"Who is to say that something better than Linux isn't out already, and the Linux community is dimissing or ignoring it? "
Define "better". For some people and some tasks I think you could argue that Free BSD or Be is "better" than Linux right now. Without more details though it's like argueing that a fork is better than a spoon. The one thing I think we can all agree on is that sporks (Windows) suck.
"In a way, I've given up hope that "the masses" will ever get the "real truth" behind things."
I know the feeling but as long as people are willing to buy crap there will be multitues of companies going nuts trying to fill the demand. I do think there is hope however. Over the past couple of years I noticed a huge increase in the level of dissatisfaction with the reliability of Windows based PCs. That's not to say that people recognize that Windows itself is a big part of the problem, most seem to blame the hardware first and then themselves for "breaking" it but at least it's a start.
"although I love Linux, I believe that one day something better would come along. The question is, when that day comes, will people stubbornly cling onto Linux the same way they are clinging to M$ now? If so, how different are they from stubborn M$ supporters of today?"
I think there is a difference. Of the few Linux users I know in the "real world" all can give actual reasons for their choice. Reasons might be "It's more stable" or "It's faster on my system" or just "there are just so many cool free things to play with" and every one of them has used at least a couple of different OSs in their time. When you ask Windows users why they made that choice the answers usually revolve around either "What else is there?" or "I've got to run exactly the same sofware as we use at the office" or "My kid must have exactly the same software he/she uses at school" and hardly any of these people have ever used anything but Windows.
I agree with your subject (mostly) but you got some of your facts wrong. The ID imbeded into Word docs. is in fact based on your MAC address. Likewise, any serial # that is available to software could be used just as easily. The problem is that when this Intel serial # issue first came out, they were promoting it for two distinct purposes:
1. To the public & press it was about securing e-commerce.
2. To developers it was a way to prevent copyright infringement.
#1 of course implies that the serial # would be sent out to anyone you have a business relationship with (and anyone else your sw vendor thinks should have it). Think of it as a sort of "Super Cookie".
#2 gives way too much power to software vendors to decide when/if you can use their software. These folks (at least in the Windows world) already take too many liberties with the systems that their software is installed on and I'm not about to give them more power. One of my clients had no less than three different processes running on one of his machines all just waiting for 30 days to expire so they could remind him to register his software. One came with a piece of commercial software that he had purchased and the other two were software that came with the hardware he had purchased. None were shareware or anything of that nature. Can you imagine what a PITA it would be if you had to call every softare vendor for a new serial # every time you re-installed a Windows box?
Any idea where the main bottleneck will be? Is an area where some of the MMX and related X86 extensions (and the equivalant PPC) might make a difference? or is this more of a memory/bandwith issue?
I'd just add that these Win-Devices are a bad idea even when you are using a supported OS. With a normal printer you can troubleshoot problems by just dumping plain text to the parallel port. In addition, since the drivers are more complicated there is more chance that they won't work when you upgrade your OS or may conflict with other software on your system. Of course since these are normally cheap devices the odds that the vendor will spend the money to update their drivers are lower as well. You can also forget using drivers for some other "compatable" device until yours is fully supported (how many printers are there that can use either Epson or HP drivers in a pinch?)
"The K5 is a 486 with some serious tweaking (which is why it paled next to a real Pentium but did very well against a 486"
No, you're thinking of the 586. The K5 is a full pentium class CPU. The higher end K5s (133-200) actually did just as well and in some cases better than equivalent clasic pentiums.
I can already hear people screaming over this, because it sounds as if the first waves of profound censorship is making its way unto the Net.
This has nothing to do with censorship, it's about the role of our government in dictating how we raise our children. This is nothing like NetNanny because NetNanny is not mandated by the government or anyone else.
it's about giving the parents the legal means to censor the Internet themselves.
Parents have no business censoring the Internet and they already have the legal right to control what their kids do on the internet. This new regulation changes nothing in that respect.
The problem with your arguement is that you are basing it on technology that is not predominant anymore and is becoming less so every day.
Consider calls from me to my ISP:
1. Every house in my neighborhood has it's own dedicated pair of wires reguardless of how many are actually in use. These wires don't cost more just because they are in use.
2. On the other side of my local switch is a fiber optic cable that leads all the way to town. The incremental cost of an additional call going through that cable is miniscule.
3. My ISP does NOT lease hundreds of individual incomming lines but instead has a small number of high capacity lines (essentially a couple of T1s) and the "switching" happens on his own equipment. These high capacity lines run in parallel with his local switch and as a result the number of calls coming into the ISP does NOT impact the number of other calls that can go through that same switch.
4. My ISP pays thousands/month for these lines and pays again for the data going back out to the rest of the internet.
It seems to me that the only significant additional cost here is at my local switch and that the telco. is more than making up for that with the fees they charge my ISP.
"Does anyone know of a national ISP that will let Linux boxes to connect via straight PPP? Let me know, I need one!"
IBM, Earthlink, Mindspring.... I know IBM allows you to sign up and get all the info. you need via the web. The other two may do that also and if that fails you can have them sign you up manually. All three are normal PPP links once you get signed up.
"This is unfortunate, but it's a support issue. AOL, AT&T and Qwest have all found that the more platforms you support, the more you have to spend on technical support."
This isn't about them supporting my OS. This about them being able to tell me about THEIR system. The sick part is that almost every ISP can be made to work with any modern OS if the sales/support folks could simply tell you a few basic pieces of information about their service.
Now that IS scary. Maybe it's time to get Aladdin's view on this. The current (5.50) version of gs is scheduled to become GPLd soon and I'd hate to see anything mess that up.
What makes you think that the openness of the drivers has anything to do with it? It seems to me that if you are looking to clone the hardware then you'll find just about everything you need by simply looking at the hardware. It's possible that Creative has patents on key parts of the sblive that make it difficult to legally clone.
The MacMillan version comes with several full length books in PDF format. I bought a copy several months ago just to check out the books even though I don't use RH.
"Actually, how could you even imagine there could not be any agreement?"
Because:
1. Both RH and Metrowerks have said so.
2. The software in question does in fact work on other distros.
3. RH already GPLs everything they write.
4. There are perfectly legitimate economic and technical reasons for limiting support to only one or a few distros.
Now before someone pops up and says just do./configure, make install, I'm not saying that it's hard to create software that will RUN on many flavors of Linux but that the cost of actually SUPPORTING (read training the tech. support folks etc) can be very high. I don't think you realize just how hard it is to provide telephone support. Unless the customer really knows what the're doing it usually degenerates into fairly detailed instructions like, click on this, type that, what do you see? now type something else. What's worse is that you can't even count on them knowing what OS their running or even what an OS is.
Yes, all this happens by mistake, just divinity!
I don't think anybody claimed that their support policy was a mistake, only that the wording in their press release should have been more clear.
"Of course it's stupid and totally unenforcable! I could carry a printout of the RSA source code across borders (I think), but not a floppy disk containing the source code files."
It's worse than that. If your neighbor happens to be a foreign national and you allow him/her access to the disk then YOU have just exported it as far as the State Department is concerned even if the disk never leaves the country.
" Don't get all flustered that some 'terrorist' state is getting it's hands on Uncle Sams crown jewels. You seem to forget the decidedly iffy way that the Carter administration tried to infringe Iranian sovereignty. They also gave asylum to the Shah of Iran, who was undoubtedly guilty of mismanagement of the Iranian economy. "
It sure doesn't look like it has anything to do with the post you responded to. He just asked why the restrection was there in the first place.
"Having watched US TV for the last three weeks while on a business trip, I can see that US jingoism is alive and kicking... "
I think I see the problem.
Re:Warning! Rocky shores ahead!
on
Linux 2.3.0
·
· Score: 1
When did they drop the price to $100? Last I checked it was $300 unless you are a student.
"Where does it say that licenses are restrictive only? "
In the U.S. it is generally legal to do anything that isn't specifically illegal. It is specifically illegal to copy a copyrighted work. Anything you write is automatically copyrighted. Therefore it's legal to do anything except copy.
" If a license is indeed restrictive only, then if I write something, copyright it, and then don't license it you seem to be saying that anyone can do anything they want with it"
Slashdot Mirror
"Who is to say that something better than Linux isn't out already, and the Linux
community is dimissing or ignoring it? "
Define "better". For some people and some tasks I think you could argue that Free BSD or Be is "better" than Linux right now. Without more details though it's like argueing that a fork is better than a spoon. The one thing I think we can all agree on is that sporks (Windows) suck.
"In a way, I've given up hope that "the masses" will ever get the "real truth" behind things."
I know the feeling but as long as people are willing to buy crap there will be multitues of companies going nuts trying to fill the demand. I do think there is hope however. Over the past couple of years I noticed a huge increase in the level of dissatisfaction with the reliability of Windows based PCs. That's not to say that people recognize that Windows itself is a big part of the problem, most seem to blame the hardware first and then themselves for "breaking" it but at least it's a start.
"although I love Linux, I believe that one day something better would come along. The question is, when that day comes, will people stubbornly cling onto Linux the same way they are clinging to M$ now? If so, how different are they from stubborn M$ supporters of today?"
I think there is a difference. Of the few Linux users I know in the "real world" all can give actual reasons for their choice. Reasons might be "It's more stable" or "It's faster on my system" or just "there are just so many cool free things to play with" and every one of them has used at least a couple of different OSs in their time. When you ask Windows users why they made that choice the answers usually revolve around either "What else is there?" or "I've got to run exactly the same sofware as we use at the office" or "My kid must have exactly the same software he/she uses at school" and hardly any of these people have ever used anything but Windows.
I agree with your subject (mostly) but you got some of your facts wrong. The ID imbeded into Word docs. is in fact based on your MAC address. Likewise, any serial # that is available to software could be used just as easily. The problem is that when this Intel serial # issue first came out, they were promoting it for two distinct purposes:
1. To the public & press it was about securing e-commerce.
2. To developers it was a way to prevent copyright infringement.
#1 of course implies that the serial # would be sent out to anyone you have a business relationship with (and anyone else your sw vendor thinks should have it). Think of it as a sort of "Super Cookie".
#2 gives way too much power to software vendors to decide when/if you can use their software. These folks (at least in the Windows world) already take too many liberties with the systems that their software is installed on and I'm not about to give them more power. One of my clients had no less than three different processes running on one of his machines all just waiting for 30 days to expire so they could remind him to register his software. One came with a piece of commercial software that he had purchased and the other two were software that came with the hardware he had purchased. None were shareware or anything of that nature. Can you imagine what a PITA it would be if you had to call every softare vendor for a new serial # every time you re-installed a Windows box?
Any idea where the main bottleneck will be? Is an area where some of the MMX and related X86 extensions (and the equivalant PPC) might make a difference? or is this more of a memory/bandwith issue?
I'd just add that these Win-Devices are a bad idea even when you are using a supported OS. With a normal printer you can troubleshoot problems by just dumping plain text to the parallel port. In addition, since the drivers are more complicated there is more chance that they won't work when you upgrade your OS or may conflict with other software on your system. Of course since these are normally cheap devices the odds that the vendor will spend the money to update their drivers are lower as well. You can also forget using drivers for some other "compatable" device until yours is fully supported (how many printers are there that can use either Epson or HP drivers in a pinch?)
"I'd much rather have a nice big
server on a local LAN and do "X -query server""
I agree but I can think of situations where a clone of this system running on the local LAN might be handy.
"The K5 is a
486 with some serious tweaking (which is why it paled next to a real Pentium but did very
well against a 486"
No, you're thinking of the 586. The K5 is a full pentium class CPU. The higher end K5s (133-200) actually did just as well and in some cases better than equivalent clasic pentiums.
That makes about as much as blaiming Exon gas for problems with your door locks. The two just arn't related.
This has nothing to do with censorship, it's about the role of our government in dictating how we raise our children. This is nothing like NetNanny because NetNanny is not mandated by the government or anyone else.
Parents have no business censoring the Internet and they already have the legal right to control what their kids do on the internet. This new regulation changes nothing in that respect.
"Think about it-- The reason we have laws about parental consent isn't because parents are too lazy to watch their kids. "
And taking away the consequences for their neglect will make parrents more or less neglectfull?
"Is it really ok to punish the Timmy who forgets to ask Mommy or are too excited because the website is promising them Really Cool Games?"
Yes, because next time it might be someone more dangerous than some toy company looking for unsupervised kids.
The problem with your arguement is that you are basing it on technology that is not predominant anymore and is becoming less so every day.
Consider calls from me to my ISP:
1. Every house in my neighborhood has it's own dedicated pair of wires reguardless of how many are actually in use. These wires don't cost more just because they are in use.
2. On the other side of my local switch is a fiber optic cable that leads all the way to town. The incremental cost of an additional call going through that cable is miniscule.
3. My ISP does NOT lease hundreds of individual incomming lines but instead has a small number of high capacity lines (essentially a couple of T1s) and the "switching" happens on his own equipment. These high capacity lines run in parallel with his local switch and as a result the number of calls coming into the ISP does NOT impact the number of other calls that can go through that same switch.
4. My ISP pays thousands/month for these lines and pays again for the data going back out to the rest of the internet.
It seems to me that the only significant additional cost here is at my local switch and that the telco. is more than making up for that with the fees they charge my ISP.
"Does anyone know of a national
ISP that will let Linux boxes to connect via straight PPP? Let me know, I need one!"
IBM, Earthlink, Mindspring.... I know IBM allows you to sign up and get all the info. you need via the web. The other two may do that also and if that fails you can have them sign you up manually. All three are normal PPP links once you get signed up.
"This is unfortunate, but it's a support issue. AOL, AT&T and Qwest have all found that the
more platforms you support, the more you have to spend on technical support."
This isn't about them supporting my OS. This about them being able to tell me about THEIR system. The sick part is that almost every ISP can be made to work with any modern OS if the sales/support folks could simply tell you a few basic pieces of information about their service.
Now that IS scary. Maybe it's time to get Aladdin's view on this. The current (5.50) version of gs is scheduled to become GPLd soon and I'd hate to see anything mess that up.
"Is "portable" mentioned in any of those documents?"
Does it matter? Just about anything is "portable" if the user is determined enough.
What makes you think that the openness of the drivers has anything to do with it? It seems to me that if you are looking to clone the hardware then you'll find just about everything you need by simply looking at the hardware. It's possible that Creative has patents on key parts of the sblive that make it difficult to legally clone.
The MacMillan version comes with several full length books in PDF format. I bought a copy several months ago just to check out the books even though I don't use RH.
"Actually, how could you even imagine there could not be any agreement?"
./configure, make install, I'm not saying that it's hard to create software that will RUN on many flavors of Linux but that the cost of actually SUPPORTING (read training the tech. support folks etc) can be very high. I don't think you realize just how hard it is to provide telephone support. Unless the customer really knows what the're doing it usually degenerates into fairly detailed instructions like, click on this, type that, what do you see? now type something else. What's worse is that you can't even count on them knowing what OS their running or even what an OS is.
Because:
1. Both RH and Metrowerks have said so.
2. The software in question does in fact work on other distros.
3. RH already GPLs everything they write.
4. There are perfectly legitimate economic and technical reasons for limiting support to only one or a few distros.
Now before someone pops up and says just do
Yes, all this happens by mistake, just divinity!
I don't think anybody claimed that their support policy was a mistake, only that the wording in their press release should have been more clear.
"Of course it's stupid and totally unenforcable! I could carry a printout of the RSA
source code across borders (I think), but not a floppy disk containing the source
code files."
It's worse than that. If your neighbor happens to be a foreign national and you allow him/her access to the disk then YOU have just exported it as far as the State Department is concerned even if the disk never leaves the country.
Where the hell did this come from?
... "
" Don't get all flustered that some 'terrorist' state is getting it's hands on Uncle Sams
crown jewels. You seem to forget the decidedly iffy way that the Carter
administration tried to infringe Iranian sovereignty. They also gave asylum to the
Shah of Iran, who was undoubtedly guilty of mismanagement of the Iranian
economy. "
It sure doesn't look like it has anything to do with the post you responded to. He just asked why the restrection was there in the first place.
"Having watched US TV for the last three weeks while on a business trip, I can see
that US jingoism is alive and kicking
I think I see the problem.
When did they drop the price to $100? Last I checked it was $300 unless you are a student.
"Where does it say that licenses are restrictive only? "
In the U.S. it is generally legal to do anything that isn't specifically illegal. It is specifically illegal to copy a copyrighted work. Anything you write is automatically copyrighted. Therefore it's legal to do anything except copy.
" If a license is indeed restrictive only, then if I write something, copyright it, and then
don't license it you seem to be saying that anyone can do anything they want with it"
Yes, anything EXCEPT copying.