"Irrelevant. You're fighting a strawman, not the position I actually take."
Actually, I was just stating my opinion, not making any claim about your position. The fact that your opinion and mine are very close doesn't deter me from making a distinction.
Since I've unintentionally prompted you to repeat yourself, I think we've probably covered all the ground we're going to. I'm going to stop now. You can have the last word if you want to add anything.
Despite the clearly stated beliefs of the leaders of these two movements, the terms "Open Source" and "Free" software are often used interchangably and I'm guilty of doing so here. Perhaps so many people do this because the term "Free software" is so ambiguous that we're afraid people will read it as "free as in beer" rather then "free as in anthropomorphic". I don't believe there is any ethical difference between Open, "Free" or Closed software.
"If their business plan is building something innovative and different, it's less likely that they'll be able to pull that off."
If they're building "something innovative and different" then naturally the source code for an legacy product will not really help them. But you don't know what your competitors are going to do, so the smart move is to not release your source code.
I don't see much effort on the part of most open source advocates to qualify their belief that all source code should be available (perhaps you are an exception or perhaps you wouldn't pass their litmus test for being an OSS advocate). Once they start making exceptions they lose the "higher moral ground" they believe exists.
"The argument here is that observing an app's user-visible design is generally sufficient for a well-funded and determined opponent to reproduce it."
The key here is "well-funded" and "determined". In many cases the funding and determination of a potential competitor to produce a knock-off falls short because they need a viable plan that is likely to result in a reasonable ROI. The more difficult you can make it, the fewer competitors you have. Releasing your source code will make it more likely that your competitors business plan will pass the ROI test.
"Roughly, in this context, it expands out to something akin to the following: "If you had to pick something which as much of a fringe element as [FOO] to find an exception to the rule which I'm trying to assert, then the rule presumably holds for more common cases".
Of course labeling something "fringe" is begging the question. Fundamentally, finding an exception merely disproves the absolute statement in the rule, it says nothing about what percentage of cases agree with the rule. That's why this argument is generally considered to be fallacious.
I can be accused of not appreciating subtlety, not recognizing hyperbole and being pedantic, but I take considerable comfort in being absolutely correct.
"That's a separate discussion"
Gee, and I'm apparently off-topic too. I don't need to use the exact words of previous posters for mine to be relevant to the discussion. The argument I was responding to attempts to dismiss the competitive value of closed source code by claiming that opening the source wouldn't provide an advantage to ones competitors.
In any case, I find the argument that the source code isn't needed to be a strange one for open source advocates to make.
"Here you have agreed that an evolved project may as well be rewritten from scratch (therefore not using the original code)."
An application can always be written from scratch if you have the necessary knowledge, but so what? That fact has no bearing on whether its the most efficient way to make changes or whether there is value in having the source.
I find the "exception that proves the rule" argument to be one the dumbest ever (no offense).
The point is that the post I was responding to stated that competent programmers "can replicate every single feature..." so finding a single case where it's not true blows that argument away.
Now you made a better argument because you narrowed the scope, but in doing so you have to admit that there are cases where closed source makes better sense. Then we are left with debating the conditions where one is better than the other and how often each scenario applies.
There seems to be a common misconception on Slashdot that software is either shrinkwrapped or developed in-house for internal use.
There is also custom software developed by 3rd parties and a mountain of embedded code that fall in neither category.
Even in those cases where the code is developed in-house for the company's own use, there's no particular reason why the company would want their competitors to have the source.
If there's some GPL'd code available that does everything a company needs, then they can just reduce the programming staff. If not, why would they GPL their own internal development so that their competitors can save money on their own staff?
The idea that a world where all software is licensed under the GPL is not going to negatively impact the economics of the programming profession is very difficult to believe.
So if, for example, someone comes up with a revolutionary approach to speech recognition that is speaker-independent and 99% accurate, a team of competent programmers can replicate it just as fast without source code as with? Dream on.
Obviously, if you rewrite a legacy application from scratch, it's going to start out cleaner than the orginal was after years of maintenance. This has nothing to do with open vs. closed source software.
"Thanks for changing the subject AGAIN." Care to be more specific about what you mean?
"Thanks for partial quoting again."
"Something you imply isn't something to be directly quoted. What you imply is the gestalt of your post(s), and that certainly was your implication."
Let me get this straight. I'm being critized for partial quoting (whatever that means) but it's OK for you to derive my intent from my "gestalt" without quoting me at all. You don't find your critera a bit inconsistent?
"IHBT"
So I'm a troll now. OK, calling troll is always the last argument of the incompetent on Slashdot.
"Have you ever heard of something called "paper?" It's an archaic file format that was government standard as recently as 20 years ago."
Are you making a joke? The only paper I know about comes from trees and it obviously isn't a file format.
"Seriously, there was never a time when an open file format wasn't available."
I didn't say that open file formats weren't available in the old days, I just said that proprietary file formats are not a recent development. Thus believing in open file formats doesn't make you any more old-fashioned than beliving in proprietary file formats.
Probably because MS has little in common with Standard Oil or AT&T.
If MS had a monopoly like AT&T had, it would design and build all the microprocessors, RAM, Hard drives, printers, modems, etc. It would then integrate these items into a system, add software (also made exclusively by MS) and allow you to lease it on a monthly basis. If you tried to use equipment or software made by somebody else they'd cancel your account and then drop by to pickup their equipement and you'd be out of the computing business.
Yes, I understand there are trade-offs between OO languages and procedural ones. I just don't think it's the same kind as fixed layouts vs. dynamic ones.
The choice of OO vs. procedural doesn't really affect the user experience, it's just an internal design detail. There may be cases where response time is different but that time is often too short for a human to detect and where it's longer, it can often by optimized away.
"There are about 200 Linux distributions (last time I checked.) You don't understand that 200 separate vendors is inherently more complicated than a single vendor?"
Well, if you're claiming that these 200 Linux distrubtions are so incompatible that they make the complexity of dealing with 10-100 times more applications on Windows trivial by comparison, then you're making a really good argument against adopting Linux.
I don't think the Linux world is really that grim. I suspect that Linus and the core Linux developers don't give a rat's ass about the 195 Linux distributions that probably make up less than 1% of the Linux "market" and make no special effort whatsoever to make sure a patch doesn't mess them up.
"You certainly did, in your earlier post. Go back and read it again."
I have read it. The fact that you don't quote the part of my post that you claim implies "that Linux patches are 100% untested" is pretty clear evidence that you can't find one. Why not just admit you were wrong and move on.
"I disagree with your assessment on orders of magnitude. The variety that exists in the open source world is much more complicated than the Microsoft world."
I'm not sure what you mean by the variety being more complicated. Given that MS has about 90% of the desktop market it makes perfect sense that there are many more programs written for Windows than Linux.
"You imply that Linux patches are 100% untested - that is absurd."
I implied nothing of the sort. I do doubt however, that any significant testing effort is performed to insure a patch won't affect other programs (which is quite different from tesing whether the patch successfully handles the bug). As far as my comment on "it's free so you shouldn't complain" its something I learned from the open/free source community. You're not seriously going to suggest that it's not a common attitude are you?
"Now that is a loaded statement! Was I providing excuses? Are you now going to turn your statement on its head and say you mean "someone" but not me? {Sigh.}"
I'm sure you're a fast typist but I wouldn't claim that all Linux excuse posting on Slashdot was done by you. Thus using the word "someone" seemed quite appropriate.
Nope, the bill said "if Saddam Hussein refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction".
And he didn't have any WMDs.
"Do you have any other way you can twist this to fit your backward logic and failed ideology?"
I didn't express any ideology failed or otherwise. As far as backward logic is concerned, it's you who insists that Bush met the terms of the bill since Saddam wouldn't give up the imaginary WMDs.
"In a major victory for the White House, the Senate early Friday voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq if Saddam Hussein refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction as required by U.N. resolutions."
The CNN story doesn't provide the actual text of the bill and I'm too lazy to look it up.
It seems to me that in order to determine if there were weapons of mass destruction, you'd have to finish the inspections and that would be an implicit (if not explicit) part of the bill.
But let's say I'm totally wrong as you state. Saddam Hussein could have kicked the inspectors out of the Iraq without fear of President Bush invading because the bill only authorizes him to invade if Saddam posesses WMDs. Saddam didn't have any WMDs but Bush invaded Iraq anyway. So the invasion had nothing to do with the Congressional action since the triggering conditions never occured.
"Gee, how often does Microsoft have unknown persons audit their code (besides the occasional code theft, of course.)"
I'm not sure what you mean by "unknown" here. I'm sure in the last few years individuals within MS who didn't write the code are auditing it for security.
"MS with it's Billions of dollars simply can't be as responsive. Er, well they could be, but they choose not to be."
Well, the number of different programs running on Windows is probably an order of magnitude greater than on Linux so more care is required to make sure a patch will not mess things up. The Linux community can always fall back on the excuse that "it's free so you shouldn't complain". Obviously MS can't.
"I don't see how this is applying a double standard"
I don't see much interest on Slashdot on breaking down a Windows security bug to see how difficult it would be to exploit, but there's always someone who will provide excuses for Linux here.
You seem to be reaching here. If implementing the protocol safely is beyond the ability of Linux developers, then they shouldn't do it.
More likely the truth is that smart developers for Linux and smart developers for MS make mistakes and will continue to do so. My only complaint is that there shouldn't be a double-standard.
A Linux developer can't exploit a Windows bug because that would make him a Windows developer and you said that a Windows developer does nothing until a Linux developer exploits it but he can't because...
Actually, Congress didn't vote to go to war in Iraq, they merely gave the president the option in order to pressure Iraq to allow the weapon inspectors to finish their work (the fact the Congress starting in the 2nd half of the 20th century has given away their sole constitutional authority to initiate a war is a subject for another day).
Bush himself said before the vote that it wasn't a vote to go to war. Of course he's proven on many occasions that lying is not a problem for him.
Slashdot Mirror
"Irrelevant. You're fighting a strawman, not the position I actually take."
Actually, I was just stating my opinion, not making any claim about your position. The fact that your opinion and mine are very close doesn't deter me from making a distinction.
Since I've unintentionally prompted you to repeat yourself, I think we've probably covered all the ground we're going to. I'm going to stop now. You can have the last word if you want to add anything.
Despite the clearly stated beliefs of the leaders of these two movements, the terms "Open Source" and "Free" software are often used interchangably and I'm guilty of doing so here. Perhaps so many people do this because the term "Free software" is so ambiguous that we're afraid people will read it as "free as in beer" rather then "free as in anthropomorphic". I don't believe there is any ethical difference between Open, "Free" or Closed software.
"If their business plan is building something innovative and different, it's less likely that they'll be able to pull that off."
If they're building "something innovative and different" then naturally the source code for an legacy product will not really help them. But you don't know what your competitors are going to do, so the smart move is to not release your source code.
"You're oversimplifying a bit"
I don't see much effort on the part of most open source advocates to qualify their belief that all source code should be available (perhaps you are an exception or perhaps you wouldn't pass their litmus test for being an OSS advocate). Once they start making exceptions they lose the "higher moral ground" they believe exists.
"The argument here is that observing an app's user-visible design is generally sufficient for a well-funded and determined opponent to reproduce it."
The key here is "well-funded" and "determined". In many cases the funding and determination of a potential competitor to produce a knock-off falls short because they need a viable plan that is likely to result in a reasonable ROI. The more difficult you can make it, the fewer competitors you have. Releasing your source code will make it more likely that your competitors business plan will pass the ROI test.
"Roughly, in this context, it expands out to something akin to the following: "If you had to pick something which as much of a fringe element as [FOO] to find an exception to the rule which I'm trying to assert, then the rule presumably holds for more common cases".
Of course labeling something "fringe" is begging the question. Fundamentally, finding an exception merely disproves the absolute statement in the rule, it says nothing about what percentage of cases agree with the rule. That's why this argument is generally considered to be fallacious.
I can be accused of not appreciating subtlety, not recognizing hyperbole and being pedantic, but I take considerable comfort in being absolutely correct.
"That's a separate discussion"
Gee, and I'm apparently off-topic too. I don't need to use the exact words of previous posters for mine to be relevant to the discussion. The argument I was responding to attempts to dismiss the competitive value of closed source code by claiming that opening the source wouldn't provide an advantage to ones competitors.
In any case, I find the argument that the source code isn't needed to be a strange one for open source advocates to make.
"Here you have agreed that an evolved project may as well be rewritten from scratch (therefore not using the original code)."
An application can always be written from scratch if you have the necessary knowledge, but so what? That fact has no bearing on whether its the most efficient way to make changes or whether there is value in having the source.
I find the "exception that proves the rule" argument to be one the dumbest ever (no offense).
..." so finding a single case where it's not true blows that argument away.
The point is that the post I was responding to stated that competent programmers "can replicate every single feature
Now you made a better argument because you narrowed the scope, but in doing so you have to admit that there are cases where closed source makes better sense. Then we are left with debating the conditions where one is better than the other and how often each scenario applies.
There seems to be a common misconception on Slashdot that software is either shrinkwrapped or developed in-house for internal use.
There is also custom software developed by 3rd parties and a mountain of embedded code that fall in neither category.
Even in those cases where the code is developed in-house for the company's own use, there's no particular reason why the company would want their competitors to have the source.
If there's some GPL'd code available that does everything a company needs, then they can just reduce the programming staff. If not, why would they GPL their own internal development so that their competitors can save money on their own staff?
The idea that a world where all software is licensed under the GPL is not going to negatively impact the economics of the programming profession is very difficult to believe.
So if, for example, someone comes up with a revolutionary approach to speech recognition that is speaker-independent and 99% accurate, a team of competent programmers can replicate it just as fast without source code as with? Dream on.
Obviously, if you rewrite a legacy application from scratch, it's going to start out cleaner than the orginal was after years of maintenance. This has nothing to do with open vs. closed source software.
I guess you're confusing me with "UniverseIsaDoghnut", the passage you quoted was from him.
"Thanks for changing the subject AGAIN."
Care to be more specific about what you mean?
"Thanks for partial quoting again."
"Something you imply isn't something to be directly quoted. What you imply is the gestalt of your post(s), and that certainly was your implication."
Let me get this straight. I'm being critized for partial quoting (whatever that means) but it's OK for you to derive my intent from my "gestalt" without quoting me at all. You don't find your critera a bit inconsistent?
"IHBT"
So I'm a troll now. OK, calling troll is always the last argument of the incompetent on Slashdot.
"Have you ever heard of something called "paper?" It's an archaic file format that was government standard as recently as 20 years ago."
Are you making a joke? The only paper I know about comes from trees and it obviously isn't a file format.
"Seriously, there was never a time when an open file format wasn't available."
I didn't say that open file formats weren't available in the old days, I just said that proprietary file formats are not a recent development. Thus believing in open file formats doesn't make you any more old-fashioned than beliving in proprietary file formats.
Probably because MS has little in common with Standard Oil or AT&T.
If MS had a monopoly like AT&T had, it would design and build all the microprocessors, RAM, Hard drives, printers, modems, etc. It would then integrate these items into a system, add software (also made exclusively by MS) and allow you to lease it on a monthly basis. If you tried to use equipment or software made by somebody else they'd cancel your account and then drop by to pickup their equipement and you'd be out of the computing business.
"Call me old-fashioned, but what business does the government have using proprietary file formats anyway?"
Since when is the idea of using proprietary file formats a new one, Mr. "old-fashioned"?
If the government banned all proprietary products they wouldn't be able to even take a crap without digging a new latrine.
Yes, I understand there are trade-offs between OO languages and procedural ones. I just don't think it's the same kind as fixed layouts vs. dynamic ones.
The choice of OO vs. procedural doesn't really affect the user experience, it's just an internal design detail. There may be cases where response time is different but that time is often too short for a human to detect and where it's longer, it can often by optimized away.
"There are about 200 Linux distributions (last time I checked.) You don't understand that 200 separate vendors is inherently more complicated than a single vendor?"
Well, if you're claiming that these 200 Linux distrubtions are so incompatible that they make the complexity of dealing with 10-100 times more applications on Windows trivial by comparison, then you're making a really good argument against adopting Linux.
I don't think the Linux world is really that grim. I suspect that Linus and the core Linux developers don't give a rat's ass about the 195 Linux distributions that probably make up less than 1% of the Linux "market" and make no special effort whatsoever to make sure a patch doesn't mess them up.
"You certainly did, in your earlier post. Go back and read it again."
I have read it. The fact that you don't quote the part of my post that you claim implies "that Linux patches are 100% untested" is pretty clear evidence that you can't find one. Why not just admit you were wrong and move on.
according to RMS.
"I disagree with your assessment on orders of magnitude. The variety that exists in the open source world is much more complicated than the Microsoft world."
I'm not sure what you mean by the variety being more complicated. Given that MS has about 90% of the desktop market it makes perfect sense that there are many more programs written for Windows than Linux.
"You imply that Linux patches are 100% untested - that is absurd."
I implied nothing of the sort. I do doubt however, that any significant testing effort is performed to insure a patch won't affect other programs (which is quite different from tesing whether the patch successfully handles the bug). As far as my comment on "it's free so you shouldn't complain" its something I learned from the open/free source community. You're not seriously going to suggest that it's not a common attitude are you?
"Now that is a loaded statement! Was I providing excuses? Are you now going to turn your statement on its head and say you mean "someone" but not me? {Sigh.}"
I'm sure you're a fast typist but I wouldn't claim that all Linux excuse posting on Slashdot was done by you. Thus using the word "someone" seemed quite appropriate.
Nope, the bill said "if Saddam Hussein refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction".
And he didn't have any WMDs.
"Do you have any other way you can twist this to fit your backward logic and failed ideology?"
I didn't express any ideology failed or otherwise. As far as backward logic is concerned, it's you who insists that Bush met the terms of the bill since Saddam wouldn't give up the imaginary WMDs.
I'll let you have the last word.
If you say so.
According to the story at your link:
"In a major victory for the White House, the Senate early Friday voted 77-23 to authorize President Bush to attack Iraq if Saddam Hussein refuses to give up weapons of mass destruction as required by U.N. resolutions."
The CNN story doesn't provide the actual text of the bill and I'm too lazy to look it up.
It seems to me that in order to determine if there were weapons of mass destruction, you'd have to finish the inspections and that would be an implicit (if not explicit) part of the bill.
But let's say I'm totally wrong as you state. Saddam Hussein could have kicked the inspectors out of the Iraq without fear of President Bush invading because the bill only authorizes him to invade if Saddam posesses WMDs. Saddam didn't have any WMDs but Bush invaded Iraq anyway. So the invasion had nothing to do with the Congressional action since the triggering conditions never occured.
"Gee, how often does Microsoft have unknown persons audit their code (besides the occasional code theft, of course.)"
I'm not sure what you mean by "unknown" here. I'm sure in the last few years individuals within MS who didn't write the code are auditing it for security.
"MS with it's Billions of dollars simply can't be as responsive. Er, well they could be, but they choose not to be."
Well, the number of different programs running on Windows is probably an order of magnitude greater than on Linux so more care is required to make sure a patch will not mess things up. The Linux community can always fall back on the excuse that "it's free so you shouldn't complain". Obviously MS can't.
"I don't see how this is applying a double standard"
I don't see much interest on Slashdot on breaking down a Windows security bug to see how difficult it would be to exploit, but there's always someone who will provide excuses for Linux here.
You seem to be reaching here. If implementing the protocol safely is beyond the ability of Linux developers, then they shouldn't do it.
More likely the truth is that smart developers for Linux and smart developers for MS make mistakes and will continue to do so. My only complaint is that there shouldn't be a double-standard.
Your story is paradoxical.
...
A Linux developer can't exploit a Windows bug because that would make him a Windows developer and you said that a Windows developer does nothing until a Linux developer exploits it but he can't because
Actually, Congress didn't vote to go to war in Iraq, they merely gave the president the option in order to pressure Iraq to allow the weapon inspectors to finish their work (the fact the Congress starting in the 2nd half of the 20th century has given away their sole constitutional authority to initiate a war is a subject for another day).
Bush himself said before the vote that it wasn't a vote to go to war. Of course he's proven on many occasions that lying is not a problem for him.