GNU's Bulletin, vol. 1 no. 15, June, 1993
Table of Contents
- GNU's Who
- GNU's Bulletin
- What Is the Free Software Foundation?
- What Is Copyleft?
- Free Software Support
- Donations Translate Into Free Software
- OCEAN Integrated-Circuit Design System
- Informal "GCC Consortium"
- GNUs Flashes
- Moscow Free Software Conference
- LPF Files Amicus Brief
- What Is the LPF?
- Project GNU Wish List
- The Text Software Initiative
- Free Information Sources
- Free Software and GNU in Japan
- Project GNU Status Report
- GNU Documentation
- GNU Software Available Now
- Tape Subscription Service
- How to Get GNU Software
- GNU Source Code CD-ROM
- The Deluxe Distribution
- MS-DOS Distribution
- Free Software for Microcomputers
- FSF T-shirt
- Thank GNUs
- Free Software Foundation Order Form
The GNU's Bulletin is the semi-annual newsletter of the Free Software Foundation, bringing you news about the GNU Project.
Free Software Foundation, Inc. Telephone: (617) 876-3296
675 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139-3309
USA Electronic mail: gnu@prep.ai.mit.edu
GNU's Who
Michael Bushnell is still working on the GNU Hurd and maintains
GNU tar
. Jim Blandy has prepared GNU Emacs 19.
Roland McGrath is polishing the GNU C library, maintaining GNU
make
and helping with the GNU Hurd.
Tom Lord is working on Oleo, the GNU spreadsheet, as well as Rx,
a faster replacement for regex. Jan Brittenson is working on
the C interpreter. Mike Haertel is making GNU grep
POSIX-compliant and beginning work on optical character recognition.
Noah Friedman is our system ambiguator, release uncoordinator
and maintains a few GNU programs in his copious spare time.
Carl Hoffman has hopped aboard as fundraiser and conference organizer. Melissa Weisshaus is now in charge of Publications. She is currently editing new editions of our documentation and working on the GNU Utilities Manual.
Lisa `Opus' Goldstein has been promoted to Treasurer, after the resignation of Robert J. Chassell who had been our Secretary/Treasurer since FSF was formed 7 years ago; Bob is now writing his Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp and remains on our Board of Directors. Larissa Carlson is Lisa's new office assistant; Gena Lynne Bean has left us to further her education. Spike MacPhee assists RMS with administrative tasks. Charles Hannum works on typesetting and many other jobs.
Richard Stallman continues as a volunteer who does countless tasks such as C compiler maintenance. Volunteer Len Tower remains our on-line JOAT (jack-of-all-trades), handling mailing lists and gnUSENET, information requests, etc.
GNU's Bulletin
Written and Edited by: Jan Brittenson, Melissa Weisshaus, Noah S. Friedman, Charles Hannum, Richard Stallman and Leonard H. Tower Jr.
Illustrations by: Etienne Suvasa and Jamal Hannah
Japanese Edition by: Mieko Hikichi and Nobuyuki Hikichi
The GNU's Bulletin is published in January and June of each year. Please note that there is no postal mailing list. To get a copy, send your name and address with your request to the address on the front page. Enclosing a business sized self-addressed stamped envelope ($0.52) and/or a donation of a few dollars is appreciated but not required. If you're from outside the USA, sending a mailing label rather than an envelope and enough International Reply Coupons for a package of about 100 grams is appreciated but not required. (Including a few extra International Reply Coupons for copying costs is also appreciated.)
Copyright (C) 1993 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This page is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 United States License.
What Is the Free Software Foundation?
The Free Software Foundation is dedicated to eliminating restrictions on people's abilities and rights to copy, redistribute, understand and modify computer programs. We do this by promoting the development and use of free software in all areas of computer use. Specifically, we are putting together a complete integrated software system named "GNU" (GNU's Not Unix) (pronounced "guh-new") that will be upwardly compatible with Unix. Most parts of this system are already working and we are distributing them now.
The word "free" in our name pertains to freedom, not price. You may or may not pay money to get GNU software. Either way, you have two specific freedoms once you have the software: first, the freedom to copy the program and give it away to your friends and co-workers; and second, the freedom to change the program as you wish, by having full access to source code. Furthermore, you can study the source and learn how such programs are written. You may then be able to port it, improve it and share your changes with others. If you redistribute GNU software, you may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, or you may give away copies.
Other organizations distribute whatever free software happens to be available. By contrast, the Free Software Foundation concentrates on the development of new free software, working towards a GNU system complete enough to eliminate the need for you to purchase a proprietary system.
Besides developing GNU, FSF distributes copies of GNU software and manuals for a distribution fee, and accepts tax-deductible gifts to support GNU development. Most of FSF's funds come from its distribution service. We are tax exempt; you can deduct donations to us on your U.S. tax returns.
The Officers of the Foundation are: Richard M. Stallman, President; and Lisa Goldstein, Treasurer/Secretary. The Foundation Board of Directors are: Richard M. Stallman, Gerald J. Sussman, Harold Abelson, Robert J. Chassell, and Leonard H. Tower Jr.
What Is Copyleft?
The simplest way to make a program free is to put it in the public domain, uncopyrighted. But this allows anyone to copyright and restrict its use against the author's wishes, thus denying others the right to access and freely redistribute it. This completely perverts the original intent.
To prevent this, we copyright our software in a novel manner. Typical software companies use copyrights to take away your freedoms. We use the copyleft to preserve them. It is a legal instrument that requires those who pass on the program to include the rights to further redistribute it, and to see and change the code; the code and rights become legally inseparable.
The copyleft used by the GNU Project is made from a combination of a regular copyright notice and the GNU General Public License (GPL). The GPL is a copying license which basically says that you have the freedoms discussed above. An alternate form, the GNU Library General Public License (LGPL), applies to certain GNU Libraries. This license permits linking the libraries into proprietary executables under certain conditions. The appropriate license is included in all GNU source code distributions and in many of our manuals. We will also send you a printed copy upon request.
Free Software Support
The Free Software Foundation does not provide any technical support. Although we create software, we leave it to others to earn a living providing support. We see programmers as providing a service, much as doctors and lawyers now do; both medical and legal knowledge are freely redistributable entities for which the practitioners charge a distribution and service fee.
We maintain a list of people who offer support and other consulting
services, called the GNU Service Directory. It is in the file
`etc/SERVICE' in the GNU Emacs distribution, `SERVICE' in the
GCC distribution and `/pub/gnu/GNUinfo/SERVICE' on anonymous FTP host
prep.ai.mit.edu
. Contact us if you would like a printed copy
or wish to be listed in it.
If you find a deficiency in any GNU software, we want to know. We have
many Internet mailing lists for bug reports, announcements and questions.
They are also gatewayed into USENET news as the gnu.*
newsgroups.
You can get a list of these mailing lists by mailing your request to either
address on the front cover.
When we receive a bug report, we usually try to fix the problem. While our bug fixes may seem like individual assistance, they are not. Our task is so large that we must focus on that which helps the community as a whole. We do not have the resources to help individuals. We may send you a patch for a bug that helps us test the fix and ensure its quality. If your bug report does not evoke a solution from us, you may still get one from another user who reads our bug report mailing lists. Otherwise, use the Service Directory.
So, please do not ask us to help you install the software or figure out how to use it--but do tell us how an installation script does not work or where the documentation is unclear.
If you have no Internet access, you can get mail and USENET news via UUCP. Contact a local UUCP site, or a commercial UUCP site such as:
UUNET Communications Services
3110 Fairview Park Drive - Suite 570
Falls Church, VA 22042
USA
Phone: 1-800-4UUNET4 or (703) 204-8000
Fax: (703) 204-8001
E-mail: info@uunet.uu.net
A long list of commercial UUCP and Internet service providers is posted
periodically to USENET in the newsgroup news.announce.newusers
with `Subject: How to become a USENET site'.
Hundred Acre Consulting Expands
Hundred Acre Consulting continues to provide support and development services, with its specialty being the GNU CC and C++ compilers. It continues its policy of donating a percentage of its profit to the FSF. Since we described its services just 5 months ago, it has hired 3 more people and moved to bigger offices. The new address is:
Hundred Acre Consulting
5301 Longley Lane, Suite D-144
Reno, NV 89511
USA
Phone: (702) 829-9700 or 1-800-245-2885
Fax: (702) 829-9926
E-mail: info@pooh.com
Donations Translate Into Free Software
If you appreciate Emacs, GNU CC, Ghostscript and other free software, you may wish to help us make sure there is more in the future--remember, donations translate into more free software!
Your donation to us is tax-deductible in the United States. We gladly accept all currencies, although the U.S. dollar is the most convenient.
If your employer has a matching gifts program for charitable donations, please arrange to have your donation matched by your employer. If you do not know, please ask your personnel department.
$500 $250 $100 $50 other $________ Other currency:________
Circle the amount you are donating, cut out this form, and send it with your donation to:
Free Software Foundation 675 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02139-3309 USA
Cygnus Matches Donations!
To encourage cash donations to the Free Software Foundation, Cygnus Support will match gifts by its employees, and by its customers and their employees.
Cygnus will match donations from its employees up to a maximum of $1000 per employee, and will match donations from customers and their employees at 50% to a maximum of $1000 per customer. Cygnus Support will donate up to a total of $10,000 in 1993.
Donations payable to the Free Software Foundation should be sent by eligible persons to Cygnus Support where they will be matched and forwarded to the FSF each quarter. The FSF will provide the contributor with a receipt to recognize the contribution (which is tax-deductible on U.S. tax returns). Donations sent to the FSF directly will not be matched, except by prior arrangement with Cygnus Support.
OCEAN Integrated-Circuit Design System
Delft University of Technology, the Netherlands, has developed OCEAN, a comprehensive chip design package. It includes a full set of powerful tools for synthesis and verification of semi-custom sea-of-gates and gate-array chips. OCEAN covers the back-end of the design trajectory--from circuit level, down to layout and a working chip.
OCEAN provides interactive tools for placement, routing, simulation and extraction, either automatically or manually guided. It is available as free software, with full source code, and is known to run on Linux, HP and Sun workstations under the X Window System. For import and export of data, it knows about EDIF, BLIF, SLS, GDSII, CIF, SPICE and LDM.
You can obtain OCEAN by anonymous FTP from
donau.et.tudelft.nl
. For more information, contact
patrick@donau.et.tudelft.nl
on the Internet.
Informal "GCC Consortium"
A group of companies including Intel, Motorola, Texas Instruments & Analog Devices have pooled funds to support central maintenance of GNU CC. The maintenance will be coordinated by Richard Kenner of New York University.
The task of central maintenance is to take responsibility for fixing bugs, integrating and cleaning up contributions, making releases and writing high priority improvements.
Richard Stallman hopes this will enable him to undertake a new project.
GNUs Flashes
- GNU Emacs 19 is Released! GNU Emacs 19 has just been released for beta-testing. Unlike some other recent derivations of Emacs, GNU Emacs 19's support for character-only terminals continues to improve along with its much improved support for bitmapped displays running the X Window System. Other new features include support for European character sets and floating point numbers, as well as source-level debugging of Emacs Lisp programs. See "Project GNU Status Report" and "Contents of the Emacs Tape" for more details.
- GCC 2 is out of beta test As of version 2.4.1, the GNU C Compiler version 2 is out of beta test. For more information, see "Contents of the Languages Tape."
- New Manuals The new GNU Emacs Manual, 8th edition, (updated for Emacs 19) and the new GNU C Library Reference Manual are now being shipped.
- Taylor UUCP Now a Full-Fledged Replacement for Unix UUCP Ian Taylor, author of Taylor UUCP, has added the final pieces for it to be a complete free replacement for Unix UUCP. It's on the Utilities Tape.
- New Scheme Tape Because of its size, MIT C Scheme is now on a separate tape. See "Contents of the Scheme Tape" for more information.
- New Programs on the Languages Tape
p2c
, DejaGnu, Tile Forth and the standalone GNU regex library have been added. Details in "Contents of the Languages Tape". - New Programs on the Utilities Tape
acm
,dc
,doschk
,es
, Gnats,rc
, GNU Shogi and UUCP have been added. See "Contents of the Utilities Tape" for more information. - New programs on the Experimental Tape Version 2 of GAS, the GNU assembler, and Texinfo source for the GNU C Library Reference Manual have been added. See "Contents of the Experimental Tape" for more information.
- New programs on the CD-ROM The CD-ROM has all the new programs and changes on the tapes. See "Contents of the CD-ROM" for more information.
- Objective C Runtime System Funded Kresten Krab Thorup, author of the Objective C runtime system, has been hired as a part-time programmer for six months by the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at Aalbord University, Denmark. His work will serve to define the most portable and extensible tools and libraries for this dynamic and popular object-oriented language.
- Dell Adopts GNU CC for Controller Software
Dell has adopted GCC for the development of new controller software.
Dell already uses GCC to build SVR4, and like Commodore notes improved
performance. Other systems based on GCC are 4.4 BSD, NetBSD, 386BSD,
BSDI, Linux and many Mach ports including OSF/1's reference ports,
NeXT and DG/UX.
SGI now ships GNU
cpp
with their C compiler. - Free Widget Foundation Announces Widgets
The Free Widget Foundation (FWF) is
a grass-roots, all
volunteer effort to create a set of powerful, flexible,
freely-accessible X graphical user-interface modules (widgets).
Since its start in 1990, the FWF release has grown to over 40
widgets, now used in several popular X applications.
The FWF is not related to the Free Software Foundation, but shares our
goal of making high-quality software freely redistributable.
For more information, contact
free-widgets-info@flute.cs.uiuc.edu
, or get file `/pub/FWF/README' via anonymous FTP toa.cs.uiuc.edu
. This file tells about mailing lists, locations of source code available for FTP, historical information about the FWF and how to volunteer for the organization. Or write:The Free Widget Foundation c/o Brian Totty Department of Computer Science University of Illinois - Urbana 1304 W. Springfield Avenue Urbana, IL 61801 USA
Moscow Free Software Conference
The International Center for Scientific and Technical Information hosted a free software conference in Moscow, April 19--23, 1993. Over two hundred people attended, arriving from the Commonwealth of Independent States, Austria, Denmark, Germany, Iran, Japan, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.
Guest of honor Richard Stallman explained why he writes free
software. Among the topics of the conference were an Algol--68 to C
converter, the Andrew User Interface System, Coexistence in a World of
New Freedoms, Efficient Recognition of Static Search Sets with
gperf
, experiences from implementing a free Modula--2
translator, Russian Experiences from a Children's Computer Club, the
Russian SQL server currently under development, the Russian PLATON
Integrated Bank System, GNU Documentation in Russia, Linux in Education
and Free Software in Russia. Other topics included resource
organization (databases and directories), and free software business
aspects.
The conference was sponsored by PC World magazine, PC Center "Techno", UrbanSoft Ltd. of St. Petersburg, Trading House Ostankino, KLOTO Scientific Research, Zelenogradsky Center "Zelax" and John Goode.
Write Victor P. Ivannikov, ivan@ivann.delta.msk.su
,
Sergei Kuznetsov, kuz@ivann.delta.msk.su
, or Yuri P.
Smirnov, sup@ivann.delta.msk.su
, to contact GNU in Russia.
For more information about the conference, contact Geoffrey S.
Knauth, gsk@marble.com
.
LPF Files Amicus Brief
The League for Programming Freedom has filed an amicus ("friend of the court") brief to support American Multi-Systems, a small business that was shut down by a court for violating two casino game software patents held by a company called Fortunet.
Fortunet, which has shut down other makers of casino games in the
past, obtained a preliminary injunction restraining Vern Blanchard,
the owner of AMS, from selling or servicing a Bingo program. The League
for Programming Freedom asked its members for prior art. Marshall
Midden and Steve Peltz found a multi--user Bingo program that had
been played on the Plato
system in the 1970's. The judge,
however, granted the motion on the grounds that a time--sharing system
playing Bingo is different from a networked system playing Bingo.
Fortunet has an expert witness with an impressive resume who is
expressing the most absurd opinions.
The LPF brief argues against the validity of software patents in general and these patents in particular. It also argues that they do not apply to the AMS Bingo system. The brief has already had an effect--the judge has scheduled a hearing to reconsider the injunction.
Fighting a patent in court is a grueling experience even if you ultimately succeed. The only feasible way to solve the problem of software patents is to address the problem as a whole. This is the main activity of the LPF. To succeed, it needs your support.
What Is the LPF?
The League for Programming Freedom (LPF) aims to protect the freedom to write software. This freedom is threatened by "look-and-feel" interface copyright lawsuits and by software patents. The LPF does not endorse free software or the FSF.
The League's members include programmers, entrepreneurs, students, professors, and even software companies.
From the League membership form:
The League for Programming Freedom is a grass-roots organization of professors, students, business people, programmers, and users dedicated to bringing back the freedom to write programs. The League is not opposed to the legal system that Congress intended--copyright on individual programs. Our aim is to reverse the recent changes made by judges in response to special interests.
Membership dues in the League are $42 per year for programmers, managers and professionals; $10.50 for students; $21 for others.
To join, please send a check and the following information:
- Your name and phone numbers (home, work, or both).
- The address to use for League mailings, a few each year (please indicate whether it is your home address or your work address).
- The company you work for, and your position.
- Your email address, so the League can contact you for political action. (If you don't want to be contacted for this, please say so, but please provide your email address anyway.)
- Please mention anything about you which would enable your endorsement of LPF to impress the public.
- Please say whether you would like to help with LPF activities.
The League is not connected with the Free Software Foundation and is not itself a free software organization. The FSF supports the LPF because, like any software developer smaller than IBM, it is endangered by software patents. You are in danger too! It would be easy to ignore the problem until you or your employer is sued, but it is more prudent to organize before that happens.
If you haven't made up your mind yet, write to LPF for more information,
or send Internet mail to lpf@uunet.uu.net
. The address is:
League for Programming Freedom
1 Kendall Square - #143
P.O. Box 9171
Cambridge, MA 02139
USA
Phone: (617) 243-4091
Email: lpf@uunet.uu.net
Project GNU Wish List
Wishes for this issue are for:
- Volunteers to distribute this Bulletin at technical conferences, trade shows, etc. Please phone the number on the front cover to make arrangements.
- Money, as always. If you use and appreciate our software, please send a donation. One way to give us a small amount of money is to order a distribution tape, diskette or CD-ROM. This may not count as a donation for tax purposes, but it can qualify as a business expense. This is especially helpful if you work for a business where the word "donation" is anathema.
- Oleo extensions or other free software for business, such as bookkeeping.
- 600+ megabyte SCSI disks to give us more space to develop software.
- A 386 or 486 PC compatible with 200+ MB of disk and an Ethernet card.
- A 4mm DAT tape drive, an Exabyte tape drive, a Sun SPARCstation and a Sun-3/60 or 4/110.
- Companies to lend us capable programmers and technical writers for at least six months. True wizards may be welcome for shorter periods, but we have found that six months is the minimum time for a good programmer to finish a worthwhile project.
-
Volunteers to help write programs and documentation. Send mail to
gnu@prep.ai.mit.edu
for the task list and coding standards. - Professors who might be interested in sponsoring or hosting research assistants to do GNU development, with FSF support.
- Speech and character recognition software and systems (if the devices aren't too weird), with the device drivers if possible. This would help the productivity of partially disabled people (including a few we know).
- New quotes and ideas for articles in the GNU's Bulletin. We particularly like to highlight organizations involved with free information exchange and companies providing free software support as a primary business.
-
Copies of newspaper and journal articles mentioning the GNU Project or
GNU software. Send these to the address on the front cover, or send a
citation to
gnu@prep.ai.mit.edu
.
The Text Software Initiative
The Text Software Initiative (TSI) is an international effort to promote the development and use of free software for all kinds of text analysis and manipulation, including markup of physical and logical text features, linguistic analysis and annotation, browsing and retrieval, statistical analysis and other text-related tasks in research in computational linguistics, humanities computing, terminology and lexicography, speech, etc. A central component of TSI is the development of guidelines and standards for text software, in order to ensure compatibility, extendability and reusability.
TSI borrows from the principles of FSF, by promoting distributed software development on a voluntary basis and protecting the freedom to copy, redistribute and modify software.
For more information, contact the project coordinators, who are Nancy
Ide, ide@cs.vassar.edu
and Jean Veronis,
veronis@grtc.cnrs-mrs.fr
.
Free Information Sources
There is more to freely redistributable information than software. Here is a partial list of organizations providing other forms of freely redistributable information.
-
FreeLore
John Goodwin,
jgoodwin@adcalc.fnal.gov
, is working on a project called "FreeLore". One goal is to create a core of useful, copylefted textbooks. Currently, he is testing a prototype curriculum for students from junior-high school through early college; the curriculum is written in Texinfo. The FreeLore project is looking for volunteers. For more information, contact John Goodwin. -
The Online Book Initiative
The Online Book Initiative focuses on books, conference proceedings,
reference material, catalogues, etc. that can be freely shared.
Currently, OBI has about 200MB of (mostly compressed) text online,
ranging from poetry to standards documents to novels. Everything can be
accessed via anonymous FTP to
obi.std.com
. You can also dialworld.std.com
with a modem (617-739-9753, 8N1) and create an account to access this information (login asnew
). Accounts onworld
are charged for their connect time (askoffice@world.std.com
for details). -
Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is the brainchild of Michael Hart. Back in 1971, he
decided to use extra computer time to type in copyright-free articles,
and he has not stopped since. What started with the Declaration of
Independence has grown to include text ranging from the King James
version of the Bible, to The Scarlet Letter, to data from the
1990 U.S. Census.
Professor Hart's hope for ultimate success derives from the nature of
what he calls `Replicator Technology': once anything is stored in a
computer, it can be reproduced indefinitely, making it available to all
who want it.
Texts from Project Gutenberg are available at a number of FTP sites,
including
mrcnext.cso.uiuc.edu
in file `/etext' andoes.orst.edu
in file `/pub/almanac/etext'. For instructions on how to obtain text from Bitnet, send the word `HELP' in the body of a message toBITFTP@PUCC
(BITFTP%PUCC.BITNET@mitvma.mit.edu
on the Internet). Instructions will be mailed. Or look atbit.listserv.gutnberg
, a USENET newsgroup.
Free Software and GNU in Japan
ICOT (Institute for Next Generation Computer Technology) is distributing
the fifth-generation software produced by their research efforts as free
software. This includes over 70 megabytes of programs for symbol
processing, knowledge representation, problem solving and inference and
natural language processing. For more information, contact
irpr@icot.or.jp
.
Mieko, h-mieko@sra.co.jp
, and Nobuyuki Hikichi,
hikichi@sra.co.jp
, continue to work on the GNU Project in
Japan. They have translated the FSF Order Form and GNU's Bulletin into
Japanese and are distributing them widely. They ask for donations and
also offer GNU software consulting. Recently they began redistributing
their Japanese translation of the GNU General Public License Version 2.
This translation is authorized by the FSF and is available by anonymous
FTP from srawgw.sra.co.jp
in
`/pub/gnu/local-fix/GPL2-j'. Yukitoshi Fujimura from
Addison--Wesley Publishers in Japan greatly contributed to this
translation. Work is underway on a formal translation of the GNU Library
General Public License.
Japanese versions of GNU Emacs (nemacs
), Epoch (nepoch
)
and MULE are available and widely used in Japan. MULE (the MULtilingual
Enhancement of GNU Emacs) can handle many character sets at once.
Eventually its features will be merged into FSF's version of Emacs.
Ken'ichi Handa, handa@etl.go.jp
, is beta testing MULE; you
can FTP sources from sh.wide.ad.jp
in `/JAPAN/mule'
or etlport.etl.go.jp
in `/pub/mule'.
The Village Center, Inc. has printed a Japanese translation of the GNU Emacs Lisp Reference Manual and uploaded the Texinfo source to various bulletin boards. Recently, they also published a copylefted book, Mieko's Think GNU. This appears to be the first copylefted publication in Japan, apart from those by the FSF. Part of the revenue generated is donated to the FSF. The address is:
Village Center, Inc. Kanda Amerex Bldg. 2F 1-16, 3-Chome, Misaki-Cho Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 101 Japan
A group connected with the commercial personal computer network in Japan
is writing and distributing a copylefted hardware (circuit diagram)
design system that runs on a MIPS-architecture CPU. The t2
OS,
which runs on this machine, is a subset of Unix that uses GCC and GDB as
the system's compiler and debugger. They are also running Mach and
MIPS-BSD.
Many groups in Japan distribute GNU software, including JUG (a PC user
group), ASCII (publishers) and the Fujitsu FM Towns users group.
Anonymous UUCP is also now available in Japan; for more information
contact toku@dit.co.jp
. Publishers in Japan are steadily
releasing more articles and books about GNU software and FSF.
You can order GNU software directly from the FSF. For Japan, we provide
an FSF Order Form written in Japanese, as well as a toll--free facsimile
number; ask japan-fsf-orders@prep.ai.mit.edu
for a copy of
the order form. We encourage you to buy tapes: every 150 tape orders
allows FSF to hire a programmer for a year to write more free software.
The FSF does not distribute nemacs
, nepoch
or MULE on
tape; however MULE is available on the GNU Source Code CD-ROM.
Project GNU Status Report
- GNU Software Configuration Scheme We now have a uniform scheme for configuring GNU software packages in order to compile them. This makes it possible to configure all GNU software in the same way. In particular, all GNU software will support the same alternatives for naming machine types and system types. The configuration scheme also supports configuring a directory that contains several GNU packages with one command. When we have a complete system, this will make it possible to configure the entire system at once, eliminating the need to learn how to configure each of the individual packages that make up the GNU system. For tools used in compilation, the configuration scheme also lets you specify both the host system and the target system, so you can configure and build cross-compilation tools easily. Emacs version 19, GCC version 2 and GDB version 4 support the new configuration scheme, as do most of our other programs and collections.
-
The Hurd
We are developing the GNU Hurd, a set of servers that run on top of
Mach. Mach is a free message-passing kernel being developed at CMU.
The Hurd servers, working with the GNU C Library, will provide Unix-like
functionality. Together with Mach they are the last major components
necessary for a complete GNU system. Currently there are free ports of
the Mach kernel to the 386 PC and the DEC PMAX workstation. (The PMAX
is one kind of MIPS-based DECstation.) Other free ports of Mach are in
progress. Contact CMU for more information if you want to help with one
of those or start your own. Porting the GNU Hurd and GNU C Library is
easy (easier than porting GNU Emacs, certainly easier than porting GCC)
once a Mach port to a particular kind of hardware exists.
There are some large projects relating to the Hurd that can be done by
volunteers. Those who can read and understand the source code with
fewer than two questions, and have the time for a large project, are
invited to make themselves known to Michael Bushnell,
mib@gnu.ai.mit.edu
. -
GNU Emacs
Emacs is the extensible, customizable, self-documenting real-time
display editor. GNU Emacs 18.59 is the current version. Emacs 18
maintenance continues for simple bug fixes.
Version 19 is in beta-release. See "GNUs Flashes" and "Contents of the
Emacs Tape" for details.
Thanks to Alan Carroll and the people who worked on Epoch for generating
initial feedback to a multi-windowed Emacs, to Lucid, Inc. for
implementing X Selections, faces, the optimizing byte compiler and the
default menu bar, to Eric Raymond who has evaluated 460 out of 851
possible new Lisp libraries, and to Stephen Gildea for doing the
Emacs 19 reference card.
Features under consideration for later releases of Emacs include:
- different visibility conditions for regions, and for various windows showing one buffer
- incrementally saving the undo history in a file, so that
recover-file
also reinstalls the buffer's undo history - support for variable-width fonts
- support for wide character sets including all the world's major languages
- support for display using an X toolkit
-
GNU Fortran (
g77
) GNU Fortran is in "private" alpha test (testing by a small group of experts) and is not yet publicly released. Untilg77
is fully released to the public, we ask people to usef2c
(a Fortran-to-C translator) withgcc
(the GNU C compiler). Asg77
uses a lot of these two tools (thef2c
libraries and thegcc
back end), using them and reporting any problems you find will help speed the release ofg77
. See "Contents of the Languages Tapes." The primary focus of the alpha test is to test theg77
front end, since that has most of the new code. The secondary focus of the alpha test is to test the integration between the front end and the back end. Currently, this is where most of the bugs seem to be. The tertiary focus is the quality of code generated by the GNU back end. A mailing list exists for those interested ing77
. To subscribe, please askinfo-gnu-fortran-request@prep.ai.mit.edu
. To contact the author and/or current maintainer ofg77
, write tofortran@prep.ai.mit.edu
. - C Compiler GCC supports both ANSI standard and traditional C, as well as the GNU extensions to C. Two versions of GCC are being maintained in parallel. Version 1 is stable, but is still maintained with bug fixes. For more information about version 1, see "Contents of the Languages Tape." Version 2 of GCC is now reliable. It also has front ends for the languages C++ and Objective C. New front ends are being developed, but they are not part of GCC yet. A front end for Fortran is in alpha test. A front end for Ada is being funded through the Ada 9X standards committee. Since it is a quite complex language, we expect completion to take a while. Volunteers are also developing front ends for Modula-3, Pascal and Cobol. For more information about version 2, see "Contents of the Experimental Tape."
- binutils Steve Chamberlain, Per Bothner and others at Cygnus Support have rewritten the binary utilities (including the linker). Version 2 is based on the same Binary File Descriptor (BFD) library used by GDB. All the tools can be run on a host that differs from the target (e.g. cross-linking is supported). Furthermore, various forms of COFF and other object file formats are supported. A tool can now deal with object files in multiple formats all at once. For example, the linker can read object files using two different formats, and write the output in a third format. The linker interprets a superset of the AT&T Linker Command Language, which allows very general control over where segments are placed in memory.
-
GNU C Library
Roland McGrath continues to work on the GNU C Library. It now supports
everything required by the ANSI C-1989 and POSIX 1003.1-1990 standards,
most facilities of POSIX 1003.2 and many additional Unix functions (BSD
and System V). In the Hurd, the C Library will do much of what the
system calls do in Unix. Mike Haertel has written a fast
malloc
which wastes less memory than the old GNUmalloc
. The GNU regular-expression functions (regex
) now mostly conform to the POSIX 1003.2 standard. GNUstdio
lets you define new kinds of streams, just by writing a few C functions. Thefmemopen
function uses this to open a stream on a string, which can grow as necessary. You can define your ownprintf
formats to use a C function you have written. For example, you can safely use format strings from user input to implement aprintf
-like function for another programming language. Extendedgetopt
functions are already used to parse options, including long options, in many GNU utilities. Version 1.06 of the GNU C Library has just been released. It includes the relocating allocator used in Emacs 19, as well as new ports to Dynix on Sequent Symmetry, SCO and SVR4 on i386, and Solaris 2 on SPARC. This is the first release to include the GNU C Library Reference Manual. For more information, see "Contents of Experimental Tape." -
Rx
Rx is a faster implementation of the GNU regex functions. It is
currently in a beta state, and we are not yet distributing it on tape.
For more information, contact Tom Lord,
lord+@andrew.cmu.edu
. -
JACAL
Aubrey Jaffer has written JACAL, a symbolic mathematics system for the
simplification and manipulation of equations and single- and
multiple-valued algebraic expressions constructed of numbers, variables,
radicals, and algebraic functions, differential operators and holonomic
functions. In addition, vectors and matrices of the above objects are
included.
JACAL is written in Scheme. An IEEE P1178 and R4RS compliant version of
Scheme ("SCM") written in C is available with JACAL. SCM runs on Amiga,
Atari-ST, MS-DOS, NOS/VE, VMS, Unix and similar systems. SLIB is a portable
Scheme library used by JACAL. Get JACAL, SLIB and SCM sources via anonymous
FTP from either
nexus.yorku.ca
in `/pub/scheme/new',altdorf.ai.mit.edu
in `/archive/scm' orprep.ai.mit.edu
in `/pub/gnu/jacal'. The FSF is not distributing JACAL on tape, diskettes or CD-ROM yet. To receive an IBM PC floppy disk with the source and executable files, send $99.00 to:Aubrey Jaffer 84 Pleasant Street Wakefield, MA 01880 USA
-
make
GNUmake
version 3.67 has just been released. It now supports the popular `+=' syntax for appending more text to a variable's definition.make
has come with a standard GNUconfigure
script since version 3.63. GNUmake
complies fully with the POSIX.2 standard, and also supports long options, parallel command execution, flexible implicit pattern rules, conditional execution and powerful text manipulation functions. For those with no vendor-suppliedmake
utility at all, GNUmake
now comes with a shell script called `build.sh' to buildmake
the first time, before you have anymake
program to use. -
Oleo
Oleo is a spreadsheet program that can be run either as an X client or
using curses. Support has recently been added both for
gnuplot
and for generating embedded Postscript. Oleo still needs documentation. If you would like to write a Texinfo manual for Oleo, contact Tom Lord,lord+@andrew.cmu.edu
. Please send bug reports regarding Oleo tobug-oleo@prep.ai.mit.edu
. See "Contents of Experimental Tape." - finger Originally, each host on the Internet consisted of a single, reasonably powerful computer, capable of handling many users at the same time. Typically, a site (a physical location of computer users) would have only one or two computers, even if they had 20 or more people who used them. If a user at site A wanted to know about users logged on at site B, a simple program could be invoked to query the host at site B about the users who were logged on. With the onset of desktop computing, the mainframe has been set aside. A modern computing facility usually consists of one user per host and many hosts per site. This makes it a trial to find out about logged-on users at another site, since you must query each host to find out about the single user who is logged on. GNU Finger is a simple and effective way around this problem, and serves as a direct replacement for existing finger programs. For sites with many hosts, a single host may be designated as the finger server host. This host collects information about who is logged on to other hosts at that site. If a user at site A wants to know about users logged on at site B, only the server host need be queried, instead of each host at that site. This is very convenient. (See "Contents of the Utilities Tape".)
-
Ghostscript
The current version of Ghostscript is 2.6.1. New features include the
ability to use the fonts provided by the platform on which Ghostscript
runs (X Window System and Microsoft Windows), resulting in much
better-looking screen displays; improved text file printing (like
enscript
); a utility to extract the text from a Postscript document; a much more reliable (and faster) Microsoft Windows implementation; support for Microsoft C/C++ 7.0; drivers for many new printers, including the SPARCprinter, and for TIFF/F (fax) file format; many more Postscript Level 2 facilities, including most of the color space facilities (but not patterns), and the ability to switch between Level 1 and Level 2 dynamically. Ghostscript accepts commands in Postscript and executes them by writing directly to a printer, drawing on an X window or writing to a file that you can print later (or to a bitmap file that you can manipulate with other graphics programs). Tim Theisen,ghostview@cs.wisc.edu
, has created Ghostview, a previewer for multi-page files that runs on top of Ghostscript. Russell Lang,rjl@monu1.cc.monash.edu.au
, has created Ghostview for Windows, a similar previewer that runs on Microsoft Windows. Ghostscript includes a C-callable graphics library (for client programs that do not want to deal with the Postscript language). It also supports IBM PCs and compatibles with EGA, VGA or SuperVGA graphics (but please do not ask the FSF staff any questions about this; we do not use PCs). The next planned Ghostscript release will be 3.0, available in the first quarter of 1994. It will implement the full Postscript Level 2 language. - Smalltalk GNU Smalltalk implements the traditional features of the Smalltalk language, but not the graphics and window features. Recently someone implemented these and they will appear in a future release.
-
groff
James Clark has completedgroff
(GNUtroff
and related programs). Written in C++, they can be compiled with GNU C++ Version 2.3 or later. Bugs ingroff
will be fixed, but no major new developments are currently planned. However,groff
users are encouraged to continue to contribute enhancements. Most needed are complete Texinfo documentation, agrap
emulation (apic
preprocessor for typesetting graphs), a page-makeup postprocessor similar topm
(see Computing Systems, Vol. 2, No. 2) and an ASCII output class forpic
so thatpic
can be integrated with Texinfo. Thanks to all those who have contributed bug reports. -
Texinfo 3
The Texinfo 3 package includes an enhanced Texinfo mode for GNU Emacs,
new versions of the formatting utilities, and the second edition of the
Texinfo Manual. This edition is more thorough and describes over
50 new commands. Texinfo mode now includes commands for automatically
creating and updating nodes and menus, a tedious task when done by hand.
makeinfo
, a standalone formatter, andinfo
, a standalone Info reader are included. Both are written in C and are independent of GNU Emacs. -
GNU Chess
GNU Chess is a program that plays chess with you. The program is
written entirely in the C language and has been ported to the PC, the
Cray-2 and numerous other machines. It has also been ported to other
operating systems, including Microsoft Windows and MS-DOS, though these
versions are not being supported by the maintainer.
GNU Chess implements many specialized features including the null move
heuristic, a hash table with aging, the history heuristic (another form
of the earlier killer heuristic), caching of static evaluations, and a
sophisticated database which lets the program play the first several
moves in the game quickly and so forth.
GNU Chess won the Uniform Platform event held in August 1992 in London,
England. Nine programs competed, running on identical hardware.
GNU Chess is primarily supported by Stuart Cracraft on behalf of FSF.
Stuart Cracraft P.O. Box 2841 Laguna Hills, CA USA Phone: (714) 770-8532 E-mail:
cracraft@ai.mit.edu
-
GNU Shogi
GNU Shogi and its protege GNU XShogi play the Japanese version of Chess
known as "Shogi". The major difference from Western Chess is that captured
pieces can be returned into play.
The latter is the X windows front end for GNU Shogi.
The former is the brain/engine which actually plays Shogi.
The programs are written entirely in the C language. GNU Shogi has been
created by modifying GNU Chess. GNU Shogi implements the same features as
GNU Chess and uses similar heuristics. As a new feature, sequences of
partial board patterns can be introduced in order to help the program
playing a good order of moves towards specific opening patterns. GNU
XShogi is a modification of XBoard.
Matthias Mutz Universitaet Passau, FMI 94030 Passau Germany E-mail:
mutz@kirk.fmi.uni-passau.de
- Porting Although we do not yet have a complete GNU system, it is already possible for you to begin porting it. This is because the unfinished part, the Hurd, is basically portable. The parts of the system that really need porting are Mach and the GNU C Library, which are already available to port and use.
GNU Documentation
GNU is dedicated to having quality, easy-to-use on-line and printed documentation. GNU manuals are intended to explain the underlying concepts, describe how to use all the features of each program, and give examples of command use. GNU manuals are distributed as Texinfo source files, which yield both typeset hardcopy and on-line hypertext-like display via the menu-driven Info system. These manuals, source for which is provided with our software, are also available in hardcopy; see the "Free Software Foundation Order Form."
Several GNU manuals are now bound as soft cover books with a new lay-flat binding technology. This allows you to open them so they lie flat on a table without creasing the binding. Each book has an inner cloth spine and an outer cardboard cover that will not break or crease as an ordinary paperback will. Currently, the Emacs, Emacs Lisp Reference, Texinfo, GAWK, Make, GDB, Bison and Flex manuals have this binding. All other GNU manuals are also bound so they lie flat when opened, using other technologies.
The Emacs Manual describes editing with GNU Emacs. The new 8th
edition has been updated for Emacs 19. It also explains advanced
features, such as outline mode and regular expression search, how to use
special modes for programming in languages like C++ and TeX, how
to use the tags
utility, how to compile and correct code, and how
to make your own keybindings and other elementary customizations.
The GNU Emacs Lisp Reference Manual covers this programming language in great depth, including data types, control structures, functions, macros, syntax tables, searching and matching, modes, windows, keymaps, markers, byte compilation and the operating system interface.
The Texinfo Manual explains the markup language used to generate both the online Info documentation and typeset hardcopies. It tells you how to make tables, lists, chapters, nodes, indexes, cross references, how to use Texinfo mode in GNU Emacs and how to catch mistakes.
The GAWK Manual describes how to use the GNU implementation of
awk
. It is written for someone who has never used awk
and
describes all the features of this powerful string and record
manipulation language.
The Make Manual describes GNU make
, a program used to
rebuild parts of other programs. The manual tells how to write
makefiles, which specify how a program is to be compiled and how
its files depend on each other. The new edition of the manual describes
the new features in make
version 3.64, and includes a new
introductory chapter for novice users, as well as a new section on
automatically generated dependencies.
Debugging with GDB explains how to use the GNU Debugger, run your program under debugger control, examine and alter data, modify the flow of control within the program and use GDB through GNU Emacs.
The Bison Manual teaches you how to write context-free grammars for the Bison program that convert into C-coded parsers. You need no prior knowledge of parser generators.
The Flex Manual tells you how to write a lexical scanner
definition for the flex
program to create a C-coded scanner that
will recognize the patterns described. You need no prior knowledge of
scanner generators.
Using and Porting GNU CC explains how to run, install and port the GNU C compiler. Currently, we are distributing two versions of GCC, version 1 and version 2, each documented by a different edition of the manual.
The Termcap Manual, often described as "Twice as much as you ever wanted to know about Termcap," details the format of the Termcap database, the definitions of terminal capabilities and the process of interrogating a terminal description. This manual is primarily for programmers.
The Emacs Calc Manual includes both a tutorial and a reference manual for Calc. It describes how to do ordinary arithmetic, how to use Calc for algebra, calculus and other forms of mathematics, and how to extend Calc.
The C Library Reference Manual describes almost all of the
facilities of the GNU C library, including both what Unix calls
"library functions" and "system calls." We are doing limited print
runs of this manual until it becomes more stable. It is new, and we
would like corrections and improvements. Please send them to
bug-glibc-manual@prep.ai.mit.edu
.
GNU Software Available Now
We offer Unix software source distributions tapes in tar
format
on the following media:
- 1600bpi 9-track reel tape
- 8mm Exabyte cartridges
- Sun QIC-24 cartridges (readable on some other systems)
- Hewlett-Packard 16-track cartridges
- IBM RS/6000 QIC-150 cartridges (readable on some other systems) (the RS/6000 Emacs tape has an Emacs binary as well)
We also offer:
- CD-ROM (see "GNU Source Code CD-ROM")
- MS-DOS diskettes with some GNU software (see "MS-DOS Distribution")
- VMS tapes (which include sources and executables) for GNU Emacs and the GNU C compiler (see "VMS Emacs and Compiler Tapes")
The contents of the various 9-track and cartridge tapes for Unix systems are the same (except for the RS/6000 Emacs tape, which also has executables); only the media are different (see the "Free Software Foundation Order Form"). Source code for the manuals comes in Texinfo format. We welcome all bug reports.
Some of the files on the tapes may be compressed with gzip
to
make them fit. Refer to the top-level `README' file at the
beginning of each tape for instructions on uncompressing them.
uncompress
and unpack
do not work!
Version numbers listed after program names were current at the time this Bulletin was published. When you order a distribution tape, some of the programs might be newer, and therefore the version number higher.
Contents of the Emacs Tape
- GNU Emacs 18.59 In 1975, Richard Stallman developed the first Emacs, an extensible, customizable real-time display editor. GNU Emacs is his second implementation. It offers true Lisp--smoothly integrated into the editor--for writing extensions, and provides an interface to MIT's X Window System. In addition to its powerful native command set, extensions which emulate other popular editors are distributed: vi, EDT (DEC's VMS editor) and Gosling (aka Unipress) Emacs. It has many other features, which make it a full computing support environment. It is described by the GNU Emacs Manual, the GNU Emacs Lisp Reference Manual and a reference card. Source for all three come with the software. GNU Emacs 18.59 runs on many Unix systems (arranged by hardware): Alliant FX/80 & FX/2800, Altos 3068, Amdahl (UTS), Apollo, AT&T (3Bs & 7300 PC), DG Aviion, Bull DPX/2 (2nn & 3nn) CCI 5/32 & 6/32, Celerity, Convex, Digital (DECstation 3100 & 5000 (PMAXes), Mips, VAX (BSD, System V & VMS)), Motorola Delta 147 & 187 Dual, Elxsi 6400, Encore (DPC, APC & XPC), Gould, HP (9000 series 200, 300, 700 & 800, but not series 500), HLH Orion (original & 1/05), IBM (RS/6000 (AIX), RT/PC (4.2 & AIX) & PS/2 (AIX (386 only))), ISI (Optimum V, 80386), Intel 860 & 80386 (BSD, Esix, SVR3, SVR4, SCO, ISC, IX, AIX & others (for MS-DOS see "MS-DOS Distribution" & "Free Software for Microcomputers")), Iris (2500, 2500 Turbo & 4D), Masscomp, MIPS, National Semiconductor 32000, NeXT (Mach), NCR Tower 32 (SVR2 & SVR3), Nixdorf Targon 31, Nu (TI & LMI), pfa50, Plexus, Prime EXL, Pyramid (original & MIPS), Sequent (Balance & Symmetry), SONY News (m68k & MIPS), Stride (system release 2), all Suns (including 386i), all SunOS & some Solaris versions, Tadpole, Tahoe, Tandem Integrity S2, Tektronix (16000 & 4300), Triton 88, Ustation E30 (SS5E), Whitechapel (MG1) & Wicat. Arranged by operating system: AIX (RS/6000, RT/PC, 386-PS/2), BSD (versions 4.1, 4.2, 4.3), DomainOS, Esix (386), HP-UX (HP 9000 series 200, 300, 700 & 800 but not series 500), ISC (386), IX (386), Mach, Microport, NewsOS (Sony m68k & MIPS) SCO (386), SVR0 (Vax & AT&T 3Bs), SVR2, SVR3, SVR4, Solaris 2.0, SunOS, UTS (Amdahl), Ultrix (versions 3.0, 4,1), Uniplus 5.2 (Dual machines), VMS (versions 4.0, 4.2, 4.4, 5,5) & Xenix (386).
-
GNU Emacs 19.8
Version 19 is in beta-release. Unlike some other recent derivations of
Emacs, GNU Emacs 19 continues to work on character-only terminals as
well as under the X Window System. New features in Emacs 19 include:
- multiple X windows ("frames" to Emacs), with a separate X window for the minibuffer or with a minibuffer attached to each X window
- associating property lists with regions of text in a buffer
- multiple fonts and colors defined by those properties
- simplified and improved processing of function keys, mouse clicks and mouse movement
- X selection processing, including CLIPBOARD selections
- hooks to be run if point or mouse moves outside a certain range
- menu bars and popup menus defined by keymaps
- static menu bars
- scrollbars
- before and after change hooks
- source-level debugging of Emacs Lisp programs
- support for European character sets
- floating point numbers
- improved buffer allocation, using a new mechanism capable of returning storage to the system when a buffer is killed
- interfacing with the X resource manager
- support for the GNU configuration scheme
- good RCS support
- many updated libraries
- GNU Calc 2.02 Calc (written by Dave Gillespie in Emacs Lisp) is an extensible, advanced desk calculator and mathematical tool that runs as part of GNU Emacs. It comes with source for the Calc Manual and reference card, which serves as a tutorial and reference. If you wish, you can use Calc just as a simple four-function calculator, but it provides additional features including choice of algebraic or RPN (stack-based) entry, logarithmic functions, trigonometric and financial functions, arbitrary precision, complex numbers, vectors, matrices, dates, times, infinities, sets, algebraic simplification, differentiation and integration.
- CLISP 1993.04.05 CLISP is a Common Lisp implementation by Bruno Haible and Michael Stoll. It mostly supports the Common Lisp described by Common LISP: The Language (1st edition). CLISP includes an interpreter, a byte-compiler and, for some machines, a screen editor. CLISP needs only 1.5 MB of memory and runs on many microcomputers (including the Atari ST, Amiga 500-2000, most MS-DOS systems & OS/2) and on some Unix workstations (Linux, SunOS (SPARC), Sun-386i, HP-UX (HP 9000/800) & others).
- PCL 1993.03.18 PCL is a free implementation of a large subset of CLOS, the Common Lisp Object System. PCL was written by Xerox Corporation.
-
gzip
1.0.7 Some of the contents of our tape and FTP distributions are compressed. We have software on our tapes and FTP sites to uncompress these files. Due to patent troubles withcompress
, we have switched to another compression program,gzip
.gzip
can expand LZW-compressed files but uses a different algorithm for compression which generally produces better results. It also uncompresses files compressed with System V'spack
program. -
make
3.67 GNUmake
supports POSIX 1003.2 and has all but a few obscure features of the BSD and System V versions ofmake
, as well as many of our own extensions. GNU extensions include long options, parallel compilation, conditional execution and functions for text manipulation. Source for the Make Manual comes with the program. GNUmake
is on several of our tapes because some nativemake
programs lack theVPATH
feature essential for using the GNU configure system to its full extent. A script is included to build GNUmake
on such systems. - Texinfo 3.1 Texinfo is a set of utilities which generate printed manuals and online hypertext-style documentation (called "Info"), and provide means for reading the online versions. Version 3 contains both GNU Emacs Lisp and standalone C programs, as well as source for the Texinfo Manual. Texinfo is distributed on several of the tapes to insure that it is possible to rebuild and read Info files for various programs.
Contents of the Scheme Tape
This tape contains MIT Scheme 7.1. Scheme is a simplified, lexically-scoped dialect of Lisp. It was designed at MIT and other universities to teach students the art of programming, and to research new parallel programming constructs and compilation techniques. The current version conforms to the "Revised^4 Report On the Algorithmic Language Scheme" (MIT AI Lab Memo 848b), for which TeX source is included.
MIT Scheme is written in C, but is presently hard to bootstrap. Binaries which can be used to bootstrap Scheme are available for the following systems:
- HP 9000 series 300, 400, 700 and 800 running HP-UX 7.0 or 8.0
- NeXT running NeXT OS 1.0 or 2.0
- Sun-3 or Sun-4 running SunOS 4.1
- DECstation 3100/5100 running Ultrix 4.0
- Sony NWS-3250 running NEWS OS 5.01
- Vax running 4.3 BSD
If your system is not on this list and you don't enjoy the bootstrap challenge, see the "JACAL" entry in the "Project GNU Status Report."
Contents of the Languages Tape
This tape contains programming tools: compilers, interpreters and related programs (parsers, conversion programs, debuggers, etc.).
- GCC 1.42 The GNU C compiler is a fairly portable optimizing compiler which performs automatic register allocation, common sub-expression elimination, invariant code motion from loops, induction variable optimizations, constant propagation and copy propagation, delayed popping of function call arguments, tail recursion elimination, integration of inline functions and frame pointer elimination, plus many local optimizations that are automatically deduced from the machine description. GCC supports full ANSI C, traditional C and GNU C extensions. It generates good code for the 32000, m68k, 80386, Alliant, Convex, Tahoe & VAX CPUs, and for these RISC CPUs: i860, Pyramid, SPARC & SPUR. The MIPS RISC CPU is also supported. Other supported systems include (arranged by hardware): 386 (AIX), Alliant FX/8, Altos 3068, Apollo 68000/68020 (Aegis), AT&T 3B1, Convex C1 & C2, DECstation 3100 & 5000, DEC VAX, Encore MultiMax (NS32000), Genix NS32000, Harris HCX-7 & HCX-9, HP-UX 68000/68020, HP 9000 series 200 & 300 (BSD), IBM PS/2 (AIX), Intel 386 (System V, Xenix, BSD, but not MS-DOS (but see "MS-DOS Distribution" & "Free Software for Microcomputers")), Iris MIPS machine, ISI 68000/68020, MIPS, NeXT, Pyramid (original), Sequent Balance (NS32000) and Symmetry (i386), SONY News, Sun (2, 3 (optionally with FPA), 4, SPARCstation & Sun-386i). Arranged by operating system: AIX (i386-PS/2), BSD (Alliant FX/8, Apollo, Convex, HP m68k (series 200 & 300), i386, ISI m68k, MIPS, Pyramid (original), Sequent (Balance & Symmetry), Genix (NS32000), HP-UX (m68k), Irix (Iris MIPS), Mach (NeXT m68k), NewsOS (Sony m68k), SunOS (Sun-2, Sun-3, Sun-4, SPARC & Sun-386i), System V (i386, Altos 3068, AT&T 3B1), Ultrix (DECstation 3100 & 5000, VAX), Umax (Encore NS32000) and Xenix (i386). Source for the GCC manual, Using and Porting GNU CC, is included with the compiler. The manual describes how to run and install the GNU C compiler, and how to port it to new systems. It describes new features and incompatibilities of the compiler, but people not familiar with C will also need a good reference on the C programming language.
-
G++ 1.42.0
G++ is a set of changes for GCC version 1 which supports C++. As
far as possible, G++ is kept compatible with the evolving draft ANSI
standard, but not with
cfront
(the AT&T compiler), ascfront
has been diverging from ANSI. G++ 1 comes with source for the GNU G++ User's Guide (not yet published on paper). G++ compiles source quickly, provides good error messages and works well with GDB. Each release of G++ 1 depends on the same numbered release of GCC 1 (in GCC version 2, G++ is merged with GCC). - libg++ 1.39.0 The GNU C++ library, libg++, is an extensive collection of C++ classes and support tools for use with G++. Partial documentation in Texinfo format is included (not yet published on paper).
- NIH Class Library 3.0 The NIH Class Library (formerly known as "OOPS", Object-Oriented Program Support) is a portable collection of G++ classes, similar to those in Smalltalk-80, which has been developed by Keith Gorlen of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), using the C++ programming language.
-
BFD
The BFD (Binary File Descriptor) library allows a program which operates on
object files (such as
ld
or GDB) to support many different formats in a clean way. BFD provides a portable interface, so that only BFD needs to know the actual details of a particular format. One consequence of this design is that all of programs using BFD will support formats such as a.out, COFF, ELF and ROSE. BFD comes with documentation in Texinfo form. -
GDB 4.9
In GDB 4, object files and symbol tables are now read via the BFD library,
which allows a single copy of GDB to debug programs of multiple object file
types such as a.out and COFF. Other features include improvements to the
command language, remote debugging over serial lines or TCP/IP, and
watchpoints (breakpoints triggered when the value of an expression
changes). Exception handling, SunOS shared libraries and C++ multiple
inheritance are only supported when used with GCC version 2.
GDB now uses a standard remote interface to a simulator library. So far,
the library contains simulators for the Zilog Z8001/2, the Hitachi H8/300,
H8/500 and Super-H.
GDB 4 can perform cross-debugging. To say that GDB 4 targets a
platform means that it can perform native or cross-debugging for it. To
say that GDB 4 can host a given platform means that it can be built
on it, but cannot necessarily debug native programs. GDB 4 can:
- target & host: Amiga 3000 (Amix), DECstation 3100 & 5000 (Ultrix), HP 9000/300 (BSD), IBM RS/6000 (AIX), i386 (BSD, SCO & Linux), Motorola Delta m88k (System V), NCR 3000 (SVR4), SGI Iris (MIPS running Irix V3 & V4), SONY News (NewsOS 3.x), Sun-3 & SPARC (SunOS 4.1 & Solaris 2.0) & Ultracomputer (29K running Sym1).
- target, but not host: i960 Nindy, AMD 29000 (COFF & a.out), Fujitsu SPARClite, Hitachi H8/300, m68k & m68332.
- host, but not target: Intel 386 (Mach), IBM RT/PC (AIX) & HP/Apollo 68k (BSD).
-
ae
ae
works with GCC to produce more complete profiling information. -
binutils 1.9
The binutils include
ar
,gprof
,ld
,nm
,ranlib
,size
andstrip
. The GNU linkerld
is fast, and is the only linker which emits source-line numbered error messages for multiply-defined symbols and undefined references. -
Bison 1.21
Bison is an upwardly compatible replacement for the parser generator
yacc
, with more features. Bison Manual and reference card sources are included. -
COFF Support
The entire suite of GNU software tools can be run on System V, replacing
COFF entirely. The GNU tools can operate on BSD object files with a COFF
header the System V kernel will accept.
robotussin
is supplied for converting standard libraries to this format. However, this workaround is becoming obsolete, as it is being replaced by BFD (see "Project GNU Status Report" and "Contents of the Languages Tape"). -
DejaGnu 1.0,
expect
4.5.2 alpha and Tcl 6.7 DejaGnu is a framework for testing other programs. Its purpose is to provide a single front end for all tests. The flexibility and consistency of the DejaGnu framework make it easy to write tests for any program.expect
(which runs scripts to conduct dialogs with programs) and Tcl (an embeddable tool command language) are both provided in this package, since DejaGnu uses them and they are useful programs in their own right. -
dld
3.2.3dld
is a dynamic linker written by W. Wilson Ho. Linking your program with thedld
library allows you to dynamically load object files into the running binary. -
f2c
1993.04.28f2c
converts Fortran--77 source files into C or C++, which can then be compiled with GCC. -
flex
2.3.8flex
is a mostly-compatible replacement for thelex
scanner generator, written by Vern Paxson of the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory.flex
generates far more efficient scanners thanlex
does. Sources for the Flex Manual and reference card are included. -
GAS 1.38.1
The GNU assembler (GAS) is a fairly portable, one pass assembler that is
almost twice as fast as Unix
as
and works for 32x32, m68k, 80386, SPARC (Sun-4) & VAX. -
GAWK 2.15.2
GAWK is upwardly compatible with the System V Release 4 version of
awk
. Source for the GAWK Manual comes with the software. -
gdbm
1.5 Thegdbm
library is the GNU replacement for the traditionaldbm
andndbm
libraries, which implement a database using quick lookup by hashing.gdbm
supports both styles but does not need sparse database formats (unlike its Unix counterparts). -
gmp
1.3.2 GNU MP (gmp
) is a library for arbitrary precision arithmetic, operating on signed integers and rational numbers. It has a rich set of functions, all with a regular interface. -
gperf
2.1gperf
is a "perfect" hash-table generation utility. There are actually two implementations ofgperf
, one written in C and one in C++. Both will produce hash functions in either C or C++. -
indent
1.7indent
is the GNU-modified version of the freely-redistributable BSD program of the same name. It formats C source according to GNU coding standards by default, though the original default and other formats are available as options. -
p2c
1.20p2c
is a Pascal-to-C translator written by Dave Gillespie. It is intended primarily for use on 32-bit machines, though porting it to convert code to work on 16-bit machines may be possible. -
perl
4.036 Larry Wall has written a fast interpreter namedperl
which combines the features and capabilities ofsed
,awk
,sh
and C, as well as interfaces to all the system calls and many C library routines. Perl Mode for editingperl
code comes with GNU Emacs 19. - regex 0.12 The GNU regular expression library supports POSIX.2, except for internationalization features. It has been included in many GNU programs which use regex routines. Now it is finally available separately.
- Smalltalk 1.1.1 GNU Smalltalk is an interpreted object-oriented programming language system written in portable C. Features include an incremental garbage collector, a binary image save capability, the ability to invoke user-written C code and pass parameters to it, a GNU Emacs editing mode, optional byte-code compilation tracing and byte-code execution tracing and automatically loaded per-user initialization files.
- superopt 2.2 Superopt is a function sequence generator that uses an exhaustive generate-and-test approach to find the shortest instruction sequence for a given function. You provide the superoptimizer a function and a CPU to generate code for, and how many instructions you can accept. The GNU superoptimizer and its application in GCC is described in the ACM SIGPLAN PLDI'92 proceedings. Superopt supports: SPARC, m68000, m68020, m88000, IBM RS/6000, AMD 29000, Intel 80x86 & Pyramid.
- Tile Forth 2.1 Tile Forth is a 32-bit implementation of the Forth--83 standard written in C, thus allowing it to be easily moved between different computers (traditionally, Forth implementations are written in assembly to utilize the underlying architecture as optimally as possible, but this also makes them less portable).
-
Texinfo 3.1,
gzip
1.0.7 andmake
3.67 See "Contents of the Emacs Tape" for a full description of these programs.
Contents of the Utilities Tape
This tape consists mostly of smaller utilities and miscellaneous applications not available on the other GNU tapes.
-
Autoconf 1.4
Autoconf produces shell scripts which automatically configure source code
packages. These scripts adapt the packages to many kinds of Unix-like
systems without manual user intervention. Autoconf creates a script for a
package from a template file which lists the operating system features
which the package can use, in the form of
m4
macro calls. Many GNU programs now use Autoconf-generated configure scripts. -
BASH 1.12 and readline
The GNU shell, BASH (Bourne Again SHell), is compatible with
the Unix
sh
and offers many extensions found incsh
andksh
. BASH has job control,csh
-style command history and command-line editing (with Emacs andvi
modes built-in and the ability to rebind keys) via the readline library. -
bc
1.02bc
is an interactive algebraic language with arbitrary precision. GNUbc
was implemented from the POSIX 1003.2 draft standard, but it has several extensions including multi-character variable names, anelse
statement and full Boolean expressions. -
cpio
2.2cpio
is an alternative archive program with all the features of SVR4cpio
, including support for the final POSIX 1003.1ustar
standard. - CVS 1.3 The Concurrent Version System, CVS, manages software revision and release control in a multi-developer, multi-directory, multi-group environment. It works best in conjunction with RCS versions 4 and above, but will parse older RCS formats with the loss of CVS's fancier features. See Berliner, Brian, "CVS-II: Parallelizing Software Development," Proceedings of the Winter 1990 USENIX Association Conference.
-
dc
0.2dc
is an RPN calculator. GNUbc
does not require a separatedc
program to run. This version ofdc
will eventually be merged with thebc
package. -
diffutils
2.3 GNUdiff
compares files showing line-by-line changes in several flexible formats. It is much faster than the traditional Unix versions. The "diffutils" distribution containsdiff
,diff3
,sdiff
andcmp
. -
doschk
1.1 This program is intended as a utility to help software developers ensure that their source file names are distinguishable on System V platforms with 14-character filenames and on MS-DOS with 11 character filenames. -
elvis
1.7elvis
is a clone of thevi
/ex
Unix editor. It supports nearly all of thevi
/ex
commands in both visual and line mode.elvis
runs under BSD, System V, Xenix, Minix, MS-DOS and Atari TOS, and should be easy to port to many other systems. -
es
0.84 This is an extensible shell based onrc
but with more features including first class functions, lexical scope, an exception system and rich return values (i.e. functions can return values other than just numbers). Likerc
, it is great for both interactive use and for scripting, particularly because its quoting rules are much less baroque than the C or Bourne shells. - Fax 3.2.1 Fax is the freely-available MIT AI Lab fax spooling system, which provides Group 3 fax transmission and reception services for a networked Unix system. It requires a faxmodem which conforms to the new EIA-592 Asynchronous Facsimile DCE Control Standard, Service Class 2.
-
find
3.8find
is frequently used both interactively and in shell scripts to find files which match certain criteria and perform arbitrary operations on them.xargs
andlocate
are also included. -
finger
1.37 GNU Finger works on a wide variety of systems. For more information, see the "Project GNU Status Report." - fontutils 0.6 The "fontutils" can create fonts for use with Ghostscript or TeX, starting with a scanned type image and converting the bitmaps to outlines. They also contain general conversion programs and other utilities.
- Gnats 3.01 Gnats (GNats: A Tracking System) is a bug-tracking system. It is based upon the paradigm of a central site or organization which receives problem reports and negotiates their resolution by electronic mail. Although it's been used primarily as a software bug-tracking system so far, it is sufficiently generalized so that it could be used for handling system administration issues, project management or any number of other applications.
-
Fun and Games:
acm
2.4, MandelSpawn 0.06, GNU Chess 4.0.pl61, NetHack 3.1, GnuGo 1.1, GNU Shogi 1.1.pl01 andhello
1.3acm
is a LAN-oriented, multiplayer aerial combat simulation that runs under the X Window System. Players engage in air to air combat against one another using heat seeking missiles and cannons. Eventually we hope to turn this into a more general purpose flight simulator. MandelSpawn is a parallel Mandelbrot program for the MIT X Window System. GNU Chess and GNU Shogi have text and X display interfaces (see "Project GNU Status Report"). NetHack is a display-oriented adventure game similar to Rogue. GnuGo plays the game of Go (Wei-Chi); it is not yet very sophisticated. GNU Shogi plays a Japanese game, similar to Chess, known as "Shogi". A major difference from Western Chess is that captured pieces can be returned into play. The GNUhello
program produces a familiar, friendly greeting. It allows non-programmers to use a classic computer science tool which would otherwise be unavailable to them. Because it is protected by the GNU General Public License, users are free to share and change it. - Ghostscript 2.6.1 and Ghostview 1.4.1 Ghostscript is GNU's graphics language which is almost fully compatible with Postscript (see "Project GNU Status Report"). Ghostview provides an X11 user interface for the Ghostscript interpreter. Ghostview and Ghostscript function as two cooperating programs; Ghostview creates a viewing window and Ghostscript draws in it.
-
gnuplot
3.2gnuplot
is an interactive program for plotting mathematical expressions and data. Curiously, the program was neither written nor named for the GNU Project; the name is a coincidence. See the entry on GNU Graphics in "Contents of the Experimental Tape" for information on a related program. -
gptx
0.2gptx
is the GNU version ofptx
, a permuted index generator. Among other things, it produces readable "KWIC" (KeyWords In Context) indexes without the need ofnroff
and there is an option to output TeX code. -
grep
/egrep
/fgrep
2.0 The[ef]grep
programs are GNU's versions of the Unix programs of the same name. They are much faster than the traditional Unix versions. -
groff
1.08 andmgm
1.07groff
is a document formatting system, which includes implementations oftroff
,pic
,eqn
,tbl
,refer
, theman
,ms
andmm
macros, as well as drivers for Postscript, TeX dvi format and typewriter-like devices. Also included is a modified version of the Berkeleyme
macros and an enhanced version of the X11xditview
previewer.mgm
is a macro package forgroff
. It is almost compatible with the DWBmm
macros and has several extensions. -
less
177less
is a display paginator similar tomore
andpg
but with various features (such as the ability to scroll backwards) which most pagers lack. -
m4
1.0.3 GNUm4
is an implementation of the traditional Unix macro processor. It is mostly SVR4 compatible, although it has some extensions (for example, handling more than 9 positional parameters to macros).m4
also has built-in functions for including files, running shell commands, doing arithmetic, etc. - mtools 2.0.7 mtools is a set of public domain programs to allow Unix systems to read, write and manipulate files on an MS-DOS file system (usually a diskette).
-
patch
2.0.12g8patch
is our version of Larry Wall's program to takediff
's output and apply those differences to an original file to generate the modified version. -
RCS 5.6.0.1
The Revision Control System, RCS, is used for version control and
management of software projects. When used with GNU
diff
, RCS can handle binary files (executables, object files, 8-bit data, etc). -
rc
1.4rc
is a shell that features a C-like syntax (much more so thancsh
) and far cleaner quoting rules than the C or Bourne shells. It's intended to be used interactively, but is great for writing scripts as well. -
recode
3.2.4recode
converts between character sets and usages. When exact transliterations are not possible, it may get rid of offending characters or fall back on approximations. It recognizes or produces more than a dozen character sets and can convert each set to almost any other one.recode
pays special attention to superimposition of diacritics, particularly for French. -
screen
3.2bscreen
is a terminal multiplexor that runs several independent "screens" (ttys) on a single physical terminal. Each virtual terminal emulates a DEC VT100 plus several ANSI X3.64 and ISO 2022 functions.screen
sessions can be detached and resumed later on a different terminal. -
sed
1.16sed
is a stream-oriented version ofed
. It is used copiously in shell scripts. -
tar
1.11.2 GNUtar
includes multivolume support, the ability to archive sparse files, automatic archive compression/decompression, remote archives and special features that allowtar
to be used for incremental and full backups. Unfortunately GNUtar
implements an early draft of the POSIX 1003.1ustar
standard which is different from the final standard. Adding support for the new changes in a backward-compatible fashion is not trivial. - Termcap 1.2 The GNU Termcap library is a drop-in replacement for `libtermcap.a' on any system. It does not place an arbitrary limit on the size of Termcap entries, unlike most other Termcap libraries. Included is source for the Termcap Manual in Texinfo format.
-
time
1.4time
is used to report statistics (usually from a shell) about the amount of user, system and real time used by a process. -
tput
1.0tput
is a portable way to allow shell scripts to use special terminal capabilities. GNUtput
uses the Termcap database, rather than Terminfo as most implementations do. -
UUCP 1.04
This version of UUCP was written by Ian Lance Taylor, and is the standard
UUCP system for GNU. It currently supports the
f
,g
(in all window and packet sizes),G
,t
ande
protocols, as well a Zmodem protocol and two new bidirectional protocols. If you have a Berkeley sockets library, it can make TCP connections. If you have TLI libraries, it can make TLI connections. -
wdiff
0.4wdiff
compares two files, finding which words have been deleted or added to the first in order to obtain the second. We hope eventually to integrate it, as well as some ideas from a similar program calledspiff
, into future releases of GNUdiff
. -
fileutils 3.6, shellutils 1.8 and textutils 1.6
The "fileutils" manipulate files:
chgrp
,chmod
,chown
,cp
,dd
,df
,du
,install
,ln
,ls
,mkdir
,mkfifo
,mknod
,mv
,mvdir
,rm
,rmdir
andtouch
. The "shellutils" are small commands used on the command line or in shell scripts:basename
,date
,dirname
,echo
,env
,expr
,false
,groups
,id
,logname
,nice
,nohup
,pathchk
,printenv
,printf
,sleep
,stty
,su
,tee
,test
,true
,tty
,uname
,who
,whoami
andyes
. The "textutils" programs manipulate textual data:cat
,cksum
,comm
,csplit
,cut
,expand
,fold
,head
,join
,nl
,od
,paste
,pr
,sort
,split
,sum
,tac
,tail
,tr
,unexpand
,uniq
andwc
. -
Texinfo 3.1,
gzip
1.0.7 andmake
3.67 See "Contents of the Emacs Tape" for a full description of these programs.
Contents of the Experimental Tape
This tape includes software which is currently in beta test and is available for people who are feeling adventurous. Some of the software already has released versions on the distribution tapes. The contents of this tape are transient; as the programs become stable, they will replace older versions on other tapes. Please send bug reports to the address in the notes for each program on the tape. Note that Emacs 19, in beta test, is on the Emacs tape.
-
GCC 2.4.1
Version 2 of GCC is now reliable. In addition to the version 1 features,
GCC 2 has instruction scheduling, loop unrolling, filling of delay slots,
leaf function optimization, optimized multiplication by constants, a
certain amount of common subexpression elimination (CSE) between basic
blocks (though not all of the supported machine descriptions provide for
scheduling or delay slots) and a feature for assigning attributes to
instructions. Function-wide CSE has been written, but needs to be cleaned
up before it can be installed. Position-independent code is supported on
the 68k, i386, Hitachi Slt, Hitachi H8/300, Clipper, 88k, SPARC &
SPARClite.
GCC 2 can also open-code most arithmetic on 64-bit values (type
long long int
). It supports extended floating point (typelong double
) on the 68k; other machines will follow. It can generate code for most of the same machines as version 1, plus the following: AMD 29000, Acorn RISC, DEC Alpha, Elxsi, HP-PA (700 & 800), IBM RS/6000, IBM RT/PC, Intel 80386, Intel 960, Motorola 88000 & SPARC (running Solaris 2). Version 2 can generate a.out, COFF, ELF & OSF-Rose files when used with a suitable assembler. It can produce debugging information in several formats: BSD stabs, COFF, ECOFF, ECOFF with stabs symbols & DWARF. Not all of the version 1 machine descriptions have been updated yet; some do not work, and others need work to take full advantage of instruction scheduling and delay slots. The old machine descriptions for the Alliant, Tahoe and Spur (as well as a new port for the Tron) do not work, but are still included in the distribution in case someone wants to work on them. Using the new configuration scheme for GCC, building a cross-compiler is as easy as building a compiler for the same target machine. Version 2 supports more general calling conventions: it can pass arguments "by reference" and can preallocate the space for stack arguments. GCC 2 on the SPARC uses the standard conventions for structure arguments and return values. Version 2 of the compiler supports three languages: C, C++ and Objective C; the source file name extension or a compiler option selects the language. The front end support for Objective C was donated by NeXT. The runtime support needed to run Objective C programs is now distributed with GCC (this does not include any Objective C classes aside fromobject
). GNU C has been extended to support nested functions, nonlocal gotos and taking the address of a label. Texinfo source for the manual, Using and Porting GNU CC, is included. - Solaris binaries for GCC 2 Since the C compiler has been unbundled in Solaris, this tape temporarily contains compiled binaries of GCC for Solaris systems in addition to the sources. In the future, Solaris binaries will be available on separate media.
- binutils 2.2.1 Version 2 of the binutils have been completely rewritten to use the BFD library (see "Project GNU Status Report"). This version has been tested on only a few architectures including Sun-3 and Sun-4 running SunOS 4.1, and SONY News running NewsOS 3. This version has not been ported to as many machines as the old binutils. Some features of the old versions are missing. We would appreciate clean, easy to integrate patches to make things run on other machines; especially welcome are fixes for what used to work in the old versions.
- GAS 2.1.1 Version 2 of the GNU assembler has been rewritten to use the BFD library (see "Project GNU Status Report"). It supports these systems, though not all have been thoroughly tested: SPARC (SunOS 4 & Solaris 2), i386, m68k, MIPS (Ultrix, Irix), Hitachi H8/500 & VAX (VMS).
-
GNU C Library 1.06
The library supports ANSI C-1989 and POSIX 1003.1-1990 and has most of the
functions specified in POSIX 1003.2 draft 11.2. It is upward compatible
with 4.4 BSD and includes many System V functions, plus GNU extensions.
Version 1.06 uses a standard GNU
configure
script and runs on Sun-3 (SunOS 4.1), Sun-4 (SunOS 4.1 & Solaris 2), HP 9000/300 & SONY News 800 (4.3 BSD), MIPS DECstation (Ultrix 4), i386/i486 (System V, SVR4, BSD, 386BSD, NetBSD, SCO 3.2 & SCO ODT 2.0) & Sequent Symmetry i386 (Dynix 3). Source for the new GNU C Library Reference Manual is included. - libg++ 2.3 This is the GNU C++ library for GCC version 2 (see "Contents of Languages Tape" for more info regarding libg++). The latest version tries to configure itself automatically, thus working out of the box on many hosts. Recent changes include portability enhancements, some use of templates and converting the iostream classes to use multiple inheritance. Partial documentation in Texinfo format is included (not yet published on paper).
-
GNU Graphics 0.17
GNU Graphics is a set of programs which produce plots from ASCII or binary
data. It supports output to Tektronix 4010, Postscript and the X Window
System or compatible devices. Improvements in this version include a
revised manual (not yet printed on paper); new features in
graph
,xplot
andplot2ps
; support for output in ln03 and TekniCAD TDA file formats; a replacement for thespline
program; examples of shell scripts usinggraph
andplot
; the addition of a statistics toolkit; and the use ofconfigure
for installation. Existing ports need retesting. Contact Rich Murphey,Rich@rice.edu
, if you can help test/port it to anything beyond a SPARCstation. - Oleo 1.4 Oleo is a spreadsheet program, that is better for you than the more expensive spreadsheets. It supports the X Window System and character-based terminals, and can output Embedded Postscript renditions of spreadsheets. Keybindings should be familiar to Emacs users and are configurable. Under X and in Postscript output, Oleo supports multiple, variable width fonts.
Contents of the X11 Tapes
The two X11 tapes contain Version 11, Release 5 of the MIT X Window System. The first FSF tape contains all of the core software, documentation and some contributed clients. We call this the "required" X tape since it is necessary for running X or running GNU Emacs under X. The second, "optional", FSF tape contains contributed libraries and other toolkits, the Andrew User Interface System, games and other programs.
The X11 Required tape also contains all fixes and patches released to date. We update this tape as new fizes and patches are released.
Berkeley Networking 2 Tape
The Berkeley "Net2" release contains the second 4.3 BSD distribution and is newer than both 4.3 BSD-Tahoe and 4.3 BSD-Reno. It includes most of the BSD software system except for a few utilities, some parts of the kernel and some library routines which your own C library is likely to provide (we have replacements on other tapes for many of the missing programs). This release also contains third party software including Kerberos and some GNU software.
VMS Emacs and Compiler Tapes
We offer two VMS tapes. One has just the GNU Emacs editor. The other has the GNU C compiler, Bison (to compile GCC), GAS (to assemble GCC's output) and some library and include files. We are not aware of a GDB port for VMS. Both VMS tapes have executables from which you can bootstrap, as the DEC VMS C compiler cannot compile GCC. Please do not ask us to devote effort to VMS support, because it is peripheral to the GNU Project.
Tape Subscription Service
The FSF has a tape subscription service. If you do not have net access, the subscription service enables you to stay current with the latest FSF developments. For a one-time cost equivalent to three tapes, we will mail you four new versions of the tape of your choice over the course of the next year.
Every quarter, we will send you a new version of an Emacs, Languages, Utilities, Experimental or MIT X Window System Required tape. The BSD Net-2, MIT Scheme and the MIT X Window System Optional tapes are not changed often enough to warrant quarterly updates.
Since Emacs 19 is now on the Emacs Tape, a subscription will be a convenient way to keep current with Emacs 19 updates as it moves through beta-test.
A subscription is also an easy way to keep up with the regular bug fixes to the MIT X Window System. We update the X11 Required tape, as fixes and patches for the X Window System are issued throughout the year.
See section "Subscriptions" in the "Free Software Foundation Order Form".
How to Get GNU Software
All the software and publications from Free Software Foundation are distributed with permission to copy and redistribute. The easiest way to get GNU software is to copy it from someone else who has it.
You can get GNU software direct from the FSF by ordering diskettes, a tape or a CD-ROM. Such orders provide most of the funds for the FSF staff, so please support us by ordering if you can. See the "Free Software Foundation Order Form".
There are also third party groups who distribute our software; they do not work with us, but can provide our software in other forms. For your convenience we list some of them; see "Free Software for Microcomputers". Please note that the Free Software Foundation is not affiliated with them in any way and is responsible for neither the currency of their versions nor the swiftness of their responses.
If you have Internet access and cannot access one of the hosts below, you
can get the software via anonymous FTP from GNU's distribution host
prep.ai.mit.edu
(the IP address is 18.71.0.38
). For
more information, get file `/pub/gnu/GETTING.GNU.SOFTWARE'.
prep
is a very busy host and only allows a limited number of FTP
logins at any given time. Please use another machine, if at all possible.
These TCP/IP Internet sites provide GNU software via anonymous FTP
(program: ftp
, user: anonymous
, password: your
e-mail address, mode: binary
). Please try them before
prep.ai.mit.edu
.
- Australasia:
archie.oz.au
(archie.oz
for ACSnet),
cair.kaist.ac.kr
,utsun.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp
,ftp.cs.titech.ac.jp
. - Europe:
ugle.unit.no
,ftp.stacken.kth.se
,isy.liu.se
,
ftp.luth.se
,unix.hensa.ac.uk
,ftp.mcc.ac.uk
,
ftp.informatik.tu-muenchen.de
,ftp.informatik.rwth-aachen.de
,
ftp.denet.dk
,ftp.eunet.ch
,nic.switch.ch
,
nic.funet.fi
,ftp.win.tue.nl
,irisa.irisa.fr
grasp1.univ-lyon1.fr
,archive.eu.net
. - USA:
labrea.stanford.edu
,jaguar.cs.utah.edu
,ftp.kpc.com
,
ftp.cs.widener.edu
,ftp.cs.columbia.edu
,uxc.cso.uiuc.edu
,
col.hp.com
,wuarchive.wustl.edu
,gatekeeper.dec.com
,
cc.utah.edu
(VMS GNU Emacs),mango.rsmas.miami.edu
(VMS GCC),ftp.uu.net
(under `/packages/gnu').
Those on JANET can look under src.doc.ic.ac.uk
in
`/gnu'.
You can get some GNU programs via UUCP. Ohio State University posts their
UUCP instructions regularly to newsgroup comp.sources.d
on
USENET. These people will send you UUCP instructions via electronic mail:
hao!scicom!qetzal!upba!ugn!nepa!denny, uunet!hutch!barber, src@contrib.de (Europe), james@bigtex.cactus.org, acornrc!bob, toku@dit.co.jp (Japan), staff@cis.ohio-state.edu, info@uunet.uu.net
For those without Internet access, see the section "Free Software Support" for information on getting electronic mail and file transfer via UUCP.
GNU Source Code CD-ROM
The Free Software Foundation has produced its second CD-ROM. This CD-ROM
contains sources for all of the programs on the Emacs, Languages,
Utilities, Experimental, and the MIT X Required and Optional tapes. In
addition, the CD-ROM contains the sources for MULE 0.9.7 (see "Free
Software and GNU in Japan"); some packages ported to Intel 80386 and
80486-based machines running MS-DOS: Demacs, DJGPP 2.4 and MIT Scheme 7.2;
and a snapshot of the Emacs Lisp Archive at Ohio State University. (You
can get libraries in this archive by UUCP (ask
staff@cis.ohio-state.edu
for directions) or by anonymous FTP
from archive.cis.ohio-state.edu
in
`/pub/gnu/emacs/elisp-archive'.)
The CD-ROM does not contain the contents of the MIT Scheme, VMS or Net2 tapes.
The version numbers of the software on the CD-ROM correspond to the version numbers listed in "GNU Software Available Now."
The CD-ROM is in ISO 9660 format and can be mounted as a read-only file system on most operating systems. If your driver supports it you can mount the CD-ROM with "Rock Ridge" extensions and it will look just like an ordinary Unix file system, rather than one full of truncated and otherwise mangled names that fit the vanilla ISO 9660 specifications.
You can build most of this software without needing to copy the sources off the CD. It requires only enough free disk space for the object files and the intermediate build targets. Except for the GCC binaries for SPARCstations running Solaris 2.0 and the MS-DOS binaries, there are no precompiled programs on this CD. You will need a C compiler (programs which need some other interpreter or compiler normally provide the C source for a bootstrapping program).
The CD costs $400 if you are buying it for a business or other organization, or $100 if you are buying it for yourself.
- What do the individual and company prices mean? The software on our disk is free; anyone can copy it and anyone can run it. What we charge for is the physical disk and the service of distribution. We charge two different prices depending on who is buying. When a company or other organization buys the disk, we charge $400. When an individual buys the same disk, we charge just $100. You, the reader, are certainly an individual, not a company. If you are buying a disk "in person", then you are probably doing so as an individual. But if you expect to be reimbursed by your employer, then the disk is really for the company, so please pay the company price and get reimbursed for the company price. We won't try to check up on you--we use the honor system--so please cooperate. Buying CDs at the company price is especially helpful for the GNU project; just 80 CDs at the company price will support an FSF programmer or tech writer for a year.
- Why is there an individual price? In the past, our distribution tapes have been ordered mainly by companies. The CD at the price of $400 provides them with all of our software for a much lower price than they would previously have paid for six different tapes. To lower the price further would cut into the FSF's funds very badly. However, for individuals, $400 is too high a price; hardly anyone could afford that. So we decided to make CDs available to individuals at the lower price of $100, but not do the same for companies.
The Deluxe Distribution
The Free Software Foundation has been repeatedly asked to create a package that provides executables for all of our software. Usually we offer only sources. In addition to providing binaries with the source code, the Deluxe Distribution includes copies of all our printed manuals and reference cards.
The FSF Deluxe Distribution contains the binaries and sources to hundreds of different programs including GNU Emacs, the GNU C Compiler, the GNU Debugger, the complete MIT X Window System and the GNU utilities.
You may choose one of these machines and operating systems: HP 9000 series
200, 300, 700 or 800 (4.3 BSD or HP-UX); RS/6000 (AIX); SONY News 68k (4.3
BSD or NewsOS 4); Sun-3, Sun-4 or SPARC (SunOS 4 or Solaris). If your
machine or system is not listed, or if a specific program has not been
ported to that machine, please call the FSF office at the phone number
below or send e-mail to gnu@prep.ai.mit.edu
.
We will supply the software on one of these media in Unix tar format: 1600 or 6250 bpi, 1/2 inch, reel to reel tape; Sun DC300XLP 1/4 inch cartridge, QIC-24; HP 16 track DC600HC 1/4 inch cartridge; IBM RS/6000 1/4 inch cartridge, QIC-150; Exabyte 8mm tape. If your computer cannot read any of these, please call us.
The manuals included are one each of the Bison, Calc, Gawk, GNU C Compiler, GNU C Library, GNU Debugger, Flex, GNU Emacs Lisp Reference, Make, Texinfo and Termcap manuals; six copies of the manual for GNU Emacs; and a packet of reference cards each for GNU Emacs, Calc, the GNU Debugger, Bison and Flex.
In addition to the printed and on-line documentation, every Deluxe Distribution includes a CD-ROM (in ISO 9660 format with Rock Ridge extensions) that contains sources of our software.
The Deluxe Distribution costs $5000. This package is for people who want to get everything compiled for them or who want to make a purchase that helps the FSF in a large way. To order the package, please fill out the "Free Software Foundation Order Form", and send it to:
Free Software Foundation, Inc. 675 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02139-3309 USA Phone: (617) 876-3296 Electronic mail: gnu@prep.ai.mit.edu
MS-DOS Distribution
FSF distributes, on 3.5 inch 1.44MB diskettes, some of the GNU software that has been ported to MS-DOS. The disks have both sources and executables.
Contents of the Demacs diskettes
Demacs is a version of GNU Emacs 18.55 ported to MS-DOS, with some changes from Emacs 18.57. Two versions are actually included--one which handles 8-bit character sets, and one, based on Nemacs, which handles 16-bit character sets, including Kanji. FSF distributes it on five diskettes.
Demacs runs on Intel 80386 and 80486--based machines running MS-DOS. It is compatible with XMS memory managers and VCPI, but not with Microsoft Windows extended mode or other DPMI managers.
Contents of the DJGPP diskettes
DJGPP is a complete port of GCC, libraries, development utilities and a symbolic debugger, for Intel 80386 and 80486--based machines running MS-DOS. FSF distributes it on four diskettes.
DJGPP requires at least 5MB of hard disk space to install, and 512K of RAM
to use. It is compatible with XMS memory managers and VCPI, but not with
Microsoft Windows extended mode or other DPMI managers. It cannot emulate
multitasking (e.g. the Unix fork
system call) or signals.
Contents of the Selected Utilities diskettes
The GNUish MS-DOS Project releases GNU software ported to PC compatibles. In general, this software will run on 8086 and 80286--based machines; an 80386 is not required. Some of these utilities are necessarily missing features. FSF distributes it on a set of diskettes.
We are distributing these utilities, both source and executables: RCS,
flex
, GAWK, cpio
, diff
, MicroEmacs, find
, some
file utilities, gdbm
, grep
, libc, ptx
, indent
,
less
, m4
, make
, sed
, shar
, sort
and Texinfo.
Contents of the Windows diskette
We are distributing versions of GNU Chess and gnuplot
ported to
Microsoft Windows, on a single diskette, containing both source and
executables.
Free Software for Microcomputers
We do not provide support for GNU software on microcomputers because it is peripheral to the GNU Project. However, we are distributing a few such programs on tape, CD-ROM and diskette. We are also willing to publish information about groups who do support and maintain them. If you are aware of any such efforts, please send the details, including postal addresses, archive sites and mailing lists, to either address on the front cover.
See "MS-DOS Distribution" for more information about microcomputer software available from the FSF. Please do not ask us about any other software. The FSF does not maintain any of it and has no additional information.
- GNU Software not on Apple computers In lawsuits, Apple claims the power to stop people from writing any program that has a user interface that works even vaguely like the Macintosh's. If Apple wins in the courts, it will create for itself a new power over the public that will enable it to put an end to free software. So long as Apple is committed to establishing this kind of monopoly, we will not provide any support or software for Apple machines. We ask that you too refrain from developing for or porting to Apple systems, since any more software adds to their business. Don't feed the lawyer that bites you!
-
Boston Computer Society
The BCS has thousands of shareware and free programs for microcomputers,
including some GNU programs. Contact them to see what is available for
your machine:
Boston Computer Society 1 Kendall Square, Bldg 1400, Cambridge, MA 02139 USA Phone: (617) 252-0600
-
GNU Software on the Amiga
Get Amiga ports of many GNU programs using anonymous FTP from host
ftp.funet.fi
in `/pub/amiga/gnu' (Europe). For info on (or offers to help with) the GCC port and related projects, ask Leonard Norrgard,vinsci@nic.funet.fi
. For info on the GNU Emacs port, ask David Gay,dgay@di.epfl.ch
, or Mark D. Henning,henning@stolaf.edu
. You can get more info via anonymous FTP inprep.ai.mit.edu:/pub/gnu/MicrosPorts/Amiga
. -
GNU Software for Atari TOS and Atari Minix
Get Atari ports by anonymous FTP from
atari.archive.umich.edu
(maintained by Howard Chu,hyc@hanauma.jpl.nasa.gov
). Ports are discussed on USENET in newsgroupscomp.sys.atari.st.tech
&comp.sys.atari.st
. -
GNU C/C++ 2.2.2 for OS/2 2.0
Michael Johnson has completed a new, completely stand-alone port of the GNU
C/C++ Version 2.2.2 compiler for OS/2 2.0. It has the C/C++
compilers, the GNU assembler, documentation & both OS/2-specific and
the BSD C libraries. You can get it from host
hobbes.nmsu.edu
in file `/pub/os2/2.0/programming/gcc2-222' by FTP. To join the mailing list, send a message toos2gcc-request@charon.mit.edu
. -
Linux: a free Unix system for 386 machines
Linux (named after its author, Linus Torvalds, and Minix) is a free Unix
clone which implements a subset of System V and POSIX functionality. Linux
has been written from scratch and does not contain any proprietary code.
Many of the utilities and libraries are GNU Project software. Linux runs
only on 386/486 AT-bus (and some EISA-bus) machines. Porting to non-Intel
architectures is hard because the kernel makes extensive use of 386 memory
management and task primitives. Linux is freely distributable and
available via anonymous FTP:
tsx-11.mit.edu
in `/pub/linux' (USA),nic.funet.fi
in `/pub/OS/Linux' (Europe). Asklinux-activists-request@niksula.hut.fi
about their mailing lists. See USENET newsgroupcomp.os.linux
for Linux discussions. -
Free 386BSD
William F. Jolitz et al. have written a 386 port of BSD Unix. This
kernel is said to be free of AT&T code and is freely redistributable. You
can obtain more information from
sokol@reyes.stanford.edu
. This is the result of the work described in the Dr. Dobb's Journal series on 386BSD. -
Free NetBSD
Chris Demetriou and friends have released another flavour of Unix for 386
machines. NetBSD is based on 386BSD 0.1, but also contains code from the
Berkeley Networking 2 distribution, some original code from the NetBSD team
and many bug fixes. Anonymous FTP the NetBSD 0.8 distribution from
agate.berkeley.edu
in `/pub/NetBSD/NetBSD-0.8'. For more info, contactnetbsd-help@sun-lamp.cs.berkeley.edu
. -
DJGPP, the GNU C/C++ compiler for MS-DOS
D. J. Delorie has ported GCC/G++ 2.4 to the 386 MS-DOS platform.
The compiler and programs it generates run in 32-bit mode with full virtual
memory support. DJGPP is available via FTP from
ftp.clarkson.edu
in `/pub/msdos/djgpp'. You can subscribe to a mailing list on DJGPP by sending your e-mail address todjgpp-request@sun.soe.clarkson.edu
. The FSF is distributing DJGPP both on floppies and CD (see "MS-DOS Distribution" and "GNU Source Code CD-ROM"). -
Demacs, GNU Emacs for MS-DOS
Manabu Higashida and Hirano Satoshi have released Demacs, a GNU Emacs port
for 386/486 MS-DOS. Version 1.2.0 is the first post-beta release. Demacs
provides several DOS-specific features: support for binary or text file
translation, "8 bit clean" display mode, 80x86 software interrupt calls
via an
int86
Lisp function, machine-specific features such as function key support, file name completion with drive name, child processes (suspend-emacs
andcall-process
). Dired mode works without `ls.exe'. Anonymous FTP it from:wuarchive.wustl.edu
in `/mirrors/msdos/demacs',utsun.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp
in `/GNU/demacs' (Japan), andftp.funet.fi
in `/pub/gnu/emacs/demacs' (Europe). The FSF is distributing Demacs both on floppies and CD (see "MS-DOS Distribution" and "GNU Source Code CD-ROM"). -
Freemacs, an Extensible Editor for MS-DOS
Russ Nelson,
nelson@crynwr.com
, has written a small programmable editor called Freemacs. It is compatible enough with GNU Emacs that Freemacs users can use the GNU Emacs Manual as a reference for it. It will run on most MS-DOS systems, including 8088 machines. Anonymous FTP it from `emacs16a.zip' (underPD1:<MSDOS.FREEMACS>
) fromwsmr-simtel20.army.mil
; or send $15 (copying fee) to:Russ Nelson 11 Grant St. Potsdam, NY 13676 USA Phone: (315) 268-1925 (Fax: 9201)
Specify floppy format:5.25"/360K
or3.50"/720K
. -
GNU Software on MS-DOS
Russ Nelson has MS-DOS ports of many GNU programs available on floppy
disk. Contact him at the above address for more information.
You can ask
info-gnu-msdos-request@sun.soe.clarkson.edu
about MS-DOS ports of GNU programs and related mailing lists. Or anonymous FTP files `/pub/gnu/MicrosPorts/MSDOS*' onprep.ai.mit.edu
. The FSF is distributing MS-DOS ports of many GNU programs on both on floppies and CD (see "MS-DOS Distribution" and "GNU Source Code CD-ROM").
FSF T-shirt
We still have our Free Software Foundation T-shirts available, designed by Cambridge artist Jamal Hannah. The front of the t-shirt has an image of a GNU hacking at a workstation with the text "GNU's Not Unix" above and the text "Free Software Foundation" below. They are available in two colors, Natural and Black. Natural is an off-white, unbleached, undyed, environment-friendly cotton, printed with black ink, and is great for tye-dyeing or displaying as is. Black is printed with white ink and is perfect for late night hacking. All shirts are thick 100% cotton, and are available in sizes M, L, XL and XXL.
Use the "Free Software Foundation Order Form" to order your shirt, and consider getting one as a present for your favorite hacker!
Work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to succeed.
-Vaclav Havel
Thank GNUs
Thanks to all those mentioned above in "Informal GCC Consortium", "GNUs Flashes", "Project GNU Status Report", "GNU in Japan" and "GNU Software Available Now".
Thanks to the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Laboratory for Computer Science at MIT for their invaluable assistance.
Thanks to the Max-Plack-Institut fuer Informatik Im Stadtwald for buying our Deluxe Distribution package.
Thanks are due to the following people for their assistance in Japan: Nobuyuki Hikichi & Mieko Hikichi, Ken'ichi Handa, Dr. Ikuo Takeuchi, Bob Myers, David Littleboy, Mike Kandall, Prof. Masayuki Ida, SEA & Japan Unix Society, Michio Nagashima & Paul Abramson. Thanks to Village Center, Inc., ASCII Corporation, A.I. Soft and many others in Japan, for their continued donations and support.
Thanks again to the USENIX Association for letting us have a table at their conference; to the Open Software Foundation for their continued support; and to Cygnus Support for assisting Project GNU in many ways.
Thanks to Wired Magazine and Barry Meikle of the University of Toronto Bookstore for donating us ad space in their separate publications.
Thanks to Warren A. Hunt, Jr. and Computational Logic, Inc. for their donation and support.
Jim Blandy thanks Jamie Zawinski for his implementation of some of the X-related features in Emacs 19.
Thanks go out to all those who have either lent or donated machines, including Cygnus Support for a Sun SPARCstation; Hewlett-Packard for two 80486, six 68030 and four Spectrum computers; Brewster Kahle of Thinking Machines Corp. for a Sun-4/110; CMU's Mach Project for a Sun-3/60; Intel Corp. for their 386 machine; NeXT for their workstation; the MIT Media Laboratory for a Hewlett-Packard 68020; SONY Corp. and Software Research Associates, Inc., both of Tokyo, for three SONY News workstations; IBM Corp. for an RS/6000; the MIT Laboratory of Computer Science for the DEC MicroVAX; the Open Software Foundation for the Compaq 386; Delta Microsystems for an Exabyte tape drive; an anonymous donor for 5 IBM RT/PCs; Liant Software Corp. for five VT100s; Jerry Peek for a 386 machine; NCD Corporation for an X terminal; and Interleaf, Inc., Veronika Caslavsky, Paul English, Cindy Woolworth and Lisa Bergen for the loan of a scanner.
Thanks to all those who have contributed ports and extensions, as well as those who have contributed other source code, documentation and good bug reports.
Thanks to all those who sent money and offered help.
Thanks also to all those who support us by ordering manuals, distribution tapes, diskettes and CD-ROMs.
The creation of this bulletin is our way of thanking all who have expressed interest in what we are doing.
------- | | Free Software Foundation, Inc. | stamp | 675 Massachusetts Avenue | | Cambridge, MA 02139-3309 | here | USA | | -------