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Linux: Fighting the FUD of Forking
sebFlyte writes "Fighting the MS FUD machine is a full time job for some open source developers, especially now Microsoft have thrown in the issue of the possibility of Linux forking (as Unix did)... it would also seem that Gates has moved on from telling people to 'get the facts' and creating FUD around patents and IP to criticising the open source communty's ability to create interoperable software."
From the guy that brought you exchange server and MS office closed format.
Each distribution has typically has its own fork. The glory of the GPL rings true here. No one can be hurt from a fork. The better code, how ever one wishes to evaluate better, will live on. As others have already noted, "Nothing to see here. Move along."
When I tell an object to delete this, am I killing it or telling it to kill me?
.. well at least that demon mascot does.
I think he's trying to make the point that someone could make a fork that is incompatible with all linux programs, or something like that. It doesn't make sense to me, because such a product would only be the result of its creators having a strong urge to shoot themselves in the foot.
I've ignored Red Hat and SuSE for about 5 years now, focusing mainly on Debian, Slackware, Gentoo, etc.
Now that I've used a Red Hat system again, I was completely dazzled by how drastically different the experiences are. I expect the GUI to be more polished, naturally, but so many underlying things are different as well. All in all, they're things I can learn, and binary and source compatibility are still there, but it's the trend that's disturbing.
All of the traditional UNIX vendors forked in order to raise the barrier of exit for people who wanted to switch platforms. Sun's platform is still alive today because Solaris is such a unique beast that you have administrators trained solely in the art of this platform. All the UNIX part does is allow for some kind of source compatibility. Maybe.
Cisco took TCP/IP, which was practically invented (and perfected?) on a BSD box and threw it away to build a new proprietary OS to run specifically on their routers.
It's hard to find a major distribution shipping the vanilla kernel these days. When does, for example, SuSE decide that binary compatibility with other distros is keeping them from "enhancing" the user experience? Can they resist?
I'd like to be wrong about all of this.
The whole nature of open source is based on interoperability. It is this very nature that made the Internet possible. Where standards are nonexistent, they are being created; for instance, look at the Jack Audio Connection Kit that allows all Linux audio applications (that support it) to interconnect. As a result, developers do not keep reinventing the wheel all the time; instead, they learn how to work with the provided interface, and just build what does not exist yet.
Visit http://ringbreak.dnd.utwente.nl/~mrjb/growingbettersoftware to download your free copy of the book
Look at this article http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/linuxunix/0,39020 390,39186059,00.htm for some background on what's meant here. Bill somehow means that Windows interoperates best with itself, and that other OSs don't do as good a job.
Put identity in the browser.
Does wider adoption benefit the developers of OSS, or would they be better spending their time working on the software than fighting FUD?
(I mean this as a serious question, not trolling)
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And it's also a convenient coincidence that they talk about this after recently releasing Office 2003 which supports saving the file as XML, and releasing the DTD giving others an option to be compatible with this XML format (albeit the license is somewhat incompatible with the GPL).
Err, when we start talking about entire Linux installs, and not just the kernel, wouldn't KDE and Gnome and (Others) count as forks? Yeah, they might be interface forks, but they each have their own software packages, configuration, etc. Yeah, KDE software will run on a Gnome desktop if the KDE libs are installed and vice versa, but that isn't really highly integrated is it?
And for software where money is made by having supporting services, etc, instead of the software itself, the incentive to create easy to use but still powerful software isn't very high - that'd mean less people buying support and help!
Shouldn't Slashdot be one of the first to stop spreading Microsoft's FUD? The less attention it gets, the less effective it will be.
Personally, I'm getting sick of seeying these 'Microsoft accuses competetition of being worse then them!' articles.
So what if there's a fork? So what if Linux experiences the same sort of trial-by-fire that occured when BSD went head-to-head with AT&T SysV? Sure, there was bickering between the BSD and SysV camps over the "right" way to do things. However, for the most part, the best methods won out by right of acclaim and attrition. There are few "pure" SysV systems, the BSD/SysV wars are ancient history, and *nix is probably the better for having gone through it.
At 3 A.M. you can see people's auras; at five you can see their contrails...
I think it's important to recognize that Microsoft, SCO and other like minded companies will do whatever it takes to distribute harmful and baseless propaganda in order to further their cause (monopolization of desktop and server markets, proprietization of media and so on). The fact is, while each distribution has minor differences in the way userland and package management is iemplemented, the fundamental Linux kernel is the same and works across all of the distributions.
As we've seen in previous anti-Linux efforts on Microsoft's part, this is another effort to steer current Microsoft users away from Linux that may be considering it to lower licensing fees and hardware overhead. We all know it takes a *lot* more sysadmin time and monetary investment in hardware and software to reach the same results with a Microsoft-based workstation or server vs. a Linux or Unix equivelent. While Microsoft's sales are strong, their propaganda efforts show some desperation and fear.
While open source developers may spend a lot of time battling Microsoft's rhetoric, I think it's more important to concentrate on creating a solid operating system for everyone, from the hobbiest to the corporate user. The best way to beat Microsoft at its own game is not to play it. That is, Microsoft seems to value marketing and scare tactics over actual development and innovation. Let's not let Linux fall in Microsoft's trap of smoke and mirrors.
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The reason why forking isn't a problem is because the open source community knows how to read the friggin' RFCs before we code something. Unlike a certain software giant who lives in Redmond.
Doesn't matter if there is one branch of a big project or 1000 forks. If they stick to specs, they are all interchangeable. Like your window manager. As long as they do what they're supposed to do, stick to specs and play fair - it doesn't matter which one you use.
This gives the user choice, which is why MS finds it to be such an alien concept.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
What Microsoft does not want you to know or think about is the difference between a fork with the proprietary Unixes and Linux. With all those proprietary types, yeah a fork is "bad" cause the code bases will never, never merge together. The opposite of that is the strength of Linux (if it ever did fork), any of those differences in code bases can be merged to one or the other or both. That's a good thing cause any improvements can be had by the other.
My karma is not a Chameleon.
The first kind is where each version of the software is slightly different, yet ABI compatible with one another. That's what the Linux kernel is, and Linus and co. have tried hard to maintain this. In essence, every time a developer sets up his own tree, it's a "fork" of the Linux kernel, but that's ok because binary compatibility is still maintained, and those changes will probably be merged back upstream anyway. Good news all round.
The second kind is where a substantial group of developers get into a messy political argument and take the codebase in a wildly different direction and becomes a new project in itself. This isn't necessarily a bad thing either, as you'll see cross-pollination between projects (like in the BSD's). However this may be what the FUD-mongerers are hinting at. I have yet to see any signs that this will happen though - it's downright impractical to fork the Linux kernel in a wildly incompatible fashion with the rest of the developer community - for one thing, there's a whole shitload of drivers you now have to maintain yourself. Not an easy job.
As for distros being different...well it's always been this way. Yet Linux's growth has been phenomenal, and with efforts like the LSB in place you won't find that distros diverge too far from one another.
Things look bright for Linux, any way you go. Don't listen to the FUD mongerers.
"Backups are for wimps. Real men upload their data to an FTP site and have everyone else mirror it." -- Linus Torvalds
Win 95, Win 98, WinNT, Win2K, WinXp. Looks like a hell of a lot of incompatible forking to me....
Linux developers need more spooning.
I'm a big tall mofo.
You know, I've started to noticed a very strong similarity between the open source movement and the progressive political movement. Both tend to just react to attacts, are not proactive, and faile to frame the debate into their own words. Thankfully for politics, the progressive movement has picked up on this and is working to change it. The open source folk can learn a thing or two from this. However, issue framing is a bit too complex for a comment post so I recommend that all of you go out and read "Don't Think of an Elephant!" by George Lakoff. Yes it's a politically motivated book, but it's the best place to learn issue framing that I know of. Perhaps I'll get off my lazy ass sometime soon and come up with something for slashdot readers.
You know you like it.
Funny how someone who talks a lot about the software 'ecosystem' wants customers to invest in this one dinosaur - instead of being amazed at the natural process of species differentiation and survival of the fittest.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
I think this is brillant, couldn't have come from a more knowledgable person at a better time. Especially given that in the past day or two a nice little article got published up on Groklaw about the SMB / CIFS protocol and what legnths they have to go to, to reverse engineer / pull it apart on the wire. It's essentially a slightly intelligent brute force method.
0 10415933
Take a look. I couldn't have made the timing for this article any better if I tried.
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20050205
I second Tridge's motion that when Microsoft really wants to come to the party on interoperability, let me know. I want to be there.
Personally, I think the major reason why they are going through what they are doing for interoperability now, it's all because of market pressure with the rise of open source, and the open standards which it follows. See what's happening with all the governments demanding open standards for documents etc?
*sigh* when will they learn?
Curiosity was framed; ignorance killed the cat. -- Author unknown
The problem isn't the forks. It is the install procedure that each fork will require to run the same piece of software.
With windows, you download a program and double click the install button. It doesn't matter if you are running Windows 98 / ME, NT, 2K, or XP. The thing installs and (sometimes) suns correctly. Try downloading a package (NOT SOURCE) built for some old version of RedHat and installing it on a new Slackware distribution. It just plain does not work by default.
This is what Bill G was talking about and I agree with him. There is no "standard" in the distribution. Where should the program go when it gets installed and does the distribution that it is getting run on grant the required privileges to install it there by default?
The Linux community needs to agree on a few things, one of the basics would be userland programs and config scripts. Until then it will continue to be it's own worst enemy as people won't be able to call themselves Linux admins, they will only be able to call themselves Distribution admins.
Yes, MS might create a lot of fear, uncertainty, and doubt, but how do you explain this?
We *could* die.
We *should* die.
We *will* die.
We *won't* die.
It even kind of has the air of: "Jeez, were you dumb enough to fall for that?"
Ever since all that hoopla about MN 2004, it's hard for me to read the word "FUD" on the front page of Slashdot and not giggle.
Forking creates a micro-market with micro competition. Software evolution is completely analygous (sp) to biological evolution. You have to have micro forking (microevolution) in order to evolve. Then the best traits are selected and carried on. Following the thoery of "punctuated equilibrium", those which have micro-evolved traits that are of significant advantage will be picked up by the others then the population of' those with the traits will explode. It is Natures way. No point in fighting it.
In IT though maintaining many microlines is viewed as a bad thing, unlike with biological life where things maintain themsleves. This is where the FUD really is. But one should realize that it need not be a big concern if the developers take that concern into account. An example of how to mitigate this is to use XML for settings. Any microline specific sub-tree of settings need not interfere and is only used by the microline.
HOWEVER this is an area where OSS has been deficient. Backwards-compatibility is not a highlight of OSS. OSS has gotten better, but even as recently as a year ago it was the policy of Mozilla to have the user manually do a uninstall before an upgrade. Such annoyances contribute to the magnitude of fear. What is more, backwards compatiblity policies vary from project to project. I do expect this to get better, and it has notten a lot better.
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
This is exactly the opposite of a fork. They took two codebases (the DOS-based 9x and the NT kernel), and gradually shared more and more code between them until they could ditch the 9x kernel and run all userland stuff on the NT kernel, as well as providing binary device driver compatibility between the later versions of both branches (WDM). It is not a fork, since the NT and DOS branches did not start off with a shared code base.
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I can't understand why Linux and F/OSS zealots waste time fighting FUD. It seems like a waste to me. All the time that is spent playing politics could be spent improving software and fighting FUD with the truth... Better software. Any person with half a brain knows that Microsoft, Sun, insert any corporation, will lie (or stretch the truth) in order to make their stuff look better than their competitors. So why fight it? IMHO there are many other more important battles to fight... Like better F/OSS software, better documentation, software patents, etc. It's weird how politics has this way of sucking people in. My self included.
The difference between MS, Unix and other propriatory systems and Linux & OSS when it comes to forking is that linux "forks" (such as the kernels that most distros ship) are compatible and indeed pretty much every "fork" or variant of an OSS program has tried to remain compatible (i.e. the kernel remains compatible with all linux apps except mabie those that talk to the kernel directly like kernel modules and drivers and so on)
And programs like Apache, OpenSSL, OpenSSH and others are based on standards.
On the other hand when Microsoft and other propriatory software vendors make forks, they are often incompatible by design.
here an idea:
:-)
pick one (use any criteria you desire), learn it.
Pick another one, learn the differences.
Try a third, more difficult distro (pick gentoo)
learn it inside and out.
Give yourself a long break from Windows (a month should do it) now go back to Windows and hate it properly.
Then never ever ever again ask What is the best distro..... as the answer will always be Gentoo anyway (ok ignore that last bit
The truth about Led Zep should never be told on
Anyway, I'm pretty sure that Bill would know what a pain in the ass it is for an operating system to have a bunch of divergent and not always compatible offerings available.
Can anyone tell me how to set my sig on Slashdot?
I think a serious Linux fork would be no problem at all, thanks to the GPL. If it had features the official kernel lacked -- an almost certain proposition -- we can assume that these features would get eventually merged in. Of course, worst case scenario most Linux software can also run on BSD.
Perhaps it's Bill himself who should get forked.
they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they attack you, then you win. - Gandhi
We're in phase 3...
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
I must be missing the M$ point as software forks all the time. Did not Winodws NT 3.5 fork from Windows 3.11 ? Are not users of Windows NT 3.x user long since faced this same issue? I don't believe Microsoft nor Linux could release a new version without a fork... but Linux being POSIX and having source code can in fact address most of the issues by re-compiling and re-installing.
But if the point is Linux could fork to a different group supporting it, this is a plus. It prevents a monopoly and the associated costs with it. It also allows distributions to evolve to what the market wants, and not marketing letting us know what we want.
For example, I was using a very old version of Linux, stable but needed to upgrade. I ended up going to a different distro as it was nicely tailered towards the desktop and it was destined for my laptop. The switch was painless.
This is my BIGGEST problem with slashdot /. a 1337 that has no time for a gnuB.
Why is it every time I admit I am a Microsoft guy, I get modded down?
I really WANT to learn Linux. Can anyone help me understand Forking, or is everyone on
There are some helpful comments here I know can help my MS peers get off the ground - if only SOMBODY could mod the parent up!
A simple explanation is not hard to find.
I read this far. The parent was high enough for me.
i ngStarted/
I would agree that you should get your hands on Fedora. (And one day you'll end up on Gentoo). In the install screen you'll want to install Apache, PHP and mySQL and install that. (...and before you get to that screen, whatever it proposes for drive partition is probably fine, in linux you need to define the amount of space for memory to overflow to) - A quick Google found this guys guide: http://www.johnmunsch.com/articles/FedoraCoreGett
Those crazy Linux commands can be dificult to learn, though powerfull. Are you going to be near this box a lot? If not it might help you to learn more about VNC and use the GUI interface remotely over the network - it functions like Remote Desktop.
Lastly, it's not really forking. At the moment their just diffrent implementations of the same standards. The linux distros are closer together on 'the linux standard' than Netscape and IE were on HTML.
.\.\att Clare
If I attempt to run a Linux application from 1995 on a modern Linux distro I generally get errors about missing libraries. In fact, trying to run apps just a few years old on a Linux box is often fraught with difficulty. I can often get it to run in the end - though not always.
Microsoft have had a fairly consistent set of APIs over the last decade. I really can't say the same about Linux - expecially the UI libraries.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
I am not sure if you are trolling or if you really are missing the point, so I will give you the benefit of the doubt.
;-)
Lets take two scenarios:
Scenario 1: You write a killer app. You keep it a closed source model, and some greedy big company decides it likes your software and wants to make money from it. Whats to stop them from doing a little reverse engineering, decompiling, and then "adapting" it to make it look like they wrote it? It's not very hard to do, really. And, since your source is closed, the only person that can really prove that SomeBigCo stole your software is you.
What is your recourse? You sue SomeBigCo for copyright infringement. However, you have to prove that you wrote it in the first place, which may or may not be an easy thing to do. SomeBigCo can also throw lots of lawyers at it and it will plod through the legal system. If your lucky and you win, you may see some money in a decade or so. In the mean time, you will need to spend your hard earned money on legal fees.
Scenario 2: You write a killer app. You open source it and use the GPL for the license. You are making money not on sale of the software (although that could be done), but on service, support, and perhaps customizing the software for others. Others have seen your software, liked it and have sent helpful patches and features to you, thereby enhancing your product. SomeBigCo sees it and wants it for their own. They have a choice then - they can either follow the GPL and release any changes as open source (thereby leveraging their developers to your effort), or they adapt it and try to make it their own.
If they release their enhancements as opensource, that is fine because you can incorporate it into your source tree. Since you are making money off service and support, you still have a revenue stream off of your software and that will not diminish by SomeBigCo helping your development.
If they try to make it their own, then you still have copyright law to enforce the copyright of your software. Only this time, since it is GPL, you stand a good chance of getting the Free Software Foundation's lawyers involved, rather than paying for your own. Additionally, a company may have no qualms about stealing software from an individual or even a small company, but only the foolhardy would risk a GPL lawsuit.
How does this protect you from "Open Source Vultures"? By using a service and support model, you will have a steady stream of income regardless of whether you are doing the development. No matter what, if SomeBigCo decides to try and steal your software, you still will need to litigate the issue. However, with a closed source model, your legal expenses will be your burden. Also, don't forget you will need to pay a lawyer to write your license for you, and if not written correctly it could allow SomeBigCo to take your software through a legal loophole. The GPL is a very stong license, and although it is not fully tested in court it is strong enough to considered formidable by the Nazgul of Armonk (IBM's lawyers).
Finally, think of it this way - writing software is very much like the pursuit of scientific research. The very act or reading this is a culmination of work and ideas created by others, all built upon one another to create this gestalt called slashdot
An ounce of perception is worth a pound of obscure
FUD, in all of it's manifestations is a sort of propoganda that can be easily equated to the negitive political ads that we in the United States see every time there is an election. When it comes to talking about all of the confusion that forking creates, it probably should be fought with answers that are real, simple, and above all logical.
Forking is a system that mimics "natural selection." When two camps have differing ideas they are both welcome to try it, whoever comes out with the "better" product is the "winner." The weaker of the two products may either "die on the vine" or continue to exist for those people who need the feature's it offers. If it dies, then the product that is being offered is clearly better. If both products continue to exist, then the user has more choices. Either way, the end user wins.
Most of today's modern automobiles have grown from "forks" of the original designs. There is no real reason why they have four wheels and symetric design other than that is what people favor. They have their humble starts with the Ford Model "T" and a few of it's fore-runners. Nobody complains that today, we have too much choice! Why is software any different?
In nature, we see that mono-cultures are almost always vunerable to some outside threat. Sadly, with the pervasivness of Microsoft Windows, we can see that the virtual world is also close to being a mono-culture. Is it any suprize that this operating system's vunerabilities have made things like viruses, trojans, spyware and other vunerabilities so wide-spread (and so dangerous)?
Forking is healthy. It works like natural evolution to both strengthen and diversify. It gives choice, and advances software's strengths and brings out it's weaknesses allowing developers to fix and improve. These are all good things!