Preface -- Rapide Toolset Quickstart

Douglas C. Campbell
October 1, 1996

Preface: Rapide Toolset Quickstart.

Objective: To show the steps necessary to compile and execute a Rapide model, and to then view the result.

In this quickstart tutorial, we will go though the steps necessary to use the Rapide toolset components. In this section, and in all following sections, we assume that you have access to an installed version of the Rapide toolset. If you do not, please visit the Stanford Rapide Project Home Page and obtain the toolset before going any further. For the latest manuals concerning the Rapide 1.0 language, you can visit the Rapide Publications FTP Site.

The following should be done before examining the Rapide Progressive Examples in any great detail:

Obtain the pathname which locates the Rapide binaries and man pages. Modify your PATH and MANPATH environment variables to reference these pathnames. If you have successfully done this, then, from a session with the modified PATH and MANPATH, you should get no errors from the commands
man r.mklib
and
pov
Create a new directory called helloworld. The directory should be empty, and you should have read/write access to it.
cd to the newly made helloworld directory.
Issue the command r.mklib. If the command is successful, performing an ls -a should indicate that the subdirectory .rpdlib has been created. This directory is used during the compilation and link procedures, and must be present.
Create a very short Rapide language file (model). In the helloworld directory, create the file hello.rpd containing the following text exactly as printed (including the double-semicolon):
```
       type T is interface
       behavior
        action Hello_World();
       begin
        Start => Hello_World;;
       end T;
```
Now, compile the model you just created. Enter the following at the command prompt:
```
       rpdc -M T -o helloexe hello.rpd
```
This will create an executable named helloexe from hello.rpd. To find out what the compilation parameters mean, enter a man rpdc command to read the man pages on rpdc.
A file named helloexe with execution privileges should be present in the helloworld directory. Execute this file by entering
```
       helloexe
```
at the command prompt. This performs a Rapide simulation.
Executing helloexe creates a file named helloexe.log in the current working directory (helloworld).
This file contains the results of the simulation. To view these results, enter
```
       pov helloexe.log
```
You should see two boxes (Start and helloworld) with an arrow between them. This is very pretty, but won't make much sense until you read Part I (For now, we're just showing you how to "pick up" the tool).

You can exit pov by using the system menu and selecting close.
To remove temporary files created during the compilation process, you can enter
```
       r.cleanlib
```

At this point, you have picked up and handled several of the most important tools in the Rapide toolset. One particularly interesting tool not discussed here, the Rapide Animator (raptor), is discussed in Part II. It is suggested, however, that you view the Examples in the order they occur in the Index.

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