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Java is a marketing buzzword that covers a variety of technologies. Quoting http://java.sun.com/java2/whatis/:

The JavaTM platform is based on the power of networks and the idea that the same software should run on many different kinds of computers, consumer gadgets, and other devices. Since its initial commercial release in 1995, Java technology has grown in popularity and usage because of its true portability. The Java platform allows you to run the same Java application on lots of different kinds of computers.

[...]The idea is simple: Java technology-based software can work just about everywhere. Java technology components don't care what kind of computer, phone, TV, or operating system they run on. They just work, on any kind of compatible device that supports the Java platform.

In the Java 1.0 days there were essentially three things referred to as Java: the JVM, the language, and the standard library. Oh, and maybe something about delivery of applets through sandboxed bytecode. Four things Sun wanted you to think of for the term "Java". Now there are a zillion. Soon, there will be a zillion and fifty.

OK, OK, those aren't at the same architectural level as the big three components. But "Java" has become increasingly vague, and don't think Sun isn't encouraging this. They want non-directed feelings of goodness associated with whatever's in their (proprietary) platform this week.

If what people wanted from Java was just a language, in the traditional view of what a language is, gcj would have taken over the world by now.

1. Nice flock of cows.

2. Hurd of cows.

1. Yes I have. Heard of sheep?

The previous edition of this CD was very good. It installed all the standard suite of GNU tools, including bash, emacs, gcc, perl, awk, grep, etc. It puts everything in one directory, no messing with the registry and shit, so it is easy to uninstall (just delete that directory). Also, using these tools does not restrict your freedom; you have the source code and the free use of it, and these same tools will be available to you should you work on other operating systems and architectures. For me, the advantage over cygwin was the nice package of stuff on the CD with the setup script, because most of the machines I was installing this on didn't have network connections.

I would advise installing either that CD or the cygwin package and teaching your friends to use emacs and one of the mail readers in it, such as rmail or gnus (I personally use gnus but it was a bit of a learning curve). I know gnus can be configured to use a remote pop server such as a yahoo account, and the other mail readers probably can also.

I am looking forward to using the new edition of this CD on a free operating system -- FreeDos -- for the first time, and I also supported the FSF by purchasing this (3 copies) and T-shirts as well.

The page for ordering the CD (and other FSF stuff) is here, and the description of the CD is here.

The previous edition of this CD was very good. It installed all the standard suite of GNU tools, including bash, emacs, gcc, perl, awk, grep, etc. It puts everything in one directory, no messing with the registry and shit, so it is easy to uninstall (just delete that directory). Also, using these tools does not restrict your freedom; you have the source code and the free use of it, and these same tools will be available to you should you work on other operating systems and architectures. For me, the advantage over cygwin was the nice package of stuff on the CD with the setup script, because most of the machines I was installing this on didn't have network connections.

I would advise installing either that CD or the cygwin package and teaching your friends to use emacs and one of the mail readers in it, such as rmail or gnus (I personally use gnus but it was a bit of a learning curve). I know gnus can be configured to use a remote pop server such as a yahoo account, and the other mail readers probably can also.

I am looking forward to using the new edition of this CD on a free operating system -- FreeDos -- for the first time, and I also supported the FSF by purchasing this (3 copies) and T-shirts as well.

The page for ordering the CD (and other FSF stuff) is here, and the description of the CD is here.

I always thought GNUs were herbavores...learn something new every day...

KidA

GRUB is fantastic! It's very simple and super-powerful. I can't check out the XOSL page, but I understand that it has been undeveloped for the past 10 months. I believe that GRUB is still unorphaned and continuously being improved.

Once you properly read the docs for grub (squirreled away inside the tar.gz) you can rapidly deploy it for any kind of multi-booting. In fact, I've never used it with a *nix, but instead use it to force multiple, independent mirrors of Windows95/98 to exist on different partitions on the same machine for Q/A purposes here at work. (hint: you can script the boot process and hide/unhide partitions to fool windows into anything)

Huh?

ftp://gcc.gnu.org/pub/gcc/releases/gcc-2.95.3

Y'know, when I installed W2K I thought Microsoft finally made an operating system that was "Good Enough". It was reasonably stable, and it did what I needed. Video games, development, office apps. It was as easy to use as Win95 (What the hell do you mean, "Robin Drive failed?") and as stable as NT4.

And I could make it as pretty as I wanted, with Windowblinds without giving up a nice bash prompt and emacs.

I swore I'd never upgrade Windows again. Now they have Windows XP. New technology, multi-user, blablabla. I thought nothing short of support for ext2fs would make me upgrade. I was wrong.

ONE new feature that is absolutely essential if you have an LCD screen. (ie. a laptop) Cleartype filtering. So much nicer on the eyes. Text has never looked so good.

Overview of Cleartype & Links
Some samples

Took a bit to find the link for this (strange how gnu.org's on search engine missed it). What RMS says in this section I think could apply to terrorists as well.

The preferred form of the Linux kernel includes an up to date changelog.

Go, GRUB, go!

I was surprised to see that, too, as the GNU Grub page says, "GNU GRUB is not released publicly yet." On the other hand, doesn't Mandrake use GRUB?

The most humorous, perhaps, but definitely not the best. The best source for seeing what changes were made is the NEWS file, which can be accessed from Emacs via `C-h n'.

--Mike

Emacs is a class of editors with similar properties (programmable, use of modifier keys to launch editor commands, and so forth.) It can also refer to GNU Emacs, one of the most powerful and widely-used implementations of Emacs today, which is what this story is about.

Emacs is one of the two most popular types of editor in Unix, the other being vi. Befitting its long history, it is very stable and functional, though lacking in the eye-candy of more recent software (though this release goes a long way to correcting that.)

The sources of information on Emacs is the GNU Emacs homepage, especially the on-line version of the Manual. The best way to learn about Emacs, as with any software, is simply to install it and try it out for yourself.

Should be at:

ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/windows/emacs/latest (latest distributions)

But you'll have to wait for the server to become unslashdotted. You might try the mirrors.

I was suprised to see it wasn't available with Cygwin yet, but it is available separately (Cygwin.dll is a POSIX api that runs under Windows, and the whole Cygwin system is a shell environment consisting of lots of programs that have been compiled to use Cygwin.dll - check it out if you use Windows at all; it's very easy to install).

Anyway, you can get what is called "NT Emacs" from one of these mirrors. Note you will need a Microsoft compiler to build it; it has not yet been configured to build under gcc for Windows - if you don't have MSVC, then get one of the binary packages.

This is the NT Emacs FAQ.

Despite that it is called "NT Emacs" it is reported to work on non-NT versions of Windows.

Here is a helpful installation guide.

Here is a Google search for "NT Emacs" that turns up a lot of helpful pages.

NT Emacs by default runs the Windows command interpreter when you run shells within it. If you use Cygwin, here is how you run bash as a shell under NT Emacs.

After getting all nostalgic about emacs in my post below, I thought I'd give my old friend another try. But right now I'm doing Windows work, and I was suprised to find Cygwin doesn't provide emacs; a little search turned up the above. I haven't actually even downloaded it yet, but I'm about to. I run Linux too (Debian PPC & Slackware) but this way I can use it for my current work.

I was suprised to see it wasn't available with Cygwin yet, but it is available separately (Cygwin.dll is a POSIX api that runs under Windows, and the whole Cygwin system is a shell environment consisting of lots of programs that have been compiled to use Cygwin.dll - check it out if you use Windows at all; it's very easy to install).

Anyway, you can get what is called "NT Emacs" from one of these mirrors. Note you will need a Microsoft compiler to build it; it has not yet been configured to build under gcc for Windows - if you don't have MSVC, then get one of the binary packages.

This is the NT Emacs FAQ.

Despite that it is called "NT Emacs" it is reported to work on non-NT versions of Windows.

Here is a helpful installation guide.

Here is a Google search for "NT Emacs" that turns up a lot of helpful pages.

NT Emacs by default runs the Windows command interpreter when you run shells within it. If you use Cygwin, here is how you run bash as a shell under NT Emacs.

After getting all nostalgic about emacs in my post below, I thought I'd give my old friend another try. But right now I'm doing Windows work, and I was suprised to find Cygwin doesn't provide emacs; a little search turned up the above. I haven't actually even downloaded it yet, but I'm about to. I run Linux too (Debian PPC & Slackware) but this way I can use it for my current work.

In case it hasn't been done yet... Ed man! !man edBest editor ever!

There's also Programming in Emacs Lisp, an Introduction[gnu.org], a GNU manual.

Actually, this changelog is more informative and more complete.

ChangeLog

-Justin

Try this link for direct access to the 21.1 changelog. It looks they've already branched in preparation for new development.

Fred is a DBA, so Windows "major major asset" is DB modeling tools.

Recent Oracle clients run on Java technology. Java technology runs on Linux86; Fred can download a Linux version of the SDK or the smaller JRE.

Sally is a project manager, so Windows "major major asset" is project tools.

She can use MrProject or Toutdoux.

Biff is an accountant, so Windows "major major asset" is spreadsheet software.

Like Gnumeric?

The situation with office apps does not parallel like the situation with Photoshop vs. GIMP. Most office suite users do not need the "high-end features" that Microsoft pushes on users with each new relea$e. Even then, those who clone MS Office don't have to worry about broad color-correction patents that play a significant part in keeping GIMP from matching Photoshop's feature set.

Try here or this or better yet just look it up for yourself using google

Certainly that is one thing that ahead-of-time compilation achieves, however it is not the only thing. Those "small" executables can of course link with traditional shared libraries (dlls) which would encompass the standard Java libraries plus (potentially) any third party libraries.

In order to achieve that, they sacrifice many of the properties that make Java interesting in the first place.

I don't agree. As I pointed out, gcj supports dynamic class loading in those few cases where it is needed.

If you take a single-process, dynamic-compilation approach, Java really shines: you can combine lots of software components at runtime, and the dynamic compiler will optimize and inline everything at runtime.

I understand that better inlining is one of the benefits of dynamic compilation. However, the just-in-time compiler (JITC) cannot perform extensive optimizations. You are paying a cost in computer time to do both the analysis and compilation every time you run the program. By the way, there is no reason you couldn't write a traditional compiler to accept profiling information and do better optimization based on those.

That's not theoretical, it really works. If you keep a single Java process running (rather than starting things up again and again), javac, jedit, and other substantial Java programs are lightning fast.

If you look at my posting history, you'll see that I've made the point that modern VMs are approaching the speeds necessary for high-performance computing. ;-)

However, wouldn't it be nice if those programs a) loaded lightning fast and b) ran fast even the first time they're used? It's rather annoying to hit an intensive operation for the first time, have it take a minute, then have it run in five seconds the next time. Don't you agree? (BTW, this could be accomplished by "freezing" the program onto disk when it is closed, then "unfreezing" it back into the VM when loaded, preserving the compiled sections. The VM would discard the frozen copy when it detected a .class/.jar file version change.)

I agree that gcj is very worthwhile, and I hope its development will continue. Many people (myself included) still want to write small, stand-alone applications some of the time, and being able to use Java is nice for that.

I think gcj has many other potential uses. First, it is a great approach (given a robust compiler;) for the large applications which are of interest to the Java Grande Forum, or any others that require the absolute best performance (I know this will have to be examined carefully by benchmarks once gcj is far enough along - my guess is that gcj will win, especially given the ability to ignore array bounds checking in tested code. Also with gcj you can deterministically lock out the garbage collector if desired.) If the JDK 1.4 VM doesn't give Java enough performance to be competitive on things like 3D games and flight sims, gcj will have its chance. Finally, gcj should do well in very small embedded environments where an interpreter/VM just doesn't make sense.

Gcj's easy connection with C++ also is a great link to existing codebases.

You're referring to CNI, which is also a very efficient way to link to C/C++. This is also a major strength of gcj.

Nevertheless, for developing a modern desktop, I think the dynamic compilation approach is a much better way to go than ahead-of-time compilation.

It wasn't clear that your comments about gcj were strictly in reference to "developing a modern desktop". In that context, I'd tend to agree with you. However, for monolithic applications (games, productivity tools, compute servers, compilers etc.) there's a lot to be said for traditional compilation.

Its also nice that gcj is open source, and can be forked for new, experimental languages. I'd like to see that done to provide a good operator overloading facility (using different than normal Unicode symbols so that overloading can be identified easily), lightweight types and generics. Some of that can be accomplished using preprocessors with Java, but direct compiler support would be better. :-)

Thanks for the interesting discussion, and sorry it took so long to respond...

299,792,458 m/s...not just a good idea, its the law!

Hmm, you swallowed the M$ line that the shell (internet explorer) is part of the OS.

Nonsense. I learned that definition back in the 80's. (I also learned the difference between a shell and a web browser long before IE was written.) Do you thing RMS is a Micro$soft dupe when he notes, "But you can't use a kernel by itself; a kernel is useful only as part of a whole operating system."

Admittedly, "operating system" is a fuzzy term; some use it to mean only the kernel, while some refer to the system as a whole. "Kernel" and "system" are clearer, and I prefer to use them. Linux - i.e., what Linus wrote - is the kernel. The stuff that makes it a useable system - and the whole vision of a free (as in speech) Unix-like system - is GNU.

Many people have made major contributions to the free software in the system, and they all deserve credit. But the reason it is a system--and not just a collection of useful programs--is because the GNU Project set out to make it one. We made a list of the programs needed to make a complete free system, and we systematically found, wrote, or found people to write everything on the list. We wrote essential but unexciting major components, such as the assembler and linker, because you can't have a system without them. A complete system needs more than just programming tools; the Bourne Again SHell, the PostScript interpreter Ghostscript, and the GNU C library are just as important. By the early 90s we had put together the whole system aside from the kernel (and we were also working on a kernel, the GNU Hurd, which runs on top of Mach). Developing this kernel has been a lot harder than we expected, and we are still working on finishing it. Fortunately, you don't have to wait for it, because Linux is working now. When Linus Torvalds wrote Linux, he filled the last major gap. People could then put Linux together with the GNU system to make a complete free system: a Linux-based GNU system (or GNU/Linux system, for short).

Also, isn't hurd an OS built on a mach kernel, or is it just a kernel?

Mach is a microkernel, which is not the same thing as a kernel. If you have a microkernel, you build servers that sit on top of it to provide the usual kernel services; the Hurd is a collection of such servers. You could can the Hurd a kernel, loosely speaking. (GNU does.)

The Hurd is, according to GNU,

...the GNU project's replacement for the Unix kernel. The Hurd is a collection of servers that run on the Mach microkernel to implement file systems, network protocols, file access control, and other features that are implemented by the Unix kernel or similar kernels (such as Linux)....The Hurd, together with the GNU Mach microkernel, the GNU C Library and the other GNU programs, provides a rather complete and usable operating system today.

Hmm, you swallowed the M$ line that the shell (internet explorer) is part of the OS.

Nonsense. I learned that definition back in the 80's. (I also learned the difference between a shell and a web browser long before IE was written.) Do you thing RMS is a Micro$soft dupe when he notes, "But you can't use a kernel by itself; a kernel is useful only as part of a whole operating system."

Admittedly, "operating system" is a fuzzy term; some use it to mean only the kernel, while some refer to the system as a whole. "Kernel" and "system" are clearer, and I prefer to use them. Linux - i.e., what Linus wrote - is the kernel. The stuff that makes it a useable system - and the whole vision of a free (as in speech) Unix-like system - is GNU.

Many people have made major contributions to the free software in the system, and they all deserve credit. But the reason it is a system--and not just a collection of useful programs--is because the GNU Project set out to make it one. We made a list of the programs needed to make a complete free system, and we systematically found, wrote, or found people to write everything on the list. We wrote essential but unexciting major components, such as the assembler and linker, because you can't have a system without them. A complete system needs more than just programming tools; the Bourne Again SHell, the PostScript interpreter Ghostscript, and the GNU C library are just as important. By the early 90s we had put together the whole system aside from the kernel (and we were also working on a kernel, the GNU Hurd, which runs on top of Mach). Developing this kernel has been a lot harder than we expected, and we are still working on finishing it. Fortunately, you don't have to wait for it, because Linux is working now. When Linus Torvalds wrote Linux, he filled the last major gap. People could then put Linux together with the GNU system to make a complete free system: a Linux-based GNU system (or GNU/Linux system, for short).

Also, isn't hurd an OS built on a mach kernel, or is it just a kernel?

Mach is a microkernel, which is not the same thing as a kernel. If you have a microkernel, you build servers that sit on top of it to provide the usual kernel services; the Hurd is a collection of such servers. You could can the Hurd a kernel, loosely speaking. (GNU does.)

The Hurd is, according to GNU,

...the GNU project's replacement for the Unix kernel. The Hurd is a collection of servers that run on the Mach microkernel to implement file systems, network protocols, file access control, and other features that are implemented by the Unix kernel or similar kernels (such as Linux)....The Hurd, together with the GNU Mach microkernel, the GNU C Library and the other GNU programs, provides a rather complete and usable operating system today.

Hmm, you swallowed the M$ line that the shell (internet explorer) is part of the OS.

Nonsense. I learned that definition back in the 80's. (I also learned the difference between a shell and a web browser long before IE was written.) Do you thing RMS is a Micro$soft dupe when he notes, "But you can't use a kernel by itself; a kernel is useful only as part of a whole operating system."

Admittedly, "operating system" is a fuzzy term; some use it to mean only the kernel, while some refer to the system as a whole. "Kernel" and "system" are clearer, and I prefer to use them. Linux - i.e., what Linus wrote - is the kernel. The stuff that makes it a useable system - and the whole vision of a free (as in speech) Unix-like system - is GNU.

Many people have made major contributions to the free software in the system, and they all deserve credit. But the reason it is a system--and not just a collection of useful programs--is because the GNU Project set out to make it one. We made a list of the programs needed to make a complete free system, and we systematically found, wrote, or found people to write everything on the list. We wrote essential but unexciting major components, such as the assembler and linker, because you can't have a system without them. A complete system needs more than just programming tools; the Bourne Again SHell, the PostScript interpreter Ghostscript, and the GNU C library are just as important. By the early 90s we had put together the whole system aside from the kernel (and we were also working on a kernel, the GNU Hurd, which runs on top of Mach). Developing this kernel has been a lot harder than we expected, and we are still working on finishing it. Fortunately, you don't have to wait for it, because Linux is working now. When Linus Torvalds wrote Linux, he filled the last major gap. People could then put Linux together with the GNU system to make a complete free system: a Linux-based GNU system (or GNU/Linux system, for short).

Also, isn't hurd an OS built on a mach kernel, or is it just a kernel?

Mach is a microkernel, which is not the same thing as a kernel. If you have a microkernel, you build servers that sit on top of it to provide the usual kernel services; the Hurd is a collection of such servers. You could can the Hurd a kernel, loosely speaking. (GNU does.)

The Hurd is, according to GNU,

...the GNU project's replacement for the Unix kernel. The Hurd is a collection of servers that run on the Mach microkernel to implement file systems, network protocols, file access control, and other features that are implemented by the Unix kernel or similar kernels (such as Linux)....The Hurd, together with the GNU Mach microkernel, the GNU C Library and the other GNU programs, provides a rather complete and usable operating system today.

1. Bonobo has been out for a while now and used as the core of Evolution, Gide, Dev Help, Nautilus and many others... ever wonder why Open Office is intergrating with Bonobo?

2. nope, no such recomendation at that link. May I remind you that Galeon just won an award for the best linux browser?

3. Absolute unsubstantiated bullshit.

4. I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves:

KDE

GNOME

5. Hurd was started in 1990, before linux, further more, the GNOME people are not employed by Gnu and are associated only substantially by name.

G/K are here to stay, deal with it.

• GNU/HURD should indeed be called just GNU, since it's the GNU OS proper; RMS said recently in a mailing-list that although this is the case one should use GNU/HURD whenever there is need to differenciate (e.g. "Debian GNU" would be awkward and misleading, hence GNU/Linux and GNU/HURD). Apart from that, the HURD is indeed GNU (since the kernel is part of the GNU system there is no need to use GNU/HURD, unlike GNU/Linux where there is such a need).
  
  
• Usability: how many people have actually tried installing and running GNU/HURD? From the comments, not a lot... Sure, there are still several things missing, but the concept of the HURD is elegant and interesting enough to make it worthwhile... the fundamental servers are already done, many interesting translators are done and others being developed (think for example of the ftp translator... that give system wide transparent FTP, with no modification on any user program...). All the gnu shell and text utils are there, and so is Emacs and hundrends of other programs, including XFree. I wouldn't call this 'useless'...
  
  
• Some limitations and shortcomings are still there, and some of them probably give the appearance of a slowdown in development (threads, the 1GB limit for the partitions that the it can handle and the ppp code); this will be hopefully soon solved (I would say very soon). The truth is that, apart from the hardware support - that will be greatly improved with oskit-mach - and some programs that depend on libs that are hard to port everything is available. I can browse the web on GNU/HURD; I can program in GNU/HURD; I can do huge ammounts of important stuff while using GNU/HURD, and all this without even going for HURD specific features that are very intriging and useful (again, servers and translators come to mind... check the GNU/HURD website for info on all this.
  
  

I wonder if everyone would be yucking it up and joking so much if this letter was sent to the FSF? I dislike MS as much as the next geek but making wise cracks about this is pretty low and tasteless. I wonder if you would mind telling that joke in front of the affected people's familes? If the thought of that makes you uncomfortable then you know you shouldn't say it in the first place. If it doesn't bother you then any words would be air better used elsewhere than talking to you...

-Pato

No offense, but I think you're reflecting your own prejudices rather than any real issue. This has actually been one of the most appreciated aspects of the migration. WinCVS is perfectly workable and usable, even with Visual Studio. What's the big deal about keeping a WinCVS window open, and Alt-Tabbing to it to do commits? Keep in mind that the CVS checkout model is significantly more powerful than that of VSS: typically, developers work with the entire source tree checked out, keeping a complete copy of the repository locally. So the anal checkin-checkout model required by VSS disappears, and you're mainly doing commits, only when you need to commit a change, while keeping the source checked out.

None of the developers at this client even murmured about it - once they got used to the improved checkout model, and found how much quicker remote version control became, they were sold.

Usability? Once it's configured by someone who knows what they're doing (e.g. me ;), there's no usability problem for the "end developers" that I know of. I provided some scripts to do things like publish web pages from CVS to their intra/extranet web sites, and to update stored procedures in their MS SQL database from CVS.

Here's another way to answer your implied question: the fact that Visual Studio only integrates with VSS is simply another example of Microsoft's undesirable product tying, which restricts customer's options. When I pointed this out to the IT manager at this company, he was open to investigating alternatives to Visual Studio. Besides, since they're now migrating from ASP to JSP, Visual Studio is no longer really appropriate, and has begun being replaced by IDEs like JBuilder and NetBeans - the latter being open source, and having excellent CVS integration.

There are a couple of solutions for using visual sourcesafe over the internet though, fast and reliable, with all the benefits of VSS: integration in visual studio's tools and visual browsing of the database. Two things CVS will not bring you.

If by "visual browsing of the database" you mean browsing the repository, again, since developers typically work with the entire source tree checked out, they can browse the repository locally using WinCVS or even simply Windows Explorer. This is actually a big benefit over VSS. If you want to browse parts of the repository that aren't locally checked out, you can simply use a web interface, like cvsweb (the one used in this case) or ViewCVS. Here are a couple of arbitrary example repositories: cvsweb (OpenBSD) and ViewCVS (GNU).

Another argument in favor of CVS is since that's what many open source projects use, familiarity with CVS is an asset. The developers I work with liked that idea.

Note that the Zope license is incompatible with the GPL. Something to consider before you start using it.

The FSF considers for example the 3-bullet BSD license free software. But it is not copyleft.

Please checkout GNU Classpath and GNU ClasspathX extensionsor the Gnu Compiler for Java if you are really interested in Free solutions for Java. Without those free foundations, Java programs will never be truely Free Software!

Please checkout GNU Classpath and GNU ClasspathX extensionsor the Gnu Compiler for Java if you are really interested in Free solutions for Java. Without those free foundations, Java programs will never be truely Free Software!

Please checkout GNU Classpath and GNU ClasspathX extensionsor the Gnu Compiler for Java if you are really interested in Free solutions for Java. Without those free foundations, Java programs will never be truely Free Software!

Though I'm a server jockey, and working on mostly server apps that are deployed on linux, I am currently being forced to use W2K at my office for development, which are then ported to linux for deployment. Screwy engineering process, but one I've learned to cope with because other developers have felt our pain, and made life better for everyone by porting the best of the open source tools.

I use Cygwin for most of my CLI tools. It provides a bash prompt and an incredibly useful set of tools such as grep, find, diff, ssh, tar, gzip, autoconf, automake, make, gcc and others. Beyond that, many other useful tools have been ported or are easy to port because of the services provided by cygwin. I have had problems getting cvs to work correctly. I have also had problems getting emacs to look correct in the console window.

I also use emacs for all of my text editing and devlopment needs. Not only does it give you a powerful development environment in conjunction with visual c++, it can also be hooked into cygwin. I tried VisEmacs and didn't like it (YMMV) as much as simply setting the proper environment variables and churning out programs with emacs 'compile' set to run nmake.

Though I'm a server jockey, and working on mostly server apps that are deployed on linux, I am currently being forced to use W2K at my office for development, which are then ported to linux for deployment. Screwy engineering process, but one I've learned to cope with because other developers have felt our pain, and made life better for everyone by porting the best of the open source tools.

I use Cygwin for most of my CLI tools. It provides a bash prompt and an incredibly useful set of tools such as grep, find, diff, ssh, tar, gzip, autoconf, automake, make, gcc and others. Beyond that, many other useful tools have been ported or are easy to port because of the services provided by cygwin. I have had problems getting cvs to work correctly. I have also had problems getting emacs to look correct in the console window.

I also use emacs for all of my text editing and devlopment needs. Not only does it give you a powerful development environment in conjunction with visual c++, it can also be hooked into cygwin. I tried VisEmacs and didn't like it (YMMV) as much as simply setting the proper environment variables and churning out programs with emacs 'compile' set to run nmake.

1. OpenNap
2. XFree86
3. Cygwin
4. Emacs
5. Vi and Vim
6. Mojo Nation
7. Visual Tcl
8. MikTEX
9. Open Perl IDE
10. Mozilla
11. WinCVS
12. BitchX
13. Firebird
14. mySQL

There is little open source software for windows, because authors of open source software do not want to support microsoft.

Sorry, this is false. I run Windows 2000, primarily because this is the sole machine that both my girlfriend and I use, and she is not comfortable with Linux desktop environments. OSS I have installed right now? Putty, GNU Emacs, bash(under Cygwin), BitchX, and an IDE based on mingw32 that utilizes ports of gcc and gdb.

I have run the Gimp on Windows, but that's actually kind of jarring; GTK look and feel just smacked down in the middle of everything else. I probably would have gotten used to it eventually, though.

Oh the sad irony that the figures are in format based upon a software patent. See the FSF's Why no GIFs? for details. As an aside there is an open source OS that supports the uITRON 3.0 API and POSIX -- RTEMS. Congratulations to all recipients. The projects are definitely worthy. --joel

You can run GNU emacs (or xemacs, if so inclined) on Windows. Pre-compiled binaries can be found here. Therefore, there ARE free LISP interpreters available for Windows, and all other platforms which emacs has been ported to.

You thought MS had sort of nazi-esque methods? Well, I will now, in this brief essay, reveal to you the hidden truth of Linux, an joint Finnish-German Nazi conspiration for revenge against the victors of WW2. Let's look at the evidence.

During the second World War, Finland was a close allied to the Third Reich, as is clearly illustrated by this photo of a finnish military aircraft. After the defeat of the Axis Powers, a revantionist urge abounds in both countries.

Linux was written by Finnish stuent Linus Thorvalds, a member of the small Swedish-speaking minority of Finland, well known for it's white supremacist tendencies. In this article Torvalds expresses his enthusiasm and admiration for the German-led KDE project. He also makes some unclear statements about the claims of Richard Stallman for calling the operating system GNU/Linux being invalid. Why is this? Obviously, the Nazi -and therefore Anti-Communist- Thorvalds here shows his support for his German allies against the Communist GNU and GNOME [gnome.org] projects.

But what does this hideous Nazi conspiracy want? We cannot, at this point, know. But what we do know, is that Nazies are up to no good. To stop them from achieving whichever horrible goals they hav in mind, I would strongly discourage any use of the Linux kernel or the KDE. Instead, I would recomend the use of a truly democratic operating system.

Thank You.

You thought MS had sort of nazi-esque methods? Well, I will now, in this brief essay, reveal to you the hidden truth of Linux, an joint Finnish-German Nazi conspiration for revenge against the victors of WW2. Let's look at the evidence.

During the second World War, Finland was a close allied to the Third Reich, as is clearly illustrated by this photo of a finnish military aircraft. After the defeat of the Axis Powers, a revantionist urge abounds in both countries.

Linux was written by Finnish stuent Linus Thorvalds, a member of the small Swedish-speaking minority of Finland, well known for it's white supremacist tendencies. In this article Torvalds expresses his enthusiasm and admiration for the German-led KDE project. He also makes some unclear statements about the claims of Richard Stallman for calling the operating system GNU/Linux being invalid. Why is this? Obviously, the Nazi -and therefore Anti-Communist- Thorvalds here shows his support for his German allies against the Communist GNU and GNOME [gnome.org] projects.

But what does this hideous Nazi conspiracy want? We cannot, at this point, know. But what we do know, is that Nazies are up to no good. To stop them from achieving whichever horrible goals they hav in mind, I would strongly discourage any use of the Linux kernel or the KDE. Instead, I would recomend the use of a truly democratic operating system.

Thank You.

You might want to check out the Apple Public Source License
It is pretty close to what you want, although it is not GPL compatable.
If you are writing your own, it might be a useful starting point.
There is a nice list of other licenses here - always a good spot to start exploring.

You might want to check out the Apple Public Source License
It is pretty close to what you want, although it is not GPL compatable.
If you are writing your own, it might be a useful starting point.
There is a nice list of other licenses here - always a good spot to start exploring.

Put up or shut up is a good thing to tell people who complain. It's not a nice thing to tell people who are trying to help you.

Without Linux, GNU would still be a rather obscure name that many computer scientists don't even recognize. Sure, the GNU tools allowed Linux to start off sooner, but there was nothing special about the GNU tools at the time Linux was created -- save that it was free (gratuis), and our beloved Finn could afford them on a student's budget.

No one who ever wrote a line of code outside of Visual Basic would ever say something as ignorant as that. First off, anyone who knows their history knows that GCC was not the only gratis compiler in the world. Second, anyone who has been using those compiler knows that GCC has long been and remains one of the best. Combined with other GNU tools, GCC provides one of the finest development environments in the world. It's reputation is well earned and great. I am not a proffesional programer, but my first compiler was gcc for DOS. I have used Borland, Watcom and MS compilers as well. All but MS have their charm. GCC is my first choice today.

Free Software is all about philosopy. It would not exist if people had not thought about community, individual rights, and how to foster such things in an increasingly greedy and careless world. GNU/Linux is a direct result of this man's effort to teach people a better way, as you might be able to tell from the vast numbers of contributors to it. A community has been formed that values individual and community rights. They publish their works under the GPL and other free liscences.

Aside from some work in the HURD, RMS isn't a software developer anymore.

Hmmm, That's a kernel, right? Just like Linus organized and maintains. Oh I see, I've been trolled. You were so good at acting ignorant it was hard to tell.

No, that's not fair, it's flambait really. By diminishing the work of one of your enemies, you seek to have people flame away at another of your enemies. Nope, not gonna work. Linus is a fine fellow and his kernel works very well. There is nothing common about any of the great achievers of the free software world.

Put up or shut up is a good thing to tell people who complain. It's not a nice thing to tell people who are trying to help you.

Without Linux, GNU would still be a rather obscure name that many computer scientists don't even recognize. Sure, the GNU tools allowed Linux to start off sooner, but there was nothing special about the GNU tools at the time Linux was created -- save that it was free (gratuis), and our beloved Finn could afford them on a student's budget.

No one who ever wrote a line of code outside of Visual Basic would ever say something as ignorant as that. First off, anyone who knows their history knows that GCC was not the only gratis compiler in the world. Second, anyone who has been using those compiler knows that GCC has long been and remains one of the best. Combined with other GNU tools, GCC provides one of the finest development environments in the world. It's reputation is well earned and great. I am not a proffesional programer, but my first compiler was gcc for DOS. I have used Borland, Watcom and MS compilers as well. All but MS have their charm. GCC is my first choice today.

Free Software is all about philosopy. It would not exist if people had not thought about community, individual rights, and how to foster such things in an increasingly greedy and careless world. GNU/Linux is a direct result of this man's effort to teach people a better way, as you might be able to tell from the vast numbers of contributors to it. A community has been formed that values individual and community rights. They publish their works under the GPL and other free liscences.

Aside from some work in the HURD, RMS isn't a software developer anymore.

Hmmm, That's a kernel, right? Just like Linus organized and maintains. Oh I see, I've been trolled. You were so good at acting ignorant it was hard to tell.

No, that's not fair, it's flambait really. By diminishing the work of one of your enemies, you seek to have people flame away at another of your enemies. Nope, not gonna work. Linus is a fine fellow and his kernel works very well. There is nothing common about any of the great achievers of the free software world.