Using AdaBasis

• The first level of information lists some application domains in alphabetical order, which serve to restrict the search space in a hierarchical way. Click at one domain to get one level deeper in the hierarchy.

• In some (sub)domains the system offers a facility to search for aspects (this is supported at the moment only for the 'mathematical functions' domain).

• At the deepest level of the hierarchy, the system presents you a short overview of the files that have been found. Short abstracts are intended to help you decide which software is most appropriate for you. The first term in parentheses is the size of the files in KBytes. Following the abstract you can find a rating of the software, sometimes together with some extra information like hardware and operating system the software has been tested on. The rating is coded as follows:
  • CS = compiled successfully
  • ES = executed successfully
  • NR = not rated - no information is available about the status of the software.

  The complete program sources are shown when clicking the file-symbol. There are two different file types, characterized by different symbols:

  • The symbol indicates a text-file, most often put together from originally several different source files. A mouse click on it will cause the text-file to be displayed and you may save it in your local directory (for explanation how, refer to the description of your WWW-Browser).
  • The symbol denotes a binary file. These are mostly compressed files to reduce transfer-time or executables. By clicking on it, this file will be fetched and you will be prompted to save it on your local host.
    

• To separate the saved file into the original files there are two possiblities: either you use the pager-tool (UNIX or PC-Version) or you may split the file manually by localizing the following lines in the file you've downloaded:
  --::::::::::
  --name of the original file
  --::::::::::
  and then separating the file by saving the corresponding parts under the given original filename.

  A suffix ".taz" or ".tgz" indicates that several files have been tarred and (afterwards) compressed with gzip. Use gunzip to first decompress these files, then un-tar them (tar -xvf ).

• Often there are alternative locations on other servers given, where you can look for similar information. This is not only the case on the initial level but often also on sublevels. Please refer to those addresses if you cannot find an appropriate source at AdaBasis.