Tobias Weingartner wrote:
> On Thursday, July 13, "Steve Arnold" wrote:
> > > Hmm, saying that the FSF brought the GNU/Linux OS into
> > > existance, is like saying that churchill and his croonies
> > > created the atom bomb. You (and they) may have created a
> > > position or environment where the item being created flourished
> > > in. It is not a very sound argument to assume that the item
> > > being created would have never made it without these conditions.
> > >
> >
> > Boy for being around this long (a real 'net old-timer :) you sure
> > seem to have missed the boat on a few things. How can you say that
> > FSF, and the GNU tools, weren't instrumental in bringing GNU/Linux
> > into being?
>
> No, you are making the assumption that without such tools, linux
> would have never been written. This is an erronous argument.
That's not what I said (at least, not what I meant to say). What I
said was "the Linux kernel would not have been much use to anyone
(including Linus) without the availability of the GNU tools,
shells, etc. How would people use a bare OS kernel without the GNU
infrastructure there to support it?
> > > You talk about freedom, about right and wrong. I fail to see
> > > where the freedom is in the GPL.
> >
> > Say what? The GPL is all about maintaining freedom (it explicitly
> > forbids you or anyone else from taking freedom away). I guess you
> > haven't read much of Richard Stallman's definitions, explanations,
> > and other philosophical stuff.
>
> Ok, I want the freedom to distribute some GPL code in a binary only
> form. If (and only if) you can give me that, then I will conceede
> that the GPL does not restrict my freedom.
Well, that's not one of the freedoms you have under the GPL,
because it would restrict the freedom of others. I don't know
about you, but I try not to advance my own position at other
people's expense. Granted, that's a standard business model, but
not one I can support. There's a *big* difference between standing
on the shoulders of others and trampling them under your feet.
> > > Did their original licensing terms for the BSD code not follow
> > > in a "truer" sense of the word of freedom? What about the
> > > original MIT project athena license for X?
> >
> > In short, no, and it sucks. RS created the GPL precisely because
> > the BSD license was too restrictive. And the XFree86 guys use the
> > GPL because they didn't like the X license (again, too
> > restrictive).
>
> Huh!?! Have you read the original BSD license? The MIT athena X
> license? Other than to provide credit (credit where credit is due),
> they don't restrict the use of code under said license in any way.
> In particular, you can distribute a binary-only package, including
> modifications you've made to the source, without having to disclose
> your source.
Let me try that one again (since I screwed it up the first time).
And yes, I have read the BSD stuff (just now :) and what I *meant*
to say was something like this: The other free licences (BSD,
Apache, X, etc) either include restrictive provisions, or they
don't go far enough in preserving the free/open aspects of whatever
code is being licensed, at least in the opinions of RS and the GNU
crowd, and I guess I agree. I just went back and re-read a bunch
of RS's stuff on the GNU site, and I can't find any real flaws in
it.
> > > Would it not be better to try and see why the opensource
> > > movement was "created" in 1998? Since (as a lot of people seem
> > > to state) the two movements have roughly the same goals in mind,
> > > does the creation of the opensource movement not point out a
> > > deficiency in the FSF?
> >
> > Not at all. As I said, I think the genesis of this more recent
> > "movement" was all about not alienating corporate/business types
> > (ie, suits). The core RS/GNU philosophy is just way to socialist
> > for real suits. Although I don't understand why they fail to see
> > the viability of the "give the code away but charge for your
> > expertise" open source business model.
>
> Here I believe you are being closed minded. Why not consider
> the possibility that the FSF/GPL state of afairs has a
> deficiency? There are reasons for the opensource movement, as
> there are for the FSF/GPL movement. I merely pointed out that the
> two seemed to have similar (if not the same) goals, and that
> there may be a reason that split
I still don't think there's a deficiency there. Yes, they have
many of the same goals, but they also differ on some pretty
fundamental philosophical grounds. I think ER and the OpenSource
camp broke away from the GNU/FSF crowd because they wanted to
appeal to business types based on practical and profit-making
concerns. Whereas, RS stands behind his people-based point of view
with uncompromising rigidity, and profit be damned. I guess I must
be some kind of closet socialist or something, because I agree with
him. I want to acquire some material possessions, as well as
feed/clothe/house my family. But I don't want to do it by
depriving somebody else, or destroying our environment. I also
can't get behind the idea that profits and share-holder value
should come before everything. When you hear the phrase "It's
nothing personal, it's just a business decision" you can be pretty
sure you, or someone else, is about to be screwed. IMO, there are
*no* business decisions; they are *all* personal to someone.
Now I'm *really* digressing...
> Also, if business "types" are telling the FSF/GPL there
> is a problem, then listening to them may actually be a good
> thing.
Not if you want to keep your soul.
> Also, not every business is built on "sell your expertise". I know
> of many software vendors that operate on "sell product". For them
> it is not an option to disclose the source to *every* product they
> sell. Youre failure to see the viability in the FSF/GPL model leads
> me to believe that you live in the proverbial ivory-tower...
No, I live in Steve's World, where the women are strong, the men
are beautiful, and all the children are above average (blatantly
stolen from Garrison K). I know of many software vendors who sell
crappy products, and then insult you when you ask why they don't
work. Maybe you get to deal with different vendors... The only
impressive vendors I've had experience with (at least in terms of
product quality, support, etc) are hardware vendors - Fujitsu,
Calcomp, Mylex, and IBM (and I've seen how IBM supports large orgs,
and even they lag sometimes).
I still say that, other than the FSF, people have long placed way
to much value in the so-called "intellectual property" that is
their proprietary code. If given the chance, would they still be
proud to show it to someone who can rip it to shreds? I'm not so
sure... I also don't see what's wrong with letting people have the
source code, when %99 of them don't have the tools to do anything
with it, and would still have to pay you for support, etc.
> > OTOH, the GNU tools, Linux, XFree86, Enlightenment,
> > etc, are like a dream come true. Hey, they actually behave
> > you change the same way each time you run them (unless
> > the configuration)! What a concept! It's almost like
> > mainframe stability on PC hardware.
> Ahh, ever try to port a linux application to another unix machine?
> One of my pet-peaves is that 90% of all linux "centric" applications
> are very hard to port. In many ways the coders of these pieces of
> software are just as bad (if not worse) then a lot of commercial
> software out there. They make use of obscure and usually
> undocumented systemcall semantics, etc...
No, I haven't. But I've seen some pretty rotten commercial Unix
tools, that cause many problems that could be eliminated through
replacing their crap with GNU stuff. But I agree with your
condemnation of poor portability (but that says a lot more about
the cluelessness, or lack of skill, of the programmer than it does
about anything else).
> I truly believe that the only way to create quality software, is to
> write software that works in many places. An exercise that will
> quickly force you to write architected and engineered software, or
> loose the game all together.
Here! here! But you're preachin' to the choir on that one.
> > Granted, most free software projects don't exactly follow good SE
> > practices either (but at least they do *some* things right, like
> > control code via cvs, etc) but the nature of open source lets as
> > many people eyeball/test the code as are interested, and actually
> > produces some of the highest quality software (ie, fewest defects,
> > highly stable, etc) we have today.
>
> It also produces some of the worst code I've seen. And I have seen
> both commercial and "free" code. You can play both sides of this
> coin. Ultimatly it rarely matters what license the source-code is
> drapped with. It matters more what the coders feel is an acceptable
> level of profesionalism in their care and feeding of their code.
True, check, and right on the money. I'd say we're in violent
agreement here. (but bad code with a lower failure rate than
commercial code...)
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Stephen L Arnold http://www.rain.org/~sarnold
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