Slashdot Mirror
Linuxworld Fun
The Linuxworld Expo is now in full swing, and there's a variety of news. The BBC has an overview. Microsoft has a booth at the Expo in the section intended for "new, up-and-coming companies". Sun is rolling out servers running Linux. And VA Software - Slashdot's owner - is moving Sourceforge.net to IBM's database software.
I'm just waiting for someone to start defacing the Microsoft booth. This will make us look REALLLY good to the corporate world.
Now, I'm no real Microsoft Affectionado, but this is probably the single most insightful thing I ever heard from a Microsoft representative. People don't want to fiddle with anything on their computers, just use the standard apps. Heck, most users don't even change their background nor their colours (God help them, the day they get XP!).
I know this is going straight against the mantra on slashdot "choice-is-good", but normal users have no base on what to make a "choice", and there inflexibility is good: it makes the normal user feel "good" about his (non)choice. How many times have I told people to switch from Lookout Express to a better email client (especially when they just got infected by the virus/worm of the day), but it doesn't help: they are familiar with it, it comes with the computer and everyone uses it. That's infexibility, and the users are inflexible, hence they need inflexible software. Sad but true.
quite simply, VA is preparing to be bought out by IBM.
four-oh-four
And VA Software - Slashdot's owner - is moving Sourceforge.net to IBM's database software.
I think this is a much bigger story then linux kernel 2.34.56 is released, yet its a one liner? Next time you wanna bury a story throw it into a slashback or a jon katz story.
four-oh-four
http://savannah.gnu.org/phpsysinfo/
OK EVERYONE move all their projects from VA's 8+ high end servers and bandwidth with a compile farm attached, to the 1 server (with ide drives) that savannah has. I'm sure savannah can take the load. look their system has 20 gigs of space to use (not in the audio-video dir), don't you think that it can hold all the worthwhile free software? Come on everyone! grab your files and GOOOO sf is obviously sucky now since they are going to use... *GASP* a paid for program.
I mean seriously guys.. no one else can replace what sf.net does for our community so SHUT THE FUCK UP unless you have a good pipe, a pile of servers, and some time to take the sf.net code base and modify it to your microcosm of a vision for how it SHOULD be done.
I have two projects on SourceForge. Please tell me when exactly should I expect problems. I hadn't single SourceForge problem yet.
Not exactly into being proactive, are we.
The concerns are (a) difficulty to extract meta-data from SF (already mentioned), (b) the uncertainty of whether or not the free (beer) SF service will be around for the forseeable future, even for non-commercial, free projects, and (c) the uncertainly as to whether or not VA will be around to offer the service, in any form, for the forseeable future.
Contrast this with the FSF, which is a charity that has been around since the eighties (at least), isn't going to 'go under' like the rest of the dot bomb anytime soon, if ever, and will never pull the kinds of stunts SF does to make obtaining and extracting one's information more difficult over time, or to change the conditions of use.
It isn't about predicting trouble with certainty, it is about recognizing a vulnerability and doing something about it before the problem can arise.
But it is your project, so if you prefer to wait until trouble actually arises, that is your perogative, and in the end, your fault.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
I don't mean to burst your bubble, but Microsoft knows everything it needs to know to "offer ways for both systems to peacefully coexist."
On the technology front, the source for anything linux is there. But why would they need that? They have been involved with writing UNIX programs for quite a while. Its code is in SCO unixware. Hell, they wrote Xenix, their own UNIX operating system!
Peacefully coexist!? They could start by NOT building anti-GPL verbage into their license agreements.
Look, the bottom line is that Microsoft wants to destroy this open source community.
rhadc