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Introduction

The Cecil standard library defines a collection of data structures and control structures used by most Cecil programs. Since even basic structures that would be built into other languages--like integers, conditional statements, and loops--are defined at user level, it is easy to define and use new control structures and new operations on the standard data types.

This manual describes the data and control structures which make up the noeval standard library. They are available to a program which explicitly includes the file prelude.noeval.cecil or which is compiled by the Vortex compiler with the stdlib (default) or noevalstdlib standard library levels. The ``How To Use Vortex'' document describes the additional functionality of the evaluator which is available to each program compiled at the stdlib level. The small standard library (small) is a part of the noeval library, but its independent use is discouraged.

This manual presents data and control structures in five sections:

with the last section describing precedences of binary operators defined in the library.

Verbal description is generally preceded by Cecil code declaring the objects and methods. Method bodies are not shown; the headers show ``types'' of arguments and the result. Examples sometimes follow the verbal description. Finally, file names refer the user to the source code for the most complete and up-to-date details.

When appropriate, abstract interfaces are described in the first part of a subsection and concrete implementations of these interfaces in the second part. In most cases, a representation and its most specific type are declared in a single object declaration, inheritance and subtyping in an isa declaration. For such objects and inheritance/subtyping, the words ``class'' and ``subclass'' will be used occasionally. Template objects are sometimes called ``concrete classes'' since they may be instantiated at runtime.



Subsections
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