gnu1987/gnu-bulletin/04/bull4.html

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<TITLE>GNU's Bulletin, vol. 1 no. 4</TITLE>
<H1>GNU's Bulletin, vol. 1 no. 4</H1>
<HR>
<H1><A NAME="SEC1" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC1">GNU's Bulletin 		 February, 1988</A></H1>
<P>
GNU's Bulletin is the sporadically published newsletter of the <BR>
Free Software Foundation, bringing you news about the GNU project.
<P>
<B>Please note:</B> we have moved to a new address: <BR>
Free Software Foundation<BR>
675 Massachusetts Avenue<BR>
Cambridge, MA  02139  USA<BR>
Telephone: (617) 876-3296 <BR>
Electronic mail: gnu@prep.ai.mit.edu <BR>
<P>
<HR>
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC3" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC3">GNU's Who</A></H1>
<P>
The GNU Team has grown larger in the last few months: <B>Brian Fox</B> and
<B>Opus Goldstein</B> have joined <B>Jay Fenlason</B> as the only employees of
the Foundation.  Most recently, Brian created a stand-alone texinfo
formatter and browser and is now working on <CODE>sh</CODE>, the shell.  Stacey
is running the mail room, distributing tapes and manuals and generally
doing every thing that programmers do not do (e.g.  interfacing with the
"real" world).  <B>Jay Fenlason</B> has just finished the profiler and is
now working on miscellaneous utilities.
<P>
<B>Richard Stallman</B> continues to do countless tasks, including refining
the C compiler, GDB, GNU Emacs, etc.; he has also written a termcap manual
and several other documents.  <B>Robert J.  Chassell</B> publishes our
manuals, and serves as the Foundation's treasurer.  <B>Chris Hofstader</B> has
become our fund raiser.  (Don't be surprised if he asks you for money.)
Finally, <B>Len Tower</B> continues to handle electronic administrivia
(mailing lists, information requests, and system mothering).
<P>
<HR>
<P>
<H3><A NAME="SEC4" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC4">GNU's Bulletin</A></H3>
<P>
Copyright (C) 1988 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
<P>
Editors: Stacey (Opus) Goldstein, Robert J. Chassell, Leonard Tower Jr.
<P>
Writers: Richard M. Stallman, Opus Goldstein, Michael Tiemann
<P>
Illustrations: Etienne Suvasa, Jean-Marie Diaz
<P>
Order form: Karl Berry, Kathryn Hargreaves
<P>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim
copies of this document as received, in any medium, provided that
the copyright notice and permission notice are preserved, and
that the distributor grants the recipient permission for further
redistribution as permitted by this notice.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC5" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC5">What Is the Free Software Foundation?</A></H1>
<P>
by Richard M. Stallman
<P>
The Free Software Foundation is dedicated to eliminating restrictions
on copying, redistribution, understanding and modification of software.
<P>
The word "free" in our name does not refer to price; it refers to
freedom.  First, the freedom to copy a program and redistribute it to
your neighbors, so that they can use it as well as you.  Second, the
freedom to change a program, so that you can control it instead of it
controlling you; for this, the source code must be made available to
you.
<P>
The Foundation works to give you these freedoms by developing free
compatible replacements for proprietary software.  Specifically, we
are putting together a complete, integrated software system "GNU" that
is upward-compatible with Unix.  When it is released, everyone will be
permitted to copy it and distribute it to others; in addition, it will
be distributed with source code, so you will be able to learn about
operating systems by reading it, to port it to your own machine, to
improve it, and to exchange the changes with others.
<P>
There are already organizations that distribute free CPM and MSDOS
software.  The Free Software Foundation is doing something different.
<P>
<OL>
<LI>
The other organizations exist primarily for distribution; they
distribute whatever happens to be available.  We hope to provide a
complete integrated free system that will eliminate the need for any
proprietary software.
<P>
<LI>
One consequence is that we are now interested only in software that fits
well into the context of the GNU system.  Distributing free MSDOS or
Macintosh software is a useful activity, but it is not our goal.  For
information on how to get the software we do distribute, please see the
article later in this issue, `How To Get GNU Software'.
<P>
<LI>
Another consequence is that we will actively attempt to improve and extend
the software we distribute, as fast as our manpower permits.  For this
reason, we will always be seeking donations of money, computer equipment or
time, labor, documentation and source code to improve the GNU system.
<P>
<LI>
In fact, our primary purpose is this software development effort;
distribution is just an adjunct which also brings in some money.  We
think that the users will do most of the distribution on their own,
without needing or wanting our help.
</OL>
<P>
<H3><A NAME="SEC6" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC6">Why a Unix-like System?</A></H3>
<P>
It is necessary to be compatible with some widely used system to give
our system an immediate base of trained users who could switch to it
easily and an immediate base of application software that can run on
it.  (Eventually we will provide free replacements for proprietary
application software as well, but that is some years in the future.)
<P>
We chose Unix because it is a fairly clean design which is already
known to be portable, yet whose popularity is still rising.  The
disadvantages of Unix seem to be things we can fix without removing
what is good in Unix.
<P>
Why not imitate MSDOS or CP/M?  They are more widely used, true, but
they are also very weak systems, designed for tiny machines.  Unix is
much more powerful and interesting.  When a system takes years to
implement, it is important to write it for the machines that will
become available in the future; not to let it be limited by the
capabilities of the machines that are in widest use at the moment but
will be obsolete when the new system is finished.
<P>
Why not aim for a new, more advanced system, such as a Lisp Machine?
Mainly because that is still more of a research effort; there is a
sizeable chance that the wrong choices will be made and the system
will turn out not very good.  In addition, such systems are often tied
to special hardware.  Being tied to one manufacturer's machine would
make it hard to remain independent of that manufacturer and get broad
community support.
<P>
<H3><A NAME="SEC7" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC7">Our First Large Donation.</A></H3>
<P>
Software Research Associates, a Japanese software house, has donated
$10,000 to the GNU project.  In addition they plan to send us a
Sun-like SONY workstation and lend us a staff programmer for 6 months.
<P>
This represents the influence of Kouichi Kishida, who organized the
Japanese Sigma project (to stimulate Unix competence in Japan), only
to conclude later that the project had gone astray and that a "grass
roots movement" was needed instead.  We hope to be this movement.
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC8" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC8">GNUs Flashes, February 1988</A></H1>
<P>
by Richard M. Stallman
<P>
<UL>
<P>
<LI>
<B>Some parts of BSD are becoming free.</B>
<P>
After years of urging from us and others, the people who maintain
Berkeley Unix have decided to release various parts of it (those which
don't contain AT&#38;T code) separately as free software.  This includes
substantial programs which we hope to use in GNU, such as TCP/IP
support and the C-shell.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Berkeley and GNU project cooperating.</B>
<P>
The next release of Berkeley Unix may contain Make, AWK and SH from the
GNU project instead of those from Unix.
<P>
The reason is that they would like to have improvements in these programs
like those in system V.3; but they find the new restrictions on V.3
licenses unpalatable.  Both we and they hope they never get a V.3 license.
We may help them avoid it by providing alternative software.
<P>
GNU Make already supports the system V features; a volunteer is now writing
the extensions for Gawk.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Shell disappointment.</B>
<P>
For a year and a half, the GNU shell was "just about done".  The author
made repeated promises to deliver what he had done, and never kept them.
<P>
Finally I could no longer believe he would ever deliver anything.
<P>
So Foundation staff member <B>Brian Fox</B> is now implementing an imitation
of the Bourne shell.  Once it is done, we will extend it with the
features of the Korn shell, thus coming to Berkeley's aid.
<P>
<LI><B>We may use Sprite, or the Sprite file system with MACH.</B>
<P>
We still hope to use the MACH kernel from CMU when it becomes free,
after the parts of Berkeley Unix which currently form part of it have been
replaced as planned.
<P>
The MACH people say that in a month or two certain new features
(call-outs from the kernel to user code) should be ready that will
enable us to start working on replacing some of these parts with new
code.
<P>
One thing we are considering is adapting the file system from
Berkeley's Sprite kernel for use in MACH.  This file system was
designed from the beginning to work in a distributed manner.  The file
system is the largest part of MACH that needs replacement, now that
the Berkeley TCP/IP code, also used in MACH, has been declared free.
<P>
<LI>
<B>GNU Make is done.</B>
<P>
The GNU version of Make is now ready, and will be distributed soon.
It features conditionals, pattern rules, and indirect search for
implicit rules, and built-in functions for text processing.
<P>
Here is how a GNU Makefile can say that the file `foo' is linked
from the object files of all C source files in the current directory:
<P>
<PRE>
   objects=$(subst .c,.o,$(wildcard *.c))
   foo: $(objects)
           $(CC) -o foo $(objects) $(LDFLAGS)
</PRE>
<P>
<LI>
<B>Most libraries are done.</B>
<P>
<B>Roland McGrath</B>, who contributed a great deal to GNU Make, has a nearly
complete set of ANSI C library functions.  We hope they will be ready some
time this spring.  These join the GNU <CODE>malloc</CODE>, <CODE>regexp</CODE> and
<CODE>termcap</CODE> libraries that have existed for some time.
<P>
Meanwhile, <B>Steve Moshier</B> has contributed a full series of mathematical
library functions.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Profiler replacement done.</B>
<P>
Foundation staffer <B>Jay Fenlason</B> has recently completed a profiler to
go with GNU C, compatible with `prof' from Berkeley Unix.  I hope it
will be distributed with GNU C soon.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Termcap Manual.</B>
<P>
We are now publishing the first thorough manual for Termcap, which some
have suggested ought to be entitled "Twice as much as you ever wanted to
know about Termcap".
<P>
<LI>
<B>GNU mailer being done.</B>
<P>
<B>Landon Noll</B> and <B>Ronald Karr</B> of Amdahl are writing a mail queueing and
delivery system, called Smail.  This project will be a supported part
of Amdahl's UTS system--and it will be available on exactly the same
terms as GNU Emacs!
<P>
We may use this mailer for the GNU system, or another mailer that
<B>Rayan Zachariasen</B> is writing, whichever turns out better.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Ghostscript status</B>
<P>
Ghostscript, the free Postscript for GNU, will with luck be finished by
<B>Peter Deutsch</B> (except for bugs) in March.  Therefore, it might be ready
for us to distribute a few months later.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Emacs version 18.50</B>
<P>
This version, to be available in a few weeks, will fix many bugs and add
support for the 80386, the Sun 4, the Convex, the IRIS 4d and the HP 9000
series 800; also support for system V.3; and add support for version 11 of
the X window system.
<P>
<LI>
<B>GDB can read COFF format.</B>
<P>
COFF is the hairy executable file format used on system V.
Recently <B>Dave Johnson</B> of Brown University contributed support
for reading COFF files in GDB, the GNU debugger.  This code will
appear in GDB 2.5, accompanying Emacs 18.50.
<P>
As a result, it should now be possible to use GDB on system V
without a large amount of work.
<P>
In general, support for COFF isn't important for the GNU project,
since we are going to use the BSD object file format in GNU.
Everything said below about VMS applies to COFF support as well.
<P>
<LI>
<B>G<CODE>++</CODE>, the GNU C<CODE>++</CODE> compiler.</B>
<P>
<B>Michael Tiemann</B> of MCC has written a C<CODE>++</CODE> compiler as an extension
of GNU C.  This is the first compiler that compiles C<CODE>++</CODE> directly
instead of preprocessing it into C.
<P>
G<CODE>++</CODE> is now being tested at several sites.  Michael believes it is as
reliable as AT&#38;T's C<CODE>++</CODE> preprocessor, but this still leaves a long way
to go before it is a solid product.
<P>
G<CODE>++</CODE> comes with GDB<CODE>+</CODE>, a version of GDB that supports C<CODE>++</CODE> class
operations in its expression evaluator.
<P>
<LI>
<B>GDB and GNU C support the 32000.</B>
<P>
GNU C has now compiled itself correctly on the Sequent 32000 system.
The port was done by Michael Tiemann of MCC, who says it is more
reliable than Sequent's compiler and yields a 40% speedup for several
programs including a prolog interpreter.
<P>
Support for the 32000 is now released in GNU C version 1.17, along
with existing support for the 68000 series and the VAX.
<P>
GDB support for the 32000 is in GDB 2.5, to appear with Emacs 18.50.
<P>
<LI>
<B>GNU C ports in progress.</B>
<P>
People are working on porting GNU C to the IBM 370, to the IBM RT/PC,
and to the 80386.  The 80386 is the easiest; there is little doubt
that this port will be available in a few months at most.  The other
machines have more troublesome architectural differences and it isn't
yet certain whether GNU C can handle them fully without significant new
features.
<P>
<LI>
<B>GNU C is becoming reliable.</B>
<P>
GNU C bug reports are becoming less frequent, suggesting that it is
approaching a state of reliability.  People are still reporting bugs,
but they also say they think there are fewer bugs than in commercial
compilers.
<P>
<B>John Gilmore</B> is now compiling all of BSD Unix with GNU C.  He has
found several bugs, but not a great number for such a large amount
of code never before compiled.
<P>
<LI>
<B>GNU C for VMS.</B>
<P>
Fed up with the deficiencies of the VMS C compiler, <B>David Kashtan</B>
from SRI decided to spend a couple of weeks and make GNU C run on
VMS.  After making considerable changes to satisfy the VMS C compiler,
he got it running and was able to take most of the changes out.
<P>
We hope to deliver VMS support in GNU C version 1.19 or 1.20,
but we can't be certain when he will finish merging it and deliver it.
(Uh oh, I hope it's not going to take a year...)
<P>
When VMS support is delivered to us, the usual GNU C sources will contain
everything needed for it, but you won't be able to compile them with the
standard VMS C compiler due to its various incompatibilities and
deficiencies.  You will need a binary of GNU C.  We plan to offer mag tapes
with VMS backup savesets containing binaries as well as sources.
<P>
Other GNU programs currently working on VMS include GNU Emacs and Bison.
<P>
Please don't ask us to devote effort to additional VMS support,
because it is peripheral to the GNU project.  We merge in and support
VMS ports that users do, because it is hard to refuse to pass on work
that other people have done.  But even when the changes are clean,
this drains considerable effort from our real goal, which is to
produce a complete integrated system.  (When they aren't clean, we
summon up the courage to ignore them.)  Merging VMS GNU Emacs and
reorganizing the changes to ease future maintenance consumed several
weeks even though the "real work" was done by others.  I hope we have
learned not to let this happen again.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Looking for a tech writer.</B>
<P>
We are trying to hire a technical writer, but so far we have not found
anyone suitable.  It seems that tech writers are not as likely as
programmers to accept a pay cut to work for our cause.  We still have
a couple of candidates who are possible, and we're still looking.
<P>
</UL>
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC9" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC9">GNU C++</A></H1>
<P>
<I>brings Object Oriented Programming to GNU</I>
<P>
by Michael Tiemann
<P>
C<CODE>++</CODE> is among the most popular languages for object-oriented
programming, for two reasons: it is nearly a superset of C, thus
making it easily accessible to the C user community, and it is
supported by AT&#38;T, which leads a standards-hungry public to believe
that, by subscribing to C<CODE>++</CODE> (as opposed to SmallTalk, Objective C, or
many other alternatives), they are following "the standard".  About
a million lines of code have been written in C<CODE>++</CODE>.
<P>
Last summer, I was faced with the task of selecting a language to use for a
new computer architecture project.  So strong was the influence of
C<CODE>++</CODE>, that the only decision I could make was "which one".
C<CODE>++</CODE> from AT&#38;T looked like the logical choice, except for two
problems: it is proprietary software, and it is a preprocessor which
converts C<CODE>++</CODE> code into C code.  This is slow and means that the
constructs and concepts of C<CODE>++</CODE> aren't available in the debugger.
<P>
I decided to see whether we could quickly modify GNU C into a C<CODE>++</CODE>
compiler that has the quality people expect from compilers for other
languages, such as easy retargetability and source-level debugging
support.  I could--and I have.
<P>
The GNU C<CODE>++</CODE> compiler is intended to implement the C<CODE>++</CODE>
programming language, as specified in Stroustrup's reference manual.  Since
most of the GNU C compiler is language-independent, it only took six months
to make a general beta-test release.  There are still gaps and bugs, but I
am working hard on finishing it.  All the optimizations of GNU C apply
equally to C<CODE>++</CODE>.  I have also added C<CODE>++</CODE>-inspired
optimizations.  Some of them, such as inlining functions, will also work in
some cases for C; others, such as optimizing virtual functions, are
strictly C<CODE>++</CODE>.
<P>
GNU C<CODE>++</CODE> is not only the first free C<CODE>++</CODE> compiler; it is the
first <EM>direct</EM> compiler for C<CODE>++</CODE> available at any price, and it
is the first C<CODE>++</CODE> implementation to interface with a C<CODE>++</CODE>
source-level debugger (GDB<CODE>+</CODE>, a modification of the existing GNU
debugger).
<P>
GNU C<CODE>++</CODE> is therefore remarkable from a technical point of view, but
it is even more remarkable organizationally, because it is free
software whose development was paid for by the Microelectronics and
Computer Technology Corporation (MCC), a consortium established in
1982 to do long range research for around 20 shareholder companies.
<P>
In January, six months after I started working on GNU C<CODE>++</CODE>, the group
of MCC shareholders sponsoring the computer architecture project were
told for the first time that I was writing free software.  It was easy
to imagine they might disapprove, Scrooge-like, or even insist on
halting the work.  But it was just the opposite: our cooperation with
the Free Software Foundation was good news to them.  Technology
transfer is one of the most difficult barriers for shareholders to
overcome when picking up MCC research.
<P>
When MCC delivers specialized software, it comes with no experts beyond
those who wrote it, and it is all but unusable except by painful learning.
When we deliver software that relies on a proprietary environment which
they do not have access to, that software becomes an expensive hostage of
its environment.  By providing software which can be made accessible to
anybody, without fear of compromising cooperative agreements, it gives the
shareholders freedom to use that technology in ways previously unavailable
to them.
<P>
Our group was specifically congratulated on its achievement of delivering
technology that they wanted, and making that technology available via the
Free Software Foundation.  Considering that this is the first free software
that MCC has ever sponsored, and the incredibly positive reaction that we
received, it is very exciting to think of the possibilities that lie ahead.
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC10" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC10">GNU Software Available Now</A></H1>
<P>
<UL>
<LI>
<B>GNU Emacs</B>
<P>
In 1975, Richard Stallman developed the first Emacs: the extensible,
customizable real-time display editor.  GNU Emacs is his second
implementation of Emacs.  It's the first Emacs available on Unix
systems which offers true Lisp, smoothly integrated into the editor,
for writing extensions.  It also provides a special interface to
MIT's free X window system, version 10, which makes redisplay very fast.
<P>
GNU Emacs has been in widespread use since 1985 and often, as at
MIT's Project Athena, displaces proprietary implementations of Emacs
because of its greater reliability as well as its good features
and easier extensibility.
<P>
GNU Emacs (as of version 18.50) has run on many kinds of Unix systems:
those made by Alliant (system release 1, 2 or 3), Amdahl (UTS), AT&#38;T (3b
machines and 7300 pc), CCI 5/32 and 6/32, Celerity, Convex, Digital (Vax,
not PDP-11), Dual, Elxsi 6400, Encore, GEC 93, Gould, HP (9000 series 200,
300 or 800 (Spectrum) but not series 500), IBM (RT/PC running 4.2 and AIX),
Integrated Solutions (Optimum V with 68020 and VMEbus), Iris (2500 Turbo
and 4D), LMI (Nu), Masscomp, Megatest, MIPS, NCR (Tower 32), Nixdorf Targon
31, Plexus, Pyramid, Sequent, Stride (system release 2), Sun (any kind),
Tahoe, Tektronix (NS16000 system), Texas Instruments (Nu), Whitechapel
(MG1), and Wicat.  These include both Berkeley Unix and System V (release
0, 2, 2.2 or 3).  Emacs also runs on several 80386 machines.  It also runs
on Apollo machines and on VAX/VMS.
<P>
GNU Emacs use is described by the GNU Emacs Manual, available from
the Free Software Foundation.
<P>
<LI>
<B>GDB</B>
<P>
GDB is the source-level C debugger written for the GNU project in 1986.  It
offers many features not usually found in debuggers on Unix, such as a
history that records all values examined within the debugger for concise
later reference, multi-line user-defined commands, and a strong
self-documentation capability.  It currently runs on VAXen under 4.2 and
4.3bsd, on Suns (systems version 2 and 3), and on some 32000 systems.
<P>
A users' manual for GDB is available from the Foundation.
<P>
<LI>
<B>GNU CC</B>
<P>
The GNU C compiler is a fairly portable optimizing compiler.  It generates
good code for the 32000, 68000, 68020 and Vax.  It features automatic
register packing that makes register declarations unnecessary.  It supports
full ANSI C as of the latest draft standard.  The texinfo source of the
manual "Internals of GNU CC" is included.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Bison</B>
<P>
Bison is an upward-compatible replacement for YACC, with additional
as-yet-undocumented features.  It has been in use for several years.
<P>
<LI>
<B>X Window System</B>
<P>
X is a portable, network transparent window system for bitmap displays
written at MIT and DEC.  It currently runs on DEC VAXstation, Lexidata 90,
and most Sun Microsystems displays, with others in the works.  X supports
overlapping windows and fully recursive subwindows, and provides hooks for
several different styles of user interface.  Applications provided include
a terminal emulator, bitmap editor, several window managers, clock, window
dump and undump programs, hardcopy printing program for the LN03 printer,
and several typesetting previewers.
<P>
Version 10 of X Windows is distributed on the GNU Emacs tape; version 11
(which is totally incompatible) is distributed on the GCC tape.  Emacs
version 18.50 will support both versions 10 and 11.
<P>
<LI>
<B>MIT Scheme</B>
<P>
Scheme is a simplified, lexically scoped dialect of Lisp, designed at
MIT and other universities for two purposes: teaching students of
programming, and researching new parallel programming constructs
and compilation techniques.  MIT Scheme is written in C and runs on
many kinds of Unix systems.
<P>
Sorry, we do not distribute documentation with the the current distribution
version of MIT Scheme.  A new standard for Scheme has been designed by the
various labs that work on Scheme, and work is going on at MIT to change MIT
Scheme to fit.  Once that is done, the standard will serve as a manual for
MIT Scheme.  At that time, we will distribute both the new release of
Scheme and the standard.  In the meantime, several books have been
published about Scheme.
<P>
<LI>
<B>Hack</B>
<P>
Hack is a display oriented adventure game similar to Rogue.
</UL>
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC11" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC11">The GDB Song</A></H1>
<P>
<I>with thanks to Joel Bion, Mark Baushke, and Lynn Slater</I>
<P>
Somebody asked us what was GDB.  With apologies to Oscar Hammerstein
II, Richard Rodgers, and Julie Andrews, we offered the following reply:
<P>
Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start, 
<P>
  When you're learning to sing, its Do, Re, Mi;        <BR>
  When you're learning to code, its G,  D,   B.        <BR>
<P>
                       (background) G,  D,   B.        
<P>
  The first three letters just happen to be, G, D, B.  
<P>
                       (background) G,  D,   B.        
<P>
(Chorus)
<P>
<DL COMPACT>
<P>
<DT>G!,
<DD>   GNU!, it's Stallman's hope,
   
<DT>B,
<DD>     a break I set myself.
   
<DT>D,
<DD>     debug that rotten code,
   
<DT>Run,
<DD>   a far, far way to go.
   
<DT>Print,
<DD> to see what you have done,
   
<DT>Set,
<DD>   a patch that follows print.
<P>
<DT>Quit,
<DD> and recompile your code  - - -
<P>
</DL>
<P>
<PRE>
That will bring it back to G,
                                        D,
                                             B,
                                                   &#60;link&#62;
</PRE>
<P>
(Resume from the Chorus)
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC12" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC12">Why Was Copyright Invented?</A></H1>
<P>
by Richard M. Stallman
<P>
Now that copyright is becoming a public nuisance that the public tries
to ignore, copyright owners try to justify this imposition by calling
it an intrinsic right.  As they tell it, their intrinsic right is a
tradition that makes the public good irrelevant.
<P>
This is contrary to the facts of the history of copyright.
<P>
The Supreme Court has stated explicitly what copyright was for.
Writing for the Court, Justice Stewart explained:
<P>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
The immediate effect of our copyright law is to secure a fair return
for an "author's" creative labor.  But the ultimate aim is, by this
incentive, to stimulate artistic creativity for the general public good.
`The sole interest of the United States and the primary object in
conferring the [copyright] monopoly,' this Court has said, `lie in the
general benefits derived by the public from the labors of authors.'
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<PRE>
<TT>             </TT>---Fox Film Corp. v. Doyal (286 US 123, 127)
</PRE>
<P>
So when copyright interferes with the public use of a program, that
directly attacks the reason for having copyright.
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC13" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC13">When Programs Become Available</A></H1>
<P>
<I>or Rather, how NOT to find out when a program becomes available...</I>
<P>
by Richard M. Stallman
<P>
I have dared to make a few predictions about when certain programs
will be ready for distribution.  Now, after the fact, I hope that
wasn't a mistake.
<P>
Creating a given program often takes much longer than expected.  If
this happens, many of you who are eager to use it might have the idea
of phoning or writing to ask me whether the program is available yet.
Or, even worse, to describe which parts are completed, or which
machines it will be ported to, or how easy it will be to port to
certain machines, or which features are going to be implemented.
<P>
Some of these questions have no answers.  When a program isn't
finished, we don't know which features we will add while finishing it.
We don't make plans to port programs because our usual policy is to
leave porting up to you.  This is a way of recruiting wider
participation.
<P>
Responding to all possible inquiries would divert time and energy and slow
the completion of the program, causing even more inquiries.  Were we to
permit this to happen, the amount of time left to devote to programming
could approach zero.
<P>
Only you can save the GNU project from this absurd fate.  Please
exert your will power, be patient, and wait for us to announce that
programs are available.  If you would like to see more GNU software
appear faster, the best thing to do is to volunteer a significant
amount of your time.
<P>
The best way to find out quickly when a piece of GNU software is released
or updated for general on-line distribution is to arrange to receive the
info-gnu mailing list on which our announcements are made.  To receive
info-gnu, send a request to
<P>
<CODE>ucbvax!prep.ai.mit.edu!info-gnu-request  (usenet)</CODE>
<P>
<CODE>info-gnu-request@prep.ai.mit.edu	     (internet)</CODE>
<P>
Some specific programs such as Emacs, GCC, GDB, GNU Chess, and G<CODE>++</CODE>
have specific mailing lists of their own on which new versions are
announced.  To be on these lists, just mention in your request which
programs you are interested in.
<P>
Tape distribution normally starts some weeks later than on-line
distribution, either because we demand a higher standard of
reliability for users who cannot easily get upgrades, or because we
are hopelessly confused and can't get our act together.  We generally
make another electronic announcement when tape distribution starts.
You can order tapes in advance if you wish, if you understand that
delivery may be delayed for many weeks while we work on reliability.
<P>
When we expect true reliability to take many months to achieve, we may
offer a beta-test tape at an earlier date, as we are doing with GNU C.
We announce these tapes in the usual ways.
<P>
If you can't receive Usenet or Internet mail and you are planning to order
a tape of a specific program, you can telephone the Foundation to find out
whether the program is available for tape distribution.  Our phone number
is (617) 876-3296.  It is best to call in the morning, EST, as you will be
more likely to reach Opus Goldstein, our office and shipping person,
rather than our tape machine.  In general, Opus cannot contact each
person individually to say when a tape is ready, but perhaps an arrangement
can be made if it is important.
<P>
If you are planning to get a copy from someone else, please ask that
person to inform you when it is ready.  This will spread the burden.
<P>
If you are truly desperate for a prognostication, you might try
consulting your local fortune-tellers.  They don't know any less than
we about the future.
<P>
<H3><A NAME="SEC14" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC14">GNU Wish List</A></H3>
<P>
<UL>
<LI>
Money, as always.  Please remember, we are tax-deductable and, among other
things, we want to hire somebody to write documentation!!!
<P>
<LI>
Office equipment, e.g. a desktop copier; a nifty new phone answering
machine that deletes old messages; a couple of Sun workstations or VAXen;
1200/2400/4800/9600 baud modems; and an electric typewriter that has a
delete key.
<P>
<LI>
Highly knowledgible technical people to write excellent documentation on 
a volunteer basis.
<P>
<LI>
Top flight programmers to help write utilities and compilers for new
languages.
<P>
<LI>
Clipings of media articles mentioning GNU.
</UL>
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC15" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC15">How To Get GNU Software</A></H1>
<P>
All the software and publications from the Free Software Foundation
are distributed with permission to
copy and redistribute.  The easiest way to get a copy of GNU software 
is from someone else who has it.  Just copy it from them.
<P>
If you have access to the Internet, you can get the latest
software from the host <TT>`prep.ai.mit.edu'</TT>.  For
more information, read the file <TT>`/u2/emacs/GETTING.GNU.SOFTWARE'</TT>
on that host.
<P>
If you cannot get the software from a friend or over the net, the Free
Software Foundation distributes tapes for a copying and distribution fee.
See the order form on the inside back cover.
<P>
If you do not have net access, and your computers cannot use either of the
two media we distribute on, you must get our software from third party
groups--people and organizations that do not work with us, but have our
software in other forms.  For your convenience, other groups that are
helping to spread GNU software are listed below.  Please note that the Free
Software Foundation is <I>not</I> affiliated with them in any way, and is not
responsible for either the currency of their versions or the swiftness of
their responses.
<P>
These Internet sites have some GNU programs available for anonymous FTP:
<CODE>louie.udel.edu</CODE>, <CODE>nic.nyser.net</CODE>, <CODE>bu-it.bu.edu</CODE>,
<CODE>uunet.uu.net</CODE>, <CODE>spam.istc.sri.com</CODE>, and <CODE>simtel20.arpa</CODE>
(under PD:&#60;UNIX.GNU&#62;).
<P>
Information on how to uucp some GNU programs is available via electronic
mail from: <CODE>arnold@skeeve.UUCP</CODE>, <CODE>ihnp4!hutch!barber</CODE>,
<CODE>hqda-ai!merlin</CODE>.  Also, you can ask:
<CODE>hao!scicom!qetzal!upba!ugn!nepa!denny</CODE> or else from:
<CODE>postmaster@uunet.uu.net</CODE>.
<P>
Ohio State also uucps GNU programs.  They post their instructions monthly
to newsgroup <CODE>comp.sources.d</CODE> on Usenet.  Current details from Karl
Kleinpaste <CODE>karl@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu</CODE> or
<CODE>karl@ohio-state.arpa</CODE> or <CODE>...!cbosgd!osu-cis!karl</CODE>; or Bob
Sutterfield (substitute bob for karl in the above addresses).
<P>
Information on obtaining floppy disks of GNU Emacs for the AT&#38;T Unix PC
(aka 3B1 or PC7300) is available via electronic mail from:
<CODE>brant@manta.uucp</CODE>.
<P>
<H1><A NAME="SEC16" HREF="bull4_toc.html#SEC16">Thank GNUs</A></H1>
<P>
Thanks to all those mentioned in GNU Flashes.
<P>
Thanks to the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science, and its head,
<B>Professor Dertouzos</B>.  The LCS has provided FSF with the loan of a
Microvax for program development.
<P>
Thanks to the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory for invaluable
assistance of many kinds.
<P>
Thanks to <B>Nobuyuki Hikichi</B> of Software Research Associates, Tokyo, for
porting GCC to the SONY NEWS machine.  Thanks also for the $10,000 they
contributed.
<P>
Thanks to NeXT, Inc., for their improvements to the GNU Assembler and the
Gnu DeBugger.
<P>
Thanks to <B>Micheal Tiemann</B> of MCC for extending GCC and GDB to handle
C<CODE>++</CODE> and for porting GCC to the 32000 with some contributions from
<B>Jan Stein</B> of the Chalmers Computer Club.
<P>
Thanks to <B>Ted Lemon</B> who wrote parts of the RTL reader and printer for GCC.
<P>
For porting GCC, thanks to <B>Charles LaBrec</B> (Integrated Solutions 68020
system); to <B>Greg Satz</B>(HPUX); to <B>David Kashtan</B> (VMS).
<P>
Thanks to <B>David S. Hayes</B> for enhancing GNU diff.
<P>
Thanks to <B>Dan LaLiberte</B> for spearheading the GNU Emacs Lisp Programmers
Manual, and to <B>Bill Lewis</B> and <B>Tom Scott</B> who have been working on
putting it all together.
<P>
Thanks to <B>Wolfgang Rupprecht</B> for providing floating point support for
GNU Emacs.
<P>
Thanks to <B>Torbjorn Granlund</B> for fast implementations of <CODE>split</CODE>,
<CODE>wc</CODE>, <CODE>cmp</CODE>, <CODE>cat</CODE> and <CODE>cp</CODE>.
<P>
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.
<P>
Thanks to those who sent money and offered help.  Thanks also to those
who support us by ordering Emacs manuals and distribution tapes.
<P>
The creation of this bulletin is our way of thanking all who have
expressed interest in what we are doing.
<P>
<HR>
<P>
<PRE>
                                                -------
                                               |       |
Free Software Foundation, Inc.                 | stamp |
675 Massachusetts Avenue                       |       |
Cambridge, MA  02139                           | here  |
                                               |       |
                                                -------
</PRE>
<P>
<HR>