Slashdot Mirror
Linux Router Project Dead
An anonymous reader submits: "The Linux Router Project is no more. This single-floppy distro was a great tool for building a number of simple super-low-cost network devices. The maintainer has a lot of bitter words about its demise, and it is sad to see it go."
What happened to all these sponsorships?
No wonder he didn't get a job.
;)
The point about GPL is that you can't get ripped off. If they rip you off, you can force them to release their derivative work also as GPL. If he chose the wrong license, he got what he deserved.
I put my embedded work under GPL and actually managed to get some funding. If it's GPL, people have to talk to you to use it commercially, you know? That's the beauty of GPL.
Anyway, I can't say I found LRP to be as great as this guy actually thinks it is. And this childish "look what you missed" bullshit is not going to get him anywhere either. The world is full of companies who are not making any money, Caldera and Lineo being two very good examples he cites himself. Don't expect them to pay you if they don't have to.
So far, almost every company that hired has tried to rip me off in the end. That's how it goes. So choose wisely, chose GPL.
BTW: A new init system? Got one of those as well... I even wrote my own libc. And you know what? People are helping with the projects, in fact, many people are helping me with the projects. Feel free to look at all the names in the dietlibc CHANGES file! I think it's how you treat people that makes them help you. If your code is readable and you treat people well, they will help. You won't get big front page articles on Wired, but you'll create a damn good project, people will know your name. And you will get invited, too! Meet me at Linuxtag 2003!
...and it was actually my greatest hesitation to updating the site instead of just dropping it off the face of the earth.
I guess every dreg and their ugly mother will crawl out of the wood work to find fault with something I did now. Have fun wasting your key strokes.
But I felt I owed a 'what happened' to the people out there that loved LRP for all it really was: Compact, Efficient, Powerful, and most of all a Unique Operating System.
But just 3 hours after I finalized the last update?? Jeez...I guess people are just dying to find anything to submit. It's always interesting when your apache processes jump from 5 to 152...
Dave
"now what company would want to hire a guy which calls his customers idiots???"
You obviously have never been in a meeting with the senior management for any large tech corporation, have you?
Or, you could just ask anyone who has/had to field tech support calls from their own customers. Customers, for the most part, don't know what the fuck they are talking about when it comes to technical matters. Slashdot users are not your atypical customers, trust me, you folks can at least figure things out provided you're given the right bits of information to work off of.
In addition to all of this, what the fuck does the programmers opinion of the customers even matter? Is the customer *ever* going to have to deal with the programmer in a support situation? In a corporate environment I would highly doubt it.
Hell, I would let the guy have a HUGE poster in his cube that said:
"The customer is wrong, bitch!"
So long as he met his project targets and his code worked well.
Now if the programmer goes public with his sentiments that the customers are idiots while working for my company then his opinion becomes a problem because it is now a PR disaster that has to either get spun somehow or I now have to punish him somehow in a public way so it looks like I am giving a shit about my customers opinions (even if I agree with my employee that they are idiots...but they are the idiots who eventually pay both our checks).
So yeah, basically, the problem is customers are idiots whom you have to keep around otherwise you're out of a job at some point.
Unless your the CEO or senior management and then you just fuck over your lower pleeb employees but sucking your fat golden parachute out of the company pension fund or some equally horrendous lack of moral pulchritude.
And people think I am too pessimistic/sarcastic for someone who is 27. To them I say, work in the tech sector for the last 10 years and try to not turn out even MORE sarcastic/pessimistic then I. If you do find someone who turned out less sarcastic then me, he is lying to himself and therefore ergo must be in sales. Bastards.
The main one is that they are desperate not to get involved in any sort of money-laundering or porn scam - to the point that a single complaint (even anonymous) can get an account (potentially containing thousands of dollars) "frozen" until you prove your innocence; sometimes they just won't give a reason, and your money is just locked for months while they perform their own investigations.
The second is an extension - paypal reserve the right to pull cash directly from any bank account or CC you give them if (in *their* opinion) they are justified in doing so. you get no appeal from them and there is no regulatory body to complain to (paypal are careful to stay outside of the criteria that would make them a regulated bank; they are simply "agents" for the financial transactions, although exactly how that works if you have $20,000 in their possession (paid by your customers but not forwarded to you) for months at their whim is a little difficult for me to figure..)
There are other issues (like the privacy ones) but those are the main two.
-=DaveHowe=-
It's constantly amazing to me too how many of the Gnu-Uber-Alles folks don't really understand that they are giving their work away for free and can not reasonably expect anything in return. Not a salary, not an occasional trip, not even acknowledgement.
You are quite wrong about that. Giving away code means gaining fame - that is, if the code is good. With enough fame, you can write your own ticket.
In today's world, fame is bankable, make no mistake about it. Now, take note that this only addresses the money factor. Giving away code - good code - has many other benefits:
- Gain respect from your peers
- Social aspects - make useful contacts, meet like-minded people
- Improve your skills
- Take advantage of the debugging/design power of peer review
- Forestall possible attempts by others to patent ideas you've discovered independently
- People will send you free computers
- If you're good enough, expect to be invited to join organizations, speak at events, etc - it's fun.
And so on.
Have you got your LWN subscription yet?
The developer of the Linux router project covered many of you bullet points on his site, with an obviously different spin.
It sounds like this guy got all of the publicity and free computers that he wanted, but he STILL wasn't bringing in enough money to pay his bills.
His example is a good one to remember when deciding whether or not to open source your software projects. If you don't have enough money to eat or pay rent, NO amount of coding skills or respect from your peers is going to allow you to program for a project that isn't bringing in any revenue!
I think that everyone can agree that this guy seriously needs a day job. He should work on the Linux Router project in his spare time, but make sure that he has the money coming in to pay those bills.
Hopefully, some Slashdot reader can provide him with a position.
Most of the information and development was on the unofficial c0wz website (those involved with LRP know which site I'm talking about). But that site went down around the time LEAF started. Every once in a while I run accross an old mirror of the c0wz website, which still has the best collection of networking links and information IMHO.
One thing people don't realize is that if they don't have the time or energy for a project, they need to hand it off to someone else. Otherwise everyone will jump ship and start a new project (see LEAF) and leave the original developer with nothing more than a dead project and a few memories. When something a popular as LRP dies, it's not because of a lack of interest from the community, it's because of a lack of interest, direction, and leadership from the original developer. The LRP would continue on if the original developer would learn to just let go...
Go not unto/. for advice, for you will be told both yea and nay (but have nothing to do with the question)
It is the same guy. He has been a nutcase for years. If I had realized that Dave 'kill a cop' Cinege was the force behind the Linux Router Project, I would have never used it. He was the first person I encountered on usenet that convinced me of two things:
1 - He is more than a little unstable.
2 - The internet can be a dangerous place.
Don't worry Dave, if you can't find work then someone, somewhere is holding a padded cell just for you.
Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see. - Mark Twain
I agree with you 100%. It is VERY important to keep the cash flow side of your life in mind when you are going to write code and GPL it. To me it seems like the *only* component he was missing was the mechanism to turn a profit on his work(I know, duh, but bear with me). He apparently never looked at himself as a vendor. I bet there could have been money to be made in selling prebuilt systems or selling his knowledge via some kind of support channel.
I use LRP as my router/firewall to connect my home network to my cable modem. One MAJOR problem I have with it is that I can't get my home -> work VPN connection to setup through my LRP box. After much googleing I have found that it is possible, but the mechanism to do it is sufficiently beyond me and my wife would not appreciate hours and hours of down time while I fiddle with it. I would have gladly payed for a preconfigured floppy, CD, flash drive (preferrably flash drive because it's just cool!) to get me going...
It's too bad really, LRP is VERY god at what it does. I for one will miss it.
Please be patient, I'm a work in progress! --Alan Jackson
The days when people didn't take free software for granted are gone. And that's too bad. Some people just think that somehow they are entitled to Linux, FreeBSD, Apache, Perl, Python, etc, etc. And I bet they claim to be "open source supporters" without ever contributing a line of code, just by virtue of using Apache or something.
On the other hand there is a definite trend developing where people who are able to write software are much more cautious about giving it away. And I actually think that's healthy, because contrary to what some may be delusional about, existence of free software is not a fact of nature, it is a result of someone's hard work and generosity.
And don't buy this bull that writing free software pays in fame or whatever. I have little respect for people who say things like this.
grisha.org