🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <8610302053.AA05161@ames-prandtl.ARPA>, getty@AMES-PRANDTL.ARPA 
writes:

> I was in the store the other day looking at the Easydraw program, and I 
> was suprised to discover that GDOS is being distributed with this program.
> Included with this GDOS were some fonts, device drivers, and a program named
> OUTPUT.PRG.  
> 
> After trying Easydraw I got a copy of PaintPro (Abacus) and tried running 
> it.  PaintPro simply would not run with GDOS installed on the system, but 
> ran just fine when the system was booted without GDOS.  The README file 
> that comes with PaintPro claimed that it would work with GDOS installed.

Apparently the README file was wrong.  We have been looking into the
compatibility issue, and have found some trouble spots -- one big problem is
that programs compiled with OSS Personal Pascal don't work with GDOS.  We
have told OSS how to fix this.

> This all disturbs me.  Apparently GDOS is already being given away in some
> form with commercial software, but you are telling us that we are going to
> have to pay money for it.  Will the GDOS given away with software in the 
> future be the same thing that is going to be sold for money separately?

Why should it disturb you?  We are licensing GDOS for use with commercial
packages -- if you get the package, you get GDOS.  The current thinking is
to package GDOS separately for consumers who want it.

EasyDraw uses a very early GDOS, under strict directions to their
programmers to use only the functions we explicitely told them were working.
The final version is complete now.

-- 
--->Neil @ Atari

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