diff --git a/README b/README
index 1231c4e51aa5ce19163a3425fc7dee39fe0a4d44..9c756726d9ccd9c9c87291287baef6c641839374 100644
--- a/README
+++ b/README
@@ -5,54 +5,48 @@ implement them.
 			Duncan C. White, dcw@doc.ic.ac.uk
 			19th March 2002
 
-Building and Packaging on Linux
+An Example of Datadec in Action
 -------------------------------
 
-Either download http://csgsoft.doc.ic.ac.uk/datadec/datadec-1.0-1.i386.rpm
-and install it (rpm -i) from there, or do a source build:
-
-1. Download the datadec-1.0.tgz file and save it in your RPM SOURCES directory.
-
-2. Extract the package SPEC file:
-   
-	tar xzf datadec-1.0.tgz datadec-1.0/PKG/RPM
-
-3. Enter the directory and build the package:
-
-	cd datadec-1.0/PKG/RPM
-	rpm -bb datadec.spec
-
-4. Now you can install the datadec-1.0-1.is386.rpm that you just built,
-   using rpm -i..
-
-
-Building on Solaris or Other Unices
------------------------------------
-
-1. Extract the .tgz file..
-
-2. Compile it:
-
-	cd datadec-1.0
-	make
-
-3. Install it (run this as root) into /usr/local/bin and /usr/man/man1:
-
-	make install
-
-4. (Optionally on Solaris) package it up and store in somewhere:
-
-	cd PKG/Solaris
-	make
-
-	(edit Makefile, changing where to store the built package)
-
-	make install
-
-5. install the package (as root):
-
-	pkgadd -d datadec-1.0-1-sol8-sparc-dcw all
-
+To give you a feel for what datadec can do, you could write:
+
+intlist = nil
+        | cons( int first, intlist next )
+        ;
+
+illist  = nil
+        | cons( intlist first, illist next )
+        ;
+
+idtree  = leaf( string id, illist l )
+        | node( idtree left, idtree right )
+        ;
+</pre>
+
+What does this mean?  
+The first rule declares that an intlist can take two basic "shapes" -
+it is either empty, nil, or of the form cons(int,intlist).
+nil and cons() are called constructors, and define different
+"shapes" that objects of the type can take.
+However, because the second argument of a cons() constructor is itself
+an intlist, this type is said to be recursively defined.
+Functional programmers will recognise nil or cons() as the standard
+way of defining a list, so more intuitively, intlist is simply
+a list of integers!
+
+Reading on, an illist is declared as a list of intlists,
+and an idtree is declared as a binary tree where each leaf node
+contains a (string, illist) pair.
+
+Given this input, datadec can automatically construct an ANSI C
+module which implements all the data types, a constructor function for
+each constructor, deconstructor functions to help you to take objects
+apart again and printing functions to help you with debugging.
+
+Building and Packaging datadec
+------------------------------
+
+See the INSTALL file for building and packaging instructions.
 
 Testing
 -------