GAP forum
On Fri, Jul 06, 2001 at 04:27:45PM +0100, Kurt Ewald wrote:
> Dear forum,
> is it possible to read the sourcecode of some functions of GAP4.

Dear Kurt,

The short answer is: Yes.
Firstly, if what you want printed is indeed a function (documented with a
F) as opposed to an operation (documented with an O) and written in GAP
i.e. in the library rather than the kernel, you can use `Print' e.g. (the
"\n" just adds a new-line so you get back to a clean gap> prompt):

gap> Print(PrimeResidues, "\n");
function ( m )
    local  residues, p, i;
    if m < 0  then
        m := - m;
    fi;
    if m < 8  then
        return ShallowCopy( PrimeResiduesSmall[m + 1] );
    fi;
    residues := [ 1 .. m - 1 ];
    for p  in Set( FactorsInt( m ) )  do
        for i  in [ 1 .. m / p - 1 ]  do
            residues[p * i] := 1;
        od;
    od;
    return Set( residues );
end
gap> Print(Centralizer, "\n");  
function ( arg )
    local  super, sub, value;
    if Length( arg ) <> 2  then
        return CallFuncList( oper, arg );
    fi;
    super := arg[1];
    sub := arg[2];
    if HasParent( sub ) and IsIdenticalObj( super, Parent( sub ) )  then
        if Tester( attr )( sub )  then
            value := attr( sub );
        else
            value := oper( super, sub );
            Setter( attr )( sub, value );
        fi;
    else
        value := oper( super, sub );
    fi;
    return value;
end

Even when `Print' doesn't help you still have access to all the GAP
library and source code. Most of the library code is in the `lib'
directory (other components are in `prim' - primitive groups, `small' -
small groups, etc.) and the kernel (C code) is in the `src' directory. In
theory, it's all human-readable, though probably you will only want to
try and read the library code components: typically, functions are
declared in files with .gd extensions and then their code is in a .gi
files, but there are also .g files; mostly, if a function is declared in
<file>.gd, then its code is in <file>.gi ... in cases where this is not
true, code tends to be a little trickier to locate. On UNIX systems, this
information plus knowing about `grep' is generally enough to locate any
piece of GAP library code ... I haven't a clue how to do the equivalent
in a Windows environment.

Anyway, I hope that goes some way to answering your question.

  Regards,
  Greg Gamble
___________________________________________________________________
Greg Gamble   __________________   mailto:gregg@math.rwth-aachen.de
Lehrstuhl D fuer Mathematik                     Tel: +49 241 804545
Templergraben 64                                
52062 Aachen, Germany   http://www.math.rwth-aachen.de/~Greg.Gamble
___________________________________________________________________