No, this trojan is literally pathetic. Basically if you run it as root it would wreck your day. Big whoop, who runs foreign executables as root?
In other words this trojan is no more dangerous than the following two line super sh trojan.
#!/bin/sh /bin/rm -r/*
I could send that out in a million emails with the subject line of "Click here for a good time." and no one would end up with an erased hard drive.
Now, it certainly is possible that this trojan could be combined in a very deadly fashion with the next Linux remote root exploit. But what's the point. Why in the world would you need a fancy back door tool to remotely control a Linux box? It would be easier just to install a hacked version of the sshd daemon that didn't ask for a password for user "m@ster". Once you've got root on a Linux box there's plenty of remote admin tools already installed.
In other words this trojan is likely to affect the vast hordes of Linux users that always log in as root, use their Linux box to read email, and who automatically install and run binaries that the receive off the Internet.
All five of them.
Seriously speaking, this is one of those areas where Windows users see how easy it is to use email to trick Windows users into triggering trojans and they figure that Linux must be similarly vulnerable. It isn't.
First of all, most Linux users, even new Linux users, don't do much of their work logged in as root. In Linux it is trivial to use su or sudo to become root as necessary, and this particularly trick is one of the first that most Linuxers learn. Second of all, Linux does not make it easy to run foreign executables. No Linux client I can think of allows you to simply click on an attachment and automatically run it. Besides that, even if the person does run the executable how does it spread. Windows email viruses rely on the fact that they can programatically access the Outlook address book. Even Windows users who use Eudora or Netscape Messenger are immune to this trick. Under Linux the question of how the trojan is going to email itself to my friends is even more difficult. There are literally hundreds of mail clients that see active use. Your trojan would need to parse many different kinds of text based address books (heck, there are probably three different Emacs packages that one could use as an address book).
And when all was said and done the chance of this trojan spreading are nearly nil. After all, even if one Linux user got infected, and the trojan successfully mailed itself to 200 of his closest friends chances are good that very few of these friends would be running Linux, and chances are even better that none of those friends running Linux would be similarly vulnerable (or nearly as dense). The trojan would refuse to spread, and that would be the end of it.
Comparing this trojan to the Code Red worm is laughable.
More to the point, you didn't hire 41 employees before figuring out how many employees your market would support. Although I admit that GPLing your product does give you an advantage that Great Bridge didn't have. When NuSphere came along to try and steal your business they quickly realized that they couldn't sell commercially licensed copies of MySQL, nor could they integrate closed source add-ons to MySQL while you folks at MySQL AB can.
When RedHat decided to market their "RedHat Database" they undoubtedly were glad that PostgreSQL was BSD licensed. That means that they can literally consider the source code their own, and can relicense it however they want. This is certainly good for RedHat, but it is bad for the folks that have poured heart and soul into PostgreSQL only to see RedHat reap the rewards.
If I was RedHat I would immediately create a highly value added addition to PostgreSQL and release it under the GPL (replication comes to mind). That would force PostgreSQL users to choose between a stock BSD licensed PostgreSQL or an enhanced GPL licensed PostgreSQL. For most users the difference in the license is minimal, they get free software with source code either way. However, RedHat could probably shift most of the development resources away from the BSD licensed version to the GPL one which they would control in much the same way that MySQL AB controls MySQL development. They would be the only vendor that could sell commercially licensed variants.
Long term breaking up Microsoft would probably be good for the economy. In the short term however (say over the next 3 years...) it will probably be fairly devastating. Remember the stock market has very little to do with reality (especially in the highly speculative high tech stocks). Earnings, revenue, and hard statistics have taken a back seat to intuition since the dawn of currency. Microsoft may not be GM, but that doesn't mean that they aren't a huge force in the US Economy. Torpedoing their stock would be bad for all tech stocks (even their competitors) in the extreme short term.
It is also important to note that Microsoft is a US company. Much of the growth of the "smaller" companies that would all of a sudden be able to compete would happen outside of US borders. That can't be good:). The perfect example of this is the fact that I am currently typing up this response using an OS developed by some punk kid undergraduate student in Finland. Now that's un-American.
As much as I disagree with the outcome, I can't help but applaud the sentiments that caused this turnaround. I don't want a President that is willing to rock the economic boat when it is sailing in troubled waters.
Microsoft will get what's coming to them in the long run. Monopolies don't last forever, and Microsoft is doing it's darndest to make sure that they don't have one single satisfied customer. Just wait and see how the hardware OEMs start to react when Windows XP fails to compell customers to upgrade their old computers. In the midst of an economic downturn Microsoft has almost doubled the cost of their basic OS for home users, and the OS was already the most expensive component of the average machine (sans monitor).
Yes, while the economy was good it was perfectly safe to gun for Microsoft. Now that the tech sector is in the dumps no sane President would try to destroy the one tech company that hasn't seen it's stock price drop out of the sky.
Let's not pretend that this has anything to do with corruption. There is no shady deal making going on. This has to do with the fact that Presidents that destroy the economy don't get re-elected.
The Democrats would have done the same thing. No sane President is going to push for the crucifiction of the one tech stock that isn't currently in the toilet with today's poor economy.
Not that it matters. Monopolies topple themselves eventually, and Microsoft is well on its way. PC sales are slow (and will remain slow despite Windows XP), corporate budgets are tight, and Microsoft is stuck in the unenviable position of having to compete not only against the growing tide of Free Software, but also against a huge installed base of it's own software.
If people don't start buying new computers or upgrading the software that they currently use then Microsoft is just as cooked as if we all switched over to Linux. And Microsoft isn't helping things either. For every nifty new feature that they have added (stability) they have added several anti-consumer features (the new registration procedure and other intellectual protection measures, higher price).
Of course they are. Who else is going to pay $400 bucks for an office suite. Most small businesses "borrow" their office software, or they run ridiculously old versions.
However, the fact of the matter is that small businesses employ far more people that large corporations, and the software chosen at small businesses tends to lead the way for corporate adoption. That's how all those Netware boxes ended up on corporate networks, and it is also why Windows NT replaced those Netware boxes at about the time when Novell's directory tools (only useful for enterprises) made Netware too expensive for small business. Heck, MS Office didn't start in the enterprise either. They were busy using Lotus 1-2-3 and WordPerfect.
Small businesses and home users are going to be drawn to freely available Star Office like flies to honey, as soon as a major OEM grows some cojones and includes it. And that day is not far off. The hardware OEMs are literally withering on the vine, and they will soon do anything to make their boxes a little more competitive. Even buck Microsoft and bundle Star Office. After all, you can bet that it kills them to go through all that work to sell hardware only to have Microsoft get all the profit.
You see, Star Office has all of the advantages of Linux (it's free) without any of the pain (it runs on Windows and does a fair job of importing MS Office files).
Nah, Star Office doesn't have to be perfect, it simply has to be "good enough" and less expensive. In the past the fact that Star Office was less expensive wasn't hardly a factor because it wasn't anywhere near "good enough" and most people could get a copy of Microsoft Office for free (by borrowing it from work or from a friend).
In the future, when small businesses and home users realize that a copy of MS Office costs more than a brand new computer preloaded with StarOffice they will see the light and StarOffice will start to get used. Once enough people are using StarOffice it won't matter that the MS Office import filters aren't perfect (they are pretty darn good), because chances will be good that the person that you are corresponding with will have StarOffice. After all, it's free!
Sure, some large corporations will stick with MS Office; heck, some large corporations are still using Lotus SmartSuite. But the corporate desktop is a very small piece of the pie. For home users and small businesspeople Star Office is good enough, it runs on the computer that they already have, and the price is definitely right. And now that people aren't simply going to be able to pass around a copy of MS Office, cheapskates are going to have to find a new office suite.
What, do you want the government to set share prices?
Part of the fun of a free market economy is that there is nothing stopping idiots from spending too much money for the goods and services they receive. Yes, sometimes that means that people will foolishly invest in companies that have no chance of ever having the kinds of profits that would justify their share price, but the alternative is far worse.
Free Market ecnomics certainly has its ups and downs, but it beats central planning of the economy all hollow. And if you are careful and stay away from people promising huge riches with little work you will find that you can avoid investing in companies that have no chance of ever justifying their sky high price.
I bill for my time and of course I include the source, however I do feel bad for the original programmer who made most of the work.
Why should you feel bad for the original programmer? Chances are good that he wouldn't have made that sale anyhow, so it's not like you are stealing from him. And your reselling his software expands his potential customer base. Sometime in the future your customers might decide that they want to contract service from someone other than yourself (let's pretend you were doing a lousy job, or that you aren't interested in service contracts). The original author would be an obvious choice for such a contract. Your work is essentially providing him with free advertising.
Besides, in the long run you will probably come to realize that at least some of your "enhancements" to the program belong in the official source tree. After all, it is a lot of work maintaining your own fork of a Free Software project, and there generally is very little benefit to that work. Folding your changes back into the project helps everyone, and it might even allow some other developer to develop features that you need.
That's what makes Free Software work, in the end it's better for nearly everyone (except, of course, the competition).
Exactly, count yourself lucky that your girl just lurked online waiting for you. I once had a girlfriend that would literally camp out in front of my apartment (@#$!! indoor hallways!). I realized things were out of hand when I found myself climbing in and out the window instead of going around to the front door.
I even tried breaking up with her, but that only made things worse. After all, she still knew where I lived, and she kept telling me that we could "work it out." In the end I had to move to another state. No, I am not kidding.
Every time you start thinking that something is entirely new, you are wrong. People are the same as they have ever been. Technology just gives us new methods of doing the same dumb/strange things as always.
The magic incantation, my friend, is price. Right now Joe SixPack probably isn't paying for his copy of Word, but the new versions of MS Office aren't going to allow for casual piracy. That leaves Joe SixPack with a choice. Stick with what he has forever (not likely), pay more for a copy of MS Office than he paid for his entire computer (my last computer cost $400 and they almost certainly are going to get even more inexpensive), or take a look at Sun's free Star Office. I wouldn't be surprised if OEMs started getting serious about shipping StarOffice on their machines by default. After all, it is probably terribly frustrating to work so hard building machines only to see the software folks make all of the profit. StarOffice is an easy way to differentiate low end boxes from the competition, and the price is definitely right.
Most people are going to find that Star Office is good enough for their needs, even if they share files with MS Office users, and it is a lot less expensive than MS Office. Contrary to popular belief it wasn't Linux's stability or security that has driven it's acceptance in the enterprise, it has been Linux's price. StarOffice is likewise prepped for much wider use.
I couldn't disagree with you more. Many pundits think that the reason that Linux is being installed is due to the fact that it is more stable or more secure, or more whatever. The pundits couldn't be more wrong. The real reason that Linux gets installed is that for many uses it is "good enough" and the price is right.
If you have some monster database, and that database costs you one grillion dollars every second that it isn't available, then you bust out your checkbook and pay for Oracle and a pile of the best Oracle DBAs you can find. However, most folks can get by with much less than the very best, and increasingly folks are shopping around. Paying a premium for software features that you don't need and won't use is stupid.
For example, in one of my projects I needed a database, not a fancy database, but something a step up from Access. Microsoft wanted me to go with SQL Server, but instead I spent the extra time to learn how to administer PostgreSQL. That extra time was time well spent. I now have several PostgreSQL databases deployed, with a fairly significant cost savings over MS SQL Server. I feel especially smug about my decision because PostgreSQL is getting ready to beta their 7.2 version which removes my last major problem with PostgreSQL, a vacuum will no longer require an exclusive lock on the table. Now I can use PostgreSQL in more demanding projects where having tables unavailable, if only for a moment, is unacceptable.
Could I have accomplished the same thing with MS SQL Server and Microsoft's development tools? Sure I could have. However, PostgreSQL, and the other Open Source tools I use, did the job for less money. More importantly, my PostgreSQL machines are completely off Microsoft's upgrade treadmill. I don't have to worry about how Microsoft is going to change their licensing agreements. Upgrades are free, and I have the choice of several organizations for support.
If you really believe that price is not a factor, then I have some software to sell you:).
Yes, and with Linux you can call RedHat, or if you don't like their support you can call Caldera, or SuSE, etc. etc. etc. And if your problem is exceptionally tricky, and very critical, you can pay someone to look at the source and fix it for you.
This is literally the biggest Red Herring ever. You can get professional support for Linux, and you can pick and choose your vendor in a way that is literally impossible with Windows. When push comes to shove the only company that can really support Windows is Microsoft, and they don't have a sterling reputation for customer service.
Two years ago!! Two years ago there wasn't really a comparison between KDE and Gnome. Gnome was still busy building a useable widget set and a fast Corba ORB. They really hadn't even started on actually making a useable desktop.
Gnome has come a long way in two years.
The reason that SUN chose Gnome over KDE should be fairly obvious. First of all, the Gnome libs are released under the LGPL and so you can use them to create commercial software. Several important KDE libs, on the other hand, are released under the GPL (the QT widget set being the most obvious example). This means that it is impossible to create commercial closed source KDE applications without purchasing a special license from TrollTech. That gives Gnome a major advantage over KDE for a company that sells software. The second reason that Sun chose Gnome over KDE was the fact that Gnome is based on Corba. KDE's DCOP might be nice, but it's not a Sun sponsored industry standard like Corba is.
Re:Not bad, but not as big as one might think.
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NYSE Goes To Linux
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· Score: 3, Insightful
It doesn't matter what OS they were using. Every time Linux gets a high profile implementation two things happen. First of all, that's one less implementation that Microsoft gets. Microsoft needs software sales to survive, and they need growth to keep their stock price high. In this respect Microsoft even is competing with old versions of their own software. If everyone decided to stick with Windows NT Microsoft would be just as screwed as if everyone decided to switch to Linux. Second, Linux gets a huge pile of publicity. Linux is always going to be a less expensive solution than any of Microsoft's OSes. The one advantage that Microsoft has is that they have an extremely large marketing budget. However, the best form of marketing is still word of mouth. If Linux continues to rack up impressive implementations Microsoft shops will start to wonder why it is that they are paying for their software.
The fact of the matter is that despite what IBM, Sun, and HP will tell you the "enterprise" market is not really where the interesting stuff happens in the technology world. The truly interesting stuff generally starts at the bottom of the technology chain and works its way upwards. That's how Windows got into the enterprise, and Linux is doing the same thing.
The ironic thing is that if Microsoft didn't spend all of it's time kicking it's customers in the teeth then there probably would be an actual groundswell of public outcry against the DOJ and the states that are suing. Microsoft's customers like the integration and the standardization that Windows and Office have fostered, and Microsoft has made software more affordable. It used to be pretty darn expensive to outfit your PC with all of the software you needed to run a business. MS Office is way too expensive, but it is less expensive than WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3 used to be.
However, Microsoft, has gotten greedy, and has basically resorted to extorting money from their users. Windows XP has a whole raft of anti-consumer "features," Microsoft's BSA goons are out in force, and Microsoft's licensing tactics get more and more predatory every year. Because of their actions nearly everyone in the computer industry is hoping that Microsoft gets taken down a peg or two. Even Microsoft's biggest customers are hoping that the DOJ chews them up and spits them out.
Perhaps someday Microsoft will learn something about customer service. Until then, don't expect any actual public support for their actions.
Humans aren't very good at "random" typing. Instead it is much better to type to some rhythm. I personally like "Shave and a hair cut TWO BITS" repeated over and over again. But hat is mostly because it scares the other people in my office when they hear me sing.
Scaring your co-workers is an important part of any decent security scheme.
More importantly RedHat went with Ext3 because it offers similar performace, potentially greater reliability (since it is based on ext2 code) and most importantly, upgrading from ext2 to ext3 is much more straightforward.
RedHat has a lot of existing customers. Providing them with an upgrade path to a journaled is a clear win for them. ReiseFS may have been first, and it almost certainly is better in some situations (and not particularly worse in others). However, it requires a much more painful transition, it isn't backwards compatible with ext2, and it doesn't come with the wide array of bulletproof recovery tools that ext3 inherits from ext2.
The beautty of Linux is (as you pointed out) we Linux users get to pick and choose from a growing assortment of very acceptable choices. We are literally being drowned with cool filesystems, and once they are mounted they will all act similarly to the 'ls -la' command.
Yes, Caldera is basically pulling a publicity stunt with this software release. In fact, for all the good that their versions of awk and grep are likely to do they might as well be releasing the original UNIX version of hello-world.c. GNU grep and gawk are far superior to Caldera's version, and there are already BSD versions of grep and awk for those folks that don't appreciate the GPL.
Now, if their version of awk and grep were cool, then the GPL would make better sense. They would almost certainly lure more developers to their version (so they would get free help maintaining their software), and if they required copyright assignation they could still continue to release binary versions under a different license.
In this particular case the one really good reason for using the GPL over some proprietary license that allowed source access is that the GPL is much easier to adminster for both Caldera and their customers. The GPL is also clearly GPL compatible, and that helps as well. Sure, there are other ways of preventing "improper" usage (they could have maintained the software under the old commercial license, for example), but the GPL is one of the better ways to release source code while still maintaining a modicum of control over the source.
Rather, GNU is slowly becoming irrelevant as people decide to release free software on their own terms.
Heh, that's a laugh. Caldera is releasing the source under the GPL. In other words, they are releasing the source under GNU's terms.
The reason that they are doing this is also pathetically obvious. No one in their right mind is going to use SCO's crufty awk and grep when they can use GNU's much better equivalents (unless their need for these pieces of software are trivial). Caldera is farming out these packages in the hopes that someone will take an interest in them, and so that their few remaining Unixware customers will stop bugging Caldera about fixing them.
Now Caldera will be able to say "You have the source, fix it yourselves, or better yet download the GNU tools and use them."
It is also fairly straightforward why they are releasing the source under the GPL and not some other license. If you have a large useable codebase that is currently proprietary you would be crazy to release it under anything but the GPL. After all, the copyright owner of a GPLed work can still release closed source proprietary packages of the code (released under a different license), however the GPL guarantees that your competitors can't scoop up your code and do the same.
The GPL, and with it all developers that are willing to release source under the GPL (like those wacky folks at the Free Software Foundation), are winning the war of the Free licenses. Sure, there are some major Free Software packages that are still available under BSD and X style licenses, but the vast majority of new software (especially software donated by corporations) is released under the GPL. Mozilla, Open Office, KDE, QT, MySQL, and now Caldera's grep and awk are all released under the GPL.
In short, being GPL compatible is more important now than it has ever been, giving the FSF more power than ever.
The fact that they didn't simply continue to maintain their version shows clearly that their concern isn't control of the software project, but rather promoting free software over proprietary software. After all, if they could manage the resources to fork a Free version of ispell they almost certainly had the resources to maintain that fork.
When ispell 3.X was released under a free license there was no longer any reason to maintain their own fork, their goal had been met. There was a free software implementation of ispell.
The Free Software Foundation is concerned about building an entirely free system. A spell checker is a fairly important tool for an operating system to have. It's a small wonder that the Free Software Foundation started maintaining their own spelling checker when they thought that they wouldn't be able to user newer versions of ispell. Yes, they probably should have used a different name for their fork, but that's a relatively minor issue.
The Free Software Foundation has a long history of building software from scratch when the license of the existing implementation didn't fit their purpose. Heck, they've essentially cloned the entire Unix userland, using development tools that they likewise built for themselves from scratch. Software developers often times go along with the FSF simply because they know that if they don't the FSF will write a competing implementation of their software released under the GPL. Not only will the FSF project compete with their software for users, but it will also compete with their project for developers, and there are more than a few developers that prefer GNU tools as a matter of principle.
If Geoff hadn't gone along with the FSF most (if not all) Linux distributions would probably be using a GNU spelling checker by now, and ispell would be a footnote of software history. It's as simple as that.
It's not about vanity or egomania. It's about principles. The FSF folk are bound and determined to have a free system, and they aren't willing to cut corners to get there. When RMS started his quest his goal was to completely rewrite all of UNIX. If he is willing to do that, then you can bet your sweet life that he is going to be willing to write his own spelling checker. The only way to avoid competing with the FSF in the long run is to release your software under an OSI approved license. Otherwise eventually someone with will start a project (perhaps even one funded by the FSF) that competes with your software.
There has been little Be desktop development By Be Inc. but there has been a fair bit in the way of application and driver development by the exceptionally talented community of Be enthusiasts. (Their like Linux enthusasts but without the foaming at the mouth)
My guess is that Be users, including the exceptionally talented community of Be volunteer developers, will soon be learning why it is that Free Software is such an important concept. Be Inc. has just sold it's intellectual property to Palm, and they soon will be closing their doors, probably forever. Since Palm just paid $11 million dollars for the Be source code, you can pretty much guarantee that they aren't going to simply cough it up, and you can also guarantee that they aren't going to be interested in the desktop portions of the OS. Palm makes handhelds.
In other words, Be as a desktop OS is DEAD and the time and effort spent writing drivers and Be specific applications has just been flushed down the proverbial toilet. Laugh at the "foaming mouth" Linux advocates all you want, at least they had the sense to base their work on software that they could get the source code to.
The problem with Windows is that it requires you to have extraordinarily competent systems administrators to keep it secure. Patching RedHat systems is as easy as paying attention to one mailing list and running:
rpm -Uvh foo.rpm
ocassionally. Debian systems are even easier to patch, apt does all of the work. Apt happily will decide which packages that you have installed need updating, download them, install them, and restart the corresponding daemons. Windows systems, on the other hand, are much more difficult to secure. Service packs invariably make so many dramatic changes that extensive testing is required, and sorting through individual patches is difficult and time consuming. Worse yet, you almost certainly are going to have to reboot, probably multiple times.
In other words, while worms are possible with both Linux and Windows, Linux's updating tools are far superior to their Windows equivalents.
I know I am not likely to find Tom Lane's (a PostgreSQL hacker) honesty from the vendors of commercial software. That's the whole point. How many times have you listened to the representative of one software firm or another talk about their new "features" only to find that when deployed in a real life scenario the new features fold like cheap card tables? I personally have seen it far too many times. Hiding these flaws may seem like a good idea to a marketing executive, but all this does is guarantee that I won't trust that company in the future.
Honestly truly is the best policy, and that's part of the reason that I like PostgreSQL. The PostgreSQL core is quite frank about what parts of their software are ready for prime time, and which parts aren't. More importantly, by skimming the pgsql-hackers list I can see what's being worked on, and how far they have progressed. That way I can decide for myself what features will be ready for production by the time my new stuff is ready to roll.
When it comes to trust, I would much prefer PostgreSQL's openness over the assurances of some faceless corporation that wants my upgrade fees so that they can have the revenues they need to keep Wall Street off their back.
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No, this trojan is literally pathetic. Basically if you run it as root it would wreck your day. Big whoop, who runs foreign executables as root?
In other words this trojan is no more dangerous than the following two line super sh trojan.
#!/bin/sh
/bin/rm -r /*
I could send that out in a million emails with the subject line of "Click here for a good time." and no one would end up with an erased hard drive.
Now, it certainly is possible that this trojan could be combined in a very deadly fashion with the next Linux remote root exploit. But what's the point. Why in the world would you need a fancy back door tool to remotely control a Linux box? It would be easier just to install a hacked version of the sshd daemon that didn't ask for a password for user "m@ster". Once you've got root on a Linux box there's plenty of remote admin tools already installed.
In other words this trojan is likely to affect the vast hordes of Linux users that always log in as root, use their Linux box to read email, and who automatically install and run binaries that the receive off the Internet.
All five of them.
Seriously speaking, this is one of those areas where Windows users see how easy it is to use email to trick Windows users into triggering trojans and they figure that Linux must be similarly vulnerable. It isn't.
First of all, most Linux users, even new Linux users, don't do much of their work logged in as root. In Linux it is trivial to use su or sudo to become root as necessary, and this particularly trick is one of the first that most Linuxers learn. Second of all, Linux does not make it easy to run foreign executables. No Linux client I can think of allows you to simply click on an attachment and automatically run it. Besides that, even if the person does run the executable how does it spread. Windows email viruses rely on the fact that they can programatically access the Outlook address book. Even Windows users who use Eudora or Netscape Messenger are immune to this trick. Under Linux the question of how the trojan is going to email itself to my friends is even more difficult. There are literally hundreds of mail clients that see active use. Your trojan would need to parse many different kinds of text based address books (heck, there are probably three different Emacs packages that one could use as an address book).
And when all was said and done the chance of this trojan spreading are nearly nil. After all, even if one Linux user got infected, and the trojan successfully mailed itself to 200 of his closest friends chances are good that very few of these friends would be running Linux, and chances are even better that none of those friends running Linux would be similarly vulnerable (or nearly as dense). The trojan would refuse to spread, and that would be the end of it.
Comparing this trojan to the Code Red worm is laughable.
More to the point, you didn't hire 41 employees before figuring out how many employees your market would support. Although I admit that GPLing your product does give you an advantage that Great Bridge didn't have. When NuSphere came along to try and steal your business they quickly realized that they couldn't sell commercially licensed copies of MySQL, nor could they integrate closed source add-ons to MySQL while you folks at MySQL AB can.
When RedHat decided to market their "RedHat Database" they undoubtedly were glad that PostgreSQL was BSD licensed. That means that they can literally consider the source code their own, and can relicense it however they want. This is certainly good for RedHat, but it is bad for the folks that have poured heart and soul into PostgreSQL only to see RedHat reap the rewards.
If I was RedHat I would immediately create a highly value added addition to PostgreSQL and release it under the GPL (replication comes to mind). That would force PostgreSQL users to choose between a stock BSD licensed PostgreSQL or an enhanced GPL licensed PostgreSQL. For most users the difference in the license is minimal, they get free software with source code either way. However, RedHat could probably shift most of the development resources away from the BSD licensed version to the GPL one which they would control in much the same way that MySQL AB controls MySQL development. They would be the only vendor that could sell commercially licensed variants.
Long term breaking up Microsoft would probably be good for the economy. In the short term however (say over the next 3 years...) it will probably be fairly devastating. Remember the stock market has very little to do with reality (especially in the highly speculative high tech stocks). Earnings, revenue, and hard statistics have taken a back seat to intuition since the dawn of currency. Microsoft may not be GM, but that doesn't mean that they aren't a huge force in the US Economy. Torpedoing their stock would be bad for all tech stocks (even their competitors) in the extreme short term.
It is also important to note that Microsoft is a US company. Much of the growth of the "smaller" companies that would all of a sudden be able to compete would happen outside of US borders. That can't be good :). The perfect example of this is the fact that I am currently typing up this response using an OS developed by some punk kid undergraduate student in Finland. Now that's un-American.
As much as I disagree with the outcome, I can't help but applaud the sentiments that caused this turnaround. I don't want a President that is willing to rock the economic boat when it is sailing in troubled waters.
Microsoft will get what's coming to them in the long run. Monopolies don't last forever, and Microsoft is doing it's darndest to make sure that they don't have one single satisfied customer. Just wait and see how the hardware OEMs start to react when Windows XP fails to compell customers to upgrade their old computers. In the midst of an economic downturn Microsoft has almost doubled the cost of their basic OS for home users, and the OS was already the most expensive component of the average machine (sans monitor).
Yes, while the economy was good it was perfectly safe to gun for Microsoft. Now that the tech sector is in the dumps no sane President would try to destroy the one tech company that hasn't seen it's stock price drop out of the sky.
Let's not pretend that this has anything to do with corruption. There is no shady deal making going on. This has to do with the fact that Presidents that destroy the economy don't get re-elected.
The Democrats would have done the same thing. No sane President is going to push for the crucifiction of the one tech stock that isn't currently in the toilet with today's poor economy.
Not that it matters. Monopolies topple themselves eventually, and Microsoft is well on its way. PC sales are slow (and will remain slow despite Windows XP), corporate budgets are tight, and Microsoft is stuck in the unenviable position of having to compete not only against the growing tide of Free Software, but also against a huge installed base of it's own software.
If people don't start buying new computers or upgrading the software that they currently use then Microsoft is just as cooked as if we all switched over to Linux. And Microsoft isn't helping things either. For every nifty new feature that they have added (stability) they have added several anti-consumer features (the new registration procedure and other intellectual protection measures, higher price).
It's going to be an interesting year next year.
Of course they are. Who else is going to pay $400 bucks for an office suite. Most small businesses "borrow" their office software, or they run ridiculously old versions.
However, the fact of the matter is that small businesses employ far more people that large corporations, and the software chosen at small businesses tends to lead the way for corporate adoption. That's how all those Netware boxes ended up on corporate networks, and it is also why Windows NT replaced those Netware boxes at about the time when Novell's directory tools (only useful for enterprises) made Netware too expensive for small business. Heck, MS Office didn't start in the enterprise either. They were busy using Lotus 1-2-3 and WordPerfect.
Small businesses and home users are going to be drawn to freely available Star Office like flies to honey, as soon as a major OEM grows some cojones and includes it. And that day is not far off. The hardware OEMs are literally withering on the vine, and they will soon do anything to make their boxes a little more competitive. Even buck Microsoft and bundle Star Office. After all, you can bet that it kills them to go through all that work to sell hardware only to have Microsoft get all the profit.
You see, Star Office has all of the advantages of Linux (it's free) without any of the pain (it runs on Windows and does a fair job of importing MS Office files).
Nah, Star Office doesn't have to be perfect, it simply has to be "good enough" and less expensive. In the past the fact that Star Office was less expensive wasn't hardly a factor because it wasn't anywhere near "good enough" and most people could get a copy of Microsoft Office for free (by borrowing it from work or from a friend).
In the future, when small businesses and home users realize that a copy of MS Office costs more than a brand new computer preloaded with StarOffice they will see the light and StarOffice will start to get used. Once enough people are using StarOffice it won't matter that the MS Office import filters aren't perfect (they are pretty darn good), because chances will be good that the person that you are corresponding with will have StarOffice. After all, it's free!
Sure, some large corporations will stick with MS Office; heck, some large corporations are still using Lotus SmartSuite. But the corporate desktop is a very small piece of the pie. For home users and small businesspeople Star Office is good enough, it runs on the computer that they already have, and the price is definitely right. And now that people aren't simply going to be able to pass around a copy of MS Office, cheapskates are going to have to find a new office suite.
What, do you want the government to set share prices?
Part of the fun of a free market economy is that there is nothing stopping idiots from spending too much money for the goods and services they receive. Yes, sometimes that means that people will foolishly invest in companies that have no chance of ever having the kinds of profits that would justify their share price, but the alternative is far worse.
Free Market ecnomics certainly has its ups and downs, but it beats central planning of the economy all hollow. And if you are careful and stay away from people promising huge riches with little work you will find that you can avoid investing in companies that have no chance of ever justifying their sky high price.
Why should you feel bad for the original programmer? Chances are good that he wouldn't have made that sale anyhow, so it's not like you are stealing from him. And your reselling his software expands his potential customer base. Sometime in the future your customers might decide that they want to contract service from someone other than yourself (let's pretend you were doing a lousy job, or that you aren't interested in service contracts). The original author would be an obvious choice for such a contract. Your work is essentially providing him with free advertising.
Besides, in the long run you will probably come to realize that at least some of your "enhancements" to the program belong in the official source tree. After all, it is a lot of work maintaining your own fork of a Free Software project, and there generally is very little benefit to that work. Folding your changes back into the project helps everyone, and it might even allow some other developer to develop features that you need.
That's what makes Free Software work, in the end it's better for nearly everyone (except, of course, the competition).
Exactly, count yourself lucky that your girl just lurked online waiting for you. I once had a girlfriend that would literally camp out in front of my apartment (@#$!! indoor hallways!). I realized things were out of hand when I found myself climbing in and out the window instead of going around to the front door.
I even tried breaking up with her, but that only made things worse. After all, she still knew where I lived, and she kept telling me that we could "work it out." In the end I had to move to another state. No, I am not kidding.
Every time you start thinking that something is entirely new, you are wrong. People are the same as they have ever been. Technology just gives us new methods of doing the same dumb/strange things as always.
The magic incantation, my friend, is price. Right now Joe SixPack probably isn't paying for his copy of Word, but the new versions of MS Office aren't going to allow for casual piracy. That leaves Joe SixPack with a choice. Stick with what he has forever (not likely), pay more for a copy of MS Office than he paid for his entire computer (my last computer cost $400 and they almost certainly are going to get even more inexpensive), or take a look at Sun's free Star Office. I wouldn't be surprised if OEMs started getting serious about shipping StarOffice on their machines by default. After all, it is probably terribly frustrating to work so hard building machines only to see the software folks make all of the profit. StarOffice is an easy way to differentiate low end boxes from the competition, and the price is definitely right.
Most people are going to find that Star Office is good enough for their needs, even if they share files with MS Office users, and it is a lot less expensive than MS Office. Contrary to popular belief it wasn't Linux's stability or security that has driven it's acceptance in the enterprise, it has been Linux's price. StarOffice is likewise prepped for much wider use.
I couldn't disagree with you more. Many pundits think that the reason that Linux is being installed is due to the fact that it is more stable or more secure, or more whatever. The pundits couldn't be more wrong. The real reason that Linux gets installed is that for many uses it is "good enough" and the price is right.
If you have some monster database, and that database costs you one grillion dollars every second that it isn't available, then you bust out your checkbook and pay for Oracle and a pile of the best Oracle DBAs you can find. However, most folks can get by with much less than the very best, and increasingly folks are shopping around. Paying a premium for software features that you don't need and won't use is stupid.
For example, in one of my projects I needed a database, not a fancy database, but something a step up from Access. Microsoft wanted me to go with SQL Server, but instead I spent the extra time to learn how to administer PostgreSQL. That extra time was time well spent. I now have several PostgreSQL databases deployed, with a fairly significant cost savings over MS SQL Server. I feel especially smug about my decision because PostgreSQL is getting ready to beta their 7.2 version which removes my last major problem with PostgreSQL, a vacuum will no longer require an exclusive lock on the table. Now I can use PostgreSQL in more demanding projects where having tables unavailable, if only for a moment, is unacceptable.
Could I have accomplished the same thing with MS SQL Server and Microsoft's development tools? Sure I could have. However, PostgreSQL, and the other Open Source tools I use, did the job for less money. More importantly, my PostgreSQL machines are completely off Microsoft's upgrade treadmill. I don't have to worry about how Microsoft is going to change their licensing agreements. Upgrades are free, and I have the choice of several organizations for support.
If you really believe that price is not a factor, then I have some software to sell you :).
Yes, and with Linux you can call RedHat, or if you don't like their support you can call Caldera, or SuSE, etc. etc. etc. And if your problem is exceptionally tricky, and very critical, you can pay someone to look at the source and fix it for you.
This is literally the biggest Red Herring ever. You can get professional support for Linux, and you can pick and choose your vendor in a way that is literally impossible with Windows. When push comes to shove the only company that can really support Windows is Microsoft, and they don't have a sterling reputation for customer service.
Two years ago!! Two years ago there wasn't really a comparison between KDE and Gnome. Gnome was still busy building a useable widget set and a fast Corba ORB. They really hadn't even started on actually making a useable desktop.
Gnome has come a long way in two years.
The reason that SUN chose Gnome over KDE should be fairly obvious. First of all, the Gnome libs are released under the LGPL and so you can use them to create commercial software. Several important KDE libs, on the other hand, are released under the GPL (the QT widget set being the most obvious example). This means that it is impossible to create commercial closed source KDE applications without purchasing a special license from TrollTech. That gives Gnome a major advantage over KDE for a company that sells software. The second reason that Sun chose Gnome over KDE was the fact that Gnome is based on Corba. KDE's DCOP might be nice, but it's not a Sun sponsored industry standard like Corba is.
It doesn't matter what OS they were using. Every time Linux gets a high profile implementation two things happen. First of all, that's one less implementation that Microsoft gets. Microsoft needs software sales to survive, and they need growth to keep their stock price high. In this respect Microsoft even is competing with old versions of their own software. If everyone decided to stick with Windows NT Microsoft would be just as screwed as if everyone decided to switch to Linux. Second, Linux gets a huge pile of publicity. Linux is always going to be a less expensive solution than any of Microsoft's OSes. The one advantage that Microsoft has is that they have an extremely large marketing budget. However, the best form of marketing is still word of mouth. If Linux continues to rack up impressive implementations Microsoft shops will start to wonder why it is that they are paying for their software.
The fact of the matter is that despite what IBM, Sun, and HP will tell you the "enterprise" market is not really where the interesting stuff happens in the technology world. The truly interesting stuff generally starts at the bottom of the technology chain and works its way upwards. That's how Windows got into the enterprise, and Linux is doing the same thing.
The ironic thing is that if Microsoft didn't spend all of it's time kicking it's customers in the teeth then there probably would be an actual groundswell of public outcry against the DOJ and the states that are suing. Microsoft's customers like the integration and the standardization that Windows and Office have fostered, and Microsoft has made software more affordable. It used to be pretty darn expensive to outfit your PC with all of the software you needed to run a business. MS Office is way too expensive, but it is less expensive than WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3 used to be.
However, Microsoft, has gotten greedy, and has basically resorted to extorting money from their users. Windows XP has a whole raft of anti-consumer "features," Microsoft's BSA goons are out in force, and Microsoft's licensing tactics get more and more predatory every year. Because of their actions nearly everyone in the computer industry is hoping that Microsoft gets taken down a peg or two. Even Microsoft's biggest customers are hoping that the DOJ chews them up and spits them out.
Perhaps someday Microsoft will learn something about customer service. Until then, don't expect any actual public support for their actions.
Humans aren't very good at "random" typing. Instead it is much better to type to some rhythm. I personally like "Shave and a hair cut TWO BITS" repeated over and over again. But hat is mostly because it scares the other people in my office when they hear me sing.
Scaring your co-workers is an important part of any decent security scheme.
More importantly RedHat went with Ext3 because it offers similar performace, potentially greater reliability (since it is based on ext2 code) and most importantly, upgrading from ext2 to ext3 is much more straightforward.
RedHat has a lot of existing customers. Providing them with an upgrade path to a journaled is a clear win for them. ReiseFS may have been first, and it almost certainly is better in some situations (and not particularly worse in others). However, it requires a much more painful transition, it isn't backwards compatible with ext2, and it doesn't come with the wide array of bulletproof recovery tools that ext3 inherits from ext2.
The beautty of Linux is (as you pointed out) we Linux users get to pick and choose from a growing assortment of very acceptable choices. We are literally being drowned with cool filesystems, and once they are mounted they will all act similarly to the 'ls -la' command.
Linux rocks!
Yes, Caldera is basically pulling a publicity stunt with this software release. In fact, for all the good that their versions of awk and grep are likely to do they might as well be releasing the original UNIX version of hello-world.c. GNU grep and gawk are far superior to Caldera's version, and there are already BSD versions of grep and awk for those folks that don't appreciate the GPL.
Now, if their version of awk and grep were cool, then the GPL would make better sense. They would almost certainly lure more developers to their version (so they would get free help maintaining their software), and if they required copyright assignation they could still continue to release binary versions under a different license.
In this particular case the one really good reason for using the GPL over some proprietary license that allowed source access is that the GPL is much easier to adminster for both Caldera and their customers. The GPL is also clearly GPL compatible, and that helps as well. Sure, there are other ways of preventing "improper" usage (they could have maintained the software under the old commercial license, for example), but the GPL is one of the better ways to release source code while still maintaining a modicum of control over the source.
Heh, that's a laugh. Caldera is releasing the source under the GPL. In other words, they are releasing the source under GNU's terms.
The reason that they are doing this is also pathetically obvious. No one in their right mind is going to use SCO's crufty awk and grep when they can use GNU's much better equivalents (unless their need for these pieces of software are trivial). Caldera is farming out these packages in the hopes that someone will take an interest in them, and so that their few remaining Unixware customers will stop bugging Caldera about fixing them.
Now Caldera will be able to say "You have the source, fix it yourselves, or better yet download the GNU tools and use them."
It is also fairly straightforward why they are releasing the source under the GPL and not some other license. If you have a large useable codebase that is currently proprietary you would be crazy to release it under anything but the GPL. After all, the copyright owner of a GPLed work can still release closed source proprietary packages of the code (released under a different license), however the GPL guarantees that your competitors can't scoop up your code and do the same.
The GPL, and with it all developers that are willing to release source under the GPL (like those wacky folks at the Free Software Foundation), are winning the war of the Free licenses. Sure, there are some major Free Software packages that are still available under BSD and X style licenses, but the vast majority of new software (especially software donated by corporations) is released under the GPL. Mozilla, Open Office, KDE, QT, MySQL, and now Caldera's grep and awk are all released under the GPL.
In short, being GPL compatible is more important now than it has ever been, giving the FSF more power than ever.
The fact that they didn't simply continue to maintain their version shows clearly that their concern isn't control of the software project, but rather promoting free software over proprietary software. After all, if they could manage the resources to fork a Free version of ispell they almost certainly had the resources to maintain that fork.
When ispell 3.X was released under a free license there was no longer any reason to maintain their own fork, their goal had been met. There was a free software implementation of ispell.
The Free Software Foundation is concerned about building an entirely free system. A spell checker is a fairly important tool for an operating system to have. It's a small wonder that the Free Software Foundation started maintaining their own spelling checker when they thought that they wouldn't be able to user newer versions of ispell. Yes, they probably should have used a different name for their fork, but that's a relatively minor issue.
The Free Software Foundation has a long history of building software from scratch when the license of the existing implementation didn't fit their purpose. Heck, they've essentially cloned the entire Unix userland, using development tools that they likewise built for themselves from scratch. Software developers often times go along with the FSF simply because they know that if they don't the FSF will write a competing implementation of their software released under the GPL. Not only will the FSF project compete with their software for users, but it will also compete with their project for developers, and there are more than a few developers that prefer GNU tools as a matter of principle.
If Geoff hadn't gone along with the FSF most (if not all) Linux distributions would probably be using a GNU spelling checker by now, and ispell would be a footnote of software history. It's as simple as that.
It's not about vanity or egomania. It's about principles. The FSF folk are bound and determined to have a free system, and they aren't willing to cut corners to get there. When RMS started his quest his goal was to completely rewrite all of UNIX. If he is willing to do that, then you can bet your sweet life that he is going to be willing to write his own spelling checker. The only way to avoid competing with the FSF in the long run is to release your software under an OSI approved license. Otherwise eventually someone with will start a project (perhaps even one funded by the FSF) that competes with your software.
My guess is that Be users, including the exceptionally talented community of Be volunteer developers, will soon be learning why it is that Free Software is such an important concept. Be Inc. has just sold it's intellectual property to Palm, and they soon will be closing their doors, probably forever. Since Palm just paid $11 million dollars for the Be source code, you can pretty much guarantee that they aren't going to simply cough it up, and you can also guarantee that they aren't going to be interested in the desktop portions of the OS. Palm makes handhelds.
In other words, Be as a desktop OS is DEAD and the time and effort spent writing drivers and Be specific applications has just been flushed down the proverbial toilet. Laugh at the "foaming mouth" Linux advocates all you want, at least they had the sense to base their work on software that they could get the source code to.
The problem with Windows is that it requires you to have extraordinarily competent systems administrators to keep it secure. Patching RedHat systems is as easy as paying attention to one mailing list and running:
rpm -Uvh foo.rpm
ocassionally. Debian systems are even easier to patch, apt does all of the work. Apt happily will decide which packages that you have installed need updating, download them, install them, and restart the corresponding daemons. Windows systems, on the other hand, are much more difficult to secure. Service packs invariably make so many dramatic changes that extensive testing is required, and sorting through individual patches is difficult and time consuming. Worse yet, you almost certainly are going to have to reboot, probably multiple times.
In other words, while worms are possible with both Linux and Windows, Linux's updating tools are far superior to their Windows equivalents.
I know I am not likely to find Tom Lane's (a PostgreSQL hacker) honesty from the vendors of commercial software. That's the whole point. How many times have you listened to the representative of one software firm or another talk about their new "features" only to find that when deployed in a real life scenario the new features fold like cheap card tables? I personally have seen it far too many times. Hiding these flaws may seem like a good idea to a marketing executive, but all this does is guarantee that I won't trust that company in the future.
Honestly truly is the best policy, and that's part of the reason that I like PostgreSQL. The PostgreSQL core is quite frank about what parts of their software are ready for prime time, and which parts aren't. More importantly, by skimming the pgsql-hackers list I can see what's being worked on, and how far they have progressed. That way I can decide for myself what features will be ready for production by the time my new stuff is ready to roll.
When it comes to trust, I would much prefer PostgreSQL's openness over the assurances of some faceless corporation that wants my upgrade fees so that they can have the revenues they need to keep Wall Street off their back.