ANNOUNCE: LVB phylogeny program Web page updated

[Daniel Barker]

http://www.icmb.ed.ac.uk/sokal.html is the Web page for the free
phylogeny program LVB. The Web page has recently been updated and
expanded.

LVB is intended for use where there is a very large amount of
information (e.g., hundreds of aligned DNA sequences). The program was
written to investigate use of the heuristic known as simulated
annealing in the search for parsimonious phylogenetic trees.

The manual is available free, in a new electronic version. It
documents LVB for users, and also the internals of the program itself
for those interested in checking or modifying LVB.

The program is free, and is now available for many popular computer
systems: PowerPC or compatible with MacOS; Pentium or compatible with
Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows NT; Pentium or compatible with
Windows 3.1 or Windows 3.11; C source code which may be compiled for
Unix. All of these may be downloaded from the Web page, and used and
copied freely. It is possible to register as a user, but this is
optional. Registration is not required to download the program or
receive support.

The Web page answers some frequently asked questions, and has links to
some related biology, evolution and bioinformatics sites.

I am happy to receive questions about LVB. I can give advice on using
LVB efficiently, and am also happy to discuss the algorithms used and
their implementation in LVB. Please let me know about any suggestions
for improvement.


Daniel Barker,
Biocomputing Research Unit,
Institute of Cell and Molecular Biology,
The University of Edinburgh,
King's Buildings,
Mayfield Road,
Edinburgh
EH9 3JR
United Kingdom