Bent Nagstrup (nagstrup at biobase.dk) wrote:
: Is the gcg-package freeware? Otherwise it might not be so cool...
The GCG package is *NOT* freeware. If you mount any copy you must have a
license. It might be possible, convincing arguments provided, that license
agreements can be made with the company to accomodate this special situation
(This is plain speculation, and usual disclaimers apply; I don't work for
them etc.)
: And, anyway the gcg programs are not worth so much without all the gigabytes
: of databases and very fast cpu's, so I really don't think it would be worth
: the bother to spend some months porting gcg to your '486sx with a 420 MB
: harddrive :)
Disks are getting cheap these days. Missing disk space will only matter
if you use non-SCSI hardware. CPU's are another issue but you can bare with a
PC-type of performance if it is for single user entities - You might wait
for a day or two but you'll make it.
: But please don't let that stop you: I also use Linux at home and I also
: think it's a neat idea, but maybe not practically possible...
Another approach will be to use Solaris on the PC, and then (theoretically)
it should work. However, question being, what do you gain? The software will
continue to evolve and, unless you can convince the provider that they support
your 'port', it will be a looser at the first problem or update you
encounter. Do not forget that Fortran on Linux is still fairly young and
GCG uses F77 at least partially to some extent. Linux is a good system if
you use software which is either supported or made specifically for Linux.
Given the restricted computational power, I would suggest a low-end
workstation (for academics , 15k$ should be enough for a 'single
user' 8GBytedisk/64MByte memory box) and this gets you the clean and smooth
access to software which is supported, for no porting cost. You want do
do it yourself, still? Consider your rating of personpower which you would
apply if you want to get hired by someone. Experience provided, at least
$200 per hour is the rate for good specialists. In only 100 hours you'll
have assembled your workstation - that is less than half a year if you spent
two hours of your free time each day (Sixpacks and coffee not counted).
regards
Reinhard
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