$Id: README,v 1.5 1997/08/21 11:01:19 tiggr Exp $

The functionality provided by the tom unit was, at least partly, inspired
by libtl, NeXTstep, NeXTSTEP, OpenStep, and the GNUstep base library.

BINARY CODING
-------------

    This is the binary coding format.  This description is possibly
    cryptic, but it's a great aid when debugging.

    tag + parms		description
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------
    0			nil
    2			switch to 2-byte (char) references
    4			switch to 4-byte (int) references
    @ 1r 2r		introduction of new object
			1r	assigned object reference number
			2r	class object's reference number
    )			finished encoding an object
    # 1r 2i bbb 4i	introduction of new class
			1r	assigned class object reference number
			2i	num bytes in bbb
			bbb	<unitname>.<classname>
			4i	class' coding version
    r 1r		object or class object reference
			1r	reference number

    S 1i 2o		selector introduction
			1i	sel sequence number assigned to this sel
			2o	Selector object describing sel
				(based on String rep of the sel)
    s 1i		selector reference
			1i	sel sequence number (denotes known sel)
				if 0, it is the nullSelector

    o 1b		boolean value
			1b	0x00 for false, 0x01 for true
    b 1b		byte value
			1b	byte value
    c 1b 2b		char value
			1b	lsb
			2b	msb
    i 1b 2b 3b 4b	int value
			1b	lsb
			2b
			3b
			4b	msb
    l bbb		long value
			bbb	4 bytes, lsb first
    f 1s		float value
			1s	string object containing printed rep (choke!)
    d 1s		double value
			1s	string object containing printed rep (barf!)

    B 1i bbb		bunch of bytes
			1i	number of bytes to follow
			bbb	the bytes

    ! 1i		reference to proxy's original at decoding side
			1i	proxy number 
    $ 1i		reference to proxy's original at encoding side
			1i	proxy number
    ~ 1i		report remote proxy death at encoding side
			1i	proxy number
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------


BINARY VERSIONS

    head		description
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------
    			version 0: no identification
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------
