Linux Continues March On China

elucidus writes: "A government-sponsored software development group in China unveiled a version of the Linux operating system it has developed that it said will eventually replace Windows and Unix on all of its government PCs and servers. Called Yangfan Linux, which means 'raise the sail' in Chinese, the open source operating system is being pieced together by the Beijing Software Industry Productivity Center, a group established by the government to organize Linux development in China." Update: 08/14 22:34 GMT by T : Note that the story from which this text is drawn originally appeared in InfoWorld; thanks to writer Matt Berger for pointing this out. Read on below for a bit more, and some interesting links.

"The source code for Yangfan was made available last week under the GNU General Public License. The group is now collecting feedback and will continue improving the operating system.

The group has also done significant work localizing the operating system to support Chinese-language characters, which will be contributed back into the Linux community, according to Jon 'Maddog' Hall, director of Linux International.

Yangfan is based on two distributions of the Linux operating system. One is the distribution developed by Chinese Linux vendor Red Flag Software. The second is a version of the operating system called Cosix Linux, developed by China Computer Software Corp."

Reader kchris59 points to these articles at The Screen Savers and at chinadaily.com.cn which provide some more insight on what's going on behind that firewall.

Comments

So, was Steve Ballmer right?

[richie2000]

Is Open Source Communism? Discuss among yourselves. :-)

Re:So, was Steve Ballmer right?

[Anonymous Coward]

Great, unfunny swedes. Just what we don't need.

Re:So, was Steve Ballmer right?

[FooBarWidget]

China is only communist by name. Their economy is, in fact, a mix between communism and capitalism. There are lots of capitalist companies in China. When you walk over the street, you'll be flooded with ads.

Actually, the US' economy is also a mix between capitalism and socialism, no matter how much people deny it. Think Social Security and that kind of things.

Re:So, was Steve Ballmer right?

[frp001]

I would not consider Social security as communism. OTOH giving out (or even selling) stocks and shares to employees looks like communism to me -> Putting the business in the hands of the workers!!

Re:So, was Steve Ballmer right?

[FooBarWidget]

But it is a socialistic program.

Re:So, was Steve Ballmer right?

[Jesus IS the Devil]

It is a communistic policy. Think of pure communism on one end of the rainbow and pure capitalism on the other end. The U.S. is probably 3/4 of the way toward pure capitalism end and China is probably 3/4 of the way toward pure communism.

And don't think the U.S. doesn't ever learn toward communism either. In times of war, turmoil, and economic collapse we start thinking and voting more socialistic. And in times of prosperity and peace we vote more capitalistic.

Supporting Chinese characters

[jonasj]

The group has also done significant work localizing the operating system to support Chinese-language characters, which will be contributed back into the Linux community

Uhm, why does Linux need to be localized to support Chinese characters? Doesn't the thing use Unicode?

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a lot more complicated than that.

Unicode is a step in the right direction, but there are still different ways of encapsulating Unicode.

I mean, transferring an 'A', (ASCII code 65), in unicode is generally NOT done like this:

0 0 0 0 65

that's wasteful.

There are encodings that 'escape' from a one or two byte encoding in to the higher-order ones. You really need to read the full spec to understand it properly.

Also, a lot of people don't really properly understand the way Eastern languages such as Chinese work. For example, some of the same *characters* might be used in Chinese and Japanese, but if you write Chinese in a Japanese *font*, it will look very unusual to a Chinese national. Compare it to writing English using Greek characters, and you will get some idea of what I mean. To foreign students of Eastern languages, the differences might look very minimal, but these are all important issues.

Also, I am not sure about Chinese, but in Japanese, you certainly need to include ruby text, (small characters alongside or underneath the main writing, usually to indicate pronunciation - you will have seen it on the lyrics to Anime theme music).

Yet another thing, you have to address vertical/horizontal writing.

Input methods, as well, there are so many ways to input Eastern languages. What about if somebody needs to mix in Korean in the same document, for example. Very, very, complicated issues.

Incidently, for anybody wanting to do all this - the latest version of EMACS is about the best thing to use, in my opinion, with LEIM installed - you can mix scripts, and use sensible input methods, it's great. Not ideal for word processing, but it gets the job done.

Any other questions about Eastern word processing, just ask.

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[Anonymous Coward]

I am often quick to critcise Microsoft, and infact use Linux exclusively, but I must say that I have not heard many complaints about their support of Eastern languages *** IN THAT LOCALISED VERSION OF WINDOWS***.

What I do think is an issue of the upmost concern is their lack of support for Eastern languages in the non-specific localised version of Windows.

How do people who use Windows do things like mixed Chinese/Japanese/Korean/Vietnamese/English word processing!?!?!? I have never been able to work that out. What do all the translation companies use???

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[Yokaze]

First, when speaking of Linux, one usually speaks of a whole bunch of software and not all software might support unicode.

Second, Unicode is just an encoding (or a set of encodings).

All the messages have to be translated, the applications have to be checked whether the display is correct or not.
The layout may be incorrect. Not to mention that the application might rely on some assumptions, which are correct for latin1, but not for other character-sets.

Not to mention that several applications aren't prepared to be localised.

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[Anonymous Coward]

First, when speaking of Linux, one usually speaks of a whole bunch of software

That's a common problem. Maybe we should think of something else to call the OS as a whole? I know, what about GNU?

*duck* ;) (troll, possibly (until I wrote this), but I actually consider that a good idea personally)

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[Yarn]

Heh, I remember at school when we got our first Windows 3 machines, some guy was certain you could translate to greek by typing in English then setting the 'Symbol' font.

Laurence Brice, are you still out there. heh.

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[leonbrooks]

the applications have to be checked whether the display is correct or not.

Ah. A Windows programmer. (-:

Use something like Tk or Qt (yes, you can use both of those on Windows and Macintosh as well as Linux/UNIX/*BSD) and the dialogs etc pretty much sort themselves out. That doesn't mean that all of your problems are solved in one go, but it does mean that such issues crop up only around 5% as often.

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[jonhuang]

Where to begin? Oh heck, I'll do all of it. Their languages are stupid. They weren't well-planned or thoughtout at all. Er.. no. With the exceptions of klingon, esperanto, and elvish, no language is planned--especially one over 4000 years old. The languages haven't evolved from their "one unique character per object" aspect in hundreds of years. Actually, chinese is composed of a number of radicals (around 200), which forms the basis for a particularly advanced form of character input. On a computer with decent algorithms, a skilled radical typist can easily type an order of magnitude faster than a western typist--no "word" should take more than three strokes. Personally, I think that Chinese is dying as a written language since more and more Chinese are becoming functionally illiterate as their birth rate increases. a) chinese literacy in increasing as income increases. b) chinese birthrates... the one child policy? Stop watching O'Reilly. The government of China should create a new language. a) And we should switch to metric. b) They already did, it's called simplified chinese and is much easier to learn. -jon

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[jasonditz]

The millenia old Chinese language was poorly designed to not consider information age concerns. Its not THAT hard to learn, and the illiteracy rate is not that high. Note that China is not the only country to use Chinese... suppose the Americans decided to invent a new English alphabet that was easier to write.

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[jonadab]

> Reading Ideograms IS FASTER THAN READING ALPHABET BASED SCRIPTS.

This is at least partly because most alphabetic writing systems
pad most words out with fluff that makes _learning_ to read
them easier. Vowells as distinct characters (as opposed to
diacritical marks as in Hebrew), spaces, punctuation, capitals.
These all help a society increase its literacy rate (well,
capitals are disputable), because they ease learning, but they
are unnecessary for a person skilled in the language (and
skilled in the writing system and practiced at reading without
spaces and distinct vowells) and make the writing take up more
space, making reading less efficient.

Anyway, speed of reading is less important to a computer
interface than speed of data entry. The latter is always
a good deal slower, and thus is the bottleneck. Yes, I
know the writing system was not designed for computers,
but we were talking (originally, at any rate) about why
Chinese is harder for computers to support properly.

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[Anonvmous Coward]

heh. That kinda reminds me of that Far Side cartoon where some scientists are trying to decipher the Dolphin language. They were extremely frustrated because they couldn't figure out why the translator kept saying 'ah blow ess pan yol.'

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[jonadab]

> With the exceptions of klingon, esperanto, and elvish, no
> language is planned

Aside from the fact that you left out Songo (probably the most
important planned language, since it is the most important trade
language in much of central Africa, with French and English coming
in second and third), you are talking at cross-purposes with the
original poster. You are talking about _language_, and while the
OP used the _word_ language, he was really talking about writing
systems, as was clear in context. Unlike languages, writing
systems generally _are_ deliberately invented and planned. (Hop
over to omniglot.com and browse around for a while, and count how
many writing systems they indicate were deliberately developed.)

> On a computer with decent algorithms, a skilled radical
> typist can easily type an order of magnitude faster than
> a western typist--no "word" should take more than three
> strokes.

This implies that the number of possible words in the language
is not more than about P(30,3) + P(30,2) + P(30,1), and in
practice (since some combinations will invariably be insensible)
probably not more than P(30,3) (the number of permutations of 30
strokes taken 3 at a time), which comes to fewer than 25000 words
and is probably generous at that.

As an English speaker, that sounds like an incredibly minute
vocabulary to me. Perhaps this is due mainly to the expansive
vocabulary of English, generally considered to exceed that of
any other language, but still... 25000 is SO few, even the
_smallest_ English lexicons, intended for gradeschool children,
boast _substantially_ more entries than that.

If by "word" you really meant "syllable", then what you say makes
more sense. Omniglot says there are about 1700 syllables possible
in Mandarin (presumably this is since it has fewer consonants than
English). This does not account for homophones (some are
distinguishable to native speakers, Mandarin being a tonal
language, and more importantly for our purposes they are written
distinctly), but the 25000 figure has ample room in it for that.
Still, some words can be numerous syllables long. One example
given at omniglot is schizophrenia, at five syllables. 5x3=15;
if a couple of syllables don't use all three strokes that's maybe
12 strokes. (Yes, I'm guesstimating.) Sure, it's a moderately
complicated word and is 13 letters in English too, but that's
pretty similar; as near as I can tell that makes the two languages
essentially comparable; claims that Mandarin is significantly
_faster_ to type would seem to be unwarranted.

What you fail to point out is that besides the traditional
ideographic system (Zhongwen), Chinese is also written with
assorted other systems, including at least one alphabetic system
(which still looks very like chicken scratchings to the Western
eye, but nevermind _that_).

It is trivial to demonstrate that alphabetic writing systems
have significant advantages from a programming standpoint.
However, it's also a well-regarded maxim in the (modern)
computer industry that it's easier to make the programmers do
hard things than it is to make the users do hard things. Which
raises the question: what is the big advantage (to humans) of
ideographic writing that justifies the extra programming effort?
Other than "we've always done it that way", I mean.

As I understand it (and my understanding is limited here, so
if there's an actual philologist or Chinese scholar about,
please chime in), the primary difficulty with using Chinese
alphabetic writing systems is that the pronunciation differs
significantly from region to region (way moreso than with the
various regional accents in the US), and using an alphabetic
system requires a (relatively) standardised pronunciation, if
people from various areas need to read it. Ideographic systems
have more latitude in that regard, since the way a word is
written is not tied nearly so directly to the exact details of
how it is pronounced.

That (as I understand it) is why it's worth the effort for someone
to do the (substantial) extra work to create full software support
for the various non-alphabetic Asian writing systems, of which
Chinese (Zhongwen) is probably foremost. (The primary Japanese
writing system, as I understand it, is a syllabary, which should
be easier to support than ideographs, at least in theory. Hangul
("Korean"), it seems, uses an alphabet.)

Re:Supporting Chinese characters

[gotr00t]

This 'ruby text' you talk of, I really don't think that it's present in Chinese. Either you're talking about 'pinyin' which is a system (usually not included with the characters) that shows the pronounciation of a certain character (a lot of characters have the same pronounciation, and a lot of characters have more than one pronounciation, making it useful only for learning). Or, you're talking about 'bu' or 'pang', the small portions of the characters that are like 'modifiers'.

And you are right about the font issue and the encoding. There is Traditional Chinese (complex and ugly, but traditional) and Simplified Chinese ( simpel and pretty, but overly 'communist'). When a simplified document is put under a traditional encoding (BIG5, for example) it just dosen't make sense.

Time for new linux slogan

[af_robot]

Choise Linux - a billion Chinese can't be wrong

Re:Time for new linux slogan

[Spaaaaaam]

That would be choise as in "Freedom of Choise"?

Re:Time for new linux slogan

[yatest5]

Choise Linux - a billion Chinese can't be wrong

Is that like 'Choose communism - a billion Chinese can't be wrong'?

Re:Time for new linux slogan

[sql*kitten]

Choise Linux - a billion Chinese can't be wrong

I wonder, given China's record on Human Rights, whether the Linux community will find itself in a similar situation to IBM?

Re:Time for new linux slogan

[DarkZero]

Throw dissidents in jail and torture them - a billion Chinese can't be wrong

This is great for China

[Zemran]

I really do think this is great for China BUT I cannot see this effecting me. I do not think I am going to rush out and get a copy to play with... I think any tools etc. that they develop will be specific to thier needs and unlikely to be of use to me. Good luck to them and I wish them well.

Re:This is great for China

[Lucky_Pierre]

Most of the world's computer hardware is made by Taiwanese companies with factories in mainland China.....who do you think writes the drivers???

If Linux becomes big in China and Taiwan, hardware support is no longer going to be a problem.

By the way, the oldest and best Chinese Linux distro is Linpus from Taiwan:

http://www.linpus.com.tw/main.htm

Re:This is great for China

[pr0nbot]

Much of the work to localise to Chinese (e.g. broadening UNICODE support) will benefit other localisation efforts. This in turn could mean broader adoption of Linux, since language is a big barrier to adoption - one that MS recognizes.

Internet-ready Microwave Oven

[jukal]

They make rather interesting products and concepts Redflag Linux, including this Internet ready Microwave Oven design concept. Thanks for posting this article Timothy, these companies seem like worth following!

Re:Internet-ready Microwave Oven

[Spaaaaaam]

Oh my God, it's still frozen - something's wrong with the microwave. Damn haX0rs... :)

Re:Internet-ready Microwave Oven

[kwishot]

I'll second that.... I was expecting some dumb american version that plays mp3s and dances or something stupid, but it seems as if their "smart" appliances will actually have legitimate uses and seem quite innovative. I just wonder how long a) it will take for these to seep into US/European markets or b) US/European manufacturers and engineers to get the same mindset for useful devices. ....... I'm counting on the former =P

-kwishot

Re:Internet-ready Microwave Oven

[JacobO]

From the article: "express and conspicuous audible and visible prompt in case there is a need to alter the user."

I wish my software was able to alter the user.

Oh darn

[Datasage]

... Thats one billion windows licences microsoft wont sell... i wonder if the calculate that as a loss?

Re:Oh darn

[kwishot]

I wonder if the RIAA is reading this....
Same concept, different context.

"But we would have sold X million copies of that cd..."

Re:Oh darn

[cozziewozzie]

That's one billion copies in lost sales due to piracy. Quick, we need more laws to stop them pirating communists!

Re:Oh darn

[archen]

I'm sure they can write of the 5 copies they sell in China

Re:Oh darn

[maxconfus]

MS won't even miss it. While at a conference not so long ago a question was posed to a MS rep about how MS was doing in Asia considering the failing economy there. The response was something like MS has not lost a thing since very few have legitimate licenses to use the software in the first place. So no harm to MS. Sorry to disappoint.

Windows clone

[JollyTX]

There was a story recently about China developing its own Windows clone. Was that false or a misunderstanding?

Really, if they wanted a free Windows, it'd be stupid not to build upon Wine.

Re:Windows clone

[Spaaaaaam]

Hey, while you're on the subject - why don't you go back and read all the stuff that was said about their free windows. That way maybe next time, you'll have something on topic to say. It's one thing /. spitting old stories back at us all the time, but we can't blame them when people like you seem to be calling out for them...

Re:Windows clone

[1u3hr]

There was a story recently about China developing its own Windows clone. Was that false or a misunderstanding?

Yes, it was a misunderstanding, caused by no one, especially the brain-dead editors, reading past the first paragraph of the story referenced in the People's Daily. So there were hundreds of bullshit posts about "cloning the Windows API", "Wine" etc, etc; when actually the substance was Open Office on Red Flag Linux.

Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[t0qer]

That could provide a cultural insight as to why china would be so open to open source?

As an american slashdotter, i'd like to point out why the US doesn't more readily adopt linux.

1. Microsoft lobbyist
2. Microsoft license sweeps
3. Microsoft Strongarm tactics
4. [insert your own M$ reason]

Technically from what I know of Bill Gates (throwing a fit at ppl pirating his altair basic) and what I know of chinese copyright laws (nearly non-existant) I guess the only conclusion is it's quality that is winning out in china.

I have heard about the open markets in china where you can purchase bootlegs of any software for near the cost of the CD. If the choice is between M$ at .5 dollars and Linux at .5 dollars linux wins.

Sorry, I was just kinda scrapin for some insightfullness there.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[G-funk]

You miss the only important reason:

Microsoft tax.

Microsoft is a fuckin huge company,and they pay a lot of tax (although not enough i'm sure), and all their employees can go out and buy stuff, and pay tax on that.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[mirko]

A lot of tax ?
Read this :
"Microsoft enjoyed more than $12 billion in total tax breaks over the past five years. Microsoft, in fact, actually paid no tax at all in 1999, despite $12.3 billion in reported U.S. profits. Microsoft's tax rate for the past two years was only 1.8 percent on $21.9 billion in pre-tax U.S. profits."

Never underestimate GwB's close friends.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[mentin]

As an american slashdotter, i'd like to point out why the US doesn't more readily adopt linux. 2. Microsoft license sweeps

Strange, I thought (and all computer magazines agreed) that license sweeps push people towards Linux. Just thing about it: if MS rise price or more strictly enforces licenses, people have to pay more. So they look for alternatives. So they switch to Linux. A lot of articles at /. blamed MS for license sweeps.

Am I wrong?

Oh, no, forget about this. As a good slashdotter you learned that you can simultaneously blame Microsoft for doing and not doing the same things.

Re: Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Black Parrot]

> That could provide a cultural insight as to why china would be so open to open source?

IANAChinese, but I would guess that the less cozy a country's relationship with the USA, the quicker that country will adopt OSS and/or non-Made-in-the-USA software, for a variety of reasons.

• as a symbol of cultural independence from American hegemony
• (for communist countries) as an explicit rejection of US IT companies as symbols of capitalism
• for reasons of national security

Regarding that last one, I don't know whether there's any spyware in Windows or not, but I do know that spyware happens, and if I ran a country I don't think I'd rely on any concept of basic human honesty to assure me that MS & the US government weren't in cahoots, systematically shipping software to spy on my country.

Heck, if I were a petty dictator I would probably try using spyware on my neighbors.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[sql*kitten]

1. Microsoft lobbyist
2. Microsoft license sweeps
3. Microsoft Strongarm tactics
4. [insert your own M$ reason]

Idiot. The US doesn't more readily adopt Linux because Joe User and his Grandma don't want to mess around with recompiling their kernels and editing text based configuration files and bitching to hardware manufacturers about device drivers in order to write letters, play games and email pictures of their kids and puppies to each other. If Microsoft didn't exist, Linux would still be confined to the tech community, and Apple (or Commodore or Acorn or whoever) would dominate the consumer and desktop space.

Face it, for 99% of computer users, Linux simply isn't suitable, at least not at the moment.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Spunk]

Yes. The fact that Microsoft paid no taxes in a year that Clinton was president is obviously Bush's fault. Truly, your logic is impeccable.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[mirko]

I indeed added a comment about the social link between GwB and BG but you're compiling both of my statements a little too fast, aren't you ?

You obviously forget the following:

• Being GwB's friend doesn't imply not being Clinton's
  
• It could also be interpreted as : the presidents are usually happy to be on the world richests' good side (unless they are extreme leftists)
  
• it is under GwB, however, that the DoJ stopped suing Microsoft.
  

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Busty Amateur]

(offtopic)

I'm one of the least qualified people to correct mistakes, but your question should read:

Are there any chinese slashdotters?

(/offtopic)

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[JWW]

Yes, but your initial post would have been better without the political rhetoric.

The scariest part of your first post is, it doesnt MATTER who is president, Microsoft pays no taxes. This kind of thing is the real reason why it would be better for corporations to pay no tax at all. Because their tax avoidance practices (expensing stock options anyone) are really pushing many of corporations' cook the books policies.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Moridineas]

Why don't they pay any tax? I don't know the full reasons obviously, but I bet part of it is the INSANE amount of money MS and Bill Gates give to charities, foundations, schools, etc.

People talk all the time about how greedy and all Gates is, but they don't realize he gives away more money in a day then most people will make in a lifetime. My school for instance has gotten somewhere around 40 million dollars from Gates in the past couple years--one of my computer science professors joked that "with the amount of money microsoft gave us for this room [a special MS room in comp sci building" we could have plated it in gold and had money to spare." -- they didn't plate it in gold but they bought the biggest widescreen flatpanel computer monitor I've ever seen.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Bilibala]

what you know of a chinese laws is actually incorrect. Chinese copyright laws, or any laws for that matter in China are plentiful and just as strict, if not more strict then other countries. The problem is that the local government doesn't usually apply these laws. Reasons for not applying them are up to your imagination... You can be assured though once applied, the implications could be many.

cost of pirated CDs actually is around HK$15 (US$2) the closer you go to big cities... the price drops the further you go.

The main reason China is going for linux is because it suddenly give China a hope of an equal footing with the software technology the US is using. By promoting linux for over 1.3 Billion people, there's a very good chance China will overtake US in technology.

all in all, I think China just wants to piss US off

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Jason Earl]

I am not Chinese, but it would seem the answer is fairly obvious. The primary reason that China is looking at Free Software is that Free Software is less expensive than the alternatives. This sort of thing didn't matter before the WTO started pressing China to stamp out software piracy, but it does now.

The second reason that Free Software is advantageous to the Chinese is that it allows them to bootstrap their own software economy instead being second or third class citizens in an American-led software economy. Their are plenty of bright folks in China who can write software. China would much rather put them to work than to pay software developers from overseas to do the work for them. The fact that Chinese developers are far less expensive than American ones doesn't hurt either.

The third reason has to do with Chinese national security. China has no idea what is in most U.S. written commercial software, but they do know that versions of Excell shipped with a flight simulator, and that before it was GPLed Interbase had a backdoor password for years. It's hard enough trusting commercial software on the very best of days, but trusting commercial software written by foreign nationals is a very sticky subject if you happen to be the Chinese government.

One thing is certain, China is not afraid of Microsoft. Microsoft and the BSA might seem scary to companies in the United States, but China is a sovereign nation (and a powerful one at that). If the BSA got too pushy the Chinese government could run their representatives over with tanks and there would be nothing that the BSA could do about it. China is cleaning up its act as regards to software piracy only because the U.S. has threatened to put sanctions on Chinese trade if they didn't. The U.S. market is important to the Chinese, and so they are trying to comply.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[The_Sock]

Substitute money with software licenses, like they really give, and you see it's not as much as you think.

Them giving away one software license shows up as them giving away $X (insert "value" of product here). Sure, they do give away some money, but far less then they let on. They mostly give away licenses for MS products.

Also remember.. Them donating hardware/money + licenses to schools only keeps up their monopoly, so are their reasons so wholesome now?

And the fact that the amount given to charity is very small compaired to their profits, joe blow giving $20 to charity once a week makes a bigger sacrifice.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Moridineas]

I'm sorry, but your post is not really true. For one, it's NOT just software licenses that Microsoft gives. I told you for one about thE MS room at my school, not to mention they are building an entire new building now named after Gates' wife (Duke University--check me out if you don't believe it). This is not built with software licenses.

Secondly, your assertion that MS doesn't give much to charity is also incorrect. As near as I could find MS gave almost 37 million dollars in 2001. This doesn't even count the salaries of the people employed by its charitable foundations. They donated 180 million worth of software--which again is hardly inconsiderable. How much of a sacrifice it is, is a ridiculous classist argument--MS's 37 million hard cash can do more good than a life time of Joe's $20.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Snover]

No, there is no chinese slashdotters, but you might need to be asking "is there any English slashdotters?" since you obviously need to work on your English a bit.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[t0qer]

I'm one of the least qualified people to correct mistakes, but your question should read:

Are there any chinese slashdotters?

It's fine to use Is at the beginning of a sentance as long as it isn't followed by a directive pronoun.. I.E.

Is you correct on grammar.

In that case, are would grammatically correct in the beginning of the sentace. (Unless you have an ebonics influence)

There was not a directive pronoun, it's an indirective pronoun therefore my grammar was correct.

And you can fuck off for trying to point that out.

--CC honors english motherfucker.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[dalutong]

you've already gotten a reply from a "pure" Chinese -- now you get to get one from a "pure" "laowai" (old foreigner) who grew up in china and has CCP (chinese communist party) buddies and whose father works for the U.S. gov't (so therefore gets to hear the U.S. side)

The Chinese people love windows. The government doesn't. What the other poster said about WTO and all is one of there issues with it, but a larger, and older, issue is one of control.

MS has been accused and convicted of many things. One of those things is having backdoors in their software (netscape developers are weenies).

The NSA has to check the source for windows if it wants to get used in gov't agencies. this means that the U.S. National Securty Agency has seen these backdoors (maybe has a special non-backdoor version? i don't know) and can therefore break into all chinese computers.

or at least that's what the chinese gov't is paranoid about.

with linux, this is not an issue. they can have their little software security group members spend all day checking out the code of the "approved" distros (Red Flag, for instance, is sold in more places than Red Hat is) and the popular unapproved ones to make sure that the chinese gov't isn't being spied on.

after that, the WTO and licences thing comes then, then the Confucius thing.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Busty Amateur]

Oooh! Big boy writes back!

How come you didn't have the cojones to post this shit when moderators were still looking? Now you can run along and remove a karma point from my account, and I don't really care.

Because in the end, it *is* correct to say: "Are there any chinese slashdotters."

See you in the funny pages.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[t0qer]

And this brilliant english advice is coming from a person named busty.. wonderful.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Busty Amateur]

As opposed to some l33t skr1pt k1dd13 who has a number in his name. Fuck you and your prejudice.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[t0qer]

What's your fuckin problem with me? Where do you get off callin me prejudice? I point out to you the difference between a direct and indirect pronoun and you have a fit.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[Busty Amateur]

More terrific english from t0qer:

Where do you get off callin me prejudice?

should be:

Where do you get off calling me prejudiced

Shine on, you crazy english major.

Re:Is there any chinese slashdotters?

[t0qer]

You forgot the question mark dumbass. Adding a "D" to the end of prejudice makes it past tense, and we're not talking about the past, we're talking about the present.

You have the attention span of a gerbil and the english skills to match.

linux, communism, humor

[bani]

Whenever I hear "linux" and "chinese" in the same sentence, I always get this image of Microsoft waging a 1950s-mccarthy propaganda war:

"When you use Linux,
you're using COMMUNISM"

I guess I've been tainted by http://www.modernhumorist.com/mh/0004/propaganda/m p3.jpg

Re:linux, communism, humor

[oliverthered]

The funny thing is, what you are saying is compleatly true!

GPL is all but comunist, because it removes ownership from a single person.

ELUA's are super capatilist (more like corporate state capatilist) because the enforce the ownership with the software producer.

Re:linux, communism, humor

[kubrick]

GPL is all but comunist, because it removes ownership from a single person.

Not necessarily. GPL depends on copyright to enforce the wishes of the author -- that's why use by those others than the author is 'licensed'. The author also has the freedom to re-license the code, or derivatives, under a different license if she so chooses.

Maybe we need a Socialist Public License, for people to release things like DeCSS under -- "Don't blame me, it's the fault of the populace at large!" :)

Re:linux, communism, humor

[oliverthered]

I aggree that GPL isn't totaly comunist, it is nearly pure comunist.

Once you release code under GPL you have effectivly relenquished everyones copyright on the GPL'd code,
you can ofcorse also release a non-GPL version. but the GPL version will always be GPL, so long as someone else has a copy.

Re:linux, communism, humor

[kubrick]

No. Relinquishing copyright would be the same as releasing code into the public domain. As it is, the author of GPL'd code can sue to protect their moral rights if the code is being used in a way that does not comply with the GPL, because and *only* because they still hold copyright over the code.

Basically, the GPL is an elegant hack to use the idea of copyright against people making money from intellectual property, whether or not that IP was their own invention to begin with.

Re:linux, communism, humor

[The_Guv'na]

If they really wanted to piss the US off, they'd call it Afganny Linux!

Err, maybe I should let this morning brew soak in a little longer before posting...

Ali

Re:linux, communism, humor

[JanneM]

Not really. You retain all rights as a copyright holder. What you really are doing is allowing people to use your property in any way they please, as long as they "pay" by extending the same courtecy in turn.

It does _not_ in any way remove ownership. Given that you have not accepted patches from anyone else, nothing prevents you from releasing another version under any license you want. Of course, you can not 'ungrant' a license (like GPL) from a version already released. What you are thinking of is perhaps the sometimes practice of granting FSF the copyright - in that case you do lose ownership, but it is a separate action that has nothing to do with GPL (and that most people would not want to do).

/Janne

Re:linux, communism, humor

[Tony-A]

because it removes ownership from a single person.
True. It's owned by each person who has the program. Not shared ownership, but each person fully owns it and can do anything they like with it (except depriving other owners of their rights). This increases, guess what? CAPITAL!

Re:linux, communism, humor

[zenyu]

GPL is all but comunist, because it removes ownership from a single person.

Um, no. as the author of some GPL'd and LGPL'd programs, I'm the only one who can relicense the code for unrestricted commercial use.

EULA's are anti-capitalists because they deter competition. When I put something under GPL anyone can figure out how it works and write a clone, add some features and compete with my implementation. A EULA often makes figuring out how the program works a licence violation, even reading the machine code is disallowed in some cases. So it acts to restrict competition since no amount of capital will get you a clone of their protocols legally. Hence they restrict the flow of capital and enforce a government coerced monopoly, i.e. communism. Actually socialism, cuz there is still a quasi-democratic government that could theoretically make EULA's illegal.

Re:linux, communism, humor

[oliverthered]

If you only had communism then evrything would be licenced in the same way as GPL.

GPL is a communist framework in a capatilist world.

Capatilism has nothing to do with competition, ELUA's enforce the ownership of whatever you using, they say you don't own a copy I do.

Re:linux, communism, humor

[kubrick]

The GPL enforces socialism, to an extent, by people other than the author, but you are only obliged to deliver source code, or source code modifications, to those people you have distributed the binary to, not to society at large. Thus "society" is limited to the society of people using the code, and this can be kept small while obeying the terms of the license if all parties agree on this.

The author still owns the code, and the copyright on the code. (However, they can't "take back" any release under the GPL, but they can improve the code and choose to release it under a proprietary license.) Thus, the GPL is not explicitly communist, as it still permits ownsership of software by the author (in fact, it's about the only form of intellectual property it does recognise), and this ownership is necessary for the GPL to be effective, otherwise the license could not be enforced.

You are looking at the software from the perspective of use/consumption, while I am looking at it from the perspective of a content producer and programmer, which is how I make my living. I assure you, the distinctions I am making are important to me as an author of software.

Re:linux, communism, humor

[jmv]

GPL includes some good ideas in communism. Why does anything that could resemble communism necessarily has to be bad? It's like saying "capitalism = bad", thus anything that has to do with money is bad. I think McCartism is still not that forgotten in the US.

Re:linux, communism, humor

[oliverthered]

Hmm.....
Well that's odd, although my only real interests in GPL are as a software producer I looked at the point of the consumer when I chose the license. I would say that this is a 'I answered why' approach, or the philosophical approach.

The approach you have described is a 'what' approach, which is a materialistic point of view.

If I treat my code and works in a not materilistic way the work fits that model and becomes 'communist'

If I treat the code and works as material then then it becomes somewhere between 'communist' and 'capitilist'

As a potential consumer of any GPL code i find, I can turn a possible 'producer' approach to GPL into 'consumer' approach.

Re:linux, communism, humor

[kubrick]

Well, the only reason the GPL is enforceable is that exists within a capitalist system. Which is good, because the only reason it needs to exist is the capitalist system it's reacting against in the first place. :)

Sort of a moebius strip approach to software licensing, turning the principle of intellectual property against itself. I only wish similar practices were possible in the world of material objects; that is, the ability to share your posessions with others while mandating that they will find it difficult to take without giving.

(I approach property discussions from something of a Proudhon-ist position; i.e. libertarian socialism. "Property is theft" and all that. :)

(BTW, if you develop code based on someone else's GPL'd code you only have author's rights over the code you wrote (of course), so it is not quite a turnaround from consumer to producer, as the main code is still 'owned' by the author, at least for any purpose that would remove it from the GPL'd area -- i.e. they still decide what is copyright infringement (people copying the code and not obeying the GPL) and what is not (relicensing the code under another license to people who want a closed version so they won't be bound by the GPL.) But apart from that it's much closer to that model than proprietary code, and attempts to ensure more consumption and production in ways that BSD, public domain et. al don't.)

Re:linux, communism, humor

[oliverthered]

"the only reason the GPL is enforceable is that exists within a capitalist system", this is a bit of a rhetorical hypothesis,The only reason GPL exists is because we have a system that enforces ownership.If everywhere was communist then there would be no need for GPL.

If I am given some GPL'd code (assuming it wasn't stolen by whoever gave it to me!) I can give the code away to all and sundry, making it effectively completely public. The person who gave me the code may not have intended this to happen, in which case they should have chosen a different licence.

On the other hand Public domain or BSD means that the intermediary could change the license to whatever they please and prevent me from giving the code away.

"the only reason the GPL is enforceable is that exists within a capitalist system", this is a bit of a rhetorical hypothesis, if everywhere was communist then there would be no need for GPL.

If I am given some GPL'd code (assuming it wasn't stolen by whoever gave it to me!) I can give the code away to all and sundry, making it effectively completely public. The person who gave me the code may not have intended this to happen, in which case they should have chosen a different licence.

On the other hand Public domain or BSD means that the intermediary could change the license to whatever they please and prevent me from giving the code away.

I choosing a GPL licence the author is saying that the code(and non author derived works) can be given away freely and no-one can change that, even the original author.

Heh...

[autopr0n]

Of course, the difference is, digital information can be copied infinitely, while labor can't.

I wonder, if we had replicator technology today would it create a star-trek style utopia, or would manufacturing companies rush to try to protect their 'intellectual property'?

Btw, the Chinese government no longer considers itself to be "Communist".

Re:Heh...

[redcliffe]

No. It would create an energy economy.

Re:Heh...

[Corporate Troll]

if we had replicator technology

It would surely be banned by companies. Made illegal, you know. The whole economy as we know would collapse. Besides, I don't think humankind would be ready for it, I'm pretty sure everyone would start to replicate Ferrari's, BMW and caviar and Champagne. It would be a neverending decadent party (think "Roman Empire"), not a strict military-like society like Star Trek where knowlegde and research goes above all.

the Chinese government no longer considers itself to be "Communist".
Not meant to flame: but how does it consider itself now? Socialist? I don't know... I know that there are more economical liberties in China now, but that doesn't really make it less communist.

To stay on topic: *if* China pulls this through, it means a whole continent converted to our beloved Penguin. This can have major impact worldwide, because (even if they wished so) China is no island, and bussiness (in the US and Europe) will be confronted with Chinese people using Linux...on the desktop! Word documents? Not anymore for our Chinese friends ;-)

Re:Heh...

[autopr0n]

the Chinese government no longer considers itself to be "Communist". Not meant to flame: but how does it consider itself now? Socialist? I don't know... I know that there are more economical liberties in China now, but that doesn't really make it less communist.

Yes, socialist. Some people call it 'facist', but I doubt that. Certanly they wouldn't call themselves facist.

Re:Heh...

[Corporate Troll]

Well, I live in a socialist country (Europe) and I wouldn't call China socialist. Perhaps something like "liberal communism", how awkward it may sound. Funny is that Americans usually equate socialism and communism, but that's due to their misunderstanding of leftist politics... I don't blame them.
Nobody would call themself "facist", I think. Well, I would if I ruled a small country as a "just tyrant", but the odds of that happening are quite low.

Re:Heh...

[den_erpel]

Word documents? Not anymore for our Chinese friends ;-)

:0 Bf
* Content-Type: application/msword;
| formail -b -f -A "$MSHEADER evil-word"

# reply rule
-snip-

:0 H
* $ ^$MSHEADER
trash

(or /dev/null, as you prefer)

Re:Heh...

[sql*kitten]

Of course, the difference is, digital information can be copied infinitely, while labor can't.

Unless you're China, in which case you just imprison a few more people in a forced labor camp and make them do it.

Re:Heh...

[brunes69]

not a strict military-like society like Star Trek where knowlegde and research goes above all.

I really hate when people make this generalization. Earth in Star Trek is not "militarized" Starfleet exists totally seperate from the World Governmnet, just as the US Military exists seperattly from the US government. The difference between Earth in Satr Trek and Earth of today isn't the militarization, it's that people became enlightened enough to realize that property is MEANINGLESS. According to the timeline, this was way before they got replicators too, BTW( sometime in the late 21st cen, after WW3). After this revolution, people started just enjoying life, doing research and space exploration for the fun of it, not pointless material profit.

Re:Heh...

[gli]

That's what communism is all about.

Typos

[af_robot]

Mama told me not to spellcheck :)

I do.

[autopr0n]

Windows 2k supports Chinese (and japanese/korean) for things like filenames and anything else you might want to do out of the box, as long as the apps support it.

I was also able to get Chinese characters in word 2000 with windows 98 after a free download from Microsoft.

Re:I do.

[Surak]

Support for Eastern languages in Windows 2000 is buggy in non-localized versions. A quick check of the README files and such will reveal that. Always the recommendation is to get the localized version of Windows.

That's because Microsoft doesn't bother to test with foreign language support until they begin releasing the localized versions somewhat after the North American versions ship.

Ironic isn't it?

[I Love this Company!]

That China, a country with draconian human-rights laws has open, flourishing Linux use and development? It doesn't quite seem to work so well (at least on a government and regular user level) in the west.

Re:Ironic isn't it?

[Jonas Cord Jr.]

You aren't really implying that the United States is as "draconian" as China, now are you? If so, I'm a bit baffled as to why your genitals haven't been prodded with electric stun guns for criticizing the United States. Or did that happen already?

Re:Ironic isn't it?

[sapone]

What exactly is a "draconic human rights law"?

Nonsense...

Re:Ironic isn't it?

[sapone]

You're fine as long as you're not a terrorist muslim these days. Who knows what they do to the genitals of Guantanamo Bay prisoners...

Re:Ironic isn't it?

[FooBarWidget]

You know, the Cultural Revolution was *30 years ago*. This is 30 years later, 2002...

Re:Ironic isn't it?

[toriver]

The laws associated with the U.S./U.N. War on Drugs. :-)

Re:Ironic isn't it?

[IkeTo]

A place where the government control most of the use of computers is the ideal place to put free software into it. Nobody can say "hey! I want my Microsoft stock value back!". Nobody can say "shit, I've just purchased twenty copies of MS Office!". And, nobody will complain "why I have to pay those tax to create the software that I already have!".

Will China keep them free? Why not? There are only benefits to keep it free. Internet control only needs to be put in the ISPs. Given the computers, their people have much more brain-power than needed to produce whatever software that the government won't want their people to be running. The "unreasonable law" and "Draconian punishments" is much better solution to the problem.

yeah so...

[(blind) (idiot)]

"A government-sponsored software development group in China unveiled a version of the Linux operating system it has developed that it said will eventually replace Windows and Unix on all of its government PCs and servers."

While this is certain to bring about certain debates or threads of thought (and this poster is not against dialogue), this is just what one company "said" their version of Linux would do, whether government sponsored or not. Time will tell...

Don't you mean 0, 65?

[autopr0n]

I don't think anyone uses UTF32, in UTF16 it would just be 0 then 65.

Anyway, while it might be wasteful, I think the world would be a better place for programmers if everyone stuck with UTF16 rather then other crazy encodings.

Compression can take care of the rest, besides how much of the large, space-taking-up information is plain text anyway?

What about if somebody needs to mix in Korean in the same document, for example. Very, very, complicated issues.

How so? It dosn't seem like it would be complicated to me.

Re:Don't you mean 0, 65?

[Tony Hoyle]

That's UCS16... UTF is an encoding, UCS is a character set.

Sensible setups use UFT8, which can encode up to UCS32 - good enough for any languages we're likely to use in the near future (assuming we don't meet aliens with billions of characters in their language).

The advantage of UTF8 is ease of transition - you can still use strcmp, normal "" strings, etc. (compare to the hoops that Win32 has to go through to do UTF16... I tried to convert a program once, and gave up after a month banging my head against a brick wall).

The disadvantage is that it's biased towards western character sets - once you get into things like chinese it takes something like 6 bytes to describe a 4 byte character (btw. 2 byte characters are not enough for chinese. Presumable 'doze uses UTF16 to get around this limitation).

Network effects.

[autopr0n]

Imagine tens of millions of kids growing up learning Linux rather then windows (I'm not going to pretend like a large percentages of Chinese schools are going to have computers. check out the film not one less)

it'll mean a lot more software and stuff for Linux. Eventually.

Good news for the Linux desktop

[unoengborg]

A widespread adoptation of Linux in China would be great for the Linux desktop. It would help to build up enough critical mass to get the attention of ISVs.

Apple still have a lot of ISV support and I believe their market share is below 10% so just a few desktops more and we could expect things to happen...

And now even Red Hat annonces that they will go for the desktop. This is great times for Linux!

Premtive Joke suppression. Plz no "Rinux" jokes.

[autopr0n]

The Chinese people have no problem pronouncing "L"s, it's the Japanese who make that mistake.

Thanks in advance.

There aren't a billion people there...

[RedBear]

but they are also doing this in the Philippines. The Advanced Science and Technology Institute has put together a somewhat simplified single-cd distro on which they've included such things as OpenOffice. They've been showing it off to the public and getting great response to it. It seems to be targetted toward home users and educational environments. According to the FAQ it's based on Red Hat 7.2. Anyone interested in trying it out can download an ISO here. A snippet from the website (the distro is named Bayanihan Linux):

BAYANIHAN is a Filipino tradition where people in a community help their neighbor in physically moving their house to a different place.

BAYANIHAN embodies the spirit of the Open Source movement. BAYANIHAN connotes people joining in and helping those in need. It also implies a movement from one place to a hopefully better place.

LINUX was added to the final name since the software's basic framework is LINUX. It was built on top of a Red Hat Linux operating system.

Re:There aren't a billion people there...

[netsharc]

When is RMS going to call them and demand they start calling that tradition, GNU/Bayanihan ? ;-)

How so?

[autopr0n]

It dosn't really seem that ironic to me. What does computer use have to do with political freedom?

While many people in the west consider Free Software a bit 'subversive' and politicized, they are right in line with the communist rhetoric that the nation was founded on.

moving a house?

[autopr0n]

BAYANIHAN is a Filipino tradition where people in a community help their neighbor in physically moving their house to a different place.

What a bizarre tradition! I mean I realize there are times when it might be convenient to move a house, but still. Such a strange idea.

Re:moving a house?

[RedBear]

Yeah, well when you live in a grass/wood/plywood/tin shack as many people do over there to this day, I suppose it's not too difficult to move the whole shack across town, with a community of people helping. ;)

(Note: I know someone from there so I'm not just making generalizations from a "US perspective", that's how it really is in the Philippines. Which seems like all the more reason for them to be working on free alternatives to costly software for running their government and school systems.)

How many Chinese

[oliverthered]

The population of china is huge, if they wanted to they could easly mobalise a workforce the same saze as the UK who only work on linux. After a coupld of months a few thousand man years of work will have been done.

Re:How many Chinese

[Ko5mo]

Even though the man power will come in handy.
Have we not learned that man power/hours != quality.

Just look at Microsoft.

Re:How many Chinese

[zoccav]

A similar scientific experiment has been conducted by putting 9 women to work on the birth of one child.
It was only after approximately 9 months that the average throughput raised in an almost discontinuous way from 0 to a staggering 0.95 kids/month. Also, the complementary 8 kids were considered very-cute-but-not-quite-planned.
High amounts of resources accelerate production processes. Creative processes (like software development) are less affected by mass.

Traditional vs simplifed chinese

[autopr0n]

The Taiwanese still use Traditional Chinese characters, while the mainland uses Simplified ones. A mainlander might have trouble using a Taiwanese distro and vise versa.

Ironically, computer technology has completely negated the need for simplified characters

Re:Traditional vs simplifed chinese

[wenzi]

It is a little bit more complicated than that.

Taiwan = Traditional
China = Simplified
Hong Kong = Traditional
Singapore = Both ( But most kids learn Smiplified )
Overseas Chinese = Traditional

Traditional encoding uses Big5, but simplified uses HZ and GB2312.

http://www.artsiv.net

Stupid mods

[oliverthered]

Why is the parent flamebate?

Personally I would call opensource, P2P networks &co comunist.

DMCA and all the RIAA lobying is capatilist.

If you don't believe me then lookup what the words comunist and capatilist mean and go and read the communist manifesto

Moding as flame-bate is the only flame here.

Re:Stupid mods

[JWW]

DMCA and the RIAA are certainly not capatilist.

Where in the restrictive rules they want is "Let the market decide." Nowhere the DMCA is a market restriction policy and everything the RIAA wants would limit the market as well. The DMCA and RIAA 's desired rules could basically be described as a twisted type of corporate socialism. Which, unlike true socailism, wanting to try to take care of the needs of the people, is taking care of the needs of the corporation in direct opposition to the needs and desires of the people.

Re:Stupid mods

[oliverthered]

DMCA and the RIAA are certainly not capatilist.
What,
Please goto www.m-w.com or www.dictionary.com and look up capatilist.

DMCA and the RIAA are enforcing strict ownership and copyright that is capatilist.

Your thinking about free market which differet from capatilist. Read wealth of the nations be Adam Smith .

Re:Stupid mods

[TheWickedKingJeremy]

Your right... the parent message is not flamebait - yours is.

You could not be more wrong about your association of the DMCA/RIAA with capitalism.

Re:Stupid mods

[bwt]

DMCA and all the RIAA lobying is capatilist.

B.S.

The RIAA is a "special interest" that seeks to lobby Congress to regulate in its favor against the public interest. It is corporatist and elitist, but certainly not capitalist. Selling a product does not make you a free trader.

The DMCA is fascist -- it takes property rights away from the owners of the property and gives them to somebody else. "Access" is a right own the owner of the physical medium. Declaring otherwise is fascist in the strictest sense of the word.

Personally I would call opensource, P2P networks &co comunist.

P2P is a form of rebellion and civil disobedience to oppressive laws that create and maintain a sound recording cartel that has market power to exclude innovative alternatives, fabricate "artists", and exclude alternative music from radio and record stores.

Open source is extremely capitalist. I trade my IP for yours, and we both act voluntarily and without government coercion .

Open source is not communist because an author if they desired sell their own copyright ownership to someone else. The fact that they often choose not to is irrelevent.

Inputing Chinese characters

[ukryule]

One *big* problem that I've found trying to use Linux with Chinese is in inputting chinese characters. There is software available (e.g. 'xcin'), but it's not anywhere near as easy to use and smooth as in Windows.

This is a difficult problem to solve - there are a large number of different methods to input Chinese which all have to be supported. Then this input method has to be easy to use across all potential applications (i.e. if you change from your Abiword window to a shell to an emacs window you still want to be able to use the same input method).

It's still at the 'doable-but-painful' stage in Linux (heh! What's new there?), but something as fundamental as entering text needs to be really simple for Linux to be useable natively in Chinese.

At the moment Windows beats Linux hands-down on this front ... so any progress in this area is very welcome.

Re:Inputing Chinese characters

[Jason Earl]

My guess is that this problem will get solved as more and more Chinese folks use Linux. As the Chinese government begins to actually roll out Linux they will undoubtedly notice that input could be slicker, and someone will fix it. Either it will be Sun trying to sell the Chinese StarOffice, or it will be hackers at Red Flag, or some Chinese college student trying to make a name for himself, but it is sure to happen. One thing is certain about Free software and that is the more use it gets the more polished it becomes. Right now Chinese input is not a big deal in Linux. Few Chinese people actually use Linux, and those that do have gotten used to the various hacks Chinese input requires. My guess is that it will become a big deal soon.

How to use Chinese characters on Linux system ?

[Taco Cowboy]

This is the question I always want to ask :

How to use Chinese characters on Linux system ?

On Windoze, there are several ways to achieve the goal. But on Linux, so far, it's kind of hard to do so.

So, anyone out there who know the answer ?

Please share !

Open Source vs Revolution

[Lord Bitman]

Here: "We are allowed to change our government, why not our software?"
There: "We are allowed to change our software, why not our government?"

Re:Open Source vs Revolution

[The_Guv'na]

There is hope for the US, heres just one example. At the end of the day, money is the language of government.

Ali

Re:Why this doesn't happen in western countries?

[zloppy303]

How much $$$ in taxes would the US loose if microsoft would be a much smaller company?

US / Leftist politics

[Unordained]

you're right that they don't understand leftist politics: the US is also a socialist country (social security anyone?) ... it's not strictly driven without government aid to the poor, moving wealth around so the rich don't hog it all ... at least, i consider it socialist ...

at that rate, do we have any non-socialist countries at all? ones where the government just lets people, economically, do whatever they like, including killing themselves? or do all current governments have -some- sort of socialist-like (because they would hate to call themselves socialist -- sounds like communist ... and communist is bad, right?) safetynet / distribution protocol? ...

would your small country run linux everywhere? ...

i'm still waiting for my GPL'ed government ...

Re:US / Leftist politics

[Corporate Troll]

Indeed the US has some socialistic traits, especially when considering social security. However I always heard (I'm talking as an uninformed European here) that it represents nearly nothing. Don't forget that most hospitals in the US are privately run and have to make profit, which is of course a very capitalistic view. That's why most Americans have to get private health insurance.
In Europe this is not the case: I surely do not have a private health insurance. Okay, they won't pay everthing (like my lenses, it's luxury) But I never ever had to pay the dentist, or the doctor. Well, I had to pay, but I got reimbursed. Of course I know that a large chunk of my salary is withdrawn for social security, but actually this contribution doesn't hurt me and I'm glad it's there when I need it. In the United States, the government "believes" that their population should take responsibility for themselves (retirement and health insurance). Weirdly enough, I think that "taking responsibility" is the thing that American citzens have most trouble with. (Stupid lawsuits, anyone?)
One thing is sure: Europe is way more socialist than America... and believe me, I'm glad it is.

There is one thing that astonishes me every time: the conception that "Communism is bad". It's not bad, the Utopian idea itself is neat but it just didn't factor in human behaviour. It's just that the "communism" implemented during our lifetime was corrupted because of human greed. In communism there is no place for selfishness, but there is nobody who can claim that he is not selfish at all.

would your small country run linux everywhere? ...

Of course! Do you really think any tyrant would like to share his power with Bill? ;-) Besides, inflicting Windows XP upon my population would already bring the human rights activists up against me.

Re:US / Leftist politics

[ealar dlanvuli]

Hospitals don't make a profit =p

It's so rediciously regulated, we have to charge 5x the cost of an item to break the origional purchase price in the amount we get from insurance companies.

If one were to abolish all regulation in the field everyones hospital bills would plumit overnight (though other bad things would happen also, but thats a diffrent topic). Currently my hospital to choose a random item has a 17.41x multiplier on the cost of using a X-Ray machine for a "standard" x-ray (eg broken arm), this will net us a few cents to a dollar after we get done collecting real hard cash from your insurance company, who will thusly start paying us less so we have to charge more. It makes medical treatment a imposibility for the non-insured. A simple ER visit for a non-trivial issue can easily break 1k in the course of a few hours because of it, which is absolutly disgusting.

Re:US / Leftist politics

[Unordained]

what's sad is ... i both grew up in europe (france) and my last job (year and a half, with girlfriend and one other programmers) was designing software to run an american-indain health system ... one tribe, with a clinic, two pharmacies, a dental office, shrinks, a wellness department ... and a billing/referral department which handled the insurance side of things. ... i got to see it all. what's funny is what the pharmacist told me, when we were doing the requirements documentation a long time ago (now that i think about it ...) -- you can charge as much as you like for medication, they'll just pay whatever they feel like, unless you charge less than what they expect to pay ... then they'll go with your price. so really, our formula doesn't matter ... might as well always send $1000 as the cost for every prescription ...

the insurance system is screwed up -- i'm paying my own now ... and i don't even get useful coverage at over $1k/year ... my parents (still living in europe) keep teasing me: a doctor visit for $20? $40 for a specialist? -sigh-

Re:US / Leftist politics

[autopr0n]

If one were to abolish all regulation in the field everyones hospital bills would plumit overnight (though other bad things would happen also, but thats a diffrent topic)

"Other band things" hrm. hehe. "Clean needles? Pff, who needs 'em"

Re:US / Leftist politics

[operagost]

Of course, you guys don't mind charging the artificially inflated price to your patients who have no health insurance as well. I know from personal experience. You also like to make billing mistakes, and instead of eating the mistake you send a bill for the difference three months later and expect payment immediately. Imagine booking a flight, and then months after you return getting a bill because you were undercharged. Could you imagine the airline being able to get away with that?

Re:US / Leftist politics

[Archie Steel]

You're right, the U.S. could be considered a socialist country, but not because of Social Security. Rather, it is its heavily-subsidized industries (military, aerospace, hi-tech, biotech, agriculture) that make it ressemble the socialist model...to a point. In fact, apart from individual liberties - including the fact that mom and pop could have a store - the U.S. of the cold war was strikingly similar to the U.S.S.R. It is safe to say that they were rivals (for oil, mostly) instead of enemies.

BTW, there are very few "capitalist" countries left in the world. After 1929, everyone pretty much understood that "pure" capitalism didn't work. So most industrialized countries now have mixed economies - the sad thing is that the U.S. forces its client nations to adopt the capitalist models and therefore become markets for american goods, even though it also ensures that their economy won't develop normally...

Re:US / Leftist politics

[Khalid]

Capitalism is the exploitation of men by other men
Communism is the contrary :)

Re:US / Leftist politics

[greenrd]

Yes, which just goes to show capitalism doesn't work for healthcare.

Suck on that, libertarians!

Also, I should point out that, despite libertarians' consistent inability to grasp this basic point, government underfunding in particular cases does not prove that socialised healthcare can't work.

Re:US / Leftist politics

[baldass_newbie]

You must be smoking crack. Do you make this up as you go along?


the U.S. of the cold war was strikingly similar to the U.S.S.R. It is safe to say that they were rivals (for oil, mostly) instead of enemies.

The Russians have far bigger reserves, for one. For two, I could get blue jeans. Russians couldn't.


BTW, there are very few "capitalist" countries left in the world.

True.

After 1929, everyone pretty much understood that "pure" capitalism didn't work.

Who's everyone? They didn't teach this in either econ or poly sci. In fact, the U.S. track history since FDR has shown that government consistently screws things up more than it helps.

So most industrialized countries now have mixed economies - the sad thing is that the U.S. forces its client nations to adopt the capitalist models and therefore become markets for american goods, even though it also ensures that their economy won't develop normally..

Who are these 'client countries' and who's forcing them to adopt capitalism? Surely you're not talking about any Western Hemisphere nations, they're all either Communist (Cuba, Nicaragua) or Socialist (the rest of them.)

Abroad, the only countries we've helped set up governments have been Germany and Japan, countries with strong socialist undertones that have economic problems BECAUSE OF THEIR SOCIALIST TENDENCIES.

Read a fucking book and stop listening to Dan Rather. Idiot.

"Freedom is not empowerment. Empowerment is what the Serbs have in Bosnia. Anybody can grab a gun and be empowered. It's not entitlement. An entitlement is what people on welfare get, and how free are they? It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights - the 'right' to education, the 'right' to health care, the 'right' to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery - hay and a barn for human cattle." - P.J. O'Rourke

Re:US / Leftist politics

[Archie Steel]

Dan Rather? What the hell are you talking about, you brainwashed moron? Do you think I waste my time with U.S. network news? Another thing, asshole (you had to insult me, now, didn't you?), if you think Germany and Japan have economic problems then perhaps you should take a trip through this great big world of ours. Just because they sometimes hit recessions or suffer from the economic woes that invariably affect industrialized nations doesn't take away from the fact that they are the #2 and #3 economic powers of the world. And that, after suffering a major military defeat 57 years ago.

Client countries would indeed include most of Central America, except for Nicaragua and Cuba, the two officially "socialist" countries. Note that, if it hadn't been for constant U.S. harassment/blockade (and an earthquake to boot, in the case of Nicaragua) these countries would have among the healthiest of economies. But all the other central american countries can be considered "client states" of the U.S. who is forcing them to adopt "free markets" by equating this concept with that of democracy (a fallacy, since you can have a free market in an otherwise autoritarian society). Implying that Honduras, Costa Rica or El Salvador are "socialist" reveals how little you know about that part of the world...

In any case, about the comparison between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. during the cold war, you'll notice that I did write "apart from individual liberties ", which covers the jeans situation. As far as natural resources are concerned, that's certainly true if you look at the two individual nations themselves, though if you include the resources of their client states, then it was probably pretty much the same.

Finally, when I say "everyone understood after 1929 that pure capitalism didn't work", I mean the governing elites of the industrialized nations, who since then have incorporated parts of the socialist model of govt. intervention in the economy, the U.S. being a champion of this. You may think that governments consistently screws things up (typical), but without that govt. and its development of the american economy through the Pentagon system, you wouldn't be typing your idiotic drivel on a PC to then post it on the Internet at all. Understand this before continuing this conversation, otherwise you're not worth my time.

Dickhead.

Re:US / Leftist politics

[johnnyb]

(though other bad things would happen also, but thats a diffrent topic)

*******

I don't think so. I think this sort of thing is best handled through consumer groups, not mandated government decrees.

If I want medical care from a substandard facility and doctor - why can't I get it? It's my life, isn't it?

"Linux is communism!"

[miffo.swe]

I wonder if Microsoft used that same sentence in their contacts with China. That could explain why China are so eager to adopt it. And they call Microsoft slick and smart. *PThhrrrr*

power/hours != quality.

[oliverthered]

Well you could look at it this way.

take 1 Billion(US) Chinese
say 0.1% are exelent coders and 1% are ok coders that gives you.

900,000 coders and 100,000 UBA coders to hand.
when you take into account 'given enough eyes all bugs are shallow'
I'm sure between them they can produce quality code.

The Chinese are well known for there technical exelance.

Re:power/hours != quality.

[pherris]

Hopefully someone in China picks up on your idea. It fits well into their socialist structure, it'd be source of national pride and would be a big boost for tux (I guy can dream, right?). The original posting desires a 5. Wish I had some mod point laying around.

I'm wondering about your stats. You really think there are that many excellent coders out their? .1% of the population seems high. Just wondering.

Great idea though. Kinda like when the People's Army brought electricity to a lot of the rural parts of the country.

thanks,
pherris

Re:power/hours != quality.

[Atryn]

Hmm... I believe you are forgetting something that programmers often do... Someone has to manage all of those programmers, someone also has to sort the bad code from the good (which assuming we have an exponential curve of some sort from good to bad code means there is always some that is "on the border" of whatever standard you set), someone has to provide support services to all those coders, someone has to provide machine resources to all those coders (most of which will be wasted by your own calculation), etc.

I'm sure there are hundreds of things I've left out.

If each coder writes, say, 10,000 lines of code (a short project?) you have 10 trillion lines of code to go over to find a usable (using 1%) 100 billion lines of code.

Re:power/hours != quality.

[oliverthered]

1:
Well the original parent said somthing along the lines of,
'What with the 2000 apps x distro installs It's going to take them ages to convert them all'
2: Thats were design comes in,
Project management is well shit, what they need is a tool that integrates project management and design from the framework level right down to each function in an application.
This method allows micro management of a node so that you can have 1000 managers/drivers on a project, each managing a node and each talk up or down a node, even the person who codes the function can be considered a manager.

Re:power/hours != quality.

[splume]

"The Chinese are well known for there(sp) technical exelance(sp)."

Jesus fucking christ man, could you be any more prejudiced? That is like saying "black people are well known for committing crimes."

Chinese Linux used for restrictive purposes ?

[bushboy]

I'm wondering whether China will use Linux for restrictive purposes - i.e. The Great Firewall of China ?

Perhaps they've found that Microsoft products are just too insecure for this purpose ? ;)

Steganography

[tlambert]

So how long before there are stegonographic comments in Linux source coming out of China to get around the gvernment censorship of the media, but not of source code?

"Take the first letter of each fortune in the fortune file, and then..."

-- Terry

Re:Steganography

[CaffeineAddict2001]

What message are they going to send that we are not already aware of? // Help! Help! Were being repressed! // Seriously, if you get this message // there are about a billion of us // trapped in this asian country // and we would really like to be // free. MUST TYPE QUEITLY, SECRET // POLICE MONITOR MY CODE!!!

UTF-8 is The Way (TM)

[joib]

UTF-8 is somewhat ascii compatible, and an efficient coding for mostly ascii data. Looks like the unix world, ietf protocols etc. are moving in this direction. For more info check out
UTF-8 and Unicode FAQ for Unix/Linux.

free==future.

[Anonymous Coward]

My company is beginning the switch to linux terminal servers for the 90% of the machines at our work. The decision is soly based on that they do not want to pay $500,000 to microsoft so workers can browse the web and write memos. And we are really just a fairly small company - i cannot imagine what a large company or government must pay. Most amusing the top managers really have no idea what linux is, they just refer to them as the penguin machines.

Linux is devleoped in a way that requires no profit margin, unlike microsoft. so unless microsoft finds a killer app it seems that companies,governments and any other organization that acts in their own self-interest will naturally swtich to the 'ultimate undercut' : linux.

Re:free==future.

[unoengborg]

Actually, the cost of licences is only a minor part in most IT budgets. You will make the real savings on simplified administration of a thin client system. There are also other savings to be made:

Contrary to what most PHBs think you may actually save money on education in the long run if you switch to Linux. This is because Linux education lasts longer. A sysadmin that learned Unix 15 years ago will feel right at home in a modern Linux system. How much would a MSCE from 1997 be able to do to a win XP system. My guess is not much. Every time we get a windows update there seams to be a new revolutionary way to do basic things like setting up a TCP/IP connection, while in Linux it's ifconfig now and it was ifconfig then.

Even user education may be cheper in the long run as Linux has a more configurable user interface that let the sysadmin configure simple interfaces that only have the functions actually need. There is no need for adminstative tools that only confuse the user.

You will also find it easier to get your employes to focus on their work, as they will not be able to install games, mp3 players and other distractions.

In a LTSP thin client solution you are less vulnerable to hardware failures. A failing client can be replaced by computer illiterate persons as there is no need for configuration. And as the clients are relatively cheap you could have some spare replacement unit in each department. This means that you could cut down support personel that go out in the offices and replace broken computers.

Even if the server will constitute a single point of failure, it is easier to compensate for that on the server than on perhaps thousands of clients. E.g. you could use hot swapping systems for disks, various extension cards, and power supply. Or have some kind of failover system. All measures that would be far too expensive to use on more than a few machines.

Given all these advantages, I am surprised that LTSP isn't a default install option in most Linux distros.
If it had, I think Linux had already bin quite common on the corporate desktop.

Re:free==future.

[unoengborg]

If the regular user have to know that he runs Linux then there is something seriously wrong with your user setup. In the ideal case all apps the user needs is started automagically on separate virtual desktops at login. Add a couple of buttons to restart the apps to
the desktop in case the user should shut them down by
mistake. Can hardly be more simple.

The user may need to learn some new applications, but this generally not harder than what it could be if you do a windows upgrade. E.g. any secretary that knows MS-Word would be fully productive in OpenOffice.org after about an hour or so.

And as for sysadmins, you are right. They need education, but they then can make use of that education for the next 10 to 15 years. In windows world you would have had to reeducate them many times to keep them up to date over that time span.

This also means that your windows admin always will be less experienced in managing his system than a unix one as the lifetime of a certain windows version only is a couple of years. While Unix/Linux is a older and more mature system that ages more slowly.

Re:free==future.

[lingqi]

...so unless microsoft finds a killer app...

yeah. it's called exchange server. and fscking outlook.

i do wish that people would realize when you kill exchange / outlook combo with something with similar functionality but either not-on-windown-period, or OS independent (i.e. web interface), windows just lost 2/3 of it's charm to large organizations.

Re:free==future.

[unoengborg]

There is a replacements for Exchange server it's called bynari, and on the client side there is Evolution with a plugin for bynari. There are
also plugins for Outlook if you want to keep
windows on some desktops.

See http://www.bynari.net

Unfortunately this is not free software, but neither is Exchange/Outlook. And this baby scales to run even
on Linux for IBM z/390

Speaking of Linux...

[Jeffv323]

This had me laughing for quite some time!

--Jeff

Re:Speaking of Linux...

[Salsaman]

Errr...what ? I get a '403 forbidden'

Chinese government no longer considers...

[phunhippy]

Btw, the Chinese government no longer considers itself to be "Communist".

Oh thats right! now they are considered Commie facist Bastards! right?

Besides does it matter what they consider themself? I always thought its more imporant what other consider somthing to be.

Smart & stupid, Distro's to try...

[RedElf]

Is it just me or are we (americans) getting dumber while the rest of the world is getting smarter...

...its no wonder they are using linux instead of windows, and our government isn't!

maybe a troll

[oliverthered]

What the poster has done is to post a comment which raises a valid point of discussion, but he knows that the American readership of /. is going to bight and go on a mad your all evil i'm no communist binge.

The comment is intended to show the lack of understanding and the stupidity(in the your all evil sense) of the /. readership.

This is story is old...

[ChunKing]

Why can't the editors do a simple search - this story has been covered before:

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/07/19/2116 23 4&mode=nested&tid=99

Even the original article from The People's Daily News that was quoted dated July 22 -

http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200207/19/eng2 00 20719_99996.shtml

- mentions that the new OS is to be called "Yangfan".

C'mon, editors, get it together.

KDE 3.0 is your friend ...

[ukryule]

KDE3 has greatly improved international support - all the Unicode/il8n stuff support is built in.
This means that at the GUI level it's just(!) a question of all the apps supporting and translating this - take a look at this table for information on the translation status for (Traditional) Chinese.

If you've got a full (with international support/fonts) installation of KDE you should be able to try it out fairly easily - just change the language via the GUI configuration tool.

Re:Traditional vs simplifed chinese (not!)

[Lucky_Pierre]

A mainlander won't have any problem because Linpus us NOT a "Taiwanese" distro. It comes in both Chinese flavors.
The main office is here in Taipei but they also have branches in mainland China.

http://www.linpus.com.cn/

propaganda forgot 'cooking the books'

[oliverthered]

Heard from ENRON just before they collapsed.

"When I said burn all the books I meant , 'put them on the fire', not 'copy them onto CD'"

.1% of the population

[oliverthered]

Well an IQ of 130+ puts you in the top 4% or something.
140+ in the top 1%+

so using that assumption the top 0.1% of the population should be fairly bright and reasonably good at anything theye put there minds to.

I know less that 1000 people, and I know a couple of very good programmers.

Re:.1% of the population

[N3WBI3]

I know less that 1000 people, and I know a couple of very good programmers.

So what I know less than 1000 and I know at least a dozen, because I work in IT. My father knows about a thousand and He knows none (I would not consider myself a good programmer). One can not use who he knows/what he knows as an extrapolation of the world at large.

Creative processes (like software development) .

[oliverthered]

If you have 10 groups of people(who feed back to each other weekley) all trying to solve a problem then your probably going to solve the problem faster and better than if you had one group.

Also,
Just look at the huge amount of software churned out by INDIA, ok it might not be great but it fits the spec.

You need to do calculus

[oliverthered]

I did say ~= communist not === communist

What GPL does is Relinquishing 'ownership' as soon as someone tries to own the code it gives the original author powers to force disownership of the code.
GPL enpowers the original author to force disownership of release code, there is no way the original author can get the release code back becuase he no-longer 'owns' it.

If I use public domain code I can claim copyright on the derived works, and keep them closed source. I own the code (this is capatilism)

If I use GPL code then I maybe able to claim some copyright, but I'm forced to distribute the product freely with opensource. everyone owns the code (this is communism)

GPL == Communist because it enforges communist ideals (ownership by everyone)

Public Domain != Communist becuase it can be owned.

I am, for one. (Re: Are there any Chinese slash..)

[DigitalHammer]

Is there any Chinese Slashdotters...that can provide a cultural insight as to why china would be so open to open source?

First of all I would like to state that I am of pure Chinese descent.

To answer your question, I believe there are 3 factors that make China very open to open source: Confucianism, the WTO, and Microsoft licensing.

The centuries-old mentality of being extremly frugal with one's money or possesions. Though this idea is ancient, the Communist government began to encourage the use of this virtue in times of famine and hardship. This article from Time Magazine titled "Overeating Dying in China" further explains:

"In the early 1980s when some nouveau rich squandered their money on restaurants delicacies and government officials took advantage of their jobs to attend luxurious feasts, a distorted concept was built up in most Chinese's minds: the wealthier one is, the more fatty foods are on your dinning table.

The grumbles about upstarts' arrogance and the government officials' corruption turned into general disapproval. People began to look favorably at the ancient Chinese maxim which praises abstinence in consumption....Considering the 30 million destitute Chinese struggling in remote mountainous areas and those laid-off work who are living a hard life, traditional virtues like fighting one's way up and building the country through hardship and thrift are still highly encouraged by the Chinese government. "

This "frugal ideal", reinvigorated in the minds of mainland Chinese, compounded with ancient Confucian values of filial piety encourage the development and acceptance of open source software over propeitery ones in China. The bit about filial piety applies to the corporate environment of Chinese businesses. Filial piety in Chinese families enforce the younger family members' respect of older ones. This encourages the younger members' to set priorities that value the importance of the older family member (typically the father, mother, and grandparents). Chinese children, raised under this mentality, carry these priorities over to their workplace where they place their upmost importance upon the boss and senior officials (formerly occupied by older family members).

In most, if not all jobs in China involving internal technology, the IT manager must find software that will create a stable infrastructure while saving as much money as possible. This is where the "frugal mentality" and the rigid set of priorities converge to brighten the appeal of open source software. Because China is attempting to gain full membership within the WTO, which requires its adherance to strict IP rules, the country began an enormous crackdown on the "pirated" software industry. Using pirated (MS) software no longer was an option, as it used to be 10 years ago. Another path would be to purchase MS software licenses. However, the thought of accepting the dinosauric financial demands of Microsoft licensing contracts clashed with the frugal mentality prolific with Chinese tech companies, and the set of priorities spawned by Confucian filial piety led them to consider the amount of funds that could be saved and allocated for other departments by not buying licenses. In turn, Chinese techs were left with another option: Open source software, more specifically Linuix. The legal and cost-free nature of the penguin OS became an appealing option to the Chinese techs, and in turn took the opportunity to develop and integrate it in to their corporate infrastructure.

Chinese cultural traditions of filial piety and frugality are further explained in this excerpt of the site "Paul Herbig's Working Papers":

Chinese Network

The Chinese commonwealth is a group of small Chinese companies from all over the world affiliated with each other, protecting and taking care of each others businesses. They are also referred to as 'Greater China', or the 'Chinese Network'.

The survival mentality and the Confucian tradition of patriarchal authority, form the values of a typical Chinese entrepreneur - one who seeks to control his own small dynasty. These so call life raft values are:

l.Thrift ensures survival.
2.A high, even irrational, level of savings is desirable, regardless of immediate needs.
3.Hard work to the point of exhaustion is necessary to ward off the many hazards present in an unpredictable world.
4.The only people you can trust are family-- and a business enterprise is created as a familial life raft.
5.The judgment of an incompetent relative in the family business is more reliable than that of a competent stranger.
6.Obedience to patriarchal authority is essential to maintaining coherence and direction for the enterprise;
7.Investment must be based on kinship or clan affiliations ,not abstract principles.
8.Tangible goods, like real estate ,natural resources, and gold bars are preferable to intangibles like illiquid securities or intellectuals properties.
9.Keep your bags packed at all times,day or night (Kao,p.25).
Unlike the Japanese Keiretsu, the Chinese network is an open system for all Chinese entrepreneurs all over the world. They watch for each others businesses and help those who are in need. These Chinese entrepreneurs have a give - and - take relationship. The network is usually formed by joint ventures, weddings, political opportunities and common cultures. Ownership of the company are usually passed to relatives, regardless of their educational background or competency (the classic example is An Wang's passing of his company, Wang Computers, to his mediocre son instead of professional managers--which ended in failure). Generation after generation, no matter in what culture they were brought up, every Chinese seeks control and security of their businesses.
The first Chinese generation has a survival and Confucius mentality. Every business decision is made for the future of the family. Unlike the old generation, the younger generation are born in other countries outside of mainland China. They do not only carry the Chinese culture, but the one they were born in as well. This generation, especially if born in a western country, has a sense of individualism. Companies like Winbond,a high-tech company in Taiwan, which considers themselves to be a Chinese company , believes that you should respect your family and love ones but you have to set your mind on what is right for the company. D.Y. Yang,owner of Winbond, says, "A Chinese company depends less on data and more on intuition,feelings,and people." But on the other hand, he also mentions, "Of course you have to respect the family business structure, but since this is a high tech company,individual contributions are important (Kao,p31)."
---snip

I have heard about the open markets in china where you can purchase bootlegs of any software for near the cost of the CD. If the choice is between M$ at .5 dollars and Linux at .5 dollars linux wins.

On a side note, frugality, combined with Communist ideals and Confucian values led to the explosive growth of the pirated software and media industry in China, as this essay written by Rutgers Univesity student Sheng Ding explains:

"Confucius's concept of the transmission of culture and Marx's views on the social nature of language and invention arose from very different ideological foundations. Nonetheless, because each school of thought in its own way saw intellectual creation as fundamentally a product of the larger society from which it emerged, neither elaborated a strong rationale for treating it as establishing private ownership interests.[15] Deeply influenced by these two ideologies, China falls behind all developed countries and many developing countries in the field of intellectual property protection. It is also not difficult to understand why most of Chinese did not know what were IPRs in 1980s."

Well, I am confident that this reply answers your question. More information about Chinese philosophies and other ideals that are involved in China's flourishing open source movement can be found below:

Paul Herbig's Working Papers

A Paper on IP Rights in China, by Sheng Ding

The Chinese Way with Money, an article from the Shanghai Star

Re:Why this doesn't happen in western countries?

[goldspider]

Linux web servers running Apache are actually becoming quite popular in the government, since in many cases, IIS doesn't pass the security litmus.

However, as far as converting the workstations over to Linux, it's not even being close to economically feasable. What you save on the licenses would quickly be surpassed by the cost of A) disposal of the old workstations and making sure they are wiped clean of all information (there's been alot of problems with this lately), B) training of some very brain-dead users who believe that a computer without Windows is not a computer, and C) everything related with dismantling an ENORMOUS existing infrastructure and getting all of the new systems to work seamlessly (which equals alot of time and $$$).

Not that ironic tho...

[MoThugz]

are they draconian because the govt. there doesn't hesitate to use force to crush resurgance against its ideology? What makes other countries who allow large corporations to starve their workers by cooking up their accounts, but give millions of dollars to head honchos who actually know these activities are happenning? Linux doesn't work, nor will it ever, in the west because they can be easily quelled by democratic members of senate who doesn't take any form of bribes at all (not even party donations, honest!), from producers of non-open source producers nor media barons (who invest in technology-related stocks/companies just to get a piece of the internet pie so that they can suppress the freedom it brings).

Developing Countries Showing Us the Way?

[shahakran]

I find it intriguing that the developing countries are some of the world's largest users of the Linux system. Africa and China are now almost exclusively using Linux and/or unlicensed Microsoft systems, a fact which Bill Gates would no doubt like to set right. But aren't they right?

Why pay for buggy pieces of crap when you can get a decent operating system for free? Not to say Linux is the be all and end all but as operating systems go it is more robust.

I think countries like China who will now be developing more and more applications for Linux could finally get the proverbial show on the road and give companies a very useable option to forking out truck loads of money for Microsoft licences.

One of the major fallbacks of Linux is the lack of applications especially those for development. The day there is an equivalent to Visual Studio in Linux is the day that companies will realistically think more about changing to Linux.

That's my opinion anyway.

Re:Developing Countries Showing Us the Way?

[maharg]

> One of the major fallbacks of Linux is the lack
> of applications especially those for
> development. The day there is an equivalent to
> Visual Studio in Linux is the day that
> companies will realistically think more about
> changing to Linux.

don't know about Kylix, huh ? - http://www.borland.com/kylix/index.html

Re:Developing Countries Showing Us the Way?

[unoengborg]

I wouldn't exactly agree that their is a significant lack of applications for development for Linux. E.g. you have Kylix, KDevelop and Eclipse. And if you want to do it the old way there is Emacs.

Application for publishing and vector graphics and image processing for print purposes (no gimp doesn't fit in here, as it lacks pantone) are far more scarse.
Not to mention high end web tools like the Macromedia suite.

Given what IBM achieved with punched cards...

[leonbrooks]

...what sort of position can you see Microsoft fulfilling when it rolls out Palladium in concert with Passport?

Drop the P to see what Passport actually is... and remember that the `My' in `My Computer' is William Henry Gates III.

For taxation purposes?

[leonbrooks]

They'll find a way, you watch and see! )-:

Re:Why this doesn't happen in western countries?

[Salsaman]

They would actually gain money if MS were a smaller company. First, the money wouldn't disappear, it would be spent in other ways, which would likely be taxed anyway.

Second, see for example this post. MS pays hardly any tax as it is.

Re:Why this doesn't happen in western countries?

[SmallFurryCreature]

mmm,

A) would happen anyway whenever you switch to new hardware regardless of the OS that is on the old/new machine. I presume at least that you do not think that linux will not run on windows hardware.

B) Most of the drones have to be trained anyway. For a large company this cost goes down as they often have their own trainers.

C) Yup but nobody is suggestion (well nobody but zealots) an overnight switch. Rather the replacement of end-of-life equipment OS/systems with new. Since MS is also forcing this switch with their constant OS/serice pack changes switching to another OS might be considered a one time expence.

I think you are forgetting that a lot of companies hate MS forced upgrade. The one I work for (large mobile telco in eu) at the moment still uses NT service pack 5. It works and moving costs a bundle. Zero reasons for IT managers to consider upgrading except that MS has cut support.

And that's not all...

[leonbrooks]

`Fraud! ' came the cry! Microsoft overvalues shares.

Virus Propogation

[capt.Hij]

This is a really good thing for Linux. When governments use a piece of software the companies that want to deal with that government have a strong incentive to also use the same software because of the convenience factor. On the down side, a huge installed base increases the probability that more people will try to propagate a virus for those machines. It would be far too tempting to try to debilitate a whole government.

There will be a threshhold at which the number of linux boxes will make for a target rich environment for virus writers. This is something that should be anticipated and dealt with now before it becomes an embarrassment. Let's learn from others mistakes!

Re:Virus Propogation

[Tanami]

Viruses are unlikely to ever be as widespread on Linux as they have been/are on windows systems.

One of the benefits of a sensible directory hierarchy is that the executables in /usr/local/bin are not going to be writable by the people running them.

Although there will always be the odd fool running everything as root, unless you put lots of fools together, there will be nowhere for the virus to spread to.

Re:Virus Propogation

[unoengborg]

Just relying on that people running Linux are no fools would be foolish. To get real security we need things like mandatory access control and perhaps means of prevent code that havn't an approved digital signature. (Somthing like in Java)

Microsoft will add this kind of features to their future systems, and if the Linux community don't want to stand out as the insecure option it have to do something similar.

However, the MS model is very centralized wher the code will be signed by MS, and they also involve hardware to checking to get DRM. Thus MS aims more at the security of the IP of MPAA members material than actual user security. We don't need that.

To get user security we could use some in house CA that signed code for use in our own company. That way
we wouldn't loose the advantages of GPL, as we would
in the MS model, but would still have good security.

Spyware? In a Microsoft product? Inconceivable!

[leonbrooks]

I don't know whether there's any spyware in Windows or not

You do now. In fact since IE v5, Alexa has been spying on you. I guess they must really despise competition if they forbid other remote management software (in the XP EULA).

A Unix World?

[Mr Bubble]

While far from inevitable, does anyone feel a sense of optimism that Unix(and variants) stands to eventually become the standard in computing?

Here's Why:

* Countries like China are probably very suspicious of running closed code like Windows and Office - I mean spying is a real thing. While open source seems to go against their nature, atleast they know what's inside. Also, the old communist mindset will come in handy - code for the Motherland!

* The developing areas of the world - Africa, India, South America etc. - are unable to pay the MS tax and are haven't been thoroughly brainwashed into thinking Bill is a genious. They need tools that work and that are inexpensive. They also want the quickest and cheapest path to an "information economy".

* IBM, Sun, Apple etc. are pushing their own Unix brands and Linux in an attempt to rest control of the direction of computing away from Microsoft. I think that they are starting to smell blood in the water. Sure, there is framgmentation in Windowing systems and sure IRIS, Solaris, OS X, Linux etc can't share binaries, but the differences are slight compared to interoperability with Windows by an order of magnitude.

* Schools in any country can't afford the MS tax - especially microsoft's new and improved licensing schemes. Standard Unix programming tools and environments have to be a pretty compelling petri dish for computer science students and young programming students.

Maybe it's wishful thinking, but big changes happen due to simultaneous forces pushing in the same direction. MS benefited greatly from an open X86 architecture and from the legitimacy of IBM and then from its eventual ubiquity I think Unix is now going to benefit from its open code, platform independence, the legitimacy of IBM, Sun, Apple etc., and its increasing ubiquity.

Re:Why this doesn't happen in western countries?

[sexykitty]

The Canadian Dept of National Defense tested Linux as a desktop solution when they were planning to upgrade all thier workstations from Windows 95.

They considered Red Hat and Corel distributions. I think the biggest drawback was that they needed Linux to be able to work with all of the hardware and applications that DND already had in place under Win95. This included support for peripherals such as smart-card readers for encryption/security, and support for Office 97 and 2000 documents. The workstations would also have to interact with all the Windows NT and Novell servers in place.

Certainly some would complain that asking Linux to work with MS apps is an unfair test. I'm satisfied that my government even considered an alternative to Windows.

AmyT

Maybe this will help the Chinese spam problem

[Gemini]

If we can just get a mailer with promiscuous relay turned off into that distribution, we could cut down on the tidal wave of spam coming from China.

Welcome to the 21st century!

[leonbrooks]

The US doesn't more readily adopt Linux because Joe User and his Grandma don't want to mess around with recompiling their kernels and editing text based configuration files and bitching to hardware manufacturers about device drivers in order to write letters, play games and email pictures of their kids and puppies to each other.

Which rock have you been hiding under for the last decade?

Very few people, even technicians, ever have to do anything like that today, let alone all of it.

As an aside: 99% of Windows users would refuse to try installing their OS. A GUI doesn't magic complexity and problems away, it just makes them prettier. A modern Linux install is actually simpler, faster and easier than a Windows install. Even RedHat, hardly the holder of a reputation for pushing the envelope, is easier to install than W2k, even though the W2k tested was a set of manufacturer's recovery CDs!

My wife (SWMBO) uses Mandrake Linux 8.2, Kmail, Konqueror (or Mozilla for sites that break Konq), OpenOffice.org, The Gimp, XMMS and about twoscore of the games. She fears the toaster, that's how technical she is (not so her sister, who flipped the PSU switch on the back of her own computer from 220 to 110 and blew it up).

Last week, I shut down SWMBO's machine for the first time in about 8 months to add some new hardware to it. She came home as it was booting and asked me what the startup screen is (text in a fancy framebuffer border with a progress bar) because she'd never seen it before, never knew textmode or the boot screen existed, never rebooted her machine. She doesn't know that it has a kernel, or that it has a USB webcam that I use as a kiddie monitor, or that her printer talks to it through USB; and your reward for asking her how the dual-scroll-wheel AOpen optical mouse connects (PS/2, in fact) would be a blank and concerned look. No worries.

Are we there yet?

Re:Welcome to the 21st century!

[radish]

All well and good, but as you point out, she has you to look after the system for her. Now imagine she was on her own (perish the thought).

I'm a smart guy, I know Unix, I've been developing on it for years, but until recently I always ran windows at home. So the other week I pop SuSE on a new box I just built. So yeah, it works, and it's pretty neat. But I'd take w2k over KDE in the interface stakes any day. And yes, you still have to fiddle with countless config files to make it do anything interesting. I'm leaving SuSE on that box, it does the job I want it to do well. But there's no way I'd recommend linux (well not SuSE anyway) to anyone who isn't of a technical background.

Re:Welcome to the 21st century!

[robi2106]

This would be all the more impressive if she had been hte person to actually install Linux. But since you did the ob for her, then her lack of technical know-how is beside the point. Any person can use a computer that is already configured and running. Any person can drive a car. Any person can surf the web. But not every person can service an engine. Not every person can configure IP chains.

jason
robi2106

mmm mmmmmmh

[Anonymous Coward]

Does it come with duck sauce?

What about Legend?

[The-Bus]

Slightly offtopic, but here's a way to get Linux to the masses in China using existing lines of distribution: According to this article (Enter the Dragon):

Last year, Legend cleared 2.9 million units, claiming 30 percent market share - three times more than its nearest domestic rival and six times more than IBM, the closest international brand. A Legend spin-off, Digital China, is also the main Chinese distributor of HP printers, Cisco routers, Toshiba notebooks, and IBM minicomputers, as well as a leading player in handhelds, systems integration, and servers. With $3.5 billion in revenue, a 35 percent annual growth rate, and a $3 billion market cap, Legend is the fifth-largest publicly traded Chinese enterprise.

Maybe we should concentrate on getting Legend to switch their PCs, not the government... I'm sure this early on, the Chinese are learning about computers and software no matter what it is - you could teach them XP, OSX, or OS/2 for that matter, it's all the same. They've never seen anything else before. So why not Linux?

Not so...

[leonbrooks]

Red Flag Linux is being run by the Emperor's son or something like that. I'd expect this little QANGO pressure-cooker to be attached to power in a similar fashion. It's not entirely ethical from our PoV but we can be grateful that number-one-son didn't get employed as head of Microsoft in China.

Re:Premtive Joke suppression. Plz no "Rinux" jokes

[UncleOzzy]

Exactly. I knew a Chinese dude who used to talk about going "lollaskating" all the time. Yeah. Furriners sure are funny.

Re:Why this doesn't happen in western countries?

[Tony-A]

How much $$$ in taxes would the US loose if microsoft would be a much smaller company?
The US would gain taxes from moneys saved, hence increasing taxable income, by companies not so adept at avoiding tax as Microsoft. A rather substantial gain I would imagine.

HAHAHA

[autopr0n]

LOL, that is seriously pretty funy dude :P

In some minds Capitalism + Totalitarian = Facist

[autopr0n]

Of course, this is a pretty gross simplification. I have seen people online call the current Chinese system 'fascist'.

I don't really know all that much about fascism per se, but if you remove the 'national identity' or 'racial identity' component, there are a lot similarities with Confucianism. IE Confucius believed each person should be in a strict hierarchy with the emperor at the top. Of course, the ancient Chinese believed they were the only actual nation in the world (everyone else was one of 4 types of barbarians, barbarians from the east, barbarians from the west, barbarians from the north, and barbarians from the south)... so obviously they would have no 'national identity' concept :P

UTF16 has 1,310,720 characters, actualy.

[autopr0n]

They have some escape stuff built in... but those would only be used in extreemly rare situations.

&& no pronunciation?

[autopr0n]

Well, I asked one chinese person if they 'heard' the characters when she read them, and she said she did.

And I do usualy think "and" or "or" when I see those symbols in code.

the cost of "free" in China

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not really sure how accurate Slashdot is with the state of Linux, GPL, Open Source and otherwise "free" software in China. Most people don't have high speed connections in China. Try cd downloading the images of Redhat sometime without a fast connection. Most people don't have cd burners in China either. That's kind of a luxury for them. CD-R blanks aren't as common there either. They're usually sold individually and not in spindles of fifty or a hundred like in the US. They are relatively expensive for the locals over there. Downloading large "free" software in China isn't really convenient or economical for the average person in China either. Buying software on cd's is much more convenient way of getting software for them.

While I was there, I bought a copy of Redhat 7.2 with chinese documentation and that was about 100 RMB ($12.50 US). RedFlag was about 68 RMB ($8.50). Compare that with 10 RMB ($1.25 US) a
cd for any pirated Microsoft stuff. This might not seem like a big deal for us but keep in mind that the average salary for a person is much less in China compared to somewhere like the US. I know that they're a lot of anti-Microsoft zealots on Slashdot but if you are an average person in China had the choice of buying 10 cd's of commonly used software which will most likely help you get a job in the future or 1 cd of some obscure software that most people don't even use in China and probably wouldn't help you make any money, which would you choose? I'm probably going to get flamed for this question with responses about "quality versus quantity" and "making Bill Gates richer by supporting the evil empire" but you need to look at the bottom line. Cheap pirated software gives them the ability to do what they need to do and try to get ahead. Bill Gates isn't seeing any of this money because it's all pirated anyway.

I'm not condoning piracy. This is just what I've seen going on while I was there. I think it's kind of misleading to give the impression that everyone in China is on the whole linux bandwagon which just isn't true. What is free ("free" economically and "free" in the RMS sense) for us is not necessarily the same for them. This is not a political comment about China's government or anything. The rules about how software works in China just different.

Re:We should introduce ideograms to English

[markbthomas]

People who are fluent in a language tend to start to read words as if they were ideograms. Rather than decoding "cat" -> "c"-"a"-"t" -> "kuh-att" -> cat, we just recognise the shape of the whole word. This is a reason why spelling is important, as slight variations in a word screw up the overall "shape" of the word, making the reader stumble.

You will probably find that you read words that are new to you, or made up words a little slower at first, as you resort to the "spelling it out" method (although this won't help you with the meaning, you may be able to discern it from the context). Also, fonts with serifs are easier to read fast as they connect the letters together better, making a word more like one symbol.

Of course, this is no excuse for English's very broken pronunciation, but to the expert reader, it's irrelevant.

I guess you could say that western letters are in some ways similar to eastern radicals (the component parts of Chinese and Japanese letters).

Whoa there, cowboy

[Marc2k]

I totally disagree. You can't call the most used language on the planet stupid, if it was it wouldn't be the most widely used, (it's different with operating systems, of course, Windows is stupid, but it's widely used, but anyway, I digress).

I don't see how it's different with operating systems at all. Millions of people use Windows (a decidedly "stupid" OS), simply because they're accustomed to it. They've used it probably as long as they've used a computer (millions of people refers to a specific user group here - home users), they were raised on it. Now putting the intelligence of a language aside for a moment, ubiquitousness of a language is determined generally by one thing: heritage. There are many, many people who only speak one language in this world, and they don't choose one based on its ease of use or adaptability; they learn the language that their parents speak. The simple fact that China has well over one billion people, and that Southeast Asia is heavily populated is about enough to make it the most used language, regardless of how "stupid" or not it may be.

Signs of China moving towards capitalism

[redNuht]

"Raise the sale" it is.

DMCA and the RIAA are certainly not capatilist.

[oliverthered]

This is now a standard reply, so i've included links and copytext!!!

What,
Please goto www.m-w.com look up capatilist.

Main Entry: capitalism
Pronunciation: 'ka-p&-t&l-"iz-&m, 'kap-t&l-, British also k&-'pi-t&l-
Function: noun
Date: 1877
: an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods, by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market

Main Entry: state capitalism
Function: noun
Date: 1903
: an economic system in which private capitalism is modified by a varying degree of government ownership and control

Sound like what the DMCA/RIAA are based on?

DMCA and the RIAA are enforcing strict ownership and copyright that is capatilist.

Your thinking about free market which differet from capatilist. Read Wealth of the nations be Adam Smith .

Re:DMCA and the RIAA are certainly not capatilist.

[TheWickedKingJeremy]

I understand that they are claiming "ownership" over their content... This is no different than Honda "owning" the Accord.

However, the key difference between the two is found right in your definition of capitalism: "prices/production/distribution determined mainly by competition in a free market." That most decidedly does NOT sound like the DMCA/RIAA... They have virtually nothing to do with competition at all. In this regard, they fall much more in-line with a government institution.. Think about it... They set prices arbitrarily because they have no competition, and they even "pass legislation" on fair use of their products.

To go back to my car example: Honda can own the Accord and do with it what they will... I am content with this because I know I can always go to Toyota/Volkswagan/Ford/etc/etc/etc if I do not like what Honda is up to, or if they aren't giving me substantial value for my buck. This is capitalism in action! Who can I turn to if I do not like the DMCA/RIAA I ask?

Re:DMCA and the RIAA are certainly not capatilist.

[oliverthered]

'an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods'

So ownership (aka copyright in the IP world) characterized capatilism.

and

'mainly by competition in a free market' that is mainly not wholely, when the free market infriges upon ownership then ownership will rule in a capatilist system.

You could also consider Buying the government as part of the free market and democracy.
You vote for Jimmy, The Smith coperation 'owns' Jimmy, Jimmy passes bill that The Smith coperation believes will aid it's capatil indevors.

It is ofcorse true that capatilism is a self defeating system, where the idea of the game is to own everything and become a corporate dictatorship.

Re:DMCA and the RIAA are certainly not capatilist.

[TheWickedKingJeremy]

So ownership (aka copyright in the IP world) characterized capatilism.

Again, I dont mind that someone owns their products... The problem comes into play when I am forced to use certain products whether I like it or not.

'mainly by competition in a free market' that is mainly not wholely,

Heheh come on, don't you think you are sweeping from "mainly/not-wholely" to "absolutely none" a little too easily? Monopolies have been broken up or simply prevented in the past... Whats so different now?

You could also consider Buying the government as part of the free market and democracy. You vote for Jimmy, The Smith coperation 'owns' Jimmy, Jimmy passes bill that The Smith coperation believes will aid it's capatil indevors.

Don't even get me started on politicians - this is a whole seperate topic altogether ;) ... You are right - the DMCA/RIAA only exist because they are tied up into the whole political "lie" they have created for themselves... That is the only reason why they have not been "broken up" - they are part of the "lie." Similarly, anyone who buys into the two-party system - anyone who votes either Republican or Democrat - is buying into the lie, and perpetuating the system.... again, this is a whole different topic for a different day.

It is ofcorse true that capatilism is a self defeating system, where the idea of the game is to own everything and become a corporate dictatorship.

I guess in some ways this is correct... The free-market certainly encourages people/companies to be successful, to grow, etc... And I think in 99% of cases this is a perfectly acceptable thing... In rare cases when a company gets so big that it is controlling the market (monopoly) it is the government's job to correct the situation... What is the problem exactly? If, say, there were three car manufacturers, and they all got together and formed the AIA (auto industry of america) and began to arbitrarily set prices - I would have a problem with this too.

Re:Premtive Joke suppression. Plz no "Rinux" jokes

[Jesus IS the Devil]

EngRish anyone?

Re:Linux in china?

[WowTIP]

Communist country?

Check your facts, troll.

Re:What a shame !!!

[N3WBI3]

are you a euro? Are you from one of the countries that spawned a tyrant this century or from one of the countries we saved from tyrants this century.

Your opinion does not look very objecteve to me so before you slam my home put your own house in order.

Re:The name 'Euro'....

[N3WBI3]

I shorten euroTRASH to euro...

Re:What a shame !!!

[sketerpot]

The chinese approach to monitoring their citizens' internet traffic is refreshing compared to the USA: publicly say that they are watching their citizens and not pretend that they aren't doing anything, as opposed to the USA, where the approach is to secretly (or at least semi-secretly) do the same thing, and then bill themselves as defenders of freedom.

I would prefer neither policy, but at least China isn't hipocritical about it.

Of course all Chinese Never Pirate software!

[pardasaniman]

1 billion people buying 1.5 windows licenses. OOOO OOHHH Bill gates won't be able to sleep tonight!

Re:What a shame !!!

[N3WBI3]

The bigger question about which is worse is 'what are the looking for?' In China they are open about the fact that if you have a religous belief which is not state approved they will bust your A$$.

In the USA They dont tell you outirght they are looking at your stuff but I can write the think Bush is a moron, the brach dividias were right, and USA stinks and not fear recrimination.

We can march on our capital for any reason 'million man, & mom' today, Vietnam and Civil rights 30 years ago. We do this without fear of ebing run over by tanks.

Is the USA perfect heck no, but you make youself look like a moron when you say you would rather live in china because while the boot crush your head at least they warn you.

monopolys

[oliverthered]

When a government controls things like monopolys then it's not captilism, there's a different word for it(but i can't remember at the moment!)

If you run a capatilist free market, but with no IP style ownership you get a strange system where the economy is split between technologists and manufacturers, and monopolys become more-or-less impossible.

Someone's lying to us.

[Anonymous Coward]

Victor, a friend of my wife's showed up from China over the weekend and asked us about "business opportunities." I asked him about some high-tech stuff in China and about the prevalence of Linux there, especially since China has all these great new distros like Red Flag Linux and Yua--.

"What's that?" He asked.

"It's the Chinese language version of Linux developed by Chinese open source programmers in an effor to end dependence on fo--."

"No, I mean 'what is Linux'?" Victor asked. "I have never heard of it."

So I spend a good four and a half hours trying to find and download a copy of Chinese language version of Red Flag Linux to install on the spare hard drive my wife uses for her job as a software tester. I finally got an ISO burned and installed it on a P3-800 with an Abit BH6 (440BX chipset), with a Matrox video card, Sound Blaster Live and Linksys NIC. The install choked twice (the "Disk Druid" Linux partitioning software didn't work all that well) and locked up on initialization the every time I tried to run Linux. I had to restart in "Safe Mode" to get the thing to work.

The GUI was a Chinese language KDE and they tried very hard to make all the icons look like they were on a Windows 2000 Pro desktop. The installation had no idea what the Sound Blaster Live was and the three year-old Matrox G400 Max video card was recognized as an ancient "Matrox Millennium" only. Victor asked if he could check his email in Chinese with RF Linux but we almost never found the beta version of Mozilla to get to the Internet. When we did, we had to type in "http://www.yahoo.com" rather than "yahoo" or even "yahoo.com" before it would work.

After a while, he asked to use my Windows XP Professional computer because the Red Flag Linux (although it was in his native language, looked very similar to Windows and was obviously based on the "stable, elegant and bullet-proof" Linux kernel) was "too slow" and "too hard" to use.

I was shocked. If you believe everything you see in PC World, open source shills like /., any Ziff-Davis magazine, News.com and on TechTV; Linux dominates China, Brazil and most of Europe. Not a day goes by that the tech press doesn't tell us that Linux is bringing technology to the masses for free-as-in-beer in every Third World hellhole. How could Victor, a Chinese businessman who owns a Benz/BMW/Hummer service dealership, a trading company, a physical therapy business and personally knows guys that code software for a living in Guangzhou _not_ know about China's own Red Flag Linux or Linux in general? The answer was simple:

"I use Windows," Victor said matter-of-factly. "Everyone does in China. No one uses Linux."

Victor and the mainstream tech media tell two very different stories about Linux in China. Sounds like someone's lying about Linux in China and since I saw the way a Chinese businessman reacted to Red Flag Linux with my own eyes, I don't think it's Victor...

(Was Victor's copy of Windows legal? Probably not, but as so many /.ers are so fond of noting Micro$oft got so rich because of their initial products being pirated.)

Re:I am, for one. (Re: Are there any Chinese slash

[Khalid]

I believe many of the traits (maybe not all) you are depicting are not specific to the Chinese society, but are rather those of traditional societies. Many African and Islamic societies function the same way. I am from Morocco (An Islamic, African, Arabic and Berber country, yes all that in the same time :) ) and this is the way many moroccans do business too.

Re:What ironic is the two-faced US government.

[meadowsp]

Really?

Been to cuba lately?

Ever heard of a thing called Waco?

Old /. news - Not Again

[jsse]

After 302 posts, no one caught this guy repeating old /. story.

I think he's just testing /. editors' ability to recognize old news. I think he got the answer. :)

Re:I am, for one. (Re: Are there any Chinese slash

[t0qer]

I read your entire comment dude, very well written (I especially liked the meaty quotes you grabbed)

Thank you for answering my question :)

--toq

Re:Spare me the crap about Chinese respect for eld

[DigitalHammer]

You may have not gotten my point. I was writing about how ideas of filial piety created a set of priorities that are transferred from from Chinese families to the corporate world, and how they influence the open source movement. I was not reffering to how a rigid set of rules lost them their jobs. (Which, in fact, has nothing to do with layoffs in Chinese companies).

From this article [globalaging.org]:""If you're over 35, it's very hard to find work," said a sad-looking 43year-old woman at the job center..." (in Tianjin)

Note that I was referring to Chinese tech companies, not the textile industry (which is what the globalaging article was about) which is under more control by the Chinese communist government. As the Chinese government wants their tech sector to grow, they lift more restrictions on Chinese tech companies on what they can do, such as partnerships with foreign companies. The textile industry do not have as much of these benefits.

Furthermore, it is not "older age" in China that will cause one's job loss in the state-owned industrial sector but rather the Chinese economy as a whole. Recently, state-owned factories have been shutting down, which I believe gained momemtum after the Asian stock market crisis of 1997 and became a full blown problem after 9/11.

On top of that, ideas spawned by filial piety do not influence whether a worker would keep his or her job.

Well, there's my 2 cents reply.

Why this REALLY doesn't happen in western countrie

[commodoresloat]

Because all the documents for this stuff are in Chinese!

I meant 'OWNERSHIP'

[oliverthered]

once code is relased under GPL you no longer 'OWN' it, it is free to run wild and you can't stop it.

Unless. someone else trys to 'OWN' the code and prevent it from running wild, then you can stop them owning it.

DMCA Copyrights.

[hackus]

I was afraid this was going to happen.

What I have said before now begins.

Countries will not use nor build thier societies economies or government bodies on information technology that unfairly gives the US/Europe an edge.

They will use our own laws against us and defeat us in the economic arena, just as we did with the USSR, as American companies quickly find they cannot sell products abroad in such markets that do not recognize DMCA or Copyright laws as they are written in US/Europe.

This is just the beginning.

There will come a time when China and the Soviet Union will awaken economically, and the US and Europe are going to be very very sorry implementing laws based on simple greed.

Greed doesn't work, quick and very fast innovation does, and with heavy laws and legal fees to bear American/European companies will not stand a chance.

The only logical move will be exactly what we see today happening in the manufacturing base in our society. It will be moved.

In this case, American and European companies will move the construction and design of software to the Soviet Union and China to escape the copyrights, patents, DMCA and all the legal expenses to build software in the US.

Companies already do this to escape the tax laws, they most certainly will do this as well when the time comes.

Which is very soon I am afraid.

Hack

Hate to break it to you

[theolein]

but the Soviet Union doesn't exist any more.

Communism

[baldass_newbie]

"You can't get good chinese takeout in China and cuban cigars are rationed in Cuba. That's all you need to know about communism." - P.J. O'Rourke

Sun claims that linux isn't profitable

[ScubaS]

As in this article on CNET, "The open-source business model hasn't worked very well,"

http://msn-cnet.com.com/2100-1001-949812.html?type =pt&part=msn&tag=cdf&form=base&subj=cn _fd

its socialism not communism

[HanzoSan]

And it also proves, along with gnutella, napster etc that socialism does work at least for technology

Re:its socialism not communism

[johnnyb]

Actually, copyrights and patents are socialistic, and the lackthereof is capitalistic. In the case of copyrights and patents, the government is artificially playing with the market, and therefore is more of a socialist way of doing things. Napster et al are making free markets, just like capitalists like.

In fact, the big businesses don't like Napster specifically because it is capitalistic. They enjoyed their government-sponsored position as holder of the copyrights. Because they had the government's help in having monopoly power over culture, they are able to become big.

From your posts, I wonder if instead of being socialist, you're just anti-big-business. If so, you may like capitalism more than you think, because big businesses are usually created because of government interventions. For example, big drug companies are created because it requires a big company to be able to handle FDA regulations. In a free market, the same could be done with small companies at a fraction of the cost.

USA was never pure capitalist.

[HanzoSan]

Pure capitalism isnt how the USA was founded to begin with. USA had labor from slaves to build up the country, this was never a true capitalist nation.

Public schools didnt always exsist but they do now, police, libraries, healthcare, we are moving toward socialism.

Pure socialism we arent ready for, pure capitalism we have moved beyond. Some people want to go to pure capitalism but they dont understand in pure capitalism, the losers or people who dont benifit from it, will become terrorists, steal, rob and so on, theres no such thing as 100 percent employment, and even if there were, without a minimum wage employment wouldnt be fair employment, pure capitalism would create class warfare to the highest degree.

Re:USA was never pure capitalist.

[johnnyb]

in pure capitalism, the losers or people who dont benifit from it, will become terrorists, steal, rob and so on, theres no such thing as 100 percent employment, and even if there were, without a minimum wage employment wouldnt be fair employment, pure capitalism would create class warfare to the highest degree.

***

And this is based on what?

Usually, this sort of thing happens when capitalism _doesn't_ happen. People often confuse big business with capitalism - they aren't the same. If you have large, controlling companies, chances are you do not have capitalism. Why? Because capitalism creates competition, and breaks down the barriers to entry. Big corporations usually exist in fields with large barriers to entry, because they are the only ones with enough cash flow to do it. Remove the barriers to entry, and all of a sudden the small companies have the upper hand because they are more nimble.

Re:In Other News

[ScubaS]

hourly reboots? you sound like you havn't used windows since windows 98.

Re:Creative processes (like software development)

[cduffy]

Depends on how paralellizable the process is. Sometimes there are huge amounts of communications overhead, and adding more people can slow ya down. This has been known in software development for aeons - read The Mythical Man Month for more.

Re:I love it when America....

[bwt]

No I didn't read the definitions, because those aren't words that have arcane definitions. I don't need a weatherman to tell me which way the wind blows, nor some "scholar" to tell me what capitalism is.

And the DMCA does NOT enforce ownership, it DIMINISHES it. If I own the DVD, certain uses of that DVD are taken from me and given by statutory decree to someone who is no longer the owner of the physical object. You cannot tell me that capitalism smiles on a situation where I need a licence to access the contents of my own propery.

Open source, 'I trade my IP for yours' what I've never known anyone who thinks that way about open source.

You should get out more.

Most people promote open source because they don't believe it should be owned, GPL prevents ownership by giving the author some rights.

This is almost unintelligable. At best you are badly stating a common myth and misconception.

Open Source is not the same thing as public domain. Open Source retains and DEPENDS ON active retaining of copyright ownership. If NuSphere violates the MySQL licence, they get sued.

I have no idea what the hell you mean when you say " GPL prevents ownership by giving the author some rights." The GPL does not give the author any rights. The Copyright Act creates those rights, and the GPL retains them, but grants OTHERS, not the author, certain LIMITED permissions.

The limitations are designed to assure that code written to extend the original will be passed back to the original author, which is why I say open source is "my IP for yours".

There arent REAL socialist countries, Fuzzy Logic

[HanzoSan]

60 percent socialist and 40 percent capitalist

There arent any real socialist or communist countries.

China never was communism, and there never was a true socialist country. Communism can only work when all the people are equal. Socialism can only work when theres true democracy. China or Europe never had true Democracy, hell USA doesnt have it either, we all have republics. Socialism can only work in a true Democracy where everyone can vote on anything.

haha, what??

[ScubaS]

"The funny thing is, what you are saying is compleatly true! GPL is all but comunist, because it removes ownership from a single person."

Save the denial and deception for the commie nations.

communism [kómmy nìzzm ] noun classless political system: the political theory or system in which all property and wealth is owned in a classless society by all the members of a community

communism is great. just look at cuba's economy! it was really cool how the USSR's economy was so poor that nobody wanted to even make televisions!

Re:haha, what??

[oliverthered]

USSR communist, jesus they did teach you weird things at school.

Remeber a few years ago, some woman kidnapped her child from cuba and took her to america?

And how the farther(who had rightful custody) thought Cuba was a great place so the child went back to live with him (after everything was dragged through the US media with all it's propaganda)

Cubas economy ain't doing too bad, especially when you consider its US trade relations.

GPL says you[everyone] may use the code but you[singular] can never own it or any derived works. a comunist framework in a capatilist world.

Re:I love it when America....

[oliverthered]

Start on this premmis,
1: Clearly you havn't bothered to verify your argument, you even say so.
2: You don't own the content of the DVD you own a licence for it.
3: Your one of the people who didn't answer why on the /. poll.
4:So far as GPL goes, your on the inside looking out, I'm on the outside looking in maybe you should resolve 1,2 and 3 it might help you get on the outside.

Re:The Short Version: a summary

[DigitalHammer]

Like the Chinese alphabet, DigitalHammer's post is rich but overly long.

You are incorrect. There is no "alphabet" in the Chinese language; whole words are represented by pictograms.

the Chinese have little or no notion of national identity

It depends on what you mean by "Chinese". The PRC recognizes over 54 resident ethnic groups, such as the Han (the so-called "majority" group), the Hakka, the Uzbeks, Manchus, etc... A person of Han descent will tell you that his or her homeland is mainland China. However, many Islamic Uighurs resident in western China and Mongolians in Northern China will tell you that they do not belong to China if asked what country they believe they belong to. (However, a large majority of Uighurs satisfied with their ties to China).

In closing, one must distinguish the Chinese lack of identity with any national government from their strong identity with other Chinese peoples. This is especially true for Chinese living outside of Taiwan and PRC.

About the Chinese living outside of Taiwan and the PRC, ABCs (American/Australian Born Chinese) CBCs (Canadian Born Chinese), BBCs (British Born Chinese) and most other "Chinese" born in the Western world identify with mainland China. I have learned this from personal experience and interviews.

But rather than being a form of national identity, this identity has more the flavor of a racist "us" versus "them" ("gaijin" or "foreigner", to use a Japanese term of Chinese origin) attitude.

The "racist flavor" you refer to is a product of over 3000 years of a generally homogenous society, and is not part of the Chinese' national identity itself. This can also be seen in 1500s-1900s Japan, where the same factors that form Chinese national identity exist.

On a side note, the Chinese term for "foreigner" (in the Cantonese dialect) is pronounced "gwei lo".

Nope, Chinese doesn't use unicode at all

[Analogue Kid]

Even with windows, unicode is not useful for Chinese. There are a couple of reasons.

1) Unicode doesn't allocate enough characters to Chinese. If you write in Unicode, there will be many undisplayable words.

2) Han Reunification- This was a very stupid idea a bunch of western standards groups came up with. Basically, there are many words that are similar in Chinese, Japanese and Korean. About 200 years ago, those differences didn't exist, but the written languages have diverged a bit. For example the word for 'a couple' (of something) was identical in all three languages prior to WWII. Afterwords, during MacArthur's program to simplify Japanese writing, the character was simplified in Japanese. Then, 20 years later, Chairman Mao simplified the same character in a different way in mainland China, but Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Korea all still use the old form. The result is that there are three very similar characters that mean the same thing.
Han Reunification means that some westerners arbitrarily decided which characters will be used (by all parties) for each word. The result is that Chinese and Koreans have to use a Japanese word sometimes, while other times Japanese and Koreans must use a Chinese word. This is similar to forcing French and English speakers to use the Spanish word for house, while forcing the Spanish and French to use the English word for computer. It's stupid, and no one is going to do that if they have an alternative that will allow them to write more normally in their native language.

Anyway, nobody uses unicode for Chinese. Depending on where you live, you'll use either Big5 or GBK.

competition

[oliverthered]

capitalism is to do with ownership.

Given the powers, size and 'corruption' of many larger corporations around today,
AOL+TimeWarner,
Microsoft,
ENRON,
WorldCom,
McDonalds,
WallMart
etc......

And there impact on Governments and the way of life of billions of people.

Would you not say that capitalism is in the process of defeating it's self.

The companies aren't winning because of competition they win by buying out all the competition or forming a cartel.

If current trends continue over the next 10 years the whole world will be run by a handful of companies. Things like DMCA, blank media taxes, the collapse of the Microsoft trail are all good examples of corporate muscle beating governments into submission.

Re:Creative processes (like software development)

[oliverthered]

That's why things like WHUPS are being developed.

If your software(anything) is well designed from the beginning, the design should help you organise the development, testing etc... into hieratical chunks, giving you a clear communications and management path.

A quick example,
Company X want's to produce a text editor.
The initial design process is set up, at this point all the design includes is a text editor project and a couple of managers and a design consultant.

The text editor project is broken down into different points of discovery so that they can find out what the text editor has to do.

Each sub-section can be micro-managed and reported back to the root project manager.

The process can be repeated right down to the function implenentation level.

Of corse all kinds of other information can be tacked onto the tree, documentation, time management, ETA's, bugs, code reviews,configuration management, test harnises etc...

The system also provides all the matrices you could ever want on things like :-
What are the dependancies of a node,
What's holding a node up,
Where did we go wrong,
Where didn't we go wrong,
What's the ETA for the whole project,
Who produces fast but buggy code,
Who produces clean code,
Who's the king of the bug fixers,
Who's great at reviewing code and locating bugs, who's good at design.

I recon you could manage a project with a few thousand people this way, with little overheads.

I just wish Linus would do this better with the Kernel.

Re:Why this doesn't happen in western countries?

[IkeTo]

> A) disposal of the old workstations and making sure they are wiped clean of all information (there's been alot of problems with this lately),

Stupid. Most hardware runs well under Linux, and actually require less horse power in the CPU to run. For the rest, the government can develop drivers for less than 1% of the cost to keep MS for one year.

> B) training of some very brain-dead users who believe that a computer without Windows is not a computer, and

Really? Did you check out recent versions of KDE and Gnome? For 90% of the needed task, Linux does it in ways exceedingly similar to Windows. The training is only for the remaining 10%, which probably won't appear in the profit and loss account at all.

> C) everything related with dismantling an ENORMOUS existing infrastructure and getting all of the new systems to work seamlessly (which equals alot of time and $$$).

Okay, this is real. But come on... you gonna being slowly eat up by the worm or to accept the pain once and get rid of it? The only sensible answer, really, is that MS lobby is real strong.

Re:Why this doesn't happen in western countries?

[goldspider]

"Stupid. Most hardware runs well under Linux, and actually require less horse power in the CPU to run."

Not stupid, cost-effective. It would cost more in man-hours to install Linux on each and every existing machine than to contract out new machines with Linux pre-loaded onto them.

"For 90% of the needed task, Linux does it in ways exceedingly similar to Windows."

Similar, I'll give you that. But the problem is that it's still different enough to worry people. Similar or not, it's the slight differences of "where things are" and "what they do" is enough to make people nervous (read: less productive).

"But come on... you gonna being slowly eat up by the worm or to accept the pain once and get rid of it?"

This is the government we're talking about. :) People find enough excuses not to work around here without the huge distraction a new OS would cause. MS influence or not, the unwillingness of people to change an established practice outweighs all external factors.

Re:Creative processes (like software development)

[cduffy]

Heh -- it looks like an interesting tool. If you've got a sufficiently skilled design team, it could perhaps fulfill part of its promise. (How much of the functionality is actually implemented? The page doesn't say much).

That said, though, I doubt that a multi-thousand-person project would necessarily go so smoothly. Just as each car may be able to regulate its speed effectively when alone on a road, and 50 cars on a given stretch can continue to navigate easily, 500 such independant agents results in a traffic jam even in the absence of some visible cause such as an accident. There's a point when network effects simply become crippling; and like a timesharing system which can handle 11 processes effectively but which breaks badly after a 12th is added, the solution isn't so simple as finding the "11" in the source and changing it to a 12.

There are also still issues with unanticipated functionality being needed -- saying (for instance) "this function will authenticate the user, and return thisandsuch a result" and not realizing at design-time that to do that properly it's necessary to write a PAM interface to the language the project is in. Having a good designer and running components through a prototype phase will ferret many of these issues out -- but still, there's no panacia.

What I'm saying is this: Managing large software projects is hard -- heck, managing ones of only medium size is hard. Having the right tools can ease the process, and maybe even move the bottleneck constant put in place by the network effects back a bit. It doesn't make anything free, though -- including the training costs of adding new developers. Under an open source model those costs are hidden -- developers largely self-train, or, if working on OSS commercially, train at the expense of their employer (largely without bothering the core development team) -- but they still happen.

Oh -- and I agree that Linus could indeed stand to be using better tools for managing the kernel. I don't like BitKeeper at all (my employer had some *ahem* unfortunate experiences *ahem* with both the product and with Larry McVoy personally), but it's certainly better than nothing (well, as long as backups are kept -- I've seen BK repositories self-corrupt too much to trust them).

Re:What a shame !!!

[sketerpot]

You horribly misinterpreted my post. I do wish that the people running china would get off their oppressive asses and put lots of civil rights and stuff into their government. All that I said was that if a government is going to moniter the internet activities of their people I wish they would be honest about it, rather than using a bunch of annoying political double-speak.

I think that the more civil rights a country has, the more likely they will be secretive about invading people's privacy. Please note, for those of you who may be tempted to misinterpret this and flame me, that this does not imply an endorsement of restrictive government at all!

You make yourself look like a moron when you say that I make myself look like a moron for saying something I didn't even say.

Click to admit that you are a total retard.

[Busty Amateur]

Prejudiced is not only a verb, it's an adjective - and used as such in this case.

You also forgot a "g" in your second-to-last post.