The "GNU Fortran Goodies" include T-shirts, mugs, certificates of appreciation, and notepads, all containing a logo I commissioned from a professional designer during late 1997.
These goodies were sent to contributors, and a few enthusiasts who we met at the 1999 Linux Expo, as a way of saying "thanks" for helping out.
I still have some of these "goodies" left, including certificates for the following people:
Michael L. Ross
Rick Lutowski
Mumit Khan
Richard Kenner
Bruce Faust
Wolfgang Dreyer
John Carr
Bill Broadley
Mary M. Cortani
If you're in the above list and would like me to send you your certificate and other stuff, or would like me to remove your name, please let me know!
I now have a slightly "off" version of the logo as a JPEG file on my home LAN, but haven't yet learned The GIMP well enough to figure out how to correct the problems. I'd like to put either the corrected version, or a newly rendered variant my own, up on this web site. I'd also like to offer it to the new The G95 project for use on their web site, if they're interested. (That they're using the "It's free crunch time" logo, which was part of the original design, suggests they will be at least interested, if not very enthusiastic!)
Here is the original announcement regarding the "goodies" sent out to thank contributors:
Subject: GNU Fortran (g77): Project "THANK YOU!!" 1998-05-10
This is a request for people who contributed to g77 prior to
January 1, 1998, and who I've not already thanked, to contact
me for their "thank-you" gifts. Details follow.
At the beginning of this year, I sent out certificates of appreciation
to 54 people who I could easily identify as being contributors to g77
(financial, equipment donors/lenders, and alpha testers) through
1997, and whose shipping addresses I could readily obtain.
Each certificate, which expresses appreciation for an individual's
contributions to GNU Fortran (g77), is signed by myself, and is
accompanied by a T-shirt and mug. All of these items have the
"GNU Fortran GNU" logo on them, a "specialty" illustration I
commissioned specifically for this project. (No, I didn't draw the
art myself; I wanted it to look good.)
The "GNU Fortran GNU" logo is a combination of a fairly unique
illustration of a GNU, with some rather interesting "grasses"
at its feet, and the following lines above and below the GNU:
GNU FORTRAN
It's free crunch time.
(This "motto" is not trade-marked, but it is my own personal creation,
intended for g77 users and enthusiasts to share and enjoy as a means
for identifying and promoting g77. I'd prefer it if people would not
use it for other purposes. Similarly, the art on the various pieces
is all effectively copyrighted, though not explicitly so; please do not
publish copies of it. I've purposely avoided the "legalistic" approaches
to these issues because I don't think they're appropriate for gifts.
If you want to make some use of the motto and/or art but you aren't
sure if I'd consider it appropriate, just send me e-mail or a letter
asking permission, and I'll get back to you.)
Now that almost all of the original 54 recipients have confirmed
receipt, and I've gotten out from under the most recent huge
work-load, it's time to try and find all those other people
who contributed to g77 through 1997 but, for whatever reason,
didn't get on the initial shipment list.
Did you contribute to g77 prior to 1998? Well, I think you did,
if, in that time frame, you did any of the following:
- Alpha-tested g77 (that is, tested releases before they were
released to the public, for beta testing; g77 is still in
beta testing, by the way, via a public release process)
- Reviewed the alpha-test version of g77 documentation, release
notes, and so on
- Donated equipment or money to someone for their work on the FSF
version of g77
- Loaned equipment to someone specifically for them to use while
working on the FSF version of g77
- Sent information on Fortran (77, 90, dialects) to g77 workers
to improve our ability to ensure proper support for various
features
- Persisted in reporting a number of bugs in g77, even if only
in the public (beta) versions
...and perhaps other things not listed above.
If you believe you contributed to g77 through 1997 as outlined
above, please answer the following questions via email:
1. Who are you and how have you helped with g77, etc.? (This is only
if you think it's at all possible I've lost track of who you are;
it should help to jog my memory, or at least give me some clue where
to look in my email archives.)
2. What is the spelling of your name as you'd prefer to see it on
your certificate?
3. What is your current (and expected through Summer 1998)
shipping address? (This needs to be a street address, not
a P.O. box, for shipping, especially outside the USA.)
4. What is your T-shirt size, with alternates in case I run
out of the desired size? I've got mostly XL, and that's what
I shipped by "default" to the original 54 recipients (after
all, it's hard to surprise people with a T-shirt *after* asking
for their sizes ;-), but I also have some M, L, and XXL in "stock".
5. Do you know anyone else who probably wouldn't see this announcement
but who should? If so, ideally, forward a copy to them yourself;
if appropriate, let me know who you think I should try to contact.
(A couple of people I've tried to contact have "disappeared" off the
Internet, and I can't find other ways to contact them that work,
so don't hesitate to contact those you might know via other
avenues and make sure they know about this g77 "thank-you" project.)
E-mail me at <burley at gnu.org> with answers to these questions.
These items -- the certificate, T-shirt, and mug -- are not for
sale. They are gifts I'm giving away. There is a finite
supply -- I have roughly 80 left -- but at this point I don't
have a good sense for whether that's more than enough, too
little, or about right. If it proves necessary, I can have
more made, but I have the feeling it'll be enough.
However, I'm quite sure I can't offer these items to everyone
who has helped *beta*-test g77, since that means basically every
g77 user out there, way more than 80 in any case. (Wish I
*could* do that, but I can't afford to.)
You might be wondering, why am I doing this -- going to all
this effort to send free stuff to people who helped with g77,
even though some people think the "biggest" help came from
me just writing it in the first place?
Well, for a long time now I've wanted to find a way to say "thanks" to
the whole g77 team, which consists primarily of alpha testers, but
also includes people who've contributed money and/or equipment
specifically for our work on g77. Coming up with some fun ideas
has not been a problem; coming up with affordable ones *has* been,
until mid-1996, when I began thinking about shipping an "attaboy"
package of some sort saying "thanks for your work on g77" to each
team member. (Actually I thought up the T-shirt idea first, later
added the mug, then realized the certificate would be a great way
to get people to send me their shipping addresses so I could send
them the T-shirt and mug as a surprise...which worked quite well, by
the way. So it didn't all come to me in mid-1996, but evolved over
a long period of time, like g77 itself.)
g77 itself seemed to have reached a noticeable, but hard-to-define, point
in its maturation process a few months ago, at which point it seemed
appropriate to finally take action on this idea. Sure, I'd like to
have waited until g77 was no longer "beta", but that seemed a *long*
way off. Supporting libU77; often exceeding f2c+gcc performance; having
a fairly complete documentation set; and perhaps becoming less "mine" and
more "everyone's" via the egcs project (see <http://www.cygnus.com/egcs>),
the upshot being that some longtime gcc developers are now working g77 in
the context of egcs; these are the mini-milestones g77 was reaching late
last year as the logo and design work were being completed, so it seemed
like the right time for me to say "thanks" to those of you who helped make
g77 a reality.
So, anyone helping out with g77 prior to near the end of 1997 clearly was
engaging in something of a labor of love, in my opinion! Since then, I
think it's finally just possible that some people help with g77 because
it actually does work very well for them as a Fortran compiler, though
it has a *long* way to go yet, and, besides, their help is appreciated
just as much even if it might be offered for more "practical" reasons.
Generally, I feel that the coders tend to get way too much credit for
the success of a software project, and now I can personally attest to
how true that is vis-a-vis g77, which so many people think I was somehow
entirely responsible for, but which I know is really the result of quite
a number of people really caring about making a "permanently free",
portable, optimizing FORTRAN 77 compiler a reality (and that's not even
taking into account all those people who worked on gcc, making its back
end better to benefit *all* languages supported by gcc; those working on
libf2c, the f2c run-time library from netlib; the developers of all those
GNU tools we've relied upon to do our work; the developers of Linux; and
so on).
So, it seems like my publicly thanking all those people this way,
aside from just being a fun thing to do, is a great way to meaningfully
say "producing good software isn't just about writing up some good code".
Hope this hasn't been *too* long and rambling, and look forward
to hearing from you!
tq vm, (burley)
Since the above announcement went out, my email address has changed, so please don't use the one given in the above notice!
Also, the wording above is a bit too precise. I think any product legitimately called "GNU Fortran", such as GNU Fortran 95, is okay to identify using the motto I developed for g77. Assuming the product substantially consists of some combination of the internationally-recognized Fortran computer language and Project GNU, and it isn't named in a manner that would confuse potential users vis-a-vis other components of that project, I'm happy for its users and enthusiasts to use the motto.
C ----------------------------------------------------------------------- C ----- GNU Fortran (g77) ----- C ----------------------------------------------------------------------- C PROGRAM G77 C COMMON/QUICKY/QNEWS,QWHAT,QWHO,QHOW,QWHERE,QRLEAS,QSTAT,QWANT, 1 QY2K,QALIGN,QFUND,QF2C,QMAIL C REAL BOF C WHAT() = 2. * 3.14 * QWHAT C READ *,STATUS,NEXT CALL GIMME(FUNDS,*999) PRINT *,'Goodies For Contributors!!' GO TO (999),NEXT CONTINUE INQUIRE (UNIT=99,NAME=WANTED) CALL WHO(CRUNCH) 999 STOP 3HWHY END C C ----------------------------------------------------------------------- C C Copyright (C) 2000, 2002 James Craig Burley C C Last modified 2002-06-20 C C -----------------------------------------------------------------------