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annotate doc/interpreter/preface.txi @ 9245:16f53d29049f
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| author | John W. Eaton <jwe@octave.org> |
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| date | Fri, 22 May 2009 10:46:00 -0400 |
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| 7018 | 1 @c Copyright (C) 1996, 1997, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, |
| 9245 | 2 @c 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009 John W. Eaton |
| 7018 | 3 @c |
| 4 @c This file is part of Octave. | |
| 5 @c | |
| 6 @c Octave is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it | |
| 7 @c under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the | |
| 8 @c Free Software Foundation; either version 3 of the License, or (at | |
| 9 @c your option) any later version. | |
| 10 @c | |
| 11 @c Octave is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT | |
| 12 @c ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or | |
| 13 @c FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License | |
| 14 @c for more details. | |
| 15 @c | |
| 16 @c You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License | |
| 17 @c along with Octave; see the file COPYING. If not, see | |
| 18 @c <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>. | |
| 3294 | 19 |
| 4167 | 20 @node Preface |
| 3294 | 21 @unnumbered Preface |
| 22 @cindex contributors | |
| 23 @cindex history | |
| 24 | |
| 25 Octave was originally intended to be companion software for an | |
| 26 undergraduate-level textbook on chemical reactor design being written by | |
| 27 James B. Rawlings of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and John | |
| 28 G. Ekerdt of the University of Texas. | |
| 29 | |
| 30 Clearly, Octave is now much more than just another `courseware' package | |
| 31 with limited utility beyond the classroom. Although our initial goals | |
| 32 were somewhat vague, we knew that we wanted to create something that | |
| 33 would enable students to solve realistic problems, and that they could | |
| 34 use for many things other than chemical reactor design problems. | |
| 35 | |
| 36 There are those who would say that we should be teaching the students | |
| 37 Fortran instead, because that is the computer language of engineering, | |
| 38 but every time we have tried that, the students have spent far too much | |
| 39 time trying to figure out why their Fortran code crashes and not enough | |
| 40 time learning about chemical engineering. With Octave, most students | |
| 41 pick up the basics quickly, and are using it confidently in just a few | |
| 42 hours. | |
| 43 | |
| 44 Although it was originally intended to be used to teach reactor design, | |
| 45 it has been used in several other undergraduate and graduate | |
| 46 courses in the Chemical Engineering Department at the University of | |
| 47 Texas, and the math department at the University of Texas has been using | |
| 48 it for teaching differential equations and linear algebra as well. If | |
| 49 you find it useful, please let us know. We are always interested to | |
| 50 find out how Octave is being used in other places. | |
| 51 | |
| 52 Virtually everyone thinks that the name Octave has something to do with | |
| 53 music, but it is actually the name of a former professor of mine who | |
| 54 wrote a famous textbook on chemical reaction engineering, and who was | |
| 55 also well known for his ability to do quick `back of the envelope' | |
| 56 calculations. We hope that this software will make it possible for many | |
| 57 people to do more ambitious computations just as easily. | |
| 58 | |
| 59 Everyone is encouraged to share this software with others under the | |
|
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60 terms of the GNU General Public License (@pxref{Copying}). You are |
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61 also encouraged to help make Octave more useful by writing and |
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62 contributing additional functions for it, and by reporting any problems |
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63 you may have. |
| 3294 | 64 |
| 65 @menu | |
| 66 * Acknowledgements:: | |
| 67 * How You Can Contribute to Octave:: | |
| 68 * Distribution:: | |
| 69 @end menu | |
| 70 | |
| 4167 | 71 @node Acknowledgements |
| 3294 | 72 @unnumberedsec Acknowledgements |
| 73 @cindex acknowledgements | |
| 74 | |
| 6531 | 75 Many people have already contributed to Octave's development. The |
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76 following people have helped code parts of Octave or aided in |
| 6665 | 77 various other ways (listed alphabetically). |
| 3294 | 78 |
| 6535 | 79 @include contributors.texi |
| 3294 | 80 |
| 81 Special thanks to the following people and organizations for | |
| 82 supporting the development of Octave: | |
| 83 | |
| 84 @itemize @bullet | |
| 85 @item | |
| 7090 | 86 The United States Department of Energy, through grant number |
| 87 DE-FG02-04ER25635. | |
| 88 | |
| 89 @item | |
| 90 Ashok Krishnamurthy, David Hudak, Juan Carlos Chaves, and Stanley | |
| 91 C. Ahalt of the Ohio Supercomputer Center. | |
| 92 | |
| 93 @item | |
| 3839 | 94 The National Science Foundation, through grant numbers CTS-0105360, |
| 7090 | 95 CTS-9708497, CTS-9311420, CTS-8957123, and CNS-0540147. |
| 3839 | 96 |
| 97 @item | |
| 98 The industrial members of the Texas-Wisconsin Modeling and Control | |
| 99 Consortium (@uref{http://www.che.utexas.edu/twmcc, TWMCC}). | |
| 100 | |
| 101 @item | |
| 102 The Paul A. Elfers Endowed Chair in Chemical Engineering at the | |
| 103 University of Wisconsin-Madison. | |
| 104 | |
| 105 @item | |
| 3294 | 106 Digital Equipment Corporation, for an equipment grant as part of their |
| 107 External Research Program. | |
| 108 | |
| 109 @item | |
| 110 Sun Microsystems, Inc., for an Academic Equipment grant. | |
| 111 | |
| 112 @item | |
| 113 International Business Machines, Inc., for providing equipment as part | |
| 114 of a grant to the University of Texas College of Engineering. | |
| 115 | |
| 116 @item | |
| 117 Texaco Chemical Company, for providing funding to continue the | |
| 118 development of this software. | |
| 119 | |
| 120 @item | |
| 121 The University of Texas College of Engineering, for providing a | |
| 122 Challenge for Excellence Research Supplement, and for providing an | |
| 123 Academic Development Funds grant. | |
| 124 | |
| 125 @item | |
| 126 The State of Texas, for providing funding through the Texas | |
| 127 Advanced Technology Program under Grant No. 003658-078. | |
| 128 | |
| 129 @item | |
| 130 Noel Bell, Senior Engineer, Texaco Chemical Company, Austin Texas. | |
| 131 | |
| 132 @item | |
| 5753 | 133 John A. Turner, Group Leader, Continuum Dynamics (CCS-2), Los Alamos |
| 134 National Laboratory, for registering the @url{octave.org} domain name. | |
| 135 | |
| 136 @item | |
| 3294 | 137 James B. Rawlings, Professor, University of Wisconsin-Madison, |
| 5753 | 138 Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering. |
| 3294 | 139 |
| 140 @item | |
| 141 Richard Stallman, for writing GNU. | |
| 142 @end itemize | |
| 143 | |
| 144 This project would not have been possible without the GNU software used | |
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145 in and to produce Octave. |
| 3294 | 146 |
| 4167 | 147 @node How You Can Contribute to Octave |
| 3294 | 148 @unnumberedsec How You Can Contribute to Octave |
| 149 @cindex contributing to Octave | |
| 150 @cindex funding Octave development | |
| 151 | |
| 152 There are a number of ways that you can contribute to help make Octave a | |
| 153 better system. Perhaps the most important way to contribute is to write | |
| 154 high-quality code for solving new problems, and to make your code freely | |
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155 available for others to use. @xref{Contributing Guidelines}, for detailed |
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156 information on contributing new code. |
| 3294 | 157 |
| 158 If you find Octave useful, consider providing additional funding to | |
| 159 continue its development. Even a modest amount of additional funding | |
| 160 could make a significant difference in the amount of time that is | |
| 161 available for development and support. | |
| 162 | |
| 163 If you cannot provide funding or contribute code, you can still help | |
| 164 make Octave better and more reliable by reporting any bugs you find and | |
| 165 by offering suggestions for ways to improve Octave. @xref{Trouble}, for | |
| 166 tips on how to write useful bug reports. | |
| 167 | |
| 4167 | 168 @node Distribution |
| 3294 | 169 @unnumberedsec Distribution |
| 170 @cindex distribution of Octave | |
| 171 | |
| 172 Octave is @dfn{free} software. This means that everyone is free to | |
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173 use it and free to redistribute it on certain conditions. Octave |
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174 is not, however, in the public domain. It is copyrighted and there are |
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175 restrictions on its distribution, but the restrictions are designed to |
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176 ensure that others will have the same freedom to use and redistribute |
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177 Octave that you have. The precise conditions can be found in the |
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178 GNU General Public License that comes with Octave and that also appears |
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179 in @ref{Copying}. |
| 3294 | 180 |
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181 Octave is available on CD-ROM, with various collections of other free |
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182 software, from the Free Software Foundation. Ordering a copy of |
| 3294 | 183 Octave from the Free Software Foundation helps to fund the development |
| 184 of more free software. For more information, write to | |
| 185 | |
| 186 @quotation | |
| 187 Free Software Foundation@* | |
| 5307 | 188 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor@* |
| 189 Boston, MA 02110-1301--1307@* | |
| 3294 | 190 USA |
| 191 @end quotation | |
| 7031 | 192 |
| 193 Octave can also be downloaded from @url{http://www.octave.org}, where | |
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194 additional information is available. |