[m-rev.] diff: update transition guide

[Zoltan Somogyi]

doc/transition_guide.texi:
	Avoid saying that we have a ! predicate, since we don't anymore.

	Fix some other minor problems.

Zoltan.

cvs diff: Diffing .
Index: transition_guide.texi
===================================================================
RCS file: /home/mercury1/repository/mercury/doc/transition_guide.texi,v
retrieving revision 1.39
diff -u -b -r1.39 transition_guide.texi
--- transition_guide.texi	2001/11/04 06:27:26	1.39
+++ transition_guide.texi	2002/07/31 06:45:34
@@ -311,14 +311,6 @@
 @chapter Cuts and indexing
 
 The cut operator is not part of the Mercury language.
-The builtin library does contain a predicate !/0 (and !/2 for DCGs),
-but it is just defined as being identical to @samp{true},
-and is there primarily for historical reasons at footnote{
-The Mercury compiler was originally bootstrapped using
-NU-Prolog and SICStus Prolog.  We needed to use cuts for
-efficiency in a few places.  Of course, now that we compile
-the Mercury compiler with itself the cuts are not needed
---- and it runs much faster anyway.}.
 In addition, the conditional operator @samp{-> ;}
 does not do a hard cut across the condition
 - only a soft cut which prunes away either the `then' goal or the `else' goal.
@@ -379,8 +371,8 @@
 that pinpoints which part of the code needs changing.
 Second, in some situations the code generator
 can implement an indexed disjunction (which we call a @emph{switch})
-using a jump table or a hash table,
-which is faster than a chain of if-then-elses.
+using binary search, a jump table or a hash table,
+which can be faster than a chain of if-then-elses.
 
 @node Accumulators
 @chapter Accumulators and Difference lists
@@ -435,13 +427,13 @@
 than the Prolog code using difference lists.
 
 In most circumstances, the need for difference lists is negated by
-the simple fact that Mercury is efficient enough for them to be
-unnecessary.  Occasionally they can lead to a significant improvement
-in the complexity of an operation (mixed insertions and deletions
-from a long queue, for example) and in these situations an alternative
-solution should
-be sought (in the case of queues, the Mercury library uses the
-pair of lists proposed by Richard O'Keefe).
+the simple fact that Mercury is efficient enough for them to be unnecessary.
+Occasionally they can lead to a significant improvement
+in the complexity of an operation
+(mixed insertions and deletions from a long queue, for example)
+and in these situations an alternative solution should be sought
+(in the case of queues,
+the Mercury library uses the pair of lists proposed by Richard O'Keefe).
 
 @node Determinism
 @chapter Determinism
@@ -510,7 +502,7 @@
 
 Prolog's various different all-solutions predicates (findall/3, bagof/3,
 and setof/3) all have semantic problems.
-Mercury's has a different set of all-solutions predicates (solutions/2,
+Mercury has a different set of all-solutions predicates (solutions/2,
 solutions_set/2, and unsorted_solutions/2 -- all defined in the library
 module @samp{std_util}) that
 address the problems of the Prolog versions.
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