
offers several relatively novel features for a spreadsheet.  It is
designed to be keystroke driven rather than mouse/menu driven
(although it can be menu driven).  It is extensible, so that users can
write their own commands and functions, for example, to allow a
function cell to write to several nearby cells.  A ruler can be put up
that reflects the semantics of column names past the ones
automatically provided as letters.

For futher information, please see the dismal-mode.doc file
accompanying the release.

OBTAINING AND INSTALLING THE PACKAGE
------------------------------------

dismal-mode is available via anonymous ftp from host 128.243.40.7
(unicorn.ccc.nott.ac.uk, but many machines don't know it, so you can
use the numbers) in the directory "pub/lpzfr" (From within ftp only
the part of the tree rooted at /usr/ftp is visible) and from the Elisp
archives at The OSU.

Again, the file is named "pub/lpzfr/dismal/dismal-VERSION.tar.Z" (so
use binary mode by issuing the "binary" command), where version gives
you the version of dismal that you are getting.

If you would like help with using anonymous ftp, feel free to send me
a message and I will explain the procedure.

To install the system:

1) Find a directory where you wish to install the package.  (At the
   University of Nottingham we currently put it in ~soar/emacs/utils/dismal.)
   Transfer dismal.tar.Z.uu to your desired directory,
    (mv dismal.tar.Z.uu.VERSION nice-directory/dismal/VERSION/dismal.tar.Z.uu)
   cd to that directory, and do 

   uudecode dismal.tar.Z
   zcat dismal.tar.Z | tar xvf -

2) Execute "make" in that directory.  This will compile the .el files.  If
   GNU emacs at your site is not called "emacs", but something else (e.g.,
   some places use "gmacs"), then compile the .el files using the alternative
   command "make EMACS=xxxx" where "xxxx" is the name of your emacs program.
   There are a lot of compiler warnings generated in 19.17.

3) Please read the file "dismal-mode.doc".  It is very important, and explains
   the basics of dismal.

4) At U-N, where dismal is installed in /psyc/lang/soar/utils/dismal/VERSION,
   users can set up their Emacs to use dismal by adding the following to
   their ~/.emacs files: 

   (load "/psyc/lang/soar/utils/dismal/VERSION/dismal-mode-defaults")

   To use dismal at your site, change the pathname to
   correspond to the location of the dismal files at your site.  More
   information about installing and using dismal are contained in the file
   dismal-mode.doc. 

FILES
-----

The files included in the package are:

    COPYING              dismal.el
    Makefile             dismal-simple-menus.el
    README               dismal-metacolumn.el
    REFCARD              dismal-mouse-x.el
    dismal-mode.doc      dismal-mode-defaults.el
          

   *float.el            *popper.el (v. 2.11)
   *float-changes.el    *vectors.el
   *heaps.el            *rmatrix.el
   *utilities/soar-misc.el
   *utilities/insert-date.el
   *utilities/simple-menu.el
   *utilities/goto-manual.el

The last group of files marked with "*" are not part of dismal proper,
but dismal depends on them.  It should be possible for later releases
of dismal to replace them with smarter and faster code.

MISCELLANEOUS
-------------

Some features which are not implemented yet, but will eventually be, are:

    use of Emacs 19's features (menus, defsubs, fonts, floating numbers)
    the use of sparse matrices to represent the spreadsheet
    use of compression technology to reduce the size of the sheet
    use of a "picture" of a buffer to draw the display at startup faster

There are too many bugs or missing features to list them here.
Interested users should consult the dismal.el file.

Frank Ritter <ritter@psyc.nott.ac.uk>
6-6-94 -University Park
