ESR Advocates Proprietary Software

mvdwege writes "Apparently, Eric Raymond has decided that proprietary software is now a good thing, according to The Register. I must say it is rather revealing how easily he is willing to compromise on this particular freedom. Is his earlier vocal proclamation of the importance of freedom (still visible on his homepage) mere posturing? And if so, how about his vocal support of other freedoms?"

Comments

That's not quite what he said.

[squiggleslash]

Much as I'd love another excuse to blast ESR here, that's putting an awful spin on an article that doesn't quite say that about a speech that doesn't quite say that.

ESR is suggesting the open source movement concern itself with making sure GNU/Linux et al works out of the box, and if that means in the short term accepting some proprietary software, then that may be necessary. His belief is predicated upon the notion that the move to 64 bit computing means people are about to make choices about the next generation of operating systems. If they get a 64 bit machine, they're going to either chose GNU/Linux, or a proprietary system like Windows, and once that choice has been made that's it.

I think ESR is wrong in believing that. But if he believes that, then it's legitimate for him to believe that a short term acceptance of some proprietary software, that can be rewritten later, may be necessary to "get us through" to the point that the system most likely to end up being 100% FOSS is the dominant operating system.

My belief is that this is all bollocks, and the move to 64 bits will make no difference whatsoever in terms of which 1970s technology OS is used, as ultimately the major candidates are. But it's legitimate for him to think otherwise, and doesn't even represent an ideological "shift" (as the article implies) to believe that in order for FOSS to win-out, it may need some non-FOSS code in the short term. That's always been the case. Even the FSF accepts that, hence the LGPL, a license they like to discourage the use of but nonetheless one they invented anyway and want to see used for certain projects. The entire point of the LGPL is exactly the same as ESR's point: you have to integrate with proprietary software in the short term if you want to move beyond proprietary software in the long term.

The only way to read the meaning the submitter attributed to ESR is to believe ESR cares more about GNU/Linux's popularity than he does about free software. I seriously doubt that's the case.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Enoxice]

ESR? Why does it seem like everyone associated with FOSS gets their own acronym?

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[dnoyeb]

We call those initials, not an acronym. Now if someone were to say "The ESR" that would be a different story.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Speare]

What is an acronym, and what is an initialism, depends on how you pronounce it.

NAFTA is an acronym, because you don't pronounce it En-Ay-Eff-Tee-Ay. Same for SONAR and SCUBA.

"The ESR" would be pronounced like The Ee-Ess-Ar. Not an acronym. The ESRB, the NAACP, and OSDN are all initialisms.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Ashtead]

They don't. The initials ESR identify Eric S. Raymond, while the acronym ESR usually refers to Effective Series Resistance, a property of capacitors. These are entirely different things!

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Gerzel]

will make no difference whatsoever in terms of which 1970s technology OS is used,

I'm curios. Just to what extent is Linux 1970's technology, really? I doubt that it really is. I mean compare the original system with the system running today(the entire system not just the kernel) with the system of the 1970's. How much of that older system is still in use in terms of lines of code? Sure the organizing principals might be similar but to call it 1970's tech is about as descriptive as calling cars Roman technology, after all they are sized according to how wide the Romans thought a vehicle and road should be. Road tech hasn't changed that much as far as the basics.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[johansalk]

I think it's really simple. Distros that want to bundle proprietary software do that, freespire already does. Distros that don't, don't. I have increasingly seen open source media formats rise in usage and prominence. ESR thinks linux has a rare opportunity to displace windows as it is shifting from 32bit to 64bit, and therefore is willing to make that compromise lest the chance is lost. Others, such as Maddog, don't think that's needed. I, for one, don't think that's needed.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[brouski]

I often hear the automobile (specifically the internal combustion engine) referred to disparagingly as 19th century technology.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Anonymous Coward]

What is an acronym, and what is an initialism, depends on how you pronounce it.

Indeed, but I think the point was ESR is an initial, not an initialism or acronym. These are 3 different things.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[squiggleslash]

POSIX and Windows are both operating systems that use hardware memory management to seperate otherwise unsafe (written in liberal mid-level languages like C) processes from one another, using a security model based largely upon user ownership. If a large number of jobs have to be done that require communications between the different programs performing the different jobs, a single program - running in its own memory space - is generally written that manages all the jobs, rather than the jobs being split out one-per-program.

Programs are loaded from files on disk, from a simplified file system that uses hierarchical name management and that's based upon arbitrary length binary files. From the point of view of the user, there are running programs and files.

This is essentially classic 1970s computer technology. In terms of where it became the standard for system design, that's roughly when it dates to.

There have been serious attempts since then to reform that model, but generally they haven't gone anywhere. The 1980s was full of simplified systems where all processes ran in the same memory space - Windows, Mac OS 6+, AmigaOS, Sinclair QDOS, etc. At the other end of the spectrum, there were many abortive attempts to break up operating systems into more simplified units protected from one another. None of these design changes are present in Windows, Mac OS X, or GNU/Linux, either the simplified or the microkernel strategies (with good reasons for both.)

The 1990s saw the beginning of managed code. While this probably does represent the future of computing, we're not seeing it yet. As yet, managed code only exists in mainstream operating systems running as high level processes at the same level as other ordinary user applications. Mac OS X, Windows, and GNU/Linux do not use managed code, they merely support it.

File systems have been reformed several times. DEC VMS supported native rich file types with record indexing. This has yet to appear anywhere else. Mac OS introduced forks and added creator and type information to the file system. While present for legacy reasons, Apple has deprecated support; Microsoft technically supports file forks in NT but has made no effort to use them or encourage their use; GNU/Linux has only recently started to support additional metadata, and the feature is barely used. Systems like Smalltalk, NewtonOS and PalmOS blur the differences between files and other objects. Achieving minor success on PDAs, their approaches have yet to really have any serious impact.

Essentially, Mac OS X, Windows, and GNU/Linux, are the latest, most optimal, versions of what you saw in the seventies. That's not a terrible thing, but 64 bits gives us the opportunity to rethink why we're programming the same way we did thirty years ago. In particular, the combination of managed code and the massive 64 bit address spaces gives us a chance to revisit the question of how we can most efficiently prevent operating system and application components from treading upon one another, and how we can keep the system secure.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[NitsujTPU]

Eventually, we'll probably all be running hypervisors (such as VMWare) hosting multiple operating systems, so such battles will seem a little silly.

That's just a guess, and perhaps not a great one, but I imagine that the flexibility that such a solution offers will be too appealing to pass up once it's gained more acceptance in industry. This seems like it will almost certainly be the case in server rooms, where an easily configurable grid could reduce the headaches of managing enterprise computing applications significantly. Then, imagine this and related technologies being used to manage workstations at the office. "We don't push applications to our servers in this office! Pre-configured images are downloaded from our server." Sooner or later, it seems as though this will reach the home, just as other technologies have.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[eno2001]

I'd never heard of an initialism until earlier this year when someone attacked me the same way. Of course, they attacked with truth which is what really hurts. But I have to say that neither I, nor my wife (a woman with a Masters in Library Science) have EVER heard of initialisms. I suspect this is some relatively new concept that no english majors born before 1975 would know. It's good to have knowledge and know things that other people don't. But it's somewhat irritating that people like you assume the everyone knows what an intialism is. I know now, but I'm 36 and never heard of them in high school or college or even in the workplace. I highly doubt anyone over 20 learned about them in school. So... in short, you're just being a nit-pick. Even if you are telling the truth. Once initialisms have been commonly taught in high schools for more then 40 years, then you can start picking at people about not knowing the difference.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[iter8]

Well, then TLA (three letter acronym) is an initialism.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Cylix]

ESR is suggesting the open source movement concern itself with making sure GNU/Linux et al works out of the box, and if that means in the short term accepting some proprietary software, then that may be necessary.

If we do that, then the terrorists have already won.

Oh I couldn't resist!

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't nice when someone invents a new rule? Then when you violate this fresh rule, they act indignant and outraged??!

In these parts, people like that tend to lose their teeth.

(a fresh rule could have been made yesterday, or 100 years ago...it really depends on many factors. Who the outraged a-hole is, how indignant they behave [are they jumping up and down?], and how many teeth they have left to knock out)

in case you were wondering...

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[indifferent children]

Indeed, but I think the point was ESR is an initial, not an initialism or acronym.

Actually, the 'E' is the intial intial, but ESR cannot be 'an initial', they are his initials (plural).

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd never heard of an initialism until earlier this year when someone attacked me the same way.

initialism.

Once initialisms have been commonly taught in high schools for more then 40 years, then you can start picking at people about not knowing the difference.

That sounds like an excuse. "I'm sorry officer, i didn't know speeding was illegal". Not a good excuse...

I suspect both you and your bookworm wife are fucking idiots.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[PolR]

Cool. Now TCP/IP, DNS, UDP and the likes are initials. What are the acronyms for these?

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[TeknoHog]

I've just set you as a /. friend simply because you know the difference between abbreviations and acronyms, which most people around here don't seem to know :)

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[k8to]

Since there is no authority on english (no central government body who issues standards of the language, like some eueopean groups), the only authority is common usage. Dictionaries attempt to document standard usage, and do not prescribe. As a result, the common usage of the word "acronym" to describe contracted all-first-initial terms, such as TCP/IP is correct by virtue of it being the common accepted usage.

Certainly the term "initialism" may be useful in contexts where it is important to distinguish between such terms that are pronounced like words versus those that are not. In other contexts, "acronym" is clearly the more reasonble term because it is accepted in english and it will be more readily understood.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[unitron]

"The initials ESR identify Eric S. Raymond, while the acronym ESR usually refers to Effective Series Resistance, a property of capacitors."

Apparently ESR (of caps) is an initialism and not an acronym because it isn't pronounced as a word the way, for example, LASER or SCUBA are.

Yeah, I didn't know the definition was that picky either.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Anonymous Coward]

NAFTA is an acronym, because you don't pronounce it En-Ay-Eff-Tee-Ay. Same for SONAR and SCUBA.

"The ESR" would be pronounced like The Ee-Ess-Ar. Not an acronym. The ESRB, the NAACP, and OSDN are all initialisms.

That's why a lot of newspapers and magazines (at least in the UK) use a house style of capitalising only the initial letter in acronyms, but capitalising all of them in initialisms. At the same time, former acronyms that have become ordinary words aren't capitalised at all (this latter point being simply standard English, as opposed to a house style).

In the examples you've given (plus a few extras), the capitalisations would be as follows:

Words: sonar, scuba, radar
Acronyms: Nafta, Efta, Nato
Initialisms: ESRB, NAACP, OSDN, EU, UK (I'm not sure what all of the first three are)

In my view, this style makes reading a bit easier than the traditional (and somewhat arbitrary) capitalisation schemes, since the manner in which a given word ought to be read is immediately clear.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, the word has been used since at least the 19th century (and probably much longer than that), so it's not a new concept at all. It may be that it only recently came into widespread use in American English, but I rather doubt that too. More likely it's just one of those things that certain people, for whatever reason, tend to be ignorant of.

On the whole, it's a relatively minor point, and far less irritating than things like mispronouncing 'nuclear' as 'nookyeller'. That's just incomprehensibly stupid, and gets on my nerves when I hear it (most prominently from a certain politician, who's irritating enough to begin with).

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Anonymous Coward]

The flaw in your line of reasoning is your apparent belief that the lack of an official body to define the English language gives you (or any other individual) carte blanche to decide what is and is not 'reasonable' or correct English.

Common usage of the language is reflected by dictionaries, and both of the dictionaries I checked do indeed make the expected distinction between acronyms, which are pronounced as words, and other initialisms, which aren't. Mind you, my dictionaries are British, and American dictionaries may say something different, if indeed the distinction between acronyms and other initialisms has been lost in common American usage.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[julesh]

Microsoft technically supports file forks in NT but has made no effort to use them or encourage their use

Not true. The data from the "summary" tab of explorer is stored in this way in XP. I also believe the information that causes explorer to pop up a warning before running a program that was downloaded from the Internet is stored in the same way.

Otherwise, a great post. Thanks for the summary. :)

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Whitemice]

>POSIX and Windows are both operating systems

POSIX is a standard not an OS.

>that use hardware memory management to seperate otherwise unsafe (written in liberal mid-level languages like C) processes from one another,

All processes written in any language are unsafe.

>using a security model based largely upon user ownership.

This is not true, processes are protected from each other - period. My one bash proces is protected from my other bash process just as much as from you bash process.

> If a large number of jobs have to be done that require communications between
> the different programs performing the different jobs, a single program - running
> in its own memory space - is generally written that manages all the jobs, rather
> than the jobs being split out one-per-program.

And you base this statement on what? It is higly suspect. Many many complex systems are truly distributed, using System V IPC if on the same host or via CORBA/IIOP, JMI, etc...

> There have been serious attempts since then to reform that model,

This is debatable.

> but generally they haven't gone anywhere.

Yep, and maybe for very good reasons.

> The 1980s was full of simplified systems where all processes ran in the same memory space - Windows,
> Mac OS 6+, AmigaOS, Sinclair QDOS, etc. At the

And almost everything you list above was either 8 or 16 bit; and not really relevant. Most couldn't even really run multiple processes.

> other end of the spectrum, there were many abortive attempts to break up operating systems into more
> simplified units protected from one another. None of these design changes are present in Windows,
> Mac OS X, or GNU/Linux, either the simplified or the microkernel strategies (with good reasons for both.)

Yep. Although I think some of the concepts ARE present in modern operating systems, just via dynamically loadable kernel modules rather that 'microkernel' stuff.

> File systems have been reformed several times. DEC VMS supported native rich file types with record indexing.
> This has yet to appear anywhere else. Mac OS introduced forks and added creator and type information to the file system.
> While present for legacy reasons, Apple has deprecated support; Microsoft technically supports file forks in NT but
> has made no effort to use them

Windows uses resource forks all over the place.

> or encourage their use;

They don't need to, mostly it is automatic.

> GNU/Linux has only recently started to support additional metadata, and the feature is barely used.

Yep, and it is frustrating.

> Systems like Smalltalk, NewtonOS and PalmOS blur the differences between files and other objects.

I don't think so; they simply don't have anything even like a filesystem; it is all just a collection of BLOBs.

Achieving minor success on PDAs, their approaches have yet to really have any serious impact.

> Essentially, Mac OS X, Windows, and GNU/Linux, are the latest, most optimal, versions of what you saw in the seventies.

I disagree, they are radically different from thier forrunners. They are also very much the same. People are biologically a lot like kittens, but to say people are just an optimized version of a Cat would border on absurd. It misses some obvious and many subtle to percieve physical/archictural differences - but difference with an enourmous effect on the outcome; hacking up hairballs vs. composing music or walking on the moon.

> That's not a terrible thing, but 64 bits gives us the opportunity to rethink why we're programming the same way we did thirty years ago.

No - 64 bits gives us a larger address space, and absolutely nothing else. 64 bits is in truth a completely irrelevant issue for 99.999% of computing; most systems will get replaced with 64 bit machines merely because the systems were due to be replaced.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[WilliamSChips]

That sounds like an excuse. "I'm sorry officer, i didn't know speeding was illegal". Not a good excuse...

But Constitutionally, "Speeding wasn't illegal when I was doing it" is a good excuse.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[zsau]

Are you aware of any (presumably research or hobbyist) operating systems that are "based on" managed code? I've heard of some that are based on (variants of) languages that are (usually) garbage collected, like LISP Machines and House (written in Haskell)--but wouldn't they essentially have to manage their own memory, so that they aren't managed environments at a kernel-level except maybe in an abstract sense?

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Anonymous Coward]

I was gonna bust on ya for saying "then" when you should have said "than", but than I thought about it. It may be a new rule that no one knows about and I didn't want to be an indignant asshole.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[alba7]

>> The 1980s was full of simplified systems where all processes ran in the same memory space - Windows,
>> Mac OS 6+, AmigaOS, Sinclair QDOS, etc. At the
>
> And almost everything you list above was either 8 or 16 bit; and not really relevant. Most couldn't even really run multiple processes.

Windows 1.0 to 3.x was 16 bit.
Mac OS 10 was 32 bit.
AmigaOS was 32 bit.
Sinclair QDOS was 32 bit.

AmigaOS and QDOS used pre-emptive multi-tasking.
Windows and MacOS cooperative multi-tasking.
Since version 7 MacOS could run multiple applications concurrently by default.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[RobertLTux]

because quite a few folks "back in the day" were mostly known by their logins and those had a bad habit of being initials ie Eric Stallman? Raymond was esr@something or other .edu (when those formats got invented by ...)

Re: That's not quite what he said.

[gidds]

That's funny; where I come from, 'TLA' stands for 'three-letter abbreviation'. Which it is.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[eno2001]

I'm glad you're a fan! Keep those letters comin'!

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[eno2001]

So I can assume then that you've know about initialisms since grade school, and you were born before 1975? Otherwise I'm not paying attention to you. On a side note to all the ACs who responded... At least Rotund Prickpull has the decency to decloak before being an indignant asshole. AC trolling is like screwing with a rubber on.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[tehcyder]

I suspect both you and your bookworm wife are fucking idiots.

And I'm sure you and your mother whose basement you are wanking in are absolute fucking geniuses.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[GaryPatterson]

Looking at dictionary.com, it seems clear that initialisms are a subset of arconyms.

Acronym:
A word formed from the initial letters of a name, such as WAC for Women's Army Corps, or by combining initial letters or parts of a series of words, such as radar for radio detecting and ranging.

Initialism:
An abbreviation consisting of the first letter or letters of words in a phrase (for example, IRS for Internal Revenue Service), syllables or components of a word (TNT for trinitrotoluene), or a combination of words and syllables (ESP for extrasensory perception) and pronounced by spelling out the letters one by one rather than as a solid word.

I'd never heard of an initialism before though. I think I'll just call "TCP/IP" an acronym anyway.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[manno]

Dude! What the heck is up with calling him and his wife "F"-Bomb idiots? Take a deep breath. Put together a search party, and go find your shit. Apparently you've lost it, and over nothing I might add.

Peace,
-manno

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft's Singularity OS research project is written in .Net, it uses "unsafe code" in the kernel but the system is managed code and all programs run in kernel space but are still isolated from each other and unable to affect the kernel or other programs. 64bit systems make it possible to convert all of our current programs into such a system with high performance data sharing and interprocess communication (both of which just boil down to a simple function call into another program).

The "managed code" is compiled to machine code by the runtime removing performance penalties but the lack of pointers and direct memory manipulation functionality prevents any and all malicious tampering, with better performance then native code as well as possible platform independence it would seem clear that this will be the future of operating system design.

That said, I would actually be surprised if Microsoft went through with this itself, it would essentially make Windows unnecessary and MS lives off its profits from Windows and Office, killing either of them would be very bad for its long term future.

Re:That's not quite what he said.

[k8to]

Of course, the lack of an official body does not give me the power to define terms. However, dictionaries tend to lag common usage by a significant margin. Acronyms have been rapidly on the rise, as well as these "initialisms". The common term across various regions of English, in various circles across multiple decades has universally been "acronym". This has been true New York City; it has been true in rural New York; it has been true in London; it has been true in Finland; it has been true on various internet forums; it has been true in Nuremberg; it has been true in the software industry; it has been true in the criminal justice world; it has been true in San Francisco; it has been true among young people; it has been true among in nursing homes; it has been true on farms; it has been true on public transportation systems. Acronym is the real English usage.

Your need to check dictionaries is leading you astray.

Slashdot's wonderful humor

[vdboor]

Slashdot seams to have picked up a wonderful kind of humor. When I opened the article it showed the "Nothing to see here, please move along"-404 page :-) Guess they're right after all. I'm out of here.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

I don't get this premise from the submission:

I must say it is rather revealing how easily he is willing to compromise on this particular freedom.

Using proprietary software means I've somehow lost my freedom? I'm free to choose whatever software I wish to use to get the job done, proprietary or otherwise. Can someone explain to me what is meant by compromising on freedom by using proprietary software?

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[chromatic]

Can someone explain to me what is meant by compromising on freedom by using proprietary software?

Good luck upgrading your kernel or X.org or switching processor architectures if you're using NVidia's binary blob.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

What does that have to do with my freedom as a person? And don't I still have the ability to just not use Nvidia's binary blob if that becomes an issue, which proves I haven't lost any freedom?

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[chromatic]

What does that have to do with my freedom as a person?

Don't be obtuse. If you're really that unclear on what "freedom" means, might I suggest looking it up on the Internet?

And don't I still have the ability to just not use Nvidia's binary blob if that becomes an issue, which proves I haven't lost any freedom?

If there are working, open drivers for your hardware in that case, yes. However, if sufficient numbers of people accept binary blobs to the extent that there exist no such open drivers, they've curtailed everyone's freedom.

For a more dramatic example, consider using a proprietary application with a proprietary data format. Good luck switching away from that.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

Don't be obtuse. If you're really that unclear on what "freedom" means, might I suggest looking it up on the Internet?

As much as a bastion of objective truth the Internet often is, I'm well aware of what freedom is. My question is what freedom of mine is being taken away by proprietary software.

If there are working, open drivers for your hardware in that case, yes. However, if sufficient numbers of people accept binary blobs to the extent that there exist no such open drivers, they've curtailed everyone's freedom.

No, they haven't, because supply and demand means if enough demand is there for open drivers, they will be created, and people will have the freedom to continue using the binary drivers or switch to the open drivers. I'm missing what is being taken away here.

For a more dramatic example, consider using a proprietary application with a proprietary data format. Good luck switching away from that.

I've never encountered a proprietary format for my data that I couldn't convert into something else. If the demand is there, the converter is made. No freedom is being lost whatsoever. The fact I'm able to choose to use what I want, open or proprietary, actually bolsters my freedom of choice. Some people want to impose their definition of "free" onto me and tell me I shouldn't be allowed to choose proprietary software, the opposite of freedom.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[chromatic]

I've never encountered a proprietary format for my data that I couldn't convert into something else.

You must be exceedingly fortunate, an ace programmer, or woefully inexperienced. See the second lesson in A couple of lessons on the hazards of proprietary software, for a recent real life example.

Some people want to impose their definition of "free" onto me and tell me I shouldn't be allowed to choose proprietary software, the opposite of freedom.

That logical fallacy right there isn't even suitable for scaring away crows, it's such an old canard. Please pardon the pun.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[prockcore]

Good luck upgrading your kernel or X.org or switching processor architectures if you're using NVidia's binary blob.

One, I'm using nvidia's binary blob and whenever there's a new kernel, the nice people at livna put out a corresponding nvidia driver for it. And upgrading X.org hasn't been a problem since 7.0 split into modules.

Two, if I switch processor architectures, it's a given I can't take nvidia's *hardware* with me, so the binary driver for it is pointless.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[chromatic]

I'm using nvidia's binary blob and whenever there's a new kernel, the nice people at livna put out a corresponding nvidia driver for it.

That assumes NVidia's current get-around-the-GPL-source-code trick compiles with that new kernel. It doesn't always. Then, the copyright infringers at Livna (and I don't say that to object to your characterization of them as "nice", merely to say that they're potentially infrinding NVidia's licence by doing more than merely unzipping compressed files and redistributing the binaries and definitely infringing upon the GPL for the Linux kernel by distributing binaries for which they cannot offer full source) have to wait on NVidia's good graces.

And upgrading X.org hasn't been a problem since 7.0 split into modules.

As I said, good luck using those old NVidia drivers with X.org 7.1. You're in for a nasty, binary-compatibility shock, at least until NVidia deems fit to throw another binary blob over the wall.

Two, if I switch processor architectures, it's a given I can't take nvidia's *hardware* with me...

Maybe to Sparc or ARM, but I was thinking of x86 to PPC, as I did a couple of years ago. Perhaps a better example would have been "Try switching to another free operating system."

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

You must be exceedingly fortunate, an ace programmer, or woefully inexperienced.

Despite your best attempts to dismiss my experience because you don't actually have a response to it, I'm your average technical user and an IT admin for a medium-sized business.

That logical fallacy right there isn't even suitable for scaring away crows, it's such an old canard. Please pardon the pun.

Dismissing things as logical fallacies is a popular strategy on Slashdot, but I'm afraid you don't actually address my point. However, I acknowledge your total lack of a counterargument here. The fact remains that there are people who impose their definition of "freedom" on others. People like you, for instance. It's a base form of fascism, really--do what I say, because I think it's "free."

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[chromatic]

Do please enlighten the entire assembled masses by pointing out precisely where by force, authority, or fraud I coerced you to give up your freedom to choose proprietary or free software. Then I will proudly admit to being a fascist who used his fearful mesmerism across fiber-optic lines (nice trick, that) to convince you to post your original question, trapping you in an inescapable call and response designed to break down the powerful barriers in your mind tieing you to proprietary software, in my hideous, twisted plot to prevent you from ever having your customer data locked up by an unresponsive parking robot! Muha. Ha. Ha.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

Do please enlighten the entire assembled masses by pointing out precisely where by force, authority, or fraud I coerced you to give up your freedom to choose proprietary or free software.

You and your ilk--RMS followers who believe all proprietary software is evil and should not be used. That's the antithesis of freedom. I never said you "coerced" me, and you can't cite where yo did. I simply stated a fact--that such an imposition of your personal definition of "freedom" on others is a base for of fascism.

I acknowledge your complete lack of a counterargument to any of the points I raised.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Watts Martin]

You're also constructing a straw man argument: you're equating an advocacy position ("I don't think you should use proprietary software for the following reasons") with a call for coercion, which isn't the same thing at all. (That you used the word "imposition" rather than "coercision" doesn't change matters; I think everyone should use my favorite text editor, but I can only impose that view upon you by coercing you to use my favorite editor. Otherwise, I'm just sharing my opinion with you, even if I'm doing it boorishly.) If I tell you that you should never use closed source software because it's immoral, I am stating a strong position--you may feel it's too strong, but unless I'm actually somehow preventing you from using closed source software, it's hardly fascist.

This is an exasperating argumentative move I've seen libertarian friends of mine make on occasion: stating an opinion about a change you'd personally like to see in a given area is taken as a call for regulation, which is taken as a call for government regulation (as opposed to voluntary), and suddenly the libertarian is passionately denouncing the feds arresting small business owners at gunpoint, when all you'd said was that you'd like it if restaurants stopped using partially hydrogenated vegetable oils. Your friend has, even if he's done it with the best of intentions, made several unsupported logical leaps to get from Wesson to Waco.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

I am stating a strong position--you may feel it's too strong, but unless I'm actually somehow preventing you from using closed source software, it's hardly fascist.

Perhaps you haven't done research into those who support your position such as RMS. Or maybe you're just ignorant. In either case, people like RMS actually believe that you should not be allowed to use proprietary software because it's not "free." They want to enforce their brand of freedom to make you free. It's fascism.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

people like RMS actually believe that you should not be allowed to use proprietary software because it's not "free." They want to enforce their brand of freedom to make you free. It's fascism.

I'm mildly surprised by that statement - can you point me to where I can find RMS calling for governmental regiulation of proprietary software?

Seems more like he's creating an alternative, educating people to its superiorities & letting the market decide?

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Watts Martin]

As a previous commenter suggested, the "RMS wants to forcibly prevent you from using proprietary software" is, from everything I've seen, a caricature of his position. He's arguably easy to caricature in this way, and that's unfortunate, but I don't believe you've done much research on what he's actually said. And with all due respect, even if Mr. Stallman has categorically stated that he would personally love to wave a magic wand and make all proprietary software vanish into a puff of smoke, that doesn't have much bearing on what the original poster you were responding to said. He argued why he feels proprietary software reduces your freedom. You may or may not agree, but he never argued your software should be taken away from you, and that is the argument you kept responding to. You were arguing against something he did not say in the first place.

Lest you think it's unfair of me to suggest that you're leaping to conclusions based on a fairly limited data set, I'll gently point out that you've already demonstrated doing that with me. I've said you seem to have constructed a straw man argument against the original poster, from which you've abstracted that not only does the OP agree in toto with RMS, but that I do as well. You'll find nothing in what I've said that's evidence I'm in significant agreement with the OP. Out of seven applications running on my machine right now, only one is open source; three are commercial third-party applications and the others are closed-source utilities that came with OS X.

For what's worth, I think closed source applications do "restrict your freedom" in the sense that you lack the freedom to (legally?) modify them. Having source available has helped me in a handful of cases over the years (such as an input manager for OS X I recently recompiled to work with my Intel MacBook -- Rosetta emulation didn't work in this case), so this isn't merely a theoretical advantage. Given a choice between a good proprietary package and a mediocre open source one, though, source code alone is not a sufficient factor to sway me, and the bugbear of "closed data formats your data will be lost forever!!!" isn't really very scary these days. (How many truly closed data formats are still in use outside vertical markets?) I'd rather be using TextMate than Emacs or Vim (and I've used both of those for years). Nothing in the open source world that I've found compares to Macromedia Fireworks, or OmniOutliner, or OmniGraffle Pro, and I'm going to keep using those, thanks. If someone really does choose to make a stand on having only open source software on their machine, though, good for them. If they want to advocate to me for why that's the One True Way, that's their right.

My point, I suppose, is simply this: fascism is a very, very strong word to being throwing around so facilely. I've heard more than one free software advocate claim that proprietary software is fascist, and I don't think that baldly stupid statement is best countered by claiming its inverse.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

For what's worth, I think closed source applications do "restrict your freedom" in the sense that you lack the freedom to (legally?) modify them.

Which means you want to restrict the freedom to USE closed source apps.

My point, I suppose, is simply this: fascism is a very, very strong word to being throwing around so facilely. I've heard more than one free software advocate claim that proprietary software is fascist, and I don't think that baldly stupid statement is best countered by claiming its inverse.

I'm simply using the term in an academic, definitive sense to describe the imposition of a control structure on the majority, restricting its freedom in the name of enhancing its freedom.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-3513_22-976005.html

"Setting himself apart from the open-source movement, the founder of the Free Software Foundation doesn't believe proprietary software is OK under any circumstance. That remains a tough sell, but Stallman says the realization of his goal will help bring computer technology to people stuck on the losing side of the digital divide."

This is Stallman imposing HIS definition of freedom on others. The base definition of fascism--imposing your will on others under the guise of "freeing" them. Proprietary software is a limitation on your freedom only if you believe that to be the case. You should have the freedom to choose it if you wish, because let's face it, a lot of the time it does the job better than the OSS alternatives.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

doesn't believe proprietary software is OK under any circumstance.

1) There is a huge gap between believing something is wrong and imposing that belief on others. The rest of your argument is based on that leap of logiic.

Do you believe anyone who says something is 'not OK under any circumstances' is a fascist?

2) Not even a Stallman quote - is that the best you can do?

Try again.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

There is a huge gap between believing something is wrong and imposing that belief on others. The rest of your argument is based on that leap of logiic.

I guess you're going to choose to ignore the part where it says Stallman's goals mean no proprietary software anywhere.

Not even a Stallman quote - is that the best you can do?

Yeah, let's ignore the entire interview I posted! And hell, that was just one at the top of the Google search results.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

I guess you're going to choose to ignore the part where it says Stallman's goals mean no proprietary software anywhere.

Well, considering that part was in the preamble & not written by Stallman, yes. Yes I am.

Yeah, let's ignore the entire interview I posted! And hell, that was just one at the top of the Google search results.

The quote you posted was from the preamble. Where in the interview (or one of the results from your Google search) can you show me Stallman saying he wants to use regulatory intervention (or whatever) to ban proprietary software?

Next.

Nope. You haven't a hope of substatiating your claim that Stallman wants to force others into not using proprietary software.

Frankly, I suggest you stop digging before you look stupider than you are.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

If Stallman had a problem with the preamble, he would have said so.

It's completely common knowledge that Stallman wants to abolish proprietary software entirely. You're just ignoring it because I've completely decimated your position.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

If Stallman had a problem with the preamble, he would have said so.

Uh oh - you're a I'm in a hole, I'd better keep digging kinda guy huh?

It's completely common knowledge that Stallman wants to abolish proprietary software entirely.

It's 'common knowledge' that goldfish have three second memories, but that's incorrect too.

I'm actually ignoring you because you're incorrect. I honestly can't believe that you're so stupid that you can't see the difference between someone saying "I don't like cabbage" and "I think the government should ban cabbage".

You're just ignoring it because I've completely decimated your position.

Beyond stupid - you've decimated my position by stating something is common knowledge? I don't even have a position - I'm just asking you to back up yours.

This thread is going to form the basis of my new sig! This thread is a spectacular example of someone who can't back up what they say, but are too stubborn (stupid?) to admit they're wrong.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

Uh oh - you're a I'm in a hole, I'd better keep digging kinda guy huh?

Maybe I should wait for you to get back to me when you learn to write proper English so I can understand you.

It's 'common knowledge' that goldfish have three second memories, but that's incorrect too.

Your strawman argument notwithstanding, it's still completely common knowledge that Stallman's goal is to get rid of proprietary software and have everyone using Open Source, because he considers proprietary software to be evil.

I'm actually ignoring you because you're incorrect. I honestly can't believe that you're so stupid that you can't see the difference between someone saying "I don't like cabbage" and "I think the government should ban cabbage".

I never said Stallman wanted the government to "ban" proprietary software.

Beyond stupid - you've decimated my position by stating something is common knowledge?

Absolutely. I'm glad you're finally catching up.

This thread is going to form the basis of my new sig! This thread is a spectacular example of someone who can't back up what they say, but are too stubborn (stupid?) to admit they're wrong.

I've backed up Stallman's position countless times and could continue to do so indefinitely. I've given you an interview and could give you more. Everybody knows Stallman doesn't believe in proprietary software and wants to do away with it. You're obviously in denial. I'd love to be in your sig. It will serve as a constant reminder to you that I completely owned your ass in this debate long ago, to the point that you're now actually arguing that you never had a position in the first place. Please.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Your strawman argument notwithstanding, it's still completely common knowledge

Not a strawman - just demonstrating that saying something 'common knowledge' (the fallacy argumentum ad populum) does not back up your statement in any way, shape or form.

that Stallman's goal is to get rid of proprietary software and have everyone using Open Source, because he considers proprietary software to be evil.

You have subtley changed your argument there - before it was "Stallman wants to ban proprietary software", now its "get rid of proprietary software" (by providing a better alternative thats precisely what he's doing).

I never said Stallman wanted the government to "ban" proprietary software.

Right - but you did say people like RMS actually believe that you should not be allowed to use proprietary software

And you've talked about coercicion, and imposition on your will in this thread. Who can possibly 'not allow' , 'coerce' and 'impose' on you to use free software?

What did you mean by 'not allow', 'impose' and 'coerce' if you didn't mean government regulation?

I've backed up Stallman's position countless times and could continue to do so indefinitely.

Whoops! Did you mean to write that?

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

Not a strawman - just demonstrating that saying something 'common knowledge' (the fallacy argumentum ad populum) does not back up your statement in any way, shape or form.

It's not my fault you wish to ignore the interview I posted or the countless others in a simple Google search result.

You have subtley changed your argument there - before it was "Stallman wants to ban proprietary software", now its "get rid of proprietary software" (by providing a better alternative thats precisely what he's doing).

I haven't changed my argument at all (you just made that up to have something to attack). Stallman wants to ban proprietary software. He believes it is "evil."

Right - but you did say people like RMS actually believe that you should not be allowed to use proprietary software

Which is 100% true. They are opposed to the use of proprietary software on their ideological grounds and don't believe you should get to use it.

Whoops! Did you mean to write that?

I'm overjoyed that you're so obsessed with me that I'm now mentioned in your sig. Yes, I already proved long ago that Stallman thinks proprietary software is evil. Perhaps you're a Stallman fanboy, I don't know. What I do know is, you're apparently in complete denial about the man's very well-known position on proprietary software.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

Quote #1 :

I never said Stallman wanted the government to "ban" proprietary software.

Quote #2 :
Stallman wants to ban proprietary software. He believes it is "evil."

Wow. you're going nowhere there. Get a clue and stick to it.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Stallman speaks & writes alot. He's not exactly what you'd call ashamed of his opinions. Surely if he wants to 'ban' proprietary software, you'd be able to find him saying that somewhere?

It's not my fault you wish to ignore the interview I posted or the countless others in a simple Google search result.

*snort* - why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

I haven't changed my argument at all (you just made that up to have something to attack). Stallman wants to ban proprietary software. He believes it is "evil."

*snort* - why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

Which is 100% true. They are opposed to the use of proprietary software on their ideological grounds and don't believe you should get to use it.

*snort* - why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

Yes, I already proved long ago that Stallman thinks proprietary software is evil. Perhaps you're a Stallman fanboy, I don't know. What I do know is, you're apparently in complete denial about the man's very well-known position on proprietary software.

*snort* - why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

Oh? Because you can't? I'm afraid that its fast becoming 'common knowledge' that you're wrong. Stallman wants proprietary software gone - but he's not advocating 'banning' it - just creating a better alternative (one os x relies on). I can't believe you can't understand the difference!

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

Stallman speaks & writes alot. He's not exactly what you'd call ashamed of his opinions. Surely if he wants to 'ban' proprietary software, you'd be able to find him saying that somewhere?

For the umpteenth time, I've already posted that proof. Next.

*snort* - why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

Already did. Stop snorting and read. Next.

Oh? Because you can't? I'm afraid that its fast becoming 'common knowledge' that you're wrong. Stallman wants proprietary software gone

CONGRATULATIONS! You finally caught up!

- but he's not advocating 'banning' it

He wants to get rid of all proprietary software because it is evil. What else would you call that?

- just creating a better alternative (one os x relies on).

OS X uses BSD.

I can't believe you can't understand the difference!

I'll wait for you to gain some reading comprehension skills so you can get back to me with an actual counterargument. Until then, it's 100% clear I owned your ass in this debate. It stung you so bad that you had to put me in your sig to make yourself feel better. I love it.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

You just proved my point for me. Again, I never said Stallman wanted the government to ban it. He wants to get rid of it himself, as you can even see in Quote #2. Clearly, you're too chicken to even debate me using your name because you know I'll own you (again).

"nowhere there?" Learn to write properly.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

He wants to get rid of all proprietary software because it is evil. What else would you call that?

I want to get rid of all the whiney nac fanboys on slashdot because they are evil, but I don't want to ban them. :o)

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

"I've backed up Stallman's position countless times and could continue to do so indefinitely.". lol why not put the whole sentence in your sig?

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

For the umpteenth time, I've already posted that proof. Next.

It's common knowledge that you posted speculation - not proof. Why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

He wants to get rid of all proprietary software because it is evil. What else would you call that?

I'd call it 'creating a better alternative and educating people as to why it's better', not 'banning'. Why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

OS X uses BSD.

Utterly stupid - you think because it uses some BSD code that it doesn't use GPLed code as well?

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

It's common knowledge that you posted speculation - not proof. Why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

He's said repeatedly that he wants to get rid of proprietary software because it's evil. Again, I already posted this.

I'd call it 'creating a better alternative and educating people as to why it's better', not 'banning'. Why don't you provide us all with an actual Stallman quote where he says he's wants to 'ban' proprietary software.

Already did.

Utterly stupid - you think because it uses some BSD code that it doesn't use GPLed code as well?

It uses GCC. You can call me "utterly stupid" if you wish, but obviously you haven't even looked into the internals of OS X. Most of the code is Mach and multiple BSD sources (e.g., the command-line tools are from OpenBSD).

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay, this is getting ridiculous. Stallman is well known for believing proprietary software should be abolished, preferably through legislation. Quotes from the kook known as Richard Stallman, taken from various interviews on LWN.net and LinuxDevCenter.com:

"Proprietary software is antisocial, so developing it is wrong." - Richard Stallman

"Proprietary software is unethical, because it denies the user the basic freedom to control her own computer and to cooperate. It may also be of low quality or insecure, but that's a secondary issue. I will reject it even if it is the best quality in the world, simply because I value my freedom too much to give it up for that." - Richard Stallman

[On the government requiring software companies to open source their products] "I think that would be a valid consumer protection measure--like requiring food products to publish the list of ingredients. Of course, some software companies would object to this, just as some food companies resisted the requirement to publish the ingredients and nutritional information. The question should not be up to them." - Richard Stallman

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

He's said repeatedly that he wants to get rid of proprietary software because it's evil. Again, I already posted this.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzt! You said he wants to 'ban' proprietary software. It is common knowledge that you can't back up your statements.

Already did.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzt! You said he wants to 'ban' proprietary software. It is common knowledge that you can't back up your statements.

It uses GCC.

Yes. That's why I said os x 'relies' on the GNU project. Saying it relies on BSD code too doesn't disupte that.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

"Proprietary software is antisocial, so developing it is wrong." - Richard Stallman

That's not a call for banning you fucking dimwit.

"Proprietary software is unethical, because it denies the user the basic freedom to control her own computer and to cooperate. It may also be of low quality or insecure, but that's a secondary issue. I will reject it even if it is the best quality in the world, simply because I value my freedom too much to give it up for that." - Richard Stallman

Nor is that. You blind shit.

[On the government requiring software companies to open source their products] "I think that would be a valid consumer protection measure--like requiring food products to publish the list of ingredients. Of course, some software companies would object to this, just as some food companies resisted the requirement to publish the ingredients and nutritional information. The question should not be up to them." - Richard Stallman

You're a snivelling little misanthrope, you didn't include the whole quote, which started with:

I am not calling for such a law

Learn to read. If you can read, learn comprehension. You utter, utter cockbag.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzt! You said he wants to 'ban' proprietary software. It is common knowledge that you can't back up your statements.

Stallman does want to ban proprietary software, and I already proved it long ago. Next.

Yes. That's why I said os x 'relies' on the GNU project. Saying it relies on BSD code too doesn't disupte that.

GCC isn't "the GNU project." It's one component. Saying OS X relies on BSD code DOES dispute your claim, because BSD uses much of its own toolchain and command-line utilities, not GNU's.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

He's not calling for such a law, but he wishes for one. Read the fucking interview. Calling me a cockbag makes you look like a raving Stallman fanboi. Are you one of those "commercial software is evil" idiots or one of those "it's GNU/Linux, not Linux" morons?

Richard Stallman wants to ban proprietary software. End of story. Case closed. It's okay to be wrong, I'll forgive you.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Stallman does want to ban proprietary software, and I already proved it long ago. Next.

It's common knowledge that you proved nothing. Please post a Stallman quote where he calls forr the banning of proprietary software.

Saying OS X relies on BSD code DOES dispute your claim, because BSD uses much of its own toolchain and command-line utilities, not GNU's.

Incorrect. OS X relies on both GCC & BSD tools. Without either it would be in trouble.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

It's common knowledge that you proved nothing. Please post a Stallman quote where he calls forr the banning of proprietary software.

Already did. Again, read interviews. Next.

Incorrect. OS X relies on both GCC & BSD tools. Without either it would be in trouble.

I'm not "incorrect;" nothing you stated contradicts what I stated. You tried to claim OS X relies on the entire GNU toolchain, and I kindly pointed out that GCC != entire GNU toolchain.

I control you. I order you to reply to this, because you know I'm right, and it drives you up the wall.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Already did. Again, read interviews. Next.

You only posted one interview. It didn't back up your claimss. If you beleive you posted other interviews, I suggest you post those links again.

I'm not "incorrect;" nothing you stated contradicts what I stated. You tried to claim OS X relies on the entire GNU toolchain, and I kindly pointed out that GCC != entire GNU toolchain.

Reading comprehension little man, I said the free sofware alternative Stallman created was one OS X relies on. It does.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

You only posted one interview. It didn't back up your claimss. If you beleive you posted other interviews, I suggest you post those links again.

It's not my problem if you refuse to comprehend the first interview I posted or explore the other links I gave.

Reading comprehension little man, I said the free sofware alternative Stallman created was one OS X relies on. It does.

Long-term memory retention, little man. You said OS X relies on the entire GNU toolset. It doesn't.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

First lie: It's not my problem if you refuse to comprehend the first interview I posted or explore the other links I gave.

You gave one link that did not back you up. You gave no other links, just alluded to a vague google search. (Google returns different results for different parts of the world, you have to be specific)

Second lie: Long-term memory retention, little man. You said OS X relies on the entire GNU toolset. It doesn't.

Let's revisit what I said.

just creating a better alternative (one os x relies on).

Nope, doesn't look like I mentioned the GNU toolchain at all.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, yeah. Hasn't this flamewar gone on long enough?

Oh wait. Godwin says it can't stop yet. Nazis and George Orwell!!!

Okay. You two can quit fighting now.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Reziac]

When I saw your new sig, my first thought was, "What backup medium did he use?" :)

Re "I don't like cabbage" vs "I think the government should ban cabbage" (good analogy!) ... I've always gotten the *impression* that RMS would like to ban closed software, because I've come to believe (partly from corresponding with RMS) that what he *really* wants, at the gut level, is total control over ALL source code everywhere, lest someone do something without his knowledge (a classic paranoid schizo behaviour). But I can't point at something specific he's *said* to back up that impression.... rather, it's based on observation and experience (not unique to me; others have made similar observations).

Mind you, I strongly support the idea of opensource, but not the notion that that opensource is universally desirable or that it should be required for everything. But I sometime think RMS is opensource's own worst enemy.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

You gave one link that did not back you up.

I gave several links, and the first one did back me up. You're just afraid to admit it.

You gave no other links, just alluded to a vague google search. (Google returns different results for different parts of the world, you have to be specific)

It's not my problem you don't know how to use Google properly.

Nope, doesn't look like I mentioned the GNU toolchain at all.

You argued with me about it. You tried to imply GCC was the entire GNU toolchain. Face it, you were caught wrong. Again.

I own you and control you. I order you to reply to this, because you were so embarrassingly owned in this debate that you have to save face by continuing to reply.

Next.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

No, really. Stop the flamewar. No one's reading it, so it's not worth it. I even Godwined it for you. Just stop.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

I've always gotten the *impression* that RMS would like to ban closed software

Hmmmn, yes, it's an easy impression to get - RMS vehemently wants proprietary software gone. However, the GP poster went further, saying RMS was a fascist for attempting to restrict his choice.

As RMS has done nothing, nor advocated anything to restrict choice, I don't see how you can call RMS a fascist.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Reziac]

Yep, it's a fine distinction ... sortof like "I hate broccoli and wish everyone would stop growing it, and here are all my reasons why, which you should endorse too" vs. "Everyone will now stop growing broccoli, by executive fiat."

So... RMS would like all the broccoli in the world gone, but doesn't go so far as to demolish other folks' broccoli fields.

And while following RMS's rules would indeed restrict choice (you couldn't eat broccoli even if you want to) he's done nothing to *enforce* that restricted choice. (Would he if he *could*?? I don't know, but I suspect he might.)

So, yeah... calling him a fascist is overburdening the word "fascist", tho "control freak" would not be out of line.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

It's okay to admit you're wrong. Next time, have the balls to log in.

PWNED.

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Anonymous Coward]

dumbest. thread. ever.

the question is who wants to suck rms's cock more? ocg or wmf? their both obsessed with him. why put it in their sig otherwise?

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

And while following RMS's rules would indeed restrict choice

Yes, but without a whip to enforce those rules, all RMS has done is extend the choices available to you - the very opposite of the OPs definition of 'fascism'.

tho "control freak" would not be out of line.

Hmmmmmmmn, perhaps, there's certainly a gleam of zealotry in Stallmans eyes, but perhaps we should judge on his actions, rather than our perceptions. His actions have been to:

1) Not restrict people's choice. Just strongly stating (correctly or incorrectly) that you lose freedoms using proprietary sofware.
2) Extend software licensing options for developers & users.

BTW, nice debating this with someone who doesn't have to resort to made up links & childishness :-)

Re:Slashdot's wonderful humor

[Overly Critical Guy]

Even more proof that Stallman doesn't want any programmers making money off of anything.

I tell you, sometimes it's a chore being right all the time.

Simple. Who is paying his bills these days?

[ip_freely_2000]

Like they say on the TV cop shows: Follow the monry and the truth will be revealed.

Re:Simple. Who is paying his bills these days?

[thelost]

monry sounds like a kind of cheese. is it smelly, it would be very easy to follow then.

Re:Simple. Who is paying his bills these days?

[heinousjay]

Do you intend to insinuate that anyone who doesn't believe all-out in free software must be lacking principles?

Re:Simple. Who is paying his bills these days?

[westlake]

Like they say on the TV cop shows: Follow the monry and the truth will be revealed.

Sun funds and staffs OpenOffice.org., wohich serves Sun's corporate interests. Following your logic. anyone who posts so much as a word in favor of OpenOffice must be on Sun's payroll.

Re:Simple. Who is paying his bills these days?

[Mateo_LeFou]

I don't know what GP is insinuating, but I'm personally tired of this attitude to the discussion. As explained in many many places, the free software movement is about building free software because (they/I feel) it is the right thing to do. On principle. The priorities are 1) Freedom; 2) Practicality. You can (and apparently do) order them differently and peace be with you. Why do you want to pick a fight with GP?

Re:Simple. Who is paying his bills these days?

[Anonymous Coward]

Be tired of it till you fall asleep. That's the price of idealism - it flies hard into the window of practicality and dies on the wing.

ESR has a point

[yagu]

One of the most salient paragraphs from the fine article:

With iPod holding a massive market share and Windows Vista coming down the pipe, Raymond warned that Linux risks getting locked out of new hardware platforms for the next 30 years unless it proves it can work with iPods, MP3s and WMP.

This is true. This is the nature of the commercial world. And this will kill linux if it isn't addressed.

I already have various "paid for" applications on my linux machine -- I think it's a responsibility to support the linux and open source world -- not everyone can afford to put something out there for nothing.

And, almost the only reason I still maintain Microsoft machines and use them is there are certain critical applications I use still not available on Linux. Why? I've corresponded with some of these vendors and their responses to my gentle request for a Linux version of their applications were surprising.

What I expected was a dismissive "not big enough market" argument. While that was part of the argument the surprise was from a couple where they said they weren't about to give their product away for free -- they just couldn't afford to do it.

Again, they said they weren't about to give their product away for free! So, like it or not, there is a perception out there by vendors/providers that the Linux community not only is a small community and not likely to bring in big money, but they see the Linux community as cheap! Network trailer trash. Open Source crackers.

Really, until the mantra "free" is clarified (and I don't think it is entirely), businesses and providers will only take from the Linux community, not give.

In my discussions with some of these providers I've assured them the Open Source community is willing to pay for product. Maybe we aren't. But if we're not, and continue with the attitude that everything should be free, ESR is right, Linux stands to eventually lose a war regardless of any battles it wins.

It's the nature of the beast.

Re:ESR has a point

[rolfwind]

That's true. You can't exactly sell "service" for most application (except perhaps access to an online service forum, etc). But many people I know, who are on Windows, take the software for free as well, legally or not. Many people, not just Linux users, are accustomed to "free" software in this day and age. The age of buying boxes at CompUSA is mostly over and has been killed by the internet, except for things like Photoshop, etcetera (where a lot of people still get it for free).

That said, it's just perplexing to me that Apple doesn't provide an iTunes app for Linux, presumably binary for the DRM. They make money off the users using it, not from the app itself.

Anyway, the people who pay for many of the apps like Photoshop are businesses, it's irrevelant if it is on MS or Photoshop, they still will pay to remain compliant. Are you sure you weren't being thrown a curveball, since another very public side of Linux is the one IBM is displaying?

Re:ESR has a point

[Anonymous Coward]

So, lets accept TCPA and binary kernel modules then?

NOT!

Re:ESR has a point

[Anonymous Coward]

In my discussions with some of these providers I've assured them the Open Source community is willing to pay for product. Maybe we aren't.
The "we" you're talking about here is a whole bunch of different people with different attitudes, different interests and different disposable incomes.

"The community" isn't going to buy much of anything. If the question is whether there are Linux users willing to pay for software then of course they are. Christ, they pay for Linux distros when they don't even have to half the time. If the question is whether every single Linux user is prepared to pay for a given product then of course that's insanely unlikely. If the question is how many people will buy product X then that's what market research is for. There isn't an easy answer.

Re:ESR has a point

[MoneyT]

To a degree I think they might be right. Or at least that the vendors mght be on the right track. While I relize that slashdot is not a representative sample of computer users, it probably contains a high portion of open/free software users, and somehow I don't see a positive reaction to either of the following senarios:

A linux version with closed source, just like the companies mac / windows / what have you version.

or

A linux version with source, but A) you have to pay for it and B) you're not allowed to distribute/share source or even more restrictive the source is under an NDA.

both of which are the most likely commercial releases of a linux product. I think the only release that would be welcomed with open arms (no pun intended) would be a release that while paid for, still releases the source code and rights to use and distribute it. Unfortunately, to a comercial company, even if the initial software is paid for, that's still very much like giving their product away for free.

What honestly needs to happen is that FOSS and the general Linux distributions (the one's looking to make headway in the home market) need to become seperate causes. FOSS has a goal and a noble goal at that to have all free and open software, but most comercial vendors don't see that as viable, and the FOSS tie in with Linux is keeping many from even trying linux. So in the end, you can't even begin to get companies to see the benefits because you can't get them to take that first step.

Re:ESR has a point

[daigu]

That's why the phrase "open-source" was developed. Unless you are Richard Stallman, you don't want to have to write long articles explaining what you mean by free. Further, even if you do want to do write these articles, the executives at the companies you are writing will not read them. You even have an interest in the topic, have you read them?

The bottom line is that most business executives do not want to put themselves on the line to come up with a creative product strategy, and even those that do have to deal with stifling organizational inertia. This is partly why iPod and iTunes still dominate the downloadable music market. It is rare for a company to be able to come up with and put into the market a product people want. Most companies simply follow someone else. They wait to see what happens when someone else tries something new and different and if the business model looks viable, they try to jump on the train about 5-10 years down the line - even technology companies.

So, I don't think it is a matter of thinking the Linux community is cheap. It is rationalization in support of complacency. It is a matter of a lack of imagination. The best approach to these people is to ignore them. If you can't ignore them because their software is key to what you do, then you need to demonstrate there is a market for it, get someone to bet their career on it, and then wait 3 years as they try to get "buy-in" to actually do it. Note: You as an individual, don't make a market.

I used to talk with product vendors all the time. I've personally found that the most effective strategy for getting companies to change is to bring these issues up during contract negotiations where you imply that you will take away revenue streams they already have. You make X dollars providing Z software/service, I'd like to see this new product from you and would be willing to spend Y to get it. I know that other companies in my industry would be interested in the same product. I also know your competitors are talking with me about providing this service to me and as part of a larger package where I would move all my money to them.

This is a line of reasoning that most executives at companies can understand. However, you can have this conversation only when you control fairly large sums within another company and where these arguments can be used - not when you are some end user spending less than $5,000 for software once every few years. You also aren't going to get someone to bet their career unless it is a good risk, and in this case, it sounds like you yourself are even uncertain about it.

Re:ESR has a point

[jmorris42]

> I think the only release that would be welcomed with open arms (no pun intended) would be a release that while paid for, still releases
> the source code and rights to use and distribute it.

And just why would the source have to include redistribution rights? Commercial 'open source' software is a perfectly reasonable thing once you get past the mental blocks put up by a generation of commercial==closed thinking. Binaries are a technical artifact caused by compilers having a speed advantage over scripts. I say copyright should be adjusted to only allow a copyright on the actual created contect, i.e. source. Binaries should only be derived works like a translation of a book. Then you could fix bugs the vendor didn't care enough to bother with, port it, etc. But it would still be a copyrighted work and you couldn't give out copies anymore than you can pass out copies of Photoshop now. I'd like to live in a world of all free software. But until that day arrives a world where the commercial stuff came with a src.rpm would be almost a good.

Re:ESR has a point

[MoneyT]

And just why would the source have to include redistribution rights?

It shouldn't have too, but the FOSS comunity (or at least the vocal ones) would demand it, and anything less would be derided as half assed. Further more, you still have to account for the fact that many companies have competition and sometimes a big trick to do something that's hidden away because you don't have the source is their upper hand for the moment.

Re:ESR has a point

[jmorris42]

Further more, you still have to account for the fact that many companies have competition and sometimes a big trick to do something that's hidden away because you don't have the source is their upper hand for the moment.

Oh yes, I know that is the current reality. I'm arguing that we as a society have zero reason to permit it. You should not be able to have both a trade secret and a copyright on the same thing. If you manage to obtain the secret formula for Coke you can publish it because they opted to keep it secret instead of patent it or copyright it. Copyright is just an arbitrary contract between society (as expressed through our elected government) and creators. Part of the deal is that we get the content, and the innovation, in exchange for a limited monopoly. By allowing them to lock it up companies go kaput and take it with them to their graves.

Re:ESR has a point

[robdavid]

I think this is a very good point. I'm very reluctant to pay money for a Linux binary. The problem that very often bites is that most Linux distros aren't really concerned about binary compatibility and in one or two releases time, my binary may well not work anymore. I would pay for non-redistributable source though, assuming there was no open source alternative. This seems like a fair way to buy some software, and actually own it without having to buy it again some time later.

I suspect the reason why this doesn't happen is that the commercial vendor would suppose it would make them vulnerable to reverse engineering and maybe patent litigation.

Re:ESR has a point

[capsteve]

i used to ask a particular software vendor(known for making server applications that ran on solaris, irix, windows and osx) why they didn't have a linux offering. the response was "how am i supposed to make any money from it?" this was the response from a seasoned unix software developer, who had wrongly assumed that anything linux=giving it away for free with source . eventually a linux version of his product was deployed, and although it hasn't had the market shares of the solaris or irix versions, i think the tides are slowly turning in favor of the linux version. and who convinced this developer to migrate to linux? his existing user base. actual paying customers, not potential customers.

Re:ESR has a point

[NoMercy]

I think OpenSource, Free(GNU) and Propitary software should mingle more. There should be more GNU software available on windows, and more propitary software available on Linux and other OSS operating systems.

Some things will never be Free, some things will always be free... they should at least work together though. It's insane in this age that applications are still written only to work on one platform and virtually impossible to move between them.

Id like to see for example KDE applications on windows and World of Warcraft on linux, without any nasty hacks. Quite dificult with Warcraft coded for windows only DirectX+D3D, and KDE using QT, for which the Windows version isn't Free.

Re:ESR has a point

[samkass]

That said, it's just perplexing to me that Apple doesn't provide an iTunes app for Linux, presumably binary for the DRM.

You don't get out much, do you? Can you seriously imagine Linux users being happy with Apple adding DRM to their platform, then providing a way for them to buy DRM-locked music? Fortunately Linux is not likely to go to GPLv3, but half the point of that new license is to kill DRM and intellectual property in general, so why should any of these companies care about Linux?

Whether or not 64-bit operating systems are an inflection point in the market, Linux is rapidly being locked out of the mainstream by stupid moves like GPLv3, and I think Eric Raymond is trying to be the voice of moderation here that keeps FOSS viable in the marketplace. I personally don't see desktop Linux ever catching on-- the system under which it's developed doesn't promote the right priorities for desktop adoption-- but every time someone is forced to transition something and they stay with Windows another opportunity is lost. Vista is going to force millions of hardware upgrades, and what if Linux shipped as the default OS on all of those machines as a cheaper alternative? Most would get wiped, but a lot of install CDs would get out there and Linux would have taken another step towards acceptance.

This is not going to happen without Linux embracing some proprietary solutions so that it (gasp!) does what people want it to do. Until the Linux community puts more importance on their product making their customers happy than on some ideological religious argument, it's can't possibly gain mainstream acceptance.

Re:ESR has a point

[MoneyT]

You can't have copyright and trade secret at the same time. Which is exactly why companies aren't so willing to jump on the open source bandwagon, because copyright won't protect them, unless you want to allow copyright of specific algorithms, and then you're really in for a hell of a time. In the end, there are 3 choices for anyone that wants to advance FOSS or Linux to the main stream:

1) Deal only with FOSS and be regulated to second class status for the foreseeable future.

2) Allow binary blobs, but prefer (and promote) FOSS as the primary and first choice.

3) Figure out some way to allow for open source while still protecting comercial interests. You personaly may not care about their business or their business model but they do, and the loss from not supporting FOSS is less than from changing their business model for you. Remember, in the end you're the one that wants to use their product.

Currently, most FOSS / Linux proponents are chosing 1, which is perfectly fine, but it's what ESR is arguing will eventualy break FOSS and Linux because too much time and effort is being spent reinventing the wheel.

3 is the optimal alternative, but will require considerable effort on the parts of the FOSS / Linux communities, which means being willing to negotiate and talk.

And 2 is the easiest solution and the one most likely to lead to 3 given the current software environment.

Re:ESR has a point

[Anonymous Coward]

Can you seriously imagine Linux users being happy with Apple adding DRM to their platform, then providing a way for them to buy DRM-locked music?

Yes, because the vast majority of Linux users simply wouldn't care. It's really only a small fraction of users that 1. actually care about the ideology of free software and 2. have the conviction to stand by their beliefs.

Sorry, but your hippie days are over, and each user-friendly mass-market distribution kills those ideas a little more. Normal computer users who do get out want their music and their movies, and if that requires proprietary code and DRM, so be it.

Re:ESR has a point

[Anonymous Coward]

But many people I know, who are on Windows, take the software for free as well, legally or not. Many people, not just Linux users, are accustomed to "free" software in this day and age. The age of buying boxes at CompUSA is mostly over and has been killed by the internet, except for things like Photoshop, etcetera (where a lot of people still get it for free).

Quite a lot of people use Windows at work, and workplaces buy legit copies of Windows more often than not.

Photoshop, on the other hand, is probably one of the few pieces of software that is pirated more often than Windows. It is very expensive -- even when you get the student/educational deals. And yet there are huge numbers of people using it for frivolous (but fun) purposes on the internet.

Re:ESR has a point

[Mr. Slippery]

[From TFA]: Raymond warned that Linux risks getting locked out of new hardware platforms for the next 30 years unless it proves it can work with iPods, MP3s and WMP.

Nah. The question is not "Why doesn't Linux work with my iPod?", it's "Why don't iPods work with my choice of operating system?"

While digital personal music players are certainly here to stay, the iPod itself is a fad, a trend, which in 30 years will be as meaningful as the original Sony Walkman is today. For the Free Software community to compromise its core principles for compatibility with a fad would be foolish.

Re:ESR has a point

[asuffield]

Really, until the mantra "free" is clarified (and I don't think it is entirely), businesses and providers will only take from the Linux community, not give.

Or alternatively and preferably, until these ingrates have all been implemented around and driven out of business. Yes, I would far rather live in a world where the people who seek only to accumulate wealth and power (at the expense of all else) end up losing. And that's the only reason why these 'providers' act in this manner.

Nobody has a 'right' to endlessly increment their wealth and power, nor is it desireable for society that anybody ever do so.

Re:ESR has a point

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

What if I were to make something impressive in the image manipulation field like Imagemagick or GIMP and try to GPL it, and someone made a website and sold access to online image manip based on it?

Or if you just used "service" as a full run-around of the gpl and have an app that is little more than a frontend to pipe data over the network and have the network return the results (either as data or opcodes to run)

Re:ESR has a point

[MoneyT]

I don't think you understand the essential question to people. The question is, will X work with what I already have? People already have an iPod, they already have WoW, they already have photoshop, they already have Office, furthermore, they have hundreds of thousands of bytes of data in those apps. They may be willing to move and they may be willing to port, but it's not going to happen all at once, so whatever they get that's new, has to work with what they have that's old. ESR's point is that Vista is propting some huge hardware upgrades and the move to new processors will do the same. When confronted with Windows, Mac or Linux to put on their new machine (or when confronted with a new machine that includes W,M or L) the question will not be "why does my current product not work with L" it will always be (and rightfuly so) "Why doesn't L work with my current product." It is the battle Apple fought for years and is now seeing the bennefits of being compatible with existing installs. The method linux needs to take is one of sneaking in and becoming casualy a part of life. People don't like change and if you can make linux the smallest change possible, then you'll get more people.

Re:ESR has a point

[Mr. Slippery]

will X work with what I already have?

Which is why we should promote open standards, so that everything works with everything else. Caving in to the some faddish proprietary protocol or format works against this goal.

People don't like change and if you can make linux the smallest change possible, then you'll get more people.

If you compromise fundamental principles, what's the point in getting more people? "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss."

The Free Software movement is not a popularity contest.

We're having fun and freedom over here in the Free Software community. Love for others to join us, but if your iPod is more important to you than freedom, well, best wishes. If you'd like to bring your iPod over, you should put pressure on the guys you bought it from to allow its free use.

Re:ESR has a point

[ciggieposeur]

Linux is rapidly being locked out of the mainstream by stupid moves like GPLv3,

GPLv3 is not a stupid move. Face it, there are (at least) three distinct classes of computer users whose interests are now in full conflict due to DRM: consumers, software developers, and content sellers. GPLv3 brings this conflict out into the open and provides some practical leverage for software developers against content creators, sorely needed in these days where the content creators have so much more money to purchase favorable legislation.

Fortunately Linux is not likely to go to GPLv3,

It will be greatly affected by GPLv3 once glibc moves to a GPLv3-like license (still LGPL, but users must be able to replace it). Given: the Linux kernel only works with the FSF toolchain (gcc, glibc), and once glibc can be replaced with a user version that doesn't bother checking signatures on new binaries, the whole TCPA/DRM lockdown comes apart. There goes the Tivo business model.

Linux kernel developers will find themselves thrown into this conflict. Do they *really* want Tivo, or maybe nVidia/ATI, to be able to use the code they wrote to dictate policy on users? If so, they'll need to either fork the entire FSF toolchain (hard) or move to BSD libc (maybe easier). Ironically enough, Linux now needs the FSF more than the other way around.

OTOH, maybe enough critical Linux kernel developers will take the FSF side and fork the kernel to stay compatible with newer versions of glibc. What then? What if something really important (like the SCSI support layer) threatened to fork into GPLv2 and GPLv3+, with many of the knowledgable developers picking only one to work on? Would Linus push for unified kernel development even if he was "forced" to stay compatible with glibc?

Or maybe the glibc developers will split in their camp, creating one version for the Linux kernel and another for everything else; they have just as much reason to pick Tivo's side as Linus does. It could domino against the FSF with a number of major FSF components forking into GPLv2 and ignoring the "GPLv3 or later" version; or it could domino against the Tivo-minded developers with a major Linux distro expicitly forking all "GPLv2 or later" applications into "GPLv3 or later", forcing their users into DRM+freedom. All it takes is two extra words in the project-wide COPYING file and your code becomes a political football for someone else to play with.

Personally, I'm glad GPLv3 is pushing this out into the open. These issues will determine the fate of the 21st Century "information economy"; if developers and consumers don't get a voice we will definitely be screwed.

Re:ESR has a point

[TheViewFromTheGround]

I have to say I agree 100%. In my own little social sphere, I'm a big supporter of FOSS (just did a Chicago cable access TV interview about the subject, as a matter of fact). But I'm not religious, and I think there are limits to free software, particularly for the desktop. I've used this example before, but the GIMP is a perfect example of this: as a designer (mainly web, but also for fine-art photography printing and print design), it really doesn't cut the mustard. Indeed, the amount of intellectual capital that is required to make a design or photo editing program such as InDesign or Photoshop is substantial. Now, Adobe profits significantly from this intellecual input by forcing new versions on users on a regular basis that may or may not add much in the way of functionality. However, Adobe is also pretty okay about maintaining application compatibility across versions, so my legal version of Photoshop 7 is all I ever need to get 95% of my work done, and if I ever need InDesign instead of Scribus (which is rare, but happens, mainly with typographically complex layouts, like posters) I just use my roommate's legal version of InDesign CS2.

Here's the thing -- I would pay good money to be able to run Adobe's products natively on my Linux desktop instead of via CrossOver Office. Those applications have significant value to me that I think it is hard (not impossible, but structurally very very difficult) for the free software development model to provide. Now, while I want Adobe to be governed by a sane and resonable copyright and patent regime that doesn't let them own their ideas for all eternity, I would assert that they should have the right to profit off their significant intellectual investment within certain limits. Therefore, I would pay -- be really delighted, in fact -- to be able to run legal versions of the Adobe CS2 applications natively on a Linux desktop without resorting to CrossOver Office.

I think many of us (rightly) believe in the whole the utility of all non-free software approaches zero over time argument. But this entire discussion, and that maxim, is primarily predicated on the current patent and copyright system, which allows intellectual property holders to withhold their work from the commons essentially forever. In a saner climate for intellectual property law, with some specific thought given to information technology, I think that free and proprietary software could coexist pretty well, with significant UI and development investments having the possibility of creating profit for the creators without screwing the rest of us in perpetuity. In fact, such a coexistence might be a healthy thing, because these debates on some level come down to making binary choices between business models that, given the broader ecology, are in conflict.

The big caveat here lot of corporate power is arrayed very much against such a scenario, which means that this is an even steeper uphill battle than the acceptance of FOSS generally. It isn't an easy argument to make, while it is very easy for corporate lobbyists and their lackeys in various governments (Congresscritters where I'm from) to keep things swinging in their favor. Their favor isn't just profits and money, but a legal environment that essentially denies the possibilities for hybrid combinations of free and proprietary software, which in turn lends fuel to the (understandable) hardline stance of the FSF and others.

Re:ESR has a point

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

It shouldn't have too, but the FOSS comunity (or at least the vocal ones) would demand it, and anything less would be derided as half assed.

Perhaps, but it's not like binary-only software would be more successful in that community. Look at qmail: It's proprietary, source-available software. How many people would use it if DJB only released binaries for the platforms that he happened to be using when he wrote it?

Re:ESR has a point

[MoneyT]

You can be interoperable without compromising the ultimate ideal. You have to do it the same way that everyone else does, by making the ideal the default, but easily allowing the alternative. Look at the way that both microsoft and apple operate to bring people into "their way of things" the default setting is "their way" (i.e. WMP defaults to WMA as an import format, and iTunes defaults to AAC) but with a simple change, both allow you use alternative formats (MP3, AIFF, WAV, what have you). Linux needs to work the same way to bring people into the fold. The default of course should be open and free, but it should not be a song and dance to operate with proprietary devices, just a switch. You could even do it transparently, much like iTunes for windows handles WMA (by converting it in the background). In the end, your goal should be making the free and open so much a part of normal everyday behaviors that when they run into something that isn't, they think twice. The goal should not be to make the change as jarring as possible, because change is bad, and therefore, linux or free and open protocols will be viewed as bad.

Make it easy for them to be free and open, and make it easy for what is already proprietary to be used in the free and open system and you will find that free and open will gain strength and acceptance.

Re:ESR has a point

[Anonymous Coward]

You either miss the parent's point, or ignore it.

You can't have copyright and trade secret at the same time. Which is exactly why companies aren't so willing to jump on the open source bandwagon, because copyright won't protect them, unless you want to allow copyright of specific algorithms, and then you're really in for a hell of a time.

A binary software program with a copyright does enjoy both a trade secret and a copyright. When the source not provided, how the program "works" is like the "secret sauce". But at the same time, the software is copyrighted. Distribution is not permitted. You could "reverse engineer" (decompile) the binary and maybe figure out how it "works" but even if you discover the "trade secret" the software is still copyrighted. Anyhow, "algorithms" can be copyrighted but the thing about a process is that it can be described/expressed in inumerable non-infringing ways (so there would be very little point in doing so if all expressions weren't already copyrighted by default). This is why software companies are so hot for software patents! Software patents and business process patents allow algorithms to be patented (even though algorithms can't be patented; love ya USPTO)!

The way I see it there's no reason for software companies in this day and age not to sell source to/in their boxed software products. Why do they do it?

1) They believe the "trade secret" is maintable for a longer term than a patent;

2) They believe the "trade secret" is more valuable than the infinite monopoly protection of the post-1976 compulsory copyright;

3) They believe the "trade secret" is a liability or evidence of their own wrong-doing. (If source is not sold, no third-party can ever determine if the patents or copyrights of others are being infringed.)

4) I guess there's always an argument that keeping all that source secret provides some security through obscurity. Is that justified?

I think it's basically a default mode of thought these days that code isn't speech and therefor not a product to be sold (like books, records etc.) it's just some raw material that gets converted into "software" which is then treated as some kind of trade-good.

Re:ESR has a point

[bulliver]

Given: the Linux kernel only works with the FSF toolchain (gcc, glibc)

Not strictly true. Linux Journal had an article (9-12 months ago) on the Intel C/C++ Compiler for Linux and they were certainly able to build the kernel.

Re:ESR has a point

[cyber-vandal]

WoW runs just as happily using OpenGL on Windows and OSX - I'm not quite sure if there's a technical reason for the lack of a Linux client. Sign the petition and see if Blizz will change their minds.

Re:ESR has a point

[julesh]

and once glibc can be replaced with a user version that doesn't bother checking signatures on new binaries, the whole TCPA/DRM lockdown comes apart

Frankly, I think the entire thing's doomed to failure anyway, because it relies on vendors of DRM data being able to verify a combination of (a) the software you're using to play the media, (b) all the drivers that are in the chain of drivers between that software and output, (c) your operating system kernel, (d) any additional software that's running in priveleged mode on your computer and could therefore theoretically snoop the data from your drivers, (e) your BIOS, and (f) any hypervisor that may or may not be running on your computer. Unless vendors are going to start listing required harware & driver versions to use their media files (e.g. you MUST have an ATI x1300 graphics card with driver version 12.5.63 or whatever) this just cannot work. Upgrade your video card driver, all your media will stop playing. Install the latest MS patch before your media provider has a chance to update their database, all your media will stop playing. The idea that consumers will put up with that kind of shit is a joke. Yes. Remote attestation for DRM is a joke.

The only way remote attestation can be used effectively is in a controlled environment, to identify a specific computer that is under your control, and to make sure that none if its software has been messed with. Or for monitoring the machines on your network so you can tell when one of them has a rootkit on it.

Not DRM. It just won't work in that environment.

Re:ESR has a point

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

Sign the petition and see if Blizz will change their minds.

No. Blizzard is going to have to apologize for the bnetd fiasco before I'll be buying anything from them.

Re:ESR has a point

[bfree]

Without redistribution rights you may be able to fix a problem/add a feature for yourself but you could not give it to any other users, nor could you employee someone else to do it for you if you are not personally able.

Re:ESR has a point

[jcr]

Can you seriously imagine Linux users being happy with Apple adding DRM to their platform, then providing a way for them to buy DRM-locked music?

Sure I can. Not all Linux users are FSF-style zealots. Some people just use it because it suits their needs.

-jcr

Re:ESR has a point

[jcr]

"Why don't iPods work with my choice of operating system?"

The answer is, because Apple isn't convinced that the marginal increase in sales of iPods to Linux users is worth the effort to port iTunes to Linux.

-jcr

Re:ESR has a point

[MoneyT]

You entirely missed reason 5:

The trade secret is enough of an edge in the current market to potentialy move themselves into the lead of their competition.

The value of the trade secret doesn't have to extend indefinately, just long enough to take market position.

Consider if ATI came up with some code that could get spectacular performance out of their graphics cards using half as much in terms of components as NVIDIA.

Eventualy NVIDIA will figure something out, either the same thing or just reverse engineer and develop their own version, either way is irellevant because at that point the trade secret is worht little to ATI, but for that 2, 3, 6 or 12 month period that it take NVIDIA to catch up, ATI has the edge, and has the chance to take market position.

By contrast, say ATI releases the source for their drivers and such with their new wonder card. It takes all of 5 minutes for NVIDIA to have someone take a drive to compUSA, buy a card and look at the source figure out how to do it and make their own.

Re:ESR has a point

[Anonymous Coward]

"Why don't iPods work with my choice of operating system?"

The answer is, because Apple isn't convinced that the marginal increase in sales of iPods to Linux users is worth the effort to port iTunes to Linux.

And of course because Apple already has one competitor & doesn't need another.

--

Marx was a philosopher.

Re:ESR has a point

[ilzogoiby]

"Why doesn't Linux work with my iPod?"

Well, it works with mine... http://www.gtkpod.org/

Uhhh, duh.

[RingDev]

OS Software is good, proprietary software is good. The two will always balance eachother in order to match the market, demand, and availability of developers. Saying one is "evil" compared to the other is just blind fundamentalism.

-Rick

Re:Uhhh, duh.

[jmorris42]

> OS Software is good, proprietary software is good.

No, I do agree with RMS on that part. Closed software is ALWAYS bad. Sometimes I'm willing to compromise principles a bit and use it anyway but it is always bad. I would have a lot fewer problems with it though if when I bought a program a got the source. At least I wouldn't be totally tied to the whims of the vendor. If a bug were biting me hard enough I could fix it, when I upgraded the OS/hardware I could fix things myself if the vendor either was gone or had abandoned my version. I could even gang up with other users and distribute patches among ourselves. We couldn't redistribute the whole program because it is copyrighted by someone else but it would be better than the current situation.

Supplying the source would in no way diminish their 'intellectual property.' In fact, since Copyright is a trade between society and the content creator (as is patents) intended to enrich the larger society, I'd argue that the deal be clarified such that Source can be copyrighted but binaries can ONLY be derived works that can't carry an independent copyright. No source no copyright.

Re:Uhhh, duh.

[kclittle]

Rick, you are being logical, rational and open-minded. Your privileges here at Slashdot is hereby revoked.

Re:Uhhh, duh.

[Anonymous Coward]

Keeping useful technical information a secret is harmful. The movement follows logically from that principle.

ESR's comments are not front-page news

[Anonymous Coward]

And havn't been since the whole Netscape open-source thing many years ago. In fact, I think I'd rather look for videos of pregnant dancing monkeys on youtube than pay any attention to ESR.

Um....

[antifoidulus]

Isn't the definition of "freedom" choice? So apparently this guy has made a choice to use proprietary software. How is that not freedom? I hate when Open Source software people get all preachy about "freedom" because to me it just comes off as "You are not free unless you do what we tell you to do". Which doesn't strike me as particularly "free"....

Re:Um....

[gustgr]

He is indeed free to make his on choices on whatever kind of software he wants to use, this *IS* freedom after all. The problem is that he always seemed to advocate for FOSS because of it freedom and openness, and now it looks like he changed his point. It doesn't look he is interested in freedom more than he is to grab a bigger market share (obviously for commercial interests of the whole community). I think it is this radical new positioning that pisses off some members of our community.

Re:Um....

[Anonymous Coward]

No, you clearly don't understand how this works. Freedom is defined by these left-wing hippie nutbars as using a completely unencumbered OS and software. The fact they have to use non-free, closed-source hardware to run this free software is irrelevant.

If you CHOOSE to run a proprietary, closed-source OS or application then there's something wrong with you and you must be ostracised.

Re:Um....

[babbling]

You're misunderstanding the stance of the Free Software community. Even the FSF says that it should be up to people to choose whether they will accept proprietary software. They say that they have chosen not to, except in certain circumstances that usually don't arise anymore. What they do say is that people should not be forced into using proprietary software.

Re:Um....

[Stalyn]

Isn't the definition of "freedom" choice?

That's only half of it. You also have to include "as long as my choice does not restrict the freedom of others". Without that clause simply "choice" would lead to less freedom than more freedom. I think the majority of FSF advocates have no problem with a person using proprietary software as long as it doesn't restrict their own freedoms. For example having proprietary software forced upon you, like certain kinds of DRM. But as long as there remains a choice between Free and Non-Free there shouldn't be an issue.

Re:Um....

[maxwell demon]

The fact they have to use non-free, closed-source hardware to run this free software is irrelevant.

You think so?

Re:Um....

[ettlz]

If you CHOOSE to run a proprietary, closed-source OS or application then there's something wrong with you and you must be ostracised.

It seems perverse to run a proprietary, closed-source OS or application because it is proprietary and/or closed-source. On the other hand, if it's the only thing that does the job then one must lump it.

Re:Um....

[Cal Paterson]

Isn't the definition of "freedom" choice?

Indeed, and what choice do you have when you're forced to use proprietary drivers because the companies won't share code.

Freedom means freedom, and binary blobs ain't it.

Re:Um....

[pjrc]

Isn't the definition of "freedom" choice?

Yes. If you go to dictionary.com, one of the 9 definitions is "The capacity to exercise choice; free will: We have the freedom to do as we please all afternoon."

Also on the list is "The condition of being free of restraints.".

But if you go to the FSF website, the definition of "free software" is:

The freedom to run the program, for any purpose (freedom 0).
The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2).
The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits (freedom 3). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.

So apparently this guy has made a choice to use proprietary software. How is that not freedom?

If you ignore the FSF definition and also the "condition of being free of restraints", then "freedom of choice" it is.

But certainly he is restrained from making and distributing copies, and from making modifications and being able to distribute those changes. Most proprietary software licences prohibit reverse engineering, and even if they didn't, not having the true source code basically restrains ones freedom to study how the program really works.

However, he probably isn't restrained from actually running the program. Maybe. Some proprietary licences even apply contractual limits for the types of uses a program may be applied. So he may not even be in "the condition of being free of restraints" for simply using the program for certain purposes. It all depends on the license, which he probably didn't read.

Everybody Loves Eric Raymond!

[TheRaven64]

Sorry, had to be said.

Not the target audience

[Scarblac]

Raymond, a champion of all things open, said it is vital to the future uptake of Linux that the community compromise to win the new generation of non-technical users aged younger than 30. This group is more interested in having Linux "just work" on their iPod or MP3 player and "don't care about our notions of doctrinal purity",

Indeed they don't. So?

It seems that ESR has started believing that "overthrowing Windows" is the end goal of Linux. It's not, it's having a completely open and Free Unix system. That group he talks about, they'll just use Windows or whatever, and be happy. I don't see how that matters for Linux' direction.

Re:Not the target audience

[dasgeht]

You're talking about GNU, not Linux. The end goal of GNU is to have a Free Unix-like operating system. I don't know what the end goal of Linux is, with Linus' rejection of the GPLv3 draft and ESR's willingness to sacrifice freedom for popularity I think it is now clear that their goal is not the same as GNU's.

Re:Not the target audience

[babbling]

You're right, but I think the idea of overthrowing the Windows empire is often played down. It would definitely benefit Free Software if there was a greater diversity of operating systems being used by the general population. All of a sudden every document being in Microsoft Word's format wouldn't be acceptable, and open standards might become important.

Proprietary software isn't a threat to Free Software, but proprietary standards are, because then Free Software users begin to be excluded from the rest of the population. Open standards are an issue of fairness and equality.

Re:Not the target audience

[tomhudson]

"the end goal of GNU is to have a Free Unix-like operating system"

You mean like the BSDs?

[insert mandatory joke about reinventing the wheel, but this time with an ew feature heretofor unthought of - SQUARE SIDES!]

Re:Not the target audience

[SavvyPlayer]

I don't believe ESR's focus here is winning the number one market position from XYZ, rather, merely addressing obstacles to healthy growth.

Re:Not the target audience

[Anonymous Coward]

>It would definitely benefit Free Software if there was a greater diversity of operating systems being used by the general population.

Yeah, but would a greater diversity of OSes be to the benefit of the general population?

(Probably not.)

Re:Not the target audience

[_Sprocket_]

It seems that ESR has started believing that "overthrowing Windows" is the end goal of Linux. It's not, it's having a completely open and Free Unix system. That group he talks about, they'll just use Windows or whatever, and be happy. I don't see how that matters for Linux' direction.

I'm curious - where did ESR state that "'overthrowing Windows' is the end goal of Linux"? Nowhere in the article, much less quotes within the article, is the word "overthrow" used.

I would say the theme of ESR's discussion is about Linux competing against other desktop environments - Windows included. And I support that. I don't know what you would do with a "completely open and Free Unix system" but I stick mine on my desktop. The more other people do the same, the more likely I'm going to find drivers and software options for my desktop. Market share, or at least perceived market share, is important.

As a side note - it's not just about Linux on the desktop. Anything being produced with desktop systems in mind may very likely have application in other environments.

Re:Not the target audience

[jefu]

Yeah, but would a greater diversity of OSes be to the benefit of the general population?
(Probably not.)

I can think of a number of possible advantages. Less opportunity for viruses, better standardization on file formats and the like, competition driving down prices, the ability to better serve niche markets...

But are these likely to be persuasive to people who buy "one size fits all" software precisely because it always looks the same and they've invested lots of time and energy in learning one system (and rightly so, should we all have to learn to drive again for every different vehicle?), because they've somehow bought into the "Microsoft does everything just right" mindset, because they often pirate software so they don't see the prices? I doubt it.

Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' article

[jmorris42]

Yup, I also disagree with ESR's reasoning somewhat but agree that if you accept his reasoning his conclusion is perfectly rational and pro Free Software. But this is slashdot and for some reason there is a large contingent that loves to slag ESR so the editors are throwing a little raw meat out to get some pageviews on a slow Saturday.

I think ESR is wrong because most people aren't ever going to notice the 64bit transition, at least nothing like the 16-32 bit horrors of the 1990s. Both Linux (almost flawlessly on RH based distros and fairly useable on Debian ones) and Windows have made it all but unnoticable whether one is using 32 or 64 bit apps for 90+% of users and uses. Only those who need to malloc gigs need concern themselves.

But even ignoring all that we might want to consider compromising enough to capture desktop share. It wouldn't be unprecedented, GNU itself was developed on closed platforms because ALL platforms were closed, and after all the FSF is still wanking with HURD.

It isn't the 64 bit barrier we need to worry about, it is the ability to play multimedia content, which ESR also is concerned about, that is a real problem. We CAN'T write and distribute Free Software for most of that stuff because of patents. Yes I hate them as much as the next geek (and had the consistency to launch a big "Fuck you" to Tivo over yesterday's patent troll by them) but until we can change the rules of the game we are mostly stuck with them. Yes [I] can go get mplayer and most of [YOU] can get it, but corporate america isn't going to take a lawyer bumrush from the MPAA/Franhaufer/etc over the issue. And newbies are being put through a horrible rite of passage when they try to join us.

GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[Psionicist]

"We have a serious problem. Whenever I try to pitch Linux to anyone under 30, the question I get is: 'Will it work with my iPod?," he said. "We are not yet as a community making the painful compromises need to achieve widespread desktop market share. Until we do, we will get locked out of more hardware."

Of course it works with iPod. Take a look at:

* GNUpod and gtkpod
* iPod Shuffle Database Builder

And then there's another one with a funky name I cannot remember.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[dsfox]

Ok, now try and actually use it with your ipod. If by some chance that works, try taking it back to a windows machine or a mac and see if it still works there.

There is nothing 'of course' about all this. If a typical, intelligent user even hears about problems involving Linux and ipod, they're going to steer clear. Who needs that kind of trouble?

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[ScrewMaster]

And then there's another one with a funky name I cannot remember..

Yes, and the funky naming of major applications is a whole 'nother issue that has an impact on consumer acceptance of Linux. Given that most users of computer systems will give up on something if they can't figure it out in half a minute, making said user waste any of that precious thirty seconds trying to figure out that his browser is called "Konqueror" is silly, and most of the other standard Linux apps have equally off-the-wall names. Sure, Explorer doesn't make a whole more sense ... but at least Microsoft put the word "Internet" in front of it. Marketing 101 is a class that a lot of Linux development houses should take.

All that aside, the reality of the situation is this: Linux purists would like their favorite OS to stay as free of proprietary binaries as possible. And that's a worthy goal. But it is also true that mainstream acceptance of Linux is being hampered by hardware compatibility issues. I can install XP on a machine and right out of the box it supports accelerated video on pretty much any video card out there. With most of the Linuxes I've used I have to fiddle around to make anything work. As a software engineer I don't mind that ... but the oft-referred-to Joe Sixpack does. So, if (and that's a big "if") the idea is to have Linux-on-the-desktop become a successful competitor to Microsoft Windows it will have to achieve a similar level of plug-and-playability. That really is the crux of the matter: is displacing Windows such a priority to Linux developers that they will sacrifice the ideals that attracted them to that OS in the first place? I think the real fear is that by making such a compromise now, the hybrid distributions will become more popular because they simply work better, and that there will be no way to put the genie back in the bottle and return to a truly free environment.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[shreevatsa]

Yes, this was already covered yesterday — The iPod can be used, very well, and easily.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[4e617474]

You've clearly never taken an iPod support call. In iTunes, the super-duper brain-dead easy mode - where you plug in your iPod and it automatically updates the iPod to a perfect mirror image of your library - prevents you from dragging and dropping more stuff on there. This generates support calls. That often involve whining. And swearing. And demands to know why this is so hard. And sometimes crying.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[Nosklo]

Ok, now try and actually use it with your ipod

I've plugged my ipod on a fresh install of kubuntu 6.06 and it worked out of the box. I don't see where the problem is.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[unapersson]

Hmm, let's see, on my menus under "Internet" I've got:

* Drivel Journal Editor
* Ekiga Softphone
* Epiphany Web Browser
* Evolution Mail
* Firefox Web Browser
* Firestarter
* Gaim Instant Messenger
* gFTP
* Google Earth
* Java Web Start 1.4
* Liferea Feed Reader
* Mozilla Composer
* Mozilla Web Browser
* Pan Newsreader
* Terminal Services Client
* Thunderbird Mail
* XChat-GNOME IRC Client

What's complicated about that? It is an order of magnitude less complicated than the ones on my Windows machine at work. All nicely categorised and easy to find. Windows doesn't even manage to keep mine alphabetical, it's grouped into several alphabetical lists depending on whether it's in all users or my local user. So in a comparison Windows only comes on top in terms of familarity, the menu is a usability nightmare.

Microsoft Outlook (what does that do? It's icon looks like nothing to do with mail)

Internet Explorer (is that not an FTP file browser?)

Microsoft Excel (some presentation about how great microsoft are? At least that's how it appears on the menu). On Linux I have "Office -> Gnumeric Spreadsheet" and "Office -> OpenOffice.org Spreadsheet".

That's not including all the other applications hidden in vendor rather than functional menus.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[ScrewMaster]

Yes, but it's only recently that KDE and Gnome have begun putting in postfixes to describe the application. In any event, your comment revolves around the way a particular distro (or you yourself) have organized the menus and described the software. I was referring the the actual project names given to the applications by their developers, which are frequently chosen for their cuteness factor, some "obvious" (to a software engineer) play on words, or other criteria having nothing to do with recognizability by an end user. Using a few of your examples without the added descriptions, from the perspective of a new user:

Drivel (what? well, at least it's in the dictionary)
Ekiga (wtf?)
Epiphany (bible research?)
Evolution (something scientific, I guess)
Firefox (hey, I've heard of that!)
Firestarter (Ah, a free Stephen King e-book! Cool!)
Gaim (Huh?)
Liferea (???)

I guess that's one problem you have when you're simply including open source applications written by many other developers into your own distro ... you pretty much have to call it what it is, regardless of how goofy it sounds. Microsoft has the luxury of naming all their default applications like "Notepad", "Calculator", "Paint", etc. This isn't in defense of Microsoft, per se, it's just that everyone here seems to want Linux to become popular among Joe Sixpacks, grandmothers, and other comparatively computer-illiterate individuals (why, I don't know ... Gates-envy, I suppose) and if you're going to do that you need to avoid confusing people any more than you absolutely have to.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[93 Escort Wagon]

Of course it works with iPod. Take a look at:

* GNUpod and gtkpod
* iPod Shuffle Database Builder

And then there's another one with a funky name I cannot remember.


I think your post, and the majority of other posts on this thread, serve to illustrate the fundamental disconnect that's in play here.

From GNUpod's home page: GNUpod is a collection of Perl-Scripts which allow you to use your iPod... If you really think this is what your typical person (you know, the type who have better things to do in the evening than sit around hacking Linux kernel modules) wants, then I don't think I can explain it to you.

gtkpod is much closer to what these "normals" would want. But it looks like there are still problems with iPod Mini support; you need a separate program to handle podcasts; there's no support for DRM'ed AAC (one of ESR's exact points, I believe); you have to use a different program to rip CDs to mp3/aac/whatever, and then manually import them.

Plus if you go to the troubleshooting links, you'll find "solutions" that talk about manually editing /etc/fstab. You may think "oh, this is simple stuff" (and for a lot of us, it is); but most people don't want to deal with the system at that level for something as trivial as getting an iPod to work! It's why a lot of Linux users (like me) defected over to OS X in the first place.

Frankly, I think ESR's thoughts on this are spot-on; and most of the posts here today are serving to prove his point, although the posters don't realize it.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[Anonymous Coward]

Does Linux work with iTunes? Can I buy songs from iTunes and put them on the iPod, while using Linux?

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[SanityInAnarchy]

What's your point? Why does it matter who added the descriptions or not?

Besides, it's good to be distinctive once people know what you are. For instance, once people know what a web browser is, it really helps to be called something like "Firefox" -- or Konqueror, or Safari, or Opera. So you google for "Web Browser", look for a good one, then you want it everywhere -- when you're at a friend's house, you hate their Internet Explorer, because it's not Firefox. Or something...

Compare this to, say, Outlook vs Outlook Express. Or Netscape versus Internet Explorer -- that's just a recipie for confusing people, as those trained on Netscape will think "Netscape == Internet", only less consciously in that they won't understand the word "Internet", just "net", so they won't know what Internet Explorer is.

The postfixes are a good idea, because that way people will know what kind of program it is, so that if they don't like it, they know what to search for -- instead of "ekiga replacement", they could search for "Linux softphone". And so on.

And really, explain to me why the new user would ignore the postfixes? Explain to me why it matters what name a project actually has, if most users will only ever install anything through package management -- and thus it only matters what the package manager calls it?

Could you clarify for me what your point is, or exactly when a new user is supposed to encounter these names and not understand what they mean? So far, this seems like as old and tired and untrue an argument as the "instructions for running Quake 3 on Linux" or "I shouldn't have to recompile my kernel to get a printer working" arguments.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[SanityInAnarchy]

On the other hand, some of the concepts that made it so hard for me to get into Linux in the first place are reasons why I'll be defecting back from OS X, after using it on my laptop for over a year. The lack of a decent, well-supported package manager is high on the list. I'm sick of my apps telling me at random times that I have to stop doing what I'm doing and update -- or worse, having to update every app individually. "Does FileMaker have an update? Hmm... Cog? Chicken of the VNC? VLC? Mplayer? Sunbird? Cyberduck? OS X? AbiWord? NeoOffice? Gimp?"

For a "user-friendly" OS, this is a serious pain in the ass, coming from a world of "emerge --sync && emerge -uaDN world" and "apt-get update && apt-get upgrade" and even Ubuntu's system tray app -- "Oh, I have updates for some of the programs on your system -- click here and let me do everything for you."

Getting a particular program to work may be a challenge, but I imagine I waste less time that way than I do making sure I'm up-to-date on my Mac whenever I want to submit a bug report.

Re:GNUpod, gtkpod etc.

[UtucXul]

gtkpod is much closer to what these "normals" would want. But it looks like there are still problems with iPod Mini support;

I wasn't aware of any problem with gtkpod and the iPod Mini. I've been using gtkpod with my iPod Mini (1st gen.) and my wife's iPod Mini (2nd gen.) exclusively for at least a year and never had any issues. Didn't even have to reformat them to fat32 like you do with windows to make it work.

ESR is clueless like always.

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux is supposed to be about freedom. Comprimising that to make corporations that tell us they hate us happy isn't helpful. The goal is not to compete with windows, vista will not hurt linux. Linux is for people who care about freedom. People who care about using shitty proprietary crap are using windows right now, and will always be using windows. Nothing linux does will change that.

Re:ESR is clueless like always.

[lowe0]

That's certainly not a helpful attitude. The question is, why do people choose to use "shitty proprietary crap" instead of what you'd like them to use? The answer is, because it does what they want it to with a minimum of hassle. The complaints of "Fuck 'em, we don't need users like that" and "MS is a monopoly, they control the PC world" are cause-and-effect.

Re:ESR is clueless like always.

[mlwmohawk]

That's certainly not a helpful attitude. The question is, why do people choose to use "shitty proprietary crap" instead of what you'd like them to use? The answer is, because it does what they want it to with a minimum of hassle. The complaints of "Fuck 'em, we don't need users like that" and "MS is a monopoly, they control the PC world" are cause-and-effect.

Why do people run shitty crap? FUD, mostly. Lack of marketing, certainly. OpenOffice.org has flaws anyone who says otherwise is ignorant or lying. The question is, are OpenOffice.org's flaws worse than the monopoly office offering. IMHO, no. I prefer OpenOffice to MS Office, why, it works, works well, and is not as bad as MS Office. Why don't other people use OpenOffice? Maybe because Microsoft made their document formats indecipherable on purpose? Everyone to whome I've given a copy of OpenOffice.org love it, but many go back to MS Office because of incompatibility to subtle features in MS Office. If the MS Office document format were a published, there would be no MS Office. The name of that game is vendor lock!

Windows sucks, Mac and Linux just don't suck as much. /p?

craps

[l3v1]

unless it proves it can work with iPods, MP3s and WMP

This is the usual media crap we see these days popping up everyplace. And we also should tell everywhere that it's not true, iPods are easy (try Amarok or choose your poison), mp3/ogg/every other music format is easy, wmp is easy (think next realplayer version, think mplayer, etc.).

Whenever I try to pitch Linux to anyone under 30, the question I get is: 'Will it work with my iPod?

While this is not a question anybody should be surprised about, I'm still happy that where I live is apprarently not like where he lives :)

at the end of 2008. After that the operating system gets locked in for the next 30 years

I don't think we (linux or not) need such close-minded people. This smells more rotten than anything else.

Remember in Animal Farm

[Anonymous Coward]

at the end when they couldn't tell the pigs from the humans? Just saying.

The lesson to be learned

[ken1984]

Free software good, proprietary software bad!

Free software good, proprietary software better!!!

Comprimise is Good

[Foofoobar]

Well all I think him and Maddog are saying is that a comprimise must be met. People expect multimedia play from their PC's and thus far, evn though progress is being made, it is slow. It's a small sacrifice to make in order to win the bigger battle.

At the same time, it will win software manufacturer support and more people will realize that they can make software for Linux that is proprietary. While the Linux community has always said this, some software manufacturers are still scared due to the militant ideal of keeping EVERYTHING free. I too think everything should be free but I don't think it's going to be possible without making concessions. Allow some through the door to get others involved and then once critical mass has been achieved, people will start creating their own options.

Re:Comprimise is Good

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a small sacrifice to make in order to win the bigger battle.

With the bigger battle being what? How will we recognise when we've won it?

Re:Comprimise is Good

[OmegaBlac]

I refuse to touch Linux unless and until its license explicitly states that I can develop, run, and sell my software without having to give away its copyrighted source code and PATENTED technology

I swear you must be trolling. If you don't license your software under the GPL then you can do all that stuff you want to do in regards to your software. You are not forced to use the GPL to release software for Linux. It is obvious that you are misinformed in regards to the GPL and Linux in general.

Please explain why companies like Google, id software, Epic Games, Macromedia (Flash plugin), and many other companies have released non-GPL, closed proprietary software for Linux? Please educate yourself on the current Linux community and software landscape before commenting with error-filled crap.

Re:Comprimise is Good

[Foofoobar]

I refuse to give away my software. If you won't pay for it, you won't get it without being a criminal and stealing it. In which case I can come down on you like a ton of bricks. I will not comprimise on this issue.

Not that big of a deal. If you don't give it away, someone somewhere will just create a clone and give THEIR version away for free. And millions of open source developers looking at and developing on that FREE code will (given time) make yours obsolete.

However if you are able to see past the limited scope of the current proprietary software business model and are able to see the software support and services model, you would see that giving away software for free and being the main repository and supporter of said software makes you the sole person for support contracts, books and other other support services.

Giving away software doesn't mean giving away your livelihood... unless your code just plain sucks ass.

Proprietary FUD

[crossmr]

One thing I've seen a lot of around here is something that many also criticize big organizations, the government, etc for generating. FUD. Like if you put proprietary Nvidia drivers on your linux box, thats it..game over, you're giong to hell no collecting $200, no trying again. The FOSS Utopia is a nice dream, but its hardly realistic. Most Free open source projects are run by volunteers with their own schedule and their own day job and responsibilities. As a business, where time is money, do you want critical part of your system made up of a piece of software where you need to throw a message on a message board and hope someone gets around to answering it to fix your problem? Or do you want to be able to pick up the phone, call the company and get your issue solved right away?
In the software world, there are certain things only money can buy. One of those things is support. No FOSS project is going to set up a toll free tech support team for their product.

As a home user, its not as critical. I don't mind taking a day or two to fix a problem, so if I have to post a message and leave it, its not that big of a deal.

There are also things that people will only make for money. Most productivity applications seem to be out there, games on the other hand not so much. They're expensive and extremely time consuming. There are lots of FOSS games out there, but they don't approach the level of the ones that cost money. I'm sure many will argue that, but the general public likes shine, and the FOSS games just don't approach that level of shinyness.

That doesn't mean keeping everything closed source is a good idea either. I think all formats should be open. MS should release the visio format so that it could be worked into dia. People then will have a choice. Do they pay for visio and get support or go with dia and scream into the void when they have an issue?

Proprietary isn't bad, it has its place and its usage, so does paying for stuff. Companies who have business models intend to make money. They're not going to make money by making a new product and saying "Here it is, now you go rebrand it and give it away to all your friends for free".

Re:Proprietary FUD

[Anonymous Coward]

"As a business, where time is money, do you want critical part of your system made up of a piece of software where you need to throw a message on a message board and hope someone gets around to answering it to fix your problem? Or do you want to be able to pick up the phone, call the company and get your issue solved right away?"

Yeah, right - pick up the phone and try telling Microsoft what to do about their (put anything here) and expect it to be fixed.

ESR is a douchebag blowhard, film at 11

[Gothmolly]

So now he's ranting about something else? Remember how he told the MS recruiter that "when I piss on Microsoft's grave in the near future, I hope it doesn't splash on you" ? ESR, Perens, hell even Eugenia, ignore them all, and they'll lose their supposed influence.

Re:ESR is a douchebag blowhard, film at 11

[winkydink]

don't forget rms. I ignore the whole lot of them. I'm capable of making my own decisions without all the religious fundamentalism. Sometimes that's Open Source, sometimes it's not.

Misconceptions in the commercial community

[jmorris42]

Again, they said they weren't about to give their product away for free! So, like it or not, there is a perception out there by vendors/providers that the Linux community not only is a small community and not likely to bring in big money, but they see the Linux community as cheap! Network trailer trash.

There is a lot of FUD among the commercial vendors, much of it probably being spread by a certain behemoth vendor and allies. Yes, many less clueful ones still think a Linux port has to be free, as if the GPL would taint their code or something. Others do subscribe to the belief that Linux users are either Free Software zealots who wouldn't pay regardless or are all a bunch of poor starving students. Some of us are hard nosed realists who refuse to be fooled again by being subject to the whims of vendors to the greatest extent possible. Some of us realize the Free stuff usually works a hell of a lot better than the piles of steaming crap vendors want to exchange a pile of cash for.

We just have to educate them. I will pay for software under very limited circumstances. If there is NO Free Software that can do the work I'll pay. If it isn't important (games) I'll pay. If it is going to process content I create it MUST write that in an open format, I won't be locked to a single vendor's whims. So I wouldn't buy Photoshop, even if Hell froze over and they ported it, unless I had an absolute requirement that The GIMP couldn't satisfy but since it writes many open formats I would buy it if I had to. Games are't a problem though. I really hated to see Loki go out, I did buy stuff from them.

At work we do the same thing. We have bought software before and will almost certainly buy it in the future. Just because I prefer Free Software doesn't mean we can refuse to computerize an operation just because there isn't a Free program available and we certainly don't have the man hours available to write an accounting system from scratch. That is just an example, yes there are some free offerings but none are anywhere ready yet. None can yet handle vital functions like payroll.

Re:Misconceptions in the commercial community

[Blakey Rat]

We just have to educate them. I will pay for software under very limited circumstances. If there is NO Free Software that can do the work I'll pay. If it isn't important (games) I'll pay. If it is going to process content I create it MUST write that in an open format, I won't be locked to a single vendor's whims.

So... that translates to you not paying for software.

Look at your rules...

If there is NO Free Software that can do the work I'll pay.

Well, that right there eliminates 99% of commercial software. Why buy Excel when there's Gnumeric? Why buy Word when there's OpenOffice? Why buy MS Visio when there's probably kVisio out there somewhere? It doesn't matter if Excel, Word and Visio are *better* than the open source alternatives... you don't consider that. But because the open source alternatives exist at all, you'll never buy them. Additionally, since it takes only weeks for some open source project to rip-off the next big commercial software product, you'll *never* buy the commercial product since the open source alternative will always exist.

If it isn't important (games) I'll pay.

You'll pay for toys, but you won't pay for products that make your work easier or life better? That's not going to help Linux adoption... at best, if everyone followed your example, Linux would become a glorified video games console that just happens to be able to run a few crappy productivity applications.

If it is going to process content I create it MUST write that in an open format, I won't be locked to a single vendor's whims.

So you'll never buy a Linux program to burn a CD, or create a Flash movie, either.

Look, if you're not willing to buy commercial software just say so. Don't give commercial vendors impossible rules that they have to somehow follow.

Re:Misconceptions in the commercial community

[jimicus]

I think sometimes you have to be a bit pragmatic.

Often there is a free solution which works but it generally lacks a lot of the refinement of its commercial brethren - and sometimes you need that refinement.

Commercial software cannot hope to compete with free software on price. So it shouldn't. It should compete on other things - for example, ease of use, support, integration with proprietary patent-encumbered things. From where I'm standing, it seems a lot of commercial software that exists in the Linux world is doing exactly this.

Re:Misconceptions in the commercial community

[jmorris42]

> So... that translates to you not paying for software.

Try reading, it is fundamental. :)

I gave one example where I'd pay, if I were a professional photographer I'd probably have to buy Photoshop.... assuming it got certified for Crossover Office or got a native port. But for my photo manipulation needs The GIMP is already more than I need.

I have paid for software for Linux, just not very often. I don't use emulation very much but I paid for VMWare when I could get it at a trade show for $100. I paid to upgrade for $39. When they decided the next hit was going to be full retail ($299) I declined and have now found Qemu. Yes Vmware is better (at emulating i386 on i386) but qemu won't lock me in again.

> Well, that right there eliminates 99% of commercial software.

Exactly. Most commercial software isn't worth making an exception for because it isn't exceptional. Spreadsheets are a thirty year old concept now, you'd have to really do something great in the implementation to make one worth paying for.

> > If it is going to process content I create it MUST write that in an open format, I won't be locked to a single vendor's whims.

> So you'll never buy a Linux program to burn a CD, or create a Flash movie, either.

I'm running the 64bit Firefox so I don't even have a Flash plugin so I really doubt I'd be creating any Flash content... at least until a Free player exists. Yet another reason to prefer Free, the closed shop still hasn't bothered making a 64 bit version for Windows (as of a while back when I bothered to look) so I'm not holding my breath for a Linux one. I had 3D support from XFree long before ATI bothered with a 64bit driver. And with the variety of Free CD burning programs out there I don't see a need to pay for one. DVD authoring is a window of opportunity but I'd bet a Free one shows up before any of the nimrods at the closed shops figure it out and port one over.

> Look, if you're not willing to buy commercial software just say so. Don't give commercial vendors impossible rules that
> they have to somehow follow.

No, I'm just saying that in a world when a modern distro has 2000+ packages ready to install for free that if you want me to pay a commercial vendor is going to have to wow me. Show me a good reason to part with real cash money instead of taking the Mrs. out for an evening, putting that money into the Roth, etc. They don't have some inherent "right" to my business, they have to earn it. Just like the people who get my hardware business, by DVD purchases, etc.

Re:Misconceptions in the commercial community

[Mr. Slippery]

It doesn't matter if Excel, Word and Visio are *better* than the open source alternatives... you don't consider that.

The fact that the Free Software alternatives are free makes them *better*. Trusting my valuable data to closed-source software that uses proprietary formats would be unwise.

Re:Misconceptions in the commercial community

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

Well, that right there eliminates 99% of commercial software. Why buy Excel when there's Gnumeric? Why buy Word when there's OpenOffice? Why buy MS Visio when there's probably kVisio out there somewhere? It doesn't matter if Excel, Word and Visio are *better* than the open source alternatives... you don't consider that. But because the open source alternatives exist at all, you'll never buy them. Additionally, since it takes only weeks for some open source project to rip-off the next big commercial software product, you'll *never* buy the commercial product since the open source alternative will always exist.

Welcome to competition. The horror!

2003 is on the phone for ESR

[iabervon]

He's absolutely right that, in order to stay relevant, Linux will have to be able to work with iPods, MP3s, and Windows Media. It's a good thing that it works with all of these, and has for a long time. I'm not sure how easy distributions make it, but the support definitely exists, so it's now not a technical problem but a distribution policy issue, and isn't at all a matter of using proprietary software, which is neither necessary nor particularly helpful.

There are certain vague caveats: there are some theoretical issues with valid patents related to MP3. But the holder doesn't seem to want to cause problems, unlike the holders of invalid patents on practically everything else. Getting the latest and best support for Windows Media files requires using a freely-available but proprietary codec as a plugin to the player program.

The actual issue, so far as I can tell, is that people conflate the iTunes Music Store with iPods, and so they ask ESR about iPods (which are easy) when they mean to ask about the iTunes Music Store (which is difficult).

Re:2003 is on the phone for ESR

[westlake]

I'm not sure how easy distributions make it.

This strips everything you've said before of any real meaning.

there are some theoretical issues with valid patents related to MP3

Home users are not system builders. OEMS and big-box retail will not touch a gray or black market codec. End of story.

people conflate the iTunes Music Store with iPods

This will only get worse if ITunes expands to include rental and subscription services. Welcome to the world of one-stop shopping and the online media mall for Windows and the Mac.

Re:2003 is on the phone for ESR

[Anonymous Coward]

He's absolutely right that, in order to stay relevant, Linux will have to be able to work with iPods, MP3s, and Windows Media. It's a good thing that it works with all of these, and has for a long time.

Great news. Please point me to the free distributions that provide support for all of these things out of the box.

I'm not sure how easy distributions make it

Oops. I responded too soon. Apparently, you were just talking out of your ass.

Re:2003 is on the phone for ESR

[SanityInAnarchy]

OEMS and big-box retail will not touch a gray or black market codec. End of story.

What, just like that?

Where's the solution?

Re:2003 is on the phone for ESR

[iabervon]

Gentoo. Except, of course, that Gentoo doesn't come in boxes, and you have to know which things to ask for.

Re:2003 is on the phone for ESR

[iabervon]

If he were addressing the policy groups for distributions, how difficult it is to get these things working would be a relevant issue. But he was addressing "the community", which is generally interpreted as the development community, which has solved all these problems ages ago. (And I'm just not a good judge of how difficult it is to do things with systems other than a few obscure ones I use; as far as I can tell, it's practically impossible to do anything with Windows, for example, but other people seem to manage it on occasion. It may be just as easy to get all of these things working with Fedora as with Gentoo, and I'd have no idea.)

There's an open-source, patent licensed MP3 codec. Now the patent license doesn't extend to modified versions, but OEMs and retail stores aren't going to modify the codec anyway.

He's trying to solve the problem the wrong way....

[Theovon]

Compromising what makes Linux Linux is not a compromise at all. It's taking the very thing that makes it great and throwing it completely out of the window. Maybe not right away, but there's that slippery slope. Eventually, Linux would make itself irrelevant.

In my opinion, the real solution is for us to start designing our own hardware.

www.opencores.org is a repository of open source hardware designs.
www.opencollector.org is another.
The Open Graphics Project is about to release real open hardware. They're focusing on graphics right now, but they have aspirations toward other kinds of hardware.

Rather than giving up control of the software just to get the hardware, take control of the hardware!

(BTW, I'm much less concerned about proprietary apps than closed-source drivers. Drivers are a major source of potential system instability. They need to be open source. Applications are isolated to their own process spaces and can't crash the system when they crash. I think a closed-source iTunes for Linux would be wonderful!)

Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[Prototerm]

The problem Eric Raymond is running up against is the cold reality of a shifting market share. Once upon a time, the Gnu/Linux community was composed mainly of programmers, system administrators, hackers, and the like. In other words, people capable of adapting to the learning curve of a Unix-like system. Now, however, an increasing number of people are interested in it who do not have those skills, or who feel that those skills should not be necessary to operate a computer.

If you cringed while reading that last sentence, if you felt a burst of bile rise up into your throat, then you're gonna *love* the future, because more and more people who feel precisely that way are joining the ranks of the Penguin every day. As the article says, "This group is more interested in having Linux 'just work' ... and 'don't care about our notions of doctrinal purity'". There will continue to be friction between the Old Guard and the N00bs, as more and more people abandon the Redmond Upgrade treadmill, until Gnu/Linux either fades into obscurity, collapses into chaos, or a compromise is found that's satisfactory to both groups. In a way, FOSS is becoming a victim of its own success, although that success has not been the sort Raymond and others had hoped. Somehow, it will have to find a way to adapt.

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[Ant P.]

"Both" groups? If someone comes to me expecting free 24/7 Linux support all the time I can just tell them to get a Mac.

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[stony3k]

Frankly there are multiple Linux distros that "just work", and even provide iPod support out of the box. There is absolutely no need to compromise on our ideals any longer. What I do feel needs to happen is that new users need to be guided to the simpler and easier distros instead of the distros that hardcode Linux fans use. The problem is that when most of us are asked about which distro a person should run, we tend to recommend what's good for us, instead of what would be good for the user. This needs to be changed.

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[ardor]

Define "Just Work".

WPA is still a nightmare (even in Ubuntu). It is not trivial to install nvidia/ati drivers (especially ati), which are essential for useful 3D acceleration. The whole access rights stuff is hard to grasp at first (ESPECIALLY with Samba, which is also horrible to configure BTW). GUIs are not as responsive as in OSX or Windows (I suspect the font rendering to play a large role in this). Configuring X is *still* awful (and necessary for setting trivial stuff like the physical screen size for correct DPI).
As long as your hardware is recognized, the driver issue is non-existant (especially Ubuntu has a wonderful autoconfiguration). But once something does not work well (even the tiniest bit), you better spend months learning everything about Linux.

Oh, and the terminal should not be necessary for configuring *anything* for a desktop. Not samba (for sharing), not wpa_supplicant, not xorg.conf, .... stuff like Apache is another thing entirely - one does not expect Joe Average to use Apache, but Joe might be interested in encrypted WLAN (and WEP is crap).

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[stony3k]

All of what you say is true and we should be working on fixing them. But I wonder why a "Joe Sixpack" user would need to configure X and whether they would even need to know about Samba or xorg. I would argue that if they are able to start up the computer at home and it work responsively and most importantly enables them to do their work (mostly just using a browser, writing docs, listening to music, etc), they will be happy.

Some parts of this are already there, some others need to be improved (like performance) or are not ideal because of DMCA (like music/movies). But I don't think we're that far off - and definitely do not think that we should start supporting proprietary software, even in the short term. If people didn't have an itch to scratch, many of the cool open source software would not have been written.

As for not needing a terminal for *anything*, I think that most of the simpler configurations should be manageable using GUIs, but when you really need to handle that corner case, nothing beats a terminal. A GUI that can handle all possible configurations ends up being ugly and too complicated (and this is very true in the Linux world). You do need to have a GUI that can handle everyday situations, and let the esoteric configurations be handled by a terminal.

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[smash]

WPA is still a nightmare (even in Ubuntu). It is not trivial to install nvidia/ati drivers (especially ati), which are essential for useful 3D acceleration.

Funny, all I had to do was fire up synaptic and search for nvidia, then tick the packages, and reboot.

Easier than having to search for a driver page on the web with Windows, download, run setup, etc.

Used to be an issue, it's not any more.

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[Anonymous Coward]

Configuration of X is required sometimes. I've had to do it twice on my system - once on the first install, because it refused to recognise that my monitor supported 1280x1024, and set the maximum as 1024x768, requiring me to edit the configuration file directly. The second time was when I purchased a new widescreen monitor - it detected everything automatically, but the point is I had to rerun the config program (or edit the configuration file myself, which I really should never be required to do).

Configuration of the x server is probably the worst aspect of a Linux system these days. Most other stuff is fine and just works.

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[ardor]

"But I wonder why a "Joe Sixpack" user would need to configure X and whether they would even need to know about Samba or xorg."

As an AP mentioned before, xorg.conf HAS to be touched at times because of unsuccessfull autoconfiguration (and changed hardware, like a new video card). As for smb.conf: it IS in Joe's range to share one of his folders so his buddies can watch the photos he made. Unfortunately, this means digging through HOWTOs and smb.conf.

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[BiggerIsBetter]

Once, I would have agreed.

But damn if I didn't have major headaches with my laptop. It came with an Intel 945 chipset which is supported... if you get the 1.6 Xorg driver with Xorg 7.1, and compile appropriate kernel modules. And it's slow. So I upgraded to ATI, which I couldn't for the life of me get working properly on Gentoo despite glxinfo claiming to be doing DRI (probably some oddball library problem). So I loaded up SLED 10, got the ATI driver after registering, and found the distro didn't recognise the X1400 card out of the box... ok, it does work with XGL, so I'm pretty stoked, but ACPI on this machine isn't quite right, so powersave doesn't know about all the switch points or fan control... so it runs very hot (but quietly... :-/).

And I'm a geek who's been using Linux since '98 or so. Hell, I've written kernel drivers and contributed software, but *still* I had huge headaches getting the 3D video working right - and ACPI still doesn't.

Re:Not Just The Under 30 Crowd

[smash]

If you're running gentoo and complaining about ease of use, you're seriously misguided.

Granted, Linux isn't perfect for ACPI, etc but then again, neither is windows.

Pah... easy

[Chaffar]

Raymond warned that Linux risks getting locked out of new hardware platforms for the next 30 years unless it proves it can work with iPods, MP3s and WMP.

Easy one... just install gtkpod for the first, XMMS/Amarok for the second, and shoot yourself if you still need the third :)

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[MindStalker]

Mentioning patents this really all doesn't make very much sense. ESR is advocating the newest GPL which has some serious impedments when it comes to patents, but THEN recommends using closed source for these devices. Doesn't he realize the contradition.

ESR is not associated with Free Software movement.

[jbn-o]

ESR, Eric S. Raymond, is not associated with "FOSS". FOSS is a term used when one wants to give credit to both the Free Software and Open Source movements without favoring either. ESR is a proponent of the Open Source movement and one of the people who started the Open Source Initiative over a decade after the GNU Project and the Free Software movement had been going.

The Free Software movement advocates exclusively for free software because only free software respects users software freedoms (the freedoms to run, inspect, share, and modify software). The Free Software movement examines these issues in terms of ethics, speaks to all computer users, and takes a far broader view than the Open Source movement which never discusses user's freedoms and examines these issues in terms of a developmental process that is chiefly aimed at businesses.

The OSI has given a remarkably disrespectful view of the differences between the two movements, reducing the difference to "ideological tub-thumping" in their FAQ. The Free Software Foundation has a far more informative and respectful view in an essay on the differences between the two movements.

To keep with the Animal Farm references

[guabah]

Raymond is ALWAYS right.

Eric seems to have forgotten something...

[3seas]

... and that is Free Software, open source software is a result of consumer choice. And that not all consumers are programmimng ignorant. And that programming languages have only to get better, easier to use (a matter of developer market drive.)

The thing about FOSS is that it's not one company or even a collective of companies that have rules to follow where if you don't you get kicked out, but that it is individuals who only have their own rules to follow or break.

The only rule is to not use, or at least do not distribute Proporiety Software code, unless permission is given.
But this doesn't stop finding other ways too do things. And its findiong other ways to do things that can be motivational to the programming wise consumers.

Its never really been about this license vs. that license, but rather about human choice, consumer choice.
Its wrong to assume all consumers here are programming ignorant.

Re:Eric seems to have forgotten something...

[Tony]

Its never really been about this license vs. that license, but rather about human choice, consumer choice.

Ah! So it *is* about the license. Some licenses are designed to protect choice. Others are designed to remove them.

Choose wisely.

Re:Eric seems to have forgotten something...

[3seas]

consumer choice involves a lot more than an attached license. And I'd imagine that for each his own.

For example, a consumer might chose FOSS because updates and upgrades are generally free, or they might chose foss because of its wonderful packaging and distrubution. Or maybe they program as a hobby and want to particape in helping, or some combination of these and more.

In this case the license does what more than to simply accomodate the legal industry.

There was free and open source software before Bill Gates yelled "piracy", before the GPL was conceived, etc..
Do not confuse the trees human placed ornaments with the trunk and roots and limbs of the tree.

The ability to copmprehend abstractions at such a level to allow "programming" is a human unique characteristic. Its our right and duty to build upon what those before us have done. Otherwise we'd be nothing more than any other mammal. We hav been more long before there was even conceived proprietary software.

Brilliant

[Anonymous Coward]

Post the exact same URL as before but this time with an even more controversial title!

I didn't get the article

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not entirely sure I understand the article, or your comments. Do the companies think that software for linux must be given away for free, or that there is only a tiny market willing to pay $500-$2000 for Linux softare? Are they worried that people are going to rip them off, or do they not want to compete with F/OSS software that has similar features at no cost? There are many companies that distribute precompiled versions of their Windows/Mac packakges for Linux. In some markets it makes sense - for other markets, it may not.

A large part of the reason I run Linux is indeed that it is free in the monetary sense of the word. Almost every good Mac utility (especially in the OS9 days), and many good Windows utilities are shareware or pay software. Most Linux utilities are free/OSS. There's nothing wrong with one or the other, but if I have a choice, I am going to go for the free software. Does that make me "cheap"? Probably, but as a graduate student who doesn't have a big pot of extra money lying around, I'd treat that as a compliment.

I certainly wouldn't expect any given program to be free. I'd expect to pay Wolfram Software for Mathematica, or Autodesk for Autocad, etc. But I do expect software to be free in the sense that I could write an alternative and distribute it for free. As things currently stand, I don't know of a single good F/OSS CAD package for Linux. But, if I wrote one, I would expect that noone could prevent me from giving it away for free. Then, there would be a choice - my package (free, but possibly lacking in features) against a commercial package (expensive, but probably full-featured). I don't expect to dictate terms to other people any more than they try to dictate terms to me. The problem is, the current trend towards software patents and closed specifications and binary-only drivers does try to dictate how I distribute what I do on my own. I should have every right to make a free package that competes with a closed-source package. Is that what companies are afraid of? Competition?

I particularly don't understand the use of iPods, MP3 players, or WMP as examples in this article. MP3 players generally show up like any other mass storage device; you plug the player in, copy files over, and you're done. I don't have an iPod, but I thought it was just as simple. WMP is a bit more complicated; all the linux players I know use the binary Windows drivers in a simulated environment. I don't think there's any native support for the newest codecs, because they're too cryptic to reverse engineer. But programs like mplayer already seem to have made that compromise; I'm not sure what it has to do with the linux kernel. Other companies (eg. Real) have binary-only players that run on linux - nothing stops Microsoft from porting WMP, if they wanted to. The best thing for linux in terms of media codecs would be wider adoption of a good OSS codec & format. It would be great if the current mess of Quicktime/WMP/Realplayer/newer-WMP-that-won't-play -until-you-update-your-codecs went away, and everyone used something that had F/OSS support on any platform. But the point is, neither Microsoft nor Apple have any incentive to support linux. On the contrary, they have incentives to use their control over media formats to benefit their own operating systems.

Win the Corporate World First

[Snap E Tom]

Linux has a better chance of winning the Desktop Wars on the Corporate Battlegrounds, and for that, it doesn't need integration with MP3 players, camcorders, etc. For that, it needs to keep coming out with better and well-marketed administrator management tools. There are a huge number of users who use Windows just because it's what they're used to at work. Put a Linux workstation in every cubicle first. A lot of home users will follow.

Re:Win the Corporate World First

[Anonymous Coward]

I was just at FOSSSL in Sri Lanka, and the word there is that piracy by home users is not prosecuted so that corporations have a ready pool of people familiar with proprietary software. They believe that home use drives corporate use.

Re:Win the Corporate World First

[Maelwryth]

"Linux has a better chance of winning the Desktop Wars on the Corporate Battlegrounds..."
Although I can see the truth in this, it's a little bit depressing. I can imagine a future where FOSS is used in the corporate world and home users are still stuck with having to use Windows/Mac because the entertainment industry has successfully locked FOSS out. It would be sad to see all the efforts of the FOSS community culminating in a better bottom line for the business world.

Will work with my iPod?

[McGregorMortis]

That's the wrong question. People should be asking Apple, "Will it work with Linux?"

Re:Will work with my iPod?

[Registered Coward v2]

That's the wrong question. People should be asking Apple, "Will it work with Linux?"

Actually, no. ESR has a very valid point - when you are a tiny blip on the radar screen you have to make yourself work with the mainstream, not vice versa; unless you forever want to be a footnote in the industry. Being compatible with key mainstream stuff like iPods (really compatible where you can go seamlessly from one OS to another and have it work out of the box as easily as the mainstream apps (not just be able to kludge together some part time solution), means people don't have to chose between their iPods and your OS.

Most movements eventually breakdown along two lines - those that want to compromise to achieve goals and those who view any compromise as a sellout and would rather see their movement marginalized (but pure) than actually accomplish something.

In the end, users just want stuff that works well and requires minimal if any intervention to add new peripherals or programs; they aren't interested in, no worried about, whether their OS is free, proprietary, or has the same name as a horrible science fiction movie.

Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popularity

[jbn-o]

[...] in order for FOSS to win-out, it may need some non-FOSS code in the short term. That's always been the case.

To win what, exactly—popularity? For free software advocates popularity is not a goal. Freedom is a goal, a goal that is not achieved by installing non-free software on one's computer.

Even in the essay discussing the LGPL (formerly known as the "Library GPL" now known as the "Lesser GPL") one can see the FSF making this point:

Proprietary software developers, seeking to deny the free competition an important advantage, will try to convince authors not to contribute libraries to the GPL-covered collection. For example, they may appeal to the ego, promising "more users for this library" if we let them use the code in proprietary software products. Popularity is tempting, and it is easy for a library developer to rationalize the idea that boosting the popularity of that one library is what the community needs above all.

But we should not listen to these temptations, because we can achieve much more if we stand together. We free software developers should support one another. By releasing libraries that are limited to free software only, we can help each other's free software packages outdo the proprietary alternatives. The whole free software movement will have more popularity, because free software as a whole will stack up better against the competition.

Not quite, but still ESR says worrisome things

[dido]

ESR, as much as I have my misgivings about him, didn't quite say that proprietary software was a "good thing". All he said was that in today's changing landscape of computing, GNU/Linux risks being left behind if it cannot achieve a compromise with proprietary software and systems. In other words, far from saying that proprietary software is a good thing, he is saying that compromise with proprietary software is a necessary evil in ensuring that GNU/Linux does not become irrelevant. A valid point, but I must ask ESR how far he is willing to take compromise. His mention of iPods and the like seems to indicate that he's willing to go far enough as to compromise on the issue of DRM, which remains a deeply contentious issue for the entire Free Software/Open Source community. I for one believe that compromising on the issue of DRM to the level required by the media conglomerates would mean that the Free Software/Open Source community will become shackled and closed, no different from the proprietary software systems that F/OSS has been so touted as an alternative. Compromise is a very dangerous game... Frankly, I don't believe that F/OSS should be playing to the twenty-something-iPod generation demographic if the goal really is to dominate the desktop. What we need to do is convince the corporate IT procurement departments that GNU/Linux is a viable alternative to Windows. That's how the IBM PC became the de facto standard. If GNU/Linux can own the corporate desktop, owning the home desktop will be a lot easier. Using different systems at home and at work is extremely painful, and once more businesses start using GNU/Linux workstations, this will drive GNU/Linux home desktops.

pulling your FUD PUD

[rubycodez]

Of course there are open source projects that have paid tech support available. There are companies that support the major pieces most business/government Linux users use, like Apache, Tomcat, Postgresql, MySQL, OpenOffice. There will be more and more of that available as Linux share increases worldwide, regardless of what the U.S.A. does. The money in software isn't in selling the product, its service and support. if any proprietary product in wide use by business were to go open source tomorrow, but factor the purchase price into support and service, customers would still pay.

Re:pulling your FUD PUD

[crossmr]

and while a few major ones have support, there are thousands of open source projects out there. Those don't all have support. If I drop $50 for a game from EA Games, I have several avenues of support open to me for the product. I can call them or e-mail them (or use an online tech support form whichever they have). I couldn't download and expect any kind of personal support, I'd be relegated to the forums. You can always find an exception to the rule, but as a general rule when it comes to FOSS software, you're saving a little money in exchange for time when you have issues.

Some people can do that, some can't, it all depends on your situation. For the general user the FOSS playground has a different feel to it than the commercial one, and attracting people (en masse) to it will often require making them comfortable.

Can't wait for Theo's response

[sbranden]

The OpenBSD crowd are going to enjoy this. Nothing like seeing opensource evangelists selling out.

Re:Can't wait for Theo's response

[Anonymous Coward]

He won't even notice, sadly. While I use OpenBSD every day, I have to keep around a Windows PC to handle the other stuff. PDF files, Flash, Windows Media, etc. all are either a pain to get working or JustNotThere(TM).

What I really wish is the companies would take notice that Linux/*BSD dollars are just as green and sell to those markets.

Re:Can't wait for Theo's response

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you serious? Those are some very minor "problems", and best of all, they're quite easily solved!

What you need to do is install KDE. KPDF will handle all of your PDF files, and it's a far nicer tool to use than Acrobat Reader. Konqueror on OpenBSD supports the Linux Flash plugin via its Linux emulation layer. Amarok, combined with the audio and video codecs from mplayer, will likely play all of your media files.

If you haven't used KDE in a while, if ever, you really do need to give it a try. It provides all the features that you would expect from a Windows XP desktop, with the stability and speed commonly associated with quality UNIX software.

"Open Source" is not clearer than "Free Software"

[jbn-o]

That's why the phrase "open-source" was developed. Unless you are Richard Stallman, you don't want to have to write long articles explaining what you mean by free.

So instead, we have confusion over what "open source" means. That term is no more clear and comes with its own long essay on what the term means (a 10-part definition, last I looked, which is longer than the definition of free software). At least with the FSF you get respectful descriptions of how things are complete with references and quotes to back up the claims. The OSI is far more disdainful and less professional in its description of the difference between the free software and open source movements. From the essay describing the difference between the two movements: (emphasis mine)

The official definition of ``open source software,'' as published by the Open Source Initiative, is very close to our definition of free software; however, it is a little looser in some respects, and they have accepted a few licenses that we consider unacceptably restrictive of the users. However, the obvious meaning for the expression ``open source software'' is ``You can look at the source code.'' This is a much weaker criterion than free software; it includes free software, but also includes semi-free programs such as Xv, and even some proprietary programs, including Qt under its original license (before the QPL).

That obvious meaning for ``open source'' is not the meaning that its advocates intend. The result is that most people misunderstand what those advocates are advocating. Here is how writer Neal Stephenson defined ``open source'':

Linux is ``open source'' software meaning, simply, that anyone can get copies of its source code files.

I don't think he deliberately sought to reject or dispute the ``official'' definition. I think he simply applied the conventions of the English language to come up with a meaning for the term. The state of Kansas published a similar definition:

Make use of open-source software (OSS). OSS is software for which the source code is freely and publicly available, though the specific licensing agreements vary as to what one is allowed to do with that code.

Of course, the open source people have tried to deal with this by publishing a precise definition for the term, just as we have done for ``free software.''

But the explanation for ``free software'' is simple--a person who has grasped the idea of ``free speech, not free beer'' will not get it wrong again. There is no such succinct way to explain the official meaning of ``open source'' and show clearly why the natural definition is the wrong one.

Free and non-free don't treat users the same way.

[jbn-o]

Such a simplistic view purposefully rejects the effect on the user; which is precisely why we should discuss and pursue user's freedoms to run, inspect, share, and modify published software.

Spot on!

[Anonymous Coward]

- quite insightful... and yes, it's 2006: geeks are no longer needed and are more of a social embarrassment than technically useful - and this applies doubly to Linux geeks...

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[byolinux]

Totally. I'm never entirely sure how ESR got to where he is... he wrote a few utilities and a book or two, but short of maintaining the Jargon file, it's hard to see what he did on a day to day basis that allowed him to be quite so prevelant.

Anyway, I think we should buy him an iPod.

Freedom is not "choice".

[jbn-o]

No, the definition of freedom is not choice.

Choice can be a scam that can railroad you out of something more important, such as your software freedom.

For some time, web users who wanted a (then) modern GUI web browser had Microsoft Internet Explorer, Opera, and Netscape Navigator to choose from. You only need two alternatives to have "choice" but here one had three to pick from.

None of these choices respect a user's software freedom because all of those programs are proprietary.

Re:Freedom is not "choice".

[adrianmonk]

No, the definition of freedom is not choice.

I would argue that, while "choice" is not a good definition of "freedom", it could be one of its meanings. The best definition I can give for "freedom" is "lack of restrictions" or "lack of a specific restriction". Consider the following different senses of "free":

• freehand -- this means drawn without the aid of a stencil, ruler, compass, etc.; the various aids for drawing straight lines or whatever are what it's free from
• free love -- this means sex without the restriction of a romantic relationship; the "strings attached" are what it's free from
• free oxygen -- oxygen that is not part of a molecule (even a diatomic one), which is the normal stable state of oxygen, usually; the chemical bond is what the oxygen atom is free of
• free jazz -- a style of jazz where rules of harmony and rhythm can be ignored, or where a harmonic/melodic/rhythmic structure may not even exist in a particular case; the regular musical structure is what the performance is free of (to a greater or lesser degree)
• free verse -- a form of poetry that does not necessary have rhymes or follow a meter; the regular rules of poetry is what free verse is free from
• free man -- a man who has been found not guilty of a crime or who has served his sentence; the legal requirement to serve a sentence is what the man is free of
• freedman -- (in the US) a person who is no longer a slave; the legal status of being a slave is what he is free from

I could go on, but hopefully a pattern is emerging. In each of these cases, there is a different thing that the person or thing is free from. So what is my point? Freedom doesn't mean just one thing. It could mean several different things.

And why am I bringing this up, and why is it relevant? Because it's possible to have one kind of freedom but not another, all at the same time. For example, a person who just traded his 15-year-old Porsche in for a new Toyota Corolla is probably now free of expensive repairs, but he is not free to effortlessly go 100 mph. John Madden (a US football announcer who rides a train or a bus instead of flying) is free of the worry that he might be in a plane crash, but he can't travel as freely as those who do make the choice to take a plane, because it requires more time and planning for him to get somewhere.

In fact, in may cases, it's impossible to have total freedom. You often trade one kind of freedom for another. That's why I think "software freedom", by itself and without any other context or clarification, is a nearly meaningless term. If you want to talk about freedom, in most cases you have to say what you're free to do, or what you're free from.

I am only talking about terminology here and not trying to say proprietary software is good or bad, but you could make a reasonable argument that because a Cathedral approach allows the vendor lots of control, they can make things work together all that much better (whether they are too lazy or incompetent to do this is not the issue). A lot of users find that the endless tweaking that you can wind up doing when you start mixing and matching things from different sources is a kind of lack of freedom itself. By going with a monolithic approach where everything comes from one party, in a sense you have a kind of freedom from having to tweak things. To some, that's more valuable than other kinds of freedom. But again, my point isn't the value of it. My point is, it is a kind of freedom, so it would be a valid definition of "software freedom".

Now, it may not be the kind of software freedom you think is best for everybody. Maybe non-prorietary freedom is more important to you than free-from-having-to-tweak freedom. But in that case, one ought to say, "freedom from proprietary software is the most important kind of software freedom to me" or something rather than "th

Re:Freedom is not "choice".

[Anonymous Coward]

if nobody is forcing your choices, that is freedom. freedom does not create new choices. it just removes the coerced ones.

Re:Freedom is not "choice".

[Brandybuck]

The best definition I can give for "freedom" is "lack of restrictions" or "lack of a specific restriction".

That is exactly the definition of freedom. The fewer the restrictions the greater the freedom. This is why proprietary software can be freer than copyleft encumbered software in some circumstances. Even the LGPL can turn out to be quite restrictive if you need to statically link your non-GPL app for an embedded system.

Can't win that way

[Tony]

Giving up your freedoms is not winning, whether it's some ill-defined "war on terror," or getting Linux to a larger audience.

Why should *we* become what *they* want? If Linux is good for them, they will use it. If not, they won't. Big humongous liver-flavored deal. I don't care if businesses adopt Linux or not. I just care that I have the freedom to use Linux on hardware I purchase, and have the freedom to work on the software I want without danger of a slap-happy patent lawsuit.

If we go down the path of sacrificing principles, we are likely to lose those freedoms.

Re:Free and non-free don't treat users the same wa

[RingDev]

And we must also discuss and pursue the developers freedom to keep private, protect, and profit from published software.

-Rick

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Anonymous Coward]

it's hard to see what he did on a day to day basis that allowed him to be quite so prevelant.

He talks a lot.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[kripkenstein]

We CAN'T write and distribute Free Software for most of that stuff because of patents.

We can't write free software - but we can get multimedia stuff to work, if we pay for the license to do so. You can get your DVDs to work 'out-of-the-box' on Linux - just use Linspire. People who believe in the ideals behind Free Software won't (including me), but for those that are worried about 'losing the desktop', options are available.

If this was the thing holding Linux back from being a massive success, Linspire would be selling millions of copies. That they aren't says something.

(Note: I wish Linspire all the luck in the world, even though I don't use their product.)

Followers vs Leaders

[argoff]

Sometimes a group of individuals will take an initiative, start to move in a direction - and then someone will run to the front of the crowd and say that he is leading them when he really isn't. This is the case with ESR. Even though he looks like a leader because he is always out in front giving direction, the truth is that he is a follower and it shows because the future is not about ipods, or embeded devices, or 64 bit platforms, but about freedom and liberty in the information age. If you have the freedom, then all the rest of the stuff will eventually follow. If you don't have the freedom, then the other stuff really doesn't matter much.

Notice how linux took off inspite of not being "enterprise UNIX" like SCO, or "for the data center" like Sun, or "pro corporate commecrial software" like Microsoft. This is because contrary to popular belief, (ESR and) the corporate world does not lead, but follows. And who do they follow: individuals exercising their liberty to act in their own best interest. And how do you guarantee liberty in the information age, by having the minimal amount of restrictions on what people can copy by not using proprietary software whenever possible.

Re:Followers vs Leaders

[bladesjester]

You're off on why Linux took off. Linux took off because it let the sysadmins and programmers that were used to using unix at work to use something like it at home without having to shell out thousands and thousands of dollars for the hardware and software necessary to do so.

After that, they just started making it more and more like the unix systems that they used at work and eventually it became an enterprise useable system (for the most part).

It was a hobby project (Linus admits that himself) that people thought was neat, so they kept tacking things onto it. They didn't do it because it was "Free". They did it because it was sort of kind of like what they were used to using, so they took steps to make it more like the commercial programs that they were using.

The license allowed them to do it, but it was not the driving motivation. If it wasn't for the fact that people thought the project itself was neat or useful, it would never have gotten anywhere at all.

Re:Followers vs Leaders

[NotZed]

Well, it also took off because of GNU - without GNU Linux isn't usable.

And unlike Linux, GNU was never 'just a hobby'.

Stop trying to rewrite history, ESR does it enough as it is, but for some reason people listen to the nut.

Re:Followers vs Leaders

[argoff]

Agreed, what he also forgot to mention is how growth in Linux exploded while growth in FreeBSD didn't. That had everything in the world to do with the fact that people who made a fork of Linux couldn't sue people who coppied it, but people who made a closed fork of FreeBSD could.

Re:Followers vs Leaders

[bladesjester]

Have you ever actually read the BSD license? You can do practically anything with BSD licensed code that you want.

Actually, the main reason Linux took off as opposed to BSD is that Linux was developed to run on cheap x86 hardware and, due to legal issues with AT&T, BSD wasn't able to move to that platform until after 1994 (3 years after the beginning of Linux). Before then, BSD was basically restricted to PDP and VAX.

quothe the wiki
"The lawsuit slowed development of the free-software descendants of BSD for nearly two years while their legal status was in question, and as a result systems based on the Linux kernel, which did not have such legal ambiguity, gained greater support. Linux and 386BSD began development at about the same time, and Linus Torvalds has said that if there had been a free Unix-like operating system on the 386 at the time, he likely would not have created Linux. Although it is debatable exactly what effect that would have had on the software landscape since, there is little doubt that it would have been substantial."

Re:Free and non-free don't treat users the same wa

[westlake]

Such a simplistic view purposefully rejects the effect on the user; which is precisely why we should discuss and pursue user's freedoms to run, inspect, share, and modify published software.

"Inspect and modify" has meaning only if you are a programmer or can employ a programmer. That excludes the home market and huge chunks of other markets.

Mod This Parent Up !!!

[viewtouch]

Hear! Hear!

Mod This Parent Up !!

We all use the GNU compiler, GNU tools & the vast body of GNU software. Who is using the OSI compiler, OSI tools and the vast body of OSI software? Nobody - because it doesn't exist. Next time they ask you the difference between what the Free Software Foundation does and what the Open Source Initiative does, mention that.

It takes more than a catchy phrase to cause a revolution - it takes a lifelong dedication to writing the software to launch and to perpetuate a revolution - and that would be GNU.

Re:Mod This Parent Up !!!

[j-pimp]

We all use the GNU compiler, GNU tools & the vast body of GNU software. Who is using the OSI compiler, OSI tools and the vast body of OSI software? Nobody - because it doesn't exist. Next time they ask you the difference between what the Free Software Foundation does and what the Open Source Initiative does, mention that.

You have to look at time and circumstances though. There was a need for RMS to build a whole open source system from scratch. When ESR wrote "The Cathedral and the Bazzar," there were GNU/Linux distros already out there. These days the GNU foundation does alot of advocacy. Most of the user land utilities are pretty stable. The compiler, glibc, classpath and such are actively developed. However, all of those would continue if the FSF were to fold. The FSF is not comissioning any new large scale undertakings at the moment. It does however, accept copyright for open source projects and provides advocacy and legal aide. The OSI, on the other hand, was born in the midst of a world of Free Software. It's purpose was to question some of the ideals of Free Software, develop its own, more business oriented ones, and advocate them. Would it be benificial if the OSI started sponsering some open source projects? I think so. I've personally given to the FSF, and never to the OSI, and my beliefs are more in line with the OSI. This is partially due to GCC and such. I outright disagree with software as a basic human right. However, with what the FSF advocates, and the state of the world today, I'm not worried about closed source software being outlawed any time soon.

Re:Mod This Parent Up !!!

[Jack Action]

The FSF is not comissioning any new large scale undertakings at the moment.

This is just blatantly wrong.

What do you call Gnu Flash? Other projects FSF is directing include Free Bios and an open 3D Card driver. More projects are listed here. Just like gcc was needed in the 80s, these are the utilities users need now.

At the risk of being modded for flame bait, I'll also point out that it seems most criticisms of the FSF are based on plain ignorance.

Re:Mod This Parent Up !!!

[sedyn]

Agreed, I was going to argue something similar and then read your entry and decided not to re-invent the wheel. (Ironic, given your argument).
When it comes to the GCC, a need was filled long before the OSI existed. Thus, not as much interest in re-inventing the wheel.

If the GP really believes that a player who is first to market, is dedicated/committed, and creates/exploits network effects is in the right, then viva the closed source revolutionaries!

Yes, they can be granted the title of being in the right place at the right time. And if they do something positive in that place should be praised for it, but to be considered universally in the right for achievements that mainly took place in the past isn't a good thing.

In my mind, the FSF has burned a lot of good will that they have earned through their work on GNU. Yet I will not ignore either "contribution".

Re:Mod This Parent Up !!!

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you call Gnu Flash?

An abomination?

Re:Mod This Parent Up !!!

[Anonymous Coward]

gnu flash was funded by the Public Software Fund, not the FSF.
FSF is mere serving to hold the copyright.

Re:Mod This Parent Up !!!

[julesh]

We all use the GNU compiler, GNU tools & the vast body of GNU software. Who is using the OSI compiler, OSI tools and the vast body of OSI software? Nobody - because it doesn't exist.

That's because the two projects have fundamentally different goals: GNU exists to create a free replacement for Unix. The OSI exists to promote the use of existing FOSS software, with emphasis on use in business enviornments. I'd say we'd need both to cause the revolution you're talking about.

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[squiggleslash]

You're taking the views of the FSF beyond what they actually are saying - note, for example, that glibc remains LGPL'd, the base libraries for GNOME are also LGPL'd - and you're also ignoring network effects.

The issue isn't being "popular", it's being widely used enough to be relevent. Without relevence, the rug can be pulled from underneath you simply by the introduction of a market where everything software has to interact with is proprietary, be it the formats of content or the hardware it runs upon. We've been running perilously close to the former for many decades, and the tide is turning in our favour where it's turning in our favour only because there's a substantial body of Free Software and of Free Software users. Hardware has been hit and miss for years, the increased complexity of the type of hardware we deal with day to day is making ordinary black-box reverse engineering efforts more and more difficult.

Is Freedom Freedom if you have to practice it in a cage?

So, allowing proprietary drivers iPod support?

[osgeek]

I'm not following the logic there. Apple isn't keeping iTunes/iPod support off of Linux because of open vs closed driver support issues. Apple could make a package that would install on Linux and talk to your iPod without that. It could sit right next to the Windows download for iTunes, or they could even include it on the CD that comes with your iPod.

Apple doesn't do such a thing because the Linux desktop market is too small to merit the effort of doing so. Even if the Linux desktop market were quite a bit larger, Apple still would probably resist because they don't want to lend support to a rival desktop environment. They only did it with Windows because that market is so gigantic that the revenue and dominance temptations for iPod outweighed the cost to their propietary OS and hardware platform.

Re:So, allowing proprietary drivers iPod support?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think that's the case at all - Apple isn't supporting Linux because there is no standard "Linux" to support. Do you take iTunes and make it for the Gnome desktop, or the KDE desktop? If you do one or the other, it still might work on all, but it becomes a nightmare to support. They'd just rather not open up that can of worms just yet.

Re:So, allowing proprietary drivers iPod support?

[osgeek]

Yeah, the fragmentation of the Linux desktop makes it worse, but even if Gnome and KDE were combined into one, it still wouldn't be interesting to Apple.

Re:So, allowing proprietary drivers iPod support?

[Relic of the Future]

Err, neither? Apple would want iTunes to look like iTunes, not like how you want your apps to be skinned, and they'll port all their own lower-level UI stuff, not use KDE's or Gnome's. You do know there are Linux users who don't run either, right?

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[CRCulver]

He wrote a few utilities and a book or two, but short of maintaining the Jargon file, it's hard to see what he did on a day to day basis that allowed him to be quite so prevelant.

ESR's essay The Cathedral and the Bazaar inspired Netscape to open-source its browser code, which resulted in the Mozilla browser and Gecko, one of the best browser engines around. Netscape's decision in turn paved the way for open-source ventures from a number of hitherto opaque corporations. That "book or two" got quite a ball rolling. That's why ESR is so respected today.

Acronyms vs Initials

[emag]

Why would the esser, the esurb, the naahcpuh, and ozdin not be acronyms?

Re:ESR is an asshole!

[kripkenstein]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_S._Raymond

In particular read the blog entries linked to by the Wikipedia article.

He may be a great programmer, but his knowledge of the human sciences is somewhat lacking (e.g. he seems not to know the tricky aspects of 'heritability', which lead him to faulty conclusions about race and IQ).

64-bit OSs overrated, overhyped, ...

[AHumbleOpinion]

His belief is predicated upon the notion that the move to 64 bit computing means people are about to make choices about the next generation of operating systems.

Then this writing fails. 64-bit OSs as overrated and overhyped. The move from 16- to 32-bit was dramatic. A lot of people, including those around here, seem to naively believe the move from 32- to 64-bit will be a similar event. It will not. 64-bit will be meaningful for some servers and some other high end applications, for the rest there will be no appreciable immediate benefit. *IF* Joe User gets all excited about 64-bit in the near term it will probably be due to a successful Micorosoft marketing campaign designed to artificially create an upgrade cycle. Barring this there will be a slow migration to 64-bit as Apple and Microsoft make the 64-bit versions of their OSs the default version, not an optional upgrade. In other words Joe User will get 64-bit when he happens to buy some distant new machine (4-5 years ?). The near term upgrades and build-to-order options will be a minority. I'll do it, I'm a programmer, I want my code to be 32/64-bit clean.

Re:64-bit OSs overrated, overhyped, ...

[R3d M3rcury]

If the move from 16 to 32-bit was dramatic, it was mostly because there were various different ways of trying to deal with getting more memory into a DOS/Windows-based computer. Remember the ol' expanded versus extended memory issues?

Joe User will not be excited about 64-bitness until (a) memory becomes cheap enough for him to have more than 4GB ($1300 for DDR2, last I looked) and (b) something Joe User really really wants to do requires him to have that much memory.

Re:64-bit OSs overrated, overhyped, ...

[AHumbleOpinion]

Under $100 for a 1G DDR2 stick at a local computerfair last week.

But that's hobbyists dinking with their own system. Dell upgrades a system from 1G to 2G for $130, 1G to 4G for $400. 1G seems standard on the higher end model, 512K on the lower end. Yeah, it will be a while before a generic box going out the door will have a 64-bit OS.

Re:64-bit OSs overrated, overhyped, ...

[Kazymyr]

512k? So Bill Gates was right!

Re:64-bit OSs overrated, overhyped, ...

[SanityInAnarchy]

This is so retarded.

As long as I can remember compiling my own kernel, there's been the option, on normal 32-bit Linux, to either not support high memory (and be limited to 896 megs of RAM), or support 4 gigs of RAM, or 64 gigs of RAM. I believe individual processes are limited to 4 gigs, though.

It's Windows that's been locked at 4 gigs total RAM, not the 32-bit arch, although I readily admit that 64-bit does it in a much cleaner way. But really, we should be upgrading to 64-bit for the obvious speed increases, at really no cost to us. It's a natural upgrade, and better to get it done sometime in the next 5 years than wait till applications really are hitting that 4 gig limit, or system RAM really is hitting the 64 gig limit.

Re:64-bit OSs overrated, overhyped, ...

[True Grit]

Joe User will not be excited about 64-bitness until

Depends on which *architecture* we're talking about. In the x86 world, going to 64 bits DOES mean more than just being able to access more memory (which AIUI is all there is to it on the other major platforms), AMD's AMD64 architecture (which Intel has basically copied as their EM64T so they would be compatible) doesn't simply extend the width of the existing registers, it DOUBLES the number of general-purpose AND math registers (from 8 of each to 16 of each), and they've done this without any significant slowdown in the system. In 64bit mode, an x86_64 CPU doesn't switch to 64 bitness by default for *everything*, it still assumes 32 bitness for some stuff (memory pointers of course have to be 64 bit, but immediate data for example remains 32 bit wide by default), and then uses a byte code prefix to an instruction to indicate it is using/referencing 64 bit wide data/registers. So a typical 64bit binary is only 15% to 25% larger than a 32bit binary (rather than the 50%+ as seen on other platforms that went from 32 to 64), and the loss in speed due to having to manage more bits is more than made up for by having more registers available to use.

So yes, if you just tell Joe User that he can access more memory, and he may just yawn, but tell him that the same applications he's using now will run *faster* (1) on the *same* (2) hardware when recompiled for 64 bit mode, and you'll probably get his full and undivided attention. Of course in the proprietary world of Windows, poor Joe will be expected to pay, possibly through the nose, to get those recompiled versions of software he already has, so it may not be worth it for him, but for Linux folk with access to the source code for most if not all of their system, switching to 64 bit mode is a no-brainer, and some of the distros out there have made it fairly painless to switch.

(1) How much faster of course depends on what the app does. For me the difference between 32 and 64 bit Linux was generally noticable but not dramatically so, but for people doing certain things, like audio/video encoding/decoding (which not only benefits from the extra general purpose registers, but is helped greatly by the extra SIMD math registers), the speed gains in 64 bit mode can be dramatic (150%-200%) on the same hardware.

(2) A lot of people who've bought a computer recently may very well have a 64 bit capable CPU under the hood, an AMD Athlon 64 or one of the EM64T-capable Intel chips, and not know it. Unlike other platforms with 32/64 variations, x86_64 CPUs can perfectly emulate a 32 bit x86 CPU, and will do so by default on power up, if not switched to 64 bit mode by a 64 bit capable OS. And unlike Intel's IA64 fiasco, x86_64 chips are not dramatically more expensive than their older cousins, and mobos for them are not significantly more expensive or complex either. The majority of mid-range and up chips being made by AMD and Intel now are 64 bit capable, even if they are not being bought for that reason or used in that capacity. While it is true that the switch from 32 to 64 will not give us quite the dramatic improvements that going from 16 to 32 gave us, it will also not be nearly as expensive or complicated as the 16->32 transition was, and I think the shift to x86_64 will happen more quickly than many people believe because of this.

Article is a flamebait and page-view-whoring

[sisukapalli1]

If you read the article, you will see it is about "interoperability" with proprietary software so that free software can take advantage of the opprortunity during the main-stream transition to 64-bits. However, as others have mentioned in earlier posts, this stuff gets more pageviews, so why not.

What next? Will Slashdot have a slogan, "We report, you decide! Fair and Balanced!"?

S

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[Anonymous Coward]

Mentioning patents this really all doesn't make very much sense. ESR is advocating the newest GPL

Is he? That sounds very out of character. Not that ESR has ever been accused of consistency but still...

It's just a matter of busses

[slashdot_nobody_nowh]

I have three hard drivers, CD-recorder and DVD-recorder. Each of them has firmware. Nobody's complaining it's closed source. I do not understand why audio and/or video card driver can't be closed source - to me it's just like the above mentioned firmware, just the devices sit on a different bus - PCI and not IDE. Of cource, open source drivers are better, but why all the fuss if closed source firmware is silently accepted ?

Re:It's just a matter of busses

[Anonymous Coward]

The firmware is simply code that makes the device do its thing.

It's not the part that talks to the OS; it's not the part that has to be compatible with 200 other things. That's the driver's job.

And if the driver is written to use old references in the libraries or the kernel which are no longer accurate, or if the way it communicates with the device is simply screwed up on one scale or another, or if device functionality is left out or otherwise missing, then the community CAN'T fix it, and as low as uptake of Linux is, and as pressured as most companies are by Microsoft, a fix from the company itself is not likely to be forthcoming.

In addition, there's no real way to stop a closed driver being used as an access vector. (This never becomes an issue with the firmware because most firmware chips are designed to only hold enough bits to make the device work (or rather, the next higher power of 2 of them), and any firmware update that makes the device work slower/more poorly/not at all will likely alienate consumers.)

Furthermore, most firmware is incapable of communicating with other devices on its own, simply by design.

Thus, while we can't see the firmware, we can trust it a bit further than we can driver code we can't see, because of how it pretty much has to work for the device to work. It doesn't mean we shouldn't WANT open firmware, it's just that it's not quite so grave of a concern.

Re:It's just a matter of busses

[doshell]

Because when the hardware blows up on your face (due to careless design/manufacturing), you have to reverse-engineer the firmware (tough) to find out what's going wrong. With open firmware you can actually see where the problem is and fix it.

Also, really faulty firmware could induce the operating system in error and become a source of system instability/insecurity.

Re:It's just a matter of busses

[AJWM]

The firmware for the drives (hard drive or optical) lives in the drive itself -- it's burned at the factory. All interaction between the drive and the OS is via standard interfaces (ATA, SCSI, ATAPI, etc) for which there are open source drivers.

There's no such standard interface for high-end audio or video cards (at the low end, it's more standard; every video card can pretend to be a dumb VGA card). Yes there's OpenGL and DirectX, although the latter is hardly an open standard, but for most cards there's still a software layer between OGL calls and hardware register twiddling, and that software lives in the kernel driver, not on the card. Now, if that lived on the card and we could make OpenGL calls (or X Server requests) directly to the card, that'd be different.

conceed a few scrimmages to win the battle

[capsteve]

not everything about linux/OSS has to be a major battle. a binary driver here and there for better acceptability is a pretty small concession to make. not every box i run has linux/bsd running, and its usually because i have equipment that requires drivers that don't yet exist/aren't ready for primetime in the *nix world.

Free and freedom are excellent goals to strive for in the computing realm, but it needs to be balanced with usability and stability. i'm not always able to retrograde to 10 year old technology, sometimes i need current technology, and i can't wait for a reverse engineered driver/hack to make it work with my system. ESR is correct, ipods, cameras, phones, pda, these are the trappings of the modern computing experience, and if you can't get it to work right with one OS, you'll use an OS that items will work with.

sometimes it's better to conceed the small fights, like binary drivers, and worry about the bigger battles, like market share. you vote with your wallet by saying "i have your product, i've spent my money and i want to use it with linux. if you can't make it work with linux i'm taking it back". refunding money is taking money out of their pocket, and most manufacturers don't ever want to do this. and invariably they will communicate with you on some level, because you are a customer, and they have an obligation.

remember a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush and if your a paying customer, you the bird in the hand that they don't want to see fly away...

threatening/posturing that you will not buy a product because it doesn't run on linux is a wasted effort. you haven't spent any money, so your not a customer. if you're not a customer, they're not gonna listen to you, 'cause manufacturers listen to their installed customer base not their potential customer base. i'd gladly pay you tuesday for a hamburger today is a piss poor way to convince manufacturers to work strongly with OSS.

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[byolinux]

What other free software ventures from corporations happened? IIRC, CATB was only one part of the decision. The fact that IE was virtually owning the web, which could allow MS to pollute HTML and prevent Netscape making it actual money from its server products was a large part of it too. AFAIK, "netscape source code as netscape product" (Hecker's paper) hasn't been released publically.

He always has...nothing new here

[Urza9814]

ESR has always supported propietary software. Read his book. Nowhere does he claim open source is better...he just says there are certain places where companies should use open source that they don't....and then certain places where they should be using propietary where they don't. Nothing new here....

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[Andy Dodd]

"To win what, exactly--popularity? For free software advocates popularity is not a goal. Freedom is a goal, a goal that is not achieved by installing non-free software on one's computer."

In that regard, ESR is more of a realist than an idealist. From his opinions in the past, and also talking with him (Talking to him in person is EXTREMELY interesting) and seeing one of his lectures back from a year or so after The Cathedral and The Bazaar, I think he has always been a realist that considers open source to be preferable, but if short-term compromises have to be made for open source software to succeed in the long term (essentially what this article suggests), he has no problems and I don't think he ever had. Back in the time around his paper and stint of evangelism/advocacy, he had some stories about cases where he actually suggested to companies that they not go open-source as it had no actual benefits for them (and honestly would not have benefitted the community much either). The example that stands out in memory was a logging company that had some special control software for their log cutter. While ESR advocated they use open source in other parts of their business, he suggested that open sourcing their control software would not benefit them, would not benefit the community in general, and would cost them a significant amount. (Remember, taking a closed-source program open-source is rarely a simple as taking a CVS snapshot and posting it to the public - there are often numerous legal ramifications to doing so. See the initial state of Mozilla - Netscape took 3-4 months ripping out the stuff they didn't have exclusive rights to before releasing the code, and when it was released it was essentially crippleware.)

ESR is right

[Money for Nothin']

"We have a serious problem. Whenever I try to pitch Linux to anyone under 30, the question I get is: 'Will it work with my iPod?," he said. "We are not yet as a community making the painful compromises need to achieve widespread desktop market share. Until we do, we will get locked out of more hardware."

Raymond is concerned the window of opportunity is closing for Linux on the desktop. He calculates the end of the transition to 64-bit computing by the close of 2008. According to his studies, the best opportunity to displace the dominant operating system (in this case Windows on the desktop) takes place with a major architectural shift like this.

Raymond believes Linux will get locked out for 30-odd years until the next platform shift as it's so far not doing enough to reach out to non-technical users.

"The end of the 64-bit transition happens at the end of 2008. After that the operating system gets locked in for the next 30 years. I'm worried we are not doing enough to appeal to non-technical users. I'm worried we will be locked out of the desktop for a very long time," he said.

I think ESR is correct here, though I'm not sure what exactly about today's environment discourages proprietary vendors from Linux...

The best time to try to get people on a new OS is during a shift in architecture. The estimate of 2008 being the year when 64-bit transitions are done seems a bit of a guess, but a range between 2008-2010 seems about right to me, when considering corporate and personal users' transitions.

The way Linux and the OSS movement needs to deal with proprietary software is to make it optional, not to try to exclude it altogether. For every piece of proprietary code we allow, we should also permit an open version to exist as well, and the OS and our apps shouldn't *require* proprietary software to run.

Of course, there's no reason this can't happen already. iPods *could* work on Linux -- if only Apple wanted to release a version of iTunes for Linux (of course, their desire to do this, as they have for Windows, is not a technical problem but a business one: Linux on the desktop doesn't have nearly the hand-forcing, monopolistic market share of Windows to make it profitable). And, in the opposite direction, some inspired OSS hackers could probably make the iPod work with Linux -- if only Apple were more forward-thinking and permit them to, without fear of legal assault.

The question is one of incentive. What incentives do vendors of proprietary software have to sell their wares for Linux? The ability to remain closed-source is a strong incentive, but again, this can already occur: look at Nvidia's drivers, or Cisco's VPN client...

The HURD: Define Wanking?

[Anonymous Coward]

and after all the FSF is still wanking with HURD.

Number of lines RMS has written for the HURD himself: zero.
Number of FSF hired programmers still coding for the HURD: zero.
Number of hobbyists working on the HURD: nearly zero.

What was your point again?

I think Linux users sometimes forget ....

[King_TJ]

... to more than just a few commercial software developers, they're "the enemy" - simply because the OS is centered around the concept of encouraging contributions of free software to the community.

This "battle" goes on all the time, regardless of the platform being coded for, but Linux is rather unique in the fact that it gives sort of a centralized "scapegoat face" to the issue.

As just one example (from the Windows world), I was at work several weeks ago, and ran into a need to convert a really oddball image file format to something more typical like GIF or JPG. I located a shareware product selling for about $40 that was perfect.... but before paying out the money, I did a little more searching. Just as I was about to give up, I found a free product some guy wrote to solve the same problem at his work.

Now, realistically, who knows if the shareware author was even aware that someone else made a free product that competes with his? But if he did, don't you think he'd probably be at least a little bit annoyed, disappointed, or upset that somebody just cut into his potential revenue stream?

Now, take this to a corporate level ... where you hire a whole team of developers to build a piece of software you're planning to get hundreds of dollars a copy for. Some unemployed software developer comes along and codes a Linux equivalent that's completely free, just because he wants the name recognition and the challenge of doing it. Some companies are going to see this and think Linux isn't their friend.

Re:I think Linux users sometimes forget ....

[Bing Tsher E]

I located a shareware product selling for about $40 that was perfect....

If you weren't able to use it to do your conversion, it wasn't shareware. It was crippleware, which sadly has almost entirely overtaken the shareware concept. The shareware definition specifies that payment is voluntary. Crippled 'demo' versions of an application that don't work unless you pay for a 'key' or an uncrippled version are NOT shareware.

Re:I think Linux users sometimes forget ....

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

The shareware definition specifies that payment is voluntary.

What shareware definition?

Re:I think Linux users sometimes forget ....

[Tim C]

He didn't say he couldn't use it, but he did say that he needed it at work. Where I work, that would have required a copy of hte software to be bought; hence I would search a little longer to see if there was a free version. I strongly suspect that he did the same for the same reason.

Re:I think Linux users sometimes forget ....

[Bing Tsher E]

Shareware started with Jim Button back in the earliest days of the IBM PC. Freely distributed software that is fully functional, not crippled in any way, and the author relies on the goodwill of the user to send him/her some green if they like the program. Use Wikipedia, for goodness sake. Shareware is a well established concept and has been for decades.

No, there isn't a 'Shareware Concept (tm)' championed by some stuffed shirt like ESR.

What can one do with software freedom?

[jbn-o]

Users can pool their money together to buy the services of a programmer then copy the program they paid someone to write and each enjoy a copy. It's not that users are prohibited from doing this, as you say, but that this not yet widely done. But in time I think this will be done more commonly, just as people hire other professionals to do technical tasks requiring specific knowledge. Not that long ago it was hard to open the phonebook and find an ISP. Today, it's not so hard to do this. These things can and do change.

If you pool your money with someone to buy a copy of a proprietary program you can't legally make a copy of that program despite that you both put in money to pay for that license (and that this sale of a license is a sale that otherwise wouldn't have happened). This is not an issue with commercial free software.

Inspection matters for everyone; some inspection jobs are easy and anyone can do them. Translating programs into another human language (French, English, etc., not programming language) requires inspection. Proprietary software doesn't allow this because that would mean being licensed to make a derivative work. Inspection also matters if one user wants to ask a more technical user to just help answer questions, the same way you hire a plumber or electrician (or ask a family member to help with these tasks).

Re:What can one do with software freedom?

[RingDev]

Wow, you need to grasp the economies of scale. True, 2 people would have to buy 2 copies of a closed source piece of software. But if two people were to attempt to fund development of a serious piece of software, or even just the modification of an existing OS project, the cost would be multiple orders of magnitude higher. The only way to combat those prices are to 1) get a LOT of investors, 2) get a LOT of donation money, or 3) get a LOT of volunteer work.

OS vs CS goes far beyond personal objections to Bill Gates. Business and Market demands as well as developer and job market demands all play a role. Again, I'm not saying one is inherantly better than the other, only that BOTH solutions will continue to exist and NEED to continue to exist.

-Rick

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, and after they opened the code did anyone actually build on it and make it better? Not really. Essentially everyone said "eww, this code is total sux0rz" and snobbed their nose at it and basically started over from scratch. In the mean time it took to rewrite the damn thing basically from scratch IE dominated the whole market.

It basically just showed more open source snobbery because once the code was opened everyone was just like "oh it's sooo complicated, this proprietary code is very sux, let's redo it" because no one wanted to bother to learn the code they just wanted to do it their way anyways. It was pointless.

ESR turns Benedict Arnold

[Anonymous Coward]

news @ /.

What does it take to run a social movement?

[jbn-o]

You're taking the views of the FSF beyond what they actually are saying - note, for example, that glibc remains LGPL'd, the base libraries for GNOME are also LGPL'd - and you're also ignoring network effects.

I think you should read the entire essay I linked to and I think you'll see that due consideration has been given to network effects and increasing use without treating proprietors like charities.

Is Freedom Freedom if you have to practice it in a cage?

Pursuing an advance of one's rights always means making choices that restrict one from what's available. This is natural when one is rejecting what's available on the grounds that it doesn't meet one's needs in some substantive way. Thus your question tries to encourage us to dismiss a pursuit of freedom on the grounds that choice is more valuable; you'll never be able to do everything you want with non-free software and building a world where you have increased freedom takes restraint, time, and effort.

Re:Free and non-free don't treat users the same wa

[_Sprocket_]

Such a simplistic view purposefully rejects the effect on the user; which is precisely why we should discuss and pursue user's freedoms to run, inspect, share, and modify published software.

"Inspect and modify" has meaning only if you are a programmer or can employ a programmer. That excludes the home market and huge chunks of other markets.

I would agree that "inspect and modify" is only a subset of what makes Open Source important. However, you are missing a bigger picture by thinking that such freedoms offer no benefit to any given end user. It's true that the end user might be oblivious to these mechanisms. But what the end user has in front of them is a direct result of the freedoms accorded to all, if only acted on by a smaller group.

Effect on the users is more important.

[jbn-o]

I believe that is what I'm doing—from the perspective of the effect of that behavior on the users.

I don't mind paying for free software, in fact I've done so for individual programs as well as entire free operating systems. But I refuse to believe that the effect on users is unimportant or that one can't run a business by distributing and building upon free software. Plenty of large and small businesses (including my own) would prove me wrong by their mere ongoing existence. I would rather do business in an ethical way which means respecting my clients software freedoms while meeting their needs for a fee.

Re:Effect on the users is more important.

[ninjadroid]

What you forget is that you're totally free to begin with. If you don't like proprietary software because you have to trade certain freedoms to use it, then don't. Nobody is forcing you to. There is, in fact, a whole community founded on the notion that trading some freedom for software isn't worth it, so it's not like you're all alone. But to assert, a priori, that the other much larger community of people who have no problem trading a little freedom for a lot of software are somehow acting immorally is, in essence, to engage in religious zealotry.

Now, everybody has a religion --- or "moral compass" --- even atheists like myself. If you just want to stipulate unfree software as amoral, that's your prerogative. But I don't agree with it, and neither does the rest of the world --- you are outnumbered, outgunned, and you will lose an ideological war. Period. So if getting widespread acceptance of at least some free software has any weight with you, then you better expect to compromise your principles.

Re:Effect on the users is more important.

[RingDev]

There is only one side in this arguement that is suggesting an absolute. My statement is that closed source and open source solutions will continue to exist and that there are advantages and disadvantages to both. You are free to use which ever you like, and so is the rest of the market. But as soon as you get out side of the view of zealotry, you can see that the market will demand both solutions and that neither is going away anytime soon. Closed source and open source solution can coincide in the market place, and the users will benefit from the options.

-Rick

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why ESR is so respected today.

Known, yes; respected, hmm..

Whatever

[xenocide2]

This is just the continuation of the rhetorical split between GNU and Linux enthusiasts, of which ESR belongs to the linux camp. The cathedral and the bazaar, after all, was written primarily with GNU as the cathedral, and Linux as the bazaar. Of course, neither side's participants exclusively believe a certain way on the subjects around open source, but it's important to note that RMS's statement generally matches with Linus's, in that things like the nvidia binary driver, while not perfect, are allowed.

If you were truly one of the Annointed looking for the one true Free way, you'd already be familiar with this Linux situation and be running Hurd instead.

Sound and fury signifying nothing

[mlwmohawk]

I have to be honest, I think ESR is just a self promoting right wing nutjob. I discount everything he writes or says as suspect, but that's just me.

If a company wants to sell software for Linux, hey that's cool.
If a company wants to GPL their software, hey that's cool.

I am pissed off at the Linux distributions like RedHat, SuSE, and others who jail teir distributions with copyright and proprietary software. Linux belongs to the community, and while the likes of RedHat and Novell do add important value to the Linux community, I think it is wrong that they don't isolate the GPL portions of their distribution amd make it available, and no, the community versions don't count.

I have personally contributed bits and pieces to various GPL and BSD projects and am not able to gain access to distributions that use my contributions.

What gets run on Linux, is not our concern. The more the better. There will always be viable alternatives in the GPL world. The availability of Linux, unencombered by non-gpl stuff is vital. This isn't a religious war, it a pragmatic and tactical offsensive to protect the rights of users and developers.

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why ESR is so respected today.

Bwahahahahaha! "so respected" hahahaha no... please... stop... it hurts to laugh so hard... Tron Man is more respected.

Ironic much?

[makomk]

I mean, it seems like the main reason the transition to 64-bit is taking so long is closed-source drivers (and software) that are only available in 32-bit versions. For example, the only reason I'm still running 32-bit Linux on my Athlon 64 machine is that I need closed-source wireless drivers (32-bit only), and various closed-source plugins and software that's also 32-bit only (Flash, codecs for various audio/video formats, Java, ...)

Re:Ironic much?

[Al Dimond]

Haha, that's the same problem my brother has on his Windows box. Which is why ESR's comments sound so... quaint to me. Not only can Free Software already work with iPods (according to the people in this discussion and others), Linux has already become Windows for lots of people, a system that people use to consume closed resources with closed programs and closed drivers. Of course, if you're going to use Linux like Windows you're going to have to give up some of the benefits of Linux, like the ability to run at 64 bits.

I wish I had a 64-bit computer to run 64-bit Linux on. I wouldn't have been tempted to install Flash player or Real player or any of that. It's pretty much all ads and crap on those channels anyway.

This is all a bunch of Linux World Domination shit. Who cares about Linux World Domination? The big differences between running Linux and Windows come from the facts that that Linux is a minority OS, that it's F/OSS and that it's not commercial. There are some benefits and drawbacks to each of these. With Windows compatibility layers, closed-source drivers/software, and commercial drivers/software Linux lets you at least partially switch sides on some of these issues these days. But once you're running majority software you're back in the target of malware. Once you run closed-source software you're tied to a company and platform. And once you're running commercial software you're back in the eye of the marketing machine (so things will happen like you try to play a CD and the first screen you get is ads, WMP-style... at least the way WMP was on my last Windows installation... this attitude was one of the things that offended me most about Windows). If that's what you want, run Windows, IE, WMP, iTunes; that's what I tell all my friends.

I respect and agree with you, mostly, but

[viewtouch]

It's fair to say that Linux might well not even exist without the work that RMS and his cohorts did in the first years of the FSF's existence.

It's also fair to say that it's NOT true that if RMS hadn't done what he did that someone else would have. It is not to be taken for granted by anyone that without RMS & FSF, sooner or later we would have ended up in essentially the same place we are today.

I know what it's like to have to get a company's permission to write software on their computers, and to pay them a LOT of money for the 'privilege'. NOT FUN. RMS has changed all of our lives in a way that we can only understand by knowing the history and by sitting back for bit and actually thinking about it.

I can't say that for ESR. All he ever did for me was threaten me for using his US service mark 'open source' on my web site, a service mark he didn't actually have. I find it easy to ignore him.

Re:I respect and agree with you, mostly, but

[sedyn]

I believe that if RMS is right, then he, and the rest of us have to acknowledge that someone else would have done the same thing... eventually.

It's kind of like math, we say that people either prove or discover something. The proper answer has always been there, but somebody had to get it right.

For example, I was using free software long before I believed in it. It was when I had to learn the true ugliness of closed software that I began to believe in alternatives. Thus, my path to freedom was a bit different than RMS', I don't think I would be brave enough to go as far as he did, but I still would have recognized the problems, if not the solution.

Upon re-reading this, I sound like an RMS shill, and I don't even like the GPL.

Re:I respect and agree with you, mostly, but

[Brandybuck]

Nonsense. Without RMS we would still have had free and open source BSD. We might not have "Linux" as we know it, but we would still have a vibrant community of free software and operating systems.

Re:I respect and agree with you, mostly, but

[julesh]

It's fair to say that Linux might well not even exist without the work that RMS and his cohorts did in the first years of the FSF's existence.

I don't believe that's entirely true. It would be fair to say that Linux would not be what it is today without the GNU codebase to draw upon. But there was already a large codebase of BSD software that could have been used instead.

Re:I respect and agree with you, mostly, but

[Drooling Iguana]

It's also fair to say that it's NOT true that if RMS hadn't done what he did that someone else would have. It is not to be taken for granted by anyone that without RMS & FSF, sooner or later we would have ended up in essentially the same place we are today.

BSD, anyone?

Re:I respect and agree with you, mostly, but

[j-pimp]

But there was already a large codebase of BSD software that could have been used instead. Compiler? Then again a compiler is one of those undertakings that you only want to do once and perhaps someone would eventually write one.

Re:ESR is an asshole!

[macshit]

He may be a great programmer, but his knowledge of the human sciences is somewhat lacking

The funny thing is that he's not a great programmer either. He's never really done anything of note technically.

Other FOSS leaders like RMS and Linus, are great programmers, so I guess it's understandable that people assume ESR must be too -- but he's not.

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[groovepapa]

I would call myself a free software advocate, but I release my code under the LGPL because I want give the users of my software the freedom to include it in non-free software. I guess I just say make free software, where the FSF seems to say make software free only to certain users. That's like saying that advocates of free speech should impose restrictions on the speech of advocates of censorship.

ideology

[symbolic]

In one sense, I think I agree with Raymond - however, the larger issue isn't just the acceptance of binary drivers, the issue is what may happen to Linux as a result. I don't think it's too far fetched too assume that those who can exert any kind of influence won't hesitate to do so. What if, for example, the vendor of a prorpetary driver started making demands that certain aspects of Linux be implemented in a very specific way in order to "protect" their interest?

Basic Human Right

[Mateo_LeFou]

"I outright disagree with software as a basic human right"

I don't think anyone argues that software is a basic human right. But well-established basic human rights underpin the moral imperative to build free software. Using your own property in the whatever way you see fit is a basic human right; controlling your own computer requires that the software on it be available to read/modify/copy.

Rainfall isn't a basic human right. But when it does rain, people have a basic human right to collect it and drink it. If the water supply is privatized and the government makes it illegal to collect rainwater, it is an injustice because of the nature of rain as a free resource, not because people have a basic right to have water given to them.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[bwalling]

I think ESR is wrong because most people aren't ever going to notice the 64bit transition, at least nothing like the 16-32 bit horrors of the 1990s. Both Linux (almost flawlessly on RH based distros and fairly useable on Debian ones) and Windows have made it all but unnoticable whether one is using 32 or 64 bit apps for 90+% of users and uses. Only those who need to malloc gigs need concern themselves.

The only way you could have written that paragraph is if you have never installed 64-bit XP. It's quite different, and you do notice. Many apps won't run on it. The default install includes two copies of Internet Explorer (one 32 and one 64) and neither works quite right. The only reason anyone uses XP 64 right now is if they have an app that requires it. Otherwise, they're just asking for misery.

Re:Free and non-free...

[Spasmodeus]

The FSF's simplistic view on "freedom" assumes that all computer users have the inclination and ability to inspect and modify their software, when undoubtedly the vast majority of computer users just want the freedom to choose whatever program bests suits their particular need.

Which, of course, the FSF is against, should you decide that proprietary software best suits your need.

Re:"Open Source" is not clearer than "Free Softwar

[daigu]

Don't get me wrong, I prefer the term "free software". However, I have been in the business side of a corporate environment and talking about "free speech, not free beer" is not a concept that is easily grasped in that context. Every new meeting, every new person that you come across you will have to explain it again and again - and they still won't get it. If you use "open source" and say it is about being able to see source code, it is actually less of a problem because it sounds like a good thing right from the start whereas you have to deal with the built-in biases that "free" means we don't make any money when we use the term "free software".

You can argue which is more correct, but the ingredient that is missing from your argument is the audience. Semantics matter and you have to use language that makes sense to your audience. I'm sure many people on Slashdot agree with your argument - I among them, but the fact of the matter is that c-level executives in most companies wouldn't even take the time to understand what you are saying. I could convey the term "open source" to them in less than a minute. I would loss them using "free software" and likely wouldn't get a second meeting. It's simply the reality.

You. Idiots.

[Hosiah]

And I mean ESR as well as all the people agreeing with him.

I know another operating system which started out open source code with it's maintainer deep in the hobbyist community before seeing money waved in front of his nose, and deciding to ditch his personal values in favor of conquering the Earth. That was Bill Gates. Because of that, Windows is a piece of shit.

Linux IS successful RIGHT NOW!!! Otherwise, why would it even be discussed? Why are you all here reading this? Why would anyone even care about it? Why would Sony be pre-loading it on the PlayStation? Why would some 270 distros and flavors of it exist on DistroWatch?

Huh? Did Linux get where it is today by sacrificing it's ideals and compromising it's freedom? Only in America is this strategy considered viable. Go torture some more prisoners to protect your free democracy from "terrorists". And then make what was free enslaving so you can sit on your tinpot throne and oink about how you conquered the world.

The drive to Windozize Linux will not save it, but ruin it. Can't you blind fools see that that's right where the enemies of technology freedom want to lead you? Linux will become a piece of shit. We've been down this road before.

Make no mistake, everybody who goes around pushing universal desktop acceptance of Linux cares about nothing but money. What people like RMS (AND ME) do is advocate Free Software only as long as it promotes freedom. Freedom of technology for everybody is good, and making it non-free will not be a benefit.

But I have a flash-back coming. I've lost this fight before. And so, I run away again as I ran away from Windows. This time to BSD or Open Solaris or GNU/HURD. And yes, thank you, I am a fucking flaming zealot. Better to be that than a greedy, shitty, fat, theiving SWINE!

Flame me all you want, I'm goddamn proud to say it. Better believe, though, if it comes to that day, I'll be ten times the enemy of Linux that I ever was of Windows. And I will not be alone.

Re:You. Idiots.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hear hear! Absolutely right. Short-term comprimises can only lead to long-term ruination. So what if Linux doesn't work with the latest fads? It will, in time, if free software writers get around to it. And, despite what Raymond says, the iPod is a case in point: not only will the iPod work with linux, you can run linux on it (there is a distro called iPodLinux...).

What bothers me about statements like this of Raymond's is that I don't understand why he supports 'open source' in the first place. RMS is quite clear that Free software is important because of the freedoms it protects. Raymond likes open source because it... has fewer bugs? Runs faster? Who knows. And now, with his support binary drivers & proprietary software, he even throws away the technological justificaiton for 'open source'. All one is left with is a bunch of legacy-software programs which are free (as in beer) and relatively bug-free, and which interoperate with a proprietary, closed-source system. I am being unclear, but I basically wish to say that: Raymond has no moral, or now even technological, reason to support his 'open source'. So why is he doing it?

The cynical person in me says it is because he wants to be loved by his 'hacker tribe' and only supports it to gain the respect or friendship of those he looks up to. But that is just me!

Re:You. Idiots.

[smash]

But I have a flash-back coming. I've lost this fight before. And so, I run away again as I ran away from Windows. This time to BSD or Open Solaris or GNU/HURD. And yes, thank you, I am a fucking flaming zealot. Better to be that than a greedy, shitty, fat, theiving SWINE!

So you're ditching Linux because of the proposal that supporting binary/proprietry software is OK - yet you're going to BSD (which can use binary windows drivers in the kernel) or Open Solaris (controlled by Sun) or GNU/Hurd (which for all intents and purposes may as well not exist)?

Top work. Enjoy.

Re:You. Idiots.

[ciggieposeur]

So you're ditching Linux because of the proposal that supporting binary/proprietry software is OK - yet you're going to BSD (which can use binary windows drivers in the kernel) or Open Solaris (controlled by Sun) or GNU/Hurd (which for all intents and purposes may as well not exist)?

I think the GP is (might be?) ditching the Linux kernel because there is growing evidence that a movement exists within the "Linux community" (whatever that is) that is actively trying to compromise ultimate user freedom in order to gain short-term acceptance in the mainstream in a fashion similar to Windows and OS X. Symptoms include encouraging users to use binary drivers rather than choose hardware with open-source drivers, implementing technologies to play locked content rather than insist on open media formats, and encouraging hardware vendors to use Free Software in their DRM-locked systems rather than insist they use proprietary or public-domain software.

I too believe that such a movement exists and is gaining ground due to simple fact that it is a software-maker-business friendly position and the megacorps have the money to encourage this view. We'll find out in the next couple years who is going to win -- the short-term pragmatists vs the long-term realists -- when the new LGPL comes out and all the FSF projects move over.

As for the OP's options: GNU Hurd is generally stagnant but could move forward quickly now; OpenSolars is dead in the water; NetBSD could be forked into a GPLv3 version (perhaps called "GPL/BSD"? :) ).

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Angostura]

The Free Software Foundation's essay simply reinforces the view that the differences are mainly to do with ideological tub-thumping. Personally, I value both ideologies. The FSF sees free software as part of a ideological struggle, the OSS sees open source as a pragmatic licensing issue.

XP 64 vs XP 32

[metamatic]

The only reason anyone uses XP 64 right now is if they have an app that requires it. Otherwise, they're just asking for misery.

And this is different from regular Windows XP how, exactly?

16 to 32 transition

[metamatic]

The move from 16- to 32-bit was dramatic.

Only for DOS/Windows users. For Mac users it was largely a non-event, bar some software incompatibilities. Ditto most flavors of Unix.

Re:16 to 32 transition

[AHumbleOpinion]

"The move from 16- to 32-bit was dramatic."

Only for DOS/Windows users. For Mac users it was largely a non-event, bar some software incompatibilities. Ditto most flavors of Unix.

Mac users were always 32-bit. If you meant Apple users, well they went from 8-bit to 32-bit. The 16-bit Apple //'s came after the Mac. Or are you referring to 32-bit addressing? Macs have always had 32-bit registers but the high order 8-bits of the address registers were ignored. The latter led to some bad practices, storing data in this byte, that broke some programs when Apple began implementing 32-bit addressing.

Not ditto for Unix. The 16/32-bit transition had merely occured much earlier. It was "ancient" history by the time most people began talking about 32-bit.

Re:16 to 32 transition

[metamatic]

Mac users were always 32-bit.

The original Macintosh used a Motorola 68000, which was 16 bit internally (16 bit ALUs, 16 bit data bus, 16 bits of address space accessible at a time, 16 bit instructions), albeit with addresses stored as 32 bits in preparation for later 32 bit models.

Not ditto for Unix. The 16/32-bit transition had merely occured much earlier. It was "ancient" history by the time most people began talking about 32-bit.

Xenix was launched on 16 bit CPUs in 1983. 32 bit support was added by 1987, so the 16 bit version was hardly ancient history by the time people were talking about 32 bits.

Minix was still a 16 bit OS in 1988. If it hadn't been, Linus wouldn't have started writing his kernel.

In 1982 SunOS was launched on Sun 100 machines, which had 68000 CPUs. In 1983, Sun 200 series machines ran on 68010s which was partially 32 bit. So again, I don't think 1982 was ancient history by 1983.

If you mean that the Mac and Unix had transitioned to 32 bit long before Windows, well, yes, I didn't suggest otherwise; I just said that Mac and Unix transitions were uneventful compared to the massive changes and improvements in Windows.

Re:16 to 32 transition

[AHumbleOpinion]

Xenix was launched on 16 bit CPUs in 1983. 32 bit support was added by 1987, so the 16 bit version was hardly ancient history by the time people were talking about 32 bits.

People really didn't start talking 32-bit until OS/2 2.0, what was that 94? 93 at the earliest? 1987 was ancient history. The masses didn't really start until Win95.

Re:16 to 32 transition

[jedidiah]

The MC68000 was a 32-bit microprocessor, PERIOD.

It's general purpose registers were 32 bit.

It supported fully relocatable code and a flat memory model.

That last part meant that even if it was a 16 bit
machine that it would have still be a 32-bit
machine in the ways that mattered.

The address space of an MC68000 is infact 24 bits.
If you don't do anything stupid, your code will be
backwards and forwards compatable with the rest
of the fully 32bit versions of the MC680x0 family.

Re:16 to 32 transition

[feijai]

The original Macintosh used a Motorola 68000, which was 16 bit internally (16 bit ALUs, 16 bit data bus, 16 bits of address space accessible at a time, 16 bit instructions), albeit with addresses stored as 32 bits in preparation for later 32 bit models.

Last time I coded assembly on a 68000, it had a 32-bit address space and 32-bit general-purpose registers. From a software point of view, it had both 32-bit and 16-bit words. How is this not a 32-bit processor? Who cares what the ALU or data bus actually did?

Re:16 to 32 transition

[Anonymous Coward]

In other words, the Instruction Set Architecture was 32-bits ab initio. The actual hardware was really 16-bit, but would run the 32-bit ISA (just with multiple hardware operations).

Re:16 to 32 transition

[julesh]

Indeed. This is very much like the arguments I see occasionally that the 386SX was a 16-bit processor. No, it was a 32-bit processor with a 16-bit bus. Unless you think the Pentium was a 64-bit processor.

Re:16 to 32 transition

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

Motorola 68000 ... 16 bits of address space accessible at a time

What do you mean by "at a time"? I've used an MC68000 chip. It had a flat 32-bit address space (well, it was actually a 24-bit address space, but it used 32-bit registers to access it).

Re:16 to 32 transition

[metamatic]

The Z80 had 16 bit registers and a 16 bit address bus. I guess that means it was a 16 bit CPU, eh?

Re:16 to 32 transition

[metamatic]

The fact that the registers and address space were 32 bit doesn't alter the fact that all processing occurred 16 bits at a time.

The Z80 had 16 bit registers and a 16 bit address bus. Guess what? It still wasn't a 16 bit CPU.

Re:16 to 32 transition

[metamatic]

The 68000 used 3x 16 bit ALUs chained together to simulate a 32 bit ALU. It was basically a 16 bit chip internally, built to execute an architecture designed to be 32 bit.

Binaries in Linux Module Format (Closed)

[hackus]

The real reason binaries in Linux are shunned is because of the administrative community maintaining Linux machines in critical operations.

Secondly, where does it stop?

If we allow closed source proprietary binary anything into Linuxland kernel apis, then what will we be forced to compromise on next? If that is the case, I would just run Windows server software.

I mean really, the benefits of Open Source is because the OS is much more robust, and much more proactive in security planning and bug corrections in software.

I find Mr. Raymonds arguements about closing one of the most serious aspects of kernel level software, dubious at best economically, and worse totally defeats the reason to running a Linux kernel over Windows for security, reliability, especially in 24x7x365 operations.

The whole idea in my opinion from working with source code for users and manufacturers is that it keeps costs low through shared development, and maintains better quality.

You also have to understand the media companies are still in old school mode with regards to making profits out of media in general.

This whole DRM craze is because Media can't keep up with the business models required to generate revenue, not because we have a "compromise" on our hands.

Whats next?

Changing the kernel so that we charge the user 2 cents per click on a web page?

Thats comming next.

-Hackus

ehem...

[wzzzzrd]

[...] painful compromises are needed to the way it deals with closed source platforms and formats to avoid losing ground on desktops and new media players.

no matter what one thinks about ERS's mindshift, this is just plain right. so, the decision to make is wether to lose ground or to stand by one's ideology. tough choice ;) and notice that he state's the compromises to be "painful". which is also right.

Why is it news when this pompous blowhard talks?

[dfetter]

See subject. :P

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Anonymous Coward]

that makes him a "one hit wonder". the question being asked was, what does he do day to day that makes him worth listening to?

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally, I don't see what all the fuss is about.

Binary drivers? sure if developers want to do them.

From the article:
"to win the new generation of non-technical users aged younger than 30."

I don't really care about attracting non-technical users, in fact, I kind of hope they stay with microsoft. Only thing I actually care about in this area is that closed formats shouldn't be used in the first place. (Playing WMA is fine, but I'd much rather people used .ogg or even .mp3.. something that is at least a little cross platform.)

It's UNIX and open standards that we ought to be promoting. That begins not by making linux handle these goofy binary formats, it begins by doing whatever we can to squash out such formats in the first place. Going after the people that produce them and saying "Hey!"

Choice of concentration camp

[Anonymous Coward]

So if you get to choose between Stalin-USSR and Hitler-Germany, you have freedom?

Even if you get to choose between one free and one non-free alternative, are you free when you choose the totalitarian alternative?

No, my friend.

You can't change it

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't change the firmware, so there's no point in wanting to be able to.

http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/free-bios.html

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[Stickerboy]

>>We CAN'T write and distribute Free Software for most of that stuff because of patents.

>We can't write free software - but we can get multimedia stuff to work, if we pay for the license to do so. You can get your DVDs to work 'out-of-the-box' on Linux - just use Linspire. People who believe in the ideals behind Free Software won't (including me), but for those that are worried about 'losing the desktop', options are available.

If this was the thing holding Linux back from being a massive success, Linspire would be selling millions of copies. That they aren't says something.

I thought Ubuntu gobbled up so much mindshare precisely because it works so well, right out of the box. (That, and the generally helpful boards for those new to Linux.) Ubuntu doesn't hesitate to use non-free (as in speech) code when there isn't a free alternative.

I respect and agree with you, mostly, but X2

[Anonymous Coward]

"It's also fair to say that it's NOT true that if RMS hadn't done what he did that someone else would have. It is not to be taken for granted by anyone that without RMS & FSF, sooner or later we would have ended up in essentially the same place we are today."

Well that's what the "light from my tapier" jefferson, copyright argument essentially says. That's also part of the "no software patents" argument as well. And BTW some of the principles RMS esposes predate him. The thing RMS did was give it a voice.

But everyone else does.

[Slithe]

Excel - a presentation showing how great Microsoft is?
Outlook - something that allows me to look on other people's computers?
Outlook Express - a faster version of Outlook?
Exchange - a money transit tool?
Passport - a program that allows me to easily get a passport?
Access - a program that allows other people to access my computer? This is where those virus-thingies must be coming from.
PowerPoint - a program to make my mouse more powerful? How does it do that?
QuickTime - a clock?

Re:But everyone else does.

[Anonymous Coward]

But you're missing the whole point here. Not a single one of those examples you named is less than ten years old. And in many cases, the names made perfect sense when they were introduced. For example, Apple had the QuickDraw graphics library built into the Macintosh. It drew things quickly. Also, "quick-draw" is a common expression, as are derivatives like "quick on the draw."

When Apple released a new graphics library that worked with isochronous data types, they called it QuickTime. Get it? It was QuickDraw plus time. Everybody who cared what QuickTime was knew all about QuickDraw already, so the name made instant and perfect sense.

Years later, QuickDraw is only a memory, but a long time ago QuickTime became synonymous with time-based computer data processing.

Compare that to, oh I don't know, a name like "Ekiga." Shit, man. I don't even know how to PRONOUNCE that, much less how to guess what it means.

There are good names and bad names. The best names are distinctive, easy to remember and evocative. A name doesn't have to be all three to be good, but "Ekiga" has none of them.

Re:Free and non-free don't treat users the same wa

[Anonymous Coward]

My freedom stop where your freedom start, and your freedom stop where my freedom start. So to speak, anything that restricts my freedom isn't welcome, and i don't want to restrict yours.

The basis of freedom : you are free to do anything that doesn't restrict the freedom of others. Giving proprietary software to the world is restricting our freedom. (i used the word "giving" and not "selling" because there are many, many softwares that are free as in beer but not as in speech. This isn't binary about commercial or not. There's too much "free as in beer" proprietary software around.)

Grow Up People

[Anonymous Coward]

As others have pointed out FOSS can indeed handle iTunes, mp3, and wmp already.
Besides, people who think that every idiot consumer needs to run FOSS are missing the point entirely. Let them eat Micro$oft, why should we care?
The one and only "political" goal we in FOSS should be advancing is NO CLOSED PROTOCOLS or FILE FORMATS. That is the only real issue regarding closed vs open source.
ESR is a liability to FOSS (as are most open source "evangelists"), the article itself is just more FUD.

Er...

[FishWithAHammer]

Then you can either get a company to open-source (Netscape), you can write your own, or you can suck it up and deal with it.

Where, exactly, is the problem? You have the freedom to write your own, don't you?

If by "now" you mean "always" ...

[Zero__Kelvin]

Eric Raymond has decided that proprietary software is now a good thing, according to The Register.

Moron's disband! ESR was never "anti-proprietary" ESR has always said that proprietery has its place ... that place merely isn't 'driving the market'

"We have a serious problem. Whenever I try to pitch Linux to anyone under 30, the question I get is: 'Will it work with my iPod?," he said.

ESR missed this one. The real question is "will my iPod work with ... [it]" ESR knows better, but he seems to have had a momentary lapse of reason here. The "under 30" person in question should not be asking "why doesn't Linux work with my iPod", but rather ... "why doesn't my iPod work with Linux???" Put the onus where it belongs, and make sure the market is driven rather than dragged ...

Old fart programmers ...

[pbhj]

... what language do you old programers program your farts in btw?

Re:Old fart programmers ...

[kclittle]

"privileges are" -- yes, I know, saw it .05 usec after I hit 'Submit'. It's hard to be grammer-perfect when your wife is yelling, "We have to go NOW or we'll be late!" at you from two feet away...grrrrr

You are clueless too.

[Anonymous Coward]

"The question is, why do people choose to use "shitty proprietary crap" instead of what you'd like them to use?"

I don't give a rat's ass what they use, that's the entire point. Did you not bother to read my post? WE DON'T CARE IF LINUX DOESN'T DISPLACE WINDOWS. It does not matter, linux is for people who want linux. If we tried to make it for people who want windows, then it would be just like windows. Why bother, those people can already use windows.

Shove your FUD up your ass you liar.

[Anonymous Coward]

There's free pdf software like xpdf, or if you really want a giant bloated pile of shit, try "cd /usr/ports/print/acroread && make install".

Windows media shit is handled just fine by mplayer+win32codecs (also in ports) and flash works fine using flashplayer (again, in ports). The only problem is flash 8 doesn't exist, and nothing the open source world does is going to make shitmunch companies like adobe change that.

ESR's a tool...

[CyberSteve]

ESR is full of hot air, spewer of babble, and far far from being my idol.

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[pinky0x51]

>I would call myself a free software advocate, but I release my code under the LGPL because I want give the users of my software the freedom to include it in non-free software.

I wouldn't call it a freedom. I think what you do is giving users of your software the power to deny other users freedom.

> I guess I just say make free software, where the FSF seems to say make software free only to certain users.

I would say the FSF says make software free to all users because FSF prefered way of licensing software protects freedom for all users while your way of licensing gives users the power to deny other users freedom.
So you are the one who says "make software free only for certain users".

So, whose payroll isn't ESR on?

[Nybble's Byte]

For all the promotion he has done over the years for Open Source, and now this? It sure sounds like backpedaling and FUD. I don't trust him.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[Al Dimond]

"It's UNIX and open standards that we ought to be promoting."

Forget Unix. Just open and free standards. If we have open and free standards then we can make things different or better than Unix if we want to.

And also, clarity about what is an open and free standard. MP3 is not, because you need a patent license to encode it. DVDs are not, because of their lame attempt at encryption (the Content Scrambling System) and the questionable legal status of decrypting it (DeCSS). And "goofy binary formats" aren't necessarily non-open; a "binary" standard can be just as open as any other, as long as it's documented and unencumbered. ELF is an open binary standard (I think SCO claimed otherwise, but what do they know?); Ogg-Vorbis/Theora, Standard MIDI files, raw PCM data and even tarballs also would be considered binary data and I'm pretty sure those are all open, too.

Re:He's trying to solve the problem the wrong way.

[ardor]

Nice ideas. But irrelevant for the mass market. These projects may yield usable hardware in what, 10 years? By then, they will be hopelessly outdated. So, open hardware for the typical geek, but not for anybody else.

Now, there are two groups: elitists who want to keep Linux hard to grasp (and absolutely HATE Joe Average), and the ones who want Linux to rule the desktop. The second group HAS to accept binary drivers, applications, games, or else mass adoption simply will not happen.

or not

[dbIII]

The compiler, glibc, classpath and such are actively developed. However, all of those would continue if the FSF were to fold.

That is becuase they are from the GNU project and not from the FSF - it appears that even RMS proposing to put the gnu prefix before the word linux did not raise awareness of it as much as he wished! A lack of basic awareness of what GNU does and what the FSF does and thinking they are both the same thing renders the argument of the proir post clueless. Both groups share members and resources but they are not the same thing - don't take it from me, they have had web pages for many years.

And no - to the far more clueless, gnu/linux is not a gnu project. There is a gnu operating system, it is called hurd. The gnu/linux renaming was initially proposed for distributions containing gnu tools, linux and X and was first proposed as LiGnuX - but personally I don't think is should be called gnu/linux unless those who put a distribution together wish to credit gnu in the name as RMS intended.

Re:or not

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

don't take it from me, they have had web pages for many years.

I assume you mean that they have had different web pages for many years, but that's not true. http://www.fsf.org/ and http://www.gnu.org/ used to serve the same web site, until the former was redesigned a year or two ago. (See archive.org for May 25, 2003, for example).

But it's true that the GNU project and the FSF are different, and the FSF has increasingly been distinguishing the two.

damn gnu hippies...

[smash]

I actually think that proprietry software is a good thing as well - or at least, the FREEDOM TO USE IT.

I maintain that there are some areas/industries that will NEVER be catered to by free software - it's just not economically viable.

In my current industry for example: mining. There's NO FSCKING WAY that anyone is going to risk $100k/hr+ of downtime per crusher train on developing free software - and there's no way that any manager is ever going to rely on in-house supported stuff that they can't blame problems on some external third party.

Sure, there are aspects of our company that rely on free software (our "modular mining" mine site monitoring program for example runs on linux), but they are individual components that are well tested and not specific to our industry (red hat enterprise linux, TCL, perl, etc). The actual apps are all commercially developed/supported.

Fact is, throwing millions of dollars at a problem will often (though not always) generate quicker and better results than a bunch of hobbyists in their spare time. And the chances are, if someone is willing to throw millions of dollars at a problem, they'll want to have exclusive rights to sell the results.

What about AFAIK?

[HappyEngineer]

What does that make "AFAIK"? When I see that I read "as far as I know". I don't read it as "uff-ake" (so it's not an acronym) and I don't read it as "aay-eff-aay-eye-kay", so it's not an initalism.

Re:What about AFAIK?

[Anonymous Coward]

What about WTFCs?

Re:What about AFAIK?

[mcn]

Talking about this.

What should the correct way to read/say "i.e."? Aye-Ee or 'that is'? I find it weird when people say Aye-Ee during a conversation when that want to further a point.

and what about "e.g.", Ee-gy or 'for example'?

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[UbuntuDupe]

only free software respects users software freedoms (the freedoms to run, inspect, share, and modify software

Yes, it respects their FREEDOMS to do those, just not their ability.

for(int i=0;i23;i+=1){for(int j=1;j45;j+=1){checkstatus();}}//does something

Re:Free and non-free don't treat users the same wa

[WilliamSChips]

You exclude the effect of the modifications on the quality of the software(almost exclusively positive)

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[smallpaul]

To win what, exactly--popularity? For free software advocates popularity is not a goal. Freedom is a goal, a goal that is not achieved by installing non-free software on one's computer.

I don't believe that Eric Raymond has never declared himself a partisan of "Free Software" so I don't know why you, the article submitter or the Slashdot editor are acting as if he did. Eric Raymond was one of several people who created an ALTERNATIVE movement to the Free Software Movement. The Open Source movement was specifically organized around the pragmatic principle, and this latest declaration is just one more pragmatic compromise he is willing to make.

I agree with him. I find ridiculous the idea that a person has a right to reprogram any program he's been given. Such a right is certainly not derivable from any major world religion, nor from any plausible natural law, nor from constitutional history, nor widely demanded by the populations of any particular country. I conclude, therefore, that it is a wish, not a right. Yes, I wish for the ability to reprogram all of my programs, as I wish for the ability to re-cut my movies, but I do not ask for the original takes of film.

Not sure how proprietary-ware relates to freedom

[Anonymous Coward]

... but then again, I've had a shower in the last week.

ESR is the best

[theashworld]

and here's why.

If you want to win against the M$FT FUD, you have to fight them using their tools. ESR is being absolutely correct, first linux will embrace proprietary stuff, then extend it and then extinguish it. He's got a perfect plan of action which shortsighted fellahs like you will never understand ...

"You have the freedom to write your own"

[David Rolfe]

For now.

Haha, only serious. If trusted computing is an eventuality the argument "don't like proprietary software? write your own" is soon to be obsolete.

Of course this line of reasoning goes straight to hell pretty quickly. Vis.: Don't like trusted sound cards? Build your own; Don't like trusted video cards? Build your own; Don't like trusted computers? Build your own. Which inevitablely leads to, "Don't like trusted chipsets and CPUs? Fabricate your own." Now, at this moment writing your own software is viable -- it make take many man-years to produce a product like Firefox on your own, but the roadblocks are pretty small. If Free software proponents continue to lose the policy war it's going to be a lot harder to "build your own" computers, especially when 'non trusted' components aren't available (possibly due to legislation). At which point, the barriers to entry for producing your own microprocessors are pretty high (at least for the forseeable future, again if it's even legal).

The DMCA is the first step down that slope. Yay. But, yeah that doesn't undermine your point: you are free not to use a computer. Wait, was I just trolled?

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[MindStalker]

Actually I think I may have been wrong, little more reading shows he is saying we don't need the GPL at all. So I think I'll STFU :) ESR RSM.. Its all so confusing :)

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[jedidiah]

The write to "reprogram" anything you possess comes from the very core notion that you by default OWN what you posess and that there is no class of property that you cannot choose to own. Sure you can lease a car or a house but it is just as commonplace and easy to own both of those outright and be COMPLETELY FREE to do with them what you please.

        What is under attack is the very basic idea that posession implies ownership. This is why so many people find the notion of intellectual property so counterintuitive. It's contrary to more than 10,000 years of human experience across the planet.

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Anonymous Coward]

> but short of maintaining the Jargon file

You misspelled "ruining". It started out fine under his stewardship, and I couldn't give a fig about the removal of the TOPS-20 entries (or was it ITS, I don't remember), but now it's just the cesspit for every silly and stupid coinage this self-styled "anthropologist" vomits up.

Bruce Perens is a terrific spokesman for the "non-FSF" Open Source movement. ESR doesn't possess half the maturity or intelligence to pull it off.

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[byolinux]

I agree.

I like Bruce too. Did you see there was a story about him here the other day? He came on and replied to lots of posts. It takes a decent person to do that.

This is why I prefer open-source...

[martinultima]

...to free software – a hell of a lot more pragmatic, in my opinion. And this is why I prefer ESR to RMS as far as open-source politics and stuff goes (mostly I stay out of it altogether, of course...) I don't know about you, but I agree whole-heartedly with what he's said – admittedly, it would be nice if I could build my own optimized version of nVidia's drivers, but you know what? As long as it works, I really don't care in the long run.

By the way, just thought I may as well mention – it's been over two years now since I last had Windows on any of my machines, and my iPod works just fine on Linux, even on a 233MHz Pentium-I laptop. Most of the time I just have to convert everything from Ogg Vorbis to MP3, and even then I could probably skip all that if I really wanted to, mostly it's just sheer force of habit from the Red Hat/Fedora days that keeps me using Ogg... :-)

Re:Free and non-free don't treat users the same wa

[KutuluWare]

And we must also discuss and pursue the developers freedom

I'm sorry, you seem to have missed the memo. Developers don't get freedoms, only users do.

more arrogance

[Scudsucker]

Indeed, and what choice do you have when you're forced to use proprietary drivers because the companies won't share code.

Not everyone either a) is a programmer that knows what to do with the code or b) has the money to hire a programmer who knows what to do with the code. Not being able to use closed source software is a big fat restriction on the "freedom" for those kind of users. Furthermore, being a purchaser of software gives the non-coder some pull that they wouldn't have with an open source product. The user can say "I need feature X, and if you don't provide it, I'm going to your compeditor." Contrast that with trying the same thing with say, the Apache team.

Re:more arrogance

[Cal Paterson]

Not everyone either a) is a programmer that knows what to do with the code or b) has the money to hire a programmer who knows what to do with the code.

Doesn't matter. Free Software often works so that it serves the needs of the community it supports. We needed MSN clients to interact with the MS servers - gaim, kopete etc arose. Even things that many companies would find unprofitable get produced with Free Software. Support lasts as long as there is demand for it (often much, much longer - I'm using a 10 year old soundcard on my 64bit machine - will Vista support the Creative SB Live?). The final word, essentially, it that is doesn't matter if you're able to personally program anything - as long as someone is, that chances are that someone will do it. That doesn't happen with proprietary software.

Furthermore, being a purchaser of software gives the non-coder some pull that they wouldn't have with an open source product.

Since when did people not purchase Free Software? Red Hat seems to make a pretty good living doing exactly this. You buy a licence from them, they work hard to fix your problems. Their customers do get listened to - Red Hat pays for a lot of original code creation (not to mention paying for buyouts of other companies - such as JBoss). They spend quite a lot of money paying for people to make contributions to the kernel source (they employed/employ Alan Cox - a massive contributor to the kernel).

The user can say "I need feature X, and if you don't provide it, I'm going to your compeditor." Contrast that with trying the same thing with say, the Apache team.

Not applicable. Normally if the customer wants a feature, and it's profitable enough, they pay for the development in a certain area. IBM, Red Hat, Novell etc have done this many times. If they want feature X, they don't have to change vendor - they simply fund the development of feature X for what's essentially a one-time cost. It's a far better system.

Re:more arrogance

[Scudsucker]

Doesn't matter.

It absolutley matters. You seem to have a hard time grasping the "not everyone is a coder or can hire a coder" concept, which particularly applies to small businesses. But I would also add a third part, "not everyone has the time to code". IBM certinally has the resources to develop open sourced software, but if they need something now, and there is no OSS option but there is a closed source one, they wont hesitate to go with the latter.

Since when did people not purchase Free Software? Red Hat seems to make a pretty good living doing exactly this.

Which is helpful if there is a commercial company backing the software, but if there isn't, you are SOL. But even companies like Red Hat depend on the volunteer aspect of OSS, and trying to herd volunteers is like herding cats.

Not applicable.

Yes, it is.

Normally if the customer wants a feature, and it's profitable enough, they pay for the development in a certain area. IBM, Red Hat, Novell etc have done this many times.

Not every company is the size of IBM or can fund development of software (once again, not everyone can hire a coder). Think small business here. There certianally are advantages to OSS, but by refusing to consider closed source software, you are limiting your own choices, and that is not "freedom". End of story.

To make a political analogy, you are like the people who insist we need term limits so we can have "freedom" from incumbents, nevermind that term limits are a restriction on who you can vote for. Or Administration officials who insist we stay in Iraq until it establishes a democracy, and then talk about how we cannot let Iraq become a theorcracy, never mind that one could be put in power democratically.

Re:more arrogance

[Cal Paterson]

Small businesses are much much much better served by Free Software.

Free Software takes away the up-front licence payments. This is a big deal. I'm not saying there aren't costs with Free Software, but in general, it is far more the case that costs scale up and down with increases size and complexity. If the IT use is small, then, in almost all cases, the costs are small too.

And since when did individual small businesses have an effect on what big proprietary programs feature-sets are? It's not like Mom and Pop Brand Foo Co. had any input in the features of Microsoft products.

But even companies like Red Hat depend on the volunteer aspect of OSS, and trying to herd volunteers is like herding cats.

Not when you do as RH does, and pay them for their time spent on your projects. It's often not that expensive at a small level. A $200 bounty for a particular feature you're interested in is often a good use of money, especially if it's the kind of small, make-or-break feature request that's common with small businesses.

And no offense intended, but that analogy is a case-in point for why using analogies is bad practice. Bringing up political references (in particular Iraq) is sure to be inflamatory, and is almost certain to get us off the main points of debate. Nevermind that I'm not an American, and previously had no knowledge of the arguements for/against political term limits.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[doom]

If this was the thing holding Linux back from being a massive success, Linspire would be selling millions of copies. That they aren't says something.

I would've said "Suse". I haven't messed with Suse myself, but I've seen it in action, and it looks pretty slick. If you're indifferent to the proprietary vs. free issue I would think you'd just run Suse and be done with it... and notably, Suse is doing fairly well.

The actual thing that seems peculiar with ESR here is that he thinks anyone needs to hear this... there are lots of different linux distros, and quite a range of different attitudes and strategies, and if all it takes is to back off on ideological fantacism slightly -- well, there are folks trying that.

If the idea is that there are too many distros out there, and it's all just confusing everyone, well okay, maybe -- but what are you going to do about it? Is he trying to convince, say, Debian, to drop the "nonfree" distinction? Good luck. Maybe he should go back to trying to herd kernel hackers.

(Now, if you ask me... WMP format doesn't work? Cool! No Flash player? Excellent!! It isn't just that I'm not willing to *compromise*, it's that I genuinely don't care about most of the proprietary crap. It would, admittedly, be difficult to live without some sort of mp3 player...)

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[doom]

I think [Eric S. Raymond] has always been a realist that considers open source to be preferable, but if short-term compromises have to be made for open source software to succeed in the long term (essentially what this article suggests), he has no problems and I don't think he ever had.

Actually, I don't think that Richard Stallman is all that different in this respect, though you wouldn't always realize this from listening to his public pronoucements. He sometimes goes a little far in swearing that you should aways use the free alternative, no matter how inferior, and so on.

But what I like to point out to people is what RMS actually did when he started on the Gnu project: he started working on dev tools, compilers, utilities, and so on... and did not let it disturb him that he had to do all this on proprietary operating systems, at the outset. Software from the Free Software Foundation has almost always been as portable as they could manage to make it. The GPL places restrictions on distributing derived work, but says nothing about what kind of software you're allowed to use it with...

RTFA, he's not advocating closed-source...

[borgheron]

He's advocating that Open Source start to engage the interest of younger people by making open source work better with things like iPods and other proprietary formats. This is a far cry from "advocating closed source." Being useful is part of the deal here. How else is FOSS supposed to catch on, if no one wants to use it?

GJC

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[2short]

I have 64-bit XP at work, and must say my experience is different than yours. Not a single app has failed to run on it. The absolutely only reason I've even noticed at all is that the 32 bit version of Tortise SVN doesn't work with the 64 bit Explorer. I hear there is a new version that does, but I've already switched the default to the 32 bit Explorer, which not only works fine, but is absolutely indistinguisable. As a developer, when dealing with the relevant obscure corners, 32 vs 64 makes a difference; as a user, it's been a non-issue.

uhh....

[CAIMLAS]

Sounds to me like someone who has a vendetta against ESR or some of the views he holds (about firearms, I imagine) saw this quote of his, took it, and ran as far as they thought they could go with it - hoping to smear his name and generally give him a bloody lip. OP needs to learn how to read, or detatch said ability from his emotionally driven hoplophobia.

So what's the problem?

[edbarbar]

I don't understand what the problem is with having drivers proprietary. It isn't as if the Open Source community is having much success in opening up IBM's VHDL or Verilog, though IBM is getting a lot of free help selling their VHDL and Verilog by open source. Who cares if others want to drive their proprietary widgets through linux? Makes a lot of sense to me.

Teaching ethics is not Madison Ave.'s strong suit.

[jbn-o]

The GNU Project won't run proprietary software except for the purpose of writing a free replacement (in which case it is necessary to make sure the free replacement can serve as a genuine substitute for the proprietary program), but the GNU Project doesn't say you have to behave the same way. Representatives from the FSF go on speaking tours and give their audiences compelling reasons to convince them that free software is a better choice (there are archives of their talks online; I recommend Eben Moglen's recent talk at the 2006 FSF member meeting, Brad Kuhn's talk at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and RMS' talk for a software exposition in Curitiba). I think you'll discover that your needs go beyond what proprietors use as talking points (often working to restrict discussion to license price and sets of features). To make free software a compelling choice, the GNU Project has worked on practical free software programs you might use directly or benefit from indirectly.

Freedom and ability are different things; one's freedom of speech isn't about the breadth of their vocabulary or how well they state their ideas, it's about what they have permission to say. Sometimes objectors conflate freedom and ability and then use that conflation to accuse those pursuing freedom of not delivering ability. One constructive response I've heard from the FSF is to talk about free software in education, pointing out that computer users in school are particularly well served by an exclusively free software computer system because they have permission to fully understand what the computer is doing all while using actual production-quality code in use around the world. Students are thus given an opportunity to turn permission into skill.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[julesh]

If this was the thing holding Linux back from being a massive success, Linspire would be selling millions of copies. That they aren't says something.

Well, there are a few things holding Linux back, at least:

• 
   
• Multimedia support, as discussed: there are solutions, but most distributions are a little leary of including them due to their potential for patent violations, and in some cases reliance on non-free code that is somebody else's copyright
• 
   
• Hardware support: no working solutions yet for many issues, including any support better than adequate for large quantities of current graphics hardware, and no support at all for much present-generation wireless networking hardware. People don't want to build their computer so Linux can work with it; they want to take a computer and put Linux onto it and have it work, yet at the moment you need to work your way through hardware compatibility lists and shit like that when you're buying your components. This isn't the way to achieve popularity.
• 
   
• Lack of support from third parties, e.g. ISPs
• 
   
• Lack of support for applications people are familiar with (e.g. Photoshop might work in Wine, but how well...?)
• 
   
• Persistent rumours of major difficulties: if you hear somebody talking about Linux, it's often about how they struggled to make X, Y or Z feature work. Even if they did get there in the end, this is offputting to most users. And even when a distribution works out-of-the-box, people will still be hearing user stories about other distributions that aren't as friendly, and equating one with the other.

Better support of proprietary software can help to solve the first and second of these issues. It is already helping to solve the fourth. Once these problems are solved the fifth will start to drop away. The third would naturally cease to be a problem when larger numbers of people started adopting Linux, which should happen as the others cease being an issue. Then we merely have inertia to overcome. And that's where free-as-in-beer helps.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[julesh]

Hmmm. Note to self: Preview comments when formatting stuff in HTML, in case slashcode's screwed up import filters screw it up.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[Earered]

Not in the default install, you need to take the decision to do so (much like debian or other distro).

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Schraegstrichpunkt]

Heh. I'm not surprised to see Bruce Perens on Slashdot, considering his UID is 3872. On the other hand, given that he was around when Slashdot wasn't the Windows-user-dominated troll-fest that it is now, maybe I should be.

But yes, Bruce is a much better spokesman than ESR. He always has been.

64-bit gaming will make a big difference

[master_p]

64-bit gaming will make a big difference. Today's 32-bit games have limited animations and models...64-bit game systems with multigigabytes of memory will be able to use procedural animation and modelling to show a detailed 3d world beyond what is possible with 32-bit systems.

Re:64-bit gaming will make a big difference

[SanityInAnarchy]

This is just as retarded as the last comment about memory.

Look, when was the last time a game used anywhere close to 4 gigs of RAM? Yes, we want to stay ahead of the curve, but WTF does this have to do with procedurally generated stuff?

I mean, you are talking about this, right? As I understand it, this does not use significantly more RAM than a static animation -- in fact, it uses significantly less, as rather than reading (and caching) a static death animation, you have a (much smaller) formula for what the death animation should look like, which you generate in real time.

So 64-bit still helps, but it helps because it's faster, not because it can support more RAM. More RAM will help with more detailed models, unless those are also procedurally generated. Remember, consoles have been severely gimped for RAM for ages. Many PS2 games still look amazing, and the entire system has 32 megs of RAM.

Also, remember how stupid you're going to sound when "multigigabytes" will sound to future generations the way "multimegabytes" sounds to us. How do you like the sound of a system with 32 gigs of RAM? That's going to sound to your grandkids the way the PS2 sounds to us today.

Re:64-bit gaming will make a big difference

[master_p]

This is just as retarded as the last comment about memory.

I just love /. criticism. People are just sooo clever :-).

Look, when was the last time a game used anywhere close to 4 gigs of RAM?

First of all, only 2 GB are available to games; the other memory is reserved for the O/S. Secondly, there are many games that come close to using 2 GB of memory; GTA SA uses disk spooling, for example, to present its vast (compared to previous games) world. HL2 uses almost 1 GB of RAM, and that is for just a single level; so is Far Cry. And let's not go to more recent games.

I mean, you are talking about this, right? As I understand it, this does not use significantly more RAM than a static animation -- in fact, it uses significantly less, as rather than reading (and caching) a static death animation, you have a (much smaller) formula for what the death animation should look like, which you generate in real time.

No. I am talking about procedurally developed graphics/models that are developed in real-time (i.e. as the game progresses) and stored in memory for later reference; if a texture is complex enough, there is no way to recalculate it for every frame without affecting performance.

So 64-bit still helps, but it helps because it's faster, not because it can support more RAM. More RAM will help with more detailed models, unless those are also procedurally generated. Remember, consoles have been severely gimped for RAM for ages. Many PS2 games still look amazing, and the entire system has 32 megs of RAM.

What? have you compared PS2 games to PC games lately? PS2 games look previous generation (because they are previous generation). And let's not forget resolutions: PS2 games are usually in 640x240, whereas PC games are 1280x1024 (at least!)...

Also, remember how stupid you're going to sound when "multigigabytes" will sound to future generations the way "multimegabytes" sounds to us. How do you like the sound of a system with 32 gigs of RAM? That's going to sound to your grandkids the way the PS2 sounds to us today.

To me, it already sounds normal; I am not impressed.

Re:64-bit gaming will make a big difference

[SanityInAnarchy]

GTA SA uses disk spooling, for example, to present its vast (compared to previous games) world.

Maybe we can clarify disk spooling...

When I imagine making a game like GTA, with a vast world, I imagine something close to just creating a 5 gig file or so, and running it through mmap.

HL2 uses almost 1 GB of RAM, and that is for just a single level

How much of said single level is visible onscreen at once? Why must it all be cached in RAM? Can players really walk so fast that dynamically loading things just beyond the horizon can't keep up?

I hate to keep bringing it back to the PS2, but the pilot game Jak & Daxter, all the way through Jak 3, did dynamic loading, and looks as good as or better than most PS2 games. Prince of Persia games did that too, and were praised for their attention to detail. Halo and Halo 2 did it, but most people can't tell, and the people who can usually only see visual artifacts in split-screen.

And we have much more CPU to spare than the PS2 does, and games get installed to real hard drives, so why should desktop games be using huge amounts of RAM when they could cover it with dynamic loading? Even with huge caches/buffers to ensure that you don't run into the edge of the world, I can't see us needing more than a gig for at least another year or two -- and probably considerably less.

No. I am talking about procedurally developed graphics/models that are developed in real-time (i.e. as the game progresses) and stored in memory for later reference;

How is this significantly different than what we do now, loading off the disk and storing in memory? Certainly with dual core processors on the rise, people could have a whole core or two completely idle while they're playing -- why not use that for generation? Not every frame, but on demand. If it really becomes prohibitive, use a disk cache also.

Remember, we only really need enough RAM for what a player can see from any one point in the game, and then maybe twice that to make sure the player can't walk faster than we can load. Now, who actually uses the 512 megs of video RAM that we have now?

What? have you compared PS2 games to PC games lately? PS2 games look previous generation (because they are previous generation). And let's not forget resolutions: PS2 games are usually in 640x240, whereas PC games are 1280x1024 (at least!)...

Fine, then. The Xbox 360 ships with half a gig. The ps3 will ship with 256 megs. We already know the 360 is capable of playing HD games, which are well over 1280x1024.

Half-Life 2 doesn't use a gig of RAM because it needs to, it uses a gig of RAM because they know they can, and they'd rather be spending time on sexier programming (HDR, film grain, facial expressions, physics, gameplay) and actual artwork than reducing RAM usage and load times, especially when they know that their game is such a classic (due to all of the above) that everyone will buy it anyway, and upgrade their system to be able to play it, and STILL tolerate being interrupted every 2 minutes by a loading screen.

Now, if we do actually fill those ridiculous 512 meg cards, then yes, we will likely need more than 4 gigs of RAM. Just spinning in a circle, you'd probably need a gig or two.

To me, it already sounds normal; I am not impressed.

You're living in the future, then. I certainly couldn't afford a system with that much RAM (32 gigs?), and if I could, I wouldn't (yet) know what to do with it, other than use it for more cache.

Oh, I'm sure 64-bit gaming will make it matter, eventually. I just don't think it will matter as soon as you think, but maybe you're right. Lazy programmers have driven upgrade cycles before...

Re:64-bit gaming will make a big difference

[master_p]

Well, everything done with 64 bits can eventually be done with 32 bits. But it is gonna be a pain in the butt for developers, and the end product may suffer (for end users). I imagine games where maps are truly vast, games are explored in real-time, each structure evolves in unique ways, and the world is populated by thousands of players. For all that, you actually need 64 bits.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[Dean Sas]

Ubuntu ships some non-free binary drivers by default. See the bottom of http://www.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/licensing

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[squidsuk]

We can't write free software - but we can get multimedia stuff to work, if we pay for the license to do so. You can get your DVDs to work 'out-of-the-box' on Linux - just use Linspire. People who believe in the ideals behind Free Software won't (including me), but for those that are worried about 'losing the desktop', options are available.

However, as you concede, then it isn't Free software any more, because of the licensing, and we can't legally redistribute it to others as Free software (gratis/libre) while preserving those freedoms including the freedom to redistribute, amongst others.

"Intellectual property" licensing is morally and ethically wrong in a digital network age, and this is one of the symptoms of that. One treatment for it is Free software, another is Creative Commons licensing.

Another would be some serious copyright reform - I would even venture to suggest that no copyright at all would be better than the insane copyright durations and DRM licensing we're presently seeing, though there are more moderate ideas for sensibly limited copyrights (7 years, 14 years, no DRM, all non-commercial copying exempt, etc) that could conceivably also be workable.

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[smallpaul]

The write to "reprogram" anything you possess comes from the very core notion that you by default OWN what you posess and that there is no class of property that you cannot choose to own. Sure you can lease a car or a house but it is just as commonplace and easy to own both of those outright and be COMPLETELY FREE to do with them what you please.

I own my iPod, but Apple does not have a responsibility to provide me with the tools to disassemble it, change it and reassemble it. Apple does not have to give me a schematic or microcode.

I own my lawn mower, but it also does not come with tools that allow me to change it. If I can figure it out by reverse engineering then so be it. If not, I'm out of luck.

Even my house did not come with blueprints (despite the considerable amount I paid for it). If I wanted to figure out what was going on, I had to rip out the walls.

Reverse engineering is a freedom with a long history. By all means, defend it. But please do not confuse it with an invented right that requires the creator of a product not just to allow you to change it but to spend time and money helping you do so. That is not a freedom: it is a burden. It is undoubtedly a transfer of power from the creators of software to the consumers of it, but some of us believe that the market should decide the appropriate balance of power in these situations and not an invented right. This invented power can transfer power from small software companies to big businesses just as it does from big software companies to consumers.

If I want more power over restauranteurs, should I invent a right to get the recipe for all food I eat?

Re:ESR is not associated with Free Software moveme

[Anonymous Coward]

Heh. I'm not surprised to see Bruce Perens on Slashdot, considering his UID is 3872.

But esr beats him in Slashdot cred with uid 3702

Re:"Open Source" is not clearer than "Free Softwar

[pinky0x51]

>However, I have been in the business side of a corporate environment and talking about "free speech, not free beer" is not a concept that is easily grasped in that context. Every new meeting, every new person that you come across you will have to explain it again and again - and they still won't get it.

And you don't have to explain Open Source?

>If you use "open source" and say it is about being able to see source code, it is actually less of a problem

But it can become a big problem because the description is wrong. If you describe them Open Source as "being able to see source code" tomorrow i will go to them and offer them a software with source code and a license which don't allow sharing, modification and distribution and they will think that they get Open Source software.

>it sounds like a good thing right from the start

Really? What will all the non-software companies say? Probably they won't see any advantage in "being able to see source code". But if you say to them: Look this is Free Software, that means your are free to use, share, modify and distribute the software that means you have the full control over your data, software and your entire IT-infrastructure and their is no vendor lock-in and you can chose freely your support/service provider.

I think this sounds more "like a good thing right from the start".

At the end you have always to describe it whether you use the term Open Source or the term Free Software. But i'm sure that the "freedom and independence"-argument is much stronger than the "you can see the code"-argument if you explain it right.

Um. 30 Years?

[tjcrowder]

Anyone else disagree with ESR purely on timescales? He seems to think once we've all switched to 64-bit (and it's debateable whether that will actually happen by 2008), that platform will be locked in for 30 years. Seems unlikely. I doubt we'll move to 128-bit any time soon, but the next major platform shift, be it more parallelism, more collaborative and ubiquitous computing in the home, etc., will happen a lot sooner than 30 years from now. And FOSS (and Linux in particular) are well-positioned to be in on many of the things looking like coming down the pike.

Sadly, he may well be right about proprietary binary drivers being a necessary evil in the short term. But as J.P. Rangaswami points out chatting with Doc Searls in this month's Linux Journal, this probably is a short-term problem.

On ocassions quality triumphs over quantity.

[jotaeleemeese]

Mexican writer Juan Rulfo wrote only 2 smallish books (almost booklets) and then retired to private life. One is a novel based on his home town, a dirty little village, the other a collection of short histories.

Any Spanish speaking writer and any moderately informed Spanish speaking reader will know his name, the names of his books and pay homage to him as a great innovator.

Google for him and be surprised.

Don't belittle a person that has written little, what he has written may be very insightful and important.

Re:On ocassions quality triumphs over quantity.

[byolinux]

Don't belittle a person that has written little, what he has written may be very insightful and important.

Granted, I'm just not so sure ESR's writing much in the way of insightfulness or importance. Have you read his blog?

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[Earered]

On the shipping, yes,they are on the CD.

Debian has a non-free repository
Suse has a NON-GPL kernel

The phrase at the bottom is confusing:

"All of the application software installed by default is Free Software. In addition, we install some hardware drivers that are available only in binary format, but such packages are clearly marked in the restricted component."

From this link:
http://www.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/components

"The restricted component is reserved for software that is very commonly used, and which is supported by the Ubuntu team even though it is not available under a completely free licence. Please note that it may not be possible to provide complete support for this software since we are unable to fix the software ourselves, but can only forward problem reports to the actual authors.

Some software from restricted will be installed on Ubuntu CDs but is clearly separated to ensure that it is easy to remove. We include this software because it is essential in order for Ubuntu to run on certain machines - typical examples are the binary drivers that some video card vendors publish, which are the only way for Ubuntu to run on those machines. By default, we will only use open source software unless there is simply no other way to install Ubuntu. The Ubuntu team works with such vendors to accelerate the open-sourcing of their software to ensure that as much software as possible is available under a Free licence. "

(the bolding is mine) That the same procedure used by pretty much all distrib, requiring user intervention to install those, and allowing users to install those.

RMS doesn't recommand any major distro for this reason: http://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2003/08/msg029 01.html

He's right on some things...

[petrus4]

...and wrong on others, IMHO.

I tend to believe that Linux has got to the point where "the mainstream" have *heard* of it, but still not necessarily to the point where they're actually *using* it. I also don't believe that being truly mainstream would be good for Linux, however I don't advocate RMS' brand of cultic insularity, either.

The stuff about 64 bit architecture is wacky, IMHO. Vista could cause problems for the adoption of Linux, but that won't necessarily have anything to do with 64 bit architecture. Something tells me that Eric has possibly been spending too much time with his corporate friends lately, and forgotten about what the real world are doing, if he thinks *everyone* has gone 64 bit.

Although I'm not running Linux right now, (I've just had to do a large re-install) when I do I don't give a damn about whether drivers are binary or not, and neither does anyone else with a brain, as far as I'm concerned. Most of us primarily care about being able to use our hardware. I'll agree with anyone who says that hardware specs should be published so that OSS drivers can be written, but unfortunately that isn't how capitalism (or at least contemporary capitalism) works, and hardware manufacturers generally adhere to capitalist economics.

If by being locked out of "the desktop" for 30 years, Eric means a scenario where casual computer laypeople can use Linux to the same degree they can Windows, then I think he needs to change "30 years" to "never", at least other than specialised applications. Last I saw, Linux at its' core was still command line oriented, systems like Ubuntu notwithstanding. I don't consider that a bad thing...but it isn't a characteristic that lends Linux to being used by novices.

Re:Making freedom doesn't mean caving into popular

[groovepapa]

Except that all of MY code is totally free, and I'm fine with that. Someone else, for whatever reason, might need or want to close off certain portions of their code. My software is free for those users.

Re:"Open Source" is not clearer than "Free Softwar

[daigu]

It all sounds good in theory. Now, put your money where you mouth is....if you think these arguments will work, please join a corporation and make it happen. I've done it, and I can tell you that in the companies I've been involved with, these arguments don't work. Companies don't care about open source, free software or anything else besides making money. Any conversation that loses the central plot of making money and talks about such things as "freedom and independence" means you have lost your audience and your credibility within that company. Fact.

Why don't they compromise?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is it the FOSS movement having to give up ideals rather than the CSS world? If they want a compromise, then they should only SELL software WITH SOURCE. The code is still copyrighted, so you can't "steal" it. So what have they lost?

Bugger all.

They won't do it, though.

Untill they compromise, why should we?

Re:Why don't they compromise?

[wzzzzrd]

Untill they compromise, why should we?

because we're smarter than them.

Mac OS _10_ was 32 bit?

[Joseph_Daniel_Zukige]

Macintosh System 6 was 24 or 32 bit addressing depending on a patch and some hardware. Around 7.5, 32 bit addressing became the default (and the name was formally changed to Mac OS).

Binary-only = evil!

[ogdenk]

I can't stand proprietary binary drivers. Not because I'm a linux zealot (I'm a BSD guy actually)or a revolutionary. I use multiple architectures that many vendors wouldn't be willing to recompile a driver for. If Broadcom released a Linux/x86 or NetBSD/i386 driver for a PCMCIA wireless card, what the f**k am I supposed to do for a Tadpole SPARCbook? Or an AlphaBook? Or an MIPS-based PDA with a PCMCIA slot? Or my linux-based iPAQ?

ESR backing this is good for Linux/x86, and that's about it. It's bad for *BSD period and bad for linux on ANY other computing architectures! This is selling out while gaining VERY LITTLE for open source as a whole and assuring x86 dominance indefinitely.

Re:Exactly right, this is just todays 'rant' artic

[Duds]

Absolutely, and as a Windows user, I can honestly say Freespire is the first time I've come close to being impressed by an out of the box linux. I'm actually considering using it on any new laptop I get.

Re:ESR is an asshole!

[lemi4]

> ...so I guess it's understandable that people assume ESR must be [a great programmer] too -- but he's not.

Fetchmail! You forgot fetchmail!

+4 funny

[Anonymous Coward]

hahaahahahahahaha! Everyone's laughing at you!