[project @ 2000-07-17 10:05:59 by rrt]

Merged Julian's changes to make it more comprehensible to non FP programmers.

diff --git a/ghc/ANNOUNCE b/ghc/ANNOUNCE
index 87417db..277f044 100644 (file)
--- a/ghc/ANNOUNCE
+++ b/ghc/ANNOUNCE
@@ -1,19 +1,31 @@
-            The Glasgow Haskell Compiler -- version 4.08
-           ==============================================
+             The Glasgow Haskell Compiler -- version 4.08
+            ==============================================
 
 We are pleased to announce a new release of the Glasgow Haskell
 Compiler (GHC), version 4.08.  The source distribution is freely
-available via the World-Wide Web and through anon. FTP; details below.
+available via the World-Wide Web and through anon. FTP, under a
+BSD-style license.  See below for download details.  Pre-built
+packages for Linux, FreeBSD, Solaris and Win32 are also available.
 
 Haskell is "the" standard lazy functional programming language; the
 current language version is Haskell 98, agreed in December 1998.
-Haskell related information is available from the Haskell home page at
 
-       http://www.haskell.org/
+GHC is a state-of-the-art optimising compiler for Haskell, generating
+good code for a variety of platforms.  The distribution includes space
+and time profiling facilities, a large collection of libraries, and
+support for various language extensions, including concurrency, exceptions,
+and foreign language interfaces (C, C++, whatever).
+
+A wide variety of Haskell related resources (tutorials, libraries,
+specifications, documentation, compilers, interpreters, references,
+contact information, links to research groups) are available from the
+Haskell home page at
+
+        http://www.haskell.org/
 
 GHC's Web page lives at
 
-       http://www.haskell.org/ghc/
+        http://www.haskell.org/ghc/
 
 + What's new
 =============
@@ -47,8 +59,7 @@ There are the following changes
 
 For full details see the release notes:
 
-       http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/4.08/users_guide/release-4-08.html
-
+        http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/4.08/users_guide/release-4-08.html
 
 + Mailing lists
 ================
@@ -66,31 +77,28 @@ Please send bug reports about GHC to glasgow-haskell-bugs@haskell.org;
 GHC users hang out on glasgow-haskell-users@haskell.org.  Bleeding
 edge CVS users party on cvs-ghc@haskell.org.
 
-
 + On-line GHC-related resources
 ================================
 
 Relevant URLs on the World-Wide Web:
 
-GHC home page            http://www.haskell.org/ghc/
-Haskell home page        http://www.haskell.org/
+GHC home page             http://www.haskell.org/ghc/
+Haskell home page         http://www.haskell.org/
 comp.lang.functional FAQ  http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~gmh/faq.html
 
-
 + How to get it
 ================
 
 The easy way is to go to the WWW page, which should be
 self-explanatory:
 
-       http://www.haskell.org/ghc/
+        http://www.haskell.org/ghc/
 
 Once you have the distribution, please follow the pointers in the
 README file to find all of the documentation about this release.  NB:
 preserve modification times when un-tarring the files (no `m' option
 for tar, please)!
 
-
 + System requirements
 ======================
 
@@ -99,7 +107,7 @@ To compile the sources, you need a machine with 32+MB memory, GNU C
 release is known to work on the following platforms:
 
   * i386-unknown-{linux,freebsd,netbsd,cygwin32,mingw32}
-  * sparc-sun-{sunos4,solaris2}
+  * sparc-sun-solaris2
   * hppa1.1-hp-hpux{9,10}
 
 Ports to the following platforms should be relatively easy (for a
@@ -114,3 +122,4 @@ The builder's guide included in distribution gives a complete
 run-down of what ports work; an on-line version can be found at
 
    http://www.haskell.org/ghc/docs/4.08/building/building-guide.html
+