The early kernels weren't posix. They weren't System V or BSD compatible either, they were basically only compatible with themselves. Unix compatibility came from POSIX.
The difference is that Posix is an open specification. BK's protocol is not. It's perfectly legitimate for anyone to implement a POSIX OS, and many have. Reverse engineering a private protocol, using tools provided under the condition that the product not be reverse engineered is a totally different ball of wax.
Linus (and others) wrote Linux to conform to the POSIX specifications. They didn't reverse engineer any form of Unix, not even Minix (though Linus did start with it, he quickly threw it away).
You might want to look up the meaning of ad hominem. An ad hominem is when you counter an argument based on something about a person. I have made no such arguments. ie, if I'd said Tridge's opinion isn't valid because he's a free software partisan, that would be an ad hominem.
Now I have made some disparaging remarks towards you simply because you seem unable to draw a conclusion from an argument. You seem to be intentionally ignoring my answers to you and then claiming i've not answered them.
Further, you've not rebutted anything i've said, but rather waved your hand and made claims about other posts rather than make your own argument. Using the software does constitute agreement to its terms, terms that Tridge knew quite well existed and knew would apply if he used it.
By the way, while I didn't use the word "spite" though now that you mention it, Tridge did intentionally continue working on his software even after agreeing not to while an agreement was being worked on. That sounds like "spite" to me and certainly not ethical or principled.
I answered the question in several ways, but you apparently can't seem to infer answers so I'll have to spell it out. I have no omnisence, i've only stated facts that been claimed by the parties involved (including tridge).
Tridge is bound by Linus's decision because he accepted the Bitkeeper license by *USING* the Bitkeeper server software when he retrieved data from it using his software.
How could you not possibly understand that point?
Even if we live in the fantasy land Tridge lives in where requesting data from a server isn't using the software, he should be have enough ethics to respect his collegues decisions. He didn't agree to the BK license, therefore he had no right to access the BK trees. Period. He didn't have to use BK, but he did have to avoid it if he didn't want to use it.
The fact of the matter is that Tridge has done the entire linux community a great disservice. He's single handedly stalled the pace of Linux development for months. That's what pisses me off. That's what I feel strongly about. He Forced his beliefs on everyone by doing this.
Let me put it this way. When something happens that effections millions of people in a negative way. It's WRONG.
Tridge standing by his priniciples was when Tridge refused to use BK. That's fine. There are lots of ways to get at the source code that doesn't involve BK.
Where he went wrong was when he chose to disregard the agreement he knew existed between Linus and McVoy (and anone else that used BK) and force his priniciples on everyone else.
Tridge has written that he didn't use BK to write his software, but this is a sufficiently narrow definition of the word "use" to fit within his small reality. When his software sent data and received data from a BK server, he was using BK software, specifically the BK Server. He refuses to recognize that as "use" even though anyone else with a rational mind would. And since he was using the software, he's bound by the license agreement whether he's read it or not.
Now, some people will use certain court rulings (such as those in germany) to say that this would not be legal, but in this case Tridge knew about the license agreement. He knew (basically) what the terms were before he ever used the software. He could have asked Linus or Larry for a copy of the terms if he so chose. His decision to use the software, knowing full well what the terms were and having them available for his reading if he so chose would nullify any argument of ignorance of them.
And, more importantly, he CONTINUED to use the software even after he was explicitly informed of them and asked to stop.
So, apart from the fact the he chose to assert his own principles on others, chose to narrow his definition of the word "use" to willfully disregard the terms he knew existed, chose to stir the pot and disrespect his collegues and screw up a situation that had been mutually beneficial for everyone for 3 years (KNOWING there was no adequate open source alternative to switch to even), single-handedly grinding kernel progress to a halt for months while Linus and others look for alternatives (affecting Millions of people)... then I guess he did nothing wrong.
Then again, if your principles include totally free speech, is yelling "fire" in a crowded theater and causing the deaths of dozens of people that get trampled in the hysteria also ethical?
No. Just because you believe something is right, doesn't mean it *IS* right.
Choice is good for devs, sure. And it keeps devs happy, since they never have to solve their social issues. They just take their toys and go home.
That's the problem
It's not good for end users, because the same solution gets rearchitected over and over again, never getting further down the path of enlightenment (so to speak) because every time a little conflict emerges, everyone just disbands and starts over.
Linus's "iron fist" control over the Linux kernel has allowed the kernel to mature much faster than if everyone were off starting their own kernel's every time a problem happened.
Apparently you have a different idea of "ethical" than I do. Disrespecting your friends and intentionally making trouble for them is extremely unethical in my opinion.
Linus has a right to be pissed at Tridge for intentionally forcing this issue. McVoy has a right to terminate the license, because it was granted under the condition that the protocol not be reverse engineered.
The *ONLY* person wrong here is Tridge, and perhaps to some extent, the OSDL for not caring enough about the issue until it was too late.
Sure, what Tridge did was legal. It was not, however, Ethical.
Not even close. Tridge was under no requirement to access the BitKeeper repositories to get at the code. It was availale in many other ways, he just didn't *LIKE* those other ways.
His choice to access the BK repositories was his own, not some choice forced on him by Larry or Linus. He had many other (including full FSF endorsed) ways to get the code.
"a simple export tool" means reverse engineering the entire protocol and implementing almost all of the functionality of BitKeeper.
We're not talking about some,v file in an attic that can be parsed and converted. We're talking about connecting to a BK server, negotiation the protocol, issuing the proper commands, interpreting the data, recombining diffs, etc... pretty much all the stuff that BK does.
To top it off, BK already provides an export tool to export the data into a non-proprietary format, but Tridge didn't like that.
Instead, he decided to selfishly ignore the agreement between Linus and BitMover to not reverse engineer the protocol in exchange for free (as in beer) use and screw up the entire kernel management process, because "he didn't like that".
While Tridge was legally within his rights to reverse engineer the protocol, morally is a different question. Clearly his morals do not include respecting others agreements simply because he didn't agree to them.
That's only possible if one sufficiently narrows their definition of the word "use", much like claiming a blowjob is not "sex".
You have to, at a bare minimum, use the BitKeeper server to send data to and from it. Maybe he never used the BitKeeper client, but he certainly used the server.
The problem is your lack of understanding of the situation. BitMover gave Linus and the community free licenses with the only stipulation that they not reverse engineer it. They *ACCEPTED* that condition. Tridge didn't accept that condition, but he should have respected that Linus (and others) accepted it. failure to do so on his part was selfish and disrespectful.
basically, Tridge "ruined it for everyone" and was the guy just didn't give a shit about anyone but himself.
That's a bogus argument. Maybe he never accepted the condition, but he should at least *RESPECT* that Linus and others were using the software under that condition.
Continuing to reverse engineer it in the face of all this was simply selfish and disrespectful to Linus and the entire Linux community.
Let's put this another way. Suppose you gain access to a conference room, under the condition that you keep the noise down and clean up after yourself. Now, you invite some friends and they are noisy and messy. You can fix the messy yourself (even though that's also disrespectful) but you can't mute them, and you lose access to the space because of it. Who's at fault?
Yes, yourr calendaring *IS* integrated in your email. You say you don't care how it works, but the fact of the matter is, it does work through email. Your email applications are aware of the special messages and provides the facility to accept or deny them, and copy that data into the calendar.
You grossly overestimate the ability of the average user to learn or care. Yes, there are average users that will figure things out, but this is, in my experience, a rarity (and I love it when I find one, it makes my job so much easier). Instead, as my typical experience bears out with end users, you have to explain the same things over and over to them. They say they understand, but they don't or they simply don't care and forget.
If you've ever watched a typical end user use something like MacOS, you notice that before long they have 10 or 15 programs running because they are confused about exiting a window and exiting an app. If the user can't see it, they forget about it. Out of sight, out of mind. Virtual desktops are just that kind of thing.
We're talking about people that can't figure out how to drag their taskbars from one side of the screen to another. We're talking about people that get confused by popups.
Your argument is typical for a power user. "Don't treat me like the least common denominator", but from a management and tech support point of view it's the opposite. You can take care of yourself, the average user can't.
And for the record. The vast majority of users weren't using computers back in the DOS days, and then the applications were much simpler, as were the user interfaces. It's the GUI that has largely allowed "average users" to use computers.
As you already mentioned, your calendaring *IS* integrated in your email, that's why it works. You've done nothing to explain why they shouldn't be integrated.
Also, atl-tab isn't a windowsism, it also works in KDE and Gnome. Try it. I switch beteween apps with the keyboard, not the mouse, and I don't want more than the current set of apps i'm using available in that list. Most typical end users are confused by virtual desktops, so that's not a real solution. You need something that will not annoy the average user, and that means integration.
Everything you describe could easily exist as seperate applications manageable via multiple front ends or via one front end. The idea should be further stated "seperation with central data sources."
In case you weren't aware, that's precisely how Exchange/Outlook works. Exchange is a central datastore, while Outlook is the "frontend" to it. If you wanted to, you could create seperarate applications to front end them, but why? Nobody wants 3 or 4 apps running all the time getting their way. In fact, having even one such application was annoying to me and was greatly relieved when Outlook 2003 offerend the ability to minimize to tray and get out of my alt-tab list.
But in any event, the email app has to have a facility to accept/deny the calendaring items, and there has to be a facility for updating the calendar automatically. Simple emails won't do this (or at least not elegantly).
Not at all, in fact it's MUCH more userful for us underlings than for the upper ups. As you mentioned, they have assistants. I don't. I don't want to spend my time managing my meetings, I just click accept and then get notified before they occur.
I spend about 10 hours a week in meetings. If I want to get other stuff done, I don't want to spend another minute more than I have to worrying about them.
If you don't understand the email/calender relationship, then you don't understand even the most basic parts of it.
Apart from the fact that people don't like having 5 or 6 apps running all the time and getting in the way (think alt-tab and having it cluttered with apps you have to run all day like email, calendering, etc.. to get full use out of them), email integration provides an eays way to invite and manage meetings.
I create a meeting and email the invites to the attendees. They click a single button to add that meeting to their calendar if they accept, or to decline (automatically informing MY calendar that they declined). If I reschedule the meeting, then everyone is automatically sent out reconfirmations, which again get automatically updated when accepted or declined.
With seperate calendaring, I have to manage the meetings (or assign someone to manage them). Integrated works much better.
The Taco Bell story isn't a myth. The source of the story is known (as cited in the Snopes article), and he claims it's true (And I believe him, since I know him and it's entirely the kind of trouble he would stir up.
While it can't be proven that it actually happened, we do know the source, so it's not a myth.
It was first published on the net by Captain Sarcastic who ran alt.captain.sarcastic. It was borrowed by others and attributed to anonymous and other sources. I knew Captain Sarcastic at the time (actually, had known him for years) and he was quite upset about it all.
I can't prove it happened, but Kurt Koller (AKA Captain Sarcastic) originally wrote it.
At least Snopes got this right. The piece was originally written by a guy going by Captain Sarcastic (Kurt Koller) who had his own usenet group. I knew the guy back in the 80's and the story is precisely the kind of thing that happened to him (and it was his style of writing as well).
He got quite upset when several sources borrowed it and attributed it to "anonymous" sources.
Actually, no. You can't demand anything. A car dealer can simply refuse to sell you the car in the configuration you want.
Secondly, even if they do sell you the car, they only have to remove "options" that are in the car. You can't, for example, demand to remove the steering wheel and be compensated for the price because it's part of the base package and the steering wheel is not a line item of that.
Not exactly. If you haven't explicitly stated that the code is only to be licenesed under version 2, then the licensee has the option to use any later version of the GPL they like based on clause of the GPL that states the licensee has the option to do so.
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The early kernels weren't posix. They weren't System V or BSD compatible either, they were basically only compatible with themselves. Unix compatibility came from POSIX.
The difference is that Posix is an open specification. BK's protocol is not. It's perfectly legitimate for anyone to implement a POSIX OS, and many have. Reverse engineering a private protocol, using tools provided under the condition that the product not be reverse engineered is a totally different ball of wax.
Linus (and others) wrote Linux to conform to the POSIX specifications. They didn't reverse engineer any form of Unix, not even Minix (though Linus did start with it, he quickly threw it away).
You might want to look up the meaning of ad hominem. An ad hominem is when you counter an argument based on something about a person. I have made no such arguments. ie, if I'd said Tridge's opinion isn't valid because he's a free software partisan, that would be an ad hominem.
Now I have made some disparaging remarks towards you simply because you seem unable to draw a conclusion from an argument. You seem to be intentionally ignoring my answers to you and then claiming i've not answered them.
Further, you've not rebutted anything i've said, but rather waved your hand and made claims about other posts rather than make your own argument. Using the software does constitute agreement to its terms, terms that Tridge knew quite well existed and knew would apply if he used it.
By the way, while I didn't use the word "spite" though now that you mention it, Tridge did intentionally continue working on his software even after agreeing not to while an agreement was being worked on. That sounds like "spite" to me and certainly not ethical or principled.
I answered the question in several ways, but you apparently can't seem to infer answers so I'll have to spell it out. I have no omnisence, i've only stated facts that been claimed by the parties involved (including tridge).
Tridge is bound by Linus's decision because he accepted the Bitkeeper license by *USING* the Bitkeeper server software when he retrieved data from it using his software.
How could you not possibly understand that point?
Even if we live in the fantasy land Tridge lives in where requesting data from a server isn't using the software, he should be have enough ethics to respect his collegues decisions. He didn't agree to the BK license, therefore he had no right to access the BK trees. Period. He didn't have to use BK, but he did have to avoid it if he didn't want to use it.
The fact of the matter is that Tridge has done the entire linux community a great disservice. He's single handedly stalled the pace of Linux development for months. That's what pisses me off. That's what I feel strongly about. He Forced his beliefs on everyone by doing this.
Let me put it this way. When something happens that effections millions of people in a negative way. It's WRONG.
Tridge standing by his priniciples was when Tridge refused to use BK. That's fine. There are lots of ways to get at the source code that doesn't involve BK.
Where he went wrong was when he chose to disregard the agreement he knew existed between Linus and McVoy (and anone else that used BK) and force his priniciples on everyone else.
Tridge has written that he didn't use BK to write his software, but this is a sufficiently narrow definition of the word "use" to fit within his small reality. When his software sent data and received data from a BK server, he was using BK software, specifically the BK Server. He refuses to recognize that as "use" even though anyone else with a rational mind would. And since he was using the software, he's bound by the license agreement whether he's read it or not.
Now, some people will use certain court rulings (such as those in germany) to say that this would not be legal, but in this case Tridge knew about the license agreement. He knew (basically) what the terms were before he ever used the software. He could have asked Linus or Larry for a copy of the terms if he so chose. His decision to use the software, knowing full well what the terms were and having them available for his reading if he so chose would nullify any argument of ignorance of them.
And, more importantly, he CONTINUED to use the software even after he was explicitly informed of them and asked to stop.
So, apart from the fact the he chose to assert his own principles on others, chose to narrow his definition of the word "use" to willfully disregard the terms he knew existed, chose to stir the pot and disrespect his collegues and screw up a situation that had been mutually beneficial for everyone for 3 years (KNOWING there was no adequate open source alternative to switch to even), single-handedly grinding kernel progress to a halt for months while Linus and others look for alternatives (affecting Millions of people)... then I guess he did nothing wrong.
Then again, if your principles include totally free speech, is yelling "fire" in a crowded theater and causing the deaths of dozens of people that get trampled in the hysteria also ethical?
No. Just because you believe something is right, doesn't mean it *IS* right.
Choice is good for devs, sure. And it keeps devs happy, since they never have to solve their social issues. They just take their toys and go home.
That's the problem
It's not good for end users, because the same solution gets rearchitected over and over again, never getting further down the path of enlightenment (so to speak) because every time a little conflict emerges, everyone just disbands and starts over.
Linus's "iron fist" control over the Linux kernel has allowed the kernel to mature much faster than if everyone were off starting their own kernel's every time a problem happened.
Apparently you have a different idea of "ethical" than I do. Disrespecting your friends and intentionally making trouble for them is extremely unethical in my opinion.
Linus has a right to be pissed at Tridge for intentionally forcing this issue. McVoy has a right to terminate the license, because it was granted under the condition that the protocol not be reverse engineered.
The *ONLY* person wrong here is Tridge, and perhaps to some extent, the OSDL for not caring enough about the issue until it was too late.
Sure, what Tridge did was legal. It was not, however, Ethical.
Not even close. Tridge was under no requirement to access the BitKeeper repositories to get at the code. It was availale in many other ways, he just didn't *LIKE* those other ways.
His choice to access the BK repositories was his own, not some choice forced on him by Larry or Linus. He had many other (including full FSF endorsed) ways to get the code.
If I have to spell it out for you, fine.
,v file in an attic that can be parsed and converted. We're talking about connecting to a BK server, negotiation the protocol, issuing the proper commands, interpreting the data, recombining diffs, etc... pretty much all the stuff that BK does.
"a simple export tool" means reverse engineering the entire protocol and implementing almost all of the functionality of BitKeeper.
We're not talking about some
To top it off, BK already provides an export tool to export the data into a non-proprietary format, but Tridge didn't like that.
Instead, he decided to selfishly ignore the agreement between Linus and BitMover to not reverse engineer the protocol in exchange for free (as in beer) use and screw up the entire kernel management process, because "he didn't like that".
While Tridge was legally within his rights to reverse engineer the protocol, morally is a different question. Clearly his morals do not include respecting others agreements simply because he didn't agree to them.
That's only possible if one sufficiently narrows their definition of the word "use", much like claiming a blowjob is not "sex".
You have to, at a bare minimum, use the BitKeeper server to send data to and from it. Maybe he never used the BitKeeper client, but he certainly used the server.
Except for the fact that creating an export tool means reverse engineering and publishing the protocol to do so.
The problem is your lack of understanding of the situation. BitMover gave Linus and the community free licenses with the only stipulation that they not reverse engineer it. They *ACCEPTED* that condition. Tridge didn't accept that condition, but he should have respected that Linus (and others) accepted it. failure to do so on his part was selfish and disrespectful.
basically, Tridge "ruined it for everyone" and was the guy just didn't give a shit about anyone but himself.
That's a bogus argument. Maybe he never accepted the condition, but he should at least *RESPECT* that Linus and others were using the software under that condition.
Continuing to reverse engineer it in the face of all this was simply selfish and disrespectful to Linus and the entire Linux community.
Let's put this another way. Suppose you gain access to a conference room, under the condition that you keep the noise down and clean up after yourself. Now, you invite some friends and they are noisy and messy. You can fix the messy yourself (even though that's also disrespectful) but you can't mute them, and you lose access to the space because of it. Who's at fault?
Yes, yourr calendaring *IS* integrated in your email. You say you don't care how it works, but the fact of the matter is, it does work through email. Your email applications are aware of the special messages and provides the facility to accept or deny them, and copy that data into the calendar.
You grossly overestimate the ability of the average user to learn or care. Yes, there are average users that will figure things out, but this is, in my experience, a rarity (and I love it when I find one, it makes my job so much easier). Instead, as my typical experience bears out with end users, you have to explain the same things over and over to them. They say they understand, but they don't or they simply don't care and forget.
If you've ever watched a typical end user use something like MacOS, you notice that before long they have 10 or 15 programs running because they are confused about exiting a window and exiting an app. If the user can't see it, they forget about it. Out of sight, out of mind. Virtual desktops are just that kind of thing.
We're talking about people that can't figure out how to drag their taskbars from one side of the screen to another. We're talking about people that get confused by popups.
Your argument is typical for a power user. "Don't treat me like the least common denominator", but from a management and tech support point of view it's the opposite. You can take care of yourself, the average user can't.
And for the record. The vast majority of users weren't using computers back in the DOS days, and then the applications were much simpler, as were the user interfaces. It's the GUI that has largely allowed "average users" to use computers.
As you already mentioned, your calendaring *IS* integrated in your email, that's why it works. You've done nothing to explain why they shouldn't be integrated.
Also, atl-tab isn't a windowsism, it also works in KDE and Gnome. Try it. I switch beteween apps with the keyboard, not the mouse, and I don't want more than the current set of apps i'm using available in that list. Most typical end users are confused by virtual desktops, so that's not a real solution. You need something that will not annoy the average user, and that means integration.
Everything you describe could easily exist as seperate applications manageable via multiple front ends or via one front end. The idea should be further stated "seperation with central data sources."
In case you weren't aware, that's precisely how Exchange/Outlook works. Exchange is a central datastore, while Outlook is the "frontend" to it. If you wanted to, you could create seperarate applications to front end them, but why? Nobody wants 3 or 4 apps running all the time getting their way. In fact, having even one such application was annoying to me and was greatly relieved when Outlook 2003 offerend the ability to minimize to tray and get out of my alt-tab list.
But in any event, the email app has to have a facility to accept/deny the calendaring items, and there has to be a facility for updating the calendar automatically. Simple emails won't do this (or at least not elegantly).
Not at all, in fact it's MUCH more userful for us underlings than for the upper ups. As you mentioned, they have assistants. I don't. I don't want to spend my time managing my meetings, I just click accept and then get notified before they occur.
I spend about 10 hours a week in meetings. If I want to get other stuff done, I don't want to spend another minute more than I have to worrying about them.
If you don't understand the email/calender relationship, then you don't understand even the most basic parts of it.
Apart from the fact that people don't like having 5 or 6 apps running all the time and getting in the way (think alt-tab and having it cluttered with apps you have to run all day like email, calendering, etc.. to get full use out of them), email integration provides an eays way to invite and manage meetings.
I create a meeting and email the invites to the attendees. They click a single button to add that meeting to their calendar if they accept, or to decline (automatically informing MY calendar that they declined). If I reschedule the meeting, then everyone is automatically sent out reconfirmations, which again get automatically updated when accepted or declined.
With seperate calendaring, I have to manage the meetings (or assign someone to manage them). Integrated works much better.
The Taco Bell story isn't a myth. The source of the story is known (as cited in the Snopes article), and he claims it's true (And I believe him, since I know him and it's entirely the kind of trouble he would stir up.
While it can't be proven that it actually happened, we do know the source, so it's not a myth.
It did happen
It was first published on the net by Captain Sarcastic who ran alt.captain.sarcastic. It was borrowed by others and attributed to anonymous and other sources. I knew Captain Sarcastic at the time (actually, had known him for years) and he was quite upset about it all.
I can't prove it happened, but Kurt Koller (AKA Captain Sarcastic) originally wrote it.
http://www.snopes.com/humor/business/tacobell.htm
At least Snopes got this right. The piece was originally written by a guy going by Captain Sarcastic (Kurt Koller) who had his own usenet group. I knew the guy back in the 80's and the story is precisely the kind of thing that happened to him (and it was his style of writing as well).
He got quite upset when several sources borrowed it and attributed it to "anonymous" sources.
Actually, no. You can't demand anything. A car dealer can simply refuse to sell you the car in the configuration you want.
Secondly, even if they do sell you the car, they only have to remove "options" that are in the car. You can't, for example, demand to remove the steering wheel and be compensated for the price because it's part of the base package and the steering wheel is not a line item of that.
The problem i was referring to was not google, so much as the authors that didn't explicitly state what version of the license.
As a GPL author, If I don't agree with the new terms, I can't change that my code can now be licensed under a license i don't agree with.
Not exactly. If you haven't explicitly stated that the code is only to be licenesed under version 2, then the licensee has the option to use any later version of the GPL they like based on clause of the GPL that states the licensee has the option to do so.