DOS systems:
In the '70s the computer manufacturers released your software sources with your equipments, very soon this situation changed and they started to sell the software at high prices puting strong copyrights over it.
Today the people is acustomed to pay important amounts of money for the sofware. An Operating System costs over than U$S 100 and programming tools over than U$S 500. In addition you get a poor support and no freedom to modify the programs to meet your needs
But a lot of people fights against that; one of the most remarkable efforts is sustained by the Free Software Foundation and the GNU project. In a few words the GNU project is a project to create free software, see the history. Here free sofware doesn't mean only gratis but free of copyrights that stops you from modifying it or for reusing the code in your own creations.
This page is dedicated to this kind of software. There are a lot of free software types so be carefull about that and don't get confused, some softwares claim to be free because are gratis, that's perfect, but are different to the softwares that are free in the two senses of the word. There are another things to take in count, the free software made by the GNU allows you to reuse your sources but this will convert your program in another free software, so be carefull and think if that is what you are looking for. Other softwares doesn't impose that, a good example is the djgpp development package; even when this package is totally free the executables generated can be used for comercial purposes.
Well, here is a list of usefull things that are FREE or just GRATIS. If you want to add some thing to the list just send me an e-mail
DOS systems:
OpenDOS (now DR-DOS again): Caldera bought the Novell DOS 7.0 and after some adjusts released it as GRATIS software for non-comercial purposes, the enterprise promess to release the sources as soon they finish killing some bugs in the original code. Now the code program is distributed by Lineo the embedded section of Caldera. Visit Lineo for more information.
DOS-C: That's a DOS clone codified in C, there is a companion book about it: "Cloning DOS in C, The DOS-C Project" to be published by Miller Freeman of Lawrence, Kansas (USA). This book will include the sources of this DOS. Until now is under developing but you can take a look at it and your sources. DOS-C is available through the FreeDOS project. An ftp site is available for downloading Free-DOS at any sunsite mirror.
UNIX systems:
GNU/Linux: That's an amazing UNIX clone, is much better than the major part of the comercial UNIX of nowadays. The kernel of this OS was created by Linus Torvalds (FI) and uses the GNU tools (compilers, file utils, text utils, etc.). You can find the Linux kernel in any sunsite mirror, but are huge, so perhaps is better is you get any of the CD distributions (Debian, RedHat, Slackware, SuSe, Mandrake, Stampede, etc).
FreeBSD: It's another UNIX clone, Home page. Was started by the Berkeley (CA) University. The main site is in the Walnut Creek machine; that of course is powered by FreeBSD (a Xeon of 500MHz, 4Gb of RAM, 1/2 Terabyte of disk connected to the net with 100 Mbps to support 5000 ftp users). PicoBSD is a distribution of BSD that fits in one 1.4Mb disk, look here for more information.
Other systems:
HURD: Is the GNU kernel for the GNU tools, so HURD is the GNU OS. The home page. Hurd is uses a micro-kernel architecture and there are versions based on Mach's micro-kernel.
Freedows '98: By now is just a project but it will have a kernel able to run Windows applications and other things, check the home page of this project.
AllOS: Allianse OS is another project based in the Stanford cache kernel model (as Freedows), looks like the idea is the same as Freedows but working faster to do it. Home page of this project.
C/C++:
GCC: Is the GNU C/C++ compiler. This compiler was designed to develope the GNU operating system but today your main use is as compiler for Linux and FreeBSD, these OSs are compiled by GCC. So if you need a FREE compiler for UNIX systems you can use it. GCC is one of the most powerfull compilers of the world and works in a lot of platforms (Intel, MIPS, Sparc, HP, RS, etc) over a lot of UNIXs (Linux, Irix, Solaris, HP/UX, AIX, etc). You can get it from any sunsite or from any simtelnet mirror. GCC can be used freelly but if you use part of the compiler code or the GNU's standard C library your code will be FREE too. All the GNU tools, including the DOS versions, are available in the Simtelnet mirrors.
GCC for DOS: Yes this great beast can be compiled and used under DOS, I use that for my programs, check out the djgpp page. DJGPP can produce comercial code because the C standard library isn't the GNU library, it's an adapted version of the BSD standard library. See the EMX too.
EMX: EMX is a port of GCC to OS/2, it can generate console and GUI OS/2 programs. In addition it can generate DOS executables but the number of tools and libraries available is inferior to djgpp. You can get EMX from: Stuttgart (Germany), Walnut Creek, US, Alternative or UK. Look for directories like emx09c or emx+gcc on these ftp sites. EMX can generate comercial code if you don't use the GNU libraries of the package. If you use the BSD libraries of the package (Curses, Databases, etc) you must add a copyright message to your program giving credits to the Berkeley (CA) University for these routines.
GCC for Win32: Cygnus is porting GCC to the Win32 enviroment, the project isn't finished and the generated code can't be used for commercial purposes.
MingW32: Originally based upon Cygnus, it is a free win32 compiler package that handles c++, c, stl, etc. You can find more informaion in this page.
GCC for DOS + Win32 extentions: Even when the Cygnus port is very good it doesn't allow to generate commercial code. So another option is to use DJGPP + RSXNTDJ. You can find more info in my links pages.
LCC: Is the retargetable compiler for ANSI C described in the book `A Retargetable C Compiler: Design and Implementation' (Addison-Wesley, 1995, ISBN 0-8053-1670-1). This compiler is supported by the Princeton University and is copyrighted by AT&T, the authors are Chris Fraser and David Hanson. The sources are FREE and you can use part of it with some limitations but without converting your code in FREE software. The install procedure is described in install. It generates code for Intel, Sparc and MIPS porcessors.
LCC for DOS: The DOS executable files are not included in the main distribution of the 3.6 version but in an old 3.5.
LCC for Win32: Jacob Navia ported LCC to Windows95/NT. The package contains a C (no C++ yet) compiler, an editor (WEdit) and a resource compiler, among other things. Home Page.
MICRO-C: Is a C compiler designed to generate code for microprocessors, a GRATIS version is available for PC's but it needs the Microsoft MASM and Linker :-P. You can find it in Simtel, the files are named mc*.zip.
Assembler:
GAS: That's the GNU assembler, you can find it in Linux and FreeBSD because GCC uses it to generate the binary files. In DOS you can find it in the djgpp package. This assembler generates files in formats that are compatible with the GNU linker (ld) so isn't so usefull if you don't use the full package. Another important thing is that it uses AT&T syntax instead of the Intel syntax on x86 machines.
NASM: Is the Netwide Assembler, it runs under Linux and DOS, generates a lot of formats (compatible with Microsoft and Borland compilers and with GCC) Intel syntax (not AT&T). The bad thing is the lack of a good system of macros and a good way to align the data. Supports MMX and PPro instructions. You can get it from: Sunsite (Linux) or Simtelnet (DOS). NASM is FREE and supports LCC and djgpp.
Star Office: is a replacement for the Microsoft Office for the Linux enviroment, is Commercial software, but free for non-commercial use. Price for commercial use not yet decided. Source code is not available. Can be found in Sunsite.
The JOLT project is aimed at providing a freely available and redistributble implementation of Sun's Java language and tools. It uses Guavac, is a stand alone compiler for the Java programming language (in GNU C++) and a free virtual machine that makes just in time compiling.
As you can see that's very oposite to the Microsoft policy. I hate this enterprise, here you can find more people that thinks that M$ is making the wrong thig:
The International Anti-Microsoft Network
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