On Fri, 2 Nov 2007 08:48:09 -0400, John Eells wrote:
>
>What Run Time Library license encumbrances are you talking about?
>
I have a historic view. Once, long ago, we chose not to implement
a product in PL/I because IBM took the position that each one of
our customers would have been required to deal with IBM to obtain
a PL/I license to use the RTL. IBM would not allow us to remarket
the PL/I RTL bundled with our product. We found that unpalatable
and chose another implementation language.
Of course, LE relieved that problem, decades too late for us.
Now, I see that METAL C is LE independent. But, I surmised,
to be POSIX compliant it must have some RTL (well, I suppose
it could all be done with macros, expanded at compile time.
Unlikely.) So, I wondered whether this new RTL would come
with new license requirements. Other plies in this thread
have said, "No."
As for POSIX compliance, on the page Brian P. cited:
http://www-03.ibm.com/servers/eserver/zseries/zos/metalc/
... I read:
...
A starter set of functions for a system environment includes
functions to test and manipulate memory and strings (like memcpy()
and strcmp() ), to classify characters (such as isalpha() and
islowerj() ), and to process text strings (using the printf() and
sscanf() family of functions). ...
... Sounds encouraging. But reading further:
... Normal input-output functionality is not provided, but
functions like sprintf() are. You can still enjoy the convenience of
%-substitution in the format string; and you can emit the resulting
string in a buffer, and then print this buffer using, for example,
WTO.
... feels like a bait-and-switch. The "printf() and sscanf()
family of functions" might not be fully implemented. ALGOL 60
failed in large part because of its lack of "[n]ormal input-output
functionality".
-- gil
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