fnf@fishpond.UUCP (Fred Fish) (05/31/90)
In article <2433@psuhcx.psu.edu> vmr@psuhcx.psu.edu (Vic Ricker) writes: >Is there a way to make DICE work without getting the Amiga includes etc..? >Like perhaps to make it compile the simple hello.c example? Although I can understand WHY there are no freely distributable versions of the Amiga include files, I have trouble accepting the fact. This is a real pain for everyone that would like to have a complete freely redistributable compilation environment for the Amiga. For a couple of years I have been kicking around the idea of a project to produce a set of include files by "reverse engineering" the include files, much like the IBM PC roms were reverse engineered. This requires two groups of users: (1) One with access to the current includes that can write abstract specifications for the include files. Although the includes are covered by copyright, the ideas and specification of their contents are not. Basically this group of users would probably be experienced Amiga developers that could fill out some specification files in some standard format. (2) The coders. These would be users who ideally have never seen and Amiga before, and have never used either the Lattice or Manx C compilers. Experienced C programmers with only Unix experience would be ideal. They would take the specifications produced from group (1) and write the include files from those specifications. These include files would be fed back to group (1) who would do all the Amiga testing and revise the specifications as necessary to bring the official include files and the reverse engineered include files into functional equivalence (I.E. a clean compile and working executables with either set of files). Anyone wishing to participate in either group, help draft up a skeleton of the include file specification, or otherwise help with documentation of the process, is welcome to send me email. I'll file the responses away for future use if the project looks feasable. -Fred -- # Fred Fish, 1835 E. Belmont Drive, Tempe, AZ 85284, USA # 1-602-491-0048 asuvax!mcdphx!fishpond!fnf
eb15+@andrew.cmu.edu (Edward D. Berger) (05/31/90)
Sounds like a project that will fail to me. It will have to be redone for 2.0 AmigaOS. Fred, I propose something different. I think you should license the includes and offer them to anyone who orders directly from you disks like FF314. The licensing fee is small, and the requirements aren't that strict (It must be on disk and be supplied with your software/hardware product, and a count must be submitted to CBM of how many you have distributed.) Of course, some people would never consider ordering directly from # Fred Fish, 1835 E. Belmont Drive, Tempe, AZ 85284, USA and that is their loss, but availability from such a known source would go along way, as too many people distrust ordering from CATS themselves. I already redistribute them for my local usergroup, with appropriate labels and license agreement, etc. I think you could do the same on a larger scale. -Ed Berger eberger@b.psc.edu eb15@andrew.cmu.edu