🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1990Jul16.032446.15840@swbatl.sbc.com> george@swbatl.sbc.com 
(George D. Nincehelser) writes:
> Yeesh!  I don't like the direction this is going.  John wrote a 
> wonderful and useful program and is giving it away free for the
> benefit off all, yet some folks are bitching about a measly 20K  
> of disk space!

Just because my program is free doesn't mean it's beyond criticism.  The 
large size of version 2.0 is one of its drawbacks, and the person who 
complained had a valid point.  I was concerned about this problem during 
development, and I wish there was something reasonable I could do about 
it.  I pity the poor folks who must download it from CompuServe or 
AppleLink or wherever using 2400 baud modems - it takes half an hour!  (As 
opposed to 28 seconds to get it via anonymous FTP from sumex-aim to my Mac 
IIci desktop using SU-Mac/IP.  Hey, when's the rest of the world going to 
get networked anyway?  Isn't it about time?)

Version 2.0 will fit on an 800K startup "Virus Tools" floppy along with 
stock System and Finder files from Apple's System Software 6.0.5 System 
Tools disk, with 44K to spare.  This isn't much room left, but it's enough 
for a bootable emergency floppy.  People with floppy-only systems who want 
to be able to print have to build a special startup disk without the 
Finder file to make room for a printer driver and the Imagewriter spool 
file (see the manual for details).  2.0 is usable on a single-floppy system
with no hard drive, but I'm the first to admit that it's a bit painful.

It would be possible for me to start releasing Disinfectant in pieces - a 
minimal application on one file, the help text on a second file, the INIT 
on a third file, the About window resources on a fourth file, etc., etc.

The reason I don't want to do this is that people will inevitably begin 
losing pieces, using pieces from different releases, posting only some of 
the pieces to bulletin boards, etc.  For electronically distributed free 
software like mine there's a big advantage to having the entire package in 
a single file.  After careful consideration I decided that this advantage 
is more important than the disadvantages mentioned above.

One possibility which we considered but have not yet implemented is 
compressing the resources which contain the text for the manual.  This 
would save perhaps 50K on disk, although it wouldn't help the size of the 
Stuffed version which people have to download.  Maybe this will make it 
into some future version.

John Norstad
Academic Computing and Network Services
Northwestern University
jln@acns.nwu.edu