The current version of <#40#>TIE<#40#> accepts a master file and up to 9 change files. Because in general it is important to use the changes in their proper sequence the order of the files must be chosen carefully.
The standard version of <#41#>TIE<#41#> prompts the user for the names of the change files interactively. The implementor may choose to replace this by a command line interface if the operating system and the compiler support such features. Within this document we will refer to the interactive version of <#42#>TIE<#42#>.
First the name of the master file must be entered. The extension of this name (beginning with a period) is stripped to get the base name of the file. The base name and the extensions <#14#>CF1<#14#>, ..., <#15#>CF9<#15#> are checked. If such files exist they are opened and are allocated as current change files. As soon as one of these files is not found the user is asked to supply additional change file names. Thus change files with other names may be used deliberately. If there are no more changes the user enters an empty name just hitting ``Return''. Then the processing mode still must be supplied. The user may request the creation of a new master file by selection of mode ``m'' or he may want to create a single change file by selection of mode ``c''.
The name of the output file created is not specified interactively.
It depends on the runtime system of the <#43#>
The multiple change files are used as if the single change files were merged into the master files step by step. Thus more than 9 change files might be incorporated by repeated application of <#44#>TIE<#44#>.
Please note that even when multiple change files are processed each of the files is read only once. For each of the change files and for the master file there is only one line in memory at a time (neglecting operating system buffering). Thus the storage requirement of <#45#>TIE<#45#> does not depend on the size of the change files or the size of a single changed section.