@setfilename tasks.info
@settitle GNU Task List
@c UPDATE THIS DATE WHENEVER YOU MAKE CHANGES!
-@set lastupdate 10 November 1994
+@set lastupdate 16 September 1997
@c %**end of header
@setchapternewpage off
@end titlepage
@ifinfo
-@node Top, Documentation, (dir), (dir)
+@node Top, Intro, (dir), (dir)
@top GNU Task List
This file is updated automatically from @file{tasks.texi}, which was
last updated on @value{lastupdate}.
@end ifinfo
-Check with @code{gnu@@prep.ai.mit.edu}, for a possibly more current copy.
-This task list is not exclusive; any other useful program might be a
-good project---but it might instead be something we already have, so
-check with @code{gnu@@prep} before you start writing it.
-
@menu
-* Documentation::
-* Unix-Related Projects::
-* Kernel Projects::
+* Intro::
+* Highest Priority::
+* Documentation::
+* Unix-Related Projects::
+* Kernel Projects::
* Extensions::
-* X Windows Projects::
-* Other Projects::
+* X Windows Projects::
+* Encryption Projects::
+* Other Projects::
* Compilers::
-* Games and Recreations::
+* Games and Recreations::
@end menu
+@node Intro
+@chapter About the GNU Task List
+
+If you did not obtain this file directly from the GNU project and
+recently, please check for a newer version. You can ftp the task list
+from any GNU FTP host in directory @file{/pub/gnu/tasks/}. The task
+list is available there in several different formats: @file{tasks.text},
+@file{tasks.texi}, @file{tasks.info}, and @file{tasks.dvi}. The GNU
+HURD task list is also there in file @file{tasks.hurd}.
+@c to fix an overfill, join the paragraphs -len
+The task list is also available on the GNU World Wide Web server:
+@url{http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/prep/tasks_toc.html}.
+
If you start working steadily on a project, please let @code{gnu@@prep}
know. We might have information that could help you; we'd also like to
send you the GNU coding standards.
-Because of the natural tendency for most volunteers to write
-programming tools or programming languages, we have a comparative
-shortage of applications useful for non-programmer users. Therefore,
-we ask you to consider writing such a program.
+Because of the natural tendency for most volunteers to write programming
+tools or programming languages, we have a comparative shortage of
+applications useful for non-programmer users. Therefore, we ask you to
+consider writing such a program.
+
+Typically, a new program that does a completely new job advances
+the GNU project, and the free software community, more than an
+improvement to an existing program.
+
+Typically, new features or new programs advance the free software
+community more, in the long run, than porting existing programs. One
+reason is that portable new features and programs benefit people on many
+platforms, not just one. At the same time, there tend to be many
+volunteers for porting---so your help will be more valuable in other
+areas, where volunteers are more scarce.
+
+Typically, it is more useful to extend a program in functionality than
+to improve performance. Users who use the new functionality will
+appreciate it very much, if they use it; but even when they benefit from
+a performance improvement, they may not consider it very important.
+
+@node Highest Priority
+@chapter Highest Priority
+
+This task list mentions a large number of tasks that would be more or
+less useful. With luck, at least one of them will inspire you to start
+writing. It's better for you to work on any task that inspires you than
+not write free software at all.
+
+But if you would like to work on what we need most, here is a list of
+high priority projects.
+
+@itemize @bullet
+@item
+If you are good at writing documentation, please do that.
+
+@item
+If you are very good at C programming and interested in kernels, you can
+help develop the GNU HURD, the kernel for the GNU system. Please have a
+look at @url{http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/software/hurd/hurd.html}, and
+then get a copy of the latest HURD task list from:
+
+@itemize @bullet
+
+@item
+@url{http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu/prep/tasks.hurd.html}, via the World Wide
+Web.
+
+@item
+@url{ftp://prep.ai.mit.edu/pub/gnu/tasks/tasks.hurd}, via anonymous FTP.
+
+@item
+@email{gnu@@prep.ai.mit.edu} via e-mail.
+
+@end itemize
+
+@item
+If you are a Scheme fan, you can help develop Guile. Please have a look
+at the URL @url{http://www.gnu.ai.mit.edu:/software/guile/guile.html}
+and then contact @email{guile@@gnu.ai.mit.edu}.
+
+@item
+Help develop the GNU web browser, E-scape.
+
+@item
+Help develop Windows NT emulation for GNU systems---for example, WINE.
+
+@item
+Implement the Kermit data transfer protocol. (See below.)
+
+@item
+Develop a free compatible replacement for Qt, a GUI toolkit library. Qt
+is not free software, because users are prohibited from distributing
+modified versions. Thus, Qt cannot be included in a free operating
+system (adding it would make the system as a whole non-free).
+
+But some developers are writing free applications that use Qt and cannot
+run without it. These programs, although free software, are useless for
+free operating systems because there is no way to make them run.
-In general, a new program that does a completely new job advances the
-GNU project more than an improvement to an existing program.
+This is leading to a serious problem, and a free replacement for Qt is
+the only solution. Hence the high degree of urgency of this project.
+
+@item
+Develop a substitute, which runs on GNU systems, for some very popular
+or very important application that many non-programmers use on Windows,
+and which has no comparable free equivalent now.
+@end itemize
@node Documentation
@chapter Documentation
@itemize @bullet
@item
-Completion of the documentation for CC-mode, a new C/C++ mode for
-Emacs Lisp.
-
-@item
-A C reference manual. (RMS has written half of one which you could
-start with).
+A C reference manual. (RMS made a try at one, which you could start
+with).
@item
A manual for Ghostscript.
-@c
-@c @item
-@c A manual for CSH.
-@c Ick, do we want to encourage using THAT? -djm
@item
-A manual for PIC (the graphics formatting language).
+A manual for TCSH.
@item
-A manual for Perl. (The books that exist are not free, and
-thus not available to be part of the GNU system.)
+A manual for PIC (the graphics formatting language).
@item
A manual for Oleo.
Manuals for various X window managers.
@item
-Reference cards for those manuals that don't have them: Gawk, C
-Compiler, Make, Texinfo, Termcap and maybe the C Library.
+Reference cards for those manuals that don't have them: C
+Compiler, Make, Texinfo, Termcap, and maybe the C Library.
@item
-Many utilities need documentation, including @code{grep}, @code{cpio},
-and other small utilities.
+Many utilities need documentation, including @code{grep} and others.
@end itemize
@node Unix-Related Projects
@chapter Unix-Related Projects
@itemize @bullet
-@item
-We could use an emulation of Unix @code{spell}, which would run by
-invoking @code{ispell}.
-
-@item
-Less urgent: @code{diction}, @code{explain}, @code{style}.
-
@item
An improved version of the POSIX utility @code{pax}. There is one on
-the Usenet, but it is said to be poorly written. Talk with
-@code{mib@@gnu.ai.mit.edu} about this project.
+Usenet, but it is said to be poorly written. Talk with
+@code{thomas@@gnu.ai.mit.edu} about this project.
@ignore
@item
@item
An emulation of SCCS that works using RCS.
+
+@item
+Less urgent: @code{diction}, @code{explain}, and @code{style}, or
+something to do the same kind of job. Compatibility with Unix is not
+especially important for these programs.
@end itemize
@node Kernel Projects
@item
A shared memory X11 server to run under MACH is very desirable. The
machine specific parts should be kept well separated.
+
+@item
+An implementation of CIFS, the ``Common Internet File System,'' for the
+HURD. This protocol is an offshoot of SMB.
@end itemize
@node Extensions
distribution.
@item
-GNU @code{sed} probably needs to be rewritten completely just to make it
-cleaner.
+Interface GDB to Guile, so that users can write debugging commands in
+Scheme. This would also make it possible to write, in Scheme, a
+graphical interface that uses Tk and is tightly integrated into GDB.
+
+@item
+Rewrite GNU @code{sed} completely, to make it cleaner.
+
+@item
+Rewrite Automake and Deja-GNU in Scheme, so they can run in Guile.
+Right now they are written in Perl and TCL, respectively. There are
+also other programs, not terribly long, which we would also like
+to have rewritten in Scheme.
+
+@item
+Finish the partially-implemented C interpreter project.
+
+@item
+Help with the development of GNUStep, a GNU implementation of the
+OpenStep specification.
@item
Add features to GNU Make to record the precise rule with which each file
An emulator for Macintosh graphics calls on top of X Windows.
@item
-A music playing and editing system.
+A music playing and editing system. This should work with LilyPond, a
+free program for music typesetting.
@item
A program to edit dance notation (such as labanotation) and display
Port the Vibrant toolkit to work on X without using Motif.
@item
-A library for displaying circle-shaped menus with X windows.
+A program to display and edit Hypercard stacks.
@item
-A program to display and edit Hypercard stacks.
+A paint program, supporting both bitmap-oriented operations and
+component-oriented operations. @code{xpaint} exists, but isn't very
+usable.
@item
-An interface-builder program to make it easy to design graphical
-interfaces for applications. This could work with the dynamic linker
-DLD and C++, loading in the same class definitions that will be used
-by the application program.
+A vector-based drawing program in the spirit of Adobe Illustrator
+and Corel Draw.
@item
-A desktop program with icons and such, for X-windows.
+An interactive 3D modeling utility with rendering/raytracing capabilities.
@item
-A paint program, supporting both bitmap-oriented operations and
-component-oriented operations. @code{xpaint} exists, but isn't very
-usable.
+A program for graphic morphing of scanned photographs.
+@end itemize
+
+@node Encryption Projects
+@chapter Encryption Projects
+
+These projects need to be written outside the US by people who are not
+US citizens, to avoid problems with US export control law.
+
+@itemize @bullet
+@item
+A free library for public-key encryption.
+
+This library should use the Diffie-Helman algorithm for public key
+encryption, not the RSA algorithm, because the Diffie-Helman patent in
+the US will expire in 1997.
+
+@item
+A free program for sended encrypted mail using public-key encryption.
+
+This program should use the library described above for the public-key
+encryption. It should use triple-DES, not IDEA, for block encryption,
+because IDEA is patented in many countries and the patents will not
+expire soon.
+
+In other respects, it should be like PGP. If the new version of PGP
+no longer uses RSA and IDEA, compatibility with it may be feasible.
+
+There is a suggestion that the Blowfish algorithm might be a good choice
+for the non-public-key block encryption. I'm not an encryption expert
+so I don't have an opinion about that.
+
+Many people believe that PGP is free software, but that is not actually
+true. The distribution terms do not allow everyone to use and
+redistribute it. We used to think that these restrictions had been
+imposed by the patent holders for the RSA and IDEA algorithms, and that
+PGP could be free software if these algorithms were replaced by
+alternatives. But we have since learned that the owners of PGP are
+themselves unwilling to make it free software. Writing a new program is
+the only way to get free software for this job.
+
+@item
+A free secure telnet program more or less like ssh/sshd. Since this
+requires a public key encryption algorithm, it is closely related to the
+preceding item.
+
+This program should follow the draft standard for ssh. As always, it
+cannot implement the RSA algorithm, but must instead support the
+alternatives that will be patent-free in late 1997. It cannot support
+IDEA, but can use triple-DES and/or Blowfish or other non-patented
+alternatives.
+
+@item
+Free software for doing secure commercial transactions on the web.
+This too needs public key encryption.
@end itemize
@node Other Projects
@itemize @bullet
@item
-[This seems to be being done:]
-A program to convert Postscript to plain ASCII text. Ghostscript will
-soon have a mode to output all the text strings in a document, each with
-its coordinates. You could write a program to start with this output
-and ``layout the page'' in ASCII. The program will be both easier and
-more useful if you don't worry pedantically about how the output text
-should be formatted. Instead, try to make it look reasonable as plain
-ASCII.
-
-@item
-A program to convert compiled programs represented in OSF ANDF
-(``Architecture Neutral Distribution Format'') into ANSI C.
+A free program that can transfer files on a serial line
+using the same protocol that Kermit uses.
@item
An imitation of Page Maker or Ventura Publisher.
@item
An imitation of @code{dbase2} or @code{dbase3} (How dbased!)
-@item
-A program to reformat Fortran programs in a way that is pretty.
-
@item
A bulletin board system. There are a few free ones, but they don't have
all the features that people want in such systems. It would make sense
to start with an existing one and add the other features.
@item
-A general ledger program.
+A general ledger program, including support for accounts payable,
+account receivables, payroll, inventory control, order processing, etc.
@item
-A single command language that could be suitable for use in a shell, in
-GDB for programming debugging commands, in a program like @code{awk}, in
-a calculator like @code{bc}, and so on. The fact that all these
-programs are similar but different in peculiar details is a great source
-of confusion. We are stuck with maintaining compatibility with Unix in
-our shell, @code{awk}, and @code{bc}, but nothing prevents us from
-having alternative programs using our new, uniform language. This would
-make GNU far better for new users. Talk with @code{lord@@cygnus.com} if
-you are interested in this project.
+A teleconferencing program which does the job of CU-SeeMe (which is,
+alas, not free software).
@item
A program to typeset C code for printing.
-For ideas on what to do, see the forthcoming book,
+For ideas on what to do, see the book,
@display
Human Factors and Typography for More Readable Programs,
(I don't quite agree with a few of the details they propose.)
+@item
+A program to convert Microsoft Word documents to text/enriched, TeX,
+LaTeX, Texinfo, or some other format that free software can edit.
+
+@item
+A free replacement for the semi-free Qt library.
+
+@item
+High-quality music compression software.
+(Talk with phr@@netcom.com for relevant suggestions.)
+
+@item
+A program to play sound distributed in ``Real Audio'' format.
+
+@item
+A program to generate ``Real Audio'' format from audio input.
+
+@ignore @c Software patents have made this domain off limits to free software.
+@item
+An MPEG III audio encoder/decoder (but it is necessary to check, first,
+whether patents make this impossible).
+@end ignore
+
@item
Speech-generation programs (there is a program from Brown U that you
could improve).
@item
-Speech-recognition programs (single-speaker, disconnected speech).
+Speech-recognition programs (single-speaker, disconnected speech is sufficient).
@item
-Scientific mathematical subroutines, including clones of SPSS.
+More scientific mathematical subroutines.
+(A clone of SPSS is being written already.)
@item
Statistical tools.
+@item
+A scientific data collection and processing tool,
+perhaps something like Scientific Workbench and/or Khoros,
+
@item
Software to replace card catalogues in libraries.
@item
-Grammar and style checking programs.
+A project-scheduling package that accepts a list of project sub-tasks
+with their interdependencies, and generates Gantt charts and Pert charts
+and all the other standard project progress reports.
@item
-An implementation of the S language (an interpreted languages used for
-statistics).
+Grammar and style checking programs.
@item
A translator from Scheme to C.
@item
-Optical character recognition programs; especially if suitable for
-scanning documents with multiple fonts and capturing font info as well
-as character codes. This may not be very difficult if you let it
-@emph{train} on part of the individual document to be scanned, so as to
-learn what fonts are in use in that document. We would particularly
-like to scan the Century Dictionary, an unabridged dictionary now in the
-public domain.
+A fast emulator for the i386 which works by translating
+machine instructions into the machine language of the host machine.
+(Support for emulation of other machines would enhance the program
+but might make it much more difficult.)
-You don't need scanning hardware to work on OCR. We can send you
-bitmaps you can use as test data.
+@item
+A map display or geographic information system.
-We may soon have an OCR program, but it will need lots of additional work.
+@item
+Optical character recognition programs; especially if suitable for
+scanning documents with multiple fonts and capturing font info as well
+as character codes. Work is being done on this, but more help is needed.
@item
A program to scan a line drawing and convert it to Postscript.
@item
A pen based interface.
-@item
-Software suitable for creating virtual reality user interfaces.
-
@item
CAD software, such as a vague imitation of Autocad.
@item
-Software for displaying molecules.
-
-@item
-Software for comparing DNA sequences, and finding matches and
-alignments.
+A program to receive data from a serial-line tap to facilitate the
+reverse-engineering of communication protocols.
@end itemize
@node Compilers
@chapter Compilers for Other Batch Languages
Volunteers are needed to write parsers/front ends for languages such as
-Algol 60, Algol 68, PL/I, or whatever, to be used with the code
-generation phases of the GNU C compiler. (C++ and Objective C are done,
-and Ada, Fortran, Pascal and Modula are being worked on.)
+Algol 60, Algol 68, PL/I, Cobol, Fortran 90, Eiffel, or whatever, to be
+used with the code generation phases of the GNU C compiler.
+
+@c Fortran status is here so gnu@prep and the volunteer coordinators
+@c don't have to answer the question -len
+You can get the status of the Fortran front end with this command:
+
+@example
+finger -l fortran@@gnu.ai.mit.edu
+@end example
@node Games and Recreations
@chapter Games and Recreations
+Video-oriented games that work with the X window system.
+
@itemize @bullet
@item
-Video-oriented games should work with the X window system.
+Empire (there is a free version but it needs upgrading)
@item
-Empire (there is a free version but it needs upgrading)
+An ``empire builder'' system that makes it easy to write various kinds of
+simulation games.
@item
-Imitations of popular video games:
+Improve GnuGo, which is not yet very sophisticated.
+
+@item
+Write imitations of some popular video game:
@itemize -
@item
@item
Defending cities from missiles.
@item
-Plane shoots at lots of other planes.
+Plane shoots at lots of other planes, tanks, etc.
@item
Wizard fights fanciful monster.
@item
Program a robot by sticking building blocks together,
then watch it explore a world.
@item
-Biomorph evolution (as in Scientific American).
+Biomorph evolution (as in Scientific American and @cite{The Blind
+Watchmaker}).
@item
A program to display effects of moving at relativistic speeds.
@end itemize
-
-@item
-Intriguing screen-saver programs to make interesting pictures.
-Other such programs that are simply entertaining to watch.
-For example, an aquarium.
@end itemize
We do not need @code{rogue}, as we have @code{hack}.
HCoop / bpt / emacs.git / blobdiff