Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!ukma!psuvm.bitnet!cunyvm.bitnet!ankgc
From: ANKGC@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU (Anil Khullar)
Newsgroups: comp.emacs
Subject: Re: Reprise: If Emacs is a text editor, Unix is a C compiler
Message-ID: <1290ANKGC@CUNYVM>
Date: 8 Apr 88 03:32:25 GMT
References: <8803291504.AA08952@unipress.uucp> <9890@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu>
Organization: The City University of New York - New York, NY
Lines: 58
DISCLAIMER: Author bears full responsibility for contents of this article


In article <9890@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu>, bob@allosaur.cis.ohio-state.edu (Bob Sutterfield) says:
>
>In article <8803291504.AA08952@unipress.uucp> mg@unipress.UUCP (required by law) writes:
>> [...a bunch of other glowing stuff nobody can really argue with :-)
>> [...also some impressivly balanced comments about how his own
>> [...product compares to GNU Emacs...]
>
>>We (UniPress) sell a commercial version of Emacs originally written
>>by James Gosling, who also wrote NeWS.  GnuEmacs is a free (but not
>>public domain) version also descended from Gosling's Emacs.
>
>All Gosling code has been excised in recent versions.
>
>>...GnuEmacs doesn't directly cost much money if you know where to get
>>it (I think $150 from the Free Software Foundation).
>
>Repeat the mantra: "That $150 is a tape copying fee."  If you don't
>want to pay FSF to spin tapes for you, you can get it via anonymous
>FTP from prep.ai.mit.edu, or via anonymous UUCP from osu-cis.

>>Also, unlike FSF, we LIKE NeWS.

>This is a FSF attitude that I entirely disagree with.  Chris Miao
>added support for NeWS 1.0 in Emacs 18.49, and Clayton Elwell fixed
>some stuff up for NeWS 1.1 in Emacs 18.50.  I understand that Chris's
>changes were offered back to FSF as a contribution to their efforts,
>but were turned down because of NeWS' proprietary status.
>
>RMS, why not accept the changes on the same basis that VMS and SunView
>are included in the distribution: work that willing contributors
>offered, in order to give the product a wider audience, in those mean,
>nasty, proprietary non-standard environments?
 I think a crucial point is missed here. It is that of not allowing
software that usually is guarded and prevent others from copying or
altering (oops ! pls del the last word I am reading from a VM machine)
hence the objection. I do not agree that groups who *sell* their code
with restrictions should not have a chance to PLUG their packages.

As for Unipress Emacs (no flames please) I nearly cried using it on
a VMS environment. They had hooked some of their definitions that
a user without priveleges could not redefine in their own environment.

I now use GNU on a VMS machine and There is enough info available
from Mukesh Prasad's port and updates from Marty Sasaki to let
nearly anyone to rehack it for his/her needs........

>Yes, I know that RMS doesn't read this newsgroup, but if we get
>everybody singing the first four bars... he'll think it's a movement!
>
>>Mike Gallaher, Emacs Hacker Boss, UniPress Software
>-=-
> Bob Sutterfield, Department of Computer and Information Science
> The Ohio State University; 2036 Neil Ave. Columbus OH USA 43210-1277
> bob@cis.ohio-state.edu or ...!cbosgd!osu-cis!bob

                                Anil Khullar
                               ank%cunyvms1.bitnet@cunyvm.cuny.edu
                                ankgc@cunyvm.cuny.edu