While Linux was created largely with the fine toolset built by FSF/Gnu, that dosen't give Richard, or anybody else for that matter (save a young gent from Finland), the right to tack the letters "G-N-U" in front of it. In fact, such labelling seems to me to be sour grapes, because the FSF could never find time / interest to develop their OWN operating system (anybody else remember HURD?). It seems to me that they, in a way, want to capitalize on somebody else's work.
I don't think the issue is whether or not they have the right to call a particular Linux GNU/Linux. But, Linux is (and remains) the trademark for a POSIX-compliant kernel developed by one Linus Torvalds et. al., and until The_Man (tm) says otherwise, Linux will remain Linux in my opinion. If Stallman and company want to build their own Linux distribution, fine. They encouraged SPI to call Debian "Debian GNU/Linux", and if that is the Linux they so bless, so be it.
But, to insist that Linux as a whole be perpetually known as "GNU/Linux" is an insult to Linus Torvalds. He managed to do something in a matter of months that FSF has yet to do: and that is produce a functional operating system using their own tools, and they've been working on it since 1991.
It's a strange thing. Stallman/FSF releases all this fine code under a progressive license. Now they want to change the terms of the license, and insist that we now refer to our operating system as GNU/Linux. Sorry guys, it dosen't work that way. Nowhere in the copy of the GNU GPL does it state that I necessarily have to insert the word "GNU" in any program or trademark I create in conjunction with the licensing requirements. In many ways, this runs contrary to how many people view the GPL.
Let FSF put the countless hours of development into producing a real operating system that the Linux community has done. A compiler and tools are great: but they are no good without the operating system to run them on. Where's HURD? Huh guys? *shrug* Nine years later, and all we have to show for HURD is about where Linux was when Linus posted the first announcements regarding Linux to Usenet ("...Remember when men were men and wrote their own device drivers?...")
Mr. Stallman, welcome to the future you helped create. Thousands of programmers and hobbyists writing millions of lines of code, around an operating system that got it's start from a few of your tools and a desire to make things better than they were before. Linux is so much more than the GNU toolkit ever was. Granted, Linux may not have been much without your toolkit. However, it's so much more than that now, and to insist FSF/GNU get equal credit is unfair to the thousands of others who embraced the free software ideal that Linux was created with and gave you a platform to speak in the first place.
I've had similar problems here where I work. We are a small content provider and software company, and just about all the staff here has a moderate level of computer skills. The problem is that our typical C++ programmer here lacks some of the fundamental knowledge in networking to properly administer their own Win98/NT box. This is worsened by the fact that, while I might even be able to solve the problem for them, many times people's egos get in the way: they do not want to admit they have a problem, nor do they want to look stupid in the eyes of their superiors.
The solution here was simple. Any machine, regardless of it's operating system, must either be behind a masquerading proxy firewall; or if that is not desirable, then they must fill out a small questionairre regarding the system's configuration and file the machine's root password with my office. I've found that the simple act of having to fill out the form prevents a lot of the potential "problem users" from wanting to suddenly put their machine on the public side of the network.
One of the big problems many network people face is that our job involves not only computers, but people as well. Increasingly, we find ourselves having to not only answer technical questions and solve engineering problems, but we have to handle political arguments as well. Having policy in place, while it can be burdensome at times, at least can provide everybody with ground rules.
It is totally possible to assemble a laptop from parts, although it is more difficult than building a desktop PC (primarily because the parts are not as readily available... but it can be done)
That issue aside, every major city on the country has some small chop-shop computer store that buys Korean-built laptops (with names like "Novacomm" and things like that) that ship from the factory with no OS. I purchased my last laptop with no OS installed from just such a store in Orange County (CA). They charged me $50 less, and gave me a machine fresh out of the shipping container in the back of the store, probably untouched by human hands since it left Korea.
That being said, however, if you don't live in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, or any other city big enough to have a subway system, you probably are screwed. And this is what Refund Day was supposed to be about. Microsoft stated that you had a choice. While that is technically correct, it is highly problematic to purchase any assembled computer without a Microsoft operating system installed.
The flip side of this argument is: if you really want a computer without Windows, you can probably find one. Has anybody who wanted a computer with Linux installed ever called VA Research, Linux Hardware Solutions, or any of the other hardware vendors that advertise in LJ?
Maybe it's time we Linux folk actually put our money where our mouth is. Reject the Microsoft Tax by (here's a novel concept) purchasing your computers from a vendor that supports Linux in the first place, and won't treat you as a second class citizen!
I think you miss the whole point here. This is being submitted as evidence in a trial. It's not like it was part of some silly ad campaign.
Microsoft's major contention in this trial is that Windows98/MSIE are inseperable, and part of their defense is that this linkage of browser to operating system provides a superior experience than the "old way." Microsoft has, time and again, fudged the numbers in their favor, even if only slightly. Every little bit counts.
Give Microsoft a break? When Microsoft starts comparing apples to apples, we'll give them a break. Even if it was a difference between a 33.6k and a 28.8kbps modem, that's significant enough to make it an unfair (and inaccurate) comparison. Apples to apples means: same components, same conditions, only the operating system version should be changed.
How do we know that Microsoft didn't fudge things further? They could have the Win3.1 box connecting to a UNIX machine, and firing off a chat script to start PPP manually; while the Win98 box connects to a WinNT RAS server. What were the conditions of the test? Without knowing that, it's just a case of more Microsoft FUD.
If it was you being charged with a crime, and you fudged the evidence this way in your favor, you'd be sitting in jail on a contempt of court charge. Why isn't Microsoft?
First off, I live in an area where the temperature rarely gets below 50 degrees (Bakersfield, CA.. although it snowed here last week). Also, I drive a pick-up truck. The MP3 box is mounted in a small enclosure behind the seat, and could conceivably be mounted under the seat of a luxury car or even in two standard DIN-style mounts in the dashboard of most cars.
If you really have to have it mounted in your trunk, I would just simply build a small, insulated enclosure with a small blower in it. After a minute of operation, just about any Pentium-class machine I know of would produce enough heat to get the internal temperature of such a chassis to well above 80F. To my knowledge, there is no danger of allowing CD-Rs to freeze, other than concerns about dew freezing on the disk itself.
Lastly, many consumer electronics manufacturers (Kenwood, Sony, et. al.) produce trunk-mounted multi-CD changers. If the environment is good enough for that, I personally don't see any problem with putting a MP3 player in the trunk.
As usual, however, your milage may vary. It works for me.
I've used car-mounted Linux boxes before... laptop hard drives (and even some conventional 3.5" drives) can be used, but you have to make sure that you properly mount the drives.
A better suggestion, however, is to just use CD-ROM/CD-R for everything. My vehicle-mounted MP3 box uses a conventional ATAPI CD-ROM drive with a small amount of FLASH disk to boot from, no problems. The "display" uses a BASIC Stamp II Microcontroller, a rotary switch, a couple of buttons, and a two-line LCD I picked up at one of the ham radio swaps in Southern California, and connects to the serial port.
Most importantly, since there are no writable file systems (except for the small RAMDISK I create on bootup), I don't have to worry about power problems resetting the machine. A decent quality voltage regulator supplies 120V AC (although a friend tells me that there is such a thing as a 12V DC computer power supply out there).
I'm working on a webpage for my project, but it's not quite ready yet. Go to my webpage and fill out the guestbook entry there, and I'll get back to you when the page is finished.
Now, to just finish my wearable...
Pournelle's a fool and the downfall of Byte
on
2 Scoops of Quickies
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· Score: 1
Hear Hear! Pournelle's columns have, historically, been full of mis-information and dreck. For example, in the particular column he posts this month on his site (that slams Linux, by the way) he makes the assertion that you cannot use a Palm III in an old-stlye PalmPilot dock. Funny, mine works fine. The only problem is you have to give the Palm III a light "push" (rather than just dropping it in) to make sure the little I/O door gets pushed aside. Other than that, it works fine. It sits in my old cradle, and syncs on demand.
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I don't think the issue is whether or not they have the right to call a particular Linux GNU/Linux. But, Linux is (and remains) the trademark for a POSIX-compliant kernel developed by one Linus Torvalds et. al., and until The_Man (tm) says otherwise, Linux will remain Linux in my opinion. If Stallman and company want to build their own Linux distribution, fine. They encouraged SPI to call Debian "Debian GNU/Linux", and if that is the Linux they so bless, so be it.
But, to insist that Linux as a whole be perpetually known as "GNU/Linux" is an insult to Linus Torvalds. He managed to do something in a matter of months that FSF has yet to do: and that is produce a functional operating system using their own tools, and they've been working on it since 1991.
It's a strange thing. Stallman/FSF releases all this fine code under a progressive license. Now they want to change the terms of the license, and insist that we now refer to our operating system as GNU/Linux. Sorry guys, it dosen't work that way. Nowhere in the copy of the GNU GPL does it state that I necessarily have to insert the word "GNU" in any program or trademark I create in conjunction with the licensing requirements. In many ways, this runs contrary to how many people view the GPL.
Let FSF put the countless hours of development into producing a real operating system that the Linux community has done. A compiler and tools are great: but they are no good without the operating system to run them on. Where's HURD? Huh guys? *shrug* Nine years later, and all we have to show for HURD is about where Linux was when Linus posted the first announcements regarding Linux to Usenet ("...Remember when men were men and wrote their own device drivers?...")
Mr. Stallman, welcome to the future you helped create. Thousands of programmers and hobbyists writing millions of lines of code, around an operating system that got it's start from a few of your tools and a desire to make things better than they were before. Linux is so much more than the GNU toolkit ever was. Granted, Linux may not have been much without your toolkit. However, it's so much more than that now, and to insist FSF/GNU get equal credit is unfair to the thousands of others who embraced the free software ideal that Linux was created with and gave you a platform to speak in the first place.
The solution here was simple. Any machine, regardless of it's operating system, must either be behind a masquerading proxy firewall; or if that is not desirable, then they must fill out a small questionairre regarding the system's configuration and file the machine's root password with my office. I've found that the simple act of having to fill out the form prevents a lot of the potential "problem users" from wanting to suddenly put their machine on the public side of the network.
One of the big problems many network people face is that our job involves not only computers, but people as well. Increasingly, we find ourselves having to not only answer technical questions and solve engineering problems, but we have to handle political arguments as well. Having policy in place, while it can be burdensome at times, at least can provide everybody with ground rules.
That issue aside, every major city on the country has some small chop-shop computer store that buys Korean-built laptops (with names like "Novacomm" and things like that) that ship from the factory with no OS. I purchased my last laptop with no OS installed from just such a store in Orange County (CA). They charged me $50 less, and gave me a machine fresh out of the shipping container in the back of the store, probably untouched by human hands since it left Korea.
That being said, however, if you don't live in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, or any other city big enough to have a subway system, you probably are screwed. And this is what Refund Day was supposed to be about. Microsoft stated that you had a choice. While that is technically correct, it is highly problematic to purchase any assembled computer without a Microsoft operating system installed.
The flip side of this argument is: if you really want a computer without Windows, you can probably find one. Has anybody who wanted a computer with Linux installed ever called VA Research, Linux Hardware Solutions, or any of the other hardware vendors that advertise in LJ?
Maybe it's time we Linux folk actually put our money where our mouth is. Reject the Microsoft Tax by (here's a novel concept) purchasing your computers from a vendor that supports Linux in the first place, and won't treat you as a second class citizen!
Yes, and they even sell laptops. </rant>
Microsoft's major contention in this trial is that Windows98/MSIE are inseperable, and part of their defense is that this linkage of browser to operating system provides a superior experience than the "old way." Microsoft has, time and again, fudged the numbers in their favor, even if only slightly. Every little bit counts.
Give Microsoft a break? When Microsoft starts comparing apples to apples, we'll give them a break. Even if it was a difference between a 33.6k and a 28.8kbps modem, that's significant enough to make it an unfair (and inaccurate) comparison. Apples to apples means: same components, same conditions, only the operating system version should be changed.
How do we know that Microsoft didn't fudge things further? They could have the Win3.1 box connecting to a UNIX machine, and firing off a chat script to start PPP manually; while the Win98 box connects to a WinNT RAS server. What were the conditions of the test? Without knowing that, it's just a case of more Microsoft FUD.
If it was you being charged with a crime, and you fudged the evidence this way in your favor, you'd be sitting in jail on a contempt of court charge. Why isn't Microsoft?
Give me a break.
If you really have to have it mounted in your trunk, I would just simply build a small, insulated enclosure with a small blower in it. After a minute of operation, just about any Pentium-class machine I know of would produce enough heat to get the internal temperature of such a chassis to well above 80F. To my knowledge, there is no danger of allowing CD-Rs to freeze, other than concerns about dew freezing on the disk itself.
Lastly, many consumer electronics manufacturers (Kenwood, Sony, et. al.) produce trunk-mounted multi-CD changers. If the environment is good enough for that, I personally don't see any problem with putting a MP3 player in the trunk.
As usual, however, your milage may vary. It works for me.
A better suggestion, however, is to just use CD-ROM/CD-R for everything. My vehicle-mounted MP3 box uses a conventional ATAPI CD-ROM drive with a small amount of FLASH disk to boot from, no problems. The "display" uses a BASIC Stamp II Microcontroller, a rotary switch, a couple of buttons, and a two-line LCD I picked up at one of the ham radio swaps in Southern California, and connects to the serial port.
Most importantly, since there are no writable file systems (except for the small RAMDISK I create on bootup), I don't have to worry about power problems resetting the machine. A decent quality voltage regulator supplies 120V AC (although a friend tells me that there is such a thing as a 12V DC computer power supply out there).
I'm working on a webpage for my project, but it's not quite ready yet. Go to my webpage and fill out the guestbook entry there, and I'll get back to you when the page is finished.
Now, to just finish my wearable...
Hear Hear! Pournelle's columns have, historically, been full of mis-information and dreck. For example, in the particular column he posts this month on his site (that slams Linux, by the way) he makes the assertion that you cannot use a Palm III in an old-stlye PalmPilot dock. Funny, mine works fine. The only problem is you have to give the Palm III a light "push" (rather than just dropping it in) to make sure the little I/O door gets pushed aside. Other than that, it works fine. It sits in my old cradle, and syncs on demand.
Fool.