[igraph] miscellaneous from a newbie, docs and interfacing

[Marco Maggi]

Ciao,

  I  am  examining  IGraph  for  a  possible  binding  to  a
high-level language.  I am using it on GNU+Linux.  I really,
really,  really appreciate  the fact  that  the distribution
comes  with   documentation  in  Info   format  (though  not
traditionally structured).

* Is it  possible to have  the doc file  named "igraph.info"
  rather    than    "igraph-docs.info",    and   make    the
  "install-info" Makefile rule install it?

* There  are  several  typos  in  the docs,  is  the  source
  available?   In   what  format?   (I  gather   it  is  not
  Texinfo... :-/)

* IMHO having  the tutorial full of references  to other doc
  nodes is distracting; at least  it is so when browsing the
  Info file.  Is it possible to turn off tutorial references
  creation for the Info output?

* While I am  fine with having C macros  with "short" names,
  if  they are not  in their  namespace problems  may arise.
  "VECTOR"  is  not a  good  name;  what  about defining  an
  optional CPP  symbol to let  the macros have an  IG prefix
  (that is "VECTOR" becomes "IGVECTOR")?

  #ifdef IGRAPH_PREFIX_MACROS
  #  define IGVECTOR(...) ...
  #else
  #  define VECTOR(...) ...
  #endif

* Skimming through the  headers I see a number  of C macros;
  these are  a bit of a  problem for me,  because my binding
  will  use a  Foreign Functions  Interface.  Is  there some
  plan to offer  the same functionality with "dlopen()"-able
  C functions, too?  Or are the macros completely optional?

* I see that the library implements containers for different
  base types; it is not clear,  from what I have read in the
  doc so  far, if the  graph functions accept  containers of
  any  type  or  only  of  the default  type.   Do  I  loose
  functionality  if   I  interface  only   the  default-type
  functions?

TIA
-- 
Marco Maggi