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Porting Open Source to Minor Platforms is Harmful

Tamerlan writes "Ulrich Drepper posted a blog entry titled "Dictatorship of Minorities". He argues that open source projects' attempts to support non-mainstream (read "non-Linux") operating systems slow down development and testing. While Ulrich may be biased (he is a RedHat employee) he has the point: if you ever read mailing list of any large open source project, you know that significant piece of traffic is about platform-specific bugs or a new release broken on some exotic platform."

8 of 709 comments (clear)

  1. FP 4 MEMORIAL DAY NEGROES by repruhsent · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    In honor of our fallen soldiers in this any all wars, I hereby claim this first post.

  2. Re:Adverse Affect For Me by andreyw · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Any reason why you're not running Solaris 10 on the Ultra?

  3. He does have a point by ShatteredDream · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    The problem with all of this "choice" is that to be able to compete with Windows, MacOS X or even Zeta in the long run, Linux distributions have to have all of their components that tightly integrated. That means that ideally the KDE, X.Org and Linux developers need to be all on the same sheet of music to make sure that their components work very, very well together. Most people cannot even tell you what GDI is on Windows, or Quartz is on MacOS X, so why should they have to know what X.Org is and why they need to care about it?

    This is the painful reality for these developers. The average buyer doesn't want a distribution, they want a complete operating system. KDE + X.Org + Linux is a cobbled together setup, Windows, MacOS X, Syllable, BeOS, etc. were and are not. That's what they expect, and it may mean that some of the smaller projects have to take on a lot of work. So be it. If you want desktop Linux to work well, and be a true replacement for Windows, then it may mean that the KDE and/or GNOME guys have to go Linux only or that another project has to be started that creates a complete and pure Linux operating system that is a "total experience and environment" rather than a collection of packages.

    The difference is fundamental, not symantic. It means that the projects must be coordinated together with one vision, one plan and a goal of one end result.

  4. To the moderators by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    How would you feel if your favorite web site suddenly decided that you were no longer good enough to participate because you have a disability? That's what Taco has done. Think about that before marking a post as a troll. Complaining about heavy-handed hate tactics is not trolling.

  5. I hope he writes C better than he writes English. by porkchop_d_clown · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    'cause if his code is like his blog, it's pretty bug ridden.

    ...multiple configurations mean diverts energies....
    ...even to undeserving once like...
    ...more about winers who complain ...

    Damned, ungrateful oenophiles!

  6. EMERGENCY: Boycott Indonesia by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    There is a crisis in Indonesia.

    An Australian woman might be put to death.

    Does anyone know how to hack into some sites in Indonesia and cause the Indonesian animals some problems?

    1. Re:EMERGENCY: Boycott Indonesia by Quelain · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Right, so one white girl gets a raw deal and NOW it's worth boycotting Indonesian tourist destinations. Pretty sad after what happened in East Timor just a few years ago, without much interest from the media and the general public.

      --
      Cthulhu loves you.
    2. Re:EMERGENCY: Boycott Indonesia by Quelain · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Go fuck yourself Nazi

      --
      Cthulhu loves you.