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Red Hat Sells RMS Linux
Chilli writes "I just stumbled over RMS Linux on RedHat's web site. It includes only free (as in freedom) software and at least $1 is donated to the FSF for every sold package. This is super cool, I think, and I probably have to buy one just because it is so cool. I think, this finally proves that - as far as this is possible for a company - RedHat cares about the community. (The URL is to RedHat's secure commerce server, I hope it manages the /. effect, but I didn't find another URL - so, this is maybe not really official yet, but what's on the Web, is on the Web.)"
No matter how often you cut and paste it here on /., it remains your (personal) opinion, and it's not definition of free sw in any sense.
The Qt judgement is based on an early, obsolete version of the QPL (v 0.9).
In the final version there is no patch requirement anymore, and you can easily maintain large changes using CVS.
You could probably quote Miguel saying he want's gnome to be like Windows, or how he wanted bonobo to be like OLE. Why the need for flames
Same old points, none are true.
It is not Gnome that gives all the themes, it is GTK+ and E. All they did for theming was to include a theme switcher. KDE 2.0 has a WM made by the KDE team that supports wild E-like themes, and a real Qt theme maker.
Show me another X11 DE that isn't a resource hog (that means KDE is one too).
Gimme an example for NIH. I bet you can't come up with a good one.
It's PR team can't be that good, or you wouldn't see distros like Caldera that refuse to ship with Gnome.
Figures--you work for Penguin.
RedHat does not want to include Qt and KDE in their distro for the simple fact that these software are mainly developed by European programmers. That of course would go with desoriented and small-minded american nationalistic feelings or something similar.
I know that the GNU-is-everything guys yell loud and long about the evils of KDE, but calling it *that* does you no favours with the rest of the Linux user population. Saying that Netscape 4.x is non open source is simply correct. Calling KDE non open source is a matter of opinion (even among the open source advocates). It's really stupid to take sides on this.
no Netscape...so for a graphical web browser that leaves, let me see, Amaya (ugh), Arena (double-ugh), Lynx (no pictures)...what else comes on the Redhat CD...no Konqueror (uses Qt), no Mosaic (not on the CD), no Opera (not out yet and not free in any case). Mozilla is still unusable in its current state. Well, I suppose anyone who purchases RMS Linux probably doesn't want anything more than lynx anyway. Maybe you could use one of the hundreds of half-finished browsers out there, and help to finish it.
Blackspring Communications (www.blackspring.com) has committed to donating 1% of their yearly profits to FSF, and another 1% to the Debian Organization.
IMHO Gnome is the Windows of the Linux world right now.
In what sense is Gnome, the Windows of the Linux world? Is Gnome a vicious monopoly that survives by mass-marketing crapware? You are way out of line, sport. Way out of line.
You have entered disrecognised space. You are five increments from hooligan status.
-t.
I remember a few years back people (Linux community at the time) had a strong hatred towards Red Hat (and before AFAIK it was Slackware) for going commercial w/ Linux. Well after everyone feared the worst from Slackware its Red Hat that I'm fearing most now. Slackware at least didn't go for IPO (IPO is nothing more than saying "I am greedy. Give me money!").
Really I don't care anymore. Linux is just an operating system. Nothing new or even interesting anymore. Red Hat can milk this cash cow for all its worth. The only problem with Red Hat is they will kill free software (and "open source"). The creators of all this wonderful software will get bent out of shape seeing their hard work going towards lining other's pockets. I was close to becoming a free software contributor. But then 1998/99 happened. The urge died along with the Linux gold rush of late.
Capitalism and free software playing nice is a paradox of sorts. I would rather keep it closed source and bring in the cash. At least you're being honest then.
Simple:
For the last time...
QT 1.X DOES NOT COME UNDER THE CURRENT QPL!!!!
QT 1.X IS NOT FREE/OPEN SOURCE, SO CAN'T BE INCLUDED. KDE 1.X REQUIRES QT 1.X, SO THAT CAN'T BE INCLUDED EITHER. WHATEVER THE CASE MAY BE WITH QT/KDE 2.X, IT DOESN'T APPLY TO 1.X.
first post~
I hope that anyone who considers RH's RMS Linux, or anyone who uses Linux will consider donating to them directly.
Personally I've always found the ways in which you can donate a bit problematic. Being in Europe it's hard to do the dollar conversion unless you send a money order, bleugh!. However the FSF says they will accept credit card donations which is easy, sure you will get hit on the conversion to dollars but that's the same as buying anywhere else on the Net. Check out:
http://www.fsf.org/help/donate.html
bit
Both "Free Software" and "Open Source" are misleading. For laymans, FS is gratis and OS is source code you can see (eg Sun's license). Now, a slightly warped argument why the term FS is better.
:)
When Joe Public hears about Free Software, they find out pretty quickly that Free DOESN'T mean price. They may get annoyed, but Free as in freedom is perfectly
legitimate. However, in the process, they will hear about freedom, of software
This is a topic that our Joe has to be shocked into thinking about.
When Joe buys a Open Source* software, (say solaris) they never realise that the software isn't free. They continued to be misled, for a long time, during which they will tell others that Open Source means seeing the source. Heck, they will believe that even if the source was closed - the average Joe wouldn't touch source with a three-metre pole (approx 10 foot).
As a result, Free Software is a better term because although people are initally misled, they find out exactly what it means quickly. Open Source is less misleading, but continue to misled, especially those who don't program.
* Open Source is out of trademark. My toaster is open source.
Show us that browser. A dozen groups started writing the mythical GPL web browser, and the only ones that have something at least a bit decent to show are the KFM authors.
Your ignorance in mind-numbing. If you want details, ask me at ralsina@unl.edu.ar. Roberto Alsina (KDE developer)
Get over it.. They're a business and it simply sounds like you're jealous that they thought of it first. They didn't *have* to do anything like this in the first place.. *yawn* Andrew Burd
To summarize what he writes about, it's virtually impossible to borrow bits of Qt to include in other projects (for instance, copy 20 lines of code), and it's difficult to make certain types of larger changes.
On a different level, there is also a major limitation on the format with which you can distribute changes, but that's not as bad as the above.
Qt is Open Source. Anything ESR labels as "Open Source" is "Open Source." It is not free software. Read http://pmitros.mit.edu/patchwork.html.
You're wrong on both counts. It does exclude Netscape, and the Netscape license is free. It's not a particularly good free license, but it is GPL for the world, BSD for Netscape. QPL is a very limiting license, on the other hand (http://pmitros.mit.edu/patchwork.html).
See http://pmitros.mit.edu/patchwork.html for a description where Qt fails.
- They should include KDE/QT - First of all, the version of Qt that works with the current KDE is decidedly non-free. Second, even if they chose to ship an unstable/development KDE snapshot, they would still be stuck with the open source, but only semi-free Qt 2.0 license. The 2.0 license lets you make modifications, but it does not let you borrow bits of Qt for other projects. It also has severe limitations on what format you can distribute the modified source in.
- Only a dollar?!?! - This is a heck of a lot better than what anyone else is doing. It's also quite reasonable when you consider that unlike CheapBytes or Mandrake, Red Hat needs to not only recoup the cost of the CD, but also very large development costs. Red Hat is not pulling a profit as is.
- Debian is already free - It'd be a good thing if all distros were free. Red Hat has distinct advantages over Debian and vica-versa.
Overall, what Red Hat is doing is a very good thing. They're doing this to help the community. It's a crap argument to say it's not good enough. It's like critisizing someone for only donating an hour of time a week and 5% of their income to charity, where no one else donates any. It's certainly not the final step, but it's a very good step in the right direction. So far, Red Hat has taken more steps like this than any other distro short of Debian. Next time I need a Red Hat CD, I will almost certainly buy one of these....is that it wasn't written by anyone from the FSF, most notably the bitter old geezer himself, Mr. Stallman. Therefore it is considered "politically incorrect" and therefore evil. Ditto Netscape, WordPerfect, StarOffice. Remember, once "Hurd" is done, the FSF will forget that Linux ever existed. Not that there is any reason for this "Hurd" to even exist except for satisfying Richie-boy's tremendous ego. But he will then have his own complete GNU system which will be used by no one except FSF Left-wingnuts and a few Slashdot-kiddies. Then again, once "Hurd" is done, maybe most Linux users will forget that the FSF ever existed.
Now I know what distro to specifically avoid. Redhat is free to do whatever they want...but once again they let their own political agenda interfere with reason.
/opt/kde /usr/lib/qt
RMS himself has come out and said the QT license is okay. Yet, once again, Redhat steps up as the self-appointed judge to overrule everyone..here we go again, the old "Qt is not free so KDE is evil" nonsense (Right Justin? Why not crawl back under your rock?).
I abandoned Slashdot during the height of the rabid anti-KDE zealotry that was going on around here when KDE 1.0 was released. I'm so happy to see the same kind of closed-minded idiocy is still present here...Justin Cheung, for example, finds it necessary to write a program specifically to remove QT and KDE from your system. Here's a timesaver Justin, just so you can get back to your idiot politics you keep posting about:
#!/bin/sh
rm -rf
rm -rf
...since it seems to offend you so much.
Personally, my money will continue to go to Mandrake, Caldera and SuSE. I'm glad to see them supporting KDE and I will happily donate my money to that project. Redhat can choke on their political maneuverings for all I care. This is pure marketing and 'suck-upmanship'. RMS doesn't want his name on something...all he's ever wanted was due credit for the FSF right from the start...ie GNU/Linux. The 'credit where credit is due' award goes to Debian for this, NOT Redhat.
--Signed, a former Slashdot poster & supporter
Either this is an homage to the father of open source, or a realization that among all the peaks and troughs of the stock market, free software is the one thing that Red Hat can count on.
Begin Redneck_Sarcasm { Us right-thinking Americans want nothing to do with those tea-drinking, can't-fight-their-own-wars, homo-hugging Europeans. We believe in using 110% real American software for us 110% real Americans! Excuse me while I change into my sheets. Red Neck^H^H^H^H Hat Forever, Y'all! } /* End Redneck_Sarcasm */
The reason no one is jumping in to claim that the NPL is a free license is that they stated nothing about the NPL.
They said they aren't including "Netscape" not "Mozilla". AFAIK, Netscape is *not* released under the NPL, Mozilla is. And there is no reason to include Mozilla since it's not a real product yet (yes, it's cool, but it's not ready yet) evevn if the NPL were "free".
It was my understanding that the 'donations' were in the form of Microsoft products, and therefore involved a considerable amount of self-promotion.
Your an idiot
I've used linux since 0.99-15 (before RedHat existed) NEVER redhat again for me!
I've read slashdot since before it was slashdot.org... I am so fed up with Roblimo's superficial happy-go-lucky 'journalism', but i will probably not stop reading slashdot yet...
Roblimo thinks he is soooo cool, but in reality he just lacks self-constraint in the same way that RedHat does.
(either you understand, and possibly agree with-, my reasons for this, or you don't, but thats OK)
stein
Gnome is a really great Windoze-clone:
- GNOME is built on hype
- GNOME tries to impress by beauty instead of stability -- and yes, it is still unstable (No wonder as Gnome didn't really care about stability from the beginning)
- GNOME is a ressource hog
- GNOME has that *not invented here* syndrom (tries to copy everything KDE has and fails miserably in most cases. -- So when will we see GMagellan, GaRts, Ganossa? -- that's only a question of time
- Instead of lots of useful apps you find lots of toys/obsolete features for GNOME to hide all those lacks and bugs
- but: GNOME (unfortunately unlike KDE) has a brilliant PR-machine
KDE instead is stable and reliable, compiles well almost everywhere and develops much faster than GNOME does. *That* sounds like Linux to me.
You might say: But KDE *looks* like Windows
And the most *most* important fact:
While GNOME needed to be supported by Redhat to avoid that GNOME would die (*This* was a really promising birth for a linux-desktop
the ac
Whenever I read statements which try to equate software with freedom I begin first to foam at the mouth, then to shake violently. Struggling to control the placement of my fingers on the keyboard, I try to raise the awareness of the Linux masses by reminding them calmly that we live in a culture that thrives on commerce, that writing software is an honorable profession that deserves its place as a means to sustain one's lifestyle, and this high moral dignity that RMS bestows on free software is an outrage to those of us who slave hours on end to produce open source software that lives in harmony with our commercial society so that it can continue to prosper, thereby guaranteeing us an environment where true Freedom can survive.
QT 2.x is not free, if you use for commercial purposes you have to pay a considerable amount of money to TT, you cannot mix it with truely free (GPL) software, you have to change QT only in patches,etc... and by the way, don't say RMS is happy with QT, that is a lie, RMS wanted to continue the Harmony project. without Harmony, KDE will be dead in the long term, and that is very bad for all of us. I love the KDE guys, and the Trolls are just a commercial enterprise, nothing against that, but please don't fool the newbies saying that QT 2.x is free! Of course everyone is entitled to use non free software, I use it myself, but I don't call it free!
Do you realize how really stupid is your argumentation? I am an European myself, I am proud of it, and I am very thankfull to Red Hat to give us all that GPL code that they produce... With your kind of logic, I hope you are not a programmer... I am.
Obviously RMS Linux is "root mean square Linux", which differs from Redhat's normal distro by a constant factor. Since Richard Stallman is a free-software radical if one ever lived, that factor happens to be radical too. I wonder if he has AC in his office?
Nice flamebait, asshole. KDE is 'crap'...yeah, that's a really cogent argument.
Yeah, I'll keep an eye out for it. I too am writing a program called the "Wanker remover". It will happily clobber anything written by Justin "idiot" Cheung who can't see his own dick past his stupid politics.
RMS publicly stated that the latest QPL was fine.
We're all glad to see that you took the apostrophe out of your sig.
Redhat should stop distributing RMS Linux immediately. Heaven forbid the most well-known Linux distributor out there try to come out with an Exclusively Free version. I suppose they should have just put in a link to Debian's site instead of even bothering.
>At this rate RedHat will start looking like RedMond
After my experience installing redhat 6.1, they look like microsoft with a hat on to me. There were numerous stupidities that could have easily been avoided by some simple testing - of the sort that totally reminded me of MS. Im just waiting for the right slashdot topic to come up so I can complain a lot.
Just as Debian, that is:
...
You can upgrade to the latest gcc/glibc/binutils, because you can recompile everything - no waiting on stalling commercial-package-suppliers
This might be too daunting for the casual user, but it's not out-of-reach for the distributor.
Toon Moene.
Qt is free software as defined by the FSF. Period.
Even RMS accepted that.
Most (if not all) Open Source software is free software as well.
The GPL is RMS's preferred license (well, he created it) but by far not the only one.
And the patchwork document is a simple opinion by someone who wants to redefine the meaning of "free software". Furthermore, the judgement of the QPL therein is based on a early, pre-release version (QPL 0.9). The final version had most of the concerns ironed out, with help from Debian.
I see little that resembles an anti-RedHat campaign, especially considering the enormous amount of cash directed at Linux that RedHat has received.
Let's be frank, the value of RedHat is not justified by the company value, but by the hopes in Linux in general. RedHat, as the first IPO and well-known distributor, was just the placeholder for Linux expectations.
It can therefore be expected that they pay back more to the community than others.
And then, RedHat is known for releasing code that only works on RedHat, while SuSE even releases X servers for FreeBSD...
Just buy the FSF's T-shirt instead. It's rather stodgy-looking, but it has the GNU Preamble on the back. You'll get more use out of it than that dumb CD set with no Netscape or KDE, and the FSF will make more than a dollar selling it to you (one would hope). If you felt really magnanimous you could even buy the shirt and donate enough to bring the total up to $29.95.
I mean from slashdot readers, not from RedHat.
Several people jump in claiming that to call the QPL non-free is disingeuous, stupid, or just plain wrong.
No-one jumps in to claim that the NPL is a free license.
And yet (assuming QT2) the two are very similar: both provide the code originator with a privileged position with respect to the code base.
I am perfectly happy to use Netscape and/or KDE (except that Netscape is bloated beyond the dreams of MS), but from an ideological position it is clear that a free distribution (or at least a GPL||BSD||Artistic distribution) should exclude both.
By the way, my development team here at Gnuidea Software is building a 100% Open Source, GPL Browser for Linux. We will give the browser away for free by FTP or website download, but will also produce a box set to be sold in stores, which will, like Red Hat's box set, include documenation, toll-free phone support access numbers, groovy stickers, free t-shirt coupons, a CD-ROM including Guido, other Gnuidea software like Waimea, Firecracker and GUM/GAB, as well as good security tools that are 100% GPL (i.e. Open Source). Like Red Hat, I will donate $1 for every box sold to the GNU/FSF for all their hard work over the years.
Here's a tentative listing of our 100% Open Source product line: (all are in design and/or early development stages)
Guido: Gnome Universal Internet Domain Observatory
Firecracker: Guido-based firewall testing utility
Waimea: stream cipher encryption algorithm
GUM/GAB: Gnome Universal Mailbox/Address Book
Ticker: Gnome panel ticker (e.g. auto-query for symbol:RHAT)
Once we have hard-coded the design, we will make the source code and binaries available on the Gnuidea website, temporarily located on my desktop plugged into the UCSC network:
http://169.233.22.137/index.html (Temporary site) http://www.gnuidea.com (official site, not yet configured to point to my AMD red hat box)
Best regards,
Justin "no-K-in-my-name" Cheung
--------------------------
Founder and Vice-President
Gnuidea Software
Santa Cruz, California
Open Source Software Dude
Penguin Computing
San Francisco, California
--------------------------
It's curious how a little web-bitch like you can be such an asshole sitting hiding behind your computer, safe at home... If you'd like to say that to my face like a real man, meet me at the Seabright Brewery any Tueday night, Santa Cruz, anytime so we can see who's the real idiot. I think i could decide in a minute whether to buy you a beer and be cool, or bitch-slap you for being such an asshole.
For a small co. like redhat, it's possible that support and stuff may be more expensive than actual CD burning.
In any case, I think it doesn't make sense to accuse a company of gouging its customers, when you can get a cheaper product elsewhere. Like, free from its own website, for instance.
I just get tired of people ripping a company to shreds because it's trying to make money. God, what an awful concept.
I can't believe that I have to resort to posting Anonymously to protect my karma, but here goes.
This place is getting out of control. It's bad enough when people open their yaps around here and start bitching about stuff that they don't understand. But that's okay. I understand the need and desire to jump in, even when you don't fully understand what's going on. Sometimes, this is even a good thing, because you can draw new participants into the forum and increase the breadth and depth of the discussion.
But who the fuck is moderating this shit up!!! Some of the comments that have 3's or 4's in this story are just plain factually wrong, or are completely idiotic rants!! Enough with this bullshit!!
And the number of level 3 or 4 redundant posts sucks too!! the first time it's informative, the second time, perhaps interesting, but the 3rd repeat comment is fucking redundant!! The fucking morons who are moderating this shit are just desparate to see their moderation points in effect.
I fucking hate the newb's around here!!!!
/* I got into this whole "red hat is too big and will squash the other distros" */
It will. Check out the support terms for other Linux distros in commercial software - often, none. Only supported on Redhat X.X
/* Red Hat giving GNOME (100% GPL as a core principle, not an afterthought) the chance to grab a foothold */
To the detriment of the Users desktop stability - just one in a long list of Redhats QA screwups.
/* I'm in full support of Red Hat, and will boycott any KDE-only distribution (i.e. Caldera and potentially Corel). */
Will you boycott any distro only supplying bash? Only supplying Xfree, only gcc, how far will you take your stance on choice? You pay the maker of the distro to select packages for you - and hopefully to get the best. No distro is inherently "anything only" to those with a net connection. I'm not going to use Debian if it doesn't come with KDE "officially". It would just make Linux to damn awkward.
/* Freedom of choice without bloat (sorry SUSE, 5CDs full of crap isn't going to cut it for "selection") */
Get current, its 6 Cd's. And you can exercise choice at install - it beats Redhats we won't include it, get it on the web at your own expense - without support.
I guess you have problems choosing for yourself.
I like this very much. I'm thinking my next Red Hat upgrade will be RMS Linux (killall -STONE bird :).
Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
Interesting choice of names, I believe it's Maori for `little water' (from memory, been a long time). Now what I'm wandering is how a little water would apply to a `stream cipher encryption algorithm'. Hmmm, as I was typing this, I got it: little water -> stream. Clever (I take it this was deliberate).
Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
Those were glorious times, but some people don't know when to let go...
TedC
well, with bootnet.img on a single floppy, i can put a decent distribution (redhat 6.1) on a machine with just 1 floppy.
M-x w3
/mill
Sure they have given much back to the community-at-large, but I was referring to the FSF in particular whom we have all benefitted from because of all the great GNU tools and such we have available. I know also, that the FSF is not there to make a profit necessarily, but they need income (which is different from profit) they must support the organization and I do believe they do have some people who work for pay (in addition to the many volunteers.) Correct me if I'm wrong. Thanks for the response anyway.
----------------
"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds." - Albert Einstein
Co-founder and designer at Music Nearby: http://musicnearby.com
...they could donate more than "...at least one dollar to the FSF." of the $29.95 total price. Don't get me wrong. I think it is cool they are doing this, but it seems they could give a little more to an organization that has contributed so much to the Linux community, not to mention Red Hat's bottom line. (Just MHO of course.)
----------------
"Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds." - Albert Einstein
Co-founder and designer at Music Nearby: http://musicnearby.com
Maybe you disgaree with this decision -- if so, put some effort into it yourself and upload QT2 RPMs to the RedHat contrib. (Actually, I'd be surprised if there aren't already QT2 RPMs available...)
--
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
How so? By not including Qt 2? Qt 2 is one of thousands of pieces of free software. By your standards, Debian is equally hypocritical. There's plenty of free software they don't include, either...
--
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
USI (Ubiquitous Slashdot Idiots). See the post you're responding to for an example of one. The USI crowd are generally recognizable for their "One True Way" attitude. USIs argue with one another all the time, but they have the same take, just switch a few words. One USI says "Since KDE exists it's stupid to work on GNOME." Another says the exact same thing, but reverses the terms. They generally are of low enough intelligence that I don't know if there's an actually opinion their and it matters to them if you reverse the terms or not -- they may be a batch of pattern-matching psuedo-AI's running at Micros~1 HQ in an attempt to flood Slashdot with worthless dross. I hope that's the case, I'd hate to think these USIs are actually people who exist and really do suffer from that much stupidity...
--
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
Understand that this is charity...
So it's completely unthinkable to pay for something unless you are threatened with fines and imprisonment?
Could you clarify that comment please? Plenty of people, myself included, have succesfully upgraded from 2.1 (aka "slink"), the current stable, to "potato", the current unstable, without any problems with the packaging system.
The APSL 1.0 was non-free; the APSL 1.1 was improved, and discussed on spi-general and license-discuss with postive responses, but I can't find a final judgement.
The OSD is essntially identical to the DFSG. The DFSG were created as a ruleset to decide whether a particular software's license should be considered free or not (disregarding dependency on non-free software).
In my opinion, the DFSG is still the closest thing we have to a definition of free software.
I agree with RMS that the way "Open Source" is used often downplays or ignores the freedom aspect, and that freedom aspect is very important.
Some argue that the DFSG needs to be tightened, but so far I'm unconvinced by the arguments I've seen.
That's pretty darned nifty! While that may silence some RedHat haters, I'm sure they'll find something else to complain about. :)
Important thing is that it provides and easy way for those who want to have a "purely free" Linux distro. Of course, most of those folks would probably prefer to roll their own!
GPL only? Does that mean you don't use X11?
This is a very cool thing. I wonder if this version will be available via ftp or cheapbytes type CDs
Here is a cut and paste from the newest copy of the QPL available from the Troll Tech homepage:
3. You may make modifications to the Software and distribute your modifications, in a form that is separate from the Software, such as patches. The following
restrictions apply to modifications:
a. Modifications must not alter or remove any copyright notices in the Software.
b. When modifications to the Software are released under this license, a non-exclusive royalty-free right is granted to the initial developer of the
Software to distribute your modification in future versions of the Software provided such versions remain available under these terms in addition to any
other license(s) of the initial developer.
RMS has stated that the QPL can be considered to be free software at least in theory,
although he does not applaud the QPL or the use of software released under it. The reason is that while technically fitting the description, it doesn't "fit" in the real world. The QPL aims at protecting the copyright of Troll Tech, while true
free licenses aims at allowing you to use and share the code. The QPL demands for patches and the fact that they get rights with your code that you don't get with theirs makes it not truly free.
Another non-Stallman point here is that since Qt is a library, the QPL should give rights comparable to the LGPL, not the GPL.
I set out to buy a RH6.1 from them and clicked on the package of the box on the front page and then on one of the buy buttons on the next page. Now, this selects a US/Canada version and on check out, the system complained that it can't send a US/Canada version to Japan, because of the $%#% export restrictions.
So, I started searching for an international version, which made me click on the small "Red Hat Linux" hyperlink on the left of the menu bar on top of the https://store.redhat.com/commerce/ page and (voila!) I had found my intl. version...and then, the "RMS Linux" link on the button of that page caught my attention :-)
You wanted to know...
Chilli
PS: And what do we learn from this? Stupid export restrictions, can be useful ;-)
-=- Just a random lambda hacker
PPS: I actually learned one more thing: Red Hat's store is rather US/Canada centric, but maybe they sell enough stuff there, so that they don't care about the rest of the planet...
-=- Just a random lambda hacker
Now, Red Hat could have done what most companies do when they donate part of their profit: They could have said, we donate 50% of our profit, but that doesn't tell you anything. Why? How about reading the Funding section in gcc's info documentation:
So, all Red Hat is doing is following a suggestion by the FSF. Next time, before you complain, RTFM.It is of course possible to argue whether the name of the distribution is good or not, but the point here is to increase public awareness concerning the importance of RMS's and the FSF's contribution - that's the main argument of RMS when insisting on the name GNU/Linux if I understand him correctly. It emphasis Red Hat's commitment to strive not only for open, but for free software.
Of course they are a company, so they have to make compromises, but to date, they contributed every line of code back to the community under the GPL - that's what ultimately counts. How many lines did you contribute?
Chilli
-=- Just a random lambda hacker
Subtle. Even had to take another look at the original just to be sure... =)
Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
Is this another sign of the worsening of the YALD (Yet Another Linux Distribution) Syndrome?
RMS-Linux?
Is it any different from RMS's "famous" GNU/Linux ?
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
---
Redhat donating to the FSF, isn't that sort
of like saying that microsoft donates money
to it's software developers?
---
Bad analogy. Any software the developer asks for money back for, Red Hat would have to pay for. I don't blame the developers for doing it for free, but I don't feel Red Hat is taking undue advantage of them in the process. If you give stuff away, don't bitch when people take it.
- Darchmare
- Axis Mutatis, http://www.axismutatis.net
- Jeff
...until they need to use a decent web browser to get work done.
Yay for open-source, yay for closed source. A big yay for good source of all kinds.
- Darchmare
- Axis Mutatis, http://www.axismutatis.net
- Jeff
True, but that doesn't mean all GNU software requires them to be paid. I'm making the assumption that RedHat is only bundling software that doesn't request payment - or paying for that which does. If the specific software itself is 'free' in the traditional sense as well as freedom-wise, then what's the problem?
Is there a piece of software that requires payment that Red Hat isn't paying? If so, then that's bad.
I've noticed that a lot of open-source projects work almost like advertising for coders who want to be hired on. Sort of a "this is what I can do for your company" type of thing. Even if the software itself is free all around, they still end up financially rewarded in the end.
- Darchmare
- Axis Mutatis, http://www.axismutatis.net
- Jeff
Not at all. That's the thing, Red Hat IS paying - and not out of any requirement to do so. That's what I'd call a Very Good Thing, but there will still be people out there who rip on them for it. "You're not giving enough", etc.
No, it's not unthinkable to pay for something when not threatened by fines or imprisonment. It's unthinkable for someone to point fingers at a company who is already giving a substantial amount of cash to a good cause and tell them they are in the wrong. Charity is charity because it's not required or expected, but encouraged at any amount.
Do you get pissed at families who only give a small fraction of their yearly income to charity each year? For every dollar given, that's one dollar more than they had to give. I'm just saying give them a break, this is a good thing.
- Darchmare
- Axis Mutatis, http://www.axismutatis.net
- Jeff
Translation: "What? WHAT?!? You mean you only donate $50,000 a year to the FSF? You greedy corporate bastards, how dare you? You should donate ALL OF YOUR MONEY to them!"
Oy. Some people can't be pleased. Understand that this is charity, and $1 can be a significant chunk of profit. Care to explain this to RHAT's stock holders?
(and yes, it's very nice of you to give RedHat permission for a price hike, I'm sure they appreciate it)
- Darchmare
- Axis Mutatis, http://www.axismutatis.net
- Jeff
I think that the point is because Red Hat is different from Debian. For myself, I happen to have started using RedHat (the Mother's Day release) long before I new there was a Debian. I like it, I'm used to it. Debian neither is, nor ever will be RPM based. If I wanted to switch to a 100% (FSF) Free GNU/Linux distribution, Debian would not be an option in my mind because I really like the way RPM does things, it's got me spoiled. Mind you, I'm not saying that Debian doesn't have an excellent package manager, I just happen to like RPM and want to stick with it.
Just my two cents.
I want all of the power and none of the responsibility.
"Redhat Means Source", which coincidentally is the same three letters as a certain free software stalwart. I wonder which came first, the slogan or the initials? :)
--
At least the main share of the Debian profits goes to SPI (Software in the Public Interest), which is a charity set up to maintain Debian etc. I'm not sure if they donate to the FSF or not, but I wouldn't be surprised if they do.
And yes, Debian is 100% free, at least the stuff in the `main' section. They even have special definitions of what `free' implies -- you can't have anything exclusive to Debian, for instance.
/* Steinar */
(This comment is of course GPLed.)
I haven't looked at RMS Linux, but I wonder if the definitions of 'free' are as strict as those for Debian. Debian has a nice utility called "Virtual RMS" that tells you everything you have installed from Debian that is vaguely non-free, and I try to be very choosey and take the free alternatives where possible. Debian has made some very laudable decisions and have stuck to their guns even when such a choice is unpopular. I just wonder if this "RMS Linux" is every bit as free as RMS would like, as I think that Debian tries to be.
yeah, I was just thinking about how Debian was mentioned as donating their proceeds... Wondering if RH thought that it would be a good idea to make themselves look good.
why invent yet another encryption algorithm if there are already lots of strong algorithms out there? Why should I trust your algorithm to be secure?
--
bgphints - internet routing news, hints and ti
I take it Redhat has never heard of Debian?
/.'ers haven't either. Debian is completely free in the GNU sense. Of course, they don't give a buck to the FSF everytime you buy it, because they don't CHARGE anything for it.
Apparently
Use Debian and give the FSF a buck yourself.
A slip of the foot you may soon recover, but a slip of the tongue you may never get over. -Benjamin Franklin
They don't do anything in TeX either, but it's not what THEY can do with it... I guess they really should have included the free software version of Qt.
Prior to QT 2, neither the "Open Source" nor the "Free Software" people thought QT was free...
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
Netscape is not open source.
Mozilla is open source but, until Netscape 5 (based on Mozilla), Netscape is not open source.
So it would not be included in a `open source' version of RedHat either.
I mean, selling software package and then give a portion to FSF. How Microsoft like!!!! I see this as yet another attempt to extend and embrace the community. Resist my brothers and sisters. We will stop them from, eh, doing good, because 1) they are a business, 2) they actually think they can *buy* goodwill by donating money, and 3) how Microsoft like of them to give money away, and not even all of it!!!
Lets boycott RedHat for... something... oh, yeah, for not giving away free (as in speech) support, package, t-shirts, hats (I want my red hat!!!).
BTW. the above was an attempt on sarcasme. I agree with the writer above (or below depending on your settings). If you are so much against the idea of RedHat only donating $1 pr. package sold, don't buy it. Send all the money you would have spent to FSF. Then SHUT UP!!!! It's a charity. They don't have to do it.
Je ne parle pas francais.
I mean, it's good that Red Hat is doing this, putting a little bit back to the community, but just $1.00 back to the FSF? Honestly, if I'm paying $30, I expect that at least $15 of it should go, considering the forementioned $6 for CD pressing, and let's say about $5 for anything else, that's still $19 left unused that could be going into the FSF.
Besides which, could someone clarify this for me? I thought that the GPL prohibited people from charging more than press and distrobution costs for a product, that's why anyone who makes a RedHat CD and sells it can only sell it for the price of the CD-R. Wouldn't that make this whole thing a violation(I won't even touch RedHat's regular price for it's distro!).
It just seems that this is just an attempt by Red Hat to get points with a community they've mostly alienated already. Red Hat is a corporation, and even worse, it is one that is following MS's lead to the top.
Cliff Palmer, Jr.
-Julius X
remove "-whatkindofspamdoyoutakemefor-" from email to send
I know several places (including Linux Systems Labs and, of course, my vague CD selling business) let you designate funds
to give to Debian. I'm not sure if anyone does it for the FSF, though (but it would be a good idea).
My Blog. Sela Ward can sell me long distanc
Okay, so I cruised on over to the SEC's site and looked at form S-1 (is that the one you were talking about?). I am still unconvinced. It said they were dependent on the support of Linus Torvalds and other prominent Linux developers. But they were talking about developments from those people, not goodwill. If Linux puts out a new kernel, it doesn't matter whether he hates Red Hat or not. Red Hat can still bundle it in RH Linux 7.9. Another risk mentioned is that Open Source community may react negatively to their business strategy. They say this may affect their reputation and brand name. I stick by my original claim that Open Source bitching about Microsoft has not hurt their brand name and reputation. Red Hat makes it clear that this would really only affect them if this perception is shared by their customers.
Again, you haven't really given me much to go on here. If Red Hat damages their relationship with the Open Source Community how is their business, operating results, and financial condition damaged? Is the risk only that they might get some bad PR from a disgruntled Open Source Community?
I thought Red Hat's business model was subscription based service?
Ok, beat it!
Go work for Redmond or maybe you do!
I have RedHat 6.1, and it rocks.
And I have never been able to fail in installing any package!
And btw, instead of f**king around like this, use gnorpm with rufus.w3.org/linux/RDF, to get any god damn software you want in rpm format.
Not satisfied, get the f***ing src rpm and type rpm --rebuild blahblahblah!
Not satisfied, build it you idiot!
Ciao
The kernel needs a Gtk/Gnome-based post-install device configuration tools "a la" make xconfig. (Better sig coming soon
It's intresting that usually a person can presume the public looks down on Microsoft for any given activity and be right.
Microsoft has generated such a name for themselfs it's hard to believe they don't have some hidden agenda in what ever they are doing.
But where chartable giving is conserned it's hard to consider a hidden agenda.
I don't actually exist.
I dunno about you folks.. but I get the :>
:>
warm fuzzlies from hearing stuff like this
Next check I'll donate some extra straight to them...
I don't need another distribution though..
btw.. website should be back up in a few days... thanx.
Friends don't let friends buy Compaq's. (Dell/Gateway... same same) You want a good computer? Build it yourself.
It would be a lot more telling of their support of the FSF if they donated $1 for every package sold, and didn't restrict this to some sideline product. In fact, I think they ought to do just that (they have my permission to bump up the price $1 to make this possible).
Belief is the currency of delusion.
Here we go =)
)
IIRC, QT 1.x was non-free due to a license clause that restricted commercial use. According to various Free Software definitions (RMS's, FSF's, Debian's..) the license can't be restrictive to any one group specifically. Let me dig up the Debian defn..
1.Free Redistribution
The license of a Debian component may not restrict any party from selling or giving away the software as a component of an aggregate software distribution containing programs from several different sources. The license may not require a royalty or other fee for such sale.
This was taken from the Debian free software guidelines (http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
Now, as stated by RMS himself, the QT 2.x license IS free. So no worries, it's just that there are no versions of KDE linked against QT 2 that are release quality. So KDE 1.x, linked against QT 1.x, is non-free.
There, I said it =)
... is for phone support in case you need a hand to install Linux. Many corporations require some form of support to even CONSIDER using an OS Of any kind. If you don't need assistance, then don't even buy the $3 CD, just get the ISO and buy a $1.50 blank CD.
Could someone please explain in simple terms why QT is not seen as 'free'? (as in speech)
Didn't it get the seal of approval a while back, with the new QT2.0 licence?
Yes, but consider that the current stable KDE version uses a pre-2.0 Qt, which is non-free. KDE fan as I might be, I sympathize with Red Hat on excluding the current KDE from the "RMS" version of their distribution.
"Oppression and harassment is a small price to pay to live in the land of the free." -- Montgomery Burns.
my thoughts are that it would be a complete and utter waste of effort.
;)
what is wrong with you guys and your 'politics'???
(bit of a troll, i know
Hmm, I'm not entirely sure what your post means, but i *assume* it's meant to be sarcastic.
;)
Anyway, are you *really* saying that the world would be a better place if somebody went about essentially replicating all the years of effort that have gone into XFree, just so that it can be given a slightly different licence?
If so, then be my guest
Speaking of Red Hat's web site -
What is up with the redesign? Red Hat has done one of those horrible redesigns that I have seen before on places like Network Solutions where they get rid of useful information and put up a crappy corporate shell site. I did a search for an rpm I was looking for (imap), and it comes up with a page but the link was broken, because of the redesign. I ftp to ftp.redhat.com and after several minutes it says to check the mirrors web page. So I check it, and where do I wind up ftp'ing the rpm from? Cdrom.com, home of FreeBSD. To me, just another sign of Walnut Creek's superiority to Red Hat, despite all the hype. I can install (Free)BSD from over the net with one diskette, let me see a decent Linux distribution that lets you do that? Why should they, then you won't go to the store and pluck down $89 for the CD-ROM. Anyway, it's good to see Stallman get his due. I don't know where I'd be without GNU's software.
The KDE issue -
KDE 1.1.2, the latest stable release of KDE, doesn't run solely on Qt 2 yet. It's not Free Software. This isn't a slight against Qt, Troll Tech, or KDE, it just isn't free software yet. While a case can be made for not including KDE 2 for hacking purposes, KDE 1.x can't be on a Free Software CD. It just can't.
The FSF Money Issue -
No other commercial distribution makes any attempt - any attempt - to either sell a Free version of their distro or give money to the FSF. Are they doing this because it makes them look good - of course! But that doesn't mean it's a bad thing! Does this mean that making a charitable donation and then claiming it as a tax-deduction is a bad thing? Can you do nothing nice for people unless it is entirely altruistic?
RedHat and Free Software -
No other distribution (except perhaps SuSE with XFree86) comes even close to donating as much to the community as RedHat - GNOME, Enlightenment, even RPM's for crying out loud! And everything - everything - that they produce is GPL'ed. Why didn't Caldera GPL Lizard? Why don't other distros go GPL on their development? RedHat is a great friend to Free Software, and we should be thankful.
The Newbie Factor -
Everyone complains that RedHat is the distro of choice for newbies. Good. People are picking up a cool system. This is good. If someone screws up and confuses RedHat with Linux, then explain to them how it works. It isn't unreasonable to see how someone could get confused, because this is a very strange business model. You don't see 35 companies all selling a product called Doritos, each at a different price and with a different philosophy, but all still Doritos and all made pretty much the same way.
I remember when we were patient and explained things to people. Now it seems like a bunch of newb's just want to come in and scream at each other. Slashdot forums are starting to look like AOL chat rooms.
I think this product comes with some form of support. In that case, Redhat are doing exactly what all proponents of OSS for business say they should be doing - making money from support.
If this is true (and it is hard to tell), then Redhat truely should be appluded for their donation. Otherwise, well... think of it as financial aid for all those hackers who got in on the IPO.
Again, if it is true, feel free to go and donate your $27 to the FSF and buy a cheapbytes CD, but remember to tell your boss at the nameless multinational corporation you work for to go and buy the RMS version on Linux from Redhat, so Redhat will give you support - then the FSF will get $1 from each of the 22,000 licences you buy. :-)
Go and have a look on www.gnu.org for the small, but important difference.
You know, Redhat Means Source is the gayest slogan I've ever heard. Not to mention misleading.
I have not so far seen anyone mention two facts about the currently-shipping RMS Linux that seem pretty important to me:
1- It is based on RH6.0, not 6.1
2- It includes alpha and sparc as well as x86
(that's why it is a 4 CD set).
Free software for $29?? i think i'll buy 2!#%&
AFAIK, the current stable version of KDE cannot use the Qt 2.x libraries. The QPL licence covers only Qt releases >= 2.x.
Obviously, it doesn't make much sense to include KDE (which is free) if you can't use it.
The point is that Red Hat claims to be using the DSFG/OpenSource guidelines. On this basis, they are being hypocritical. To be honest, they should say that they do not agree with those guidelines and that they are holding some "higher" standard. You can't have it both ways: you can't just pick and choose which DSFG-free software is really free if you adhere to the DSFG in the first place. About http://www.gnu.org/software/software.html:
"free software" is not equivalent to "GNU software": there is a lot of free software not mentioned on that page that is free and even GPL/LGPL. Besides, look closely at what that page actually says: "These are some additional Non-GPL-covered free programs which we think it is useful to mention." The list does not claim to be exhaustive.
Another point is that you cannot do "whatever you like" with GPL software. I can't sell it and keep the source to myself for example
Finally, there was some discussion between RMS and Troll Tech about the issue you hghlighted (6c), but RMS still considers Qt 2.x as free software. The bottom line is that one must be consistent in one's use of the word `free'. When you say "I can't call this free software also" you are using the word `free' in a different sense than what the Open Source/DSFG guidelines state. This is OK as long as there is one is clear about what one is doing.
I stand by my statement that Red Hat is playing the politics of division.
Best wishes to you
Samawi
I believe there may also be a quote somewhere where RMS says that Free Software should be used even if there is a better proprietary equivalent.
I think the Free Software argument is about (funnily enough) FREEDOM. ie, that proprietary software threatens us all.
My bias is to agree with that proposition, and I thank RMS and all the other GNU-heads for what they have achieved. Just when our freedom was most at threat from microsoft and government hegemony (also thanks Phil Zimmerman), Free Software snuck in to mass conciousness and more or less saved us.
I may be going too far now, but I think RMS is practically a Ghandi like figure in his ideals and practice.
He talks the talk and walks the walk. For fucks sake, he wrote the compiler! We would any of us be without that?
-- Reverend Vryl
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
Now, what you seem to be missing is the investor connection. The investors determine the stock price. This price is based on perception -- what the investors think. If they think that RHAT is worth a bundle, they'll be willing to pay more, and the stock will go up, even if Red Hat's profits are nil and even if the stock price no longer has any relationship to reality. It's what the investors think, and nothing else, that counts.
Now, RHAT's financial filings are unimpressive, and yet they're stock is high. Why is that? Again, it's what the investors *think* that counts. Investors *think* that Red Hat is a part of this new Open Source Movement that they *think* promises to usher in an entirely new way of looking at, buying, maintaining, and using software, and they *think* that this promise will be very valuable someday. If that promise is false, however, they have no reason to invest in RHAT.
Consequently, if investors get wind that Red Hat is not playing nice with the Linux, Open Source, and free-software communities, they'll be forced to conclude that Red Hat, itself, doesn't buy into the promise of the Open Source Movement. The investors will *think* that the Open Source promise is broken, and they'll sell RHAT like crazy, and the stock price will drop. Which, as many people have pointed out, Red Hat's leaders are obligated to avoid.
And that's why Red Hat has an obligation to do right by the aforementioned communities.
Cheers,
Tom
Easy, automatic testing for Perl.
One buck??
Why? It would be much cooler if they throw them one cent for every sold copy, I think. One buck is just too much.
:-(
I don't think we frown on their donations, just them.
Juln
Uhm. Except for the fact that they refer to it as GNU+Linux at least once in the product listing.
Of course, one *could* ask the question of how much money Red Hat gives to the FSF *outside* of this product? Does anyone have those figures, or are we to just assume that Red Hat is the Evil Empire Redux?
Why not just get the Cheap Bytes CD-ROM for $3, or $6, or whatever they are charging, and donate $20 to the FSF? Same result, more money for the good guys.
- Have a picture
What's the difference? An open source advocate would be happy enough to see the source. A free software advocate wouldn't be happy until they had the rights to modify the code.
The point of doing this is that RedHat is big! They actually have a chance of selling some volume, which could raise a significant amount of money for the fsf. Like it or not, newbies have a lot of trust in big companies. If redhat can market this well, this could do a lot not only to raise money, but to raise awareness of free software. Even on /. there are a lot of people who seem pretty clueless about the difference between open and free.
Oops! You are absolutely right. Sorry to everyone I criticised.
I guess if they labelled it a 'fully GPL compatible' distribution, then there would have been no controversy, because (I assume) most of us accept RMS' analysis that while the QPL is DFSG-free, it is not GPL compatible.
Since the name is an obvious homage to RMS, the intent to be 'GPL compatible' might be inferred. But by using the word 'free' instead RH perhaps treated KDE a little harshly.
What and use an operating system that isn't supported by a large corporate entity! Are you crazy!!
But seriously... yes perhaps RedHat is feeling threatened by Debian's place in the linux world.
As in it is completely free, and while it is not quite as friendly to set up and use (or at least I am told, I personally have never had any trouble with it... I love it...), it is the most complete distribution, and everything in the distribution is free (as in freedom....) but the contrib (meaning still free but not necessarily as in freedom) and non-free (as in free in the ambiguously frightening commercial way).
YADA, YADA, YADA. So what will you use Gnome? That's even more crap. IMHO Gnome is the Windows of the Linux world right now. And just what we need another Linux distro. Jesus, Now everyone will be putting one out. I guess you want to help in the fragmentation of Linux huh? If you want a new LInux distro make one for your own use. I don't think anyone cares about another Lnux distro. There is enough good ones out there. Why don't you spend your time and effort helping one of the others out. I really don't think many people care whether a distro is 100% pure GPL OSS.
Don't go away mad, just go away.
Gabriel/TSS!
The Truth is a Virus!!!
Very well stated :)
OTOH, $1 is actually a good piece of the pie considering Redhat mentions in their SEC filing and elsewhere that they do not make money on their CD distributions in general. Their money is made through support contracts, training, etc.
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
Interestingly, part of the RMS Linux result will be to ask "how much does the community really care about 'free'ness vs. openness?"
For all some people will talk about how software must be free, many, many people care more about the openness. It's not an awareness issue in many cases either, people simply believe what they believe and it doesn't make sense to most people that a software product "must be free".
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
Nobody frowns on the millions MS employees donate to charities, just that they believe those millions are significant in light of available funds.
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
The OSS movement also exists because many of us disagree with RMS on the "nature" of the digital world. Not all of us believe that digital media must be free (as in speach, of course.
... read his writings.
It happens to be that many intelligent business will see the advantages of open source software, but probably won't agree re: free software per se because it goes against the nature of what they're doing in most cases (selling software). RMS has said many things about this, so I won't bother any more
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
Of course Red Hat's moves are selfish - but that's the nature of altrusim. For every altruistic act,
there is an equal an opposing selfish counter-act. Altruism is meant to set up symbiosis, where both
parties invoived are better off than each party alone. I'd rather have RedHat giving back to the
community rather than Microsoft obliterating the community.
And think before you post: how much would the FSF be getting if RedHat *didn't* make this
move? Far less than they would with it - the FSF doesn't have the advertising, marketing, or
political muscle to get this kind of support on their own, so RedHat's move gets both them and their philosophy a platform for expression, as well as validating the reasons for their existence.
As for red hat, well, with this move they enforce the development community, which translates to
faster turn-around and quicker products. Its just a little more complex than a PR manoeuver. So
kudos for them and their move - I think it was brilliant.
Ed
(PS: you think that contributions for Free Software are 'totally altruistic?' BS: in this case the payment for the contributor is knowledge, skills, ability to use good software products, etc. I doubt that there are many developers out there toiling in the dark under total anonymity. They've got to get *something* out of it - they wouldn't be doing it if they didn't.)
If you think donating to the FSF is so cool, and that would be the reason for buying a copy of RMS Linux, then why not just donate the whole $29.95 directly to the FSF?
I want to thank both Redhat and RMS for this excellent thing they offer.
Recently I downloaded the entire Redhat 6.1 binaries and source CDs over my cable modem from a local university's mirror site - see
http://www.redhat.com/download/mirror.ht ml
for a mirror site near you. To make it totally easy to burn CD copies, the mirror site had these as ISO disc images!
Do you know if Redhat intends to make the RMS distro available for free downloading? Of course the FSF would not get that dollar, but I at least would be willing to send a check off direct to the FSF. I'll tell you for sure, the RMS all-free distro is the one I want on my home computer.
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
True, but the product is "RMS Linux". Stallman, you know RMS, has said that Linux should be used in reference to the kernel only and that the entire system should be "The GNU system" or "GNU/Linux".
However, I do feel you are making some statements which aren't exactly fair. For example; if everyone does feel QT & KDE is free software, why didn't they put it on http://www.gnu.org/software/software.html ? The page is recently updated so that should not be the problem.
Next. If you read the description you can see that this free release is made so people can easily modify, rewrite, redistibute, or simply do what ever they like to it. Easy; you can do this because it is free software. Now... lets take a look at the QT license (http://www.troll.no/qpl/):
6. You may develop application programs, reusable components and other software items that link with the original or modified versions of the Software. These items, when distributed, are subject to the following requirements:
a. You must ensure that all recipients of machine-executable forms of these items are also able to receive and use the complete machine-readable source code to the items without any charge beyond the costs of data transfer.
b. You must explicitly license all recipients of your items to use and re-distribute original and modified versions of the items in both machine-executable and source code forms. The recipients must be able to do so without any charges whatsoever, and they must be able to re-distribute to anyone they choose.
c. If the items are not available to the general public, and the initial developer of the Software requests a copy of the items, then you must supply one.
So; whenever I make a program using the qt library the developers of this library can demand a copy of the program I made. Just considering this one little detail (I won't go into more due to the time) I think RedHat made the correct decision. I can't call this free software also.
Just curious since we are in a 'redhat based topic' at the moment. I know it will run since RedHat is plain Linux, easy does it. But will it also update RPM databases and such if an user installed the rpm files?
QT may be useful for things other than KDE, but since RHat doesn't make anything on QT, it makes it kind of pointless to distribute it (kinda like giving an engine but not a car).
Nice one RedHat, this is what we like to see.
--
--
Andy
donate to needier charities is frowned upon by people here :|
not that there's anything wrong with RMS Linux.
Debian already is composed of all free software
(not all GPL, but free software). Redhat is kinda
stepping over the line.
For every altruistic act, there is an equal an opposing selfish counter-act.
:)
but then... that's not Altruism! It's ethical egoism!
Okay, I had a high-school debate flashback. Sorry
Interesting to apply this exact argument to Microsoft. Just as RedHat execs have a legal and moral duty to maximise the RedHat stock price, so do execs at MS. Looks like they're doing a pretty good job...
If you don't like the end result, blame capitalism, not an individual company.
R: The freedom to read the source code and learn from it.
M: The freedom to modify the software so that it fits my needs better.
S: The freedom to share the software with other people.
Ok, so moderate me "corny".
I've had people try to hire me over the phone when I call a company for tech support. On the other side of the fence, I've had interview candidates call up and cancel their interviews because they got an on-the-spot offer at another interview, and they took it.
The ability of a software company to survive depends on its ability to attract and retain engineering talent.
Microsoft knows this. They have made public comments about their view that developer mindshare is key to their business, and that Java and Linux are making inroads into that mindshare.
Red Hat has found a novel way to attract developer mindshare. That's part of what supports their stock value. As you say, Red Hat actually has an obligation to their shareholders to attract and retain developer talent.
I think Red Hat has a great strategy and great execution for doing so. Contrast with Corel, which provoked some serious developer ill will with their licensing policies.
What I don't get is how RH sells a $29 product, that is FREE SOFTWARE and only gives $1 back. When it should be giving all but maybe $10 for the cost of the CD they burnt it on. Don't flame me if I got something wrong. Im in school right now hahaha when I should be doing my work.
That was a GREAT story. You can be sure I'll be relating your parable around many company campfires in the next few weeks to a lot of Suits that THINK they know open source but don't know jackware from slackware. Unfortunately I have to deal with them all the time .. but stories like yours really nail a point.
Thanks!
Crusade against lame software! votezone.com
Red Hat is not serious in the least about "open source", let alone about "free software". As evidence, consider the following:
* Red Hat sells Red Hat Motif, a closed-source program, for $150.
* Red Hat has, in the past, sold various other closed-source programs.
* Red Hat's commercial version (i.e. not the one you download) includes an entire CD filled with nothing but commercial programs, most (all?) of which are closed-source.
* Red Hat's site is littered with ads for closed-source programs, including an exceedingly expensive compiler (namely, Code Warrior).
* Red Hat makes no efforts to separate closed-source (or, for that matter, non-free) software from open-source software in its distribution. Things like Netscape and, in the past, XV (I've heard they took it out?), are mixed indiscriminately with the other packages in Red Hat's heirarchy of package categories. They make no efforts, as Debian does, to separate the "free" from the "non-free", or at LEAST the "open-source" from the "closed-source". They're just all mixed in in one great big mishmash.
Think about it. All of this adds up to the simple conclusion that Red Hat does what they do pertaining to helping the "open source" movement not out of any sort of moral belief, but out of the desire for money.
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
There was no sarcasm intended... I am not going to pursue developing anything like XFree... I am committed to working on Guido and Firecracker first, then perhaps spending some serious time on Waimea... I'm sorry if my post was ambiguous. Again, I wasn't being sarcastic... I agree with your statement and AM NOT going to pursue working on a GPL re-write of XFree
Take care,
Justin
so tell me, Anonymous Coward... what does that mean? Yes, I work for Penguin and am damn proud to be affiliated with the company.. We're doing some cool things other people are not doing, but our support for open source software has not changed. We are committed to pushing open source, as much as we can.
I think you've misquoted Miguel, but if he did say that, provide me with a primary source document that will prove to me beyond a reasonable doubt that an Anonymous Coward like you is telling the truth.
I remember Miguel being quoted in MIT's Technology Review as saying something like "windows did some things right"... but never did I hear him say "I want to be Windows"... Your error, no matter how minor you think it to be, could be a complete misrepresentation of how Miguel really feels... If you want the final verdict, why not ask Miguel himself to post his official position on GNOME..
On another note, someone said KDE is stable??? I'd like to set up another GUI crash-a-thon and show the world how easy it is to crash KDE... KDE is just plain crap when it comes to stability, and it has heavier hardware requirements by default.
GNOME, on the other hand, runs over an independent windowmanager, and when we were finally able to crash GNOME (it took us over five times as long to crash GNOME as it did to crash KDE), the Enlightenment window manager was still there.. all we had to do was "ps ax", kill off all the phantom processes, and open up an xterm and type "panel &"... GNOME was back... try that with KDE!
Justin Cheung
Gnuidea Software, Santa Cruz
Penguin Computing, San Francisco
http://www.penguincomputing.com
Web browsers can indeed be 100% GPL>.. my team of developers is working on one as we speak.. and when we have something ready to show, we'll turn it over to the open source community to see what we can do to make Guido even better.
Justin Cheung
Founder and Vice-Penguin, Gnuidea Software
Open Source Dude, Penguin Computing
http://www.penguincomputing.com
I forgot to add one thing: I personally (this is my own politics at hand) am developing a text-based KDE uninstall utility called "Special K"... it will completely remove KDE core files, Qt files, and all the rest of the crap that is KDE... Special-K will be available on the Gnuidea website soon... Keep an eye out for it!
Later gaters,
Justin (of Gnuidea Software and Penguin Computing)
Right on... It's like that a lot and even happened to me once... I got into this whole "red hat is too big and will squash the other distros" mode and supported Debian for a while... Now, after Red Hat 6.0 and Red Hat giving GNOME (100% GPL as a core principle, not an afterthought) the chance to grab a foothold, I'm in full support of Red Hat, and will boycott any KDE-only distribution (i.e. Caldera and potentially Corel). Freedom of choice without bloat (sorry SUSE, 5CDs full of crap isn't going to cut it for "selection") is what i want, that's why I use Red Hat and Turbolinux (which will include GNOME and Enlightenment on their next workstation release)...
Justin
ruud writes: "why invent yet another encryption algorithm if there are already lots of strong algorithms out there?"
I'm doing it because I love mathematics and it is not just my algorithm, it will be a community effort to work on crypto design. IF you're not interested in working on it, that's your problem... I am not going to demand that anyone use Waimea... stream ciphers are special, and this is merely my project. You don't have to like it, or use it.
"Why should I trust your algorithm to be secure?"
You don't have to. It's your choice to trust or not to trust, based on your analysis of the Waimea source code and binaries... It doesn't sound like you're interested in using, or contributing to the Waimea project anyway. Again, (I shouldn't have to reiterate this, but you seem to be making lots of assumptions about me and about the Waimea project) I am not pushing any of this on anyone!... People have the choice to download, or not to download... to develop, or not to develop... to buy the box set, or not to buy the box set... It's all about choice, and if you're not interested, then choose not to become involved. I make no claims of producing the best stream cipher ever... I am just trying my hand at design and development and with the help of the open source community and the right crypto people, things could work out nice for Waimea.
Justin
"I really don't think many people care whether a distro is 100% pure GPL OSS."
I care.
If you don't care, that's your choice. I don't think your opinion, or mine, is necessarily representative of Linux users in general...
Justin
You can e-mail me at: unroot@cats.ucsc.edu if you have further flames, or if you wish to schedule a face-to-face meeting...
Thanks,
Justin
Good point... However, since I'm not doing a distribution of Linux, i'll leave the X11/XFree86 issues up to the appropriate parties. Gnuidea software will be 100% GPL.
But since you mentioned it, I was wondering if you think re-writing XFree as 100% GPL software would be a good thing. What are your thoughts on writing a GPL Xserver from scratch that would handle current needs and demands?
Justin
It's funny how the script kiddie flamers just seem to go away after a while... hmm... =) gotta love slashdot!
I'm more interested in exchanging ideas with someone who's not afraid to link their identity with their statements. Any takers?
Justin
I'd like to see the source code for the Wanker remover program you're writing... I think you may really have something there!
Justin
P.S. I can see both my dick and my politics just fine.
Thanks for your advice! I'll put my efforts into designing good software and allowing the open source community to contribute at as early as stage (in product development) as I can... Take care, and best regards,
Justin
Yes, it's about the freedom of choice... You can choose to disclose your identity, and stand behind your flames, or you can choose, like you've shown us all, to post as "Anonymous Coward". so what's it gonna be? Oh and if you gutless script kiddies were thinking of breaking into my site, please do so by all means... and while you're inside, please enjoy the landmines and trojan horses, especially the ones that look and feel like the real thing.
Your pal Justin =)
I smelled alot of sarcasm in his post dude
The angle of the Dangle is equaly proportional to the heat of the beat. ---Beavis
well if redhat doesn't turn a profit they lose... they will either get acquired or drop out of business thats the way things work
The angle of the Dangle is equaly proportional to the heat of the beat. ---Beavis
1. The lack of packages non-"open" packages such as Netscape, QT and KDE is good in principle, as this is a showcase of GPL only work, but this is an inconvenience toward the actual usability of the installed operating system. True it is easy to install the packages later, but this is another step. Hackers wouldn't mind, but the average consumer would not find this an attractive feature.
Result: Hacker/FSF supporter/Demonstration only Distribution
2. If someone wanted to support the FSF, they could donate that $29.95 and give 30 times as much money. All of those packages are available free, as they are all GPL. Even the RMS distribution itself is copyable and legal. If you want the convenience of that package, just find somebody and copy their CD's. Legal.
Of course, by buying from Redhat you are also supporting the free software community. They have to somehow get out of the Red. Their efforts in development, commercial support and Linux advocation have been a major boost to Linux in the past years and will continue to help our cause in the years to come.
If you're a supporter, buy this, it helps us all. =)
I don't know if this really occured to anyone else, but in doing this Redhat can easily show how much good software there is in GPL. Just imagine : You can show this to all those non-believers out there, "look, here is an entire operating system, complete with all kinds of applications, which is very usable and practical, yet it is ALL open and free". Tell me we haven't come a long way :-)
- They can't include Qt 1.x because it's non-free.
- They can't include KDE stable because it won't run without Qt 1.x.
- There's no point in including Qt 2.x as few if any packages use it yet
Basicly, Qt 2 would be a waste of space until stable versions of KDE start using it.Bill - aka taniwha
--
Leave others their otherness. -- Aratak
Ahh, but with the RMS version, every time you type "Linux", a daemon corrects it to "GNU/Linux". A similar patch modifies incoming email.
:)
I would expect that the potential profit on that represents $3, and sending $1 of that to the FSF actually is reasonably generous.
The notion that they're changing anything that has been established for the last 30 years is pretty silly; there has been evolution of locations chosen to "put stuff" throughout the history of UNIX.
The usual criticisms of this come from the perspective that RHAT tends to use SysV-isms as opposed to BSD-isms.
And criticizing RHAT for not following HOWTOs that are not likely being maintained and which probably also don't match the other distributions seems to me to be a cheap shot. HOWTOs tended to be written for Slackware, and many are quite horribly out of date. Feel free to criticize the HOWTO Trainwreck; that would be an interesting Slashdot thread...
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
You'd think that if they were going to boost their credentials with the letters RMS they might have done the guy a favour and called it
RMS GNU/Linux
But then that would dilute the (de facto)Linux brand, and confuse the customers. After all, Linux is the cool late 90's phenomenon, while GNU is long-haired 1970's programmers.
Linux brand = Nice young man who works for All-American pioneers Transmeta, and who is taking on big bad Bill. Cool new OS that is surfing the Internet wave to steal a march on NT. Neat word with an 'x' and the end.
GNU brand = Old guy with long hair who doesn't work for anybody and hangs around at some university. Some wierd programs with two and three letter names. Named his movement after a smelly animal from Africa.
I rather like the idea of these two things being combined. But image is everything......
-----
I know there are differences in the open/free software community, but what exactly is the *technical* difference? And what is the *philosophical* difference?
Good question. Warning: like everyone here, I'm biased, so I'm going to make a longer post which hopefully will be less offensive than a less thought-out post by me would be. Please pardon (and correct!) any offensive, incorrect statements or stereotypes. My bias is towards Open Source.
The technical difference is partly that the Free Software definition is more specific, and partly that the Free Software community has grown around the GPL (so Free Software projects tend to use the GPL).
The philoosophical difference is related -- the Free Software definition is much narrower partially because they're more idealistic (hence the more specific requirements for freedom) and partially because they're more pragmatic (hence the stronger restrictions in the most commonly used license, the GPL).
The Free Software movement practices the theory that freedom must be assured with law (GPL) as well as action.
The Open Source community, on the other hand, has at its core the theory that freedom cannot be assured by law in all cases, but must always be fought for in person.
As I mentioned, though, the Open Source definition is a lot less specific, so outside of the core of the Open Source community people often hold wildly varying theories. The only one universally accepted is that free/open source software development is more efficient than proprietary software development.
This particular belief is part of the friction between the Free Software and Open Source communities, with FS people posting violent diatribes against the pragmatism of OSS, and OSS people posting equally violent rebuttals claiming their love for freedom.
It's important to recognise that the heart of the OSS movement has the same goals as the Free Software movement.
And the good news -- as far as I can see, they're both winning.
-Billy
I guess this is the "good old red hat" version. Has only true GPL stuff in it. This is good cause I wouldn't buy a $80 version of RH.
Linux is only free if your time has no value. Windows is only free if you threaten to use Linux.
FSF says "free as in freedom, not price" and clearly states that they wish to be paid. See:
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.ht ml
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.ht ml
http://www.gnu.org/help/help.html#helpgnu
I'm frankly getting a bit tired of these posts that don't make any sense, just filled with a bunch of anti-corporate buzzwords, (and yet someone out there keeps moderating them up? Those same people will probably moderate this one way down. Fire away boys, I got karma to burn...)
You seem to be worried about Red Hat not "caring" about the Linux community. *smirk* Look, Bob Young, AFAIK, is still in charge of Red Hat, and he seems committed, no, he seems to "care" about the Linux community. His gang has put out a commercially successful Linux distro, while staying true to the ideals of the Free software and Open Source movements. He still calling the shots. So what makes you people worry that Red Hat doesn't care?
I mean, even if Red Hat *didn't* care, it's still in their interest to promote Linux and Free Software. If no one trusts or uses Free Software, no one is going to buy their product, and their stock holders will be pretty upset.
Look, Red Hat is one of the good guys! They have contributed to GNOME, KDE, XFree86, now the FSF and they release all their software as GPL. Can you say that about Suse? Caldera? (dare I say it...) Debian? (calm down, I'm only pointing out that they give out more money than Debian. Its a Good Thing, don't diss them for it!)
Now, Red Hat isn't a perfect distro, but the folks who blindly critisize it must have some sort of agendas, as I see it. Probably affiliated with a competitor (Suse, Caldera, Debian, MS...) Please don't listen to them (and for cripes sakes stop moderating them up!) If certain members of the Linux community keep tearing down any organization that is successful in promoting Linux and Free Software to a wider audience, then the push to "world domination" will surely fail.
Sure, but that still leaves the question why they didn't include Qt2.
Qt2 is under the QPL (see www.troll.no), which is a DFSG-free / Open Source license. Qt is best known for being the library upon which KDE is built, but it is a useful library for GUI development in and of itself.
Ahh, but with the RMS version, every time you type "GNU/Linux", a daemon corrects it to "GNU/Linux". A similar patch modifies incoming email.
How in the world did you manage to stumble over RMS Linux? Yes, the direct URL worked, but I couldn't find a way to get there from starting at the main page.
Did I miss something?
I want all of the power and none of the responsibility.
Agreed, technically Open Source is the same as Free software when it comes to licenses (though I'm not sure about where the APSL fits in), and the DFSG is great for when you don't want to be so restrictive as GPL only.
:)
The freedom aspect is indeed very important, and Open Source downplays it. However, what bothers me most is what I see as (mainly) hypocracy in the Open Source movement. The two main arguments for the adoption of the term Open Source are:
(a) executives, marketroids, etc are all scared off by the term free software, and
(b) the term free software is ambigious (speech vs. beer).
I only have a problem with people trying to attract business when it compromises on morals, such as (a) does.
As for (b), well, as is pointed out in http://www.gnu.org/phi losophy/free-software-for-freedom.html, the term Open Source is worse because the obvious connotation (and let's face it, this is the one that counts, that Joe Public is going to directly or indirectly use) is that you can see the term, which is completely different from the actual meaning, which is the OSD, and quite similar to free software.
Hmmmm, I think I might hop off my soapbox now...
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
/* Rant on */
Man oh man. The more I read comments posted here the more I realize that some people just assume that no matter what Redhat does, it must be evil and wrong. Okay so yeah, they may not be the One True Free Software Champions(t)--they are a business! They have a commitment to be profitable for their shareholders.
We see a lot of so called reasons Redhat is evil, mostly summed up by:
1. They are a business
2. Their distro is more expensive
3. They might be the Microsoft of Linux
4. People think their distro is no good.
Sorry, but none of these are valid reasons to trample on Redhat. They have a history of releasing their work to the community that a number of people think is outweight by the fact they are successful.
But I'll tell you the real reason people like to slam Redhat:
*It is in style and undergroud!*
Suprised? Don't be. People like to slam Redhat becase it is a popular sentiment these days. It makes them feel good and a part of the One True Underground Linux Community(t). Blah.
Use the right distro for the right job people. And stop trying to be a part of the *cool underground*.
/* Rant off */
This sig is false.
Red Hat's only concern and obligation is to maximize stock value. If it does not maximize stock value it opens itself up to shareholder suits.
On the other hand, let's say that it pisses off and antagonizes the entire Free Software Community. What can they do about it? How can they prevent Red Hat from using their software without destroying the very Freedom they claim to espouse? It has no obligation to "do right" by the free software community because the free software community has no recourse if Red Hat screws them over. What is the FSF going to do, include a clause in the GPL saying, "Except for Red Hat, they are dirty cheating scum and they can't use our software no matter what"?
The Free Software Community would bitch and moan. How effective has their bitching and moaning been against Microsoft's business? Maybe a few negative stories would get published but then investors would realize that other than possibly bad PR from disgruntled socialists the Red Hat business model is exactly the same as the day they first threw money at them.
I fail to see how Red Hat has an obligation to the free software community. Perhaps you could elaborate?
It's apparent you're still confused. You said "the differences between Open Source and Free Software (as in GNU licensed according ot the Free Software movement)". I'm sorry, but "GPL" is not the definition of "Free". Software licensed under the BSD, MIT(X), Artistic, MPL, QPL, and many other licenses are also free. Sofware does not have to be under a GNU license in order to be free.
The FSF definition of Free Software, and the OSI definition of Open Source Software, ARE THE SAME! The OSI definition goes into more detail, but every example of Open Source Software is also Free Software, and vice versa.
Philosophically, RMS and the FSF see Free Software as a political freedom (aka free speech), whereas the Open Source Initiative concentrates on the practical and pragmatic. Saying that Open Source is wrong is stupid. It's like saying any newspaper that doesn't have "free" in its name is ignoring freedom of the press.
Of course, many people see the "Free" (or "Libre") of "Free Software" as referring to something other than a political liberty. They see the "freedoms" issued by a license as synonymous with "permissions." The deeper issues that RMS refers to aren't emphasized because, when one goes searching for them with an unfettered mind, they simply don't exist.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
Redhat has always hated KDE. Their actions speak for themselves. First they declared KDE "illegal" (Matt Welsh's word, not mine). Then they fund, promote and actively support KDE's competitor, but do not give one penny to Harmony. Then when the market expresses its dislike of the non-KDE policy by switching to Mandrake or SuSE, they finally include KDE. But this KDE is broken, and the distro still requires the use of Gnome. And they still have the whitepaper declaring KDE illegal up on their site! (they finally removed it after dozens of emails pointed out their hypocracy. Perhaps the Gnome FAQ should remove their link to it as well :-)) Finally, still wanting to cater to the rabid anti-KDE crowd, they issue a new release that specifically mentions the lack of KDE in its advertisements. But Redhat must still believe in choice, because we now have a choice between a KDE-free distro for $25 and a distro with KDE included for $80.
Not only does Redhat want to be the market leader, apparently they also want to be the moral arbiters of the Linux community. Bob Young says he wants to be the "Heinz" of the Linux world. Sorry, Bob. I prefer "Hunts".
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
If this distro were pure GPL only, it would be unusable! Do you even know what the GPL is? Take out all non-GPL programs. You have no X!!! Which means no Gnome!!! No Mozilla, Apache, etc. Take out impure forms of the GPL and you have no Perl (double licensed), or even the Linux kernel (expceptions)!
This is not a showcase of GPL-only stuff. It is merely the showcase of Redhat's panderings to the vocal GNU minority.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
I'll ignore the fact that RMS (Richard, not Redhat) considers the QPL to be free, and concentrate one a misreading of the QPL. The license says in effect, "if you use our open source library, your application must also be open source." This clause prohibits closed "public" beta testing, ala Corel.
Looking at the first paragraph of section 6, subsection c only applies to applications that are "distributed". This clause merely guarantees that all modifications can be returned to the initial developers.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
These are your opinions only. You are free, of course, to consider people who disagree with your diatriabes to be ignorant buffoons with no concept of the truth. However, I am also free to think the same of you, particularly when you say that even RMS doesn't understand what Free Software is.
You may find that the QPL doesn't meet your needs of utility, but it is every bit as free as the GPL. Of course the QPL has restrictions on the how you can modify the source code. So does the GPL! If you don't believe in intellectual property, then the software that you possess is yours and yours alone, and neither Richard Stallman nor Erik Eng have anything to say about what you do with it. If there is no IP, then violate the GPL to your hearts content!
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
If Open Source Software is almost, but not quite, the same as Free Software, then what exactly is the objective difference? Notice I said "objective" and not "subjective". I already understand that Free Software is morally superior to Open Source, but is there any difference for a FSF-agnostic?
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
The obvious connotation of "Open Source" is that the source code is open! This may not be a 100% accurate connotation, but accurate enough compared to the obvious connotation that "Free Software" is gratis!
But I have serious problems with the following statement. Perhaps you merely worded it incorrectly.
"I only have a problem with people trying to attract business when it compromises on morals, such as (a) does."
Any code of moral behavior that one ascribes to is a religion (or at least religious like). You might not call it a religion, but that does not change the fact. To insist that one ascribe to certain FSF philosphies in order to be moral is to elevate the FSF to the status of a religion. I'm sorry, I cannot and will not do this.
When I use the term "Open Source" I am compromising nothing. To suggest that I am immoral in doing so is extremely offensive.
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
Apologies in advance, as this HAS been done to death already, BUT:
;)
Could someone please explain in simple terms why QT is not seen as 'free'? (as in speech)
Didn't it get the seal of approval a while back, with the new QT2.0 licence?
Now, a cynical type might believe that RedHat not including KDE and QT is not *entirely* ideologically based...
Paul
Qt 2.x would NOT be a waste of space. It's an extremely simple-to-use toolkit, which has tons of widgets and *excellent* documentation.
;)
(This could easily spark off YAFW - yet another flame war - so i'll stop here
debian is free of course, but the latest stable version is quite old ... if you use the unstable one you end up in a destroyed packaging system, should i reinstall now?
...
i liked debian a lot, but has to keep pace with the commercial world, so a striped down redhat may sound interesting
The GPL is primarly concerned with free as in freedom not price, but it does refer to the latter also, as they can have a knock on effect.
The GPL does allow you to charge for the distribution of the program ("You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.") That is, I can legally sell any GPL program for $100,000. (Getting someone to buy it is another matter, and in any case, they can redistrubute it for free themselves)
What you may be thinking of is the charge for the distribution of the source. On distribution of the source, the GPL states you must offer "for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code".
The GPL is extremely well thought out, that it included this. Consider a situation of the GPL without this clause: Company takes GPL program. Company modified program. Company sells program. You ask for source. Company says, that costs $100,000,000. Without this explicit mention of cost, it would be possible to "close-source" GPL products in this way. You may be legally allowed to change/distribute the source, but if you can't access the source in the first place, you're toast.
--
Exigo spamos et dona ferentes
I agree. For all the complaining /.er here. If you havn't donate >=29.95 to FSF, SHUT UP and stop being a smartipants. Everyone can count and know how much RedHat is getting. We don't need you to remind us.
If nothing else, this is still the coolest commercial linux distribution package. It's cooler than OpenLinux, cooler than SuSE, miles cooler then Corel and that "Deluxe Linux 6.0" from the QUE® and Sams, (whose distributor's name is very small and hidden behide a blue hat) Okay, tell me a cooler commercial package, with the exception of that VA linux/Debian package.
It's time to give pressure to the vendors to label a hugh $1, $2 sign on the box that declear the donation amount.
CY
I must say that this post is self-contradictory. It basically says, since Red Hat is now a publicly traded company, that it has necessarily become weasely and will milk the Linux community for everything it's worth. The post then suggests that RHAT's only concern -- no, it's obligation -- is maximizing stock value, and so if you trust RH to do good deeds, you're simply a sucker.
I would say that quite the opposite is true. Because Red Hat has an obligation to its shareholders, it has an obligation to preserve and continually improve its relationship with the Linux and free-software communities. Red Hat has an obligation to genuinely contribute and genuinely do good works. Don't forget that most of RHAT's stock value derives from what the investment community considers a unique business model, one founded on free software and on a genuine partnership with the free software community.
If Red Hat were to start hosing down the free software community with a stream of weasily tactics, it would poison the genuine partnership and in doing so irreparably damage one of the foundations of its business model. It wouldn't take too long for the investment community to figure out that Red Hat considered its own business model to be a lie, and investors would drop the stock like a white-hot anvil.
Hence, Red Hat is obligated to do right by the Linux and free software communities.
Some of Red Hat's new hires, being brought in from the outside world, might overlook this important fact. And so, some Dumb Things will happen. This RMS distro might be one of them, but I don't think so. I think that the RMS distro was intended to be a good thing, and that some members of the Linux community have been overly harsh in their criticism of Red Hat.
In summary,
Cheers,
Tom
Easy, automatic testing for Perl.
More bluntly:
Get it? If investors wanted to buy into a company whose business model was based on bullying and weaselry, they would have bought MSFT. RHAT investors, on the other hand, expect Red Hat to be a good member of the communities because without those communities (and their respect), RHAT's business model won't fly. (Read Red Hat's pre-IPO SEC filing to see how dependent they are on the free-software commnunities.)
Cheers,
Tom
Easy, automatic testing for Perl.
One good step to avoid corporate anthropomorphism would be to remove their status as individuals with rights under the law. I think this encourages the anthropomorphic tendency.
What you say about RedHat's obligation to shareholders is true, but it needs to be tempered a little. If you read their SEC filing you'll see that they know they depend on the goodwill of the free development community for their very existence. Thus a move that makes economic sense in the short term, but pisses off developers, is not really in the shareholder's interest. Likewise acts of goodwill could actually improve their position in the longer term, even if it makes for a short term loss. How else could Microsoft have justified giving away IE to it's shareholders? Anyone with a share of stock want to try suing Microsoft over this? In the long term it wasn't so stupid, was it?
BTW, I think this legal pressure for short term gain is very harmful. Corporations make products that frequently have hidden costs. For example cars entail a high rate of accidents, expensive road maintenance, and environmental degradation. These must be paid by society, but they don't show up on the balance sheet of the corporation. Naturally, there is a tendency by corporations to do their accounting in such a way that maximizes how good the balance sheet looks, and as a result products actually become *more expensive* to society as a whole in the interests of making the corporation look more profitable to it's shareholders.
We don't need to force corporations to act in the public interest, but it would be very nice if we could give them an exception under the shareholder laws that made moves in the general public interest defensible.
I know there are differences in the open/free software community, but what exactly is the *technical* difference? And what is the *philosophical* difference?
.plan file vs. Steve Job's speeches for an example).
For instance, id software is technically not open, but philosophically, they are extremely friendly to programmers and developers. OTOH, the open source ppl have supported Apple and other biz leaders, who don't give a shit philosophically about the programming community. (read John Carmack's
Since there seems to be a splintering of opinions on this - what exactly are the technical & philosophical differences among the various factions of the free/open source software community?
Another question - if there were a company (like id) which is extremely friendly to programmers and tries its best to release source code, yet keeps its latest product proprietary for business reasons, would that win your support? What about the opposite - an open source co. which is unfriendly to developers?
(By way of background - id released the DOOM source code, and Carmack has said he was developing quake II for multiple platforms for the sheer joy of programming. He said something like - There may be only 10 people playing it using linux on SPARC, but we still want to do it because it's good programming. I was REALLY impressed by that statement. id's software is never open/free for the latest release, and they try to open it after some years, when it's obsolete in terms of market value. However, nobody doubts that they are the programmer's programming company.)
The donation to FSF is an extra bonus from most people's point of view I imagine. They're also getting the software (and support).
Its probably also seen as a form of proof that Red Hat are serious about open source. Although I must say that seemed fairly obvious anyway.
Redhat donating to the FSF, isn't that sort of like saying that microsoft donates money to it's software developers?
MS press release:
"Bill Gates anounced today that from now on we'll not only be paying our consumer support staff, salespeople and marketing department. We'll also be donating $1,- to our programmers' pension fund for each copy of windows sold."
As long as no one can answer those questions I think its totally unfair to make comparisons the way you do. You are comparing a product which you know (cd at cheapbytes) with something you don't.
Oh; 2nd detail; $1 to FSF should be at least one dollar. $6 for making the cd's. How much for shipping? I live in Europe and would also like a copy...
IMHO a lot of people seem to keep forgetting that RedHat is a company and as such they have 1 major goal which is to make money. And if you can make that money but are still making sure others can also profit, which makes them different from Microsoft I might add, I think it is a very positive move indeed.
I get this eery feeling that a lot of people think this idea is bad simply because its RedHat who's doing it. IMVHO offcourse.
Now I, and I presume others, wouldn't mind having a similar check-off box on my RedHat online purchase order form. It would be an easy way for me to slip a few extra dollars to the Cause, without antagonizing my wife too much:)
Of course, I could be wrong .. I might be the only one interested in this. Am I?
If it's good for the community if one company does it, isn't it better for the community if all the companies do it?
I propose that if you're making money selling FSF software, if it makes you do a little dance when you look at your bank statement, then you should be giving some back.
I also think that if you're making a lot of $$$ because you have highly trained, skilled employees, you should make a donation to a local school.
Helping those that are helping you is likely to provide tangible rewards in the future. Might make you feel good, too.
if you wanna help fsf buy their books, those are at least as good as oreilly ones i just ordered my second book from fsf.... http://www.fsf.org/order/order-europe.html
Let me get this straight: $1 to FSF, maybe $6 for making the CD's... That's leave 22.95 for Red Hat. I think that's a bit of a price gouge. but I don't think a software that is largely based on GPL or Free Distribution (Netscape for example) should be sold for as much as $70 when all they do is press some CD's and copy the Linux Doc website and call it a book.
I think what Red Hat has done for Linux is a good thing, but I am very aware and concerned about the tendency for Red Hat distributions to no longer comply with the File Hierarchy that has been established for the last ~30 years. If you don't believe me - take the Linux HOWTO's and start comparing them to the Red Hat 6.0 installation - things are moving around on us.
This will eventually mean that unless you are very good at Linux you cannot install anything that does not come packaged from RedHat. I don't like that implication, free software or not, it's no longer free.
They can come up with all the cool marketing schemes they want to, but I am not going to get any software that claims to support the FSF (and back it with money) and then put a spin on their software installations such that I cannot install anything someone elses binary packages and have it come close to working - and only because they libraries and files are not where they traditionally are supposed to be.
At this rate RedHat will start looking like RedMond
Legal? Yes, absolutely. I wouldn't argue with that a bit, and I'm sure there's some legal bits requiring that officers maximize stock value at all costs.
Moral? *rofl* Nonsense! This silly notion has justified so many repugnant outrages, from the Nestle baby formula, to the same jerky behavior that routinely gets Apple raked over the coals on Slashdot, to most things Microsoft has ever done worth being outraged about. There are no moral rules written into corporate law. If you think that working for a corporation automatically gives you the obligation to ignore your own morality and that of the world at large, and extort, abuse, lie, and harm in the name of being good to the corporation, then please don't ever work for a corporation, OK?
- That's not very much caring
- If RHAT expects to get some goodwill from the community for that $1, then a $1 contribution does not forcibly represent that they care about the FSF; it merely represents that they care to get some goodwill.
There's also some "flip side" considerations:Although if there turn out to be $30 RMS Linux boxes on store shelves, this probably means that RHAT is contributing about 10% of their revenues, which suggests that the small percentage is more meaningful than the 3.3% figure would imply.
In other words, $1 may be all that it's safe to contribute on a $30 "product."
It strikes me as a good thing that after the "product line redesign" of the last six months, they have chosen to redeploy the "FSF contribution" in a way that makes it more obvious that it is such.
Money isn't the most valuable thing that one can contribute to free software; the most valuable thing is in fact free software.
And the RHAT sponsorship of GNOME development as well as XFree86 (via Precision Insight) thus represents substantial contributions of software.
I'm quite certain that RHAT spent considerably more money last year on developers producing free software than the (publicly available, if you ask them) amount the FSF spent on "program expenses" (that is the category where "transforming money into software" lies).
The long and short of this all is that:
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Software product as defined by the FSF, this four CD set does not contain Netscape, Qt, KDE, and several additional non-open-source packages which are available in other Linux products.
Interesting implication there, eh? Qt and KDE aren't Open Source, says the article.
Based on the amount I've been coding with the excellent open source Libnet library as of late, having a library I can work with and perhaps release updated features for is critical to my personal experience of open source code. Since, as far as I can tell, there's a very strong "look, maybe even touch, but don't share in a convenient manner" aspect to the QPL, for the way I've been using Open Source Products, I probably have to agree with Redhat on this one.
Your Mileage May Vary, of course.
Yours Truly,
Dan Kaminsky
DoxPara Research
http://www.doxpara.com
No. Read it properly - it says they're not free. There's a difference between free and open-source (at least in connotation, despite what ESR says), and you appear to have missed that distinction. As http://www.gnu.org/phi losophy/free-software-for-freedom.html says,
``Open source software'' describes a category of software licenses, almost but not quite the same as ``free software.''
Qt 1.x is not free (Qt 2.x is, AFAIK). It may be open source, but it is not truly free. AFAIK, KDE is, but as has already pointed out, it's useless without Qt and Qt 2.x won't do.
The goal of RMS Linux is like Debian, to be a 100% free distro, not open source. If you want open source, just go for the regular Redhat.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
What am I missing? Why not just donate to the FSF directly? Using RH as a middle-man seems a pretty round-about way of giving support..
Belief is the currency of delusion.
Isn't debian already 100% Free? I know for a fact that if you buy debian money goes to the FSF. It's cool that RedHat is doing this, but I kind of wonder what the point is since there already is a distro that does this.
From Red Hat:
>To qualify as an exclusively Free Software
>product as defined by the FSF, this four CD set >does not contain Netscape, Qt, KDE, and several
>additional non-open-source packages which are >available in other Linux products.
Note that Red Hat here does NOT distinguish Qt 1.x (old license) from Qt 2.x. Qt 2.x IS "free" according to FSF guidelines (and RMS himself) and should have been included. By being unclear and fuzzy on this issue, Red Hat is playing the usual politics of division, something I thought they had grown out of. Qt 2.x as a toolkit is independent of KDE and can be used outside of that context (just as Gtk is independent of GNOME and even of the GIMP). Red Hat knows this quite well; leaving it out is clearly an attempt to discourage the use of this particular "free software" in any context.
Some have said that this is a "hackers" distribution. Well in that case, then those interested in hacking KDE 2.0 (which uses the FSF-free Qt) could have benefitted from the inclusion of both the latest KDE sources as well as Qt! Or Red Hat could have included the sources of the present KDE official version (also DSFG-free) so that hackers could work on compiling it with Qt 2.0. Doing so would have gone some way in showing that this is not merely an anti-Qt/KDE distribution.
Note that Red Hat did not call this a "GPL-only" distribution. So one cannot claim that since Qt 2.x is non-GPL that this is the reason it was not included. This is clearly a pathetic attempt to throw a bone to all the KDE haters out there. Those who do not like KDE should also see this and not let their sentiments be played with so casually. Red Hat would have been more honest to simply call this thing a "non-KDE, non-Qt distribution" instead of falsely and shamelessly hiding behind the DFSG and RMS (who himself agrees that Qt 2.x is free!).
I used to be a big Red Hat fan. With each childish stunt like this, my opinion of them is being continuously revised downward. I hope that KDE lovers, haters, as well as neutral parties will all see through this divisive political stunt.
RMS Linux costs $29.95 and FSF will be paid at least $1. (Of course, this prevents us from interpreting it as exactly $1.)
We are supposed to buy this as it is "cool" and gets FSF a dollar! Works to 3.3% of the proceeds... tell you what, buy linux at $2/$3 from cheapbytes and donate $27 to FSF. This will show that *we* care for FSF.
RMS -- it used to mean Richard M. Stallman... over time, marketing and morphing will ensure that RMS stands for Red hat Means Source! To deprieve a man of his name is not cool, it is cruel.
Yes, very cynical indeed... but very true, unfortunately. While I also believe that there are people at RedHat who believe in what they're doing, they are in many selling linux down the river. It is extremely difficult to maintain your integrity while selling it (your integrity, that is).
For too many newcomers to linux, RedHat == Linux. Is this a good thing? Well, no. But, perhaps more importantly, is this a bad thing? Well, not necessarily. But maybe.
A year ago, we were saying that everything and anything that puts the name Linux out there into the popular media and "technical" press is a Good Thing -- there's no such thing as bad publicity. But, as one poster mentioned, RedHat is rapidly becoming the Microsoft of Linux -- in the sense of being the most well-known and arguably the most popular (meaning RedHat is the version that non-technical people know and are most familiar with). An example: I was talking with a tech support guy who worked at one of the major universities here in Boston (ahem, Harvard, ahem), and he mentioned that they were starting to use Linux on some of their servers. Great, I said; which distribution? He looked at me as if I had asked him the stupidest question in the world, and said "6.0, of course."
To sum up -- while RedHat has done a great job of positioning Linux as a "corporate" solution, they have done it by becoming a Corporation themselves. And, as the previous poster wrote, as a corporation, they have more to worry about now -- shareholders, stock prices, turning a profit, and positioning themselves as a viable company. To assume that these guys can still maintain the kind of commitment to the Linux community, the FSF, and individual programmers/Linux users like me is perhaps a little naive. This is not your father's RedHat.
darren
(darren)
Just goes to show what a treacherous business selling distributions can be.
Heh, RMS probably will not like his namesake distribution because it's not being presented as GNU/Linux.
This is your change I'd say; proof RedHat wrong and put your money where your mouth is.
If you won't; fine. But then I would suggest you'd better shut up about the amount of money at all since you are then very busy proving that the idea of buying cheap & donating heavily does not work and that you're simply bashing.
I'd expect major donations to FSF after reading all the comments but I would not wager my money for it. Unfortunatly I might add.
I have seen in several postings here some confusion about the differences between Open Source and Free Software (as in GNU licensed according ot the Free Software movement).
r eedom.html for
:-)
I too mixed these two definitions up in an article I wrote a while back about GIFs. However I got a mail from RMS who put me straight about which is which. I'll leave the general population to argue about which is best etc, but here's a snippet from the mail I received from RMS:
------------------------
The Open Source movement is a different group, started in 1998. We and they do similar activites, but we do them for completely different philosophical reasons. The Open Source movement aims to get support from business, by mentioning only practical advantages, and never talking about deeper issues. The Free Software movement says that freedom and community are important in themselves.
See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-f
more explanation.
-----------------------------
Seems like a bit of a "Bite Me!" comment to me, but it explains why QT, Netscape et al are not included in this Free Software version of Red Hat.
Hope it helps clear up some confusion.
(and RMS - if you are reading this, does this atone for my earlier confusion?
A little planning goes a long way...
at least $1 is donated to the FSF for every sold package.
When you're examining the apportioning of the pie, look at how much the other parties are getting as well as how much the FSF is getting. I think you'll find that $1 is not that big of a share.
This is super cool, I think, and I probably have to buy one just because it is so cool.
Sorry to sound cynical, but this just means you've been suckered by their publicity ploy.
I think, this finally proves that - as far as this is possible for a company - RedHat cares about the community.
People need to realize that Red Hat is now a PUBLICLY TRADED COMPANY. This means all of the normal PUBLICLY TRADED COMPANY APPURTENANCES, such as a Board of Directors, SEC filings, PR departments, marketing consultants, branding consultants, market research managers and liasons, and many, many other gears of the corporate machine. It is now a very naive belief to feel that Red Hat, as a corporation, "cares" about anything or anyone other than the value of their stock. In fact, it is now the legal and moral obligation of all officers of Red Hat to do everything in their power to maximize that value.
It is truly a mistake in perception to attribute human behavioural characteristics such as "caring" to a corporate machine. A group of people in an organization with a purpose will behave differently than any individual. My favorite example of this is two forces of civil war soldiers charging each other. No sane individual would contemplate running at a group of armed enemy soldiers who are hell bent on shooting you. But as a group, you are under an extremely complex set of psychological motives, manipulations, and pressures, and it is historical fact many soldiers died in exactly such circumstances.
Now, there may very well be INDIVIDUALS at Red Hat who "care about the community." I believe this is true. But rest assured that every action taken by the CORPORATION is carefully weighed and executed based on its short and long run potential impact on that all-powerful share price, and you should keep this in mind as you evaluate a company's behaviour. Remember that shareholders are more than ready to BRING SUIT against officers of a public company who engage in actions motivated by objectives other than that share price that seem to hurt the company.
Judging by the reactions here, it was a good move for Red Hat though.
You were warned. ^_^
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