John:
So we have yet to find anyone who is currently working on GPC, which brings the original question back to the foreground. Is GPC dead? If so, shall we revive it or would it be better to implement Extended Pascal in Free Pascal? If it is ongoing or deemed to be worth reviving, what can we non-developers do to help (leaving open the possibility that some of us may need to become developers)?
I'm strongly in favor of reviving it. Having several compilers allows one to bypass problems with one of them and to find bugs. I have a set of Pascal programs for DNA sequence analysis and soon I'm going to release previously patent-protected code. This code will be useful to many molecular biologists around the world. They already use sequence logos:
https://alum.mit.edu/www/toms/glossary.html#sequence_logo
Those show average patterns in DNA (by stacks of letters). The method is used all around the world now.
The soon to be released code is for sequence walkers:
https://alum.mit.edu/www/toms/glossary.html#sequence_walker
Here's a pretty picture of what they can do to show patterns in DNA:
https://schneider.ncifcrf.gov/ftp/fispromoterArt.jpg
So if people are to take advantage of these tools, having several healthy Pascal compilers is important.
Tom
Thomas D. Schneider, Ph.D. Senior Investigator National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute Center for Cancer Research RNA Biology Laboratory Molecular Information Theory Group Frederick, Maryland 21702-1201 schneidt@mail.nih.gov https://schneider.ncifcrf.gov (current link) https://alum.mit.edu/www/toms (permanent link)