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1. Introduction

1.1 Purpose

The Linux OS has evolved from its origins in hackerdom to a full blown UNIX, capable of rivaling any commercial UNIX. It now provides an inexpensive base to build a great workstation. It has shed its hardware dependencies, having been ported to DEC Alphas, Sparcs, PowerPCs, with others on the way. This potential speed boost along with its networking support will make it great for workstation clusters. As a workstation it allows for all sorts of research and development, including artificial intelligence and artificial life.

The purpose of this Mini-Howto is to provide a source to find out about various software packages, code libraries, and anything else that will help someone get started working with (and find resources for) artificial intelligence and artificial life. All done with Linux specifically in mind.

1.2 Where to find this software

All this software should be available via the net (ftp || http). The links to where to find it will be provided in the description of each package. There will also be plenty of software not covered on these pages (which is usually platform independent) located on one of the resources listed on the links section of the Master Site (given above).

1.3 Updates and comments

If you find any mistakes, know of updates to one of the items below, or have problems compiling and of the applications, please mail me at: jae@NOSPAM-zhar.net and I'll see what I can do.

If you know of any AI/Alife applications, class libraries, etc. Please email me about them. Include your name, ftp and/or http sites where they can be found, plus a brief overview/commentary on the software (this info would make things a lot easier on me... but don't feel obligated ;).

I know that keeping this list up to date and expanding it will take quite a bit of work. So please be patient (I do have other projects). I hope you will find this document helpful.


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