THE FREEWARE HALL OF FAME WHO IS HERE? Among the most prominent people in the computer world, past and present, are those programers who allow us to use their programs at no cost. Writing software and distributing it via Bulletin Boards with no request for payment from users, they enable everyone to share the fruit of their toil, the benefit of their discoveries, and the steady advances that have typified the computer industry from the beginning. THIS FILE is intended to honor those generous and wonderful people. The file is not now--and never will be-- finished. It's a list that will grow every few months as we attempt to catch up and then keep up with the hundreds of fine people who represent the hobby side the PC world, whether from the era of CP/M, the years before, the era of DOS, or the years after. AMONG THEM are some of the best programmers in the profession, software experts sought after and often employed by the most advanced government and industry employers in the world. The Freeware they write on their own time commonly reflects the highest level of programming concept and execution. Nowhere is the death of the 19th Century homily, "You get what you pay for," more evident than in Freeware. BENEFITS This Freeware Hall of Fame is also a guide to software to seek out on BBS's to add to your own supply of programs free to use. The file is indexed to make these programs easy to locate, but identifying them on a Bulletin Board is not always obvious. Since the Board's ZIP, ARC or LHARC packets commonly use an abbreviated version of a program's full name, you might have to hunt and peek. "FREEWARE" means programs that may be used without payment of a fee to the writer. Usually the writer will copyright the program as a way of legally insisting that no one tamper with the program as it was distributed. Other Freeware is offered to us in the Public Domain, which means the author is giving up any ownership rights in the program. Both types of Freeware are to be found on this list. WHAT'S NOT HERE is Shareware which refers to a way of marketing computer software so as to earn income. Many fine programs are distributed as Shareware. It's the "try before you buy" concept and through Shareware many fine programs are made available at reasonable cost. That cost is the difference between Freeware and Shareware. Shareware asks for a fee for continued use of the program, and the author says so. Freeware never does, and the author also says so. WHO IS HERE? To gain entry to the Freeware Hall of Fame, anyone may nominate himself or any other person. The ONLY requirement is that the person nominated has prepared a PC program or database for the free use of all, and states in the program or an accompanying file that the program may be freely used. It matters not at all to the Hall what operating system the program is written to run on nor the importance of the program in the scheme of things. Ward Christiansen gets a one-line entry for XModem--a phenomenally influential program-- and you'll get a one-line entry for your program. NOMINATIONS are made to the compiler of this list and must include 4 elements: Author Name, Software Name, a brief description of what the program does, and your *absolute certainty* the program is FREEWARE. CALL THE HALL I can be contacted three ways: via the Interlink computer network anywhere, through CHEERS! in Memphis, TN, or through CAVU in Charlottesville, VA. Hundreds of BBS's are members of Interlink which is international and most North American cities have an Interlink affiliate or two. INTERLINK is a collection of more than 100 topic conferences and the proper conference for contacting me is the SHARE- WARE conference which also includes discussion of FREEWARE. Since all Interlink messages sent on the network are public, if you want to leave a private comment it must be sent to my home boards, CHEERS! or CAVU, and can be left in the Main Conference as a Private message addressed to Rey Barry. The CHEERS! public line is 901-373-5941, 9600 HST. CAVU is 804-977-0750, 2400 MNP. Both are PCBoards. CAVU allows instant registration/upgrade. LAYOUT The Freeware Hall of Fame comprises three alphabetized indexes. Each index contains the same information: the Author, the Program name, a brief Description of the program, and the Program Category. Index One is sorted by Author, Index Two by Program and Index Three by Category. TO PRINT the indexes, set standard 80-col narrow-carriage printers for 12 chars per inch (Elite). The file prints very nicely with appropriate page breaks on 8« by 11 paper, and this edition runs 15 pages. The DOS (or 4DOS) Print program prints it in the background. Otherwise you can use TYPE HALLFAME.TXT > PRN or LIST.COM or any word processor. The file is prepared using Quattro and appears here in standard ASCII. UPDATES will always be named HOFmmyy.ZIP and there will never be two in one month. The ZIP will contain HALLFAME.TXT, this README and a SYSOP.NOTe. Adding BBS advertising to ZIP files is common so finding a BBS ad attached should come as no surprise. I didn't put it here. COPYRIGHT This file, the accompanying files HALLFAME.TXT and SYSOP.NOT, and the name "Freeware Hall of Fame" are Copyright 1990 by Rey Barry with all rights reserved. It is offered for the use of all in the hope that Freeware authors will be given the recognition their monumental contributions have made to the PC computing hobby. Rey Barry, Charlottesville, VA, USA