On Sun, Nov 30, 2014 at 4:06 PM, Ben Finney <ben+pyt...@benfinney.id.au> wrote: > I don't get a vote. So I'm glad there are some within the Python core > development team that can see the mistakes inherent in depending on > non-free tools for developing free software.
While this is a laudable view, this kind of extreme stance is contrary to any semblance of practicality. Compare: http://www.gnu.org/distros/free-distros.html http://www.gnu.org/distros/common-distros.html#Debian Debian is not considered sufficiently free because "people can readily learn about these nonfree packages by browsing Debian's online package database", even though you have to be very much explicit about these things (you have to go and enable the non-free repos). Yes, GitHub is proprietary. But all of your actual code is stored in git, which is free, and it's easy to push that to a new host somewhere else, or create your own host. This proposal is for repositories that don't need much in the way of issue trackers etc, so shifting away from GitHub shouldn't demand anything beyond moving the repos themselves. How bad is it, really? Is it worth fighting a philosophical battle for the sake of no real gain, sacrificing real benefits for the intangible "but it's not free" debate? Python is already using quite a bit of non-free software in its ecosystem. The Windows builds of CPython are made with Microsoft's compiler, and the recent discussion about shifting to Cygwin or MinGW basically boiled down to "but it ought to be free software", and that was considered not a sufficiently strong argument. In each case, the decision has impact on other people (using MSVC for the official python.org installers means extension writers need to use MSVC too; and using GitHub means that contributors are strongly encouraged, possibly required, to use GitHub); so why is it acceptable to use a non-free compiler, but not acceptable to use a non-free host? I admire and respect the people who, for their own personal use, absolutely and utterly refuse to use any non-free systems or software. It's great that they do it, because that helps encourage free software to be created. But for myself? I'll use whatever makes the most sense. Proprietary systems have inherent issues (the best-maintained non-free programs seem to have about the same bugginess as a poorly-maintained free program, or at least that's how it feels), but if the available free alternatives have even more issues, I'll not hobble myself for the purity of freedom. Practicality wins. ChrisA _______________________________________________ Python-Dev mailing list Python-Dev@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-dev Unsubscribe: https://mail.python.org/mailman/options/python-dev/archive%40mail-archive.com
