Subject: Re: James Stewart's article

From: [email-masked] (Allen Adler)
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 1996 21:50:06 -0600 (CST)

James Stewart cleared up a number of misconceptions I have had
about MOPAC 7 in his candid posting. I just have a few more
questions.

> I would like to reiterate:  MOPAC 7 is NOT intended for production
> work.  It should NOT be used by users.  It is intended to be a
> public-domain source of code for program developers.

(1) Does that mean that the code can be quoted in a book on MOPAC?
(2) Does that mean that it is ok to develop and distribute a CWEB or
    FWEB file which produces MOPAC 7, with or without its bugs,
    and a thorough documentation of the resulting program?
    (Not that I am capable of doing it...)
 
> There are about 300 to 400 known errors in MOPAC 7.  The errors that
> users have reported are known bugs.  

Is there a complete list of known bugs available?

> All bugs detected in MOPAC 7 have already been removed.  The corrected
> program is called MOPAC 93.  
> 
> This copyrighted program is intended for users. It can be obtained 
> from the QCPE.  There is no license fee for academic users, the 
> license for commercial use is $2,000. 

The reason I never consider using the QCPE is that once I happened
to look at a list of prices for obtaining the software. It might be
that the hundreds of dollars these programs seem to cost is due only
to distribution fees, but the simple fact is that I can't afford it.
From my point of view, there is no QCPE. That's for rich folks.

I understand that the QCPE could not afford itself if it did not
charge these fees, but from where I sit the net effect is the same.
 
> Might I make a plea - STOP USING MOPAC 7 !!!  It wastes your time and 
> time is valuable - if you want to use MOPAC, then get a copy of MOPAC 93 
> from QCPE.  If you find any bugs in that, then let me know, and I'll 
> be happy to repond.

If MOPAC 93 is truly free in the sense I alluded to above, this
is an easy request to honor. Speaking as someone whose time has
a current market value of zero, I'll go with the software that is
truly free, no matter what might be wrong with it, particularly
if it comes with source code. At least that way, an interested
user community can maintain it.

Allan Adler
[email-masked]