jxw@rods.ius.cs.cmu.edu (John Willis) (07/12/90)
From several articles on comp.unix.i386, a reader might conclude that the software development tools available from the Free Software Foundation (GNU) are: (1) Hard to install (2) Less reliable than commercial tools (3) Poorly documented (4) Constrain re-release of code developed under them Based on experience developing a parallelizing compiler for several complex hardware description languages running on 80386, 68020, and SPARC hosts, I believe that NONE of these conclusions are supportable. I use FLEX, Bison, GCC, G++, Libg++, GDB, EMACS, GAS, and binutils. The compiler I am developing, 50K+ lines of source code, stresses each of these tools. (1) With any recent release of these tools, I have never spent more than about 3 hours of background processing to install an upgrade. Other people have invested enough effort that upgrades are almost as easy as installing vendor packages. Once you have the full set of tools, there should be no black magic: you have source code as well as an email connection to the code author. (2) I am using each of these tools to do things that I CAN'T effectively do with commercial tools. I have never found a show-stopper in a new release, although I do keep a copy of the old release until I'm very confident. Turn-around on fixes is often days, in the few cases when they matter. Fixes for most of the tools are at the level of better diagnostics. (3) GNU prose documentation is generally very complete, running 100+ pages for "products" such as GCC. If you need to know more, read the source. This is much easier than spending hours and lots of dollars on telephone calls or reading binary dissassembly of striped code. (4) I am almost certain that code compiled USING these tools is not constrained in any way by the GNU public license. If you incorporate substantial code provided by the Free Software Foundation, such as a library, then the terms do apply. However from a reasonable person viewpoint, perhaps you might consider repaying the favor GNU has done for you by following the GNU philosophy where possible. GNU tools are a real bargain: I believe that you really get much more than you "pay" for. Please consider encouraging the Free Software Foundation's efforts with a financial donation. I have no affiliation with them except as a VERY satisfied user. On a related note, I've had almost the same very positive experiences with Everex hardware. Half a dozen peripherals have come up without trouble and run for years. When I've tried to diagnose a system problem, the telephone hotline people really go out of their way to help. They've never failed to return a call when they said they would or failed to follow up on some really bizarre requests that go beyond normal usage. If this tradition follows with the ESIX people, we all ought to buy stock in Everex. I'll be glad to complain long and loud if someone really fouls up, but both of these organizations deserve all the praise and encouragement we can offer. -John