I've updated the website with rc1, including what I think is the current testing status.
Please notify of any omissions, corrections or otherwise. Also, if anyone can help fill out the testing matrix, please let us know. Bill. On 7 April 2010 19:25, MPIR Team <[email protected]> wrote: > Dear All, > > Despite our recent April Fools prank: > > http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel/browse_thread/thread/d2777413749f37e5 > > the MPIR developers have actually been considering a switch to an LGPL v3+ > license for a while, for the following reasons: > > 1) Maintaining GMP interface compatibility - a major requirement for MPIR > users - > without moving to an LGPL v3 license would involve a significant, ongoing > and > wasteful effort in duplicating code that has already been written. This > would > seriously undermine more productive investments in code development that > we hope to make. > > 2) It is desirable that MPIR is able to incorporate high quality code from > developers who are committed to v3 licensing. For example, the first rate > toom8h code written by Marco Bodrato would not be available for use in > MPIR without a major and costly rewrite. > > 3) There is a danger that staying with a v2 license when others in the > bignum > community are moving to LGPL/GPL v3 will merely contribute to community > fragmentation. > > There are of course also disadvantages in that some developers dislike the > political aspects of v3 licensing and some companies have decided not to use > any v3 licensed code. But given the limited development effort available to > us, we believe the ability to easily maintain GMP interface compatibility, > the > ability to incorporate high quality LGPL v3 licensed code, the avoidance of > a wasteful duplication of development effort and additional time to put more > effort > into the improvements that we have been contributing, combine to make a > move > to an LGPL v3 license seem worthwhile in practice. > Accordingly we have now developed an LGPL v3+ version of MPIR, based on > selectively > using code from the GMP project where we consider it to be of high quality. > We have > not adopted all GMP speed improvements though as we have it in mind to > pursue > different strategies in some areas which should ultimately see much more > significant > gains. > Moreover this release includes new code developments of our own. In this > release we > have concentrated effort on speed improvements in multiplication and > division with a > focus on the creation of a basis for future performance improvements > in division and > elsewhere. > We also have speedups in the root code, string input/output and gcd/gcdext > by > selective use of code from GMP. There are also dramatic performance > improvements > in the Itanium assembly code made possible by mixing code from GMP and a > little bit > of new code by Jason Martin. > Our first release candidate is available for testing at: > > http://www.mpir.org/mpir-2.0.0-rc1.tar.gz > > Documentation is here: > > http://www.mpir.org/mpir-2.0.0.pdf > > See the files AUTHORS and NEWS for details of all the improvements and > who they were written by. Our website will be updated with full credits and > details as usual once testing of the release is complete. > > MPIR 2.0.0 is near to 100% compatible with the published interface of GMP > 5.0.1 > (some minor exceptions exist, such as the lack of support for secure > cryptographic functions which we believe are not appropriate for MPIR). > We'd be grateful for any and all feedback on this release. (We also need > someone > with an i7 to do some tuning for us - it only takes a few minutes; can > someone help?). > > Before switching license permanently, we decided to consult with numerous > individuals in the bignum community privately by email. All responses so far > have been encouraging and positive. We also wish to consult publicly, now > that we have a first offering available. > > So how would this affect your projects? Are there any reasons we should not > change license permanently? > > We think that the benefits of our planned change outweigh the disadvantages. > What do you think? We are interested to hear your opinion. > > Best Wishes, > > The MPIR Team > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "mpir-devel" group. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/mpir-devel?hl=en. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "mpir-devel" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/mpir-devel?hl=en.
