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FLOSS Developer Survey Results Published
grex writes "The FLOSS (Free/Libre/Open Source Software) study from the University of Maastricht has published its final report. One of its five parts is the developer survey based basically on developers from the European Union. Results show that Debian is the preferred distribution, GNOME the desktop the majority choose and vi more popular than Emacs. But this survey also handles economic, law-related and motivation aspects among developers that make it very interesting to read."
good god, please use the floss you smelly hippies.
I had warm bawls.
Heathens !
ffff
Winnipeg Manitoba SUCKS!!
The difference between the two is only ~2%, in Gnomes favor. This out of of a group of a little over 2200, I don't know if I would consider that a large enough percentage to consider it to be anything other then a margin of error.
Results show that Debian is the preferred distribution, GNOME the desktop the majority choose and vi more popular than Emacs
Jeez, no wonder open sores development is so lacking. They are batting 0 for 3.
What exactly does Levi Spear Parmly (1790-1859) - the inventor/developer of dental floss - have to do with open source software!
:-)
Or then again, maybe I am just missing something...
Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy. -- Benjamin Franklin
Oh GOD!
I'm AVERAGE !
noooooo!
What's this Submit thingy do?
Oh my god... Call the firemen FAST!
In one day, we read:
A review of Vim to get people primed for an editor war.
Next, we read about Which is the better browser, to get that war going.
Now, we just put all our eggs in one basket for an all out flamewar that includes distros, editors, Window Managers, and even will bring up the euro vs. american flamewars.
Sweet lord, people! Wonder why Linux is still having trouble competing with MS? Could it possibly be internal conflicts?
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Results show that Debian is the preferred distribution, GNOME the desktop the majority choose and vi more popular than Emacs.
So what you're saying is, these guys spent a ton of money to produce a giant troll ? Did they happen to say to whether Britney Spears is hotter than Shakira, or which Star Trek TV series was best ?
Patient: Doctor... I seem to have a problem with my teeth.
Doctor: Yes, what is it?
Patient: I have his nagging pain here, is there anything you can do?
Doctor: Let me see... HOLY CRAP! (cough) Well uh... let me put it to you straight. You seem to have a Gnome stuck inbetween your teeth. I'd get the FLOSS out, but I don't think it'd help your problem. Perhaps we should knock your teeth out and replace them all with KDE bridges.
You know, the Tested Open-ObjecT Hierarchical PAtented SoftTware Environment.
Jesus H. Christ, ED's.
How many "Comment Whoring" flame wars are you fuckers trying to start today?
An editor war isn't enough, so why don't you throw in a browser war..
Well fuck me, that's not doing it, so let's just throw in the hottly debated desktop issue and just start an all out flame war to end all flame wars.
Great fuckin job, fucktards.
Who cares about vi versus emacs anyway? They're both old-fashioned and not useful. No one uses fixed-line editing anymore. If you want a real text program, look at MS Word, and for all you linux junkies, look at xtext.
I just heard some sad news on talk radio - Horror/Sci Fi writer Stephen King was found dead in his Maine home this morning. There weren't any more details. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss him - even if you didn't enjoy his work, there's no denying his contributions to popular culture. Truly an American icon.
Only Floss the ones you want to keep!
This is true man! I gots periodontial desease and it was bad YO.
Them teeth done be growin back yall.
Takes care of em or dey will leave.
This study is shit. It was based on voluntary user input and it was heavily advertized on some hardcore Linux websites, so it isn't reprensentative at all. This explains vi vs. emacs, Gnome vs. KDE, Debian vs. the world...
The industry produces seriously flawed studies. This goes to prove that the open-source world can too !
Nobox: Only simple products.
When using emacs I tend to agree with those who say Stallman is a lunatic.
And people would pay him for tutorials in this crap !?
It's true. Look at the study.
Now, if we compare this to /., where approximately six people have a girlfriend, and half of them are girls, we must conclude that nobody on /. actually does anything useful.
<G>
Frumpf... they should take a university mathematics class in statistics.
Let see a survey of mainly European developers prefer free software versus paying higher prices for import software (and hardware.) Geez this has been an reality for decades. Being I used to be a Marketing slime I'll throw in this was always a problem selling U.S. software outside the U.S. because of import costs. Also higher hardware costs outside the U.S. means they tend to run older hardware so they need software with less system requirements. Even more an issue in South America. So is anyone surprised that the results show a free OS that has less system requirements appeals to them. I'm suprised they felt they needed to do a survey to figure it out.
Now they have good taste in editors vi rules! but poor taste in desktops. Gnome oh yuck, it is so five minutes ago.
About 30% of the people say they are doing open source to help their chances of getting a job!
From my experience most software companies don't hire people with a open source background since it's high risk. The risk ofcause is that people will run off with the code, cloning the project just for the purpose of driving the company out of business.
That risk is obviously very real since over 30% of the people who has answered says proprietary software shouldn't exist.
I like that vi doesn't give me Emacs-pinky, but Eamcs has this command C-M-\ that automatically indents every highlighted line of C source code so you don't have to reindent it line by line. vi doesn't seem to have any such thing. Also, it is easy to bind keystrokes to your own functions in Emacs. I still haven't figured out how to make the spacebar do what Control-F does in normal mode (scroll down one screen) and backspace do what Control-B does (scroll up one screen) in vi.
Has anyone written a vi clone in emacs-lisp yet? ;-)
Seriously, vi is an editor; emacs is an operating system.
It is obvious why open source isn't over taking the evil Microsoft empire .... look at the people that they surveyed for the answer:
.... Mainly single males .... maybe some of this stuff needs a women's touch (man, am I going to get flamed for saying that) ... but look at neopets.com. It is the most popular, free online game right now ... why???? Because women like it!!!!!!
... it is skeewed towards software engineers. Where are the systems administrators and network administrators in that list?? I also didn't see that much in terms of University/public researchers .... they are the people that use this stuff!!! I think that the statistician that did this survey needs to go back to Probability & Statistics 101 ... and look at some of the fundemental rules for taking a survey.
.... man can they skeew numbers!!!! (and I bet they're grant money was also listed as "soft money" ....)
99% Males
40% Single
Hmmmmm
Back to the topic, I don't think that the sample of the population makes for a good survey
Debian as the favorite Linux distribution??? Gimme a break!
Gnome?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
I can't stop laughing!!!!
These people must also work for Enron
HallmarkOrnaments.Com
q
Q
GNOME the desktop the majority choose
Not to nitpick, but since when did 33% constitute a majority? FYI, Gnome leads the poll at 33%, with KDE closely behind with 30%.
I've had to work on many different UNIX workstations, and the lack of Microsoft's word program was crippling. You can call me stupid (we'd all know that that would be a farce) but perhaps more linux distrobutions should include a copy of Microsoft Word. If you want Joe Sixpack to buy a copy of Redhat, you'll have to give him something that doesn't require him to remember arcane keystroke commands. IMHO, Microsoft Word is the key to linux advocacy.
I got a 1600 on the SATs.
They all suck hard.
Debian over Red Hat?
VI over Emacs?
Gnome over KDE????
These are the worst representations from the open source community. Didn't anyone tell the people of the EU that they are free and they do have a choice. Don't they know that they can choose from the much better options and the Open Source software is all about the freedom of choice? Those poor oppressed bastards are suffering under the worst of open source and they say they like it.
If you're a Linux user, you already have it.
If you're a Windows user, get VIM.
And if you're a Mac user, buy a PC then get VIM.
If you don't like that, you should check out American Presidential elections.
Majority rules. Hahaha
This survey consisted entirely of self-selected participants. The surveyors actually seemed to boast that they didn't select anyone themselves. This study is bogus and proves nothing.
The staggering support for Debian (48%!) only proves that Debian developers are more successful in recruiting other Debian developers to participate in bogus online survey's. This isn't a dig against Debian, it's a dig against the silly methodology of this study.
This survey, despite its seemingly thoroughness, is no more valid than the weekly Slashdot Poll. The only conclusion that can be drawn from this survey is that Debian, GNOME and vi users are more likely to participate in a self-selected survey than Redhat, SuSE, Mandrake, KDE and emacs users.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
Debian Weekly News comments on this in their latest issue:
62.3% of Linux users have a (warezed) Windows 2000 partition so that they can play Warcraft III
59.3% of Linux users prefer 'slender, young looking' anime babes to 'busty, voluptuous' anime babes.
only 22.3% of Linux users really think Natalie Portman is all the good looking, even in tight white spandex. Most were just thankful that JarJar only got 2 scenes.
93.2% of Linux users who read Slashdot have JonKatz permanently filtered.
32.3% - Boxers
44.1% - Tighty Whiteys
22.3% - Flappin' in the wind, baby!
62% of Linux users think that 'man' is a threatening name for a documentation application since it's vaguely homoerotic.
58.3% of Linux users think that all polls about free software are orchestrated by Microsoft and are unwilling to trust the results, even if they are positive.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
If you agree with this, you must copy this text, go to the top story on /. at the time you are reading, and paste this into a reply to the parent.
To The Washington Post
Dear America:
And so it has come to this. Your once great nation has
fallen into madness, an affliction of mass denial that brings shivers up
the spines of millions outside your borders. Yours is a sick nation. But
most of you carry on as though nothing at all is the matter.
Dark, evil operations run rampant in the secret corners
of your government institutions. An illegally constituted government pursues
war at will anywhere on earth, discussing nuclear options that become points
for cheerful chatter over lunch. Your military and intelligence agencies
employ terrorist tactics around the globe even as they insist that such
tactics are necessary in the fight against terrorism.
You have become a nation of monsters, America. Hypocrites.
Murderers. Fools.
Your constitution is a shambles thanks to national security
measures resulting from what might well be U.S.-government-sponsored terrorist
attacks in New York City and Washington D.C., covert provocations designed
to justify a malevolent, poisonous, oil-based military economy.
Never mind that earth-friendly technology already exists
to once and for all end dependence on oil, coal and nuclear energy from
huge, out-of-control utilities and corporations. You would rather pay through
the nose for your insecure comforts, wouldn't you America ? and make others
pay with their blood.
At the same time, you stand by as the Israel?s secular
Zionists ? whom you support through the supply of arms and money -- slaughter
untold numbers of innocents in the West Bank, then blame the Palestinians
for bringing the terror upon them selves. True, there are terrible Arab
suicide bombers in Israel?s midst. But are they not driven to madness and
desperation by your infernal support of international terrorist politics?
As I write these words, you support a nation run by a
convicted murderer who with impunity is carrying out war crimes as cruel
and horrendous as those of other sadistic tyrants in history. And you say,
in your utter cynicism, when will these Palestinians bring this war to
an end?
You recklessly wage combat on other fronts, too. At home,
your War on Drugs is a disastrous 30-year folly -- a gigantic con game
designed to benefit lethal cartels, corrupt politicians and menacing intelligence
agencies across the planet.
Meanwhile, military tanker jets daily spray massive quantities
of unknown chemicals into the skies above your cities without your population?s
consent, and most of you do not even have the wherewithal to look up. Those
who do and who voice their outrage hear only a deafening silence from your
congress and your tax-supported health agencies. Some Americans have too
active imaginations, yes? Best treat them with mind-numbing prescription
drugs, and try to forget that the awful side effects number in the thousands.
Indeed, those who your government appoints to oversee
your safety and security laugh in your faces. With your government?s support,
crooked multinationals like Monsanto buy up the world?s water supplies,
and take possession of the world?s vegetation through Frankenstein technology
already known to cause illness.
Does the FDA care about any of this? Hell no. It?s long
been on the bandwagon to foist genetically altered food on the Guinea Pigs
of the country -- including every man, woman and child on America?s increasingly
toxic soil.
You are a nation of suckers, America, to be bled dry
of your hard-earned pay through outrageous bank schemes, Wall Street rip
offs and fake government budget grabs. Your Pentagon cannot account for
trillions in lost dollars. Does this bother you? Not in the least.
Your whole economy is controlled by what is for the most
part ravenous, international private banking interests in the form of The
Federal Reserve, which with your government?s consent leads you down the
garden path to irrecoverable debt and certain financial ruin.
Is this worth thinking about? When?s the football game
on?
These very same money men are the ones who, through unmonitored
and unrepresentative world committees, are driving countries like Argentina
into hopeless debt and social upheaval. These greedy overlords are creating
strife and suffering on a scale too tragic for words in nation after nation.
Just look at Africa.
They?ve got their sites on America, now, too; disrupting
economic stability through so-called free trade initiatives and provisions
for special favors and the endless flow of cash to corporate monstrosities
like Enron.
For the most part, your congressional representatives
are nothing but swine gathering at the corporate troughs. Your president
is a creep and a thug, a hypocrite who through his actions celebrates war,
repression and greed even as he gives lip service to peace, freedom and
justice.
George W. Bush hoodwinks you daily, the coward hiding
behind a phony patriotism. He is an Enron buddy boy, a spoiled child lying
in his teeth about his past and current dirty deeds. Does he care about
you America? Hardly. This is altogether obvious to those outside your borders
who are politically aware and awake to the world around them.
You were never concerned about the disgraceful practices
of George's ruthless father, either, a Bin-Laden cohort and friend to criminals
and killers in global drug, oil and terrorist enterprises. Iran. Vietnam.
El Salvador. Chile. Guatemala. Iraq. And on and on. The never-ending bully-boy
story of blood, guns, drugs and money.
Does any of this matter? Not really. Go get your ten-billionth
burger America. Fatten your already fat asses with bacteria-and-hormone-ridden
meat and do nothing as you sit stupefied before your mind-numbing television
sets awaiting the next episode of sad families being humiliated on Cops.
Few among you are the least bit concerned that no real
investigation of 911 has taken place, that no serious investigation of
the anthrax attacks is moving forward, that no authentic investigation
of Enron, or the murder of one of its top executives, is underway.
How many of you give the slightest damn about the totalitarian
measures your government is taking to keep its secret meetings, grubby
files and treasonous activities from your eyes? You look the other way
as your own honest citizens rise up against those within your nation who
gassed innocent children to death at Wako, hid evidence in the TWA 800
air disaster and rubbed elbows with foreign terrorists in Oklahoma City.
When did you stop caring America? Was it after your own
CIA and FBI plotted the murder of President John F. Kennedy? Or is this
just the raving lunacy of the conspiracy nut? What does your gut tell you
America? Is something a little amiss here?
Forget about it. Have some Pepto-Bismal.
Today, in futility, your own government goes to court
against itself for information you are entitled to by law. But this is
hardly deemed vital news in the community. It is a fleeting reference in
an electronic sea of meaningless banter. For proof, just look to all the
spineless whores who constitute your mainstream news media.
Today, you excoriate, ridicule and ostracize the brave
and true among you. Your best investigative journalists are fired from
their jobs and ignored. Congress?s few courageous souls are laughed at
and dismissed out of hand. The most honest and conscientious political
leader in the country, Ralph Nader, is a powerless, near invisible curiosity
easily side-lined by hired goons.
America, you are a goddamn shame.
What law matters now in your despicable state? What justice?
What truth? When will you wake up? If you had your druthers, you would
right now gather your courage, take to the streets and march on Washington
D.C in the millions. But I know you will do no such thing. The vast majority
of you are spiritually, emotionally and intellectually dead.
You consume. You eat. You shit. And that?s just about
it.
As I write these words in Spring of 2002, I can only
imagine what additional horrors your shadow government might be planning
in what will surely be an attempt to justify militarism and totalitarianism
on a universal scale. A nuclear explosion in one of your cities perhaps?
A massive bio-chemical attack?
Or perhaps it will be some Arab terrorist who does the
great and terrible deed, his last thought before death being the promises
you made to him before killing his family.
Sincerely,
Robert McDougall
A Canadian
Come on, admit it, USA is crazy! 37 murders every minute, 422 armed assaults every minute, 20484 rapes every minute.. CRIME IS A DISEASE, but you americans GOT THE CURE! Stallone COBRA! ;)
"and vi more popular than Emacs."
Wow, software developers aren't retards... who knew?
troll. U KAN"T USE W!NDOWS ON LINUX!
it's not nice to troll my comments you asshole. go back under the bridge.
They didn't count the results from Finnish users, otherwise you would have seen linux from scratch over debian, bash over gnome or kde and lynx over mozilla..
I can't remember where i saw the servey either and i don't go arround seeking them out so it must have been quite prominent.
Those who didn't respond might not put make much effort into other open source areas too.
It's been so long since I did this, I forgot about JonKatz.
I'm surprised there isn't a troll posting "Emacs is dying" post like the "BSD is dying" posts.
I'd love to see a high quality survey of users and developers of free OSes like GNU/Linux and the BSDs. Something really detailed with tons of questions.
It would be interesting to see the results. Of course, I have no idea how you would keep fraud for messing up the stats for such a thing.
FLOSS is not about the frivolous items discussed in the summary. The poll is only a small part of the study, which goes into great depth in the use and role of free software in companies and in government.
It goes as far as recommending that EU states adopt legislation similar to the one proposed in Argentina, Perú, Colombia and others, mandating the use of free software in government for security reasons. Section 4.2
Gnome 32.52%
KDE 30.05%
Mac 2.3%
Pure Text 8.37%
Windows 3.56%
Other 23.19%
Since when is 32.52% a majority? This is less than one third, and certainly not more than half, which is waht was indicated by the summary. Of course, I am an idiot for expecting accuracy on /., right?
Lasers Controlled Games!
I really wish they had asked how people find time to develop open-source software. We couldn't expect completely honest answers, of course, but it's always interesting to see how many people not only do open-source work when they're supposed to be doing something else (e.g. paid work or study) but even admit that they do so. A similar question would be about what effects the expenditure of time on open-source projects has had on other aspects of people's lives - e.g. flunked out of school, got fired, lost a girlfriend, etc.
I know that many do open-source work entirely on their own time (or get paid to do it) and manage to find a balance between that and other aspects of their lives. I don't mean to imply otherwise. I just think that any sociological study of open-source developers should pay at least some attention to this "darker side" in addition to the by-now-overdone philosophical and work-habit questions.
Slashdot - News for Herds. Stuff that Splatters.
Really, this comment hits the target!
:-)
(it seems that you've really read the documents)
quantitatively!
We are to expect Lunix users, especially whiny eurotrash ones to floss? Ridiculous!
America is run by a mod of globalist, multiculturalists, homosexual Jews. Nader is a sucker. Join The National Alliance (there's even a Canadian Chapter)