FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS                              

-------------------
Q:
 What means "Spar"?

A:
 Spar stands for Simple PARser. In fact the oldest releases contains only a top- down parser with a few commands (1999): then, I have decided to learn Linux
 programming under the "law" of the Open Source, of course. Well, Spar, at 
 the beginning was only a parser that only the math operators +,-,*,/.  

--------------------------
Q: 
 What is the Spar Library?

A:
 The Spar library is C/C++ framework to easy develop maths applications. It's
 a comprehensive math library that allows the programmers to write in a safe
 ways many math base application: "spar" (under the dir. text-fe) is a 
 example of SL application.

--------------
Q:
 What is Spar?

A:
 Spar is a math parser that can be easily extended with modules. A module
 is a small C/C++ that compute a specific task, such as solve a quadratic 
 eq, solve a cubic eq. ecc. 
 
 Also the program supports: variables, many common functions, some common
 constants (please, have a look at the man page "man spar").


--------------------------------------------
Q: 
 I can't compile Spar on my Red Hat machine!

A:
 There is a "broken" version of the readline.h include file on many RH 7
 machines. If the compilation process ends with this message: 

gcc -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I..     -Wall -c readline.c
In file included from readline.c:92:
/usr/include/readline/readline.h:376: parse error before `*'
/usr/include/readline/readline.h:445: parse error before `*'
/usr/include/readline/readline.h:445: warning: data definition has no type or storage class
make[2]: *** [readline.o] Error 1
make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/davide/projects/spar-0.5.2/spar'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/davide/projects/spar-0.5.2'
make: *** [all-recursive-am] Error 2

 just add the line "#include <stdio.h>" to the include file 
 /usr/include/readline/readline.h:

#if defined (READLINE_LIBRARY)
#  include "rlstdc.h"
#  include "keymaps.h"
#  include "tilde.h"
#else
#  include <readline/rlstdc.h>
#  include <readline/keymaps.h>
#  include <readline/tilde.h>
#endif

->>> insert here "#include <stdio.h>" <<<-

--------------------------------------------------
Q:
 I think I found a bug! How do I report it to you?

A:
 Well, there is a file called BUG-REPORT installed on your doc directory:
 compile them and send to <davide178@inwind.it> 

-----------------------------------------
Q:
 When you will release the final version?

A:
 Good question. I really do not know. There will be a lot of test versions 
 before the final release which will be somewhere in middle 2002.

---------------------------------------------------------
Q:
 Where I can learn to programming with the Spar Library??

A: 
 At the moment you can learn "Spar Programming" in two ways:
   - by the tutorials (have a look at the "tutorial" dir.)
   - by the source code
   
 Finally, Spar was developed in C but you can use then also in C++ projects
 and soon also in Pascal, Python and Perl.