Never any source code for these things. Why?
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SETI@Home For Linux
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Actually the source for the SETI@HOME project was available over a year ago if you registered as a volunteer developer. I have 3 different version of the Windows client laying around my PC. If you contact the director, you may be able to get an older version, or even the latest version. The screen shot of the new version looks 100 times better than the version I hacked away on.
I wonder if they have a KDE or GNOME version yet (hehe)?
ChiChi, your arguements only hold if all players play on a level playing field. They do not. Not all people have equal access to money and/or power. The homeless guy you step over on your way to class every morning (I've been to your YAF site, so I know your not in the real world) has no access to wealth (money) and therefore no power under a capitalist system. Would he or any of the other people who staved to death in US streets be considered 'victims' of capitalism? How about the situation in the old South Africa - millions of blacks subjected to poverty, death and torture due to racism and the good capitalist whites getting rich off of them. Would you then not consider Steven Biko a 'victim' of capitalism? When the playing field is not a fair one, it really doesn't matter if your economic system is 'capitalist' or 'socialist' - people are oppressed all the same. So instead of giving us URLS to dogmatic right-wing propoganda sites, try thinking for yourself. Ask Karen Silkwood what happens when you try as in individual to stand up to the power of a corporation with the backing of the so-called democratic government...oh, sorry I guess you can't ask her, now can you?(hey I guess she's another 'victim' of you 'freedom'). I don't pretend to be a super-red loving socialist - Marx had some good ideas and he was full of it on a lot of other things (he missed the rise of the service economy for instance), J.J Rouseau had some intersting things to say as well. Wasn't it John Locke who said that no one should have so much land (read this as wealth/money since land was wealth in Locke's time) that another would starve to death. Is Locke now a 'communist' or a 'socialist'? If he were alive I think he'd beg to differ.
Capitalism does not equal freedom. The ends do not justify the means (defeating totalitarian communism in the USSR does NOT make it ok for the US to murder a democratically elected leader of a foriegn nation and replace hime with a brutal dictator who is friendly to US "interests"/companies - see Salvadore Allende, so far victim #4 of you idea of 'freedom').
A good socialist ideal of modern times is that everyone be given an equal chance to succeed - a level playing field. If the choose (see this is freedom) to become Ross Perot or Bill Gates, that's their choice. If they choose to do nothing and live on the poverty line, then that is also their choice. But don't force them to live at that poverty line becasue the don't have access to the tools (money, education, food or power) or because it doesn't fit into the 'maximization of profit' ideas.
Is an unemployed auto worker more free than a cane cutter in Cuba simply because they live in a capitalist, 'free' country? Niether can feed their kids properly and niether can do much about it since they are pretty much powerless - and don't say the auto worker can get another job - where? MacDonalds? Can the economy of the US stand it if everyone has a job and there is no supply/demand tension in the labour market? No. for comapnies to make money and keep wages low, there must always be a greater demand for jobs than supply. So the poor autoworker is stuck as one of the unemployed persons needed so Chrysler can make profits. Is this freedom? Ask the autoworker, s/he may not agree with you.
Freedom is about having the POWER to choose. When you graduate and finally enter the real world think about it in your daily life. That impoverished crack user/dealer who broke into your house or shot you sister during a robbery, they 'must resort to less-than-honorable tactics to secure one's interests' in dealing with a system that is unfree. That's life outside the ivory tower.
Now take all this and apply it to OSS...
God you make me ill with you illogical dogma...I think I have to call in sick tommorow!
So keep it complicated and hard to understand? And that will make them set up their systems better? Get real. They set it up wrong BECAUSE its complicated. Keeping it hard to use will not solve this problem.
I hope Linux just dies and withers away. The last thing the world needs is another group of idiots who think they know better than anybody else and won't share their tools. I will certainly NEVER use Debian solely on principle. I certainly have the knowledge and technical ability to install and use it but I won't. Any group with those kinds of attitudes does not deserve my support. Linux is about sharing. Period. Sharing ideas, source code rights etc. Beleive it or not there are people out there who could greatly benefit from Linux but have niether the time nor desire (and in some cases the intellegence) to become *nix gurus just so they can do a spread sheet or play a game. Do they not deserve the benefits of Linux? Personally I will throw my support behind a distibution which attempts to INCLUDE people from the Linux club (RedHat, SUSE, Caldera etc) not exclude them. Funny, all the Debian snobs say RedHat is acting like MS, but when I read their posts, they seem to be the only ones not willing to help out everyone and share in the knowledge, to make it easy so Linux can spread beyond their realm. Now who's acting Like MS?(Keeping things secret so to try to get people to do things their way) Hopefully all the "newbies" and "clueless" will pick anoher distro (if the pick Linux at all after that elitist rant!) and relegate Debian to the Amiga of the *nix world. Be careful what you wish for - all the "clueless" will stay away - millions of them and MS Windows will continue to rule the OS world.
Since we're talking 'licencing' and thus legalities, everyone here seems to be missing one vital point that every purchase manager and CEO always considers when buying/getting software (or any other commodity for that matter) - protection against harm. Companies (who by far spend the most money on software) want quality products to do a specific job or task to help their business succeed. And They want that software to work. That being said they will NEVER use "free" (as in beer) software. Why? Basic contract law - if I pay you for a good or a service that is supposed to do something and it doesn't do what it is supposed to, you are in violation of our 'contract' and I can sue you (for cost recovery, damages, etc). If, however, I get it from you for free (as in beer), no 'contract' exists (no consideration has been given) and I am stuck. So companies will always pay some amount of money for software. And since they want it to work when they get it, they are more likely to buy their OSS version of PhotoShop (or GIMP or what have you) from Adobe rather than from Bob across the street. That's because they trust Adobe. They are there for one reason only - to make and sell software. Bob, well we really don't know why he is there. The company can trust, for the most part, that the version they get from Adobe will NOT be a security-risk trojan horse version that can damage their system. Whether it's true or not, they simply won't feel the same way about a version from Bob and won't take the risk, even if he sells it and can be sued. It won't do much good to sue Bob after his trojan has wiped the hard drive, the damage is done. They will then still have to pay enormous amounts to recover from the damage. The risk is just too high to buy from Bob. So that means, in an OSS model, making money from software will mean less the selling of the product (if it is freely available in the form of source code) and more about selling quality and peace of mind. The chances of the Adobe version being harmful and misrepresented, in the eyes of the company, are very slim compared with getting a free version from Bob (or anywhere else), even if he compiles it in front of you. Although this is a lot less likely when we talk about indiviuals getting software, the same still applies. My mother will want a word processor to work and she will want to be reasonalby sure that it will not fry her hard drive. Using the same logic as above, she is likely to be just as influenced by WHO made the software and WHERE she obtained it as she is about the price (free). This is the situation we have now with pirated software - I might be able to get some version of Illistrator for free or as low as $10 but chances are that I (and most people) would feel more comfortable paying $300 for the peace of mind that this copy of Illistrator is the real thing and propbably won't eat my drive. Some people will accept that risk but, just like now, a lot won't. So how does OSS fit in? Development. As we all know, the OSS model means that bugs and security holes are more likely to be found and fixed a lot sooner than with proprietary software, since there will be a lot more eyes on it. That drives up the quality. OSS also provides it's own sort of internal competition (for all those Ayn Rand loving rabid libertarians reading this)by having source code available. Most people won't pay $450 for a single copy of a proprietary software title with one licence - they will copy it illegally from a friend (akin to getting the source code). These same people, however, would buy an open source version if the cost was, say between $10 and $25 and they could maybe get some tech support (which they don't get if they "copy" the program - proprietary or otherwise). This makes them feel better (they are not "stealing") and give them peace of mind (they are buying from the source). Thus the OSS model will drive the price down to make software available to a greater number of people (make money through VOLUME). And these same people will pay $10 again to get the upgrade, even if it is free, for the same reasons (you continue making money). People will pay a small price over and over again for convienience and peace of mind (Admittedly, I'm talking psychology not economics here for the most part but it can be hard to separate the two sometimes). As for source code availability, well lets face it, I may want to see the source code and you may want to get at the source code for most programs but 95% of the rest of the world could care less. End of story. I would ventrure to guess that most individual users and a good chunk of corporate (especially small busineses) don't even WANT the source code - it takes up space on their hard drive and they can't understand it anyway. They certainly won't invest the time and money in learning how to compile themseleves (or getting someone else to do it) if it is just easier and more convienient to pay a small amount of money to have it done for them (not everyone is like the people of/. - looking for a technical challenge).
So OSS provides the best of both worlds - if you want the code you can get it, look at, copy it, whatever. If you sell it, you get better quality, more reliable, easier to customize and maintain software and more customers - and you can still make money. The consumer gets great software a good prices and buys from the source more than they do now (heck this could be bad for pirating). And lets not overlook the Consluting jobs that may arise...
Gee, I guess I missed the day the DOJ and the Marines walked into MS offices and took over, summarily executing Bill Gates and Paul Allen...I'll have to surf over to CNN a little more.
Get Real. If you don't like what the government is doing, vote them out (you guys are the land of democracy and freedom right?). And speaking of guns and weapons...try to stay clear of diesel fuel and fertilizer, you really scare me. This is/., the News for Nerds....Militia and "Patriot" sites are around the corner, way over on the right.
I read throough many of the posts here and I agree with the general consenus that this guy doesn't seem to have it all together. But like it or not, he makes some valid points about the maturity and mentality of some of the people in the Linux/Open Source movement. Arrogance is only a symptom of a greater danger lurking under the surface. Linux and the Open Source were started and improved on by some good people, spurned on by idealism to create a technically superior, legally "free" software movement (RMS, Linus etc). As it became more popular, it began attracting some who seemed to NEED to belong to some kind of movement. Linux and Open Source became more than an OS or a way to write software, for these people it became a way of life, a way justify their existance and exert their personality in a world where they may have otherwise been marginalised. Suddenly Linux is a fervor, almost to religious proportions. They feel powerful because they know something or can do something most other people can't. Instead of getting some gratification in helping others to learn, they use their knowledge to belittle these people, calling them "clueless" or "idiots" or any other of the names we've all seen on SlashDot do describe users, particularly Windows users (and programmers I might add). I suppose this makes them feel superior and somehow better people than these users because they are 'in the know' with the sacred Linux...and if you happen to disagree, or be foolish enough type an opinion other than what is accepted by these self-proclaimed "hackers", look out! The flames fly! Your intelligence is questioned, your "real" motives scrutinized in twisted, strange, paranoid ways ("Your a Microsoft Lackey! You must work for RedHat! Is it strange that ZDNet would print this today.. Your nothing but a suit!!"). And of course lets not leave out the Great Satan, Uncle Bill and Microsoft. Everything is an MS plot, MS and Bill are the cause of all things wrong with the software industry, they are the focus of evil in the corporate world. Part of the existance of the community is in response to MS'(and others, I might add) business practices and monoplistic policies. These Linux zealots, however, take this to extremes, painting anything assciated with MS or the way they do business with the same brush of evil. They close their minds to the possiblity that SOME MS products and Windows programs in general may actually be good quality software. Some of it is even GPLed (not by MS of course, but there are GPL windows programs out there). By the same extension anything that is Linux/GNU/GPLed is good, whether its actually a quality or useful program or not. Very closed minded. Suddenly, the vast majority of people in the community, who only want the technical challenge and satisfaction of creating a viable alternative OS and way of creating software, are drowned out by the belowing of the zealots. They wave the 'Little Red Book' of Linux and sing the 'Horst Wessel Song' of Open Source, a be damned to anyone who doesn't agree or gets in their way. I don't mean to sound preachy, but I'm genuinely worried. Linux and Open Source should become a strong viable alternative to Windows (or any other OS/Licence scheme) on both servers and the desktop. If that's what we want, scaring off users AND programmers (through contempt intimidation and arrogance) who could contribute to the technical growth of the community, is not the way to do it. The bigger danger is that all of us are starting to act like the Zealots...I admit (as some of you who have read some of my posts will agreee) to doing some of the same nasty things I'm talking about. We all have done it every now and again. It's getting hard to figure out who ISN'T a zealot here. Yes, we should have a completely free exchange of ideas but lets not forget about having an open mind about opinions. Debate the facts not defame the poster. Remember, Linux is just an OS (and not the only OS). Open Source is just a way of creating and licencing software (but not the only way). Listen to what people are saying and debate those facts, not who is doing the saying. Just because your a flake doesn't nescesarily mean what your saying is wrong.
Maybe some of the whiners should read this article again....IPP is like JINI in a sense that you plug your printer into the network with an IP address and it becomes like instantly printing e-mail. Unlike printing e-mail however, you know the capabilities of the printer before you send it so you can be pretty sure what it will look like when printed ( right now you could print this post on a laser printer, and ink jet or a dot matrix for all I know..it will certainly look different every time). On my network right now ther are 5 different printers and a plotter. I need the drivers for all of them on my machine to use them. IPP means I don't need the Cannon BJ400 driver AND the Lexmark driver (crap I know!) I only need the IPP. That eliminates alot of drivers on my system. It also allows me to send to any printer because I can know instantly its capabilities without having to get a driver for it. IPP is a Protocol (that 2nd P). Sure all this may mean I might need a new kind of software to manage what printers I have access to and/or what they are capable of doing so I can choose whether or not to send my do to that printer. The choice is mine...think of this as a convergence of e-mail/fax and printing all in one. Just as TCP/IP doesn't know how one client handles an e-mail message (HTML,ASCII, POSTSCRIPT), IPP doesn't need to know either.. it just gets the info there. With the added bonus of knowing that if my e-mail doesn't handle HTML (Eudora Lite) I won't send it (If that printer cant't print high quality colour bitmaps, the one at Kinkos will).
"Atlas Shrugged" - your allusion not mine. Right wing vs Left wing diatribes (hence the pairing of Rand and Marx). My point is that in a modern economy classical ideas of Liberal and Conservative can get pretty meaningless. My question is, instead of spouting dogma or pap ideology, why no try thinking by yourself? ( and be prepared to accept that some things the right wingers say makes sense and some thing the left says make sense - and they can both be equally wrong and evil as well).
"Try getting a permit to TRANSPORT those firearms to the area where you intend to hunt. "
I get that permit every November and it takes about 30 minutes. In most places you simply need to show the Mounties or the OPP your FAC and a valid hunting licence (which in Ontario states the area you will be hunting in) and voila...you have a transport permit. As long as you transport the gun safely (ie with the ammo and gun in separate locked containers, not loaded on a rack behind your head...but that's just common sense safety with a loaded weapon)no one is going to bother you. Most of the cops will even wish you good luck on your hunt.
"You can't use them for self-defense, of course. "
Under no regulation or law in Canada does it say you CANNOT use a gun for self defense. The Criminal Code of Canada states that a person can use as much force as is reasonably nescesary to prevent or stop an assault on themselves or some one under their care (a child etc). This is up to and including deadly force, if nescessary to stop the assault. Nowhere does it say you can use this self-defence section of the Code to kill someone with anything EXCEPT a gun? That just doesn't make sense. Unless what you mean by 'self defence' is shooting someone because you don't like them or they don't agree with your opinions...in that case, no you can't use a gun for self defence. But you can't even do that in Texas.
"If you think that a majority choice to strip a minority of its citizenship or other rights is a good thing, I suggest you be transformed to a Jew in the midst of Nazi Germany. "
I suppose if you can't beat my arguements with logic, you have to resort to pandering to emotion. Nowhere, in any post I have ever put on slash dot have I ever suggested the majority should take away the citizenship and or rights of a minority. As a matter of fact, my allusion to Quebec separatism actually supports the rights of French Minority within Canada (although a Majority within the Province) to assert themselves, if they vote to. This arguement is a "straw-man attack" against me - 'That's not the argument he made, but if he had this would be a great comeback and if I pretend he made this arguement it'll make me look like I won'. As for the 'guilt by associations' references to Nazis....well that's about as logically effective as the "straw man" - its not.
Perhaps you should return to Canada for a visit, since it seems you've been gone for a very long time and have lost touch with what is really going on up here.
You have every right to your opinion, I just hope they are based on FACTS (which in my opinion they aren't). And, yes, in case it doesn't show, not only do I have a CS degree, I also have a Criminology degree so I'm quite familiar with the Criminal Code.
Hey man, I don't know how Quebec would do it...I really don't care. My point is we'd let them try and we wouldn't shoot French people into a ditch for wanting to go (are you taking note Slobadon M.)
Cause my farmer parents will never have cable...companies just won't string coax 2 kilometers to serve 2 houses. They've only owned there own telephone line since 1984 (ei no party line with 12 nieghtbours in which you listen for your ring - one long and one short!). Maybe old Newt ought to consider a mixed system that will service rural people as well ( as one poster above mentioned )
Amazing how easy your Socialist states seem to fail when the CIA organizes a coup and murders your democratically elected President (Salvador Allende). If real socialism is so bad and is doomed to failure, why does the US have to spend so much money to defeat it? Wouldn't it just collopse because it wouldn't work?
Just once I'd like to see a socialist country left on its own to try it...if it doesn't work or turns to totalitarianism (like the Soviets) knock 'em out. But what if it works? I guess we'll never know....The CIA will stick a Pinochet or Samosa in power before it even gets started...that's where your tax money goes.
Because its easy to get to Canada from there! I don't know where you got this idea but the only medical "treatment" people flock to the US for is plastic surgurey. You guys have some great Cancer treatment places...unfortunately to use any of it you have to be rich rich rich! So the only people "flocking" to the US for treatment are the super wealthy who can afford to pay for it...everyone else just suffers.
Up here in the Great White North I pay somewhere between 27 and 35%. Many you guys have got it easy! I pay that kind of money to my governemnt and what do I get? Excellent roads, "free" medical care for everyone, Univerity eduation that's about 1/3 the cost of the US a low crime rate and the highest standard of living in the world (according to the UN for 5 of the last 7 years).
Damn I wish I could get away without paying so much tax, but I guess you get what you pay for.
(Now before the flame throwers come out, Canada is no where near perfect. But all I have to do is try to drive through downtown Detroit's crime ridden pot-hole fest to be reminded why I don't mind paying my taxes. Like I said, you get what you pay for)
Um...I'm looking at both my FAC (Firearms Aquisition Certificate) and my Outdoors Card (Hunting and Fishing Licence for the Province of Ontario)right now and they weren't too hard to get. Lets see, my Dad has 6 rifles, all legal, my brother has 2. The only thing outlawed in Canada are hand guns (cuz ya don't hunt deer with a revolver) and automatic weapons (ditto for an AK-47)...even then, you can get a pistol if you aren't crazy and are willing to jump through the paperwork loops (a friend of mine has a Smith and Wesson 9mm - perfectly legal). And all your guns need to be registered so if they get stolen the police can find them or if you have a donnybrook with your wife, they know wether you have a lethal weapon in the house. Does that sound like the country you just described? Are you even a Canadian? (If you are, I'll bet my paycheck your an Alberta redneck!). All this gun control hasn't brought about the downfall of democracy up here...we have elections almost yearly for some level of government (hey we'll even let Quebec vote to LEAVE our country and let them go if they vote yes..can't get much more democratic an free than that...I doubt Alaska or any other state could do the same). Its actually made it quite safe...last year the entire country had about 750 murders (with a population of 30 million). Washington DC beats that by itself and it has what, 5 million people at the most.
So hey, if ya want to move up to the mountains of BC with yer shotgun go ahead... as long as you don't try shooting people no ones' gonna even know your there, much less care.
Either this is a great big troll (in which case, sorry I got suckered in) or your an idiot. uspect the latter.
Yeah, Kokanee sucks...You American dudes, what you want is a good pint of Cinquante ("50"), right fellow Canadians (wink, wink). Or maybe Laurentide. Come on up and get it..we'll through in a coupla 2-4s of Cinci for free... Just Remember, the Dark Horse Ale and the Upper Canada Dark, that sucks...just leave it up here with us (hehhehehe!)
So in your humble opinion, if you can't program you shouldn't be allowed to benefit from a free (as in speech or beer - which ever you choose)software movement? You seem quite upset because you can't get a movie or clip you want to see in anything but an AVI format. FYFI, a great many Windows PROGRAMMERS do make free (as in BEER) software - POVRay, Mozilla (yes, it does have a Win32 port!) are only a few big examples. A lot of us (yeah, I do Windows too)make some general purpose programs and give them away to friends/co-workers etc. We like making free game engines, graphics libraries and programming tools. Some of these are even GIVEN away by companies!! (wxWindows, ITIlib etc). Try using a search engine sometime and you may discover that there is, in fact, a Windows community out there. It's not as tight as the Linux community, granted but it still exists. And some of us sit on the fence, both in the Windows and *nix world. As for your observation that "the vast majority of Windows users are twits" - well you just seemed to back up a lot of Windows users opinions that *nix users are elitist thunder nerds who don't want to let anyone into their exclusive club and think anybody who doesn't use the command line is somehow inferior. Both of these statements are equally true. (in case you are wondering I mean that neither of them is right). Maybe when you've calmed down you can think about how creating free, open source software for windows can be beneficial since it will make some software companies adopt the same standards. Who cares about whether Windows is opensource. People use applications, not operating systems (the OS just gets them to run their app). Many people don't use *nix systems because they don't know what's available on them. Port a few apps and libs to Windows and you'll attract more programmers and users alike ("You mean this cool program I've been using/hacking around in is also available on a better operating system that's also free?!!??...Where do I sign!") And that can only be a good thing... What Blender has done is just thrown another semi-functional shareware product out there for most Win users to ignore (most shareware for Win is crap). That will never attract new people to Linux (unless that's what you want, in which case, never mind)
Well I agree that NT is not the most stable system, let's not cheer Oracle simply because they're not MS. I'm currently working on an Oracle/NT project for a government Ministry and, apart from some OLE problems opening Word Templates from an Oracle Form, the majority of our problems have been from the Oracle side. For instance, we started with Oracle 8.04, which is pretty recent. We discovered that the Import/export facilities don't work under this version because, if you can believe this, Oracle 8.04 (released with in the last 6 months) doesn't support FAT32 under Win 95OSR2 client machine (released over 2 years ago!)...Guess what? we had to upgrade to version 8.05, at our expense to get the system working. (Does this seem syuspicious to you?). This in turn, caused other problems requiring us to download a 650Meg patch (took 3 tries) and apply it. The database runs pretty stable, even on NT but the support for clients and utilities is sadly lacking. Ok as long as you don't want replication or to change your db in any way during development(that happens, right?). I won't even begin to talk about how crappy Dev 2000 is or how the latest version of Designer generates erroneous code that needs to be fixed by hand.
So maybe we should be wary not only of poor hardware or OS but of the product itself. I'd stick with something a little more tried an true, since Oracle seems to have problems giving proper, up to date tech support for an OS with 80%+ marketshare, let alone one with 17% that's not quite as widely accepted yet.
P.S for god sakes don't use Developer/Designer 2000 - your just asking for headaches!!
WP is pretty good now (at version 7 or 8) but back when it was at version 6 - AGHHHHHHH! I still won't go near it simply out of fear! But back in the Windows 3.1/ DOS days WP was IT!
So, Lets create something that can be IT for Linux.
You know, as a programmer, I find most of that stuff by hand myself anyway, even on Windows, when I do an install (I just want to be sure I get the right version of the drivers). The key is, of course, I'm a programmer. This shit is my life. Unfotunately my mother the 911 dispatcher would rather just plug it in and let it be done for her, since she doesn't know computers that well. Ditto for my sister the hairdresser or my brother the cop. Actually I suspect that's true for most people outside of our profession. They just want to USE the computer to help them in their jobs, not be an expert in hardware or programming. Given that, be careful what you wish for...everyone may just "go to Windows and stay there". Then where will Linux be?
Slashdot Mirror
Actually the source for the SETI@HOME project was available over a year ago if you registered as a volunteer developer. I have 3 different version of the Windows client laying around my PC. If you contact the director, you may be able to get an older version, or even the latest version. The screen shot of the new version looks 100 times better than the version I hacked away on.
I wonder if they have a KDE or GNOME version yet (hehe)?
ChiChi, your arguements only hold if all players play on a level playing field. They do not. Not all people have equal access to money and/or power. The homeless guy you step over on your way to class every morning (I've been to your YAF site, so I know your not in the real world) has no access to wealth (money) and therefore no power under a capitalist system. Would he or any of the other people who staved to death in US streets be considered 'victims' of capitalism? How about the situation in the old South Africa - millions of blacks subjected to poverty, death and torture due to racism and the good capitalist whites getting rich off of them. Would you then not consider Steven Biko a 'victim' of capitalism?
When the playing field is not a fair one, it really doesn't matter if your economic system is 'capitalist' or 'socialist' - people are oppressed all the same. So instead of giving us URLS to dogmatic right-wing propoganda sites, try thinking for yourself. Ask Karen Silkwood what happens when you try as in individual to stand up to the power of a corporation with the backing of the so-called democratic government...oh, sorry I guess you can't ask her, now can you?(hey I guess she's another 'victim' of you 'freedom').
I don't pretend to be a super-red loving socialist - Marx had some good ideas and he was full of it on a lot of other things (he missed the rise of the service economy for instance), J.J Rouseau had some intersting things to say as well. Wasn't it John Locke who said that no one should have so much land (read this as wealth/money since land was wealth in Locke's time) that another would starve to death. Is Locke now a 'communist' or a 'socialist'? If he were alive I think he'd beg to differ.
Capitalism does not equal freedom. The ends do not justify the means (defeating totalitarian communism in the USSR does NOT make it ok for the US to murder a democratically elected leader of a foriegn nation and replace hime with a brutal dictator who is friendly to US "interests"/companies - see Salvadore Allende, so far victim #4 of you idea of 'freedom').
A good socialist ideal of modern times is that everyone be given an equal chance to succeed - a level playing field. If the choose (see this is freedom) to become Ross Perot or Bill Gates, that's their choice. If they choose to do nothing and live on the poverty line, then that is also their choice. But don't force them to live at that poverty line becasue the don't have access to the tools (money, education, food or power) or because it doesn't fit into the 'maximization of profit' ideas.
Is an unemployed auto worker more free than a cane cutter in Cuba simply because they live in a capitalist, 'free' country? Niether can feed their kids properly and niether can do much about it since they are pretty much powerless - and don't say the auto worker can get another job - where? MacDonalds? Can the economy of the US stand it if everyone has a job and there is no supply/demand tension in the labour market? No. for comapnies to make money and keep wages low, there must always be a greater demand for jobs than supply. So the poor autoworker is stuck as one of the unemployed persons needed so Chrysler can make profits. Is this freedom? Ask the autoworker, s/he may not agree with you.
Freedom is about having the POWER to choose. When you graduate and finally enter the real world think about it in your daily life. That impoverished crack user/dealer who broke into your house or shot you sister during a robbery, they 'must resort to less-than-honorable tactics to secure one's interests' in dealing with a system that is unfree. That's life outside the ivory tower.
Now take all this and apply it to OSS...
God you make me ill with you illogical dogma...I think I have to call in sick tommorow!
So keep it complicated and hard to understand? And that will make them set up their systems better? Get real. They set it up wrong BECAUSE its complicated. Keeping it hard to use will not solve this problem.
I hope Linux just dies and withers away. The last thing the world needs is another group of idiots who think they know better than anybody else and won't share their tools.
I will certainly NEVER use Debian solely on principle. I certainly have the knowledge and technical ability to install and use it but I won't. Any group with those kinds of attitudes does not deserve my support. Linux is about sharing. Period. Sharing ideas, source code rights etc. Beleive it or not there are people out there who could greatly benefit from Linux but have niether the time nor desire (and in some cases the intellegence) to become *nix gurus just so they can do a spread sheet or play a game. Do they not deserve the benefits of Linux?
Personally I will throw my support behind a distibution which attempts to INCLUDE people from the Linux club (RedHat, SUSE, Caldera etc) not exclude them. Funny, all the Debian snobs say RedHat is acting like MS, but when I read their posts, they seem to be the only ones not willing to help out everyone and share in the knowledge, to make it easy so Linux can spread beyond their realm. Now who's acting Like MS?(Keeping things secret so to try to get people to do things their way)
Hopefully all the "newbies" and "clueless" will pick anoher distro (if the pick Linux at all after that elitist rant!) and relegate Debian to the Amiga of the *nix world. Be careful what you wish for - all the "clueless" will stay away - millions of them and MS Windows will continue to rule the OS world.
Since we're talking 'licencing' and thus legalities, everyone here seems to be missing one vital point that every purchase manager and CEO always considers when buying/getting software (or any other commodity for that matter) - protection against harm. Companies (who by far spend the most money on software) want quality products to do a specific job or task to help their business succeed. And They want that software to work. That being said they will NEVER use "free" (as in beer) software. /. - looking for a technical challenge).
Why?
Basic contract law - if I pay you for a good or a service that is supposed to do something and it doesn't do what it is supposed to, you are in violation of our 'contract' and I can sue you (for cost recovery, damages, etc). If, however, I get it from you for free (as in beer), no 'contract' exists (no consideration has been given) and I am stuck.
So companies will always pay some amount of money for software.
And since they want it to work when they get it, they are more likely to buy their OSS version of PhotoShop (or GIMP or what have you) from Adobe rather than from Bob across the street. That's because they trust Adobe. They are there for one reason only - to make and sell software. Bob, well we really don't know why he is there. The company can trust, for the most part, that the version they get from Adobe will NOT be a security-risk trojan horse version that can damage their system. Whether it's true or not, they simply won't feel the same way about a version from Bob and won't take the risk, even if he sells it and can be sued. It won't do much good to sue Bob after his trojan has wiped the hard drive, the damage is done. They will then still have to pay enormous amounts to recover from the damage. The risk is just too high to buy from Bob.
So that means, in an OSS model, making money from software will mean less the selling of the product (if it is freely available in the form of source code) and more about selling quality and peace of mind. The chances of the Adobe version being harmful and misrepresented, in the eyes of the company, are very slim compared with getting a free version from Bob (or anywhere else), even if he compiles it in front of you.
Although this is a lot less likely when we talk about indiviuals getting software, the same still applies. My mother will want a word processor to work and she will want to be reasonalby sure that it will not fry her hard drive. Using the same logic as above, she is likely to be just as influenced by WHO made the software and WHERE she obtained it as she is about the price (free). This is the situation we have now with pirated software - I might be able to get some version of Illistrator for free or as low as $10 but chances are that I (and most people) would feel more comfortable paying $300 for the peace of mind that this copy of Illistrator is the real thing and propbably won't eat my drive. Some people will accept that risk but, just like now, a lot won't.
So how does OSS fit in?
Development. As we all know, the OSS model means that bugs and security holes are more likely to be found and fixed a lot sooner than with proprietary software, since there will be a lot more eyes on it. That drives up the quality. OSS also provides it's own sort of internal competition (for all those Ayn Rand loving rabid libertarians reading this)by having source code available. Most people won't pay $450 for a single copy of a proprietary software title with one licence - they will copy it illegally from a friend (akin to getting the source code). These same people, however, would buy an open source version if the cost was, say between $10 and $25 and they could maybe get some tech support (which they don't get if they "copy" the program - proprietary or otherwise). This makes them feel better (they are not "stealing") and give them peace of mind (they are buying from the source). Thus the OSS model will drive the price down to make software available to a greater number of people (make money through VOLUME). And these same people will pay $10 again to get the upgrade, even if it is free, for the same reasons (you continue making money). People will pay a small price over and over again for convienience and peace of mind (Admittedly, I'm talking psychology not economics here for the most part but it can be hard to separate the two sometimes).
As for source code availability, well lets face it, I may want to see the source code and you may want to get at the source code for most programs but 95% of the rest of the world could care less. End of story. I would ventrure to guess that most individual users and a good chunk of corporate (especially small busineses) don't even WANT the source code - it takes up space on their hard drive and they can't understand it anyway. They certainly won't invest the time and money in learning how to compile themseleves (or getting someone else to do it) if it is just easier and more convienient to pay a small amount of money to have it done for them (not everyone is like the people of
So OSS provides the best of both worlds - if you want the code you can get it, look at, copy it, whatever. If you sell it, you get better quality, more reliable, easier to customize and maintain software and more customers - and you can still make money. The consumer gets great software a good prices and buys from the source more than they do now (heck this could be bad for pirating).
And lets not overlook the Consluting jobs that may arise...
I may be way off but I think this can work.
Gee, I guess I missed the day the DOJ and the Marines walked into MS offices and took over, summarily executing Bill Gates and Paul Allen...I'll have to surf over to CNN a little more.
/., the News for Nerds....Militia and "Patriot" sites are around the corner, way over on the right.
Get Real. If you don't like what the government is doing, vote them out (you guys are the land of democracy and freedom right?). And speaking of guns and weapons...try to stay clear of diesel fuel and fertilizer, you really scare me. This is
I read throough many of the posts here and I agree with the general consenus that this guy doesn't seem to have it all together. But like it or not, he makes some valid points about the maturity and mentality of some of the people in the Linux/Open Source movement. Arrogance is only a symptom of a greater danger lurking under the surface.
Linux and the Open Source were started and improved on by some good people, spurned on by idealism to create a technically superior, legally "free" software movement (RMS, Linus etc). As it became more popular, it began attracting some who seemed to NEED to belong to some kind of movement. Linux and Open Source became more than an OS or a way to write software, for these people it became a way of life, a way justify their existance and exert their personality in a world where they may have otherwise been marginalised.
Suddenly Linux is a fervor, almost to religious proportions. They feel powerful because they know something or can do something most other people can't. Instead of getting some gratification in helping others to learn, they use their knowledge to belittle these people, calling them "clueless" or "idiots" or any other of the names we've all seen on SlashDot do describe users, particularly Windows users (and programmers I might add). I suppose this makes them feel superior and somehow better people than these users because they are 'in the know' with the sacred Linux...and if you happen to disagree, or be foolish enough type an opinion other than what is accepted by these self-proclaimed "hackers", look out! The flames fly! Your intelligence is questioned, your "real" motives scrutinized in twisted, strange, paranoid ways ("Your a Microsoft Lackey! You must work for RedHat! Is it strange that ZDNet would print this today.. Your nothing but a suit!!").
And of course lets not leave out the Great Satan, Uncle Bill and Microsoft. Everything is an MS plot, MS and Bill are the cause of all things wrong with the software industry, they are the focus of evil in the corporate world. Part of the existance of the community is in response to MS'(and others, I might add) business practices and monoplistic policies. These Linux zealots, however, take this to extremes, painting anything assciated with MS or the way they do business with the same brush of evil. They close their minds to the possiblity that SOME MS products and Windows programs in general may actually be good quality software. Some of it is even GPLed (not by MS of course, but there are GPL windows programs out there). By the same extension anything that is Linux/GNU/GPLed is good, whether its actually a quality or useful program or not. Very closed minded.
Suddenly, the vast majority of people in the community, who only want the technical challenge and satisfaction of creating a viable alternative OS and way of creating software, are drowned out by the belowing of the zealots. They wave the 'Little Red Book' of Linux and sing the 'Horst Wessel Song' of Open Source, a be damned to anyone who doesn't agree or gets in their way.
I don't mean to sound preachy, but I'm genuinely worried. Linux and Open Source should become a strong viable alternative to Windows (or any other OS/Licence scheme) on both servers and the desktop. If that's what we want, scaring off users AND programmers (through contempt intimidation and arrogance) who could contribute to the technical growth of the community, is not the way to do it.
The bigger danger is that all of us are starting to act like the Zealots...I admit (as some of you who have read some of my posts will agreee) to doing some of the same nasty things I'm talking about. We all have done it every now and again. It's getting hard to figure out who ISN'T a zealot here.
Yes, we should have a completely free exchange of ideas but lets not forget about having an open mind about opinions. Debate the facts not defame the poster.
Remember, Linux is just an OS (and not the only OS).
Open Source is just a way of creating and licencing software (but not the only way).
Listen to what people are saying and debate those facts, not who is doing the saying.
Just because your a flake doesn't nescesarily mean what your saying is wrong.
Maybe some of the whiners should read this article again....IPP is like JINI in a sense that you plug your printer into the network with an IP address and it becomes like instantly printing e-mail. Unlike printing e-mail however, you know the capabilities of the printer before you send it so you can be pretty sure what it will look like when printed ( right now you could print this post on a laser printer, and ink jet or a dot matrix for all I know ..it will certainly look different every time). On my network right now ther are 5 different printers and a plotter. I need the drivers for all of them on my machine to use them. IPP means I don't need the Cannon BJ400 driver AND the Lexmark driver (crap I know!) I only need the IPP. That eliminates alot of drivers on my system. It also allows me to send to any printer because I can know instantly its capabilities without having to get a driver for it. IPP is a Protocol (that 2nd P). Sure all this may mean I might need a new kind of software to manage what printers I have access to and/or what they are capable of doing so I can choose whether or not to send my do to that printer. The choice is mine...think of this as a convergence of e-mail/fax and printing all in one. Just as TCP/IP doesn't know how one client handles an e-mail message (HTML,ASCII, POSTSCRIPT), IPP doesn't need to know either.. it just gets the info there. With the added bonus of knowing that if my e-mail doesn't handle HTML (Eudora Lite) I won't send it (If that printer cant't print high quality colour bitmaps, the one at Kinkos will).
"Atlas Shrugged" - your allusion not mine. Right wing vs Left wing diatribes (hence the pairing of Rand and Marx). My point is that in a modern economy classical ideas of Liberal and Conservative can get pretty meaningless. My question is, instead of spouting dogma or pap ideology, why no try thinking by yourself? ( and be prepared to accept that some things the right wingers say makes sense and some thing the left says make sense - and they can both be equally wrong and evil as well).
I'll use my karma to run over your dogma!
"Try getting a permit to TRANSPORT those firearms to the area where you intend to hunt. "
I get that permit every November and it takes about 30 minutes. In most places you simply need to show the Mounties or the OPP your FAC and a valid hunting licence (which in Ontario states the area you will be hunting in) and voila...you have a transport permit. As long as you transport the gun safely (ie with the ammo and gun in separate locked containers, not loaded on a rack behind your head...but that's just common sense safety with a loaded weapon)no one is going to bother you. Most of the cops will even wish you good luck on your hunt.
"You can't use them for self-defense, of course. "
Under no regulation or law in Canada does it say you CANNOT use a gun for self defense. The Criminal Code of Canada states that a person can use as much force as is reasonably nescesary to prevent or stop an assault on themselves or some one under their care (a child etc). This is up to and including deadly force, if nescessary to stop the assault. Nowhere does it say you can use this self-defence section of the Code to kill someone with anything EXCEPT a gun? That just doesn't make sense. Unless what you mean by 'self defence' is shooting someone because you don't like them or they don't agree with your opinions...in that case, no you can't use a gun for self defence. But you can't even do that in Texas.
"If you think that a majority choice to strip a minority of its citizenship or other rights is a good thing, I suggest you be transformed to a Jew in the midst of Nazi Germany. "
I suppose if you can't beat my arguements with logic, you have to resort to pandering to emotion. Nowhere, in any post I have ever put on slash dot have I ever suggested the majority should take away the citizenship and or rights of a minority. As a matter of fact, my allusion to Quebec separatism actually supports the rights of French Minority within Canada (although a Majority within the Province) to assert themselves, if they vote to. This arguement is a "straw-man attack" against me - 'That's not the argument he made, but if he had this would be a great comeback and if I pretend he made this arguement it'll make me look like I won'. As for the 'guilt by associations' references to Nazis....well that's about as logically effective as the "straw man" - its not.
Perhaps you should return to Canada for a visit, since it seems you've been gone for a very long time and have lost touch with what is really going on up here.
You have every right to your opinion, I just hope they are based on FACTS (which in my opinion they aren't). And, yes, in case it doesn't show, not only do I have a CS degree, I also have a Criminology degree so I'm quite familiar with the Criminal Code.
I'll be anxiously awaiting this reply...
Hey man, I don't know how Quebec would do it...I really don't care. My point is we'd let them try and we wouldn't shoot French people into a ditch for wanting to go (are you taking note Slobadon M.)
Cause my farmer parents will never have cable...companies just won't string coax 2 kilometers to serve 2 houses. They've only owned there own telephone line since 1984 (ei no party line with 12 nieghtbours in which you listen for your ring - one long and one short!). Maybe old Newt ought to consider a mixed system that will service rural people as well ( as one poster above mentioned )
Ayn Rand and Karl Marx are dead the last time I checked...You may want to try thinking a little more out of the political ideology box.
Amazing how easy your Socialist states seem to fail when the CIA organizes a coup and murders your democratically elected President (Salvador Allende).
If real socialism is so bad and is doomed to failure, why does the US have to spend so much money to defeat it? Wouldn't it just collopse because it wouldn't work?
Just once I'd like to see a socialist country left on its own to try it...if it doesn't work or turns to totalitarianism (like the Soviets) knock 'em out. But what if it works? I guess we'll never know....The CIA will stick a Pinochet or Samosa in power before it even gets started...that's where your tax money goes.
Because its easy to get to Canada from there! I don't know where you got this idea but the only medical "treatment" people flock to the US for is plastic surgurey. You guys have some great Cancer treatment places...unfortunately to use any of it you have to be rich rich rich! So the only people "flocking" to the US for treatment are the super wealthy who can afford to pay for it...everyone else just suffers.
Up here in the Great White North I pay somewhere between 27 and 35%. Many you guys have got it easy!
I pay that kind of money to my governemnt and what do I get? Excellent roads, "free" medical care for everyone, Univerity eduation that's about 1/3 the cost of the US a low crime rate and the highest standard of living in the world (according to the UN for 5 of the last 7 years).
Damn I wish I could get away without paying so much tax, but I guess you get what you pay for.
(Now before the flame throwers come out, Canada is no where near perfect. But all I have to do is try to drive through downtown Detroit's crime ridden pot-hole fest to be reminded why I don't mind paying my taxes. Like I said, you get what you pay for)
Um...I'm looking at both my FAC (Firearms Aquisition Certificate) and my Outdoors Card (Hunting and Fishing Licence for the Province of Ontario)right now and they weren't too hard to get. Lets see, my Dad has 6 rifles, all legal, my brother has 2. The only thing outlawed in Canada are hand guns (cuz ya don't hunt deer with a revolver) and automatic weapons (ditto for an AK-47)...even then, you can get a pistol if you aren't crazy and are willing to jump through the paperwork loops (a friend of mine has a Smith and Wesson 9mm - perfectly legal). And all your guns need to be registered so if they get stolen the police can find them or if you have a donnybrook with your wife, they know wether you have a lethal weapon in the house.
Does that sound like the country you just described? Are you even a Canadian? (If you are, I'll bet my paycheck your an Alberta redneck!). All this gun control hasn't brought about the downfall of democracy up here...we have elections almost yearly for some level of government (hey we'll even let Quebec vote to LEAVE our country and let them go if they vote yes..can't get much more democratic an free than that...I doubt Alaska or any other state could do the same). Its actually made it quite safe...last year the entire country had about 750 murders (with a population of 30 million). Washington DC beats that by itself and it has what, 5 million people at the most.
So hey, if ya want to move up to the mountains of BC with yer shotgun go ahead... as long as you don't try shooting people no ones' gonna even know your there, much less care.
Either this is a great big troll (in which case, sorry I got suckered in) or your an idiot. uspect the latter.
Yeah, Kokanee sucks...You American dudes, what you want is a good pint of Cinquante ("50"), right fellow Canadians (wink, wink). Or maybe Laurentide. Come on up and get it..we'll through in a coupla 2-4s of Cinci for free...
Just Remember, the Dark Horse Ale and the Upper Canada Dark, that sucks...just leave it up here with us (hehhehehe!)
Gee that's funny... I did it yesterday in about 10 minutes with out down loading anything
So in your humble opinion, if you can't program you shouldn't be allowed to benefit from a free (as in speech or beer - which ever you choose)software movement? You seem quite upset because you can't get a movie or clip you want to see in anything but an AVI format.
FYFI, a great many Windows PROGRAMMERS do make free (as in BEER) software - POVRay, Mozilla (yes, it does have a Win32 port!) are only a few big examples. A lot of us (yeah, I do Windows too)make some general purpose programs and give them away to friends/co-workers etc. We like making free game engines, graphics libraries and programming tools. Some of these are even GIVEN away by companies!! (wxWindows, ITIlib etc). Try using a search engine sometime and you may discover that there is, in fact, a Windows community out there. It's not as tight as the Linux community, granted but it still exists. And some of us sit on the fence, both in the Windows and *nix world.
As for your observation that "the vast majority of Windows users are twits" - well you just seemed to back up a lot of Windows users opinions that *nix users are elitist thunder nerds who don't want to let anyone into their exclusive club and think anybody who doesn't use the command line is somehow inferior.
Both of these statements are equally true. (in case you are wondering I mean that neither of them is right). Maybe when you've calmed down you can think about how creating free, open source software for windows can be beneficial since it will make some software companies adopt the same standards. Who cares about whether Windows is opensource. People use applications, not operating systems (the OS just gets them to run their app). Many people don't use *nix systems because they don't know what's available on them. Port a few apps and libs to Windows and you'll attract more programmers and users alike ("You mean this cool program I've been using/hacking around in is also available on a better operating system that's also free?!!??...Where do I sign!")
And that can only be a good thing...
What Blender has done is just thrown another semi-functional shareware product out there for most Win users to ignore (most shareware for Win is crap). That will never attract new people to Linux (unless that's what you want, in which case, never mind)
Well I agree that NT is not the most stable system, let's not cheer Oracle simply because they're not MS. I'm currently working on an Oracle/NT project for a government Ministry and, apart from some OLE problems opening Word Templates from an Oracle Form, the majority of our problems have been from the Oracle side.
For instance, we started with Oracle 8.04, which is pretty recent. We discovered that the Import/export facilities don't work under this version because, if you can believe this, Oracle 8.04 (released with in the last 6 months) doesn't support FAT32 under Win 95OSR2 client machine (released over 2 years ago!)...Guess what? we had to upgrade to version 8.05, at our expense to get the system working. (Does this seem syuspicious to you?). This in turn, caused other problems requiring us to download a 650Meg patch (took 3 tries) and apply it.
The database runs pretty stable, even on NT but the support for clients and utilities is sadly lacking. Ok as long as you don't want replication or to change your db in any way during development(that happens, right?). I won't even begin to talk about how crappy Dev 2000 is or how the latest version of Designer generates erroneous code that needs to be fixed by hand.
So maybe we should be wary not only of poor hardware or OS but of the product itself. I'd stick with something a little more tried an true, since Oracle seems to have problems giving proper, up to date tech support for an OS with 80%+ marketshare, let alone one with 17% that's not quite as widely accepted yet.
P.S for god sakes don't use Developer/Designer 2000 - your just asking for headaches!!
WP is pretty good now (at version 7 or 8) but back when it was at version 6 - AGHHHHHHH! I still won't go near it simply out of fear! But back in the Windows 3.1/ DOS days WP was IT!
So, Lets create something that can be IT for Linux.
Check out "Easter Eggs" in a search engine or go to http://alcor.concordia.ca/~guoro_ch/ and click on the "Easter Eggs" button
Yeah, Your right on both counts...
You know, as a programmer, I find most of that stuff by hand myself anyway, even on Windows, when I do an install (I just want to be sure I get the right version of the drivers). The key is, of course, I'm a programmer. This shit is my life. Unfotunately my mother the 911 dispatcher would rather just plug it in and let it be done for her, since she doesn't know computers that well. Ditto for my sister the hairdresser or my brother the cop. Actually I suspect that's true for most people outside of our profession. They just want to USE the computer to help them in their jobs, not be an expert in hardware or programming.
Given that, be careful what you wish for...everyone may just "go to Windows and stay there". Then where will Linux be?
Nowhere.