The Reconstruction Engine:
a computer implementation of the comparative method
>>>Our apologies, but RE is not available yet. We expect to have a distributable version in the near future.<<<
Program Requirements
In order to run RE, you'll need to get the following list of things together in the same place at the same time:
- SPITBOL-386, a compiler for the SPITBOL programming language.(available from Catspaw, Inc. Salida, CO. Make sure to get version 2.7 or higher, especially if you use a memory manager (such as HIMEM.SYS for Windows).)
- A computer capable of running or emulating MS-DOS or PC-DOS, version 3.1 or higher. Besides being able to accomplish this feat, your computer must also
- Be able to run 80386 software in protected mode. Basically, this means you need an 80386 processor or higher.
- Have at least 1 megabyte of RAM, and 4 or more is better. There is no precise way to say how much memory would be needed for any particular set of data. For the Tamang data with which we have been experimenting, 8 megs has been quite adequate. A statistical summary of this data (for planning purposes only) is included in Appendix E.
- Have approximately two megabytes of disk space available for RE itself. You may need substantially more if you have large data files.
- Support ANSI.SYS, which is used by the windowing functions of RE. You may have to install this in your CONFIG.SYS file, though in some computers this support is built-in. See your computer's hardware manual for instructions.
We would be interested to hear your reactions to the program. You may contact us at:
John Lowe
Linguistics department
2337 Dwinelle Hall
University of California at Berkeley
Berkeley, CA 94720-2650
voice: (510) 643-5623 / fax: (510) 643-9911
email: jblowe@garnet.berkeley.edu
Martine Mazaudon
LACITO/CNRS
44 rue de l'Amiral Mouchez
75014 Paris, France
email: mazaudon@LACITO.msh-paris.fr