From sq!sq.com!ian Thu Feb 16 21:21 EST 1995 From: lashley@netcom.com Subject: comp.windows.NeWS CHARTER/FAQ Date: Sat, 11 Feb 1995 17:57:57 GMT Content-Length: 3952 Content-Type: text Status: RO X-Lines: 117 Last changed: 18 March 1994 This is a weekly posting intended to reduce the number of inappropriate postings by those who may be confused by the newsgroup name; and to answer some of the more frequently asked questions (if anything can be considered frequent in such a low-volume group...) Feel free to suggest additions or alterations. Note that this is an entirely personal effort, and does not represent any sort of official statement from Sun Microsystems, Inc, or any of its subsidiaries or divisions. ------------------ WHAT THIS GROUP IS (AND ISN'T) ABOUT -------------------- (This section wouldn't be necessary if netnews allowed mixed-case groupnames; or if Microsoft hadn't perverted yet another generic term into a specific product name...) This group is for discussions about Sun's Network extensible Window System (NeWS); it is -NOT- for news about DOS MS WINDOWS. There are a number of newsgroups for WINDOWS-related postings under the comp.os.ms-windows hierarchy; and a few scattered elsewhere (comp.windows.ms, comp.windows.ms.programmer, comp.binaries.ms-windows, etc.) All of the MS WINDOWS groups have `ms' in their name somewhere. Now that Sun has announced that NeWS is being EOLed (EOL = End Of Life), some of the long-time readers of this group may suggest that we simply abandon it to clueless WINDOWS users. But I belong to the camp that strongly rejects this suggestion. There are still people using NeWS; it will still be available for some time; and there are even people working on freely-redistributable NeWS clones; so I believe that this group can still serve its original purpose. And when it no longer can serve that purpose, it should be abolished rather than abandoned to misuse. ------------------- THE FUTURE OF NeWS ------------------------ SunSoft has announced the intention to shift from the X11/NeWS server to an X11+DPS based windowing system; and that NeWS and TNT have entered End Of Life. As far as SunSoft is concerned, NeWS has no future (although some of the technology might wind up in other products.) But some NeWS fans aren't willing to just quietly accept the demise of such an elegant and powerful environment. Some of them are working on NeWS clones; at least one of which is intended to support TNT. I would be happy to include further information in this FAQ; but I don't have any reliable information on these efforts. (Or at least none that I'm at liberty to release...) ------------------- THE FUTURE OF NeWSprint ---------------- SunPics has announced their continued support for NeWSprint; and continued development of new features. Will it still be based on the current xnews server? SunPics isn't saying, and it doesn't really matter to the user anyway... ------------------- Known NeWS applications --------------- The following commercial applications are known to have either been written using NeWS, or have had NeWS ports: FrameMaker 3.x (OpenLook version) Altsys Virtuoso SimCity HyperLook (formerly HyperNeWS, formerly GoodNeWS) NeWSprint ShowMe (Later ported to X11. I'm not sure whether the NeWS version was publicly released.) Non-commercial NeWS applications: jet (excellent terminal emulator) hexsweeper (game) -------------------- NeWS References -------------------- The NeWS 3.1 Programmer's Guide SunSoft, Inc., 1992 The NeWS Toolkit 3.1 Reference Manual SunSoft, Inc., 1992 The NeWS Book James Gosling, David S. H. Rosenthal, and Michelle Arden Springer-Verlag, 1989 NeWS Classes; an Update Fifth computer Graphics Workshop Owen Densmore Usenix, 1989 Object Oriented Programming in NeWS Computer Graphics Workshop Owen Densmore Usenix, 1986 A Window on the Future? Unix Review, Volume 6, Number 6 Samuel J. Leffler Methodology of Windoww Management, F.R.A. Hopgood, D.A. Duce, E.V.C. Fielding, K. Robinson, and A.S. Williams Springer-Verlag, 1986 NeWS is a registered trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc.