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Linux News Issue 08
L i n u x N e w s
A summary of the goings-on of the Linux community
Issue #8, November 28 through December 19, 1992
**** Highlights in this issue
- kernel now at 0.99
- new newsgroups: comp.os.linux.announce, comp.windows.x.i386unix
- the end of Linux News?
- mpeg-1.1
- deliver
- TeX sources for Linux
- Lilo 0.7
- xgraph
- efsprogs alpha 11
- xphoon
- Newspak 1.1
- ckermit
- mawk
- Seyon 1.5
- Xcomm
- Epoch 4.2
- SLS updates
**** Editorial
In case you haven't noticed, I'm unusually late with this issue, about
three weeks. Sorry about that. Due to the large number of things
that I had saved for inclusion, and my chronic lack of time, I have
had to keep things very short in this issue, and have also skipped
unusually many things.
Probably the biggest news at the moment is that "1.0 is coming, are
you ready?". Well, actually there is not that much to be ready about,
since 1.0 will not introduce many changes from the current kernel.
Unless you are dedicated into building your system from scratch,
you'll probably be best of with the SLS release, and if you update
your system to that, you can be fairly certain of having a
well-working system.
Two other quite important things are two new newsgroups:
comp.os.linux.announce, and comp.windows.x.i386unix. If you don't
have the time to read all of comp.os.linux, but want to stay up to
date with what is happening with Linux (and are disgusted with the
delays with LN :), read that group. Also, if you have something to
announce that is of general interest for the Linux community, do it in
c.o.l.a. (Nice acronym, eh?) C.o.l.a will be gatewayed to a
mailing-list for those without Usenet access sometime in the future.
The splitting vote for comp.os.linux failed to create the other
proposed groups. There will not be a new vote until at least six
months have passed since the previous one.
Comp.windows.x.i386unix is intended for discussions about X on 386
Unices, including Linux. It is a good idea to use it instead of
comp.os.linux for such discussions, since there is quite enough of
traffic in c.o.l as it is.
Last, and probably least, I'm looking for a volunteer to take over
Linux News. I don't seem to be able to have enough time to do it
often enough and well enough, so I'd like to hand it over to somebody
else. Mail me if you are willing. I'd like somebody who has been
using Linux actively for some time so that she (or he :-) has some
understanding of what is going on and what various things are.
Alternatively, I might change LN into a non-periodic thing and only
publish and issue every few weeks or months, and include more articles
and less news items. (Might have to change the name too, then.)
**** Legalese
Linux News can be copied, re-published, printed, hung on walls, used
as toilet paper, and used in any other way you wish. If you
distribute LN outside comp.os.linux and the LINUXNEWS channel, please
tell me: the more people I know are reading LN, the more eager I am to
put energy into it.
I take no responsibility whatsoever for any information in Linux News,
or any problems due lack of information. If you get killed due to
Linux News, mail me, and I'll feel sorry for you, but that's just
about all I can do.
**** Notices
Linux News is only a summary, if you want more information about a
given subject, please see the source that is referenced at the end of
each note (for Usenet articles, the reference is the Message-ID of the
article). I try to include all the relevant information, including
ftp sites and filenames, as given in the announcements (I probably
won't have the time or energy to check filenames, or to find pointers
to other ftp sites). If possible, I will try to indicate directories
with a trailing /, e.g. ``pub/linux/SLS/''.
I won't include announcements on mailing lists or testing releases,
only things that are meant to be used generally (I admit that the line
can be somewhat difficult to draw, since the whole system is
pre-release). There will be exceptions.
**** News section
November 30. Scott A. Laird announced an upload of MPEG-1.1. It is a
program for viewing "movies" in the MPEG compressed format. Needs X.
Scott says he gets about 8 frames per second on a 486DX2/50 with ATI
Graphics Ultra, so it is probably not particularly fast on a 386SX...
FTP: tsx-11.mit.edu (binary), toe.cs.berkeley.edu:
/pub/multimedia/mpeg/ (source).
(Source: <1992Nov30.070546.23765@midway.uchicago.edu>)
December 8. Matthew Donadio announced binaries for Deliver for Linux.
It is a program which delivers electronic mail once it has arrived at
a given machine.
FTP: sunsite.unc.edu: deliver.TZ
(Source: <1992Dec8.173324.19957@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 8. Thomas Dunbar announced Linux TeX source upload.
FTP: tsx-11.mit.edu: /pub/linux/packages/TeX, files web2c.taz
(essential things) and texweb.taz (misc source).
(Source: <1992Dec8.191750.22643@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 7. Werner Almesberger announced Lilo 0.7. Lilo is the Linux
Loader, the set of programs that allows Linux to boot from a hard disk.
FTP: tsx-11.mit.edu: pub/linux/packages/lilo, files lilo.7.tar.Z
(sources for programs and docs), lilo.7.ps.Z (docs in PostScript
format).
(Source: <1992Dec7.062414.6307@bernina.ethz.ch>)
December 7. Isaac Wong announced xgraph for Linux. It is a
two-dimensional plotting program.
FTP: tsx-11.mit.edu: xgraph.taz (source and binary).
(Source: <1992Dec7.193518.21471@netcom.com>)
December 9. Remy Card announced version alpha 11 of the extended
filesystem support programs.
FTP: ftp-masi.ibp.fr: /pub/linux/ALPHA/extfs/, tsx-11.mit.edu.
(Source: <1992Dec9.172910.22669@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 10. David Peterson announced binaries for xphoon. It is a
FTP: sunsite.unc.edu and tsx-11.mit.edu: phoonbin.tar.Z.
(Source: <1992Dec10.160753.22094@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 11. Vince Skahan announced Newspak-1.1. It is a set of
programs for setting up a Usenet site. It includes cnews, tin, trn,
and nn. It doesn't include UUCP or other networking, which you need
from elsewhere.
FTP: sunsite.unc.edu: /pub/Linux/System/news/
(Source: <1992Dec11.170805.22139@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 12. hutchinson@wrair-emh1.army.mil announced ckermit5A(188)
and mawk 1.1.2 binaries upload. ckermit is a terminal / file
transmission program, mawk is an implementation of the AWK language.
FTP: tsx-11.mit.edu: ckermit5A.188.tar.Z, mawk1.1.2bin.tar.Z
(Source: <1992Dec12.053016.6610@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 13. Linus released version 0.99 of the kernel. This
version should have all the functionality of 1.0, and should only be
changed to fix bugs before 1.0, which will hopefully be released
before the end of the year.
There were a couple of problems with 0.99, fixed by small patches
posted by Linus.
FTP: nic.funet.fi: pub/OS/Linux/PEOPLE/Linus: linux-0.99.tar.Z
(Source: <1992Dec13.193812.6958@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 13. M. Saggaf announced Seyon 1.5. It is a terminal program
for X.
FTP: sipb.mit.edu: /pub/seyon; also export.lcs.mit.edu,
nic.funet.fi, and sunsite.unc.edu.
(Source: <1992Dec13.194528.7230@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 14. Jeff Randall announced Xcomm patchlevel 5. It is a
terminal program.
FTP: xcomm3b-L1.5.src.tar.Z, xcomm3b-L1.5.bin.tar.Z
(Source: <1992Dec14.191822.12572@tc.cornell.edu>)
December 14. Thomas Dunbar uploaded a binary of Epoch-4.2. It is an
X version of GNU Emacs.
FTP: tsx-11.mit.edu: /pub/linux/packages/TeX/epoch42.taz
(Source: <10438@vtserf.cc.vt.edu>)
December 18. Ian Jackson announced archives of
comp.os.linux.announce, up to December 17.
FTP: nic.funet.fi, tsx-11.mit.edu, ftp.informatik.tu-muenchen.de,
sunsite.unc.edu, fgb1.fgb.mw.tu-muenchen.de, ftp.dfv.rwth-aachen.de,
ftp.win.tue.nl, ftp.ibr.cs.tu-bs.de, ftp.uni-kl.de.
(Source: <1992Dec18.194443.2246@tc.cornell.edu>)
Lotsa dates. Peter MacDonald has been updating SLS fairly often.
The changes include: nfs and shadow password support, the syslogd
daemon, ghostscript, mailpak, and the 0.99 kernel.
Check the HISTORY file on ftp sites for more information.
