rick@uwmacc.UUCP (02/19/87)
[ binary bug food ] Agreed, there is no need for *MINIX* binary postings. However, some of you/us would like to not have any binaries on the net at all; here are a few legitimate reasons for distributing binaries: (1) micro development systems have very inconsistent libraries; even moving from (say) one version of C for the IBM PC to another is often quite hard; it can be impossible if you don't have the libary reference for the original compiler; (2) who can legally afford to own all the different languages that people use on micros? they aren't licensed along with the OS in the way that Unix languages (usually) are; (3) many binaries are posted by persons other than the author, and hence no source is available to the poster; (but why give up a good program -- not all of us have source licenses to Unix) (I have seen the statement that its because free stuff has too many bugs that have to be fixed -- in my experience, it is no different from commercial software in that respect, and I don't get source to the commercial stuff, either) (4) some authors simply do not want the hassle of getting calls constantly about "bugs" in hacked versions of their source -- Lauren Weinstein (of Stargate) and Ozan Yeti (Proff) are two people who have made such statements in the past. Only (4) seems to be possibly valid with regards to MINIX, but the other three are reasonable for many non-MINIX users. Please don't discourage the spread of useful binaries....thank you! -- "I'll do it -- I've got the GUTS. I'm the PRESIDENT." "Maybe we should take that box away from him." "Why bother?" Rick Keir -- one floor up from the Oyster Tank -- UWisc - Madison {allegra, ihnp4, seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!rick