New Features for Compaq Visual Fortran Version 6.1

New features added to Compaq Visual Fortran (Visual Fortran) Version 6.1 (since Version 6.0.A) include the following:

• The Compaq Extended Math Library (CXML) is now provided with the Visual Fortran kit (all editions). CXML is a highly efficient set of math library routines that covers Basic Linear Algebra (BLAS), Linear Algebra Routines (LAPACK), sparse linear system solvers, sorting routines, random number generation, and signal processing functions.

  In addition to being provided with Visual Fortran, CXML is also available on other Compaq Fortran platforms. CXML is:

  • Provided with Compaq Fortran Version 5.3 (or later) for Tru64 UNIX Alpha systems and Compaq Fortran Version 1.0 (or later) for Linux Alpha Systems
  • Provided with Compaq Visual Fortran Version 6.1 (or later)
  • Provided with Compaq Fortran Version 7.3 (or later) for OpenVMS Alpha systems
  • Available as a separate download for most platforms (see the CXML home page at http://www.compaq.com/math)

  For more information on CXML, see Using the Compaq Extended Math Library (CXML) in the Programmer's Guide or the online PDF file Cxmlref.pdf. For information on online PDF files, see The IMSL Routines and CXML Routines Online PDF Documentation.

• IMSL® Version 4 libraries are now provided with the Professional Edition (prior to Visual Fortran 6.1, Visual Fortran provided IMSL Version 3 libraries). The IMSL routines reference documentation is available in PDF format (not HLP format).

  For information on using the IMSL libraries, see Using the IMSL Mathematical and Statistical Libraries in the Programmer's Guide. For information on online PDF files, see The IMSL Routines and CXML Routines Online PDF Documentation. For more information about IMSL and Visual Numerics®, Inc., see http://www.vni.com.

• New functionality has been added to the Dialog Procedures:
  • You can use ActiveX Controls in your dialog boxes. See Using ActiveX Controls in the Using Dialogs section in the Programmer's Guide.
    
    
  • Edit Box control enhancements:
    
    You can now use multi-line edit controls and the maximum size restriction of 256 characters has been removed. The Edit Box control supports 2 additional integer indexes (see Using Edit Boxes):
    
    
    • DLG_TEXTLENGTH - Sets or Gets the current length of the text in the edit box.
    • DLG_POSITION - Sets or Gets the current text cursor position in the edit box.
      
      
  • The dialog box supports a new callback index, DLG_SIZECHANGE (see Control Indexes). This callback is invoked when the size of the dialog box changes.
    
    
  • New dialog routines are provided:
    • DlgSetTitle - Sets the title of the dialog box.
    • DlgFlush - Updates the display of the dialog box. Useful when changing the dialog box outside of a dialog callback.
    • DlgModalWithParent - Allows you to specify the parent window of a modal dialog box. Useful in an SDI or MDI Windows application that uses modal dialog boxes.
    • DlgIsDlgMessageWithDlg - Allows you to specify which dialog box to check. Useful when the dialog box was created in a DLL.
• New SPORT_xxx (Serial Port) routines have been added.

  The SPORT_xxx collection of routines helps Fortran programmers do basic input and output to serial communication ports. The programming model is much the same as a normal file except the user does a connect/release instead of an open/close. Two types of read and write operations are provided:

  • Read and write arbitrary data from/to the port
  • Read and write line terminated data

  Calls are provided to set basic port parameters such as baud rate, stop bits, timeouts, and so on. Additionally, a call is provided to return the WIN32 handle to the port so that raw WIN32 APIs may be used to implement additional needs of the programmer.

  The documentation overview can be found in Using the Serial I/O Port Routines in the Programmers Guide.

  For a detailed description of the routines, see the Language Reference, A to Z Reference under S (SPORT_xxx), such as SPORT_CONNECT.

• The new subroutine TRACEBACKQQ allows you to initiate a stack trace in your program whenever you like. The input arguments allow you to specify your own message text to head the output and other options as well. See the following for more information:
  
  
  • Obtaining Traceback Information with TRACEBACKQQ in the Programmer's Guide
  • TRACEBACKQQ in the Language Reference, A to Z Reference.
    
    
• In Developer Studio, you can now print a Fortran source file in color (requires a color printer). After you open the source file in the text editor, in the File menu select Print Colorized Fortran. This has been tested with the Internet Explorer and Netscape browsers. Because Print Colorized Fortran does not know when printing has completed, it creates and leaves the HTML file in your TEMP directory. Delete previously printed HTML files from your TEMP directory to free up disk space. Print Colorized Fortran uses the FSC utility to create an HTML file with the coloring information and then instructs the application on your system that handles HTML files to print the file. If you encounter a problem using the Print Colorized Fortran item, please use the FSC utility directly.

  The FSC.EXE utility takes an .F90 or .FOR source file and produces an HTML version that is colorized per the current Developer Studio Color settings in the registry. It has default colors that are used if the current registry settings are not available. The resultant HTML file may be printed or viewed with your favorite browser. This utility may be invoked from a command prompt (use FSC -? or FSC /h for help) or from within Developer Studio.

• VFRUN provides a self-extracting executable file that installs redistributable Visual Fortran run-time components on the target system. These run-time components include DLLs and other files, as described in "Redistributing Visual Fortran Files" in Compaq Visual Fortran Installing and Getting Started.

  VFRUN files are provided for different Visual Fortran releases and for x86 and Alpha systems. For example, for Visual Fortran v6.1, VFRUN61i.exe is provided for x86 systems and VFRUN61a.exe is provided for Alpha systems. You can download VFRUN from the Visual Fortran Web site, http://www.compaq.com/fortran (click on Downloads and Updates, then Run-Time Redistributables Kit). Please download the VFRUN kit for the version of Visual Fortran used to create the executable application.

• Visual Fortran (VF) Reporter is a new tool that helps you report problems by e-mail to the Visual Fortran team. This tool gathers and displays system information and guides you to send relevant information in an e-mail message. This tool can be optionally installed during Visual Fortran installation. For information on technical support and using VF Reporter, see Compaq Visual Fortran Installing and Getting Started.
  
  
• Greater Access to Windows APIs

  Additional interface definitions have been provided to simplify calling Win32 routines from Visual Fortran:

  • DFWINTY.F90 has 980 new derived types and 4070 new Fortran parameter constants added. These new items represent the difference between Microsoft Visual C++ 4 header files and Visual C++ 6 header files.
    
    
  • USER32.F90 has 72 new interfaces to routines in USER32.LIB. These new routine interfaces again represent the difference between Microsoft Visual C++ 4 header files and Visual C++ 6 header files.
    
    
  • KERNEL32.f90 has 50 new interfaces to routines in KERNEL32.LIB.
    
    
  • GDI32.F90 has 25 new interfaces to routines in GDI32.LIB.
    
    
  • ADVAPI32.F90 has 50 new interfaces to routines in ADVAPI32.LIB.

  In all these files, the new material is under conditional compilation so that defining "__DO_NOT_INCLUDE_VC6_ITEMS" will remove the new items. Search for the string above to locate the new items which will be found towards the ends of the files.

  The files are shipped without the string being defined, and the mod files will contain the new items.

• New or changed compiler options include:
  
  
  • The /align option now includes the /align:sequence keyword to allow alignment of derived type data with the SEQUENCE statement. This option appears in the Fortran Data category in the Project Settings dialog box (see Categories of Compiler Options).
    
    
  • The /ccdefault:keyword option controls carriage control use when writing to a terminal screen. This new option appears in the Run-Time category in the Project Settings dialog box.
    
    
  • The /cxml option requests that the Compaq Extended Math Library (CXML) library be linked against (provided for documentation purposes only). This new option appears in the Library category in the Project Settings dialog box.
    
    
  • The /fast option now sets the /arch:host /tune:host /align:sequence options.
    
    
  • The /imsl option ensures that the IMSL libraries will be passed to the linker (your program needs to specify the appropriate USE statements and set the IMSL environment variables). This new option appears in the Library category in the Project Settings dialog box.
    
    
• Visual Fortran puts literals into read-only memory so storing into a dummy argument that has a constant as its associated actual argument will result in an access violation and program termination:

  
   call f(0)
   ...
   subroutine f(i)
   i=1                ! this will die
  

• Two new Fortran source directives for controlling optimizations are now available:
  
  
  • cDEC$ IVDEP
  • cDEC$ UNROLL

  For an overview of these directives, see Compiler Directives Related to Performance in the Programmer's Guide.

  For more detail, see IVDEP Directive and UNROLL Directive in the Language Reference.

• Version 6.1 for x86 (Intel) systems contains all of the applicable updated files from the Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0 Service Pack 3. Therefore, Version 6.1 x86 users do not need to install Visual Studio 6.0 Service Pack unless you have other Visual Studio products. Version 6.1 for Alpha systems contains all of the applicable updated files from the Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0 Service Pack 2.
  
  
• You can now maintain previously saved Fortran Environment Project Settings (see Saving and Using the Project Setting Environment for Different Projects. Use the Manage Saved Fortran Environment icon in the Fortran toolbar. Also, application wizards that assist in creating a new Fortran Windows project have been enhanced.
  
  
• HTML Help now supports the ability to define (View menu, Define Subset... item) and use subsets of the current collection of HTML Help titles (see Compaq Visual Fortran Installing and Getting Started). This is especially useful when using the full-text search capabilities of HTML Help.
  
  
• HTML help no longer includes embedded Adobe Acrobat PDF files. Instead, the PDF files ship on the Visual Fortran CD-ROM (and are installed if requested). For details, see The IMSL Routines and CXML Routines Online PDF Documentation. This reduces the size of the Visual Fortran HTML help (CHM) file and minimizes the possibility of software problems displaying embedded PDF files reported on certain systems.
  
  
• For additional details, see the online release notes, installed in Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\Df98.

Changes to Compaq Array Visualizer are described separately in the Array Visualizer HTML Help documentation.