You missed the point too. When you buy a USB device and then point at some drivers, those drivers are NOT provided by Windows. They are provided by the manufacturer.
As long as the manufacturers write Windows drivers, and users write Linux drivers, USB support on Linux will always be behind Windows.
p.s. I think the whole idea of drivers is wrong. A separate driver for each device means that there is no standardization.
It's not even plug and play under Windows. If it's a mouse, then yeah. But if it's not, nine times out of ten you have to install a driver. Installing a driver is NOT plug and play.
Plug and play is taking your brand new USB device out of the box, plugging it in, and having it work instantly.
No, he's saying that if Windows can reach 95%+ marketshare with an installer that starts off in textmode, then perhaps, just perhaps, a full 100% GUI installer is not the Holy Grail so many people in this community think it is.
Every distribution can use an idea like this. It irks me when I try an "easy-to-install" distro with no way to get an expert installer interface (like letting me tell Mandrake what video card I have instead of it guess incorrectly). On the flip side, quick-n-dirty simple installers are great for just trying out a system.
There is a reason why GPL'd Linux has made an impression where BSD and BeOS were unable to...
That reason is timing. Linux was in the right place at the right time while BSD was tied up in court with a monopolist. At precisely the moment when hackers first had access to inexpensive personal computers capable of running Unix a unix like operating system, AT&T decided to sue.
...and then the Redmond guys show up and build a fence around everyone else
The arable land is infinite! The Redmond guys can't possibly build a fence big enough. Land grabs are pointless when there's infinite land.
Or to bring this more to reality: I run FreeBSD, which is under the FreeBSD license. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that Microsoft can do to make FreeBSD unfree. They might make their copies unfree, but they can't touch mine and they can't touch yours.
However, that is not the case with GPL vs. BSD. I can freely use and modify any code under the GPL or the BSD. It's not like some company can just take over BSD code and never let me use it. They are both free.
I have a better analogy to counter to bad analogy:
Since software can be infinitely copied and distributed with no loss, think of it as an infinite stretch of arable land. Proprietary guys come along and fence off a section with a sign saying "keep out". GPL guys come along and fence off a section saying "free for everyone". BSD guys come along and notice that fences are utterly irrelevant...
Well, it depends what you want. If you are happy with Linux having less than 1% of the desktop market, then fine.
Why should I be in any way concerned what marketshare my operating system has? It's running on my system and that's all I need to know. As long as there's enough people developing it to keep it current, it doesn't matter to me if my neighbor is using it to.
But there are many people like myself who believe that the world would be a better place if OSS software were much more widely used.
Of course, the world would be a much better place if everyone voted the same way I do...
Oh but it is! It is providing the products and services that people want. Microsoft would be a pauper if tried to sell stuff that no one wanted.
Your argument seems to be that monopolies are contrary to working markets. But monopolies are not evidence of broken markets. Government chartered monopolies (power, cable, telco, etc) are very problematic, but natural monopolies can indeed arise in working market.
Microsoft is a natural monopoly. Despite their legal shenanigans and unethical practices, it was the marketplace that gave Microsoft the status of monopoly. Because it is a natural monopoly, the competition is brutal, but there is still competition. Some of that competition is doing quite well despite your blinders.
Take a hard look at the Macintosh. I know the majority of slashdot readers have just tuned me out for even mentioning the Mac, but it is genuine competition for Windows. The fact that it doesn't run on i386-class machines is irrelevant. A significant number of consumers choose to run Mac/PPC rather than Windows/i386. As geeks, we know that the OS is not the hardware, but the average consumer does not. And it is the average consumer who drives the market. They look at the total package, not the parts.
Why is the monopoly granted? To promote the progress of science and useful arts.
Being able to profit from your work here and now is one large incentive the copyright law provides to promote publishing. Being able to bequeath the copyright to your heirs is another.
In your example she's inheriting physical things - money, buldings, equipment.
She's also inheriting non-material things, such as accounts receivable. Material property is a much different thing than intellectual property, but they are still both properties, and have certain basic attributes in common. If it is legitimate to sell or assign away one's copyright, then why is it not also legitimate to bequeath it to an heir?
However, the question is whether the government should be signing these contracts (passing extended copyright laws) at all.
My argument is NOT that any length of term is reasonable. Far from it. But according a reasonable fixed term to copyrights should extend to the heirs as well. For instance, I think 25 years with no extensions for a copyright is reasonable. If the author should die in year one, why should his or her heirs not inherit the remaining 24? The general public is no worse off than if the author had lived.
Here's another reasonable term: 25 years or 12 years after the death of the author, which ever comes first.
However, a window washer's widow does not continue to take in income from her late husbands previously washed windows.
No, but she does inherit the window washing business, including any inventory or tools, receivables, contracts, etc.
Property can be inherited. Intellectual property can be inherited as well. If you consider copyright a type of lease from the public, then why should not the widow inherit the remainder of the lease?
Does it matter whether the license is dual or not? If it's GPL, then the GPL rules apply
The GPL part of the dual licensing is typically there just to ensure GPL compatibility. Otherwise the license ends up being least common denominator. This makes a huge difference from the standard GPL. Artistic License + GPL removes all copyleft. MPL + GPL removes the need for GPL linkage chains. Etc.
Even in the trivial case of Linux with a GPL exception, you now have the ability to make standard kernel calls from non-GPL applications. This is not something intended by the GPL.
Re:Is installation getting easier or better doc'ed
on
FreeBSD 4.7-RELEASE
·
· Score: 1
in large part due to the really bizarre way it handles partitions
It's not bizarre, it's just not the Microsoft DOS way.
gcc-3.2 was released less than two months ago. gcc-2.1 was released less than five months ago. And gcc-3.0 was released not much longer than one year ago.
How many -release- Linux distros can you name that were using gcc-3.2 even thirty days ago?
Face it, gcc-3.2 has not been around "for quite a bit of time now". It is in their -current (unstable) branches, and if you wish to live on the cutting edge, feel free to use them. But two months is nowhere near the amount of time required to properly test the inclusion of a new compiler in a system with a reputation for stability.
If I absolutely had to use Linux as my main system, I would probably use Gentoo. No doubt about it. But the mere word "linux" is not enough to make me switch back. FreeBSD does what I want it to do and does it well. It's not about being 1337, it's about using the system I want to use.
p.s. I bet both FreeBSD *and* Gentoo users are wondering what all those complaints of sluggish KDE coming from Redhat, Mandrake and Debian users are about...
I'm positive I will get royally flamed for this, but oh well...
This isn't the first time I've seen a segment of the Open Source/Free Software community turn on itself.
The slash in your quote is 90% of the answer. There are two similar-but-not-identical philosophies in this "movement". As with any other two similar-but-not-identical philosophies, tension is constant and conflict assured. If you look down the list of the Holy Wars that have occured during the Age of Software, you'll find that they all split down the same line. There is considerable fuzz and overlap at the borders, and most outsiders can't even tell the difference.
Due to circumstances, history and personalities, KDE is in the Open Source camp, while GNOME is in the Free Software camp. Many in the Free Software camp still don't believe that KDE is really Free Software (read this article at -1 threshold and you'll see). They want KDE to fail. Or if not fail, at least be a distant second to any other desktop. Some people just can't stand the fact that KDE is currently the most popular Unix desktop.
Some people see the existance of KDE as a personal attack on their philosophy. They feel they must attack back, or at least cheer on anyone else doing so.
Slashdot Mirror
You missed the point too. When you buy a USB device and then point at some drivers, those drivers are NOT provided by Windows. They are provided by the manufacturer.
As long as the manufacturers write Windows drivers, and users write Linux drivers, USB support on Linux will always be behind Windows.
p.s. I think the whole idea of drivers is wrong. A separate driver for each device means that there is no standardization.
It's not even plug and play under Windows. If it's a mouse, then yeah. But if it's not, nine times out of ten you have to install a driver. Installing a driver is NOT plug and play.
Plug and play is taking your brand new USB device out of the box, plugging it in, and having it work instantly.
No, he's saying that if Windows can reach 95%+ marketshare with an installer that starts off in textmode, then perhaps, just perhaps, a full 100% GUI installer is not the Holy Grail so many people in this community think it is.
Every distribution can use an idea like this. It irks me when I try an "easy-to-install" distro with no way to get an expert installer interface (like letting me tell Mandrake what video card I have instead of it guess incorrectly). On the flip side, quick-n-dirty simple installers are great for just trying out a system.
So let's have both.
There is a reason why GPL'd Linux has made an impression where BSD and BeOS were unable to...
That reason is timing. Linux was in the right place at the right time while BSD was tied up in court with a monopolist. At precisely the moment when hackers first had access to inexpensive personal computers capable of running Unix a unix like operating system, AT&T decided to sue.
Can we do some Star Wars analogies now?
Source Wars
...and then the Redmond guys show up and build a fence around everyone else
The arable land is infinite! The Redmond guys can't possibly build a fence big enough. Land grabs are pointless when there's infinite land.
Or to bring this more to reality: I run FreeBSD, which is under the FreeBSD license. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, that Microsoft can do to make FreeBSD unfree. They might make their copies unfree, but they can't touch mine and they can't touch yours.
However, that is not the case with GPL vs. BSD. I can freely use and modify any code under the GPL or the BSD. It's not like some company can just take over BSD code and never let me use it. They are both free.
I have a better analogy to counter to bad analogy:
Since software can be infinitely copied and distributed with no loss, think of it as an infinite stretch of arable land. Proprietary guys come along and fence off a section with a sign saying "keep out". GPL guys come along and fence off a section saying "free for everyone". BSD guys come along and notice that fences are utterly irrelevant...
If your students are so shallow that they need a 640x480 background for a boot manager then someone needs to whack them upside the head.
A boot manager that is easy to install is Good. A boot manager that is easy to configure is Good. Who cares about a boot manager that is pretty.
Well, it depends what you want. If you are happy with Linux having less than 1% of the desktop market, then fine.
Why should I be in any way concerned what marketshare my operating system has? It's running on my system and that's all I need to know. As long as there's enough people developing it to keep it current, it doesn't matter to me if my neighbor is using it to.
But there are many people like myself who believe that the world would be a better place if OSS software were much more widely used.
Of course, the world would be a much better place if everyone voted the same way I do...
My first computer was an 8086. And yes, I said 8086, and not 8088.
If you want to be recognized, don't follow the (questinable) ideas of others.
What's so questionable about explorer-style file managers?
I've used a myriad different file managers over the last twenty years, and I find that explorer-style are by far the best kind.
The market is NOT working.
Oh but it is! It is providing the products and services that people want. Microsoft would be a pauper if tried to sell stuff that no one wanted.
Your argument seems to be that monopolies are contrary to working markets. But monopolies are not evidence of broken markets. Government chartered monopolies (power, cable, telco, etc) are very problematic, but natural monopolies can indeed arise in working market.
Microsoft is a natural monopoly. Despite their legal shenanigans and unethical practices, it was the marketplace that gave Microsoft the status of monopoly. Because it is a natural monopoly, the competition is brutal, but there is still competition. Some of that competition is doing quite well despite your blinders.
Take a hard look at the Macintosh. I know the majority of slashdot readers have just tuned me out for even mentioning the Mac, but it is genuine competition for Windows. The fact that it doesn't run on i386-class machines is irrelevant. A significant number of consumers choose to run Mac/PPC rather than Windows/i386. As geeks, we know that the OS is not the hardware, but the average consumer does not. And it is the average consumer who drives the market. They look at the total package, not the parts.
Woo hoo! Universal IDs! I hope they stamp them on my forehead while they're at it!
Why is the monopoly granted? To promote the progress of science and useful arts.
Being able to profit from your work here and now is one large incentive the copyright law provides to promote publishing. Being able to bequeath the copyright to your heirs is another.
In your example she's inheriting physical things - money, buldings, equipment.
She's also inheriting non-material things, such as accounts receivable. Material property is a much different thing than intellectual property, but they are still both properties, and have certain basic attributes in common. If it is legitimate to sell or assign away one's copyright, then why is it not also legitimate to bequeath it to an heir?
However, the question is whether the government should be signing these contracts (passing extended copyright laws) at all.
My argument is NOT that any length of term is reasonable. Far from it. But according a reasonable fixed term to copyrights should extend to the heirs as well. For instance, I think 25 years with no extensions for a copyright is reasonable. If the author should die in year one, why should his or her heirs not inherit the remaining 24? The general public is no worse off than if the author had lived.
Here's another reasonable term: 25 years or 12 years after the death of the author, which ever comes first.
However, a window washer's widow does not continue to take in income from her late husbands previously washed windows.
No, but she does inherit the window washing business, including any inventory or tools, receivables, contracts, etc.
Property can be inherited. Intellectual property can be inherited as well. If you consider copyright a type of lease from the public, then why should not the widow inherit the remainder of the lease?
Why? They are seperate works of art, in seperate mediums. Why require one to mimic the other? This attitude only holds back film.
But they both depict the same thing: the story. You change the story and you change the thing.
there were a few geeks and a lot of "oh-i-can-install-suse23-so-i-am-a-linux-god"-peop le
So in other words, it was just like any other Linux get-together anywhere else in the world...
Does it matter whether the license is dual or not? If it's GPL, then the GPL rules apply
The GPL part of the dual licensing is typically there just to ensure GPL compatibility. Otherwise the license ends up being least common denominator. This makes a huge difference from the standard GPL. Artistic License + GPL removes all copyleft. MPL + GPL removes the need for GPL linkage chains. Etc.
Even in the trivial case of Linux with a GPL exception, you now have the ability to make standard kernel calls from non-GPL applications. This is not something intended by the GPL.
in large part due to the really bizarre way it handles partitions
It's not bizarre, it's just not the Microsoft DOS way.
Slackware is amazingly simple to configure, except for you SysV weenies :-)
gcc-3.2 was released less than two months ago. gcc-2.1 was released less than five months ago. And gcc-3.0 was released not much longer than one year ago.
How many -release- Linux distros can you name that were using gcc-3.2 even thirty days ago?
Face it, gcc-3.2 has not been around "for quite a bit of time now". It is in their -current (unstable) branches, and if you wish to live on the cutting edge, feel free to use them. But two months is nowhere near the amount of time required to properly test the inclusion of a new compiler in a system with a reputation for stability.
The five most popular and successful Open Source applications today are either not under the GPL, or under a dual'ed or exception'ed GPL:
XFree86 - MIT License
Apache - Apache License
Perl - Artistic/GPL
Linux - GPL with exception
Mozilla - MPL/NPL
more specifically, Gentoo
If I absolutely had to use Linux as my main system, I would probably use Gentoo. No doubt about it. But the mere word "linux" is not enough to make me switch back. FreeBSD does what I want it to do and does it well. It's not about being 1337, it's about using the system I want to use.
p.s. I bet both FreeBSD *and* Gentoo users are wondering what all those complaints of sluggish KDE coming from Redhat, Mandrake and Debian users are about...
I'm positive I will get royally flamed for this, but oh well...
This isn't the first time I've seen a segment of the Open Source/Free Software community turn on itself.
The slash in your quote is 90% of the answer. There are two similar-but-not-identical philosophies in this "movement". As with any other two similar-but-not-identical philosophies, tension is constant and conflict assured. If you look down the list of the Holy Wars that have occured during the Age of Software, you'll find that they all split down the same line. There is considerable fuzz and overlap at the borders, and most outsiders can't even tell the difference.
Due to circumstances, history and personalities, KDE is in the Open Source camp, while GNOME is in the Free Software camp. Many in the Free Software camp still don't believe that KDE is really Free Software (read this article at -1 threshold and you'll see). They want KDE to fail. Or if not fail, at least be a distant second to any other desktop. Some people just can't stand the fact that KDE is currently the most popular Unix desktop.
Some people see the existance of KDE as a personal attack on their philosophy. They feel they must attack back, or at least cheer on anyone else doing so.