The ismev package is based on S functions by Stuart Coles. This file documents the main changes from these functions. 1. The datasets no longer end in `.data'. As is usual for R packages, the datasets are made available using the function data. 2. The $conv element of the list returned by fitting functions is the return code provided by the optimization function optim (which gives zero when a local minimum has been found). 3. The first column of the dowjones dataset, giving the dates of each observation, is now a POSIXct object. 4. The fitting functions and the functions pp.fitrange and gpd.fitrange have show arguments to control printing. 5. The argument method has been added to fitting functions to specify the optimization method used by optim. 6. The fitting functions allow full control of the optimization, as arguments can be specified that are passed to components of the control argument of optim. 7. The formal argument ufun of pp.fit and gpd.fit has been changed to threshold, and can no longer be a function.