2010/1/4 Jorge E. ´Sanchez Sanchez <[email protected]>: > Dear William, > > I am so sorry to perhaps put more noise in this thread, my modem was dead > and for this reason is why until today I am reading it, and I just want to > share my experience with Cygwin and to tell you that since 2005 I > was working very well with my Cygwin installation combining quite armoniusly > both worlds of Unix and Windows mainly EPD in the last one, files were easy > to share and there were'nt any scientific linux library which I cannot > put into work on my Cygwin where I also use to run my fortran and C++ > codes. Then in 2008 I discover SAGE in a precompiled binary for Windows and > I became a fan of it, so I was very dissapointed when I could'nt run it > after a failed update. I search for the possibility to install it from > source on Cygwin but (I believe in a comment I found from you) it was almost > impossible to do it. I try the VMware installation for a while but it seemed > to me that it was not the same functionality, and as far as I could thought > I could'nt understand why I should have a Cygwin (which now had deceived me > for that reason) and a VMware linux at the same time in the same machine. So > I decided to delete Cygwin and the VMWare and make an Ubuntu 9.04 linux > partition. I have moved all my stuff just below SAGE in order to have the > possibility to make all kind of calculations algebraic as well as numerical > within it, I was a little unconfident with this last linux installation > because in other computers I have had issues after a while with the hard > disk and lost info. However I have been working succesfully during a year > and a half until without thinking I accept the linux upgrade to 9.10 > automatically and all that happy world came down in little pieces, because I > have again troubles with the hard disk and lost all the work I have > dedicated to configure my SAGE installation. > The best of the Cygwin world is its reliability and windows compatibility I > think the existence of a Cygwin SAGE would make me very happy again because > I could trust my software to it.
I *totally* understand what you mean. I think you are a fairly typical potential Sage-on-Windows user... and often typical computer users are Windows users. We definitely, definitely want to produce a Cygwin port of Sage. Keep your eyes out for it! William > > Have a nice 2010 year > Jorge > >> Date: Fri, 1 Jan 2010 15:13:01 -0800 >> Subject: Re: [sage-support] SAGE and .NET interoperability. >> From: [email protected] >> To: [email protected] >> >> On Fri, Jan 1, 2010 at 2:46 PM, Dr. David Kirkby >> <[email protected]> wrote: >> > William Stein wrote: >> >> On Fri, Jan 1, 2010 at 9:04 AM, Dr. David Kirkby >> >> <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> William Stein wrote: >> >>> >> >>>> Unfortunately, there is no native port of Sage to Microsoft Windows >> >>>> (I >> >>>> wish there were). So you can't use it from .NET. >> >>>> >> >>>> -- William >> >>> Is that situation changing? >> >> >> >> Not lately. >> > >> > Shame. As much as I do not like to admit it, a Windows version would >> > dramatically increase the user base. >> > >> > That said, tech savvy people who are thinking of running Sage are more >> > likely to >> > use OS X, Linux, Solaris than the average PC user. >> > >> > But still, a large number of tech savvy people only use Windows. >> > >> >>> I was under the impression Microsoft were sponsoring >> >>> a port, but I've not heard much about it. >> >> >> >> 2 years ago Microsoft sponsored part-time work on a port for a year. >> > >> > There was never a hope in hells chance with that. >> > >> > To get ALL of the functionality of Sage, the time is going to be several >> > man >> > years - probably 10 to 30 of them. A more limited subset of >> > functionality would >> > take less time of course. >> > >> > If people can run some parts of Sage, but it pops up with the >> > occasional: >> > >> > "Sorry, that functionality is not available in the native Windows >> > version of >> > Sage. Please use Linux, Solaris or Install VirtulBox on your PC and >> > download an >> > image from ..." >> > >> > A limited sub set of the full functionality: >> > >> > 1) May be sufficient for many users. >> > >> > 2) Might get them wanting more, and so upgrade. >> > >> > Shareware software was often like that. You get some functionality free, >> > but you >> > paid for the rest. Well in this case, they don't pay money, but they >> > have to pay >> > with a bit of effort to install Linux, Solaris or VirtualBox, plus learn >> > to use >> > Linux/Unix. >> > >> > >> > >> >>> Knowing the hurdles to overcome in porting Sage to Solaris, I would >> >>> imagine >> >>> those hurdles are much larger to port to Windows. However, with a >> >>> larger user >> >>> base, perhaps you can attract more developers, so a port is easier. >> >> >> >> That appears to not be the case. After 3-4 years of >> >> waiting/trying/encouraging, I'm pretty sure the only way Sage will >> >> ever get ported to Windows is if me and Mike Hansen just do it >> >> ourselves. >> > >> > I'd go for the limited subset approach. >> >> The Cygwin-based port will provide all functionality, not a limited >> subset. As an estimate of difficulty: I'm confident Mike Hansen and I >> working fulltime for one month could complete it. It would have been >> finished already if good people were working on it. Just to back up >> that claim, consider: >> >> (1) For most of 2005 and 2006, Gary Zablackis distributed a >> Cygwin-based version of Sage, complete with a nice automated 1-click >> .msi installer. Unfortunately, Gary stopped working on this in >> mid-2006 so it languished. Gary was exceptionally capable, in that he >> actually understood the internals of Cygwin1.dll, and wasn't afraid to >> dive in, hack stuff in there, report bugs to the Cygwin dev's. etc. >> Once a new version of Cygwin1.dll completeley broke robustly building >> Python C extensions, and Gary had a huge argument with the Cygwin devs >> about this (he was right about the technical issues). >> >> (2) In Jan 2007, I spent one solid week and redid a port of Sage to >> Cygwin, which people used for a while around then. I was motivated >> by an upcoming visit to Microsoft to give a talk. >> >> (3) The Cygwin port was killed around March 2007 mainly because of >> libSingular. More precisely I'll take responsibility -- I made a bad >> choice to let libSingular into Sage without the portability issues >> that it caused on Cygwin being resolved. >> >> (4) The Cygwin port has stayed dead for almost two years, from March >> 2007 until now, while much new functionality has been added to Sage, >> thus making the port even harder. (It's possible this was because a >> certain Sage developer staked out doing a Windows port as "his >> terrain".) On the other hand, the build system and code in Sage has >> been made more portable and is better understood, due to porting to OS >> X 64-bit, Solaris, etc., so maybe the port is easier now. >> >> (5) In the meantime, Cygwin itself has certainly got much better. >> For example, they just did a new release that evidently greatly >> improves their fork system call, which is highly relevant for Sage. >> >> --------- >> >> For a full native MSVC-based port, a limited subset of functionality >> is perhaps more realistic, and might be the approach we're already >> following. However, note that creating a version of Sage with >> "limited functionality" is actually very, very difficult, and requires >> exceptional knowledge of Sage, Python/Cython programming, and a wide >> range of areas of advanced mathematics. The different parts of >> mathematics are actually highly interrelated. >> >> -- William >> >> -- >> 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/sage-support >> URL: http://www.sagemath.org > > ________________________________ > Windows Live y Samsung equipan tu casa. Participa y gana! > > -- > 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/sage-support > URL: http://www.sagemath.org > -- William Stein Associate Professor of Mathematics University of Washington http://wstein.org -- 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/sage-support URL: http://www.sagemath.org
