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Garnet Toolkit Frequently Asked Questions



Archive-name: garnet-faq
Last-modified: June 17, 1994--BAM
Posting-Frequency: bi-monthly

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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) about Garnet.

This file is stored as:
	ftp://a.gp.cs.cmu.edu/usr/garnet/garnet/FAQ

------------------------------------------------------------------------
The following questions about Garnet are answered below:

[1] What Is Garnet?
[2] How do I get Garnet?
[3] Does Garnet run on a Macintosh or a PC?
[4] Which forms of Lisp does Garnet work in?
[5] What hardware does Garnet run on?
[6] How do I get CMU CL (a free, public domain lisp)?
[7] How do I get MCL (Macintosh Common Lisp)?
[8] I am having trouble getting CLX to work...
[9] Why doesn't Garnet use CLOS?
[10] When will there be a C or C++ version of Garnet?
[11] What do all the acronyms stand for?
[12] How can I learn more about Garnet?

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[1] What Is Garnet?

Garnet is a user interface development environment for Common Lisp and
X11 or Macintosh.  It helps you create graphical, interactive user interfaces 
for your software.  Garnet is a large scale system containing many features
and parts.
* Toolkit intrinsics:
   - A custom object-oriented programming system which uses a
	   prototype-instance model. 
   - A graphics layer that hides the differences between X/11 and Macintosh.
   - Automatic constraint maintenance: so properties of objects can depend on
	   properties of other objects, and be automatically re-evaluated
	   when the other objects change.  The constraints can be
	   arbitrary lisp expressions.
   - Built-in, high-level input event handling.
   - Support for gesture recognition
   - Widgets for multi-font, multi-line, mouse-driven text editing.
   - Optional automatic layout of application data into lists, tables, trees,
	   or graphs.
   - Automatic generation of PostScript for printing.
   - Support for large-scale applications and data visualization.
* Two complete widget sets:
   - One with a Motif look and feel implemented in Lisp, and one with
	   a custom look and feel.
* Interactive design tools for creating parts of the interface without
	   writing code:
   - Gilt interface builder for creating dialog boxes
   - Lapidary interactive tool for creating new widgets and for
	   drawing application-specific objects.
   - C32 spreadsheet system for specifying complex constraints.
  (The next parts are not yet ready for release.)
   - Jade automatic dialog box creation system.
   - Marquise interactive tool for specifying behaviors.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[2] How do I get Garnet?
	 
Garnet is available for free by anonymous FTP.  There is currently
only one site from which it is available.   To retrieve Garnet, ftp to
a.gp.cs.cmu.edu (128.2.242.7).  When asked to log in, use "anonymous", and
your name as the password.  Then change to the garnet directory (note the
double garnet's) and get the README explanation file:
	ftp> cd /usr/garnet/garnet/
	ftp> get README
NOTE: We are currently working on the ALPHA version of 3.0, which
supports the Macintosh.  To get the ALPHA release, use the directory
path /usr/garnet/garnet/alpha/ instead of the above.

Now, follow the directions in the README file.

There are no restrictions on your use or redistribution of Garnet.

NOTE: If you are reading this FAQ from Mosaic or another WWW client,
you can get the README file and perform the ftp operations by selecting
"Garnet FTP directory" off of the Garnet Home Page -- under the
Garnet Information menu.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[3] Does Garnet run on a Macintosh or a PC?

The Macintosh version of Garnet is in early Alpha test.  You can FTP
it if you want to help us debug it.  We expect an official release
later this summer.  There are no plans for a PC version.

The object and constraint system of Garnet, called KR, will work by
itself on other systems, since it only uses straight CommonLisp and no
window manager.  You can FTP just the KR part and the KR manual from
the standard Garnet distribution (see question [2]).
	 
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[4] Which forms of Lisp does Garnet work in?

On the Macintosh, we only support MCL Version 2.0.1.  On Unix, we
support every Lisp that we have come across which has a CLX (interface
to X11), which currently includes Allegro, Lucid, CMU, Harlequin
Lispworks, AKCL, CLISP and TI Explorer Lisps.  It appears that AKCL
and CLISP are quite slow.  (See also question [6].)

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[5] What hardware does Garnet run on?

Garnet runs on any hardware that has X11 and Common Lisp
implementations.  This is pretty much any workstation class machine,
including Sun, DEC, HP, Apollo, IBM 6000, Silicon Graphics, etc.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[6] How do I get CMU CL?

CMU CL is a free, high-quality implementation of full Common Lisp
which works on Suns and other hardware.  CMU Common Lisp is a separate
project unrelated to Garnet.  Garnet does work in CMU CL, and the
following information is from the standard CMU CL FAQ:

   CMU Common Lisp is free, and runs on Sparcs (Mach and SunOs),
   DecStation 3100 (Mach), IBM RT (Mach) and requires 16mb RAM, 25mb
   disk. It includes an incremental compiler, Hemlock emacs-style editor,
   source-code level debugger, code profiler and is mostly X3J13
   compatible, including the new loop macro.  It is available by anonymous
   ftp from any CMU CS machine, such as ftp.cs.cmu.edu [128.2.206.173], in the
   directory /afs/cs.cmu.edu/project/clisp/release. Login with username
   "anonymous" and "userid@host" (your email address) as password. Due to
   security restrictions on anonymous ftps (some of the superior
   directories on the path are protected against outside access), it is
   important to "cd" to the source directory with a single command.
   Don't forget to put the ftp into binary mode before using "get" to
   obtain the compressed/tarred files. The binary releases are
   contained in files of the form
                <version>-<machine>_<os>.tar.Z
   Other files in this directory of possible interest are
   *-source.tar.Z, which contains all the ".lisp" source files
   used to build the various versions. Use "dir" or "ls" to see what is
   available. Bug reports should be sent to cmucl-bugs@cs.cmu.edu.

Please do not send CMU CL questions to the Garnet group: use 
cmucl-bugs@cs.cmu.edu instead.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[7] How do I get MCL (Macintosh Common Lisp)?

For information about MCL (including whether and when it will work on
the PowerPC), consult the Internet bboard comp.lang.lisp.mcl.

Macintosh Common Lisp is sold by Apple and is available from the Apple
Programmers and Developers Association (APDA). To order MCL, and to
get a free catalog featuring over 300 other Apple programming
products, contact:

        APDA
        Apple Computer, Inc
        20525 Mariani Ave.
        Cupertino, CA 95014

        800-282-APDA (800-282-2732), toll-free in the USA
        800-637-0029, toll-free in Canada
        716-871-6555, international
        716-871-6511, fax

        APDA    (Applelink)
        APDA@applelink.apple.com        (internet)
        A.DEVELOPER3    (GEnie)
        76666,2405      (Compuserve)
        APDA Sale       (America Online)

MCL is also available from APDA programs in many countries. Contact your
local Apple office for more information.  In Germany, try:

	Thilo Bretschneider
	Promo GmbH
	Waterloohain 6-8
	D-22769 Hamburg, Germany
	Applelink: GER.APDA
	Internet: GER.APDA@applelink.apple.com
	phone: 49-40-43-13-60-66
	fax:   49-40-43-13-60-60

MCL is also available from SFA (Software Frameworks Association, formerly
called MADA), an independent nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting
the use of object technology in software development. Several levels of
membership are available. SFA members may purchase MCL at a special
discount. For more information, please contact SFA at:

        Software Frameworks Association
        Suite 202-B
        10062 Miller Ave.
        Cupertino, CA 95014

        408-253-2765 (phone)
        408-253-2767 (fax)
        FRAMEWORKS@applelink.apple.com (email)

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[8] I am having trouble getting CLX to work...

CLX should be supplied with every Common Lisp for Unix.  If you have
trouble with CLX, please contact your Lisp vendor.  We can't help you.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[9] Why doesn't Garnet use CLOS?

CLOS is the standard Common Lisp Object System, and Garnet uses a
custom object system (called KR) instead.  There are a number of
reasons for this.

The main reason is that Garnet uses a prototype-instance model, rather
than the conventional class-instance model supported by CLOS.  We have
found the prototype model to be more effective for user interface
prototyping and construction.  A second reason is performance: it
appears that KR is more efficient than CLOS for most standard
operations.  Since we have control of KR, we can also optimize the
performance of constraint satisfaction, which would require extra
overhead in CLOS.

There are no plans for a CLOS version of Garnet, although we are
thinking about easier mechanisms to link Garnet objects and an
application's CLOS objects.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[10] When will there be a C or C++ version of Garnet?

We are currently working on the design for a C++ version of Garnet.
This will be developed in collaboration with researchers from Georgia
Tech, USC/ISI, and others.  We are especially interested in corporate
sponsors of this effort.  If you would like to help and influence the
C++ version of Garnet, please let us know.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[11] What do all the acronyms stand for?

GARNET:				KR:			CORAL:
Generating an			Knowledge		Constraint-Based,
Amalgam of			Representation		Object-Oriented
Real-time,						Relations
Novel				OPAL:			And
Editors and			Object			Language
Toolkits			Programming		
				Aggregate		
C32:				Layer			JADE:
CMU's							Judgement-based
Clever and			LAPIDARY:		Automatic
Compelling			Lisp-Based		Dialog
Contribution to			Assistant for		Editor
Computer Science in		Prototyping		
CommonLisp which is		Interface		
Customizable and		Designs			
Characterized by a		Allowing		GEM
Complete			Remarkable		Graphics and
Coverage of			Yield			Events
Code and 						Manager
Contains a			AGATE:			
Cornucopia of			A			
Creative			Gesture-recognizer
Constructs, because it		And
Can				Trainer by
Create				Example
Complex,			
Correct				
Constraints that are		MARQUISE:
Constructed			Mostly
Clearly and			Automated,
Concretely, and			Remarkably
Communicated using		Quick
Columns of			User
Cells, that are			Interface
Constantly			Software
Calculated so they		Environment
Change				
Continuously, and		
Cancel
Confusion.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[12] How can I learn more about Garnet?

There is an Internet bulletin board called comp.windows.garnet on
which Garnet is discussed.  If you cannot access this, then the
messages are repeated on the mailing list garnet-users@cs.cmu.edu.
Send mail to garnet@cs.cmu.edu to be added if you cannot access the
bulletin board.

There is a World-wide Web page about Garnet which can be accessed via
WWW browsers, such as Mosaic.  It contains pictures of the Garnet
developers, screen shots from some of your applications, abstracts and
postscript for papers, and links to the Garnet FTP directories and
other information.  You can get to the Garnet page by opening the
following URL from within your browser:
   http://www.cs.cmu.edu:8001/Web/Groups/garnet/garnet-home.html

The complete reference manuals for Garnet, which include a tour and
tutorial, are available for anonymous FTP (see instructions above).
The best overview article about Garnet appeared in IEEE Computer, vol.
23, No. 11., Nov, 1990. pp. 71-85.  A number of old articles about
Garnet were collected into a CMU Technical Report: "The Garnet
Compendium: Collected Papers, 1989-1990" CMU-CS-90-154, August, 1990.
A new compendium has been printed including 9 recent papers: "The
Second Garnet Compendium: Collected Papers, 1990-1992" CMU-CS-93-108,
February, 1993.  To order either, send mail to reports@cs.cmu.edu.
There have been about 35 refereed papers and 12 technical reports
about Garnet so far, including papers in OOPSLA (88, 92), SIGCHI (89,
90, 91, 92, 93, 94), ACM TOIS (July 90), Visual Computer (Feb 92), and
UIST (89, 91, 92), and a complete bibliography is available on the
Mosaic pages.  The bibliography and the postscript for some articles
are stored in the directory /usr/garnet/garnet/doc/papers/