GNU-Darwin Dropping Cocoa, PPC Support

Johnny Mnemonic writes "MacSlash is reporting that the Gnu-Darwin ports project has taken issue with some of Apple's current policies, to the extent of: 'GNU-Darwin will not support or distribute any software which links to proprietary libraries, and that includes Cocoa, Carbon, CoreAudio, etc. There will be no native package manager from GNU-Darwin (pkg_add suffices). Second, we will be moving our operations to x86, and we are putting the ppc collection into maintenance mode.' Astonished reaction on MacSlash, and recognition of the Fink alternative. Is this a worthy principled stand, or is it more like Kruschev banging his shoe in the UN? Will this help or hurt Apple's adoption of GPL technology?"

Comments

Re:Utter Stupidity

[squiggleslash]

Or even easier, name one non-Linux company that has embraced the GPL at all.

Netscape.

Started off closed. Was mostly-opened via the NPL and MPL, and now is MPL/GPL dual licenced.

Off the top of my head, there's also Trolltech.

Out of interest, when did Apple try the GPL? I thought Darwin was still 100% APSL? If they're dual licencing too, then that's great news, but I haven't seen anything like that lately.

Re:Utter Stupidity

[David Gerard]

"name one non-Linux company that has embraced the GPL at all."

Although it's now owned by Red Hat, Cygnus embraced the GPL before Linux existed.

procius's answer on MacSlash

[jakobgrimstveit]

clarifications anyone?
by proclus on Wednesday December 18, @07:05PM EST

Sorry, I just couldn't let the story to out this way, because truth is important to me.

All machines that are currently supported will continue to be supported in their current configurations, so we are not pulling out the rug as it were. The situation could be better than this, but the ball is now in Apple's court. I will say that Apple has been moving in the right direction with respect to these issues over the past few years. If projects like ours can stay engaged with them, there may be a chance. It is not easy, and may be overly optimistic, but there it is. I'd like to give some time for Apple to respond.

The main source for the Apple/DMCA story is at the following link, although it has been covered extensively on the web as an 'Apple DMCA' googlesearch will reveal.

http://news.com.com/2100-1023-955805.html

Based on my experience with the Adobe boycott and other anti-DMCA activism, I consider Declan as a trusted source. Here are some good stories about the impact of the DMCA in general and on Apple users.

http://www.tidbits.com/tb-issues/TidBITS-656.html# lnk3
http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=06901

As for the APSL, this has been a long standing issue with the Distribution, which dates back to the founding.

http://newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=00/12/01/20282 54&mode=thread

Darwin is not free software, because the APSL is not consistent with the free software definition. For more information, check GNU Project.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/apsl.html

You may know Yves@gnu-darwin.org, who is a OSXFaq.com editorial contributor. His most recent installment is highly germain.

http://www.osxfaq.com/Editorial/open/index4.ws

Until Darwin is freed, activists such as myself will be leading users away from it instead of toward it. This antagonism towards Apple in the free software community has been aggravated by the DMCA fiasco. For example, Slashdot coverage of Apple has soured considerably since that time. We added the caveat to our Darwin distribution CD's soon after that (see grey box).

http://www.gnu-darwin.org/order.shtml

Clearly it is in Apple's best interest to repudiate the DMCA, to remove the onerous anti-privacy clause from the APSL, and to meet the standards of GNU Project, so that users can have a truly free OS, and so that activists can support Darwin instead of undermining it.

The message for users is to educate yourself about software freedom. In this world of economic contraction, the DMCA, RIAA, and the patriot act, that might take some effort, but it will be worthwhile in the event that free software becomes more difficult to maintain. Here is the starting point.

http://www.gnu.org

Regards,
proclus
http://www.gnu-darwin.org/

Why you bang off your shoes

[pgpckt]

or is it more like Kruschev banging his shoe in the UN

For those of you who might not be familar with why a person would do this, I thought I should point out that this is from the bible. A person bangs off their shoes to condemn a place.

Luke 9:5

"If people do not welcome you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave their town, as a testimony against them."

Luke 10:10-12

"But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go into its streets and say, 'Even the dust of your town that sticks to our feet we wipe off against you. Yet be sure of this: The kingdom of God is near.' I tell you, it will be more bearable on that day for Sodom than for that town. "

Acts 13:50-51

"But the Jews incited the God-fearing women of high standing and the leading men of the city. They stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region. So they shook the dust from their feet in protest against them and went to Iconium."

So you can see that banging your shoes off is quite a big deal in a bibical Just a little background info.

Re:Utter Stupidity

[FreeUser]

I thought that Netscape started off as a combination of open source (though not GPL, of course) projects.

No.

Netscape was not 'based' on mosaic ... they reimplemnted the browser from scratch using Motif instead of xaw widgets (for their *nix versions) and obviously windows equivelents for their 'doz versions. It was a complete rewrite, and entirely proprietary code until they chose to GPL it much later ... after Microsoft had nearly killed their market share through illegal leverage of their desktop monopoly (a crime for which Microsoft has been convicted, despite the current administration's unwillingness to uphold the law).

Netscape certainly falls in the category of "non-Linux company to embrace the GPL", though they certainly are not alone. Cygwin, Trolltech, and others have done likewise ... the GPL ironically is a very protective license to those commercial entities which wish to open their code without having competitors take it and incorporate it into their proprietary products. It is an effective innoculation against such things, which makes it a very useful license for many companies who have much to gain from opening their code, but do not wish to empower their competitors directly in the process.

It isn't for everyone, or appropriate for all circumstances (recall that OggVorbis is being released under the BSD License so that it will be adopted far and wide, in both free and proprietary products ... including hardware, and recall that the Free Software Foundation has endorsed this with its full support), but it is a very solid license in many (perhaps most) free software circumstances, and its innoculation against future abuse and closing off of the source is a very important, and very effective, feature in insuring that the public commons of code continue to grow and flourish.