[Techtalk] neat project, where to start?

[Dan Richter]

>My friend gave me this neat fractal program he wrote a few years back.
>According to him, it's a decent fractal program, and he would like more
>to be done with it (although he does not want to continue working on it
>himself.) It's programmed in C/C++, uses the Allegro graphics library,
>and runs in DOS.  I have both the DOS executable and the source code.
>   What I want to do with it is the following:
>
>*license it under the GPL

If you license the program under the GPL, you should read the full GPL:
    http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html
It's not long or boring, but you should read it to make sure you are 
technically in compliance with it. For example, according to the license, 
you cannot just say "this is GPL'd"; you have to include a copy of the 
license with the program.

Practical advice is provided on the bottom of the same page:
    http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html#SEC4

>*use the OpenGL graphics library instead.

OpenGL is intended for 3D graphics. Fractals are generally 2D, so you 
should consider whether you want to use OpenGL for the graphics. If you do, 
you might want to look into Mesa, which is a free (libre) OpenGL 
distribution for Linux.

One advantage to OpenGL is that it's well known and there are several 
references on the Internet. A quick look through Google reveals these:
   http://www.eecs.tulane.edu/www/graphics/doc/OpenGL-Man-Pages/index.html
   http://www.cevis.uni-bremen.de/~uwe/opengl/opengl.html
If you're just getting started with OpenGL, I can help you out. But I don't 
have a working OpenGL environment at the moment, so I can't help you with 
anything complicated.

========== Dan Richter ============== mailto:Dan at wimba.com ===========
  People in my area called and said, "How can you support [GATT] when
  you haven't read it?" They assume I haven't read it. They're right,
  of course - but I resent a little that they assume I haven't read it.
       - U.S. Senator Robert Bennet (R-Utah)

_______________________________________________
Techtalk mailing list
Techtalk at linuxchix.org
http://mailman.linuxchix.org/mailman/listinfo/techtalk