[Please note: this is a text only version of the on-line magazine, OS/2 e-Zine!.  OS/2 e-Zine! is a graphical, WWW OS/2 publication and, if possible, should be viewed in its HTML format available on-line at http://www.os2ezine.com/ or zipped for off-line reading.  Some graphically oriented articles have been removed from this document.]

OS/2 e-Zine!		January 16, 1999	volume 4, number 1
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Copyright 1998		Falcon Networking	ISSN 1203-5696

	"Over Three Quarters of a Million Satisfied Visitors!"

Reviews:

1998 Readers' Choice Award Winners:

They're here! All the votes have been counted and the winners of the
1998 OS/2 <em>e-Zine! Readers' Choice Awards announced!
* Developers 
* Internet Software 
* Business Applications 
* Utilities 
* Development 
* Entertainment and Multimedia 

* First Looks and Nifty Gadgets - Christopher B. Wright 


Articles:

* Predictions: The Top 10 Stories to come in 1999 - Chris Wenham 
- Some predictions for the year of 1999 on what the top stories for OS/2 will be. 

* Where Are They Now? - Chris Wenham 
- Checking up on some ghosts from OS/2's past, and where they are now. 

* The OS/2 <em>e-Zine! Lifetime Achievement Awards - Chris Wenham 
- A moment of recognition for those individuals we feel have dedicated a virtual lifetime of service to OS/2 and its community. 

* The Bazaar and The Other Bazaar - Christopher B. Wright 
- What are the differences between the various terms we've heard used to describe free or open source software? 

* GNU's Not Linux - Christopher B. Wright 
- An in-depth look at the GNU General Public Licence, how it works, and what it may mean to OS/2 developers seeking to use it. 


Opinions:

* Chris Wenham 
* Chris Wright 


Departments:

* The Rexx File 
* Help Desk! 


ADMINISTRIVIA:

* How to Subscribe to OS/2 e-Zine! for FREE.
* How YOU can Sponsor OS/2 e-Zine!
* The Sponsors that Make this Issue Possible


Copyright 1999   -   Falcon Networking
ISSN 1203-5696


Chris Wenham
 
Summary: An annual look at all that was silly, embarassing and wrong in the year past. A summary of all that was messed up, fouled up, or goofed up in 1998

The 1998 Annual Egg-In-The-Face Awards

 Things We Don't Need Ported To OS/2 Right Away

There's trivial, there's absurdly trivial, there's obscenely trivial, and then there's (http://www.cometsystems.com/) Comet Systems' Comet Cursor. This is a company with a product, and boy what a product. A plugin for Netscape that changes the mouse cursor into custom designs that are embedded in the web page. The idea is that a web developer can have the mouse cursor change shape when a page is loaded, or when it glides over a hot-spot. In their words, a basketball site could let the user "pick their favorite basketball team's logo," or a Spice Girls site could... well... do the same I guess.

Now this is perhaps mildly interesting to say the least. This is something you might think about only after you've written Javascript that changes the browser's status bar to scroll "Hi! Welcome to our cool web page!", and this might be something you think about adding to your site after you've finished individually animating the bullets for your links collection, but no way would you ever pay for it, right?

Wrong, at least that's what Comet thinks. They actually want to charge web developers $1,500 and <em>more per month for the power to change the mouse cursor. Here's an idea of what kind of competition Comet Systems is up against: Practically every 14 year-old who's checked into the Mozilla source-code tree and has 30 minutes of spare time. Now here's an idea of their customers: The NBA and the Spice Girls.

Comet Cursor is currently only available for Windows, which means we won't be able to show you how hilarious it looks when you shift Netscape's "pointy finger" cursor over by one digit. We also believe the web masters of all the companies who shelled out to use this junk on their web sites might also be interested in a new wardrobe too - with clothes made out of a special fabric that only other smart and intelligent web developers can see.

 A Ten Year Old Might Snigger

Innoval deserves a tip of the hat for the admirable work they've done on J Street Mailer - still the best Java e-mail solution there is and one that got a respectable number of votes in our Reader's Choice awards too. But we were wondering what they were thinking when they made Web Willy, or more precisely, when they <em>named it. Web Willy is a form of parental control software that blocks questionable web sites from innocent young eyes. But despite its smut-busting image... does Innoval know what "Willy" is schoolboy slang for?

 Things We Find Interesting...

That the word "vaporware" is in Star Office's default spell-check dictionary.

That television ads for the Microsoft Network claim their service is brought to you by the same company that made your computer "reliable" and "easy to use".

That Microsoft is trying to sell off the Microsoft Network to IBM.

 Oh, and the Winter Olympics are canceled too!

Early last year disaster struck Warpstock as the Chicago committee quit over irreconcilable differences with the Warpstock steering committee. I guess this was a blow, but the first  we heard of the news was that "Warpstock is canceled!" This overreaction came from a number of people, including a web site that proceeded to publish the entire e-mail conversation between the Chicago committee and the Steering committee. They thought that if they blanked out the names of all the people involved and replaced them with numbers instead, nobody would guess the identities of each e-mail's author. This might have worked, but I bet you a big bar of chocolate it never occurred to them to edit out the give-away mannerisms of those authors too.

 And we were also going to have live coverage of Burning Man

In the tradition of all Egg-in-the-face awards since January 1997 when they first started, the last tauntings are reserved for us. This time we get a pawful of yolk in the mush for claiming on the front page to have "Live" coverage of Warpstock '98. It weren't to be so, folks. After organizers suffered too many troubles getting a network connection out of the hotel, our reporters barely managed to squeek a couple of short summaries to the unlucky staff back home. Alone. Not having any fun. Not getting chummy with a girl and a beer like that freewheeling ex-editor-in-chief of ours.

On other unfinished business, Chris Wright, the guy in the leather jacket at Warpstock, was not me. We only have the same first name and last initial. Please... please stop confusing him for me. You'll know me when you see me. I'll have a beer and a girl on each arm.

			- * -

If you didn't get to go to Warpstock either, come mope with me in our (http://www.os2ezine.com/forums/get/forums/rant/Jan16-1999.html) interactive forum. We can trade stories of other humorous goof-ups in 1998 while we cry into our Heineken.

*********************************** 

Chris Wright  - Christopher B. Wright 
 
Summary: Is Open Source the future of OS/2? More and more it looks as if it might be, and Chris Wright begins his in-depth look at the issue this week.

A Dream of Open Source

The computer press talks about it more and more frequently: the phenomenon that is Linux and the power of the distribution and development environment that is Open Source. It has become the latest in a long line of buzzwords in Silicon Valley, and is credited, even by Microsoft, as a startlingly fast way to create quality, bug-free applications.

So far it doesn't seem to bother most of the people who talk about these things that Open Source Software (as Eric Raymond likes to call it), or Free Software (as Richard Stallman likes to call it) is a radical idea -- one that would put many, many "proprietary" companies out of business. It's an idea that, if it succeeds, would forever change the way the world of computing evolves.

It's an idea I want to happen.

I believe in the promise of Free Software. What's more, I believe in the ideology and implications of Free Software, and the background it comes from -- free information, free exchange of ideas, freedom from coercion. I think these elements are sorely missing from today's society, and I think the way we use computers (and spend our time) has suffered because of it.

For some time there has been a growing murmur in the OS/2 community that IBM should release OS/2 as an Open Source product and let OS/2's advocates become its developers. Comp.os.os2.advocacy has become a battlefield between people who say "it will work!" and people who say "there's no way in hell it will work!"

Who is right? Could Open Source save OS/2? Would it be of any use to IBM at all if they were to release OS/2 as Free Software? Why should they bother? What are the strengths and weaknesses of this type of software development? Is there any rational reason why a for-profit company would ever consider releasing a formerly proprietary product as one where the source code is freely available for anyone -- including competitors -- to use?

The answers (short version): Both, Yes, Yes, It depends, Significant on both counts, Yes but not in every situation.

In the following issues I will be examining and addressing these questions (and answers). But before OS/2 users can discuss the idea of "Open Sourcing" OS/2, we need to understand what, exactly, Open Source and Free Software are. In this issue I examine the Free Software and Open Source movements. While many people will tell you they are exactly the same thing, I don't agree... and I'll tell you why.

This issue I also examine the GNU General Public License, one of the most venerable of the Free Software Licenses, under a microscope. Developers interested in using the GPL may want to read this to get a better idea of what you can and cannot do with this license.

In future issues I'll look at other licenses -- the Mozilla Public License, for example -- and examine them just as closely. And all the while we'll try and piece together whether an Open Source future for OS/2 is desirable -- or even possible -- in the long run.

*********************************** 

The Rexx File  - Dr. Dirk Terrell 

Summary: Dirk shows how to make a simple utility which recursively deletes files across nested directories. He also reveals a few tricks to searching command line arguments for switches and separating them from other arguments such as file masks.

This month I wrote a simple little program that extends what the OS/2 del command does. The del command, of course, deletes files and can handle wildcards like * and ? to match multiple files. One key capability it lacks, though, is a recursion option so that you can delete files not only from the current directory, but also from all the directories below the current one. So, I figured others might find a recursive delete function useful and wrote one I call recdel.

Because of the potential damage a deleting program can do, you should make the program default to prompting the user for each file being deleted and provide a command line switch that enables them to turn off the prompts. The recdel program does this by looking for a /F or /f switch to force the deletes to occur without prompting. If the user does not pass the switch to the program, it will ask for a confirmation for each file that will be deleted. To accomplish this, we will scan the command line for the switch and set a variable <em>Confirm equal to 1 if confirmations should be requested. Thecommand line scanning code looks like this:

Parse Arg Mask
MaskUC=Translate(Mask)
Confirm=1

N=Pos("/F",MaskUC)
If N<>0 then Do
   Mask=Strip(Overlay("  ",Mask,N))
   Confirm=0
End

At first we dump all of the parameters passed to the program in variable <em>Mask with the Parse Arg instruction. Then we create another variable <em>MaskUC which is <em>Mask converted to uppercase so that we can catch /F or /f. We then use the Pos() function to see if /F is in the command line arguments. The variable <em>N will be 0 if it is not present and some non-zero value (the location in <em>MaskUC where it is found) if it is present. If it is non-zero, then we need to strip it out of variable <em>Mask since we want <em>Mask to contain the search mask files that we want to delete, *.chk for example. As usual, there are many ways to accomplish this. We'll do it with the Overlay() function. Overlay() allows you to replace part of one string with another. What we want to do is overlay two spaces on the string <em>Mask where the /F or /f switch is. Since we used the Pos() function to determine the location, we have the information we need and we call the function like so:

Overlay("  ",Mask,N)

which means that two spaces will overwrite the contents of <em>Mask at character position <em>N which we got from the Pos() function. If we wrap a call to Strip() around the call to Overlay(), we will eliminate the extra spaces and have <em>Mask contain only the search mask:

Mask=Strip(Overlay("  ",Mask,N))

Now that we have our search mask, we can use the SysFileTree() function to find all the files that we need to delete:

/* Register REXXLIB functions */
call rxfuncadd 'SysLoadFuncs','RexxUtil','SysLoadFuncs'
call sysloadfuncs
rc=SysFileTree(Mask,"File.","FSO")

The "FSO" switches mean files only (F), scan subdirectories (S), and report only filenames(O). Stem variable <em>File. will contain the filenames that mask our search mask and <em>File.0 tells us how many files were found. So now all we have to do is loop through all of the files and delete them, asking for confirmation if needed. The loop code looks like this:

Do i=1 to File.0
   rc=0
   If Confirm=1 then Do
      Say "Delete" File.i||"? (y/n)"
      Parse Pull Answer
      If Translate(Answer)="Y" then
         rc=SysFileDelete(File.i)
      End
   Else
      rc=SysFileDelete(File.i)
   If rc<>0 then
      Say File.i "could not be deleted."
end /* do */

We use the SysFileDelete() function to delete the files. The return code will be 0 if the file was deleted and non-zero if it could not be deleted. See the online REXX help for the meanings of the various non-zero return codes. All we do here is say that the file could not be deleted if the return code is non-zero.

And there you have it, a recursive delete command. There are some things you could add, such as a /Q switch to not report unsuccessful deletes, and a "Do you really want to do this?" prompt if the mask is * or *.*, especially if it is being executed from the root directory of a drive and the /F switch has been given. You could be in a heap of trouble very quickly if you're not careful with a script like this.

*********************************** 

The Top 10 Stories to Come in 1999  - Chris Wenham 
 
Summary: Chris Wenham makes some predictions for the year of 1999 on what the top stories for OS/2 will be.

10. It becomes cool to run OS/2 again

In 1999 we predict no more cringing from friends and colleagues, no more embarrassment or shyness when you tell them what you run. They'll think that if you're <em>still using it after the mainstream press has claimed "OS/2 Is Dead" all through 1995 and onwards, then you must know some special secret that they don't. The good news is, there <em>is something of substance to that "special secret", so it's not as if you'll be faking it.

9. Norton AntiVirus

IBM sold their AntiVirus division to Symantec, but as part of the deal the company will be producing an OS/2 version of their popular Norton AntiVirus tool. Already in beta testing, it should be released in early 1999. Even better news is that there are still a pathetically small number of viruses designed to infect OS/2, we don't predict that this will increase by any noticeable amount in 1999. But we do suggest you get an antivirus tool anyway, to be certain, and to protect against viruses that infest your DOS and WinOS/2 programs.

8. Opera

While Opera's web site says that very little progress has been made in the OS/2 port of the slim web browser, 1999 might be the year when a working version actually ships. Don't expect it to make much of a splash, though. We think it's already too late for it to compete with the new browser in town, which is...

7. Warpzilla

Sometime in 1999 you should be able to download a version of Warpzilla - the OS/2 port of the open-sourced Netscape browser - that's ready enough for prime time, or at least good enough to serve as a full replacement for Communicator. Warpzilla is exciting not just because it's a new browser, but because it's a <em>fantastic new browser. Mozilla, the proper name for the browser from which "Warpzilla" is derived and ported from, is rapidly advancing and showcasing some of the hottest technology in web publishing. The "Next Generation" layout engine is not only slim and fast, negating many of the reasons for wanting Opera, it's also considerably more flexible. Warpzilla will probably end up being our access portal to the new world of "Web Applications" too - or programs that work through platform-agnostic HTML interfaces rather than using an OS/2 or Windows API.

6. Sci-Tech Display Doctor

GRADD nearly cut the mustard, but IBM has been too slow in getting it ready for prime time. A clear surprise to all of us was when (http://www.scitechsoft.com/) Sci-Tech announced they were porting their display driver technology to OS/2. This should clean up the driver crisis in a big, beautiful bang. To make you salivate, proper support for 3D accelerated cards should be included too.

5. More Warp users switch to.... Not Windows.

The defection continues as more and more users find they can't keep going with OS/2 anymore and make the switch, not to Windows, but to Linux. Those OS/2 users who weren't in it for the "we hate Microsoft" reason or the "we like better technology" reason have already switched to Windows during '97 and early '98. What we have left are technology loving, solution oriented, Microsoft disliking people who are now being courted by other technology rich platforms like BeOS, FreeBSD and Linux. How many drop OS/2 cold turkey, or find a way to keep a little on the side with the help of Boot Manager or second PCs is anybody's guess.

4. Open Source Software becomes critical to OS/2's survival

If there's no profit to be made anymore, where else is software going to come from than people who don't care about profit anyway? In 1998 we saw the open source software movement make headlines, and in 1999 we'll see the OS/2 world wake up to the fact that this is where its next major apps are coming from. What are a few good names to drop? GIMP - the Photoshop-level graphics tool, Warpzilla - the next generation web browser that shows Internet Explorer how it's done, SANE/2 - the answer to all our scanner driver dreams, Apache - the web server of the masses, and MySQL - the enterprise-worthy database back-end.

Yet while it seems that nearly every day you hear about another major program being released into the open-source domain (especially games, such as Doom, Hexen, Heretic, Descent etc.), there's little benefit to OS/2 users if there aren't enough programmers around to port them all. The shortage of <em>potential applications may disappear, leaving us with another shortage problem: programming talent. Expect to see teeth grind in 1999 as the mountain of desirable, but un-ported open-source software grows.

3. Warpstock 99

Where will it be? How will it go? What surprises are in store? Note to developers and vendors: You've got about 9 months to come up with something incredible. Good luck!

2. Warp Client 5

If the rumors are true, Stardock Systems might be handed the crown opportunity to be the marketing force behind a new OS/2 client. The idea is simple: Code by IBM, consumer push by Stardock. Let the debates fly on whether Stardock is the right choice, but as for now this is still all hot air. We contacted Brad Wardell of Stardock Systems after the rumor was (http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/1999/1/ns-6567.html) exposed to the big-time in a Ziff Davis UK publication, but all he wants to say right now is that ZD's article has "some inaccuracies" and he still wants to talk with IBM before saying more.

1. Y2K

If your power utility doesn't fail you, this will be a time to sit back and laugh. Windows <em>still isn't fully Y2K compliant, but OS/2 is. Rated as story #1 not because it has special importance to OS/2 users, but because it's going to be drummed ad-nauseum in the media in the year of 1999. Prepare to have lots of water-cooler conversations that center around this topic.

In the coming months we'll be helping you make double sure you're safe though, with tutorials that help you get your system ready. Plus we'll have tests of dozens of OS/2 applications, showing you what will work in "twenty oh oh" and what won't.
			- * -

So what are your predictions? Have some insider info that might shed light on what the next big thing for OS/2 is going to be in 1999? Let us know in our (http://www.os2ezine.com/forums/get/forums/predictions/1999.html) interactive forum.

*********************************** 

Where Are They Now?  - Chris Wenham 
 
Summary: A pause to check back on some old promises and a few old faces, to see if they'll ever be kept, and to see if we'll ever know them again.

TrueSpectra Photo>Graphics

As of January 1<sup>st</sup>, 1999, TrueSpectra ceased to sell and develop their remarkable OS/2 graphics software: Photo>Graphics. Incidentally, they also did the same for the Windows version, so it's not as if we were exclusively penalized. TrueSpectra's current product is something called Image Server - a program that puts the ColorWave graphics engine of Photo>Graphics into a web server. It gives webmasters control over the images they display, such as delivering multiple views from a single high-resolution file, or mixing the various graphics and drawing effects of the ColorWave engine on the fly. A demonstration is available on their newly redesigned (http://www.truespectra.com/) web site. At the moment, this product is only available for Windows, but TrueSpectra have told us they've been developing their products with Java and C in tandem. Whether anything of use to OS/2 users materializes remains to be seen.

Panacea's ProNews/2

We could see early on in the vote tabulation stage that ProNews/2 was going to win the newsreader category by a very healthy margin, yet the product has been out of development for over 6 months and the company apparently dissolved. Everyone was expecting it to disappear completely and leave PMINews to have the whole pie by itself, but last month we saw a ray of hope. Bill Buchanan of Panacea software posted a (http://x12.dejanews.com/getdoc.xp?AN=426368133) public letter that explained what had happened. The long and short of it is that the programmers suffered from "burn out" and had to take a long, or permanent leave. Fortunately the departure of these programmers took place under friendly terms, meaning that future revisions aren't completely out of the question.

With that, the company is now considering a number of options. The least desirable of course is to simply drop all OS/2 support while their staff continue to explore other venues such as Be and Linux. The other is to hand over the code to another company, or even to release the source into the public domain. The last is for Panacea to hire more OS/2 programmers. We're hoping that if Panacea can't get it together, they'll do the right thing and open the source to the public.

Accucount/2

Only after publishing the voting form did it occur to us that we could have added a new "Turkey of the Year" category, but then we also realized that there'd be one definite winner of that unflattering award. In the words of dozens of e-mails we've received from irate OS/2 users who've paid up for the beta: WHERE THE HECK IS THIS THING? (http://www.cei.nu/) Cybercom, developers of this vaporware business accounting program have been mum for considerable time now. They wouldn't reply to our inquiries, nor, it seems, those of their customers who have turned to us instead.

For their quietness, Cybercom's web site has still been redesigned a number of times (and with the same old stale promises as usual). Now it looks as if they've put a re-emphasis on their web design services. Maybe they should sort out their priorities and start giving their customers an honest answer instead of the decreasingly credible "Online here in mere days!"

Other news on their web site is a Accucount/2 related product called ZipSearch that looks up US Postal Service "zip codes" for use in locating addresses. They have a download link and the news that it's "Fixed - Now downloadable", but wouldn't you know... it's still broken.

Think Tool Pro

As far back as Indelible Blue's 1997 Spring/Summer catalog, on page 49, there's an entry for something called "The Think Tool" by (http://www.PhxSoft.com/) Phoenix Software - a personal information manager and general purpose object database all in one. The catalog entry doesn't say anything about the fact that the product did not exist at the time they went to print with it, and still doesn't exist in sellable form today. Promised to be "coming soon" for a good year longer than Accucount/2, this product has also been the topic of many irate e-mails from our readers who want us to investigate. We ourselves were also promised a "demo" last year when we conducted our Personal Information Manager review, that didn't materialize and the screenshots we were also promised came too late to include in our article. That simple screenshots couldn't be supplied smelled a bit suspicious to us.

So we contacted Phoenix Software and the "good news" is that they are still alive and doing something. They claim to be almost ready to ship a CD with the second beta of their product, plus they have two full time employees and one part-time programmer working on the code. Think Tool Pro is described as being a major piece of software with impressive database technology, but here at the <em>e-Zine! we're not believing anything until we see it on shiny pressed plastic. Stay tuned, this story may have a happy ending.

*********************************** 

1998 Readers' Choice Awards: Developers  - OS/2 e-Zine! staff 
 
_Shareware / Free Software Developer:_

Winner: (http://www.southsoft.com/) SouthSoft, Inc.

It's been a battle to reach the top, but they finally did it. After two long years of being #2, SouthSoft gets voted into the Winner's spot this year by a slim majority behind our Runner-Up, OS/2 Netlabs and Peter Nielsen. SouthSoft has been famous for years for PMMail, a stellar e-mail client. Recently they also diversified into newsreaders with the release of PMINews, marketed in partnership with Stardock Systems, Inc.

1997 Winner: Knightware Software Company
1996 Winner: Knightware Software Company

Runner-Up: (http://www2.rz.hu-berlin.de/~h0444vnd/os2.htm) Ulrich Moeller

It was quite a surprise to see Ulrich win Runner-Up position in our Shareware / Free Software developer category, but it probably had a lot to do with XFolder, the Workplace Shell enhancement utility that puts many important and useful new features at your disposal. Late last year, Ulrich released the source code for XFolder under the GNU public license, giving hundreds of programmers everywhere the opportunity to see how a WPS utility works and improve it with feature suggestions and bug fixes.

1997 Runner-Up: SouthSoft
1996 Runner-Up: SouthSoft

_Commercial Software Developer:_

Winner: (http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock Systems, Inc.

Galactic Civilizations. Object Desktop. Entrepreneur. These and other entertainment and utility releases put Stardock Systems on the map as a major OS/2 developer. Releasing more commercial software titles for OS/2 in 1998 than any other vendor, Stardock has kept its faith in OS/2, and in return the OS/2 community has put them in the Winner's position once more with twice as many votes as the Runner-Up.

1997 Winner: Stardock Systems.
1996 Winner: Stardock Systems

Runner-Up: (http://www.stardiv.com/) Star Division

Go on, you can say it, it was the office suite, right? Everybody got an early Christmas gift from Star Division last year when they released their rich and mature StarOffice free for personal and non-profit use. With word processor, spreadsheet, sophisticated graphics, database, and heavy internet integration, StarOffice flew off the proverbial shelves (or FTP sites to be exact). In thanks, readers added their votes for Star Division, pushing it high enough to get Runner-Up status.

1997 Runner-Up: Star Division
1996 Runner-Up: Lotus Development Corp. / IBM

*********************************** 

1998 Readers' Choice Awards: Internet Software  - OS/2 e-Zine! staff 
 
_E-Mail Clients_

Winner: PMMail
By (http://www.southsoft.com/) SouthSoft, Inc.

There was no question about it, PMMail won the Readers' Choice for e-mail by a very wide margin. It's one of the few dedicated e-mail clients that offers both a Windows and OS/2 version that can share its e-mail database and address books across the gap. Now at version 2.0, PMMail has evened out the feature disparity between it and its Windows brother (called PMMail98).

PMMail has been around for a long time too. It was one of the first serious alternatives to the unpopular UltiMail that came with Warp 3 way back in 1994.

1997 Winner: MR/2 ICE
1996 Winner: MR/2 ICE

Runner-Up: MR/2 ICE
By (http://nick.secant.com/mr2ice.htm) Knightware Software

It enjoyed the top for a while, but now it's slipped to Runner-Up position. Knightware's MR/2 ICE has long been legendary for its superb level of support from Nick Knight, the author of the e-mail client. So too has its interface been a source of popularity, being unique among e-mail clients.

1997 Runner-Up: PMMail
1996 Runner-Up: PMMail

_Web Browsers_

Winner: Communicator 4.04
By (http://www.netscape.com/) Netscape Communications

Winner by a crushing majority was Netscape Communicator for OS/2. For so long it was disbelieved that Communicator would ever be ported to OS/2 at all. There was the massively long delays as IBM fixed up Navigator 2.02 instead to better handle Java, and then there were the rumors too.

Communicator isn't just a browser though. It comes with an e-mail client (Messenger), newsreader (Collabora) and HTML editor too (Composer). As such, Communicator vied for all three other spots in our voting, sometimes coming very close to winning a Runner-Up spot.

In addition to votes for Communicator explicitly, many readers also voted for its older version: Navigator 2.02. Enough, in fact, that it would have won Runner-Up position had we considered it separate. But since Communicator was Navigator's upgrade, we had to roll the votes together into one. That left a different and quite surprising Runner-Up instead.

1997 Winner: Netscape Navigator 2.02
1996 Winner: Netscape Navigator 2.02

Runner-Up: Warpzilla
By (http://www.mozilla.org/ports/os2/) Mozilla.Org / Warpzilla team

Either way we counted it, Netscape won twice. Warpzilla is the grassroots ported version of the open-source Netscape browser, called Mozilla. Since it was not ported to OS/2 by either Netscape or IBM we considered it separate rather than an upgrade to Communicator. At the moment, Warpzilla (also refered to as NGLayout and Gecko) is still in early alpha stages. The front end, which runs as a graphical PM session, is largely a frame with which to test the guts of the program: the HTML rendering or layout engine. What makes Mozilla exciting is this Next Generation Layout engine, or "NGLayout". It's faster, slimmer and more flexible than the old one.

Warpzilla may find itself transformed into more than one look and feel in the future. Since it's open-source, other OS/2 developers may come and use the guts of it in their own frames, with their own ideas about how the interface may be. Right now, it looks an awful lot like Navigator 4.04.

1997 Runner-Up: StarOffice browser
1996 Runner-Up: Web Explorer

_Newsreaders_

It should be testimony to the sheer quality of a product that even after its parent company seems to disappear, readers still vote it as number one in its category. That's what it looked like with Newsreaders.

Winner: ProNews/2
By  (http://www.panaceasoft.com/) Panacea Software

Message to Panacea: You've got a hot one! Whatever problems caused the shareware company to take such a bad hit midway through 1998, it wasn't lack of popularity. Even though their nearest competitor kept plugging away with updates and a whole new major revision, it looks like ProNews/2's basic formula just can't be beat. Choosing to combine article lists and article bodies in a single split window, ProNews/2 is excellent for subject browsing through your favorite newsgroups.

The program also has a superior way of managing tasks and connections. You can change the priority of, or cancel a process (such as retrieving an article or header refresh) without affecting others, <em>and you can kill a dead connection      without canceling the process that happened to be using it. ProNews/2 is different from many newsreaders in that you can arbitrarily add more connections to the news server on the fly, without needing to re-start the program to take advantage of them. A few killer features its competition still doesn't have.

1997 Winner: MR/2 ICE w/News
1996 Winner: EmTec News

Runner-Up: PMINews
By (http://www.southsoft.com/) SouthSoft / (http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock Systems

PMINews, the next major competitor to ProNews/2, got off to a rocky start when it first appeared in 1997. It suffered from serious bugs and flawed performance that have since been fixed in its most recent revision: 2.0. Southside have also experimented much with the user interface of PMINews, taking out the tabbed grouplists and putting in a tree-based one that resembles their e-mail product: PMMail.

PMINews has certainly struggled, but perhaps its getting into the swing of things at last. It's distributed commercially by Stardock Systems and can be purchased in a bundle with PMMail too. Together they can share the same address book and offer a common look-and feel.

1997 Runner-Up: ProNews/2
1996 Runner-Up: Netscape News

_FTP Clients_

Winner: FTP Browser
By (http://www.bmtmicro.com/catalog/ftpbrowser.html) Jason Rushton

Fast, lightweight memory demands and good Workplace Shell integration are the hallmarks of 1998's FTP client Winner. But not only that, FTP Browser features directory caching, "quick-paths" and file searching too.

1997 Winner: OS/2's FTP Clients
1996 Winner: EmTec FTP

Runner-Up: EmTec FTP
By (http://www.emtec.com/) EmTec.

Once upon a time this used to be called NeoLogic FTP, coming as one of the components in the NeoLogic Network suite. But a couple of years ago EmTec, of ZOC fame, took over the ownership and development. Since then the suite and especially the popular FTP client have been improved with new features and bug fixes. Some of the highlights of EmTec's FTP are easy creation of download lists, support for resuming aborted downloads, and multithreaded multiple connections.

1997 Runner-Up: FTP Browser
1996 Runner-Up: NcFTP

_IRC Clients_

For so long there weren't any graphical IRC clients for OS/2. You made do with IRCII, or IRC/2, or ran mIRC in a WinOS/2 session. The first graphical clients were Gammatech IRC, NetComber's IRC module, and Internet Adventurer. Then came along another client with all the swank and pose it inherited from the classic IRC culture, and it took our hearts away. This year we had a total of 2 votes for non-GUI chat clients, we guess the character-mode days are over.

Winner: OpenChat/2
By (http://www.escape.com/~mikh/openchat.html) Max Mikhanosha

Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is dominated by the hacker culture. In a real-time chatting environment you get the instant feedback and smooth flow of ideas that aren't carried as efficiently by e-mail. It's also a great place to show off gadgets and scripting prowess, be that sometimes to the disruption of the conversation. For features and gadgets, OpenChat/2 is where it's at. Featuring full IRCII script compatibility, this client looks like a character-mode program that got captured and framed in GUI containers. Scroll-bars and menus are the only hint that you're not actually running a program in an OS/2 command-line window.

The client is usually teamed up with a script called Gemz which adds command aliases, macros, features and formatting improvements. This combination gives you a client with attitude, not to mention instant cool.

1997 Winner: OpenChat/2
1996 Winner: GammaTech IRC

Runner-Up: Gammatech IRC
By (http://www.gt-online.com/) Gammatech

More conservative in attitude is Gammatech IRC, also know as GTIRC. It was the first graphical client and a significant number of readers still think it's the best. This chat client was also the first to choose Rexx as its scripting language instead of IRCII-script.

1997 Runner-Up: Gammatech IRC
1996 Runner-Up: OpenChat/2

*********************************** 

1998 Readers' Choice Awards: Applications  - OS/2 e-Zine! staff 
 
_Word Processor_

Winner: StarWriter
By (http://www.stardiv.com/) Star Division

In 1998 Star Division happened. You may have remembered the long and perpetual back-to-back beta tests of their office suites. Starting with version 3.0 we had the chance to download and try out the time-limited beta tests, but never did a purchasable product ever materialize for the English speaking market. In late '98, StarDivision released version 5 of their office suite. Final. Complete. Ready. And the big surprise was that it was free.

As in free beer, not free speech.

As a result, a huge number of OS/2 users flocked in to download StarOffice. The results were seen in more huge numbers on our vote tallies. Winning the Word Processor category in a close race behind Lotus WordPro is Star Division's StarWriter, a component of StarOffice. While StarWriter stands on its own as a highly capable word processor that ranks equal with big-boys such as WordPerfect and MS Word, StarWriter also benefits from the tight integration it has with the other StarOffice components.

1997 Winner: Lotus Word Pro
1996 Winner: DeScribe

Runner-Up: WordPro
By (http://www.lotus.com/) Lotus Development Corporation

But the Runner-Up this year is no slacker either. WordPro has evolved from roots in the form of Ami Pro, a word processor for Windows that was acquired by Lotus Development way back in the early 90's. Ami Pro for OS/2 was released, then came WordPro a few years later as Lotus joined the "Office Suite" movement of the mid 90's. Now it's one of the top word processors available for PC, on Windows or Warp.

1997 Runner-Up: DeScribe
1996 Runner-Up: Lotus WordPro

_Spreadsheet_

This was probably the closest race in this year's awards. As we tallied the votes we saw StarCalc take an early lead, then stand still for a while as Mesa 2 inched past. It looked as if 1-2-3 wasn't even going to make it as a Runner-Up for a while, as all the action took place between Mesa 2 and StarCalc. Then the tide turned. The release of StarDivision's office suite for free seemed to do the trick as far as numbers go, but it was time for the old GrandDaddy of spreadsheets to get its own back at last.

Winner: 1-2-3
By (http://www.lotus.com/) Lotus Development Corporation

Near the end the votes were in favor of the long-time champion of spreadsheets since the 80s: Lotus 1-2-3. It came after an earlier program called VisiCalc, but while VisiCalc is now only remembered by historians and old timers, 1-2-3 is still being updated and sold today. The latest version for OS/2, available as part of Lotus Smartsuite for Warp 4, has both hints of its past hidden in the cracks (try typing the slash key to find the "Classic" menu structure) and modern improvements that have kept it relevant today.

1997 Winner: Mesa 2
1996 Winner: Mesa 2

Runner-Up: StarCalc
By (http://www.stardiv.com/) Star Division

Star Division's decision to release its office suite for free is still sending ripples through the OS/2 and Linux communities where good "meat and potatoes" applications are badly needed. It's also likely to have strong effects elsewhere as other small companies realize a new business model exists that could help them compete against entrenched competitors.

Star Division's StarCalc may not have the history and rooted depth of Lotus 1-2-3, but it's got Moxy. It features easy construction of formulas, support for reading Microsoft Excel 97 files and more.

1997 Runner-Up: Lotus 1-2-3
1996 Runner-Up: Star Division's StarCalc

_Database_

Winner: Approach
By (http://www.lotus.com/) Lotus Development Corporation

Approach makes databases easy. That's the idea behind its design, which includes many SmartMasters to guide you through the design of a working database, not to mention working examples of common databases that you can empty the sample data from and use for your own business right away. The previous two winners of our Database category were IBM's DB2 - an industrial grade database that you'll find working behind the scenes of many high-trafficked web sites. But this year, it looks like ease of use and small-business settings were the deciding factor. For this, little beats Approach on the OS/2 platform.

1997 Winner: IBM DB2
1996 Winner: IBM DB2

Runner-Up: StarBase
By (http://www.stardiv.com/) Star Division

StarOffice shows up again with it's database offering: StarBase. Like Approach, StarBase is geared towards small business and home use. You may even find yourself using it without realizing, since it's used behind the scenes to power the address book and scheduler too. "Autopilots" help you create tables, queries and reports, plus you can interactively build forms for entering and viewing data.

1997 Runner-Up: Lotus Approach
1996 Runner-Up: Sundial DBExpert

_Personal Information Manager_

Winner: Organizer
By (http://www.lotus.com/) Lotus Development Corporation

Organizer visually resembles a leather-bound paper organizer that you might have once carried in your briefcase before you got a laptop. Pages turn, the trashcan burns unwanted records with a satisfying whoosh of flame, and everything is held together with the usual snap-open steel rings. Only thing is, you don't have to snap them open and shut yourself. Organizer is so loaded to the gills with gadgets and widgets and custom controls that it'll have you wishing you had a more active life - just so you could <em>use them all.

1997 Winner: Lotus Organizer
1996 Winner: Relish

Runner-Up: Relish
By (http://www.sundialsystems.com/) Sundial Systems

But while Organizer is very fancy looking, it eats RAM for breakfast, lunch and dinner too. Relish, on the other hand, doesn't. Relish is not only much better integrated with the Workplace Shell than Organizer is, it also nips along at a faster pace. Start typing anywhere, and Relish will instantly begin displaying records that begin with the letters you just typed. Or use a Relish Bun object to create a custom view of your schedule. Need desktop space back? Minimize Relish down to a small and unobtrusive mini-calendar that's still functional.

1997 Runner-Up: IBM Works
1996 Runner-Up: IBM Works

_Financial / Accounting Software_

Winner: InCharge
By (http://rampages.onramp.net/~landeck/) Spitfire Software

This personal and business accounting system has been at the top of our readers' choice since the category was introduced. Some of the features that have made it such a hot choice are tracking of multiple books, multiple currencies, management of securities and insurance, and the ability to print checks and pay bills. Round it off with features like a calendar and other time related functions, and you've got a perfect finance solution.

1997 Winner: InCharge

Runner-Up: Electronic Teller
By (http://www.travel-net.com/~phcaron/) Paul Caron

Beyond the basics of managing multiple portfolios and accounts, some of Electronic Teller's advanced functions include automatic tracking of bank service charges, tracking your credit card limits, Quicken import/export conversion, check printing and graph reports of your finances.

1997 Runner-Up: Money Tree

_Communications_

Winner: InJoy
By (http://www.fx.dk/) F/X Communications

Until cable modems and ADSL take over the world, most of us still have to use dial-up connections to get onto the internet. It's a relief, then, that a program such as InJoy makes this not only an easy task, but also squeezes more speed out of the line than you thought possible. InJoy can automatically learn the steps necessary to log into your internet provider and begin a PPP session, plus it opens up many more options than IBM's Dial Other Providers program ever did - meaning better optimization and faster rates.

Some of InJoy's more advanced features are Dial-On-Demand, firewall support, IP masquerading (for connecting multiple computers to a single dial-up connection) and a news-ticker plugin.

1997 Winner: F/X InJoy
1996 Winner: EmTec's ZOC

Runner-Up: Zap 'O Comm (ZOC)
By (http://www.emtec.com/) EmTec

It's a terminal program. It's a Telnet program. It's an ISDN program. It's all three and more. This is ZOC, short for Zap 'O Com, EmTec's powerful and versatile communications application that can do anything from get you to your favorite dial-up BBS, vendor support BBS, Internet accessed role-playing arena or Telnet service. Zap O' Com has all of the features and terminal protocol emulation you need.

1997 Runner-Up: ZOC
1996 Runner-Up: HyperACCESS

_Graphics_

Winner: PMView
By (http://www.pmview.com/) Peter Nielsen

Winner by a staggering majority is OS/2's best general-purpose graphics viewing and conversion utility. PMView can read practically every bitmap graphics format you'll ever come across, from the common to the dusty and obscure. PMView does slideshows, it does batch conversions, it does thumbnails and it even does filters like emboss.
Recent news about PMView is that version 2.0 is coming soon with lots of new features.

1997 Winner: PMView
1996 Winner: SPG ColorWorks

Runner-Up: GIMP/2
By (http://www.netlabs.org/) OS/2 Netlabs / (http://www.gimp.org/) The GIMP development team

For our Graphics Runner-Up position there was a tie between GIMP/2 -- the port of the General Image Manipulation Program born on Linux -- and TrueSpectra's Photo>Graphics -- the advanced concept drawing and painting program. To break the tie we used the votes that came in after the January 10<sup>th</sup> cut-off date for Readers' Choice vote submissions. One vote for GIMP clinched it, and the free image processing and painting program won Runner-Up position.

But what is GIMP? In answer to the proprietary and expensive nature of Adobe's Photoshop, a small group of programmers got together and created a paint and image processing program that was free and had its source-code available. In development for several years now, it has grown to a sophisticated and advanced application. Being open-source, a couple of OS/2 programmers working in conjunction with OS/2 Netlabs ported it over to Warp. There's only one problem though, it doesn't yet come in a PM version. You have to install XFree86 for OS/2 or some other X Windows server to run it. Despite this requirement, GIMP is still an exciting new addition to OS/2's graphics repartee.

1997 Runner-Up: TrueSpectra's Photo>Graphics
1996 Runner-Up: PMView

_Backup_

Winner: Back Again/2
By (http://www.cds-inc.com/) Computer Data Strategies

BackAgain/2 comes in three editions, Enterprise, Professional and Personal, offering a decent package for everyone's backup needs; as your organization grows, it does as well. Fully multithreaded and integrated with the WPS, it makes backups a snap, even without a tape drive since it allows backups to hard disks, floppy disks and even removable media such as Zip Drives. Including enhanced network support and disaster recovery tools, it's also ideal for network administrators.

1997 Winner: BackAgain/2

Runner-Up: BackMaster
By (http://www.msrdev.com/) MSR Development

BackMaster is the Runner-Up in this category, but is by no means very far behind. Like BA/2, BackMaster has a GUI interface (and a text-based disaster recovery program), and supports a slew of drives and backup devices. It also includes enhanced data compression for tape drives and multi-drive backups and filtering features to allow for backup of only certain types of files. All these features tie in to give quite a respectable program.

1997 Runner-Up: BackMaster

*********************************** 

1998 Readers' Choice Awards: Utilities  - OS/2 e-Zine! staff 
 
_Disk / File Utility_

Winner: File Commander/2
By (http://silk.apana.org.au/fc.html) Brian Havard

This newcomer to the Readers' Choice Awards is a clone of Norton Commander for DOS and provides some powerful file management functions as well as viewing, editing and archive management in the classic two-pane layout that has proved highly popular for years. It may still run in character mode (an OS/2 window), but it's fast and can create WPS objects or cut-and-paste to and from the OS/2 system clipboard.

1997 Winner: Partition Magic
1996 Winner: FileManager/2

Runner-Up: FileManager/2
By Barebones Software

In "Top 40" speak, you could say FileManager/2 dropped off the charts for a while, only to make a comeback later, although perhaps not at #1 like before. What makes FileManager/2 powerful is the fact that it's stuffed to the gills with features and also comes with a number of valuable command line programs such as a HPFS defrag utility. To quote its documentation, File Manager is "a sort of super-Drives object, something midway between the Drives objects and a more traditional file manager."

1997 Runner-Up: GammaTech Utilities
1996 Runner-Up: GammaTech Utilities

_Workplace Shell Utility_

Winner: Object Desktop
By (http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock Systems

Object Desktop has been the reining king of Workplace Shell enhancements ever since it was released. Being one of the few major OS/2 utilities to make heavy use of the SOM and class-inheritance technology that IBM put into OS/2, Object Desktop blends so well with the desktop that someone dubbed it a "Third party upgrade to OS/2".

Object Desktop was updated recently to version 2.0, one that rolls the standard and "Pro" versions together into one super-enhancement set that handles everything from file management, archive management, user interface improvements and more.

1997 Winner: Object Desktop Pro
1996 Winner: Object Desktop

Runner-Up: XFolder
By (http://www2.rz.hu-berlin.de/~h0444vnd/os2.htm) Ulrich Moeller

XFolder was on nobody's mind until 1998, when it appeared out of nowhere with some killer features. It added menus to every folder on your desktop in a beautifully elegant way: by building them out of the objects you drag-n-dropped into the configuration folder. It also added status bars, a superior alternative to OS/2's Shutdown command, and a DDE link to Netscape.

XFolder entered a new phase of its life late in '98 when the author, Ulrich Moeller, decided to make its source code available to everyone under the GNU public license. With that in mind, 1999 could be a year of much improvement and expansion for the enhancement utility.

1997 Runner-Up: Object Desktop
1996 Runner-Up: NPS-WPS

_System Utility_

Winner: Process Commander
By (http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock Systems

Process Commander began life as WatchCat, a popular shareware utility that monitored running tasks and killed them when they went astray. Anyone who's had Netscape"black out" on them will appreciate what this software does. Process Commander is the result of the WatchCat team's partnership with Stardock Systems and introduces a GUI front end in addition to the usual "Control-Alt-Delete" fullscreen session, plus the ability to telnet into a machine over the Internet (or Intranet) and control processes remotely.

1997 Winner: UniMaint
1996 Runner-Up: UniMaint

Runner-Up: WPTools
By Henk Kelder

Another one that caught us off guard by its popularity is this set of tools for maintenance of your OS/2 desktop. There's a Workplace Shell backup and restore utility pair, a program for completely resetting your desktop, and another called CheckINI which goes through your OS2.INI and OS2SYS.INI files to find and correct many of the problems that can develop with them. For the Rexx programmer, WPTools also includes a Rexx library for accessing much of the WPS objects' data.

1997 Runner-Up: Process Commander
1996 Runner-Up: Process Commander

_Archive Utility_

Winner: InfoZip's Zip/Unzip

In the mainstream computer community, there is PKZip and PKUnzip by PKWare. In the OS/2 community, there is Zip and Unzip by Info-ZIP. Both sets of archive utilities are so ubiquitous that there is hardly a person with a computer who doesn't have a copy, but there is a significant difference between the two: Zip/Unzip are freeware. Long the standard in the DOS/Windows world, PKZip was never able to claim similar marketshare with OS/2ers due to Zip/Unzip's great performance, compatibility and price.

1997 Winner: InfoZip's Zip/Unzip

Runner-Up: Object Desktop
By (http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock Systems

Being possibly the smartest way of handling archives such as ZIP files, ZOO files, LHA, TAR, RAR and other formats of archives, Object Desktop's Object Archives has a habit of getting Runner-Up spot behind the main Zip/Unzip utility itself. With Object Desktop, an archive file is considered to be just like another desktop folder. You can copy and move files in and out with regular drag-n-drop, plus you can open files and even programs from within an archive without unpacking the whole archive first.

1997 Runner-Up:Object Desktop

*********************************** 

1998 Readers Choice Awards: Development  - OS/2 e-Zine! staff 
 
_Programming_

Winner: Visual Age for Java
By (http://www.ibm.com/) IBM

Ah, it's time to do the switcheroo again. Trading places in the awards with Visual Age C++ is Visual Age's Java programming environment. Hot language, hot development tool. Now in version 2.0 developers can make extensive use of Javabeans and all the new enhancements that have been introduced by Sun. Raid Application Development has never been the same.

1997 Winner: VisualAge for C++
1996 Winner: VisualAge for C++

Runner-Up: Visual Age for C++
By (http://www.ibm.com/) IBM

IBM has a habit of producing some of the best developers' tools around, especially with its VisualAge line which now spans over a dozen different languages. Winner of last two Readers' Choice awards, this robust visual development environment is the successor to the popular CSet++ and contains a C/C++ compiler, linker, debugger, performance analyzer, visual builder, database access tools and IPF compiler. VAC++ also features extensive class libraries and Direct-to-SOM support.

1997 Runner-Up: Visual Age for Java
1996 Runner-Up: Watcom C/C++

_Text Editors_

Winner: MED (Mr. Ed)
By (http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Matthias_Pfersdorff/) Matthias Pfersdorff

Formerly known as Mr. Ed, MED is a great programmers editor that supports syntax highlighting for a staggering number of programming languages, including C, C++, Java, Rexx, HTML and even OS/2's CONFIG.SYS, believe it or not! Not only that, but MED also comes with a number of other handy widgets that make programming life easier, such as a Window Monitor for keeping track of lots of open files, macro recorder, multiple compiler support and immense configurability.

1997 Winner: OS/2's Enhanced Editor (EPM)
1996 Winner: OS/2's Enhanced Editor (EPM)

Runner-Up: Enhanced Editor (EPM)
By (http://www.software.ibm.com/) IBM

EPM is a do-all workhorse used for everything from simple text editing to program code editing to HTML editing. Its programmability allows users to extend its basic functions with new, custom menus and features. This incredible versatility and low price tag (free) keep its popularity high despite competition from third party products.

1997 Runner-Up: MED
1996 Runner-Up: The SemWare Editor

_HTML Editors_

Winner: Homepage Publisher
By (http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/clerin/) JBC

HomePage Publisher was the first standalone "WYSIWYG" web page editor for OS/2, allowing users to create or modify HTML pages without knowledge of HTML tags or syntax. With HPP, users can make changes by simply clicking toolbars, etc. In short, HPP is a Web browser that offers all the possibilities of a word processor. Now winner for two years in a row, Homepage Publisher continues to be updated with new versions.

1997 Winner: HomePage Publisher
1996 Winner: Panacea's HTML Studio

Runner-Up: Tie between HTML Studio and StarWriter
By (http://www.panaceasoft.com/) Panacea Software / (http://www.stardiv.com/) Star Division

Runner-Up was a hard call in the HTML category, since not only did two different programs tie with the same number of votes, but our tie-breaker method didn't work either, since none of the late ballots voted for either. So it was either flip a coin, or give them both a moment in the spotlight. We chose the latter.

HTML Studio by Panacea Software allows you to rapidly create and edit web pages without having to know HTML, just like HomePage Publisher (but it isn't "WYSIWYG"). The program features drag 'n drop support, a preview window (a fully functional HTML 3.0 web browser using WebExplorer libraries), printing, font and color support. Despite its lack of WYSIWYG features, HTML Studio is still a solid contender with our readers.

StarWriter on the other hand is a part of Star Division's StarOffice suite. Primarily a word processor, StarWriter also has excellent HTML authoring capabilities that made it pull so many votes for this category.

1997 Runner-Up: HTML Studio
1996 Runner-Up: HomePage Publisher

*********************************** 

1998 Readers' Choice Awards: Games and Multimedia  - OS/2 e-Zine! staff 
 
_Games_

1998 marks a historic first, as it is the first year that Galactic Civilizations did not even win Runner-Up status in our Readers' Choice Awards, despite having a new sequel available. But was it ever a close race! Hopkins:FBI took the early lead, followed rapidly by Entrepreneur and Galactic Civilizations neck and neck until the final deadline when Entrepreneur squeeked ahead by only one vote. That left the Winner and Runner-Up positions as:

Winner: Hopkins:FBI
By (http://www.polyex.com/) PolyEx Software

Hopkins:FBI has made its way to OS/2 thanks to PolyEx software, a company already known for WordUp graphics toolkit and the game Vigilance on Talos V. Hopkins is a graphics intensive role-playing game (RPG) that puts the player in an FBI agent's shoes - charged with the job of solving a crime.

The graphics are all drawn by a professional comic book artist, plus they're also beautifully well animated. Some of the scenes can be shockingly bloody or violent, though. But since when did that matter when mom wasn't looking?

1997 Winner: Galactic Civilizations II
1996 Winner: Galactic Civilizations

Runner-Up: Entrepreneur
By  (http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock Systems, Inc.

This is the game that booted Galactic Civilizations out of its cozy position on our Readers Choice charts, but we doubt Stardock will be crying about it, because you see: Stardock made Entrepreneur too. Shaving off GalCiv by a single vote (and falling behind Hopkins:FBI by only two votes), Entrepreneur might have edged out by one simple fact: It gives you the opportunity to kick Bill Gates in the pants.

Economically, that is. Entrepreneur is a game about corporate warfare, domination of markets through sales and marketing prowess, plus research and development. Do you build a new factory, or seek to improve worker productivity? Do you develop a technological advantage, or run an advertising campaign? That's what it's all about.

1997 Runner-Up: Links for OS/2
1996 Runner-Up: Trials of Battle

_Multimedia_

Winner: MainActor/2
By (http://www.mainconcept.de/) MainConcept

MainActor used to be what you launched whenever you needed to convert a FLC into an AVI, or a MOV into an MPG. Sometimes it'd also do the unglamorous job of assembling an animated GIF for a web page. But not anymore, MainActor now comes with a full featured video sequencer, one that does more than merely string a series of frames together. MainActor can now mix and fade, combine and link multiple video and audio sources of multiple formats. If it's animated, then chances are MainActor can handle it. MainActor can even mix in audio from an MP3 file - rapidly becoming the default format for high-compression, CD quality sound.

1997 Winner: Practice QuickMotion
1996 Winner: QuickMotion for OS/2

Runner-Up: PM123
By (http://www.teamos2.sci.fi/pm123/) Taneli Lepp&auml; / Samuel Audet

Speaking of which, the hot new music distribution format, MP3, has driven a newcomer into the awards too; PM123. This is the luxury MP3 player for OS/2, the one with all the bells and whistles, the one that ends WinAMP envy. While PM123 is an excellent and low-CPU demanding MP3 player, it also has gadgets and features that must have pleased enough to rake in the votes. Skins support let you re-design the user interface the way you want to, or use any of the hundreds already developed for WinAMP. There's also a real-time spectrum analyzer that bumps and spikes visually with the beat and melody of the music you're playing.

1997 Runner-Up: WarpAMP
1996 Runner-Up: MainActor/2

*********************************** 

OS/2 e-Zine! Lifetime Achievement Awards  - Chris Wenham 
 
Summary: A moment of recognition for those individuals we feel have dedicated a virtual lifetime of service to OS/2 and its community.

OS/2's 11 year life hasn't been enough to fill any but the youngest lifetimes, but halfway through its history everybody jumped to what we call <em>Internet Time - which goes fast enough to make dog years look long. This year, the OS/2 <em>e-Zine! staff decided to highlight a handful of individuals which we think deserve some recognition for the virtual lifetime of effort they've put into OS/2 and its community.

Esther Schindler

Maybe the Evil Ziff Davis Empire isn't as bad as we think, after all, they hired one of the few active journalists who has deep roots and love for OS/2. Esther Schindler has been there to represent Warp in the mainstream trade press with fair, evenhanded reviews and reporting, both when she worked as a freelance journalist and moved up to a full-time employment with ZD.

Esther serves on the board of (http://www.possi.org/) POSSI (Phoenix OS/2 Society, Inc.), the largest OS/2 user group in the world, and with her husband Bill Schindler (a Rexx guru you might have heard of) edits the last remaining English print magazine dedicated to OS/2 - extended attributes.

Esther is currently the Technology Editor at (http://www.zdnet.com/sr) Sm@rt Reseller magazine. She and her husband's web site can be found at (http://www.bitranch.com/) http://www.bitranch.com/

Judy McDermott

Here's an unsung hero if there ever was one. She might have solved your technical problem on IRC, you might have met her at Warpstock, you might have visited her web page, and you might have seen her moderating hand in some of the VOICE Speak-up interviews. But Judy is like a beating heart in the chest of the OS/2 advocacy and grassroots support. One of the movers behind Warpstock, one of the forces behind V.O.I.C.E., one of the kind of person we need more of.
Judy's homepage, "Judy's Warped World", can be found at (http://www.gt-online.com/~bri/) http://www.gt-online.com/~bri/

Timothy Sipples

There's barely a day that goes past that we don't get something sent to us here at OS/2 <em>e-Zine! or WarpCast from Tim Sipples. He's like a spigot that pours information and news out from within IBM, distributing it everywhere and helping us all stay appraised of what's going on inside the belly of the Big Company. For this and his other advocacy work, we are eternally grateful.

Timothy can be currently seen writing the "Ask Timmy" OS/2 networking column in (http://www.32bitsonline.com/) 32 Bits Online.

Brad Wardell

He's loved. He's hated. He's admired. He's despised. But don't ever say he's giving up on OS/2, because the numbers, and the dollars, won't agree with you. Brad Wardell started (http://www.stardock.com/) Stardock Systems, the largest publisher of consumer titles for OS/2 today, not counting IBM itself. More new OS/2 entertainment titles have shipped with the Stardock logo on them than anybody else's.

Brad started out by writing the classic OS/2 game: Galactic Civilizations, getting his first taste of fame - and money - that was followed up soon afterwards by Object Desktop. Stardock is now the subject of a few interesting rumors that also involve IBM and a new version of Warp Client. Brad was mum about these rumors when we contacted him about it. so we'll have to wait and see.

But never mind the rumors, Brad's done much for OS/2 in both the economic and morale sense, enough to earn our award for a lifetime's achievement.

Trevor Smith

Veni. Vidi. e-Zine!

He came. He saw. He started a web site.

Trevor Smith is the man responsible for the pages you're reading right now, as over three years ago now he saw a need for a publication that covered OS/2 news and issues of interest to the home and small business user. Late last year he decided the time was right to retire from the business and move on to something else, which seems to consist of employing every opportunity to kick off his shoes and take it easy.

Trevor still uses OS/2 every day and is moderately active in the community as maintainer of the BMT Micro web site. The Southern California OS/2 Users Group also published an (http://www.scoug.com/os24u/1998/scoug812.2.os2ezine.html) interview with him recently, where he discusses a little more about the <em>e-Zine! story and his dog - Varley. He can be reached by sending email to (trevor@haligonian.com) trevor@haligonian.com.

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The Bazaar and the Other Bazaar  - Christopher B. Wright 
 
The World of Free Software and the World of Open Source: Semantics or
Culture Clash?

Summary: What are the differences between the various terms we've heard used to describe free or open source software?

If you look through the technology rags today, you'll notice 5 key phrases that get used almost interchangeably.
Linux. Open Source. Freeware. Free Software. GNU General Public License.

To many people, they all mean essentially the same thing, but in reality, all of these terms are different. Free Software is an ideology that believes a program's source code should always be available to the people who use it. Freeware is a name used synonymously (and incorrectly) for Free Software. The GNU General Public License is a software license that seeks to ensure that a program protected by it will always remain free software. Linux is an operating system licensed under the terms and conditions of the GNU General Public License, and is therefore free software. And Open Source is an attempt -- a bold, and surprisingly successful attempt -- to focus on the developmental advantages of Free Software while downplaying the political underpinnings of the Free Software movement.

The terms "Free Software" and "Open Source" are used to describe a radical idea in the world of software development. Radical because, in the corporate world of software design, software developers work in their own little worlds, rarely sharing their work with their peers, allowing them to sell their software without fear of someone else studying their work to make something that works better. This is what allows companies like Microsoft to create cash cows like Microsoft Office -- programs that people come to depend on that they can get from only one source.

In the corporate world of software design, people are dependent on one source of support per program. One company creates the program, one company maintains the program, one company updates the program. You can only buy the software from that one company (and those companies that pay for the privilege to sell it). You depend on that one company (and only that company) for product updates and bug fixes. Depending how important the particular feature or bug fix is, you may wind up waiting for a long, long time for it to reach you. In effect, your power as a user of the program is limited by the resources of the company who owns it.

It wasn't always this way, of course. When computers first started to become popular among the techno-geeks and hobbyists, people were always sharing programs with each other. Computer Magazines would print code in its issues for people to type in and play around with. Other people would take that code and add a few improvements here and there, then share it with everyone else.

These programs were usually released into the Public Domain, which means in effect that the source code was available for anyone to do anything with. Unfortunately, while Public Domain grants everyone access to the source code, it doesn't necessarily provide any assurance that it will stay that way. Someone could take the source code, add some improvements, patent and copyright it, and release only the binary version of the program, for a fee. People started doing just that, and suddenly, this community practically disappeared and in its place were a few people making a ridiculous amount of money.

After a while, many of those people got lazy. Shortly after that, a lot of software started to suck really, really, bad.
In 1984, a few people who were sick to death of this situation started a project called GNU's Not Unix, or GNU. This project was aimed at reviving the open development model that the early PC years enjoyed (and that many in the Unix world were still using). However, they wanted to ensure that people involved in this development model wouldn't have their programs stolen out from under their noses by people who would take the work they were doing, patent it, and take that work out of the loop. Their answer was the GNU General Public License, or GPL.

The GPL was a software license that protected the availability of a program's source code. In shorthand, the GPL gives anyone unrestricted access to the source code, but requires that any work done with that source also be placed under the GPL. This gave the new software development community the ability to work on each others work with the security of knowing that what they contributed for everyone wouldn't wind up in a proprietary program.

This kind of software was called "Free Software." Free Software was equated to the concept of free speech -- everyone had the same rights and responsibilities associated with its development under the GPL. It is not the same as "Freeware", which is a program binary that can be used free of charge.

Over time, other people created Free Software licenses that were not the GNU General Public License but were based on the same basic principles. Some were "more free" than others -- some licenses, for example, allowed you access to the source, and allowed you to freely distribute the source, but would not let you charge money for any work you did unless you paid the originators a licensing fee. Today there are many kinds of Free Software licenses: XFree86 uses its own license, Mozilla has its own license, Aladdin's Ghostscript has its own Free Software license, the various distributions of BSD have their own free licenses, the list goes on. The GPL is still the most recognizable license, however, and is the one you'll run into most of the time.

Since its inception, the Free Software community enjoyed a healthy and loyal following. However, there has always been a perception from outsiders that the Free Software community was nothing but a bunch of crazy Marxist radicals trying to infect the software community at large with the ideology of Communism.

The term "Open Source" came into being when someone tried to alter this perception. Eric S. Raymond, a well known programmer in the Free Software community, wrote a paper called "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" that dealt with the advantages that Free Software had over proprietary software as a process of developing software. In his paper, he covered the development history of an e-mail program that he was developing. Because his source code was available for other people to look at, other programmers were able to see what he was doing and send in suggestions, improvements, and new features. Because everything was available for everyone to try out, he was able to call upon a much larger pool of beta testers than he otherwise would have been able to find. In short, because the development model was open to the world at large, the program was updated faster, released faster, and fixed faster than it would have been if Eric had been working on it himself. Thus, the term "Open Source" was used to describe a development model rather than a use and distribution environment.

The term Open Source seems to be the favorite of the computer industry at large, mostly because it doesn't have the word "free" in it (which makes corporate execs twitch and break out into a cold sweat). Open Source advocates are getting the attention of corporate software houses because they are showing evidence that developing in their environment is faster and allows more people to respond more quickly to unforeseen problems ("bugs").
Meanwhile, there is a very polite and civilized disagreement as to whether Open Source or Free Software is the correct term to use for "that kind of software." Open Source advocates say that the term Free Software is misleading and too political, it needlessly alienates companies that would otherwise embrace the benefits of the software. Free Software advocates say that the term Open Source is misleading because it whitewashes the legitimate legal and social implications of Free Software.

For the most part, people treat the terms Open Source and Free Software as interchangeable words for the same idea. Even Richard Stallman describes Open Source as another term for Free Software, though he thinks it confuses the issue. In the Linux community, Open Source and Free Software are often used in the same breath.

In truth, there are more similarities between the two groups than there are differences, but there are differences. Open Source licenses are more likely to put a little more power into the companies that originally develop a product -- the Mozilla Public License, for example, gives Netscape the right to take any source code contributed to the Mozilla product and use it in a proprietary product (at least, it did at one time. That may have changed). This would never be permitted under the terms of the GNU General Public License, which falls solidly and unrepentantly in the Free Software camp.
For my part, I prefer to use the term "Free Software," but I recognize the usefulness of saying "Open Source" when dealing with people who are interested primarily in making a profit. The importance, after all, is not in the name, it's in understanding the license. Ultimately, it doesn't matter if you call it Open Source or Free Software, because neither name will change the freedoms and limitations of a software license.

You will, of course, find people who disagree with my distinction between Open Source and Free Software. Many of these people will have had many more years of experience dealing with both terms than I have, and will probably be much better suited to comment authoritatively on the subject. That's fine. Just pay attention to what <em>they call it, then see if it turns out I'm not right after all.

			- * -

If you have a different idea of what all the terminology means, discuss it with Chris Wright and others in our (http://www.os2ezine.com/forums/get/forums/wright/bazzar.html) interactive forum.

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GNU'S Not Linux  - Christopher B. Wright 
 
Learning the Language of the Oldest Merchant in the Bazaar

Summary: Chris Wright takes a look at the GNU General Public License and tries to explain what is involved when you release software under its terms and conditions.

The venerable GNU General Public License isn't just a license for Linux software -- in fact, it was never intended to be. The GNU General Public License, or GPL as it is often referred to, is a license and development model for the advocates of Free Software. Free Software is an ideology, not an operating system, and GNU's name (GNU's Not Unix) reflects this.

Indeed, GPL'd software (software that has been distributed under the GNU General Public License) can be found on every platform -- even under the Microsoft Windows platforms. There is plenty of GPL'd software available for OS/2: we have native versions of Emacs, Tex, SANE, even the GIMP. We even have some software for OS/2 that was developed <em>natively</em> (i.e., not ported from Linux) and released under the GPL. And with free software's recent surge in popularity, it seems reasonable that we might be seeing much, much more software in the future.

But the GNU General Public License isn't something you can simply decide to use and slap on your source code. The GPL was written to guarantee that at some point down the road, some yahoo won't come along, take your code, make it proprietary and make a lot of money off it while simultaneously removing it from the software community at large. To that end, it is very explicit concerning what you can and cannot do with a GPL'd work. In some situations, software <em>cannot</em> be placed under the GPL, and if you aren't careful you could find that your noble intentions put you in a situation where you won't be able to release your program at all, under any kind of license.

That said, it is still a very useful license, and an invaluable tool for protecting the rights of developers who wish to contribute to the growing body of free software in the world. And GNU shouldn't be just for the Unix world -- free software should be available for all platforms. The better you understand the in's and out's of this license (and other free licenses, which I will cover later) the better developers for OS/2, the Macintosh, BeOS, Windows 95/98, Windows NT, the Amiga, and every other platform I can't think of will be able to help the free software movement encroach the borders of the realm of proprietary systems.

So what is the GNU General Public License? What does it really mean? Legal Licenses are often written in a language only Lawyers understand. The GNU General Public License is not as confusing as some licenses out there, but it still bears close study. To that end, for the last month I have been reading the GPL, talking with people who have had experience with the GPL, and written down a point by point dissection of the GPL.

I would like to thank everyone who has been kind enough to talk to me about the GNU General Public License, and I apologize in advance for the inevitable situation where I take someone's explanation and twist it so horribly out of context that it bears no meaning to the person's original statement. Having said that, the following is an explanation of the GNU General Public License, as well as some commentary as to how it might effect OS/2 software development.

Disclaimer: I am not a Lawyer. Therefore, my observations on the GNU General Public License, what it means, what you can do with it, and what you cannot do with should not be taken as Gospel truth. My comments are based on a careful reading of the license, asking questions in usenet forums, following past discussions via DejaNews, and drawing my own conclusions as logically as I could. While I have put a great deal of time and effort into trying to decode the license and explaining it thoroughly and accurately, there is still a chance that the conclusions I've drawn are, quite simply, wrong.

A Description of the GNU General Public License

Here is a breakdown of the GNU General Public License, and an explanation of each of the sections.

"GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
Version 2, June 1991
Copyright (C) 1989, 1991 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA

"Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document, but changing it is not allowed."

This first part is pretty self explanatory, but there are a few items of interest here.

First, of course, is the title of the license, the GNU General Public License (commonly shorted to the "GPL"). After that comes the revision of that license -- latest version of the GPL (2) was created in 1991.

The version number is important because there is more than one revision of the GPL in use in the free software community. The GPL is designed so that if a new version is released, people have the option of using the terms of the new version instead of the current version.

Notice that the program is copyrighted not by the author of the software, but by the Free Software Foundation, Inc. The FSF is an organization that ensures that the GPL remains a valid license, this notice helps make the enforcement of the GPL possible.

Finally, the last sentence allows people to use the license, but does not permit anyone to modify the license.

In other words, if you like the license in general but don't agree with a clause, you can't simply remove that one clause and distribute it as a version of the GPL. The GNU General Public License is an all or nothing deal, if you don't agree with part of it, don't use it. But you can always use it as a template to write your own...

Preamble

Unlike many licenses, the GPL includes an introductory section in "Plain English" to help non-lawyers understand what the license is for and how it should be used properly. For the most part, the language used in licenses is very technical and specific to the legal profession. While this generally makes understanding a legal document very difficult for non-lawyers, it can greatly cut down on the ambiguity of a document when used in legal proceedings, and can cut down the length of it considerably.

On the other hand, it can mean very little to the layman, and even imply the opposite of what it really means. The GPL Preamble is an attempt to educate the non-lawyer about the GPL, and give them a general overview of what it does.

"The licenses for most software are designed to take away your freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free software--to make sure the software is free for all its users. This General Public License applies to most of the Free Software Foundation's software and to any other program whose authors commit to using it. (Some other Free Software Foundation software is covered by the GNU Library General Public License instead.) You can apply it to your programs, too."

Very simply, the GPL distinguishes itself from other licenses by restricting your ability to restrict your users, instead of restricting your users from having the same privileges you do with your program. The GPL is available for anyone to use with their software.

"When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not price. Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for this service if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs; and that you know you can do these things."

The most common explanation of this concept is "Free speech, not free beer." This explanation tells you two things: first, it gives you an idea of the after-hours habits of your average Unix and Linux user; second, it tells you that Free Software deals with the liberty to take action, not the privilege to use programs without paying for it. This is why the term "Freeware" is not an appropriate description for Free Software. There are many companies in the Linux world -- Red Hat and Caldera are the most visible -- that charge for Linux, which is licensed under the GPL. The GPL does <em>not</em> take away your "right" to charge money for the distribution of a product. It does, however, require that you a) make your source code available for others to view and use, and b) <em>tell</em> people that your source code is available for viewing and use.

"To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights. These restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it."

In other words, the stipulations in the GPL apply to anyone -- including the software author -- who uses the program.

"For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that you have. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the source code. And you must show them these terms so they know their rights."

"We protect your rights with two steps: (1) copyright the software, and (2) offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy, distribute and/or modify the software."

"Also, for each author's protection and ours, we want to make certain that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free software. If the software is modified by someone else and passed on, we want its recipients to know that what they have is not the original, so that any problems introduced by others will not reflect on the original authors' reputations."

This is a very important point. Because software that has been free software for quite some time will ultimately have been developed, modified, tweaked and massaged by a large number of authors, the GPL makes it clear that due to the nature of the software there is absolutely no warranty attached to the software of any kind.

This does not mean, however, that you cannot provide a warranty separate of the GPL. It is possible to provide a warranty independent of the GPL that covers to what extent you pledge to support the product.

"Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software patents. We wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free program will individually obtain patent licenses, in effect making the program proprietary. To prevent this, we have made it clear that any patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all."

Example: if you licensed a video card driver from a video card company and included the display driver technology in your own distribution of Linux, the only way it would not violate the GPL would be if you licensed that driver with the understanding that you were licensing it to be used in software that would be freely available (i.e., no royalties).

"The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and modification follow.

"Terms and Conditions for Copying, Distribution and Modification"

"0. This License applies to any program or other work which contains a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed under the terms of this General Public License. The quot;Program", below, refers to any such program or work, and a "work based on the Program" means either the Program or any derivative work under copyright law: that is to say, a work containing the Program or a portion of it, either verbatim or with modifications and/or translated into another language. (Hereinafter, translation is included without limitation in the term "modification".) Each licensee is addressed as "you"."

While pretty self-explanatory, the phrase "work based on the Program" needs to be explained because it illustrates a very important part of the nature of the GPL: it is viral. Any software that incorporates GPL'd code must itself be GPL'd. That is, if a program or part of a program covered by the GNU General Public License is incorporated into another program <em>not</em> covered by the GNU General Public License, the new program must either be licensed under the GPL, or the GPL'd code must be removed, or the program cannot be released at all.

"Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the Program (independent of having been made by running the Program). Whether that is true depends on what the Program does."

This paragraph distinguishes between creating something based on the source code of the program and creating something based on the binary of the program. For example, if you were running GNU Emacs (a very popular text editor -- among many other things -- in the Unix community, and also available for OS/2) and wrote a book using the program, that book would not be required to be covered under the GPL. That is because your book came from using Emacs, not copying, distributing, or modifying it. Use of a program is not restricted.

This also works, by the way, with software development tools. If you used a GPL'd compiler to create a program, you could release that program under a license other than the GNU General Public License, since compiling a program falls under the category of "use" and in no way copies, distributes, or modifies the compiler itself.

"1. You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program's source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you conspicuously and 	appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty; and give any of the recipients of the Program a copy of this License along with the Program."

"You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee."

The only restriction on copying and distributing GPL'd programs is that you must a) include a copyright notice identifying the program as covered by the GNU General Public License, and b) identify that the GPL does not come with any kind of warranty whatsoever.

However, if you wish, you may provide a warranty independent of the GNU General Public License. For example, if you were trying to sell a GPL'd work, you might decide to include a warranty with all purchased versions of the software -- to entice people who otherwise might simply get the source code and compile it themselves to buy it from you directly.

"2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any potion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:"

"a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change."

The GNU General Public License allows you to modify other software covered under the GPL, but it still requires that you document what those changes are, to allow people to trace the history of the application.

"b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License."

If you distribute an application under the terms of the GPL, you cannot charge licensing fees to any third party who wishes to use the technology contained in that product for their own purposes. (Of course, if they do use it then their work is immediately "infected" by the viral nature of the GPL, so anything they produce with your technology must also be placed under the GPL).

A good example of this in the OS/2 world is the Win32-OS/2 project. At Warpstock, Timur Tabi gave a presentation on the status of the project, and he mentioned that the developers were considering using code from the WINE project (a Linux Windows emulator). WINE is covered by the GPL, and at that point in time, the developers (who were still studying the GNU General Public License) weren't sure whether the entire Win32-OS/2 project would have to be licensed under the GPL, or just the code used from WINE.

Well, the Win32-OS/2 project is free to use the WINE code without cost due to Section 2b of the GPL. However, using that technology would make the Win32-OS/2 project a "Work based on the Program" -- at least in part -- and would therefore be required to be released completely under the terms of the GNU General Public License (which it has been, according to a recent article on Slashdot).

This is a tricky relationship, and not immediately obvious to people unfamiliar with the GPL. It's tripped people up in the OS/2 world before: a few years ago, an OS/2 developer released, as shareware, an application that made use of some GPL'd code. He'd thought at the time that all he needed to do to remain compliant was to release the source of the code he'd borrowed -- not his whole application. It was an honest mistake, and when he realized he was not complying with the license he released the entire program under the GPL. Before that, of course, he was jumped on from all sized by rabid GPL advocates for being a scurrilous rogue who dared "steal" code, but that's a topic for an article in its own right...

"c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively when run, you must cause it, when started running for such interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under these conditions,a nd telling the user how to view a copy of this License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on the Program is not required to print an announcement.)"

I call this the "splash screen clause" because it seems to require most interactive programs to display the copyright notice when it is being used, much like many graphical programs create a brief graphic identifying itself as it is being loaded. An interactive program is a pretty broad term -- you tell the program to do something, the program does it. You tell the program to do something slightly different, and the program does that. Unzip and Star Office are both interactive programs, though on slightly different levels.

The exception threw me -- it seems strange that an interactive program would not normally be able to create a splash screen. I think the license is referring to programs that can be configured, but usually run in the background unobtrusively. If a program is supposed to be unobtrusive, creating a splash screen would tend to make that more difficult.

"These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program, and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it."

To illustrate this point, let's use as an example a program called SANE, a Linux scanner application that has been ported to the OS/2 platform. The SANE source is covered under the GPL -- though the API is not and can be used for proprietary purposes (I'm ignoring this for the moment). SANE is a text-mode program; you type in commands at a command prompt, the program does things, and something happens. It has no GUI to speak of, just as the unzip.exe command has no graphical interface.

It would be possible, however, to create a program that would act as a graphical interface for SANE. These programs basically allow you to set a bunch of preferences, click a button, and send a pre-configured command to SANE. These programs can also, if desired, capture any output from SANE and display it in a window. The result is a program that doesn't actually use any SANE code -- it merely sends commands to the program's binary.

In theory, according to Section 0 of the GPL, such a program falls outside of the license's scope -- it is an activity other than distribution, copying, or modification. SANE isn't modified at all... there's just another program feeding it information (and fielding any information it spits back out). Therefore, in theory, it is possible for such a program -- a GUI front-end to a GPL'd text-mode program -- to be proprietary in every way.

However, Section 2 seems to state that in order for such a program to truly be exempt from the stipulations in Section 0 -- in order for it not to be classified as a modification to the program -- it could not be distributed with SANE. So, for example, if an ISV or developer were to sell a proprietary GUI shell for SANE they would not be able to distribute SANE with the program.

"Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the Program."

"In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under the scope of this License."

In essence, this restrains the viral quality of the GPL -- it cannot "infect" programs simply because they are sharing the same storage space. For example, there are both GPL'd and non-GPL'd programs on CD's of OS/2 archive sites. The non-GPL'd programs are not subject to the terms and conditions of the GNU General Public License simply because they reside on the same CD-ROM.

It may seem at first glance that the last paragraph in Section 2 contradicts the information two paragraphs above it, where if you bundle a non-GPL'd program with a GPL'd program, the non-GPL'd program must be GPL'd or un-bundled immediately. My tentative understanding of this is that the GNU General Public License makes a distinction between a software <em>bundle</em> and a software <em>collection</em>. With a software <em>bundle</em>, you would purchase one program (the SANE GUI, for example) and get a second program free (the SANE application). With a software <em>collection</em>, you're not really purchasing the programs, you're purchasing the convenience of being able to install them from a single CD-ROM, or Zip disk, or similar medium.

"3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it, under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:"

"a) Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,"

This is the most common practice as far as I know concerning the distribution of the GPL source code. In most cases, the source code is included with the binaries. In the case of some purchased software, the source code will be included in the same package, but on a different medium than the binary code. For example, Red Hat Linux 5.2 is distributed with all program binaries on one CD and all source code on another CD.

"b) Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution a complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange or,"

I've never run into this situation myself. The important note here is that this service must be provided at cost: you can charge only for the expense of putting it on the medium and sending it to the customer. Because the crux of the GPL deals with making the source code freely available, it restricts a developer's ability to profit from this act.

"c) Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer to distribute corresponding source code. (This alternative is allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you received the program in object code or executable form with such an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)"

If you acquired the program as a binary only file with a written offer to provide the source code at cost (as stated in Section 3b, above), you can freely distribute that binary, but only if you don't charge money for it and only if the written offer to provide source code is included in that distribution.

The important part here is that the source code, or information on how to get the source, must <em>always</em> be available to the person using the program.

"The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it. For an executable work, complete source code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the executable. However, as a special exception the source code distributed need not include anything that is normally distributed (in either source or binary form) with the major components (compiler, kernel, and so on) of the operating system on which the executable runs, unless that component itself accompanies the executable."

This is probably the single most controversial paragraph in the entire license. It has caused more headaches, arguments, flame wars, and rifts in the Free Source community than any other part of this license.

This paragraph defines "source code" as everything that is used when compiling the program. This means not only the C code that you wrote and compiled, but the libraries that your code linked to, the code that went into the dlls that it relies on to give it this or that feature, and everything else that you can possibly think of that is required to make the program work. And because the GPL covers all of the source code, that means that Sections 0, 1 and 2 are also applicable to the source code outside of the actual executable -- the dlls, system resources, etc. -- that are required to make the program work.

The only exception to this is the source code that is defined as part of the operating system that the program runs on. This means that if an OS/2 program licensed under the GNU General Public License uses a system DLL, that DLL is not affected by the GPL, nor is the license compromised by use of that DLL.

This allows people to write free software for non-free operating systems, which is good, but it has also created a few questions that haven't been answered to anyone's satisfaction -- yet.

For example, what constitutes an operating system? In the world of Linux, the operating system does not have a graphical interface per se. Linux is a command-line OS -- but there are graphical interfaces that sit on top of it. Sitting on top of Linux is XFree86, a windowing system, and sitting on top of that is a Window Manager like Enlightenment, or AfterStep, or WindowMaker.

None of these layers are actually part of the Linux operating system -- Linux can run quite well without them. However, all of these layers are some form of free software, so it is possible to create a GPL'd application that uses their libraries and resources without violating its own license.

This is not the case with OS/2. OS/2 the operating system does not have a graphical interface either -- like Linux, it is a command-line OS. Sitting on top of OS/2 is the Presentation Manager, and sitting on top of the Presentation Manager is the Workplace Shell, a marvel of engineering unparalleled by any other interface currently available. The Workplace Shell, an object oriented environment that allows programmers to modify objects and alter its behavior, is not, technically, part of the operating system.

This brings up a thorny issue: can you create GPL'd software that integrates with the Workplace Shell? Based on a conversation I followed via DejaNews (search "Plug-ins and the GPL" on the complete archive), the answer seems to be "no."

In this debate, the question was asked: is it possible to create a plugin for a proprietary browser (like Opera or Internet Explorer) and release that plugin under the GNU General Public License? Many people, including Richard Stallman (the man behind the Free Software Foundation) state that such a piece of software would violate Section 3 because a plugin will not work without the browser. In other words, it would require resources (the browser) that are proprietary, and a browser, not being part of the operating system, would not qualify for exemption. (As an aside, there was no discussion as to whether or not Internet Explorer could be considered a part of the Windows operating system). An opposing camp claimed that, for the purposes of application plugins, a browser could be considered an operating system in and of itself. This argument was not really resolved, but it's a safe bet that if Richard Stallman (who created the GPL) considers such a program a violation of the GPL, it will be treated as such by the FSF.

Bringing this problem closer to the realm of OS/2, in the Linux world there is a GUI called the K Desktop Environment (KDE) that uses a set of libraries that are not covered under the GPL. These libraries (called the QT libraries) were available free of charge for anyone who did not try to sell their software, but anyone who wanted to use them for commercial purposes were required to pay a fee to TrollTech, the company that created them. Despite this, the people who created KDE decided to release it under the GPL, which sparked off waves of controversy that the Linux community has yet to fully resolve.

Because KDE linked to proprietary libraries, and because the GPL specifies that libraries are considered part of the source code, and because there were situations where TrollTech did charge for the use of those libraries, many people claimed that KDE violated Section 2 of the GPL. Section 2 states that the source code must be available for third parties to license <em>as a whole at no charge</em>. Since this      was not always the case with TrollTech's Qt license, a lot of people viewed this relationship with suspicion.

Bringing this back to OS/2, programs like Object Desktop can be considered "plugins" for the Workplace Shell. Since the WPS is not truly a part of the OS/2 operating system, it seems that it is not legal to license WPS add-ons under the terms of the GNU General Public License. Therefore, GPL'd programs that use the WPS run into the same problem (only worse) that KDE had with the Qt license: the applications would be in part using a very proprietary application with very proprietary libraries, dlls, and the like.

Unfortunately, some of these applications already exist. XFolder, a program that does some of the same things Object Desktop does (as well as some other neat tricks) is currently licensed under the GPL -- quite possibly in violation of it.

Again, this is a hotly contested clause in the GPL, but all developers need to at least be aware of the issues and take sides. Most people seem to feel it's best to err on the side of caution not use the GPL with any software that might run into conflict with its terms.

"If distribution of executable or object code is made by offering access to copy from a designated place, then offering equivalent access to copy the source code from the same place counts as distribution of the source code, even though third parties are not compelled to copy the source along with the object code."

A good example of this is if both the source code and the program are available from a developer's web site, but are contained in different zip files.

"4. You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt otherwise to 	copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License, However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance."

Once an application is placed under the GPL, it stays in the GPL. While it's possible for the "owner" the original version could probably choose to re-license <em>that</em> version under another license of his or her choosing, it becomes much, much harder to do that after other people start playing with and adding to the source code.

"5. You are not required to accept this License, since you have not signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or distribute the Program or its derivative works. These actions are prohibited by law if you do not accept this License. Therefore, by modifying or distributing the Program (or any work based on the Program), you indicate your acceptance of this License to do so, and all its terms and conditions for copying, distributing or modifying the Program or works based on it."

The only way to modify or distribute the program is to abide by the specifications in the GNU General Public License. If you modify or distribute the program you are indicating that you accept the terms of the license.

"6. Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein. You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to this License."

When you distribute the application you may not impose any restrictions that are not already mentioned in the GNU General Public License. In other words, anyone you distribute the program to has exactly the same rights (and responsibilities) that you do when modifying and distributing the program.

Further, you bear no responsibility for the actions of anyone who gets the program from you, even if their actions wind up violating the GNU General Public License. And finally, you are not responsible for <em>enforcing</em> compliance to this license.

"7. If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues), conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you may not 	distribute the Program at all. For example, if a patent license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Program by all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the Program."

In a "what if" scenario, let's pretend that Microsoft has sued everyone who ever contributed to the Linux operating system because the Linux kernel uses some kind of technology that Microsoft invented and patented back when it actually tried to create new things instead of stealing technology from everyone else. Let us also assume that Microsoft managed to convince a Judge that they were right, and that Judge decreed that from then on Microsoft was entitled to a licensing fee for every copy of Linux source code that was distributed, copied or modified. The GPL is very clear that source code must be licensed to third parties at no cost; paying Microsoft a licensing fee would violate the GPL. Therefore, under the terms of the GPL, the only alternative is to <em>not distribute the Linux kernel</em>.

This plan of action has actually been suggested in the first of the Microsoft "Halloween" documents, though opinion is decidedly mixed as to whether or not this would actually work.

"If any portion of this section is held invalid or unenforceable under any particular circumstance, the balance of the section is intended to apply and the section as a whole is intended to apply in other circumstances."

If, due to legal action or other activity, a specific item in the GNU General Public License is found not legally enforceable, the rest of the license remains in effect. In other words, it is not possible to render the entire license unenforceable by negating only a part of it.

"It is not the purpose of this section to induce you to infringe any patents or other property right claims or to contest validity of any such claims; this section has the sole purpose of protecting the integrity of the free software distributions system, which is implemented by the public license practices. Many people have made generous contributions to the wide range of software distributed through that system in reliance on consistent application of that system; it is up to the author/donor to decide if he or she is willing to distribute software through any other system and a licensee cannot impose that choice."

"This section is intended to make thoroughly clear what is believed to be a consequence of the rest of this License."

"8. If the distribution and/or use of the Program is restricted in certain countries either by patents or by copyrighted interfaces, the 	original copyright holder who places the Program under this License may add an explicit geographical distribution limitation excluding those countries, so that distribution is permitted only in or among countries not thus excluded. In such case, this License incorporates the limitation as if written in the body of this License."

The United States (and other countries) restricts the distribution of certain kinds of programs (such as encryption) to certain countries. Other countries restrict the use and modification of some types of programs within their borders. Section 8 of the GPL allows the distributor to comply with national and international laws by restricting the distribution of the software to specific countries. This clause is useful if you'd like to avoid a situation where a country holds you responsible for releasing software that a third party smuggles illegally into a restricted country.

"9. The Free Software Foundation may publish revised and/or new versions of the General Public License from time to time. Such new versions will be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to address new problems or concerns."

"Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program specifies a version or number of this License which applies to it and "any later version", you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that version or of any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of this License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software Foundation."

When you decide to redistribute a program that was released under the GPL, you may have the option of choosing which version of the GPL to redistribute it under. For example, if the application was originally released under version 1.0 of the GNU General Public License, you could opt to distribute it under the terms of the version 2.0 release instead.

Note that the license does not say that you may choose to release the program under an earlier version of the GPL. If the original license states that it applies to the current version or "any later version", then once a program is "upgraded" to a higher version of the license, that development path cannot go back. In the event that no version number is specified, however, you may choose to redistribute the program under any version of the GPL you deem appropriate.

"If you wish to incorporate parts of the Program into other free programs whose distribution conditions are different, write to the author to ask for permission. For software which is copyrighted by the Free Software Foundation, write to the Free Software Foundation; we sometimes make exceptions for this. Our decision will be guided by the two goals of preserving the free status of all derivatives of our free software and of promoting the sharing and reuse of software generally."

Sometimes there are other applications that are not covered by the GPL that you might want to incorporate GPL'd work into. This is possible, but it must meet two conditions:

1. It must be free software. Free software is defined as software that has been "copylefted".

The GNU General Public License is not the only example of free software, though it is arguably the most famous. The license used in the XFree86 environment is not the GPL, but it is free software.

Other free software licenses may have terms or conditions that are different from the GPL; it is important to make sure that the terms of the respective licenses do not conflict with each other. If they do, you will not be able to use the technology.

2. You must receive permission from the author of the program. This can be somewhat difficult, since depending on the amount of people who contributed to the program there may be quite a few authors to track down.

"NO WARRANTY"

"12. because THE PROGRAM IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. EXCEPT WHEN OTHERWISE STATED IN WRITING THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND/OR OTHER PARTIES PROVIDE THE PROGRAM "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM IS WITH YOU. SHOULD THE PROGRAM PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING, REPAIR OR CORRECTION."

Due to the nature of the GNU General Public License, and the likelihood that there will eventually be many, many authors responsible for adding code to a GPL'd program, there is no automatic warranty associated with the license. Each person using and distributing a GPL'd work is doing so at his or her own risk.

It is possible, however, to supply your own warranty when distributing a program, independent of the GPL. Some companies and people do this to make purchasing the application more attractive.

"12. IN NO EVENT UNLESS REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW OR AGREED TO IN WRITING WILL ANY COPYRIGHT HOLDER, OR ANY OTHER PARTY WHO MAY MODIFY AND/OR REDISTRIBUTE THE PROGRAM AS PERMITTED ABOVE, BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR DAMAGES, INCLUDING ANY GENERAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THE PROGRAM (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO LOSS OF DATA OR DATA BEING RENDERED INACCURATE OR LOSSES SUSTAINED BY YOU OR THIRD PARTIES OR A FAILURE OF THE PROGRAM TO OPERATE WITH ANY OTHER PROGRAMS), EVEN IF SUCH HOLDER OR OTHER PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES."

If you use the program and it messes up your machine, no one is to blame but you -- even if the damage was the result of buggy code.

Now, the reality of the situation is that the nature of software development in the world of free software is such that seriously damaging bugs are rare. However, in the corporate world where people don't like using anything new unless they have someone or something clearly designated as the object of blame in case something goes wrong, Item 12 is a source of worry and unease. However, you can still provide your own warranty independent of the GPL and set yourself up as a source of blame, if you really want to.

"END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS"

While I don't expect my interpretation of the GNU General Public License to be absolutely correct, I do hope that some of you find it useful when deciding whether or not use it with your software. As I get more information and feedback on the GPL and what it does and does not mean, I will update this document to reflect that information. Consequently, if you have any comments, corrections or clarifications on my observations concerning the GNU General Public License, please contact me either through the TalkBack or <a href="<$Forum>"><strong>interactive forum</strong></a> linked to this article.

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