Waldek, On 6/29/07, you wrote:
... I plan to created a new project called FriCAS -- many details are undecided yet (even the name may change).
I was amused when I saw the name you chose for the new project. Perhaps it is not obvious to a non-English speaker (or perhaps this really was your intention since there is a similar word in French) but this project name bears a very close similarity the to English word 'fracas' meaning: "a noisy quarrel or brawl" http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?sourceid=Mozilla-search&va=fracas That certainly seems appropriate given the nature of recent exchanges on this email list. :-) This name also has other mostly humorous connotations to me, but I can think of some like "Fri" as in Friday (today), so FriCAS would be today's version of the former Axiom project... Or maybe Fri as a suffix that sounds like "free"?? Anyway, I think it is a terrible choice of name.
Let me shortly state my reasons: - I feel that current "official" statements about Axiom project are harmful for the project - my attempts to change project direction are labeled as stealing the project -- new project should make situation clear I value Axiom comunity, but feel that leaving current project is the best way to clarify situation.
While I do agree with you and I also strongly disagree with most of the current "official" statements about the Axiom project, I am not sure that creating a fork of the Axiom project is such a good idea. I am disappointed that so few people were willing to reply to William Sit and Tim Daly's request for a vote on the subject of whether to promote wh-sandbox as our best candidate for a new Axiom Gold, but my sense is that in spite of the silence, this proposal has the support of a majority of the people who are reading this list and who are seriously interested in Axiom. I still consider this a much better alternative than the creation of a new project. http://wiki.axiom-developer.org/VoteASuggestionForGold On the other hand, if you personally have enough energy and time to devote to an entirely new development path for Axiom and you are confident that you will be able to attract the interest of other developers and users of computer algebra systems who for what ever reason are not currently interested in the existing Axiom project, then this might be a positive development for both the "old" Axiom project and the new FirCAS project. If you are serious, then this a a bold step and I thank you again for your continuing contributions to this work - by what ever name you wish to call it. :-) Regards, Bill Page. _______________________________________________ Axiom-developer mailing list [email protected] http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/axiom-developer
