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Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!munnari.oz.au!news.Hawaii.Edu!ames!agate!spool.mu.edu!caen!usenet.coe.montana.edu!grapevine.lcs.mit.edu!kaleb From: kaleb@expo.lcs.mit.edu (Kaleb Keithley) Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.questions Subject: Re: mwm for XFree86 2.0 ...exists?? Date: 22 Nov 93 09:58:59 GMT Organization: X Consortium Lines: 42 Distribution: world Message-ID: <kaleb.753962339@kanga.x.org> References: <2cpjrr$ftg@nwfocus.wa.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: kanga.x.org daniel@halcyon.com (Daniel Jordan) writes: > hello, i looked at freebsd.cdrom.com for a port of this window manager, but >didn't see it, is it someplace else? No, and the likelihood is that you never will. The Motif window manager, like the rest of Motif is a proprietary product. There is at least one company that sells Motif, including the window manager. They're in Italy. Don't ask me, I don't know their address. Perhaps there are others. The problem with Motif on *BSD (and Linux too) is this. XFree86 is R5 based. Nominally that means you need Motif 1.2.x. The 1.2.x source license for the purpose of selling Motif binaries/libraries is US$ 15,000. I have contemplated this before. Suppose I offered that if 300 people were to send me US$ 90 ($50 to cover the cost of the license, $40 to OSF for the per CPU Motif runtime license.) that I would acquire the license and deliver the libraries and binaries. The problem with this is that to be done properly, the Motif validation test suite should be run on the resulting binaaries. You might say that you don't care, but others might, and in order to be sold as "Motif" it has to have the test suite run on it. I don't have enough room on my disk, so I'd have to go buy a bigger disk and a QIC tape drive. Then there's the issue of time and effort to a) acquire the license, b) build, c) test, d) distribute, and lastly e) maintain all the paperwork required by OSF. I've got better things to do with my time (like writing an R6 server ddx for FreeBSD. Sorry, the XFree86 server ddx just isn't a good fit with R6) so it would have to be worth my while to undertake such a project. Just as a WAG, I'd need another 150 people willing to spend US$ 90 to cover the capital outlay required, including a business license, a tax ID, a bank account, and the services of an accountant. Are there 450 people out there who'd be willing to pay US$ 90 to get Motif? I don't know. (If 450 people fill my mailbox telling me yes, then I'll consider asking them to back up their interest with a check (cheque) for US$ 90. :-) ) -- Kaleb Keithley