Richard. all...
I for one would like to thank you for participating in EUGLUG, I think that
you have made some good arguments, and have increased the awareness of GNU.
Probably the only complaint that Ive heard is that you sound (in your email)
like a whiney bitch sometimes (I can relate... I guess I do too...),
whineyness asside, I apreciate your writing the list.
Wilford
On Thursday 07 February 2002 06:56, Richard Stallman wrote:
> yes, one could easily get into the chicken/egg argument. could you use
> GNU w/out linux? could you use linux w/out GNU?
>
> You can use GNU without Linux now. For instance, you can run the
> GNU/Hurd system, which is GNU using the Hurd as kernel. However, in
> the 90s this option was not working yet, and GNU as a whole was always
> used in combination with Linux back then. That linkage is what led to
> the confusion of lumping GNU in with Linux.
>
> I think it is possible to use Linux without GNU, but only for embedded
> computers or special purposes, because you don't have a real operating
> system that way. Also, you could theoretically put Linux into some
> system other than GNU, say FreeBSD, and then you would have
> FreeBSD/Linux. But that is not the system we use. The system we use
> is GNU/Linux.
>
> Personally I cant imagine how
> someone could understand much about linux without not knowing about
> GNU.
>
> Often they have heard the name "GNU" but they have the wrong idea of
> what we did. They may think GNU is the name of a license, or that GNU
> was a project to develop a collection of "tools", or that it was a
> precursor or inspiration for "the Linux system". The actual truth,
> that we started the development of the system they think of as "Linux"
> seven years before Linus, seems incredible to them when they hear it.
>
> The truth will continue to seem incredible as long as people rarely
> come across it. That is why we ask EUGLUG to help spread the word.
> Calling the system "GNU/Linux" is the most effective way to do it
> without lots and lots of work.
>
> then when Redhat includes tools for install, its redhat/linux/gnu, and
> when mandraike improves on redhats tools, its mandrake/redhat/linux/gnu,
> And If I make a distro with mandrake, its
> rocksolidnetworks/mandrake/redhat/linux/gnu. Can you see how this becomes
> cumbersome?
>
> Sure. At some point you will need to drop from the name some of the
> secondary contributions, such as Red Hat, Mandrake, and Linux. GNU,
> being the biggest contribution and the one that started the whole
> thing, is the last one you should omit.
