Slashdot Mirror

Then the FSF would appreciate your feedback on what the license recommendations and GPL FAQ pages leave unclear.

Then the FSF would appreciate your feedback on what the license recommendations and GPL FAQ pages leave unclear.

'in two years time I'm afraid there will be no free games to play in the world,'

That's absurd. First, there will always be DRM-free games. People like me will not buy them. I don't care if I have to wait 5 years before I play a game, selling my soul, privacy, control of my computer, and all the other hassles of DRM is not worth it. Eventually software companies will realize that they're losing out on people like me and our money, and eventually they'll come around.

Secondly, aside from DRM-free, closed-source, non-free commercial software, there are numerous free software games out there of varying quality.

PostgreSQL is impressive, especially now that software companies are becoming more and more abusive.

Adobe software becomes inoperative if you don't let it contact Adobe every time you start a program.

Microsoft's Software is Malware: Microsoft Windows has a universal back door through which any change whatsoever can be imposed on the users.

We need a government that supports the people (democracy), rather than a government that supports the rich and powerful (dictatorship of the rich).

Microsoft's Software is Malware. "Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user."

Microsoft has a long history of extremely incompetent management. For example, the cover of the January 16, 2013 issue of BusinessWeek magazine has a large photo of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer (now replaced by Satya Nadella) with the headline calling him "Monkey Boy". See the BusinessWeek cover in this article: Steve Ballmer Is No Longer A Monkey Boy, Says Bloomberg BusinessWeek. The BusinessWeek cover says "No More" and "Mr.", but that doesn't take much away from the fact that the magazine called Ballmer Monkey Boy -- on its cover.

Worst CEO in the United States: Quote from an article in Forbes Magazine about Steve Ballmer: "Without a doubt, Mr. Ballmer is the worst CEO of a large publicly traded American company today." Another quote: "The reach of his bad leadership has extended far beyond Microsoft when it comes to destroying shareholder value -- and jobs." (May 12, 2012)

You write your languages in C with ASM for the places it makes sense.

The GCC developers aren't using only C any more, and LLVM is written in C++, as is clang.

The low-level parts of language runtimes might be written in a mix of C and assembler, but that's another matter.

According to Linking over controlled Interface this is not a problem, as long as the OpenJDK license allows linking via the OpenJDK API.

Don't directly use the IP of a game company.

By "IP", I assume you didn't mean "Internet Protocol" address. Did you mean copyright, patent, trademark, trade secret, right of publicity, or something else? If "yes", which? because these are different areas of law.

How can a game company know whether it's unintentionally using the copyright, patent, trademark, trade secret, right of publicity, or other exclusive right of some other game company? I have the feeling that refraining from using any character names, likenesses, locations, and events is not enough to avoid "directly using the IP", as shown in the Sega case mentioned above as well as Konami v. Roxor and Tetris v. Xio.

* Some people claim that the term PC refers specifically to a system with Windows. Their argument invariably represents an ignorance with respect to the history of both Microsoft and the various PCs.

Some people also claim that the term "Linux" refers to a system with GNU/Linux. Their argument invariably represents an ignorance with respect to the history of both the GNU userland tools and the Linux kernel. As long as we're being pedantic...

Did we even notice that this article is about old, secondhand books? Derp, derp, derp. It's just unsettling to see people so willing to discard the old way of doing things and completely fail to see the problem with the new way, up to the point of harshly criticizing those who decline to change. A short story called "The Right to Read" should hopefully make an impression, though I doubt it.

Native apps from "garage" developers: zero users on Wii U. Web apps from "garage" developers: greater than zero users on Wii U.

You're not genuinely trying to argue that the Wii U is a significant application platform, are you? It's a games platform for children, and the least successful console of the current generation by a mile. You'd be crazy to target it for applications, native or otherwise.

Even HTML5 game support is weak on the Wii. No support for sound? Does it even have WebGL support? Nope, guess not. And look at this weird non-standard stuff. Effortless support it ain't.

You haven't provided evidence for your claim that web development with all its current limitations, with all the vagaries of differences between browsers is more efficient or productive than native cross platform application development. Some me some real, measurable outcomes instead of making vague assertions.

First, there's the overhead of obtaining hardware on which to test the build for each platform. You essentially have to buy a Mac, buy a copy of Parallels, and buy a retail copy of Windows.

Welcome to professional development. And as you said yourself it's the same deal for web development. What, you got your Wii U for free in a box of cereal or something?

That's fine once your company is big enough to afford "the right development environment".

Many cross platform languages, libraries, and development environments are free. You can use GCC or Rust or Python or Free Pascal and their associated libraries, or use none of them and use something else. You want to do GUI applications? Look, here's an option. Here's another. Use what you want, I don't care.

There are more options available now than ever. Small companies can easily find the right development environment for them for native application development for as much or as little money as they want to spend.

"Philanthropy" is often a name for a destructive person or organization buying support.

Windows 10 is Malware. "Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user." Will Microsoft top managers be the targets of a court case? Other spyware makers have been convicted. Will there be an anti-trust case against Microsoft's virtual monopoly?

Microsoft has a long history of extremely incompetent management. For example, the cover of the January 16, 2013 issue of BusinessWeek magazine has a large photo of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer (now replaced by Satya Nadella) with the headline calling him "Monkey Boy". See the BusinessWeek cover in this article: Steve Ballmer Is No Longer A Monkey Boy, Says Bloomberg BusinessWeek. The BusinessWeek cover says "No More" and "Mr.", but that doesn't take much away from the fact that the magazine called Ballmer Monkey Boy -- on its cover.

Worst CEO in the United States: Quote from an article in Forbes Magazine about Steve Ballmer: "Without a doubt, Mr. Ballmer is the worst CEO of a large publicly traded American company today." Another quote: "The reach of his bad leadership has extended far beyond Microsoft when it comes to destroying shareholder value -- and jobs." (May 12, 2012)

I thought that "open source" as pitched by Perens and Raymond, was mainly distinguished from Stallman's Free Software

The Open Source Definition published by Mr. Raymond's organization is nearly word-for-word identical to the Debian Free Software Guidelines. Each item in the DFSG expounds on an item in FSF's definition of free software: DFSG 1 is FSF 2, DFSG 2 is FSF 1, DFSG 3 and 8 and OSD 10 are FSF 3, DFSG 4 explains how Debian applied FSF 3 to the QPL, DFSG 5 and 6 are FSF 0, DFSG 7 ensures FSF 3 applies even on a desert island, and DFSG 9 explains how Debian applies FSF 2 to collective works.

by the former's lack of restrictions on what the licensee could do with the software.

It depends on what exactly you mean by "what the licensee could do with the software." Copyleft licenses, such as the GNU General Public License, qualify under the definition. A license that bans use by a "group of persons" or in a "specific field of endeavor" would not.

Windows 10 is Malware. "Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user." Will Microsoft top managers be the targets of a court case? Other spyware makers have been convicted. Will there be an anti-trust case against Microsoft's virtual monopoly?

Apparently Microsoft is moving towards these arrangements: With Windows 10, Microsoft has complete control over any computer connected to the internet, so Microsoft can use its spyware, which it calls "telemetry", to gather personal information to be sold to advertisers. Eventually there may be monthy payments to use Windows, as with Microsoft Office-365. Apparently Microsoft is paid by secret agencies of governments to steal personal information.

As many people have said, putting spyware into Windows 10, and not allowing people to know the purpose of "updates", will obviously be bad for Microsoft, eventually. So, why is Microsoft becoming even more offensive? It seems that the company is amazingly badly managed. For example, the cover of the January 16, 2013 issue of BusinessWeek magazine has a large photo of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer (now replaced) with the headline calling him "Monkey Boy". See the BusinessWeek cover in this article: Steve Ballmer Is No Longer A Monkey Boy, Says Bloomberg BusinessWeek. The BusinessWeek cover says "No More" and "Mr.", but that doesn't take much away from the fact that the magazine called Ballmer Monkey Boy -- on its cover.

Worst CEO in the United States: Quote from an article in Forbes Magazine about Steve Ballmer: "Without a doubt, Mr. Ballmer is the worst CEO of a large publicly traded American company today."

Another quote: "The reach of his bad leadership has extended far beyond Microsoft when it comes to destroying shareholder value -- and jobs." (May 12, 2012)

Articles about Microsoft abusing customers:

How Can Any Company Ever Trust Microsoft Again?

NSA Backdoor Exploit in Windows 8 Uncovered

Microsoft Gave the NSA Direct Backdoor Access to Outlook, Skype

Microsoft has no plans to tell us what's in Windows patches. Each update is a black box, and it's going to stay that way.

Leaks show that Microsoft writes release notes, so why can't it publish them? The lack of documentation of Windows' updates is a baffling move on Microsoft's part.

Microsoft [lack of] Privacy Statement

Here's how to Block Windows 10 "Spying" (But, of course, Microsoft can change the spyware to avoid blocking.)

You have cherry picked one comment from Richard Stallman, which was just his personal ideology. David Edelsohn replied this:
https://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/201...

GCC is working toward re-factoring its code base toward a more
compositional approach for "toolification". One can look at
presentations from the recent GNU Cauldron 2013 for discussion of the
topic. David Malcolm also has created patches for the GCC backend to be used as a JIT.
The assertions that FSF policy prevents technical development and
innovation simply is not true.

Maybe GCC was "deliberately obtuse", but as I see it, steps are taken to change that and enhance GCC for tool chains and to be used a library just as LVMM is.

>1) Long term Freedom. The importance of which can not and should not be understated.

That is very true. https://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/201.... Long live gcc.

"They are getting the unintended consequences that any rational person should have seen coming a mile away. This is not going to go well for MS, and it would not surprise me if it ended up in court."

Will Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella go to prison? Other spyware makers have been convicted.

Will there be an anti-trust case against Microsoft's virtual monopoly?

Articles about Microsoft abusing customers:

Microsoft's Software is Malware. Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user.

How Can Any Company Ever Trust Microsoft Again?

NSA Backdoor Exploit in Windows 8 Uncovered

Microsoft Gave the NSA Direct Backdoor Access to Outlook, Skype

Microsoft has no plans to tell us what's in Windows patches. Each update is a black box, and it's going to stay that way.

Leaks show that Microsoft writes release notes, so why can't it publish them? The lack of documentation of Windows' updates is a baffling move on Microsoft's part.

Microsoft [lack of] Privacy Statement

Here's how to Block Windows 10 "Spying"

Will Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella go to prison? Other spyware makers have been convicted.

Will there be an anti-trust case against Microsoft's virtual monopoly?

Articles about Microsoft abusing customers:

Microsoft's Software is Malware. Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user.

How Can Any Company Ever Trust Microsoft Again?

NSA Backdoor Exploit in Windows 8 Uncovered

Microsoft Gave the NSA Direct Backdoor Access to Outlook, Skype

Microsoft has no plans to tell us what's in Windows patches. Each update is a black box, and it's going to stay that way.

Leaks show that Microsoft writes release notes, so why can't it publish them? The lack of documentation of Windows' updates is a baffling move on Microsoft's part.

Microsoft [lack of] Privacy Statement

Here's how to Block Windows 10 "Spying"

I've thought about this many times myself over the years. At worst, it seems to be bait-and-switch.

You're right, it's bait-and-switch.

There's a similar bait-and-switch that happens with the terms "use" and "utilize".

If you are a layman, the terms are the same: "I am utilizing Microsoft Word to make a brochure"/"I am using Microsoft Word for my business cards".

For a software engineer, the distinction is important, when referring to source code: "I am utilizing emacs to take a portion of the source code of emacs and use it in a derivative work".

And no, this is not accidental. It's amazing how many people apply the GPL to their code, without the understanding that the GPL is an instrumentality of a political agenda, and thus have never read "The GNU Manifesto" to understand the emergent properties that the GPL is designed to cause to come to fruition from its use.

The GNU Manifesto: http://www.gnu.org/gnu/manifes...

My feelings on this align with a certain activist's:

https://gnu.org/education/educ...

"stronger drive to a subscription model"

That seems to be Microsoft's plan. Eventually everyone will pay monthly to use Microsoft software, following the lead of Adobe Systems.

"Windows 10.0 is the devil."

Microsoft's Software is Malware. "Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user."

Apparently the idea of Microsoft management is that many, many small abuses cause people to accept abuse. Then the abuses can be made bigger.

From a previously posted comment: Articles about Microsoft spying:

Microsoft's Software is Malware. "Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user." -- Gnu.org

How Can Any Company Ever Trust Microsoft Again? -- Computerworld UK

Microsoft handed the NSA access to encrypted messages -- The Guardian

Publishers often refer to copying they don't approve of as "piracy." In this way, they imply that it is ethically equivalent to attacking ships on the high seas, kidnapping and murdering the people on them. Based on such propaganda, they have procured laws in most of the world to forbid copying in most (or sometimes all) circumstances. (They are still pressuring to make these prohibitions more complete.)

If you don't believe that copying not approved by the publisher is just like kidnapping and murder, you might prefer not to use the word "piracy" to describe it. Neutral terms such as "unauthorized copying" (or "prohibited copying" for the situation where it is illegal) are available for use instead.

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy...

A member of an advisory group to President Barack Obama said about surveillance, "There can be serious negative effects on other U.S. interests". -- From the Reuters article, Russian researchers expose breakthrough in U.S. spying program.

Another quote from that article: "The U.S. National Security Agency has figured out how to hide spying software deep within hard drives made by Western Digital, Seagate, Toshiba and other top manufacturers, giving the agency the means to eavesdrop on the majority of the world's computers, according to cyber researchers and former operatives."

"China is seeking to make its own secure smartphones, in an attempt to insulate its handsets from U.S. surveillance." -- Wall Street Journal
Links: Direct, possibly paywalled, also through Google Search.

How will China react to Windows 10, which gives Microsoft complete control over any computer connected to the internet?

Articles about Microsoft spying:

Microsoft's Software is Malware. "Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user." -- Gnu.org

How Can Any Company Ever Trust Microsoft Again? -- Computerworld UK

Microsoft handed the NSA access to encrypted messages -- The Guardian

In a democracy, citizens are allowed to participate in government. Secret government projects in the U.S. make the U.S. less of a democracy and move toward hidden control.

Articles about secret agencies often assume they are managed well. But an employee of an NSA sub-contractor, Edward Snowden, was able to copy huge amounts of data. What would stop NSA employees from listening to telephone conversations of CEOs to find inside information for profiting from buying stock, for example?

NSA = No Sales for America.

Question: Other producers of spyware have been put in prison. How does Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella avoid a court case?

I would make it open source (or at least unlocked). Locked hardware (and to a lesser extent, 'cloud' services) is one of the biggest threats to the worldwide computer community these days. It gives control of things to corporations, much like AOL was trying to do in the 90s. Who wants to be locked into the AOL world?

Right to Read is fiction, but corporations have been trying to make it reality for a long time. Walled gardens are bad for our freedom (and frankly don't improve security, either).

"... I'd rather trust the last official version of Truecrypt [7.1a] (with correct checksums) than any binary downloaded from the Veracrypt website."

When I go to the VeraCrypt web site, NoScript tells me that site uses Javascript from 3 different Microsoft web sites: aspnetcdn.com, msecnd.net, and s-msft.com.

The many connections to Microsoft web sites makes Windows 10 the world's most common spyware. Should you trust VeraCrypt when it is so closely monitored by the world's biggest spyware company?

Mozilla Foundation and Firefox are now controlled by Microsoft. Google stopped giving Mozilla Foundation $300,000,000 per year. Now Mozilla Foundation gets money from Microsoft through Yahoo. Microsoft pays Yahoo to use Microsoft's Bing Search. Yahoo pays Mozilla Foundation to use "Yahoo" search as the default in new installations of Firefox.

One of the effects of the control of the Mozilla Foundation by Microsoft is apparently that the Thunderbird and SeaMonkey Composer GUIs have been damaged, apparently deliberately. Every time you do a file save, the newer versions of both ask for a new file name, and don't suggest the last one chosen. The damage was reported several months ago, but has not been fixed.

A few of the many, many articles:

Microsoft has no plans to tell us what's in Windows patches. Each update is a black box, and it's going to stay that way.

Leaks show that Microsoft writes release notes, so why can't it publish them? The lack of documentation of Windows' updates is a baffling move on Microsoft's part.

Microsoft's Software is Malware. Malware means software designed to function in ways that mistreat or harm the user.

How Can Any Company Ever Trust Microsoft Again?

NSA Backdoor Exploit in Windows 8 Uncovered

Microsoft Gave the NSA Direct Backdoor Access to Outlook, Skype

Microsoft [lack of] Privacy Statement

Here's how to Block Windows 10 "Spying"

Also, his stuff is free.

APK Hosts File Engine is not free software. It's proprietary, and APK intends to keep it that way. When I told him that proprietary software inherently has strings attached, here's what he said, with cleaned-up formatting:

I have no reason to give up my source code to anyone. I'm under no obligation to do so. I believe coders should build their own stuff, not ride on the coattails of others. My opening up my code would cause that, and I am "not with it". The only people who have seen my code are MalwareBytes' hpHosts admin, who verified it as safe since he wouldn't have hosted it in the first place otherwise, and he recommends it above all others of its kind in fact, it's done so well.

So it's not the best choice for someone who is switching to free applications in preparation for switching to a free operating system.

Also, his stuff is free.

APK Hosts File Engine is not free software. It's proprietary, and APK intends to keep it that way. When I told him that proprietary software inherently has strings attached, here's what he said, with cleaned-up formatting:

I have no reason to give up my source code to anyone. I'm under no obligation to do so. I believe coders should build their own stuff, not ride on the coattails of others. My opening up my code would cause that, and I am "not with it". The only people who have seen my code are MalwareBytes' hpHosts admin, who verified it as safe since he wouldn't have hosted it in the first place otherwise, and he recommends it above all others of its kind in fact, it's done so well.

So it's not the best choice for someone who is switching to free applications in preparation for switching to a free operating system.

PCs were the only solution to certain problems for a long time: How do you interact with a website? How do you answer email?

And in the era of "every child should learn to code", how do you do your programming homework? Raspberry Pi?

For some consumers, yes, they'll need documents, spreadsheets, and gaming

I think the idea is that at some point everyone will become among "some consumers". But perhaps your use of "consumer", meaning someone who only views works created by others and does not create works, is misleading.

I can't think of any off the top of my head. But about a decade and a half ago, there was a proposal called Uniform Computer Information Transaction Act to make each of the several states in the United States such a jurisdiction: Why We Must Fight UCITA

The community has. I didn't know about it until this thread. So here's a link lifted from another comment! https://www.gnu.org/software/g...

And I imagine the vast majority of Linux devices out there (e.g. Android, and embedded devices) don't run most of the GNU software at all.

FSF agrees that the term "GNU/Linux" is inappropriate for Android and embedded operating environments incorporating the kernel Linux. But "GNU/Linux" is still shorter than "Linux/that/isn't/Android/or/embedded".

Actually, a lot of what I use on Linux has very little to do with GNU at all.

And unless you want to get into the crap that would be Apache/XFree86/OpenGL/Linux and other such nonsense, there's no reason to credit GNU over any other project that has contributed.

And GNU is an entirely replaceable part of an ordinary Linux distro. In fact, much of it is nothing more than those things present in BusyBox.

http://www.gnu.org/manual/blur...

It's suprisingly... bland software to be honest. Easily replaceable, many alternates, etc. and very o ften not the preferred alternatives of modern distros anyway. It forms an absolute minority by SLOC, file size or even number of executables on a typical Linux distro.

And this is exactly my point. It's as ridiculous to call it GNU/Linux as it would be to call something ClassicShell/Windows, and just as inaccurate in terms of proportion of the overall contribution.

About the biggest thing they contribute is bash, but bash is being phased out silently via symlinks to use other shells, and being pulled from the system initialisation sequences (whether I agree with that or not).

Sorry, but at one time GNU was relevant. Not any more. Those who care don't always care about the naming. And I imagine the vast majority of Linux devices out there (e.g. Android, and embedded devices) don't run most of the GNU software at all.

I don't think Tetris® was ever officially ported to GNU/Linux. The original designer of Tetris is in fact on record as an opponent of free software. He said free software "should never have existed" because it "destroys the market". It makes me wonder why the Free Software Foundation hasn't been sued yet for one of the .el files included with Emacs. The closest to Tetris for Linux is probably EA's port to Android.

"EA's port: It's in the game."

I guess "serverizing" the copylefted library in the manner you describe would have been fine in the specific case I ran into at work. The "aggregate" section of the GPL FAQ provides vague guidance as to when two programs are considered too coupled for an "aggregate" defense.

But I can think of other cases where you can't bundle a copylefted executable in the install package at all, such as porting a game to a game console using a copylefted reimplementation of the engine and assets licensed from the game's copyright owner. Console makers' developer agreements ban copylefted software.

Both in the technical sense and in the human sense.

Technical: People at Linus' caliber understand exactly the rules for signed/unsigned integer promotion and where underflow is defined (as wrap) and where it's undefined[1]. Consequently he wrote perfectly-correct code for detecting the underflow and bailing out safely. Programmers at mere mortal levels of skill, however, routinely mess this up, often causing exploitable security bugs (believe me, I do code security audits as part of a real honest living). My advice for everyone (contra Linus!) is always always always use the compiler intrinsics for integer math. Feel free to decline this advice if you are a Linus level wizard (if you were, of course, you would already feel free to decline it) but if you have to wonder if you are, you probably aren't.

Linus seems to think that the kernel should only be written by folks that don't need that kind of help -- and for that I won't argue with him. It's his baby and he can chose whether to have a small number of über-developers or a larger number of mortals. Which goes straight to the second point:

Human: People at Linus' caliber thrive on negative feedback. At their level, positive feedback means nothing because there's nothing he can learn from someone praising his work. He wrote a kernel, he knows he's good. Meanwhile negative feedback is useful (unless trivially discountable): if the complaint is right, he'll correct something he was doing wrong; if the complaint is wrong, he'll be forced to think through why. In any event, he could never imagine why someone would sugar-coat their opinion on any matter.

So it seems like his mode of communication is meant to answer that question for the former: he wants people of his caliber that don't write ugly code using arithmetic crutches and don't care about strongly worded criticism. There's nothing invalid about that either -- maybe it's true that the best model is that Linuses work in the kernel and the rest of us go up into userland where we use crutches like memory protection and higher-level constructs :-)

[1] And when behavior is undefined, a smarter compiler can remove the code-path entirely -- the kernel itself was hit by such a bug where GCC legally removed a NULL check because the pointer was dereferenced before the check. See also this reference. Then there's the sad fact that people still argue against the clear language rules that say that assert( 100 + some_int > some_int ); can always be optimized away.

Both in the technical sense and in the human sense.

Technical: People at Linus' caliber understand exactly the rules for signed/unsigned integer promotion and where underflow is defined (as wrap) and where it's undefined[1]. Consequently he wrote perfectly-correct code for detecting the underflow and bailing out safely. Programmers at mere mortal levels of skill, however, routinely mess this up, often causing exploitable security bugs (believe me, I do code security audits as part of a real honest living). My advice for everyone (contra Linus!) is always always always use the compiler intrinsics for integer math. Feel free to decline this advice if you are a Linus level wizard (if you were, of course, you would already feel free to decline it) but if you have to wonder if you are, you probably aren't.

Linus seems to think that the kernel should only be written by folks that don't need that kind of help -- and for that I won't argue with him. It's his baby and he can chose whether to have a small number of über-developers or a larger number of mortals. Which goes straight to the second point:

Human: People at Linus' caliber thrive on negative feedback. At their level, positive feedback means nothing because there's nothing he can learn from someone praising his work. He wrote a kernel, he knows he's good. Meanwhile negative feedback is useful (unless trivially discountable): if the complaint is right, he'll correct something he was doing wrong; if the complaint is wrong, he'll be forced to think through why. In any event, he could never imagine why someone would sugar-coat their opinion on any matter.

So it seems like his mode of communication is meant to answer that question for the former: he wants people of his caliber that don't write ugly code using arithmetic crutches and don't care about strongly worded criticism. There's nothing invalid about that either -- maybe it's true that the best model is that Linuses work in the kernel and the rest of us go up into userland where we use crutches like memory protection and higher-level constructs :-)

[1] And when behavior is undefined, a smarter compiler can remove the code-path entirely -- the kernel itself was hit by such a bug where GCC legally removed a NULL check because the pointer was dereferenced before the check. See also this reference. Then there's the sad fact that people still argue against the clear language rules that say that assert( 100 + some_int > some_int ); can always be optimized away.

And here's the link for that: https://www.gnu.org/software/h...

If you read the hurd paper here:

Part 1: A More Usable Approach to OS Design

Kinda rules that out, huh ?

Has anyone here ever actually tried to use a laptop on a bus?

I regularly do. The fact that my laptop's screen is only 10.1" makes it practical space-wise.

Oh, goody, I can carry around my files but not any of the expensive proprietary software installed on the work PC necessary to actually work on those files.

Then install "the expensive proprietary software" to the flash drive rather than to the computer. Or do not use proprietary software in the first place.

FYI: gcc now has integer overflow builtins

https://www.gnu.org/software/g...
Stallman called it...

Have you read "The Right to Read"?

Yes, years ago.

The problem is that there are literally billions of us and not very many of them. The Chinese have tried stuff like this for years and still can't do it. The Great Firewall of China has been a resounding flop for anyone who wants to get around it. It's got more holes than a New Orleans whorehouse.

No matter what they come up with there will always be a way around it. Until they put a chip in our brains I don't see them winning at this game.

Have you read "The Right to Read"?

Thing is, all the technology it describes is possible now, and even in use on some platforms (think iOS, where all apps must be signed by Apple, and apps are specifically prohibited from allowing the execution of arbitrary code). The only gap is in legislation, but that legislation continues to be pushed forward aggressively.

The author of that nifty little program could well find themselves in a nifty little jail cell. They've already tried it, more than once ; and they will keep trying, with the force of these new international treaties like TPP behind them.

I agree that DNS-level blocking is effective. It was effective for TWX, who blocked ads on a DNS proxy built into a home router. But it relies on an anomaly in the present web advertising market, namely that ads are delivered from a different hostname from the rest of the site. Thus a site can defeat it by serving the ads and the rest of the site from the same hostname.

the program I built for custom hosts file generation is completely FREE, no strings attached

Does it come with the ability and right to make and distribute improved versions? If not, that's a string.

It is nice to know that self proclaimed "Trekies" are taking the intellectual property that once belonged to Paramount Pictures.

There is no such thing as "intellectual property", and you can't "take" it.

The copyrights to TOS episodes belong to, IIRC, CBS. But these fan-made episodes are not those TOS episodes.

These fan-made episodes might be argued to be "derivative works", but even if they are noncommercial creation and sharing of such is fair use and so does not infringe those copyrights.

content creators and content consumers

The use of the loaded terms "content", "consumer", and "creator" is slightly confusing. I prefer "users who create works" ("authors") for short and "users who view works created by others" ("viewers" for short). But terminology aside:

So these two [author and viewer] camps want very different things, and we're seeing the start of a market split into those camps. It is inevitable that when the PC market falls down below a point, economies of scale won't be there and the prices will rise

At first, I sort of agreed with your core sentiment that the economies of scale for devices for creating works may evaporate as walled garden mobile devices continue to gain popularity among pure viewers. But there will still be a need for devices on which university students can prepare homework, and a locked-down walled-garden device such as an iPad isn't quite ideal for a freshman computer science course. On the one hand, this means that at least university students will form a market for PCs. On the other hand, it could justify overcharging for PCs the way publishers overcharge for textbooks.

Slashdot users' opinion on this issue appears split. Some users, such as betterunixthanunix and one Anonymous Coward, think children will be harmed by lack of access to devices designed for creating works. Others, such as geekoid and another Anonymous Coward, think used laptops and Raspberry Pi single-board computers ought to be enough for anyone.

The GPL says nothing about users of the software.

Wrong. The GPL says:

This License explicitly affirms your unlimited permission to run the unmodified Program.

This is essential - and something notably missing from much proprietary software. (Take a look through the license agreement for Word or Photoshop sometime.) The GNU project has a list of four freedoms that, by their definition, free software must permit, of which the first is:

The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0).

Again, this is a freedom exercised by the *users* of the software.

Of the remaining items on the list, two of them involve tinkering with the source code, which is difficult if you're not a programmer. But, short of giving people free programming lessons, there's nothing more you can do in the license agreement to protect this freedom than to ensure that they can ask anyone (not just the author, or authorised redistributors) for help with it. And that's not a trivial thing: it ensures that, ultimately, the user is not dependent on the original author, which fundamentally changes the power dynamic between them.

The GPL says nothing about users of the software.

Wrong. The GPL says:

This License explicitly affirms your unlimited permission to run the unmodified Program.

This is essential - and something notably missing from much proprietary software. (Take a look through the license agreement for Word or Photoshop sometime.) The GNU project has a list of four freedoms that, by their definition, free software must permit, of which the first is:

The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0).

Again, this is a freedom exercised by the *users* of the software.

Of the remaining items on the list, two of them involve tinkering with the source code, which is difficult if you're not a programmer. But, short of giving people free programming lessons, there's nothing more you can do in the license agreement to protect this freedom than to ensure that they can ask anyone (not just the author, or authorised redistributors) for help with it. And that's not a trivial thing: it ensures that, ultimately, the user is not dependent on the original author, which fundamentally changes the power dynamic between them.

As usual, the GNU GPL does not restrict what people do in software; it just stops them from restricting others.