README.08a

                       Regina 0.08a
                      10 April 1997

This is an "unofficial" release of the Regina Rexx Interpreter.

The "unofficial" status is due to the fact that I am not the author
nor the maintainer of this product.  The author, Anders Christensen,
will not be surprised by this release, as I had indicated to him in
September 1996, that I would be releasing this version. Most of the
enhancements and fixes I made to Regina 0.07a (and which are
incorporated in this release) were sent to Anders in August 1996,
in the hope that he would be able to make an official release.
As he has yet to do that I took it upon myself to enable
others to benefit from the enhancements I have made to Regina.

Explanation over; what's been done.

Apart from several bug fixes, particularly in the API, this release
include the following enhancements:

o added new built-in functions per the ANSI standard:
  countstr(), changestr()
o modified the date() and time() functions, again per the ANSI
  standard to support date and time conversions
o enhanced the API to support external functions residing in shared
  or synamic libraries, that can be loaded with the rxfuncadd()
  built-in function.  Although Regina 0.07a could also do this, you
  had to write your external function package in a way that only
  Regina would recognise.  External function packages built for OS/2
  can be ported simply to Regina.
o ported Regina to Win32 and supplied it as a DLL.
o added a DOS VCPI port (built using emx) that can be run under OS/2
  and under DOS without the need for a DPMI memory manager.
o shared libraries of Rexx external functions are now supported under
  several Un*x platforms.  The rexx library can be built as a static
  or dynamic library.
o modified the source for the Regina curses external function package to
  conform to a "standard" use of the API.  This curses external function
  package can be built with XCurses (my port of PDCurses to X11)
  enabling a Rexx program to display and control a native X11 window.

Please report any bugs with this release of Regina to me, NOT to Anders.
Most likely the bugs are of my origin, so I will attempt to fix them.
As with previous bugs fixed by me, I will pass these fixes on to Anders.

Cheers, Mark.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Mark Hessling                 Email:             M.Hessling@qut.edu.au
 PO Box 203                    Phone:                    +617 3802 0800
 Bellara                          http://www.lightlink.com/hessling/
 QLD 4507                      **** Maintainer PDCurses & REXX/SQL ****
 Australia                     ************* Author of THE ************
+------------------------------------------------------------------------