


                 O B J E C T I V E - C   F A B R I C A T O R
	
                               by David Stes

WHAT IS FAB ?

	Fab is a tool for producing Objective C objects; the source
	code of the Computer Algebra Kit, a set of Objective C
	objects for arbitrary precision arithmetic and computer
	algebra, is written in "fab".
	
	Fab extracts private and public header, source and
	documentation files from files with a ".fab" extension.
	Given a file named "MyObject.fab", fab deposits,
	depending on the options being used, files called
	"MyObject.h", "MyObject.m", "MyObject.html" etc. in the
	specified directories.
	
	In my opinion, the most important benefit of using "fab" is
	the ability to produce public/private header files.

HISTORY

	I wrote 'fab' back in 1994 with the GNU compiler on SunOS.
	It was also ported to the Stepstone compiler.

	Some cleanup in '98 for the POC.

	10/98 :
	* use Paragraph/Text classes for extra pass, so documentation
	* can now more easily be generated in various formats.
	* add new files html.m, ascii.m and nroff.m to render in those formats
	* this also means you need POC 1.10.1 or higher now to compile fab
	* remove -Hhtml option, added -rtf option

INSTALLING THE SOFTWARE

	Type in a shell,
	
		make install
	
	to install fab in your home directory (~/bin).

	On HP-UX, you have to add a -Ae flag to OBJCOPT (or to CFLAGS).
	
	There's also a manpage for fab.
	
	You might have to add, ~/man to your MANPATH for 'man fab' to work. 

	Of course, it's also possible to install fab in a place like
	/usr/local for use by a workgroup (see the Makefile).

