[David Ascher]
> In case you haven't heard about it, ActiveState has recently signed a
> contract with Microsoft to do some work on Perl on win32.
I'm astonished at the reaction this has provoked "out there". Here:
D:\Python>perl -v
This is perl, version 5.001
Unofficial patchlevel 1m.
Copyright 1987-1994, Larry Wall
Win32 port Copyright (c) 1995 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
Developed by hip communications inc., http://info.hip.com/info/
Perl for Win32 Build 107
Built Apr 16 1996 at 14:47:22
Perl may be copied only under the terms of either the Artistic License or
the
GNU General Public License, which may be found in the Perl 5.0 source kit.
D:\Python>
Notice the MS copyright? From 1995?! Perl for Win32 has *always* been
funded by MS, even back when half of ActiveState was named "hip
communications" <0.5 wink>. Thank Perl's dominance in CGI scripting -- MS
couldn't sell NT Server if it didn't run Perl. MS may be vicious, but
they're not stupid <wink>.
> ...
> fork()
> ...
> Any guesses as to whether we could hijack this work if/when it is released
> as Open Source?
It's proven impossible so far to reuse anything from the Perl source -- the
code is an incestuous nightmare. From time to time the Perl-Porters talk
about splitting some of it into reusable libraries, but that never happens;
and the less they feel Perl's dominance is assured, the less they even talk
about it.
So I'm pessimistic (what else is new <wink>?). I'd rather see the work put
into threads anyway. The "Mac OS" problem will go away eventually; time to
turn the suckers on by default.
it's-not-like-millions-of-programmers-will-start-writing-thread-code-then-
who-don't-now-ly y'rs - tim
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