Path: utzoo!utgpu!cunews!bnrgate!brtph3!brchh104!brchs1!bnr.ca!rice.edu!sun-spots-request
From: miranda!mc@moc.jpl.nasa.gov (Mike Caplinger)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.sun
Subject: GX "support" from Sun
Keywords: Software
Message-ID: <1139@brchh104.bnr.ca>
Date: 9 Jan 91 17:16:30 GMT
Sender: news@brchh104.bnr.ca
Organization: Sun-Spots
Lines: 14
Approved: Sun-Spots@rice.edu
X-Sun-Spots-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 5, message 14
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Read on the net today that Sun has removed all the GX include files from
4.1.1 "to discourage reverse-engineering of the hardware."  Kind of makes
the "open systems" concept seem like lying marketing hype, doesn't it?

Anyway, I also read that Sun is distributing "run-time support" for XGL
(their low-level graphics library that supports the GX hardware graphics)
bundled with 4.1.1.  Does this mean that they give you shareable libraries
but no include files?  How long is it going to take to reverse-engineer
those?  Or have they come up with some other abomination to make it
impossible to link against specified libraries?  They were happy to sell
me the GX but if I want to use it, well, that's an extra $1000 for XGL...

	Mike Caplinger, ASU/Caltech Mars Observer Camera Project
	mc@moc.jpl.nasa.gov