DR.  DOBB'S JOURNAL OF SOFTWARE TOOLS

       The history of Dr.  Dobb's Journal goes back to the earliest days of
    the microcomputer industry.  In 1975,  MITS  created  the  Altair,  the
    first  real  microcomputer.   One  of  the  few people who realized the
    significance of this event was Bob Albrecht,  an  ardent  supporter  of
    computer  education  for the masses.  Albrecht had always believed that
    the general public should have access to computers and he knew that the
    Altair  and  similar machines could make this happen.  He also realized
    that widespread use of microcomputers was unlikely as long as the  only
    language  in  which  they  could  be  programmed was assembly language.
    Albrecht concluded that what was needed was a public domain version  of
    BASIC   that   could   be   distributed  to  microcomputer  enthusiasts
    everywhere.  He persuaded his friend Dennis Allison, a  member  of  the
    Computer  Science faculty at Stanford, to write a version of BASIC that
    was small enough to fit within the limited memory of the new  machines.
    To  promote  and  distribute  this  "Tiny"  BASIC, Albrecht and Allison
    created the People's Computer Company and started a newsletter.

       Tiny BASIC was more popular than Albrecht and Allison  had  expected
    and  they  soon needed a separate newsletter just to publish Tiny BASIC
    developments.  They christened this newsletter Dr.  Dobb's  Journal  of
    Tiny  BASIC  Computer Calisthenics and Orthodontia.  "Dobb's" came from
    collapsing together Allison's and Albrecht's first  names,  Dennis  and
    Bob.   "Calisthenics  and  Orthodontia"  was  an  allusion to the motto
    "running light without overbyte." After  all,  Tiny  BASIC  had  to  be
    "slimmed down" to fit in 4K of RAM.

       The  microcomputer  industry has grown up since those early days and
    so has Dr.  Dobb's Journal.  We no longer distribute Tiny BASIC to  the
    masses.   Instead,  we  have become known as a place where all kinds of
    ideas about  computer  languages,  tools,  utilities,  algorithms,  and
    programming  techniques can be discussed and examined.  The average Dr.
    Dobb's reader has also grown up.  Today, he is a professional  software
    designer  or  systems  programmer.  Our primary goal is to provide this
    individual with information he can use.

       One way in which we meet this goal is to  publish  serious,  useful,
    public domain or low-cost programming code written in a wide variety of
    languages.  This code takes the form of tools and  utilities  that  the
    programmer  can use himself or subroutines that he can incorporate into
    programs he is writing.  Sometimes, the code has educational value  and
    teaches  the  programmer  how a particular type of program works.  Some
    examples of code we have published in the past several years are  James
    Hendrix's  Small-C  Compiler,  Ed  Ream's  screen editor RED, and Allen
    Holub's grep.c.  In 1985 alone we published Richard Rylander's  package
    of  assembler  routines  for  solid  shape drawing on the Commodore 64,
    Donald Krantz's Christensen protocol file transfer utility  in  C,  and
    the CICFIG's Forth target compiler.  Our columnists have supplied handy
    subroutines for things like random number generation, queue management,
    object  allocation,  and  floating  point arithmetic and have discussed
    algorithms and techniques for sorting, parallel pattern  matching,  and
    maximum I/O throughput.  In 1986 we plan to continue this tradition and
    to publish as much useful code and as many programing tips as we can.

       Of  course,  the  professional  programmer  cannot  rely  solely  on
    public-domain   tools,  utilities  and  subroutines  provided  by  DDJ.
    Consequently, another one  of  our  goals  is  to  conduct  comparative
    reviews  of  the  commercial  software  development tools and libraries
    available to the professional microcomputer programmer.  In  August  of
    1985 we ran a comparative review of MSDOS C compilers and followed that
    up in November with a comparative review of programmers'  editors.   In
    1986  we  plan  to  expand  these  reviews  and  to cover other product
    categories, such as the validated Ada compilers for microcomputers that
    are  scheduled  to  appear.

       Consistent with our goal of providing useful software  at  low  cost
    has  been  our  commitment  to  show  our  readers how they can enhance
    microcomputer hardware at minimal expense.  Last January, Thom  LaFleur
    and Susan Raab showed DDJ readers how to fatten their Macs from 128K to
    512K for $200.  This article generated a small industry, as a number of
    companies sprang into existence to provide the service described in the
    pages of Dr.  Dobb's.

       But,  there  is more to Dr.  Dobb's than code, reviews, and hardware
    enhancements.  We try to keep our finger on the pulse of  the  computer
    industry and update our readers on new developments in areas such as AI
    and parallel processing.  We also like to stir up a little  controversy
    now  and  then.   Whether  it  is Dave Cortesi delivering a critique of
    non-standard implementations of Pascal, or Richard  Stallman  exhorting
    the  masses  to create a public-domain Unix, or Ray Duncan exposing the
    deficiencies of assembly language programming  environments,  you  will
    find  that  our  writers'  opinions  are  always  incisive  and thought
    provoking.

       Enough of the history and philosophy  of  DDJ.   Why  are  we  going
    online?   There  is  one  primary  reason.   In  the past, readers have
    repeatedly asked  us  to  make  our  listings  available  through  some
    electronic medium.  Usually, these requests have followed 3 consecutive
    nights of squinting at a dot matrix listing that we reduced 33% to  fit
    into the magazine.

       The  useful  code that we have published has not always been easy to
    use.  To eliminate this problem we will now make our listings available
    through two different CompuServe services.  First of all, we will place
    most of the listings from our articles and columns  in  the  DDJ  Forum
    Data  Libraries.   Secondly, some of the more valuable listings will be
    made available through the  Softex  service.   Softex  is  CompuServe's
    electronic  software  exchange,  a  menu driven program that allows the
    user to purchase and download software through the network.   We  don't
    have the Softex software installed yet, but when we do we will probably
    offer James Hendrix's Small-C and Allen Holub's shell and utilities for
    MSDOS  as  our  first offerings.  Stay tuned to the Forum bulletins for
    announcements (if you want more information on Small- C or  the  shell,
    please leave an inquiry with the Sysop in the DDJ Forum).  We will also
    use the Data Libraries and Softex to offer selections from some of  our
    more  popular back issues and to run listings that have not appeared in
    the magazine at all.

       Clearly, another excellent reason for going online would be to  make
    available  the  text  of our articles, columns, and reviews.  It is not
    really practical, however, to place the full text of DDJ  online  every
    month  and  we doubt whether users would want to scroll through some of
    the lengthier articles.  Still, we will  upload  some  of  the  shorter
    columns  and  provide  abstracts  of  the longer pieces.  We hope these
    abstracts will encourage non-subscibers to subscribe to DDJ and get the
    full  text.   We  also  plan  to  extract catalogs of products from our
    reviews, compile bibliographies in selected areas,  and  offer  capsule
    reviews  of  newly released books.  We will also make available general
    magazine information, such as  our  editorial  calendar,  our  writer's
    guidelines  and  information  about  advertising  in  DDJ.  As an extra
    service, we will begin to upload indexes to the back issues  and  bound
    volumes  of  Dr.   Dobb's so you can find out just exactly where it was
    that you saw that programming pearl.

       So, if you find a reference in the index to some listing that  looks
    particularly  enticing,  how do you get hold of it?  In the near future
    you will be able  to  order  back  issues  and  bound  volumes  through
    CompuServe's  Electronic  Mall  service.   You will also be able to use
    this service to order the magazine itself or one of a new series of Dr.
    Dobb's  Books (The Dr.  Dobb's Toolbook of C and Dave Cortesi's book on
    Z80 assembly language programming are already available).  For now,  if
    you  want  more  information  about what's in these publications please
    select the menu option "Other DDJ Publications" from the Main Menu.

       But we have other reasons for going online beside the desire to make
    DDJ  available to you.  We want you to make yourselves available to us.
    We want the DDJ Forum to be just that, a Forum, a place where  everyone
    participates  and  contributes.   We  know  that  users will often have
    questions that are beyond our range of knowledge.  This  is  where  you
    can  step  in  and  share  your  expertise.   We  encourage  you to get
    acquainted with your fellow Forum members.

       All these things are possible in the DDJ Forum.  And please don't be
    shy  about  leaving messages to the sysops.  Introduce yourself and let
    us know if you have an interesting listing to upload, or a proposal for
    an  article  or  review,  or  a suggestion for a conference guest, or a
    correction to something in the magazine.

       Well then, there you have a bit of the history and philosophy of Dr.
    Dobb's   Journal  and  some  of  our  reasons  for  going  online.   In
    conclusion, we want to bid you warm welcome to the  Electronic  Edition
    of  DDJ  and  express  the  hope that your enthusiasm for the Doctor in
    electronic form will be as great as your enthusiasm has been for him in
    print.

       Frank DeRose