% Abstract of the ACPC Manual, saying what this Manual is about:

\begin{abstract}
The ACPC Network Guide is a manual that gives the reader an overview
of the machines in the ACPC Network and the software that is installed
on these machines. Therefore, it gives the user of one of these machines
the most important information that is needed for the work on this machine
and it refers to additional manuals for more complex software packages
where this is necessary.

However, before this overview is given, in the three introductory chapters the
structure and the aims of the ACPC are discussed. The first chapters also
contain some general information about the ACPC Network that might also be of
interest for people who do not intend to work on one of the machines in this
network. A reference to an FTP server, containing information about the ACPC
Network and the ACPC in general is given. The ACPC Mailing List, which is used
for distributing information among the groups in the ACPC, is also mentioned
in this general part of the manual.  Furthermore, this part also
contains a short description of the groups in the ACPC and of their research
interests in the area of parallel computation. 

The main part of the manual is then formed by one section for each ACPC
working group that contains some information about the group and its members,
a description of the hardware at this group and a description of the software
that is installed on these machines.

The appendices summarize information that is already present but spread around
in the other chapters. As we think that the information presented there will
be needed quite frequently, the appendices can be seen as a kind of quick
reference.
\end{abstract}

