PLT Unix Installation

The file you have downloaded is called plt.ARCH.tar.gz, where ARCH is replaced by the name of your architecture (eg, i386-freebsd for FreeBSD or sparc-solaris for Solaris on a Sparc architecture).

Unpacking

Uncompress the distribution using the GNU gunzip utility: 
    gunzip plt.ARCH.tar.gz

The gzip utility can simulate gunzip with the -d file. If you don't have gzip, you can obtain it from the GNU archive. Once you have uncompressed the distribution, you should have a file called plt.ARCH.tar.

Extract the contents of the distribution using the tar command: 

    tar -xvlf plt.ARCH.tar
This will create a directory called plt/ in the current directory.

Determine where you want the distribution to eventually reside. We recommend the directory /usr/local/lib/plt/. If you cannot or do not wish to use that location, you may pick any other (including, say, one of your own directories). Move the plt/ directory into its final destination, e.g., 

    mv ./plt /usr/local/lib/

At this point, you can delete the distribution file (plt.ARCH.tar) using rm.

If you're low on disk space, you can do all this in a single step. For instance, the default configuration can be obtained thus: 

    cd TARGET
    gzcat LOCATION/plt.ARCH.tar.gz | tar -xvlf -
    rm LOCATION/plt.ARCH.tar.gz
where TARGET denotes the target directory for the installation, and LOCATION denotes the location of the compressed file, and gzcat can be performed by gzip using the -cd flag.

Internal Installation

Run ./install while the current directory is plt/. This will modify the scripts in plt/bin/ (based on the full pathname of the current directory) and will create .zo files (for faster startups). All files are created within the plt/ directory hierarchy.

Modifying Your Path Variable

All of the PLT executables are in plt/bin/. Thus, you might wish to include /usr/local/lib/plt/bin/ or ${PLTHOME}/bin/ in your PATH (as appropriate). You could also create links from some standard directory to the executables. For instance, if you put the distribution in /usr/local/lib/plt, you could add these links: 
    cd /usr/local/bin
    ln -s /usr/local/lib/plt/bin/drscheme .
    ln -s /usr/local/lib/plt/bin/drscheme-jr .
    ln -s /usr/local/lib/plt/bin/mzscheme .
    ln -s /usr/local/lib/plt/bin/mzc .
    ln -s /usr/local/lib/plt/bin/mred .
To do this, you probably need root privileges.

PLT / scheme@cs.rice.edu