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GNU Autoconf
GNU Autoconf is a software development tool for generating a configure script that in turn generates files for building a codebase and for packaging or installing the resulting files. Autoconf is part of the GNU Build System along with Automake, Libtool, Autoheader and other tools. Autoconf is agnostic about the programming language of the codebase to build. None-the-less, it is primarily used with C, C++, Fortran, Erlang, or Objective-C. A configure script configures a software package for installation on a particular target system. After running a series of tests on the target system, the configure script generates header files and a makefile from templates, thus customizing the software package for the target system. Usage overview The developer specifies the desired behaviour of the configure script by writing a list of instructions in the GNU m4 language in a file called "configure.ac". A library of pre-defined m4 macros is available to describe common conf ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
GNU Project
The GNU Project ( ) is a free software, mass collaboration project announced by Richard Stallman on September 27, 1983. Its goal is to give computer users freedom and control in their use of their computers and Computer hardware, computing devices by collaboratively developing and publishing software that gives everyone the rights to freely run the software, copy and distribute it, study it, and modify it. GNU software grants these rights in GNU General Public License, its license. In order to ensure that the ''entire'' software of a computer grants its users all freedom rights (use, share, study, modify), even the most fundamental and important part, the operating system (including all its numerous utility programs) needed to be free software. Stallman decided to call this operating system ''GNU'' (a recursive acronym meaning "''GNU's not Unix!''"), basing its design on that of Unix, a proprietary operating system. According to its manifesto, the founding goal of the project w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Header Files
An include directive instructs a text file processor to replace the directive text with the content of a specified file. The act of including may be logical in nature. The processor may simply process the include file content at the location of the directive without creating a combined file. Different processors may use different syntax. The C preprocessor (used with C, C++ and in other contexts) defines an include directive as a line that starts #include and is followed by a file specification. COBOL defines an include directive indicated by copy in order to include a copybook. Generally, for C/C++ the include directive is used to include a header file, but can include any file. Although relatively uncommon, it is sometimes used to include a body file such as a .c file. The include directive can support encapsulation and reuse. Different parts of a system can be segregated into logical groupings yet rely on one another via file inclusion. C and C++ are designed to leverage ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
M4 (computer Language)
m4 is a general-purpose macro processor included in most Unix-like operating systems, and is a component of the POSIX standard. The language was designed by Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie for the original versions of UNIX. It is an extension of an earlier macro processor, m3, written by Ritchie for an unknown AP-3 minicomputer.Brian W. Kernighan and Dennis M. Ritchie. The m4 macro processor. Technical report, Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, New Jersey, USA, 1977pdf/ref> The macro preprocessor operates as a text-replacement tool. It is employed to re-use text templates, typically in computer programming applications, but also in text editing and text-processing applications. Most users require m4 as a dependency of GNU autoconf and GNU Bison. History Macro processors became popular when programmers commonly used assembly language. In those early days of programming, programmers noted that much of their programs consisted of repeated text, and they invented simple means fo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
System Administrator
An IT administrator, system administrator, sysadmin, or admin is a person who is responsible for the upkeep, configuration, and reliable operation of computer systems, especially multi-user computers, such as Server (computing), servers. The system administrator seeks to ensure that the uptime, Computer performance, performance, System resource, resources, and Computer security, security of the computers they manage meet the needs of the User (computing), users, without exceeding a set budget when doing so. To meet these needs, a system administrator may acquire, install, or upgrade computer components and software; provide routine automation; maintain security policies; troubleshoot; train or supervise staff; or offer technical support for projects. Related fields Many organizations staff offer jobs related to system administration. In a larger company, these may all be separate positions within a computer support or Information Services (IS) department. In a smaller group ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Software Versioning
Software versioning is the process of assigning either unique ''version names'' or unique ''version numbers'' to unique states of computer software. Within a given version number category (e.g., major or minor), these numbers are generally assigned in increasing order and correspond to new developments in the software. At a fine-grained level, revision control is used for keeping track of incrementally-different versions of information, whether or not this information is computer software, in order to be able to roll any changes back. Modern computer software is often tracked using two different software versioning schemes: an ''internal version number'' that may be incremented many times in a single day, such as a revision control number, and a ''release version'' that typically changes far less often, such as semantic versioning or a project code name. History File numbers were used especially in public administration, as well as companies, to uniquely identify files or cases. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Feature (software Design)
A feature is "a prominent or distinctive user-visible aspect, quality, or characteristic of a software system or systems", as defined by Kang et al. At the implementation level, "it is a structure that extends and modifies the structure of a given software in order to satisfy a stakeholder’s requirement, to implement and encapsulate a design decision, and to offer a configuration option", as defined by Apel et al. Context The term feature means the same for software as it does for any kind of system. For example, the British Royal Navy's HMS Dreadnought (1906) was considered an important milestone in naval technology because of its advanced features that did not exist in pre-dreadnought battleships. Feature also applies to computer hardware. In the early history of computers, devices such as Digital Equipment Corporation's PDP-7 minicomputer (created in 1964) was noted for having a wealth of features, such as being the first version of the PDP minicomputer series to use ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Porting
In software engineering, porting is the process of adapting software for the purpose of achieving some form of execution in a computing environment that is different from the one that a given program (meant for such execution) was originally designed for (e.g., different CPU, operating system, or third party library). The term is also used when software/hardware is changed to make them usable in different environments. Software is ''portable'' when the cost of porting it to a new platform is significantly less than the cost of writing it from scratch. The lower the cost of porting software relative to its implementation cost, the more portable it is said to be. This is distinct from cross-platform software, which is designed from the ground up without any single " native" platform. Etymology The term "port" is derived from the Latin '' portāre'', meaning "to carry". When code is not compatible with a particular operating system or architecture, the code must be "carried" to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
X Window System
The X Window System (X11, or simply X) is a windowing system for bitmap displays, common on Unix-like operating systems. X originated as part of Project Athena at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1984. The X protocol has been at version 11 (hence "X11") since September 1987. The X.Org Foundation leads the X project, with the current reference implementation, X.Org Server, available as free and open-source software under the MIT License and similar permissive licenses. Purpose and abilities X is an architecture-independent system for remote graphical user interfaces and input device capabilities. Each person using a networked computer terminal, terminal has the ability to interact with the display with any type of user input device. In its standard distribution it is a complete, albeit simple, display and interface solution which delivers a standard widget toolkit, toolkit and protocol stack for building graphical user interfaces on most Unix-like operating syst ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Imake
imake is a build automation system written for the X Window System. It was used by X from X11R1 (1987) to X11R6.9 (2005), and continued to be used in XFree86 (last commit 2009). It is implemented on top of the C preprocessor and make. The first version was written by Todd Brunhoff at Tektronix. imake generates makefiles from a template, a set of C preprocessor macro functions, and a per-directory input file called an Imakefile. This allows machine dependencies (such as compiler options, alternate command names, and special make rules) to be kept separate from the descriptions of the various items to be built. imake was heavily used for X and X-related software through the 1990s, and for unrelated software such as ChorusOS. It was also used for configuration management. With the release of X.org X11R7.0, it was replaced by GNU Autotools. (X11R6.9 and X11R7.0 were the same codebase with a different build system.). X.Org plans to use Meson In particle physics, a meson () is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Open-source Software
Open-source software (OSS) is Software, computer software that is released under a Open-source license, license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and Software distribution, distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. Open-source software may be developed in a collaborative, public manner. Open-source software is a prominent example of open collaboration, meaning any capable user is able to online collaboration, participate online in development, making the number of possible contributors indefinite. The ability to examine the code facilitates public trust in the software. Open-source software development can bring in diverse perspectives beyond those of a single company. A 2024 estimate of the value of open-source software to firms is $8.8 trillion, as firms would need to spend 3.5 times the amount they currently do without the use of open source software. Open-source code can be used for studying and a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Free Software Foundation
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985. The organisation supports the free software movement, with the organization's preference for software being distributed under copyleft ("share alike") terms, such as with its own GNU General Public License. The FSF was incorporated in Boston where it is also based. From its founding until the mid-1990s, FSF's funds were mostly used to employ software developers to write free software for the GNU Project and its employees and volunteers have mostly worked on legal and structural issues for the free software movement and the free software community. Consistent with its goals, the FSF aims to use only free software on its own computers. The FSF holds the copyrights on many pieces of the GNU system, such as GNU Compiler Collection. As the holder of these copyrights, it has authority to enforce the copyleft requirements of the GNU General Public License (GPL ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Macro (computer Science)
In computer programming, a macro (short for "macro instruction"; ) is a rule or pattern that specifies how a certain input should be mapped to a replacement output. Applying a macro to an input is known as macro expansion. The input and output may be a sequence of lexical tokens or characters, or a syntax tree. Character macros are supported in software applications to make it easy to invoke common command sequences. Token and tree macros are supported in some programming languages to enable code reuse or to extend the language, sometimes for domain-specific languages. Macros are used to make a sequence of computing instructions available to the programmer as a single program statement, making the programming task less tedious and less error-prone. Thus, they are called "macros" because a "big" block of code can be expanded from a "small" sequence of characters. Macros often allow positional or keyword parameters that dictate what the conditional assembler program gen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
