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<title>AbiWord's Potential LG #43</title>
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<H4>
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"Linux Gazette...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I>"
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</H4>
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<P> <HR> <P>
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<center>
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<H1><font color="maroon">AbiWord's Potential</font></H1>
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<H4>By <a href="mailto:layers@marktwain.net">Larry Ayers</a></H4>
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<P> <HR> <P>
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<center><font color="maroon"><h3>Introduction</font></h3></center>
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<p>There is a tension in the Linux community between developers, who tend to
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be comfortable with their text editors and mark-up formatting systems, and
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users who want the sort of word processor common in the Mac and Windows
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worlds. This tension periodically sparks discussions in newsgroups and
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mailing lists, but an Open Source project has yet to produce a finished, fully
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usable word processor. The release of GPLed source last year for the Maxwell
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word processor failed to draw enough programmer interest to result in an
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ongoing and dynamic project to complete the program, possibly because of
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Maxwell's reliance on the Motif widget set.
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<p>Of course the commercial products StarOffice, WordPerfect and Applix Words
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are available for Linux. These are large applications; I'm under the
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impression that many users desire something quick to load and less complex, a
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word processor suitable for formatted business letters and other shorter
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documents. Another factor mitigating against the above commercial
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applications is the lack of community involvement. I've noticed that
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closed-source applications don't seem to generate mailing list and newsgroup
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postings as readily as do various free software projects. I rarely write
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directly to developers involved in the various free software projects I
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follow, but I know who they are and if the need happened to arise I
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wouldn't hesitate to make contact. Free software projects typically attract a
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secondary level of co-developers and skilled users who often frequent the
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various net forums answering questions and providing assistance.
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<p>It has been suggested that writing a good word processor is such a
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difficult task that it is beyond the capabilities of an Open Source
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development process. More likely, I think, is that a large enough group of
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programmers ardently desiring such an application just hasn't ever coalesced.
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Perhaps this sort of project is suited for a hybrid approach, one involving
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both a commercial firm and independent free-software programmers. AbiSource,
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Inc. is giving this idea a try.
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<center><font color="maroon"><h3>AbiWord So Far</h3></font></center>
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<p>Is it possible for an ambitious Open Source project to thrive and produce useful
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results under the sponsorship of a for-profit corporation? The Mozilla
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project is one such undertaking. After over a year of source availability much
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has been accomplished but the current binary releases, while intriguing,
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aren't yet as usable as the current releases of Netscape Communicator. The
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bulk of the new code still seems to be primarily coming from paid Netscape
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programmers. This might indicate that free software programmers prefer
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working on projects which aren't under a corporate aegis; another possible
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reason is the sheer size and complexity of the Mozilla code-base. Many
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programmers might lack the time and/or skill to comprehend such a project, and
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starting from scratch with a relatively new widget-set (GTK) must further
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increase the difficulty.
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<p>The programmers who started AbiSource, Inc. don't seem to be daunted by the
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dearth of efforts to mix business with Open Source from the very beginning of
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a project. Mozilla already had a massive source tree when its development was
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opened to the outside world last year, while Eric Allman's Sendmail business
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followed years of non-profit and open development; Eric had written a proven and
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widely-used piece of software before he formed a company to provide service
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for corporate users of Sendmail.
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<p>It should be kept in mind that these are still early days in the
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intersection of the free software and business worlds. Another year or so of
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experimentation with the various trials and ventures ought to make evident which
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approaches have managed to make money without driving away the developers and
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users in the free software community. AbiSource is a new company gambling
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that its ideas will prove viable and useful.
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<p>AbiSource's goal is to provide basic Open Source business applications for
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Linux, Windows, and BeOS users. Their idea is to give their applications away
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and charge for service and customization. Abi's first product is a GTK-based
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word processor, AbiWord. Outside programming help is welcomed and all of the
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usual paraphernalia of an Open Source project, such as mailing lists, CVS
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servers, and bug-reporting mechanisms, are available from the AbiSource
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web-page,
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<a href="http://www.abisource.com">http://www.abisource.com</a>.
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The number of non-Abi volunteer programmers contributing code isn't
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mentioned on the site, but I believe that the completion of the BeOS port
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was largely due to outside Be programmers.
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<p>It's interesting that while the source code is under the GPL and thus freely
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available and modifiable, the names AbiSource and AbiWord are copyrighted.
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This is intended to protect whatever reputation and name-recognition the
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company might gain if their services become popular.
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<p>The most significant difference between AbiWord and nearly every other
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word processor available is the nature of the native file format. An *.abw file is
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written in XML and thus is also in ASCII format; the files can be read by any
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text editor. This is quite a break with word processor tradition and ensures
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that when you write a document with AbiWord you don't run the risk of being
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strictly tied to one particular word processor, which may not even run on
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machines five years from now. AbiWord can also save in the HTML and RTF
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formats, both of which are accessible with word processors such as MS-Word and
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WordPerfect. Due to limitations of HTML and RTF some formatting
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information is lost (such as the specific fonts used), but attributes such as bold
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and italic font styles and tab-settings are retained. If XML really does
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become a widely-used and open data-format (as its proponents predict)
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AbiSource might be in a good position to gain users and clients.
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<p>Many Linux users would like to be able to read MS-Word files with a Linux
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word processor. StarOffice, Applix Words, and WordPerfect all come with
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filters for the ubiquitous format; these filters usually work well with simple
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documents but more complex documents with embedded macro routines are another
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matter. AbiSource has chosen to avoid this particular can of worms; the RTF
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support should ensure that simply formatted files can be exchanged with Word
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users.
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<p>Linux users and developers in academia, with its strong unix traditions,
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have less of a need to be able to deal with MS-Word files than do the growing
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numbers of users coming to Linux from the "real" world, the larger
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world of commerce and corporations. Until the nearly universal usage of the
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MS-Word format for even the simplest documents begins to decline, alternative
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word processors will have to struggle to gain market-share. The fact that
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AbiWord is free should be of some help, though there still exists a common
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idea that free software is somehow suspect.
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<p>With the release of 0.7 (and most recently 0.7.1) AbiSource began to make
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binaries freely available on their web-site and have even pressed CDs which
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are available at a nominal price. This would seem to indicate that the program has
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reached a state of usability. I've been trying out the latest release;
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it's serviceable but basic and seems to be stable. I've not had it crash
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once. Few of the paragraph and document formatting functions have been
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enabled at this point, but font-changes and tab-settings work well. Zooming
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(enlarging the apparent size of the document on the screen) is enabled. The
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fonts can be changed either from a drop-down selector or with the spiffy GTK
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font-selector dialog-box. Here is a screenshot of version 0.7.1:
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<p><img alt="AbiWord window" src="gx/ayers/abi.gif" width=690 height=631>
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<p>Looks like a normal word processor, doesn't it? Notice the red squiggly
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lines beneath certain words; this is supposed to indicate misspelled words. I
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have yet to find a way to turn it off. AbiWord comes with its own dictionary,
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but there doesn't yet seem to be a way to spell-check a document. Many of the
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menu-items are non-functional. Clicking on one of these summons a message-box
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stating that "the [function] dialog hasn't been implemented yet"
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followed by a pointer to lines in the source file which need the work, a
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thoughtful hint to a prospective code contributor.
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<p>If you give AbiWord a try, create a new file with a few lines of content,
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save it, then examine the resultant <b>*.abw</b> file with a text editor. Your
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content will be readable in this file, with surrounding XML tags indicating
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formatting specifications. As an example, here is the last line of the file
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used in the above screenshot:
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<p>
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<pre><code><p props="line-height:1.5; margin-right:1.8125in">
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<c props="font-family:Century Schoolbook; font-size:14pt; font-style:normal;
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font-weight:normal">Variable line-spacing is now working. This is set now for
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one and one-half rather than single-spacing.</c></p>
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</code></pre>
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<p>As you can see, the formatting tagging is comprehensible and could even be
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modified "by hand", in an editor rather than in the
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word processor. The actual content is accessible, a welcome difference from
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the usual binary word processor format in which the content is immersed in a
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sea of unreadable binary symbols.
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<p>The source distribution contains some interesting examples of
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<b>*.abw</b> files but these files were omitted from the binary packages.
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<p>In the Linux version, and I assume in the Windows and BeOS versions as
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well, printing is handled by the existing print system. On my system the file
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seems to be converted to Postscript format, then is passed to Ghostscript for
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processing by my print filter. AbiWord uses standard Postscript Type 1 fonts,
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but for some reason they need to be located in an Abi-specific directory.
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Several standard fonts are supplied with AbiWord, but more can be added as
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long as both the <b>*.afm</b> and the <b>*.pfa</b> files are supplied for each
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font. As in standard X Windows font installation, the index file
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<kbd>fonts.dir</kbd> must be updated as well.
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<hr>
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<center><font color="maroon"><h3>Conclusion</h3></font></center>
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<p>In its current state AbiWord is useful for writing short, simply formatted
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documents, but lack of paragraph and document formatting templates, as well as
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the lack of functional image insertion, limit its scope. It seems to me that
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AbiSource has developed the base structure of the word processor solidly, and
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the hooks for completion of the feature-set are in place in skeletal form and
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just need to be fleshed out. The decision to use an XML file format should
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appeal to users who would like to use something other than the exclusive
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binary file-formats of typical word processors. Whether AbiSource will be
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able to keep the development process alive until revenue is generated remains
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to be seen, but at least the source code will remain available should they fail.
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<!--===================================================================-->
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<P> <hr> <P>
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<center><H5>Copyright © 1999, Larry Ayers<BR>
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Published in Issue 43 of <i>Linux Gazette</i>, July 1999</H5></center>
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