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<A HREF="README.html"><EM>README for XFree86[tm] 3.3.5</EM></A>
 <b>:</b> <EM>The XFree86 Project, Inc.</EM><BR>
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  <H2><A NAME="7"></A>7. The XFree86 Project, Inc.</H2>

<p>The XFree86 Project, Inc, was founded to accomplish two major goals:
<ol>
<li>To provide a vehicle by which XFree86 can be represented in
X Consortium, Inc, the organization responsible for the
design, development, and release of The X Window System.</li>
<li>To provide some basic funding for acquisition of facilities for
ongoing XFree86 development, largely to consist of new video
hardware and basic computing facilities.</li>
</ol>

The first of these was the primary motivation.  We have held discussions
with the X Consortium on and off for many months, attempting to find an
avenue by which our loosely-organized free software project could be
given a voice within the X Consortium.  The bylaws of the Consortium
would not recognize such an organization.  After an initial investigation
about funding, we decided to form our own corporation to provide the
avenue we needed to meet the requirements of the X Consortium bylaws.</p>
<p>By doing this, we were able to be involved in the beta-test interval for
X11R6, and have contributed the majority of XFree86 to the X11R6 and X11R6.1
core
release.  The version of XFree86 in the initial X11R6 core is 3.0.  The
version of XFree86 in the current X11R6.3 release is 3.2.</p>
<p>An additional benefit of this incorporation is that The XFree86 Project,
Inc has obtained outside financial support for our work.  This will
hopefully give us the freedom to be more pro-active in obtaining new
video hardware, and enable us to release better products more quickly,
as we will be able to go and get what we need, and get it into the hands
of the people who can do the work.</p>
<p>The current Board of Directors and Officers of the The XFree86 Project,
Inc, are:
<ul>
<li>David Dawes, President and Secretary</li>
<li>Dirk Hohndel, Vice-President</li>
<li>Glenn Lai, Director</li>
<li>Rich Murphey, Treasurer</li>
<li>Jim Tsillas, Director</li>
<li>Jon Tombs, Director</li>
<li>David Wexelblat, Director</li>
</ul>

Email to <i>&lt;BOD@XFree86.org&gt;</i> reaches the board of directors. </p>
<p>Our bylaws have been crafted in such a way to ensure that XFree86 is and
always will be a free software project.  There is no personal financial
benefit to any member of the Core Team or any other XFree86 participant.
All assets of the corporation remain with the corporation, and, in the
event of the dissolution of the corporation, all assets will be turned over
to the X Consortium, Inc.  It is hoped that by doing this, our corporation
will be merely a formalization of what we have been doing in the past,
rather than something entirely new.</p>
<p>As of March 1997, The XFree86 Project has revised its source/binary
access and release policy.  The main points of the new policy are:
<ul>
<li>There will be no more time-limited public binary-only beta
releases.  Instead we plan to increase the frequency of full
public releases to about four releases per year.</li>
<li>The source access/use is divided into three categories:
<ul>
<li>End users.  End users have access to only the source
of full public releases.  The main reason for this
restriction is that our development code often contains
code from other sources which cannot be released to the
public immediately.</li>
<li>Active developers (members of the XFree86 ``developer team'').
Active developers must formally become non-voting members
of the XFree86 Project, and have full access to our
internal development source.  They are permitted to make
time-limited binaries (in coordination with the Core Team)
of the servers they are actively working on available to
external testers for specific testing.</li>
<li>Commercial members.  Commercial members are non-voting
members of The XFree86 Project who donate
US&#36;5000/year to the Project.  Additionally, companies
who contribute significantly to the development effort of
XFree86 can be awarded commercial membership by the Core
Team on a yearly bases.  Commercial members can use the
internal XFree86 development source for derived binary-only
products providing that they take full responsibility for
supporting the product, and don't call it ``XFree86''
(although the derivation of the product must be
acknowledged in any accompanying documentation).  Binary
packages for the OSs we support which are simply compiled
from our internal source without significant added value
are explicitly NOT allowed.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>
</p>
<p>Here is a list of the organizations and individuals who have provided
sponsorship to The XFree86 Project, Inc, either by financial contribution
or by the donation of equipment and resources.  The XFree86 Project, Inc
gratefully acknowledges these contributions, and hopes that we can do
justice to them by continuing to release high-quality free software for
the betterment of the Internet community as a whole.
<ul>
<li><A href="http://www.uu.net/">UUNET Communications Services, Inc.</A></li>
</ul>

UUNET Communications Services, Inc, deserves special mention.  This
organization stepped forward and contributed the entire 1994 X Consortium
membership fee on a moment's notice.  This single act ensured XFree86's
involvement in X11R6.</p>
<p>
<ul>
<li>GUUG -- 1st German Linux Congress</li>
</ul>

Also deserving of special mention are the organizers and attendees of the
1st German Linux Congress in Heidelberg.  Significant funding to The
XFree86 Project has been provided from its proceeds.</p>
<p>
<ul>
<li><A href="http://www.aib.com/">AIB Software Corporation</A>, Herndon, VA</li>
<li>Roland Alder, Armin Fessler, Patrick Seemann, Martin Wunderli</li>
<li>American Micro Group</li>
<li><A href="http://www.atitech.ca/">ATI Technologies Inc</A></li>
<li>Andrew Burgess</li>
<li><A href="http://www.bsdi.com/">Berkeley Software Design, Inc</A>, Colorado Springs, CO</li>
<li><A href="http://www.caldera.com/">Caldera, Inc.</A></li>
<li><A href="http://www.delix.de/">Delix Computer GmbH</A>, Stuttgart, Germany</li>
<li><A href="http://www.destek.net/Destek/">The Destek Group, Inc.</A>, Nashua, NH (formerly Synergytics)</li>
<li><A href="http://www.diamondmm.com/">Diamond Multimedia Systems, Inc.</A></li>
<li><A href="http://www.digital.com/">Digital Equipment Corporation</A></li>
<li><A href="http://www.elsa.de/">Elsa GmbH</A>, Aachen, Germany</li>
<li>Genoa Systems Corporation</li>
<li><A href="http://www.helius.com/">Helius, Inc.</A></li>
<li><A href="http://www.hercules.com/">Hercules Computer Technology, Inc.</A></li>
<li>Ralf Hockens</li>
<li>Dirk Hohndel</li>
<li><A href="http://www.infomagic.com/">InfoMagic</A>, Flagstaff, AZ</li>
<li>Daniel Kraemer</li>
<li><A href="http://www.eni.net/">Epoch Networks, Inc.</A>, Irvine, CA</li>
<li>Frank &amp; Paige McCormick</li>
<li>Internet Labs, Inc.</li>
<li>Linux International</li>
<li>Linux Support Team, Erlangen, Germany</li>
<li><A href="http://www.lunetix.de">LunetIX Softfair</A>, Berlin, Germany</li>
<li><A href="http://www.morse.net">Morse Telecommunications</A>, Long Beach, NY</li>
<li><A href="http://www.melcoinc.co.jp">MELCO, Inc</A></li>
<li>MIRO Computer Products AG, Braunschweig, Germany</li>
<li>Rich &amp; Amy Murphey</li>
<li><A href="http://www.ncr.com/">NCR Corp</A></li>
<li>Brett Neumeier</li>
<li>Number Nine, Lexington, MA</li>
<li>Kazuyuki Okamoto, Japan</li>
<li><A href="http://www.ptf.com/">Prime Time Freeware</A>, San Bruno, CA</li>
<li><A href="http://www.redhat.com/">Red Hat Software</A>, Chapel Hill, NC</li>
<li>Norbert Reithinger</li>
<li>SPEA Software AG, Starnberg, Germany</li>
<li>STB Systems</li>
<li>Clifford M Stein</li>
<li>Joel Storm </li>
<li><A href="http://www.suse.de">S.u.S.E. GmbH</A>, Fuerth, Germany</li>
<li><A href="http://www.tekelec.com">Tekelec Airtronic GmbH</A>, Muenchen, Germany</li>
<li>Jim Tsillas</li>
<li>Trans-Ameritech Enterprises, Inc., Santa Clara, CA</li>
<li>Unifix Software GmbH, Braunschweig, Germany</li>
<li><A href="http://www.vix.com/">Vixie Enterprises</A>, La Honda, CA</li>
<li><A href="http://www.cdrom.com/">Walnut Creek CDROM</A>, Concord, CA</li>
<li><A href="http://www.xfree86.org/xtreme">Xtreme s.a.s.</A>, Livorno, Italy</li>
</ul>

The XFree86 Project, Inc, welcomes the additional contribution of funding
and/or equipment.  Such contributions should be tax-deductible; we will
know for certain when the lawyers get finished with the papers.  For more 
information, contact The XFree86 Project, Inc, at
<i>&lt;BOD@XFree86.org&gt;</i> </p>

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