Are they one of the top companies that SCO might end up sueing? If so, then it might be cheaper to buy the licenses than to fight a law suit.
I never understand this. Why must it be expensive
to fight a stupid lawsuit? Why should a company
that's clearly in the right need to hire Expensive
Lawyers at all? Why can't they just turn up in
court and say ``Your honour, this is bollocks''
and have done?
Do not just boycott EV1. Boycott anybody who remains their customer after next month. Contact anyone you know who works with EV1 and tell them you do not believe in supporting SCO extortion.
I can see where this is coming from, but isn't
it just a tad extreme? Boycotting SCO is one thing.
Boycotting EV1 because they paid their protection
money is another. But boycotting a third party
because they host with people who paid
protection money to the criminals... well,
I think that's enough levels of indirection
for even the most rabid C++ programmer.
I mean, what next? Boycott the office services
companies that do the cleaning for the
companies that host with people who paid
protection money to the criminals? How many
more levels will it take before you have to
boycott yourself?
In every step building the EV1 business, I've had to make decisions that I believed in my
heart were in the best interests of my clients and my shareholders.
It has been argued by a Linux Journal reporter that I have essentially called the various GPL Linux developers plaugerists. This is false.
Hmm, I'm not sure about that. I certainly learned
a lot from P. J. Plauger's books, not least
The Elements of Programming Style
(co-written, of course, with Brian W.
``Water-Buffalo'' Kernighan). Does that make
me a Plaugerist?
I really wanted to read this, but it seems to have gone away. I've tried to get the google cached
version, but can't find the right way to stick
my fingers down google's throat. Anyone got it?
I also disagree with his proposal that we should shun proprietary software for the sake of encouraging the development of free software. Any business should do what best, subject to the law, makes money for its owners. The profit motive, which is responsible for the great efficiency of our economy, leaves scant room for altruistic software preferences.
This is not a universal constant, it's just
your preference of what you consider important.
You say "Any business should do what best, subject to the law, makes money for its owners". This is
a philosophical/ethical statement, and your
ethics on this subject differ from Stallman's.
For that matter they differ from those running
the many and various non-profits out there.
There are other motivations that making money.
That's not to say that your motivation is
necessarily a bad one, of course. Just
that you need to realise it's only a
motivation, not the only one. So if the
behaviour and statements of people like Stallman
perplex you, then it's because he is marching
to a completely different beat.
Thanks, Dr. Zowie. It's the occasional
helpful, informative posting like this
that keep Slashdot (just) worthwhile.
Having read your explanation, I now
don't understand how anyone has
ever got a rocket to work!:-)
If I could mod and post in the same
discussion, your comment would be +6.
I'm serious. What's the big deal about rocket
science? How hard can it be? You point your rocket the way you want it to go and have a reaction
push it in that direction, with stabilising fins
keeping it on course. End of story, one might
think. So to this naive observer, rocket science
basically looks like ballistics+chemistry, neither
of which is exactly rocket-science. Er... you know
what I mean.
That's strange, I'm in the UK and
SlashDot is hosted in America, so
according to this story, I should be
having problems -- but in fact,
everything is working just fiFgfdgf3gf4h32hh%$$$424452
This is a bad thing. Why? Because routers
are one of those appliances, like toasters,
that are supposed to Just Work. No magic,
no "intelligence", no attempt to outguess
the user - just do the damned job already.
Route packets.
As soon as that model is compromised, you
have a new source of uncertainty every time
you have to debug a network problem. When
packets don't make it to their destination,
is the problem a firewall at this end? Or
at that end? OR - new possibility - funky
anti-virus software on ANY ONE of the
routers between here and there. You just
can't tell.
Why? Sheesh, I don't know,
but whatever story gets posted here,
someone always claims it's a good
thing, so I figured it might just as well
be me this time.
Dinosaur locomotion has been one of the big
research areas in vertebrate palaeontology
for decades, and it's not going to go away
any time soon! I don't think you'd find any
informed scientist today claiming that any
dinosaur was obliged to live in water (as used
to be a claimed of the sauropods twenty or thirty
years ago), but exactly how athletic they were on
land is still controversial.
One camp, vocally led
by Bob Bakker and Greg Paul, claims that most
dinosaurs (including Tyrannosaurus and
Triceratops) were capable of fast motion,
of the order of 40mph (72khm), and it is of course
this group that's influenced the dinosaurs in the
Jurassic Park movies.
Another, probably larger, group argues instead that the locomotory performance of most dinosaurs
was more like that of elephants than rhinos,
with T. rex for example capable of a fast
walk but not a true run.
The evidence is equivocal. rex knees
seem to be built in such a way that they were
permanently flexed in life, which is a running
adaptation, but John Hutchison's study last
year appeared to show that the animal would need
70% of its entire body-weight in leg muscles in
order to run.
It's a fascinating area, and everyone ought to
study it! I particularly recommend starting with
R. McNeill Alexander's very approachable book, Dynamics of Dinosaurs and other exinct giantsBuy at amazon.comBuy at amazon.co.uk
I have a lot of respect for what the OpenOffice people
(and before them, StarOffice) have done, but I would like
OO about a billion times more than I do if only it would
let me do:
$ oowriter --printImmediatelyAndExit foo.doc
and
$ oowriter --convertToHtml foo.doc > foo.html
I'd say these two operations cover maybe 80% of all
my OpenOffice use (and I doubt that is an unusual
usage pattern). It sucks that I have a crank up a big,
ugly, desktop-dominating GUI app just to do that.
McBride: Every time I ship a copy of my operating system, I pay royalties to Novell and Veritas.
Yes, folks, you read it right. Not ``the'' operation system, not even ``our'' (SCO's) operating system, by ``my'' operating system. The layers of delusions grow ever thicker - Darth McBride now believes the whole darned thing is his.
Back before they built the sewers in the 1850s or so, the sewage from two and a half million people went into the thames - which is a tidal river at that point. So you have 2.5mil ppl's crap going up and down the thames with the tide. They got outbreaks of cholera from that because the water companies just pumped that water and distributed that to people - drinking beer exclusively was a good plan in those days.
Dependency Hell is a thing (almost...) of the past.
Please excuse me while I laugh so hard I rupture
several major organs. If you think Debian makes
this stuff easy, you've obviously never read
Why Debian Is Not My Favourite Operating System.
1. SCO's lawsuit is about misappropriation of trade secrets
2. RCU is a patented technology
3. Patents are publicly viewable
4. Therefore, RCU cannot be a trade secret
Slashdot Mirror
I never understand this. Why must it be expensive to fight a stupid lawsuit? Why should a company that's clearly in the right need to hire Expensive Lawyers at all? Why can't they just turn up in court and say ``Your honour, this is bollocks'' and have done?
Really.
I can see where this is coming from, but isn't it just a tad extreme? Boycotting SCO is one thing. Boycotting EV1 because they paid their protection money is another. But boycotting a third party because they host with people who paid protection money to the criminals ... well,
I think that's enough levels of indirection
for even the most rabid C++ programmer.
I mean, what next? Boycott the office services companies that do the cleaning for the companies that host with people who paid protection money to the criminals? How many more levels will it take before you have to boycott yourself?
Shame he didn't use his brain instead.
Hmm, I'm not sure about that. I certainly learned a lot from P. J. Plauger's books, not least The Elements of Programming Style (co-written, of course, with Brian W. ``Water-Buffalo'' Kernighan). Does that make me a Plaugerist?
Brief, to the point. I like it!
I really wanted to read this, but it seems to have gone away. I've tried to get the google cached version, but can't find the right way to stick my fingers down google's throat. Anyone got it?
You seem to have trouble understanding the idea that the owners might have any other motivation than making money.
This is not a universal constant, it's just your preference of what you consider important. You say "Any business should do what best, subject to the law, makes money for its owners". This is a philosophical/ethical statement, and your ethics on this subject differ from Stallman's. For that matter they differ from those running the many and various non-profits out there. There are other motivations that making money.
That's not to say that your motivation is necessarily a bad one, of course. Just that you need to realise it's only a motivation, not the only one. So if the behaviour and statements of people like Stallman perplex you, then it's because he is marching to a completely different beat.
(And, BTW., may I say thank God he does.)
If I could mod and post in the same discussion, your comment would be +6.
So: why is it so hard to make rockets work?
Well, I'm told hitting them in the kneecaps can be quite effective too.
That's strange, I'm in the UK and SlashDot is hosted in America, so according to this story, I should be having problems -- but in fact, everything is working just fiFgfdgf3gf4h32hh%$$$424452
As soon as that model is compromised, you have a new source of uncertainty every time you have to debug a network problem. When packets don't make it to their destination, is the problem a firewall at this end? Or at that end? OR - new possibility - funky anti-virus software on ANY ONE of the routers between here and there. You just can't tell.
This is a nightmare in the making.
What actually is your project?
4. Profit!
Very neatly done! I take my hat off to you, AC.
Why? Sheesh, I don't know, but whatever story gets posted here, someone always claims it's a good thing, so I figured it might just as well be me this time.
One camp, vocally led by Bob Bakker and Greg Paul, claims that most dinosaurs (including Tyrannosaurus and Triceratops) were capable of fast motion, of the order of 40mph (72khm), and it is of course this group that's influenced the dinosaurs in the Jurassic Park movies.
Another, probably larger, group argues instead that the locomotory performance of most dinosaurs was more like that of elephants than rhinos, with T. rex for example capable of a fast walk but not a true run.
The evidence is equivocal. rex knees seem to be built in such a way that they were permanently flexed in life, which is a running adaptation, but John Hutchison's study last year appeared to show that the animal would need 70% of its entire body-weight in leg muscles in order to run.
It's a fascinating area, and everyone ought to study it! I particularly recommend starting with R. McNeill Alexander's very approachable book, Dynamics of Dinosaurs and other exinct giants Buy at amazon.com Buy at amazon.co.uk
There really ought to be a "-1 blatant karma-whoring" moderation.
I'd say these two operations cover maybe 80% of all my OpenOffice use (and I doubt that is an unusual usage pattern). It sucks that I have a crank up a big, ugly, desktop-dominating GUI app just to do that.
Yes, folks, you read it right. Not ``the'' operation system, not even ``our'' (SCO's) operating system, by ``my'' operating system. The layers of delusions grow ever thicker - Darth McBride now believes the whole darned thing is his.
``In those days''?!
Please excuse me while I laugh so hard I rupture several major organs. If you think Debian makes this stuff easy, you've obviously never read Why Debian Is Not My Favourite Operating System.
And the master replied, ``My child, you are far from the hacker spirit''.
At that moment, the novice was enlightened.