con:0/0/640/200/ICPUG & THE AMIGA LIBRARY THE INDEPENDENT COMMODORE PRODUCTS USERS GROUP ---------------------------------------------- The only recognised Users' group for Commodore products in the UK, ICPUG can offer many advantages for the Commodore user: ° Over 70 local groups with regular meetings ° Superb newsletter - 80+ pages every two months ° Free software library for nearly every Commodore machine ° Help and advice ° Wide ranging discount scheme 1986/7 UK subscription is £10, although overseas members have different subscriptions which reflect different postal rates. For details, please send a stamped & addressed envelope to the Membership Secretary: Jack Cohen, 30, Brancaster Road, Newbury Park, ILFORD Essex IG2 7EP || THE ICPUG AMIGA LIBRARY ----------------------- There is a range of freely distributable software for the AMIGA, and ICPUG has collected, checked and sorted the items from a range of sources. The principle one being the so-called FISH disks, a collection of programs collected and checked by Fred Fish, from California. This has led the ICPUG library to be nick-named "Filleted Fish". There are other sources of such software, including databases such as Compuserve, DELPHI and BIX in the USA and Compunet and PRESTEL in the UK. Software companies may also release disks with demonstrations or documentation and, of course, ICPUG members may contribute. In general, most of the material in the ICPUG library is "public domain" (that is, copyright has been waived to allow free distribution or modification of the software) - however, many authors retain copyright on their creations, although they are happy for them to be freely distributed PROVIDED that the copyright notices are preserved. || As a matter of policy, only items known to be freely distributable are included in the library. This will be the case if they: contain explicit copyright notices permitting redistribution. contain an explicit notice placing them in the public domain. were posted to a publically accessable bulletin board and did not contain any copyright notice. were posted to a widely disseminated electronic network, thus implying their author/poster intended them to be freely distributed but only if they contain no notice limiting distribution. have been provided by the author or distributor with written confirmation that they may be freely distributed. Any items subsequently discovered to have had copyright notices removed, or were provided outside these guidelines, will be removed immediately from the library. || ICPUG AMIGA LIBRARY - ORGANISATION As far as possible, applications/programs are contained in their own directories together with source code and documentation when available (in README, .DOC or POSTER files), with some disks having separate directories for different sub-categories. Executable programs may have .LATTICE or .MANX (or similar) suffixes to indicate the compiler used. All disks include library-related files, including this file (_about.ICPUG) _about.this.disk (details of files on the disk) plus s/startup-sequence devs/system-configuration and .info files. Apart from the "s" and "devs" directories, all these files begin with "_" (underscore) to separate them. Some programs are only executable from the Command Line Interface (CLI). This is usually done by typing the directory name followed by the program name. For instance, the program FILEZAP may be executed by the sequence: df1:filezap/filezap filename BASIC programs are generally restricted to AmigaBASIC (MicroSoft's BASIC for the Amiga) and these may be suffixed .MSB. || ICPUG AMIGA LIBRARY - ORGANISATION Library disks are divided into several broad categories, and disks will normally contain as detailed a collection of files as possible. However, a GENERAL category is used for those not interested in source code. As far as possible, these disks will be configured for running directly from WorkBench. Utilities disk, file, C, graphics, printer, system, general Text including text processing and formatters Audio digitised sounds, audio demos & speech programs Pictures hi- medium- & lo-res pictures (most in IFF format) Languages compilers & interpreters and associated utilities Recreation Entertainment, including games Examples programming examples in C, BASIC etc. Comms including terminal emulators & comms utilities Documents misc documentation files (generally fairly advanced) Demos misc demonstrations (use from WorkBench) Graphics variety of graphics programs Copies of the executable files should be put onto the user's own disks as it is NOT intended that the ICPUG library disk be used as a working disk. || The "about.this.disk" file (readable through WorkBench or CLI) contains details of the programs as in the following example from UTILITY_1: disk/DiskSalv/ by Dave Haynie (Fish 20) DiskSalv Makes a valiant attempt at copying a corrupted disk - recreates directories as required DiskSalv.c Source Code POSTER detailed documentation The first line contains the directory path to get at the file (in this case the files are in the DISKSALV subdirectory of DISK) - the author(s) names and the source of the software (in this case, Fish disk number 20). The executable file(s) are given first (with brief description), followed by the source files (of which there may be MANY!) and finally, details of the documentation provided. Occasionally, MAKE files are included, and these are intended for use with MAKE utilities during compilation. || ICPUG AMIGA LIBRARY Any contributions to the Amiga library are welcome. Please send them, with as much documentation (on disk!) as possible, and include source code where possible, details of how the program should be compiled and a statement of the status of the program as far as copyright is concerned. Address them to: Archie Clark, Peter Miles, 20 Middle Mead, OR The Queen Armes Hotel, Fareham, Charmouth, Hants PO14 3EG. Dorset DT6 6QF. Details of the complete ICPUG Amiga library and how to obtain copies of the disks can be obtained from the same address (include a stamped and addressed envelope please). The general rule is that up to five disks (they do not need to be formatted) should be sent to the appropriate librarian with return packaging and postage included. It is very difficult for ICPUG to answer detailled enquiries regarding the library disks - but we would welcome reports of serious problems that may be encountered with the software.