About SISC (Second Interpreter of Scheme Code)
----------------------------------------------

SISC is an extensible Java based interpreter of the algorithmic
language Scheme.  SISC uses modern interpretation techniques, and
handily outperforms all existing JVM interpreters (often by more than
an order of magnitude).

In addition, SISC is a complete implementation of the language. The
entire R5RS Scheme standard is supported, no exceptions. This includes
a full number tower including complex number support, arbitrary
precision integers and floating point numbers, as well as hygenic R5RS
macros, proper tail recursion, and first-class continuations (not just
the escaping continuations as in many limited Scheme systems). SISC
also attempts to implement the standard as correctly as possible,
while still providing exceptional performance.

SISC also provides useful real-world extensions, such as networking,
elegant exception handling, a scope-friendly module system, support
for SLIB, numerous SRFIs, and an extensible type system 
with a Java foreign-function interface.

Finally, native functionality can be added through the use of native
libraries that may add new types, values, and functions to the
language. These extensions can be packaged into scopable modules at
the Scheme level as well.

Installation
------------

Define SISC_HOME in your environment variables to point to the
directory in which you installed the SISC distribution. Then, install
"sisc" (Unix) or "sisc.bat" (Windows) in your path. 
If you are running on a Unix or Unix-like system, you may also wish to 
run the "install-srfi22.sh" script, which will set up SRFI-22 support 
for running Scheme programs directly from the shell.

To run SISC, just type "sisc" or "sisc.bat", followed by any scheme source
files you wish to load.  Refer to the SISC Manual (which accompanies
the full distribution and can be found on the SISC website) for the
full command-line usage instructions.


Bugs
----

If you encounter an unexpected error, please send an email to
sisc-devel@lists.sourceforge.net, with the following information:

1. Build version
2. Steps to reproduce the error
3. A stack trace, 
  (print-exception (get-last-exception))

If you're running the Lite build, you will not be able to perform step 3. 
Please obtain the full build and see if your error occurs there as well,
then submit a report with the stack trace from the full build.  

Website
-------
More information about SISC, including a paper on the implementation
and the full SISC manual, can be found at the SISC website,

http://sisc.sourceforge.net


(C) 2000-2007 Scott G. Miller <scgmille@freenetproject.org>
This software is distributed under a dual licensing scheme, with the
GNU General Public License, v2, and the Mozilla Public License.  The
source code should be available from the same place you found this
binary distribution.
