A lot of people seem to think that no one should be administering a machine unless they are experts at it. Unfortunately, anyone who runs a computer at home is the administrator, like it or not. So security needs to be made simple enough for your mom to do. Especially if you decided to be l33t and gave her a Walmart special with Lindows preinstalled.
But the sad fact is, security is the obverse of convenience. Security is going to be inconvenient in terms of hassles, time, or money. For the newbie or lazy, take the inconvenient spend-some-money route, and buy a good router. It's not perfect (nothing is), but it's a heck of a lot better than nothing. Personally I'm using a DLink router. (I'm not relying on it though).
Funnily enough I frequently here this from scripting language "programmers" , I hardly ever hear it from programmers who can do both scripting AND low level C/C++ coding.
I have to program system software in Bourne, Perl, C and C++. Each one has its place. I simply cannot stand people who think one language can do everything. It's like saying you can build a house with only mortor but no bricks.
When all you know how to use is a hammer, then everything looks like a nail. Likewise when all you know is Perl, everything looks like it should be a script.
I don't view that as a plus. I think a base OS install should come with a full-featured scripting language that gives access to all OS facilities, and as much stuff as possible should be implemented in it.
So why are you bitching at FreeBSD? Why aren't you bitching at SuSE, Redhat, Mandrake, Gentoo, Slackware and Debian? Some of those system will give you Perl and sometimes Python as part of the minimal install, but none of them implements as much stuff as possible in either of those languages.
I think Perl is a pretty awful language, but not including it in FreeBSD strikes me as a stupid decision.
It is included in FreeBSD, and it is installed by default, it's just not a part of the base system. The same situation occurs with XFree86. The base system is the operating system and environment. Stuff that isn't the OS, or isn't expected to be included with the OS, shouldn't be there. Bash isn't there. Emacs isn't there. Why should Perl be there? If you've ever used Slackware, you could consider the base system to be the "A" distribution, and Slackware doesn't have Perl in the "A" distribution. So far I've seen no one argue that it should be there.
What is BSD doing instead? Implementing all utilities in C? Gee, that's bright: let's create lots of unnecessary work for ourselves
Actually, it's making things a heck of a lot easier for the user. In the olden days (a few months ago) you used the Perl version that was in the base system. It was very difficult to use a new version. You were stuck with the default. There were several pieces of software that I was never able to use simply because I was unable to update my Perl. But the situation now is that I can use any version of Perl I want. Upgrading is simple and hassle free.
Rewriting a *few* Perl scripts in C and bourne was a good thing. These are lowest-common-denominator languages, and should be used whenever possible for low level system software (which is not to say that they are necessarily appropriate for higher level software).
In short, you will see absolutely zero drawbacks in FreeBSD if you are a Perl developers. Zero. But you will see several advantages to it not being in the base system.
Re:Before all the flamers get in.
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Qt On DirectFB
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· Score: 1
I have no problem with DirectFB, Fresco, and any other alternative to X11R6. But I still want to keep X11R6. But there are too many mini-dictators on slashdot arguing that it must be one or the other, and that I must do things their way just so they can have a game machine.
p.s. Sites that require direct hardware rendering to display their content are going to be the sites I avoid, regardless of my system's capabilities.
Re:DirectFB and non-english letters
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Qt On DirectFB
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· Score: 1
It was sarcasm...
Re:DirectFB and non-english letters
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Qt On DirectFB
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· Score: 2, Insightful
Since everyone wants to get rid of the X11 remote networking because "95% of people don't use it", then the obvious answer to your question is "if 95% of the people can get by with US-English keyboards, then the rest of you can go suck wind". </sarcasm>
Since you haven't said exactly what is bloated and buggy with XFree86, nor stated why Windows 95 is a better GUI than any other X GUI, I'll assume you're just talking out your arse.
But rather than just flame, I'll present you with some reasons why you *perceive* Windows to be better.
A) Everyone tells you it's faster. Don't laugh this one off! The average human being rivals the cow when it comes to peer pressure. I've done some tests on my dual boot Win2k/FreeBSD machine. FreeBSD with KDE can do from powerup to surfing slashdot with Konqueror in 45 seconds, while powering up under Win2k to surfing Slashdot under Internet Exploder takes 60 seconds.
B) At work we're taking a i486 embedded device running X11R5 (R5 mind you!) and redesigning it from scratch to run WinXP Embedded on a 1Ghz P4. The new system *HAS* to use DirectX, because win32 is too damn slow. It does not have the performance that the i486/X11R5 has. They can't draw realtime *labels* and *graphs* faster than 15fps without it.
C) But that's speed. There can be a noticable response difference between the two, especially if your distro was asleep at the wheel when it came to default X settings. Why is Win95 more responsive than KDE or GNOME? Because the Win95 GUI DOESN'T DO ANYTHING! Even vanilla Blackbox has a higher feature set then it does! The win95 desktop can't even handle a jpg background without resorting to an ActiveDesktop hack, but most X window managers can use any image format you throw it at, and will scale the image without aliasing to boot.
D) A Qt application is no slower or less responsive under XFree86 than the same Qt application recompiled for win32. Try it and see! In fact, the only GTK+ application I use under Windows is *slower* than its XFree86 counterpart (GIMP).
E) If you see a significant performance increase under Win95/2k/XP, it's because it's an ActiveX application. It's bypassing the GUI completely. Please reread the previous sentence and attempt to comprehend it. See my note under B. We had to use ActiveX in our project because the WinXP GUI is too slow. Linux/BSD needs an ActiveX analogue, true, but that's no reason to dump X completely. Sometimes when you're playing Quake and feeling l33t because you're using Linus instead of Windows, then you want a good direct rendering engine. But it's completely pointless when you're running Scribus or GIMP. Perhaps DirectFB can fill this role for the times it's needed.
Re:Before all the flamers get in.
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Qt On DirectFB
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· Score: 1
You may think it's exotic, but I use it everyday for everyday things. And so do a lot of people I know. I use it because I can run Framemaker, Clearcase and ClearQuest on my FreeBSD box from a remote Solaris workstation.
Re:Before all the flamers get in.
on
Qt On DirectFB
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· Score: 5, Insightful
In reality, though, to a great many linux users, it's a neat trick that you don't necessairly NEED.
In the midst of citing reality, you're ignoring reality. First of all, Linux isn't the only OS that uses XFree86, X11R6, or another X11 based windowing system. Heck, it ain't even the only free OS that uses it.
Second, even supposing Linux will achieve it's goal of "World Domination", where everyone must use Linux or be branded a luser, it's still ignoring the fact that Linux is a Unix-like operating system, and to confine it to only the home based game machine is to deny it 95% of its potential.
Third, that "neat trick" doesn't cost you a damn thing if you don't need it. The only thing holding back XFree86 performance is the fact that it must operate in userland.
I've heard the phrase "why keep it of 95% of the people don't use it", referring to the remote network capabilities of X11. Well, why not turn that statement on its head? Why support SMP in Linux, if 95% of the users don't use it? Heck, why do I need snowchains for my car if 95% of the time I won't be driving in snow?
Fact of the matter is, most people using Linux, BSD or UNIX outside of the home will want and need the networking capabilities of XFree86. If you want Linux to be confined to home game machines, then go roll your own distro. But in the meantime a lot of us want the capabilities of XFree86.
A bunch of guys in suits who havent had a product in a decade will sit around wondering why they arent making any money.
Hate to break the news to you, but ALL suits sit around and wornder why they aren't making any money, regardless of their situation. At my company we have 53% marketshare out of a field of three, increased revenues by 14% from last year, and are making enough money that we are keeping our sibling divisions in the corporation afloat. Yet the CEO is still yelling at us for being nogoodniks, laying off people left and right, and outsourcing research and development. He's kvetching and moaning that we're losing money, while the independent industry press is praising us for strong growth during the recession.
And yet it took them over ten years to die from the date they "didn't roll over and die when Word (for DOS) came out". Think about that. They continued to exist for one half of the entire PC era after you say they took the fatal wound.
Methinks you're placing way too much blame on Microsoft, and not nearly enough on Corel.
What you call "privilege" I have more often seen called "power". You can't advance freedom by granting the power to take away others' freedom.
Privilege *IS* power. My main point was that there is no such thing as the "freedom to restrict freedom."
The GPL simulates a world in which copyright does not exist, at least for anything derived from my releases.
Nonsense! The FSF may say one thing, but their actions via the GPL say the opposite. If software should not be owned, then it follows that I should not own the software I write. I should therefore have even less ownership of derivative works. If I have no moral right to control my own works, then the control of derivative works is completely beyond my domain. But the GPL is asserting that I DO have moral rights over derivative works!
The right to control derivation does not exist in nature. It can only come from the use of government force. In a world without copyright, there can be no copyleft, because there can be no way to mandate source code availability. Copyleft is founded on the threat of initiating force.
On the other hand, "copycenter" software (take it down to the copy center and run off as many copies as you want) is fully in adherence with natural rights and would still exist in a copyright-free world. Yes, they still depend upon copyright, but this is solely to keep the liability disclaimer intact. It uses copyright because the world uses copyright.
Devil's advocate aside, though, to call it GNU/Linux or the like is IMO an appalling oversimplification.
How true. All Linux distributions are mosaics of pieces welded together. Even the most trivial emergency floppy distro probably has significant parts from half a dozen different projects. The true authors of the OS as whole are the ones to name it, and the true authors are the distributions.
If you take a look at FreeBSD, you'll see that every utility does have a man page. And every driver and substantial parts of the kernel do as well. I guess that's why it's not a popular as Linux...
Sigh. My point was *NOT* that KDE and Corel were in the right and the FSF was in the wrong (IMO, one of them at least was very wrong). Rather, my point was simply that the GPL is not an easy document to understand, even by experienced developers and corporate lawyers.
There is no case law covering this. But neither is it fiction. Their interpretation is just as "legally" valid as anyone else's. But I still think they're completely off base.
Think TCP/IP stack in Windows, it's licensed to Microsoft under BSD and then licensed again to the end user
If you distribute source code, people are going to use it in their own project, and some of those people are going to use in proprietary projects. It doesn't matter if it's BSD, GPL or anything else, it's still going to happen.
It's like alchohol. People are going to drink it. When the US, Canada, and other countries decided to have a prohibition on alcohol, they intended that people wouldn't drink. But what happened in reality is that no one stopped drinking, but a lot of people got arrested and thrown in jail. Ditto for narcotics (actually, more people are using narcotics now than they ever did before the Harrison act).
Using someone else's source code without permission is a victimless crime. It harms no one. Someone else's licensing decision might, but using the code itself does not.
What's more free, the freedom to take away the other's freedom or the prohibition to do it?
I will agree with you that the previous poster was spouting metaphysical bullshit. But you are making the mistake of confusing freedom with privilege.
Privilege belongs to a few, freedom belongs to everyone. There is no such think as the freedom to take away the freedoms of others. You are confusing this with the privilege of taking away the freedoms (or privileges) of others. Please understand the difference.
Freedom is based upon the respect of property (with 'self' included as a property). I am free to do whatever I want with my own property, within my own domain. But I am not free to do anything at all to your property within your domain without getting your permission first. The reason my freedom to swing my fist ends at your nose, is because your nose is not my property to do with as I wish. The reason I cannot yell "fire" in a crowded theater is because that endangers the property (lives) of others.
Everyone has (or should have) the freedom to do whatever they want with their own software that they have written. But when you start dealing with the software that other people have written, then the firm respect for property is critically important to preserve freedom. The BSD license is free because it recognizes this. It says "this is my property, do with it as you wish." The GPL is free because it says "this is my property, and you can use it if you follow my rules". The biggest difference between the two licenses is that the GPL strenously asserts its property rights over the work and its derivatives, while the BSD license absolves all but the most trivial property rights over the work and its derivatives.
If you like the GPL, then proudly assert that you are in favor of strong copyrights and software ownership, and people may only use your property in according with your demands. But don't go asserting that other licenses are less free just because they don't wave the legal cudgel of copyright in everyone's faces.
Was it straightforward to you before you were told by someone else what it means? After all, there is still a great deal of disagreement over what some clauses mean.
Remember the KDE fiasco? The situation was hunky dory, until Redhat came along and issued a white paper saying that KDE was illegal. Then Debian got in on the act, and before you knew it, there was this completely new interpretation of the GPL coming from the FSF. Do you really think that none of the KDE developers read the license? Of course they did!
Then there was the Corel LinuxOS fiasco. They had a "private" beta, and everyone jumped all over them. Do you really think that none of the lawyers at Corel bothered to read the license?
And consider the latest fiasco with Java and the LGPL. People have been using the LGPL with Java for years. Not once did anyone every complain. Then suddenly someone at the FSF offered up a contrary opinion, and all hell broke loose.
Notice I used the word "fiasco" with all of the above examples. That's because the GPL is a complicated and hard to understand document, yet everyone thinks they know what it means. The LGPL is even worse, because everyone thinks it's simpler, when in fact it's more complicated.
But that's "contractleft" not "copyleft". Since today's EULAs aren't based on copyright law anyway, maybe the FSF should start using EULAs to be more consistant.
I was talking about dynamic linkage, not static linkage. A dynamically linked application does not contain any of the library's code. All it contains are *references* to the function names. There is no modification. There is no copying.
Slashdot Mirror
A lot of people seem to think that no one should be administering a machine unless they are experts at it. Unfortunately, anyone who runs a computer at home is the administrator, like it or not. So security needs to be made simple enough for your mom to do. Especially if you decided to be l33t and gave her a Walmart special with Lindows preinstalled.
But the sad fact is, security is the obverse of convenience. Security is going to be inconvenient in terms of hassles, time, or money. For the newbie or lazy, take the inconvenient spend-some-money route, and buy a good router. It's not perfect (nothing is), but it's a heck of a lot better than nothing. Personally I'm using a DLink router. (I'm not relying on it though).
Funnily enough I frequently here this from scripting language "programmers" , I hardly ever hear it from programmers who can do both scripting AND low level C/C++ coding.
I have to program system software in Bourne, Perl, C and C++. Each one has its place. I simply cannot stand people who think one language can do everything. It's like saying you can build a house with only mortor but no bricks.
When all you know how to use is a hammer, then everything looks like a nail. Likewise when all you know is Perl, everything looks like it should be a script.
I don't view that as a plus. I think a base OS install should come with a full-featured scripting language that gives access to all OS facilities, and as much stuff as possible should be implemented in it.
So why are you bitching at FreeBSD? Why aren't you bitching at SuSE, Redhat, Mandrake, Gentoo, Slackware and Debian? Some of those system will give you Perl and sometimes Python as part of the minimal install, but none of them implements as much stuff as possible in either of those languages.
I think Perl is a pretty awful language, but not including it in FreeBSD strikes me as a stupid decision.
It is included in FreeBSD, and it is installed by default, it's just not a part of the base system. The same situation occurs with XFree86. The base system is the operating system and environment. Stuff that isn't the OS, or isn't expected to be included with the OS, shouldn't be there. Bash isn't there. Emacs isn't there. Why should Perl be there? If you've ever used Slackware, you could consider the base system to be the "A" distribution, and Slackware doesn't have Perl in the "A" distribution. So far I've seen no one argue that it should be there.
What is BSD doing instead? Implementing all utilities in C? Gee, that's bright: let's create lots of unnecessary work for ourselves
Actually, it's making things a heck of a lot easier for the user. In the olden days (a few months ago) you used the Perl version that was in the base system. It was very difficult to use a new version. You were stuck with the default. There were several pieces of software that I was never able to use simply because I was unable to update my Perl. But the situation now is that I can use any version of Perl I want. Upgrading is simple and hassle free.
Rewriting a *few* Perl scripts in C and bourne was a good thing. These are lowest-common-denominator languages, and should be used whenever possible for low level system software (which is not to say that they are necessarily appropriate for higher level software).
In short, you will see absolutely zero drawbacks in FreeBSD if you are a Perl developers. Zero. But you will see several advantages to it not being in the base system.
I have no problem with DirectFB, Fresco, and any other alternative to X11R6. But I still want to keep X11R6. But there are too many mini-dictators on slashdot arguing that it must be one or the other, and that I must do things their way just so they can have a game machine.
p.s. Sites that require direct hardware rendering to display their content are going to be the sites I avoid, regardless of my system's capabilities.
It was sarcasm...
Since everyone wants to get rid of the X11 remote networking because "95% of people don't use it", then the obvious answer to your question is "if 95% of the people can get by with US-English keyboards, then the rest of you can go suck wind".
</sarcasm>
Since you haven't said exactly what is bloated and buggy with XFree86, nor stated why Windows 95 is a better GUI than any other X GUI, I'll assume you're just talking out your arse.
But rather than just flame, I'll present you with some reasons why you *perceive* Windows to be better.
A) Everyone tells you it's faster. Don't laugh this one off! The average human being rivals the cow when it comes to peer pressure. I've done some tests on my dual boot Win2k/FreeBSD machine. FreeBSD with KDE can do from powerup to surfing slashdot with Konqueror in 45 seconds, while powering up under Win2k to surfing Slashdot under Internet Exploder takes 60 seconds.
B) At work we're taking a i486 embedded device running X11R5 (R5 mind you!) and redesigning it from scratch to run WinXP Embedded on a 1Ghz P4. The new system *HAS* to use DirectX, because win32 is too damn slow. It does not have the performance that the i486/X11R5 has. They can't draw realtime *labels* and *graphs* faster than 15fps without it.
C) But that's speed. There can be a noticable response difference between the two, especially if your distro was asleep at the wheel when it came to default X settings. Why is Win95 more responsive than KDE or GNOME? Because the Win95 GUI DOESN'T DO ANYTHING! Even vanilla Blackbox has a higher feature set then it does! The win95 desktop can't even handle a jpg background without resorting to an ActiveDesktop hack, but most X window managers can use any image format you throw it at, and will scale the image without aliasing to boot.
D) A Qt application is no slower or less responsive under XFree86 than the same Qt application recompiled for win32. Try it and see! In fact, the only GTK+ application I use under Windows is *slower* than its XFree86 counterpart (GIMP).
E) If you see a significant performance increase under Win95/2k/XP, it's because it's an ActiveX application. It's bypassing the GUI completely. Please reread the previous sentence and attempt to comprehend it. See my note under B. We had to use ActiveX in our project because the WinXP GUI is too slow. Linux/BSD needs an ActiveX analogue, true, but that's no reason to dump X completely. Sometimes when you're playing Quake and feeling l33t because you're using Linus instead of Windows, then you want a good direct rendering engine. But it's completely pointless when you're running Scribus or GIMP. Perhaps DirectFB can fill this role for the times it's needed.
You may think it's exotic, but I use it everyday for everyday things. And so do a lot of people I know. I use it because I can run Framemaker, Clearcase and ClearQuest on my FreeBSD box from a remote Solaris workstation.
In reality, though, to a great many linux users, it's a neat trick that you don't necessairly NEED.
In the midst of citing reality, you're ignoring reality. First of all, Linux isn't the only OS that uses XFree86, X11R6, or another X11 based windowing system. Heck, it ain't even the only free OS that uses it.
Second, even supposing Linux will achieve it's goal of "World Domination", where everyone must use Linux or be branded a luser, it's still ignoring the fact that Linux is a Unix-like operating system, and to confine it to only the home based game machine is to deny it 95% of its potential.
Third, that "neat trick" doesn't cost you a damn thing if you don't need it. The only thing holding back XFree86 performance is the fact that it must operate in userland.
I've heard the phrase "why keep it of 95% of the people don't use it", referring to the remote network capabilities of X11. Well, why not turn that statement on its head? Why support SMP in Linux, if 95% of the users don't use it? Heck, why do I need snowchains for my car if 95% of the time I won't be driving in snow?
Fact of the matter is, most people using Linux, BSD or UNIX outside of the home will want and need the networking capabilities of XFree86. If you want Linux to be confined to home game machines, then go roll your own distro. But in the meantime a lot of us want the capabilities of XFree86.
Two examples that prove you wrong. Public company that doesn't support Linux: Microsoft; Private company that does: SuSE.
A bunch of guys in suits who havent had a product in a decade will sit around wondering why they arent making any money.
Hate to break the news to you, but ALL suits sit around and wornder why they aren't making any money, regardless of their situation. At my company we have 53% marketshare out of a field of three, increased revenues by 14% from last year, and are making enough money that we are keeping our sibling divisions in the corporation afloat. Yet the CEO is still yelling at us for being nogoodniks, laying off people left and right, and outsourcing research and development. He's kvetching and moaning that we're losing money, while the independent industry press is praising us for strong growth during the recession.
And yet it took them over ten years to die from the date they "didn't roll over and die when Word (for DOS) came out". Think about that. They continued to exist for one half of the entire PC era after you say they took the fatal wound.
Methinks you're placing way too much blame on Microsoft, and not nearly enough on Corel.
Why do they bury spammers twelve feet deep?
Because deep down they really are good people!
What you call "privilege" I have more often seen called "power". You can't advance freedom by granting the power to take away others' freedom.
Privilege *IS* power. My main point was that there is no such thing as the "freedom to restrict freedom."
The GPL simulates a world in which copyright does not exist, at least for anything derived from my releases.
Nonsense! The FSF may say one thing, but their actions via the GPL say the opposite. If software should not be owned, then it follows that I should not own the software I write. I should therefore have even less ownership of derivative works. If I have no moral right to control my own works, then the control of derivative works is completely beyond my domain. But the GPL is asserting that I DO have moral rights over derivative works!
The right to control derivation does not exist in nature. It can only come from the use of government force. In a world without copyright, there can be no copyleft, because there can be no way to mandate source code availability. Copyleft is founded on the threat of initiating force.
On the other hand, "copycenter" software (take it down to the copy center and run off as many copies as you want) is fully in adherence with natural rights and would still exist in a copyright-free world. Yes, they still depend upon copyright, but this is solely to keep the liability disclaimer intact. It uses copyright because the world uses copyright.
Devil's advocate aside, though, to call it GNU/Linux or the like is IMO an appalling oversimplification.
How true. All Linux distributions are mosaics of pieces welded together. Even the most trivial emergency floppy distro probably has significant parts from half a dozen different projects. The true authors of the OS as whole are the ones to name it, and the true authors are the distributions.
The userland is not a part of the operating system. That's Microsoft think.
If you take a look at FreeBSD, you'll see that every utility does have a man page. And every driver and substantial parts of the kernel do as well. I guess that's why it's not a popular as Linux...
Sigh. My point was *NOT* that KDE and Corel were in the right and the FSF was in the wrong (IMO, one of them at least was very wrong). Rather, my point was simply that the GPL is not an easy document to understand, even by experienced developers and corporate lawyers.
There is no case law covering this. But neither is it fiction. Their interpretation is just as "legally" valid as anyone else's. But I still think they're completely off base.
Think TCP/IP stack in Windows, it's licensed to Microsoft under BSD and then licensed again to the end user
If you distribute source code, people are going to use it in their own project, and some of those people are going to use in proprietary projects. It doesn't matter if it's BSD, GPL or anything else, it's still going to happen.
It's like alchohol. People are going to drink it. When the US, Canada, and other countries decided to have a prohibition on alcohol, they intended that people wouldn't drink. But what happened in reality is that no one stopped drinking, but a lot of people got arrested and thrown in jail. Ditto for narcotics (actually, more people are using narcotics now than they ever did before the Harrison act).
Using someone else's source code without permission is a victimless crime. It harms no one. Someone else's licensing decision might, but using the code itself does not.
What's more free, the freedom to take away the other's freedom or the prohibition to do it?
I will agree with you that the previous poster was spouting metaphysical bullshit. But you are making the mistake of confusing freedom with privilege.
Privilege belongs to a few, freedom belongs to everyone. There is no such think as the freedom to take away the freedoms of others. You are confusing this with the privilege of taking away the freedoms (or privileges) of others. Please understand the difference.
Freedom is based upon the respect of property (with 'self' included as a property). I am free to do whatever I want with my own property, within my own domain. But I am not free to do anything at all to your property within your domain without getting your permission first. The reason my freedom to swing my fist ends at your nose, is because your nose is not my property to do with as I wish. The reason I cannot yell "fire" in a crowded theater is because that endangers the property (lives) of others.
Everyone has (or should have) the freedom to do whatever they want with their own software that they have written. But when you start dealing with the software that other people have written, then the firm respect for property is critically important to preserve freedom. The BSD license is free because it recognizes this. It says "this is my property, do with it as you wish." The GPL is free because it says "this is my property, and you can use it if you follow my rules". The biggest difference between the two licenses is that the GPL strenously asserts its property rights over the work and its derivatives, while the BSD license absolves all but the most trivial property rights over the work and its derivatives.
If you like the GPL, then proudly assert that you are in favor of strong copyrights and software ownership, and people may only use your property in according with your demands. But don't go asserting that other licenses are less free just because they don't wave the legal cudgel of copyright in everyone's faces.
Was it straightforward to you before you were told by someone else what it means? After all, there is still a great deal of disagreement over what some clauses mean.
Remember the KDE fiasco? The situation was hunky dory, until Redhat came along and issued a white paper saying that KDE was illegal. Then Debian got in on the act, and before you knew it, there was this completely new interpretation of the GPL coming from the FSF. Do you really think that none of the KDE developers read the license? Of course they did!
Then there was the Corel LinuxOS fiasco. They had a "private" beta, and everyone jumped all over them. Do you really think that none of the lawyers at Corel bothered to read the license?
And consider the latest fiasco with Java and the LGPL. People have been using the LGPL with Java for years. Not once did anyone every complain. Then suddenly someone at the FSF offered up a contrary opinion, and all hell broke loose.
Notice I used the word "fiasco" with all of the above examples. That's because the GPL is a complicated and hard to understand document, yet everyone thinks they know what it means. The LGPL is even worse, because everyone thinks it's simpler, when in fact it's more complicated.
But that's "contractleft" not "copyleft". Since today's EULAs aren't based on copyright law anyway, maybe the FSF should start using EULAs to be more consistant.
I was talking about dynamic linkage, not static linkage. A dynamically linked application does not contain any of the library's code. All it contains are *references* to the function names. There is no modification. There is no copying.