Software copyrightAuthor(s): Bob KanskySource: The Mathematics Teacher, Vol. 74, No. 8, Microcomputers (November 1981), p. 591Published by: National Council of Teachers of MathematicsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27962625 .

Accessed: 13/09/2014 04:12

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

.

National Council of Teachers of Mathematics is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extendaccess to The Mathematics Teacher.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 110.146.133.181 on Sat, 13 Sep 2014 04:12:03 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

reader reactions to articles and points of view on the teaching of mathematics

Software copyright A primary goal of the Instructional Affairs Com

mittee in developing the NCTM publication Guide lines for Evaluating Computerized Instructional Materi als was to improve the quality of instructional software. By accepting and applying the Guidelines,

we?as individuals and as professional groups?are telling software vendors that we expect their products to meet certain expectations of technical and ped agogical quality. Moreover, we are calling on the ven dors to develop materials and procedures that will

permit us to view and evaluate computerized course ware before we purchase it; in brief, we won't buy an electronic pig in a poke.

It is certainly our professional right and duty to in sist on quality-control standards for this new instruc tional medium. It also is our responsibility to ensure financial rewards for those vendors who invest the ef forts required to meet those standards.

Lawyers are in pursuit of the exact wording of

copyright laws dealing with software. In the mean

time, a common-sense rule of copyright recognition can be enforced: If a program's listing or documenta tion contains a claim to authorship or if the media has electronic guards against copying or listing the pro gram, unauthorized reproduction of the program is

larceny?software piracy?in any language. Because Wyoming's teaching center is engaged

both in the exchange of teacher-authored software

(for which permission-to-copy rights have been

granted) and in the viewing and evaluating of com mercial software, we find the following declaration valuable.

The Science & Mathematics Teaching Center of the

University of Wyoming will not participate in the unauthorized reproduction or exchange of any computerized courseware which bears an explicit or

implicit copyright claim.

This statement shields us from the embarrassment of requests to "exchange" software that falls under the

protection of our common-sense copyright law. In the interest of encouraging the production of quality soft

ware and out of respect for those who labor to develop this new medium, we urge NCTM, its affiliates, and its individual members to adopt our position. (The statement bears no copyright.)

Bob Kansky Science & Mathematics

Teaching Center

Laramie, WY 82071

Single copies of Guidelines for Evaluating Comput erized Instructional Materials are available from

NCTM, 1906 Association Drive, Reston, VA 22091, $3.75.???

M T cover Readers who have access to an Apple computer

may be interested in either of two programs that

graph the 1981 cover of the Mathematics Teacher

(MT). One is in black and white and the other is in color. Anyone interested can send me a postage-paid, self-addressed envelope.

John Mahoney Sidwell Friends School 3825 Wisconsin Avenue, NW

Washington, DC 20016

Generating prime numbers Many texts include one or two simple polynomials

that produce quite a few primes. One polynomial in

particular is found in almost every such discussion:

( ) = 7!2-7! + 41.

It produces a prime for every value of up to 41.

But, what about > 41?? A computer was used (see the program) to check for < 1000, and the results

were somewhat surprising. From P(l) to (1000), primes were produced 581 times yielding an efficiency rating of 58.1 percent. By contrast the simple "sieve," P(n)

= n> has a 16.8 percent efficiency rating.

100 PRINT 110 PRINT "THIS PROGRAM CHECKS OUT PRIMES" 120 PRINT "GENERATED BY THE FORMULA : "

130 PRINT 140 PRINT " -2 - + 41" 150 PRINT 160 PRINT " " , "CORRESPONDING PRIME" 170 FOR = 1 TO 100 180 REM-THE FLAG F REHAINS 0 FOR PRIMES 190 LET F = 0 200 LET = N-2 - + 41 210 REM-CHECK FOR DIVISOR'S D 220 FOR D = 3 TO SQR(P) STEP 2 230 IF P/D = INT?P/D) THEN LET F = 1 240 REM-THE FLAG F BECOMES 1 FOR COMPOSITES 250 NEXT D 260 IF F = 1 THEN GO TO 280 270 PRINT , 280 NEXT 290 END

(Continued on page 598)

November 1981 591

This content downloaded from 110.146.133.181 on Sat, 13 Sep 2014 04:12:03 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions