OpenBSD sucks. Theo de Raadt sucks. OpenSSH sucks too. No exploits in the default install for 48 hours! Time to move to NetBSD and Kerberos5.
So let's see... OpenBSD and OpenSSH have had a few exploits over the past few weeks. Linux et al have had... um, can somebody count them up for me? I don't have enough free time to do so.
All of the things you threw out in your email did nothing to change the laws either.
My point remains. There are ways to get laws changed, and then there are ways to try to look like a hero while actually doing nothing but getting a photo op. Me, I'll revere the folks who take action, not the folks who cause mischief. All of the examples you mentioned entailed mischief and did absolutely, positively, undeniably nothing to change anything.
Hey, maybe Bruce can dress in an Indian costume and rip up his Selective Service card while tossing handfuls of Boston tea onto a Chinese tank. That would be about as effective as his little stunt would have been, plus it would give me some cool pictures to laugh at.
...is that the loser who made this all happen has a heartattack and can't get through to 911 emergency services because his/her own virus/hack/whatever is tying up the line.
Seriously, if murder is already illegal, why does murder with a computer have have to have special legislation?
That's easy... Representatives are more interested in getting re-elected than actually doing the country any good. Computer oriented laws are today what gun control laws were a decade or so ago: quick, easy opportunities for representatives to make it look like they're doing something really good when in fact it's all a bunch of crap.
When politicians start getting unpopular you'll see lots of "buzzword" bills being pushed through Congress. Right now Capitol Hill is the focal point of major flamage with the lameness of our defenses against terrorism and the way the White House appears to be slapping CEOs on the wrist and setting them free after they've effectively collapsed our economy. I'm sure more "buzzword" bills are on their way...
The single biggest hinderance in the adoption of Linux as a viable desktop OS is most likely its inability to run MS applications efficiently. WINE comes close (CodeWeaver's version especially), but it still isn't "there". And don't give me a bunch of hooey about VMWare; that's not emulation, that's actually running Windows. A clean emulation layer that doesn't require hundreds of megs of disk space and costs about $50 would be a friggin' GODSEND for Linux. I hope to hell they actually do that... I'd be one of the first people to buy the damn thing!
Your article is flawed in a few spots
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Is RPM Doomed?
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· Score: 2
1) Red Hat and Mandrake were/are not excluded from UnitedLinux. All Linux companies are welcome to join. They may not have been in on the initial UL chats, but had they been included I wouldn't be even slightly surprised if at least Red Hat would have caused the talks to go nowhere with their "we're the standard, be like us" mentality. Leaving the Red Hats of the world out of the round #1 discussions was probably the only way UL got as far as they did.
2) You oversimplify the issues of divergent Linux distros. If you think the main reason people leave distros like Mandrake is because of packaging issues, you're not looking at the big picture. I've tried just about all of the major Linux distros at any particular time (including SLS, TAMU, MCC, etc. from the days of the original Linux distros) and the only reason I have migrated from one to the other was because of operational issues and/or stability, not package management. The latter could have influenced my decision to move on, but it was never the majority reason.
3) You ignore the other direction people are going in (such as myself): *BSD. You toot your horn about Gentoo without acknowledging what Gentoo itself acknowledges: its package management system is based heavily on *BSD's "ports" system. Besides being sick of being told I can't use Linux unless I subscribe to the Linux religion, I find that the *BSDs (although not really compatible with each other) are simple to use, no more difficult to set up than your average mid-level-techie Linux distro, and I can get almost all of the same software running on it as I can on Linux. A simple "cd/usr/ports/[directory name]" then "make install" is all it takes. System updates? "cd/usr/src", then "make world" (assuming all sources are on the system, which is VERY easy to make happen).
I'll agree with you on the point that there is no GPL violation here. What I find particularly interesting is the fact that RMS himself is endorsing just such boycotts and restrictions, and he's responsible for the license that these actions would violate. Kind of odd if you'd ask me.
Now, on to Caldera.
The concept of per-seat licenses is nothing new, and to be honest it's what many large companies want. If you think Caldera did that to make tons of money, look at their numbers. There's more behind a per-seat license than money. Perception is everything, and other than the IBMs and Calderas of the world, the Linux realm *appears* to be dominated by hackers and zealots. This is not the case, of course -- not everyone who uses Linux considers it a religious or political revolution -- but that's the perception.
As for what Caldera has done for the Linux community... I guess the work they've done on the following don't matter:
PPP IPX PCMCIA RPM Red Hat's graphic tools (netcfg, printtool, etc.) OpenSLP OpenWBEM Saving Netscape on Linux (would Mozilla even exist?) NFS SPX Financial support for XFree86
I'm sure there are others, but as with all the other times I (and other folks) have posted such information here on Slashdot, it will probably all be ignored anyway so why bother...
If you distribute an application that is built from GPL'd source code, you must make that source code available to anyone who wants it. You can charge for the media you use to distribute it, and you can charge for the service of assembling and sending out the source code (last time I checked, the FSF charges around $200 to copy its sources to a tape, and you must supply the tape), but you can not make any part of the GPL'd source code unavailable. If you only use the GPL'd application internally (i.e. you don't distribute it), you can do whatever you want with the sources. That's my understanding.
If you see parts of the GPL that say otherwise, do everyone a favor and post them here with your interpretation of how the exceptions work.
The GPL mandates that you keep source code open to any and all who want it, and it says absolutely nothing about mandating binary distribution.
UnitedLinux says the source code for GPL'd apps will be available to all without restrictions as mandated by the GPL itself, but binaries that are certified as being UnitedLinux compliant that are not covered by the GPL will be held back.
You're saying by giving away the GPL'd source code (which is compliant with the GPL) but not the binaries (which is also compliant with the GPL) equals an almost-corporate-hijacking of the GPL.
UnitedLinux is a base from which Linux distributions will be produced.
Want a developer platform? Get SuSE 9.0, or OpenLinux 4.0, or Turbolinux WhateverItWillBe, etc.
You don't develop directly on top of UnitedLinux, folks... You develop on a distribution that is built from UnitedLinux.
Now for pete's sake QUIT BITCHING ABOUT BINARY DISTRIBUTION!! You'll have the sources, and you'll have Linux distributions that are built from UnitedLinux. If you want more, I can't imagine what it could possibly be!
What disappoints me most about RMS is that he promotes the GPL but will then turn around and tell developers they should be selective about the freedoms they allow in their GPL'd software.
Has RMS read the license he helped create? This guy is supposed to be all for people using/patching/distributing GPL'd software. His latest tirade makes me believe he's becoming a hypocrite to his own political/philosophical movement.
I'm sorry, but I'm going to stick to my guns here. RMS had done good things, but as with most of our so called spokespeople (on the Free Software side as well as the Open Source side) he'd probably help out free software more by just sitting back and being quiet. When it gets to the point where he's so emotional about a certain group's usage of GPL'd software that he encourages people to make their sources free only for developers he approves of, it's time to put him to bed. He is contradicting himself and the license he's trying to get developers to use.
I'm embarassed for the guy. I would have expected much more intelligence and integrity from someone of his stature.
It doesn't seem that anything would stop you from doing that, nor do the UL folks give a rat's patootie if you do. Just don't call it "United Linux". I thought this was made quite clear in the conference call (perhaps lots of folks that have been posting didn't bother to call in. That's understandable. If the Linux media has any credibility whatsoever this will all be clarified in the various news publications, online or otherwise).
All you're restricted from using is the brand. This is a problem? I guess you also can't sleep at night because Linux can't use the UNIX trademark?
Who cares?? Compile the sources and say they're "UnitedLinux compatible". As long as you don't say "compliant" (which implies passing the certification tests) everything should be peachy.
You're reading drama into a situation that has none. Promote your favorite distros as much as you want, but don't do so at the unnecessary expense of others, especially when those others are putting forth an honest effort to help Linux.
Considering how Taco categorized the announcement as being "...from the who-really-cares department", no, I don't think he's joking. It seems he doesn't see a need for UL.
If he does see a need, his categorization of this announcement as well as his jab at the end will be that much more confusing.
You're right, Taco. You DON'T get it.
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United Linux is Here
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· Score: 5, Insightful
When an ISV has to port a software package to Linux, it has to port it so it'll run on multiple different platforms. As much as most of the folks here want to say "just port to Red Hat, that's what everyone uses", the fact is porting to Red Hat locks out a large chunk of the potential market for software. Porting to all distros doesn't make sense either, though.
Try as you may to state otherwise, the fact remains that glibc is glibc, libm is libm, the kernel is the kernel, etc. Red Hat, Caldera, et al differentiate themselves using little chunks of code like package managers and installers, but when the system is installed it's all just Linux. The idea that an ISV has to port something to lots of different flavors of the same OS is silly. It's not like the old days of UNIX where the different flavors actually WERE different. Linux systems should be able to run Linux apps without going through ridiculous gyrations with filesystem heirarchies, RPM versions, etc.
Currently, ISVs can't rely on the base system of all Linux distros being consistent. An effort like United Linux offers a predictable, consistent base on which ISVs can port their software.
UL won't take over the entire Linux market, but it should. There's absolutely no reason companies like Red Hat, Sun, and HP can't use UL as the base for its distro (remember, Red Hat doesn't shine because it uses a special Red Hat glibc; it's the installer, the package management, and the branding that Red Hat is known for, not the base system). With the rising cost of creating, maintaining, and supporting these Linux distros that so many of you love to get for free, eventually companies like Red Hat, Sun, and HP will need to consider cutting what is literally a pointless duplicated effort.
All ISVs and OEMs care about from a technical standpoint is the base system and its ability to run apps or run on an OEM's hardware. That's it. The marketing folks love brand names, but what's under the hood is spooky magic to them so they don't care. If all Linux distros (at least RPM based distros) adopted UL as its base, Linux may actually have a chance to take over the IT world.
In my view, the folks who DON'T adopt UL are the ones that will be fragmenting Linux. No single point of failure, support organizations worldwide... UL just makes sense.
Perhaps some folks think SciFi has to include battles between spaceships, alien invasions/cultures, lots of computers for folks to scrutinize ("...is that GNOME on that system? I think it may be..."), etc. Gattaca deals with actual human beings -- not spaceships, aliens, pod races, blahblahblah -- and does so in an intelligent, stylish way that is not only cool to watch but is also representative of a future that I can actually buy into (as opposed to a future where people live in deserts, fly floating cars, hire flying bug things to run stores, or whatever). What makes Gattaca so cool is that it's believable. I can't say that for the Buck Rogers, Star Trek, Star Wars, MIB, etc. genre of movies.
I don't know if Gattaca qualifies as being #2, but it definitely deserves a single digit rating (no, not "0").
Ever try to get the Debian group to commit to a date for anything? They're practically indignant about putting out software when they feel like it, and if you don't like that you should go elsewhere. Yeah, I want folks like that backing my mission critical systems (I'm just using the Debian group as an example. There are other development groups out there who have a similar attitude toward release schedules and updates)...
When the OSS world grows up I'll trust them with my flights. Until then, they can make editors and MP3 players all they want and I'll be perfectly happy...
You know, it's possible that they were part of the layoff. Caldera did drop 73 people, after all. Upper management isn't necessarily immune to cuts.
If people really want to figure out this puzzle, look to see if Caldera replaces Drew Spencer and Harrison Colter. If not, they were part of the cut. If Caldera hires a new CTO and a new chief legal counsel, then it's safe to conclude that Drew and Harrison quit unexpectely.
Linux has been ported to uCsimms, Palm devices, inventory devices (wireless inventory machines at Hahn have been running eDesktop for a while now), TiVos, web cameras, you name it.
There's a reason why it's so much like Lizard... It's not a copy of Lizard: it IS Lizard. Joe Cheek et al just took Caldera's installer, made a few very minor tweaks (like removing a few stages and twiddling with a few graphic files), then they called it RLizard.
This isn't just the installer, either. Lycoris' distro is built from OpenLinux. Sure, some other stuff was tweaked, but Lycoris at least USED to acknowledge that their distro is an altered version of OpenLinux.
I wish them all the luck in the world. Maybe they'll be the next Mandrake (taking someone else's distro, altering it, then making a name for themselves). I think the days of introducing new distros is long gone at least from a business perspective, but hey, that's just me. If they can pull it off, more power to 'em. I lost my lust for trying new distros a long time ago so I probably won't bother, but I guess there are still newbies out there who want to try Linux and think that a simple installation is all that matters.
Personally, after Linux is installed, I think that the distros are more alike than different. That's just me, though. An installation is done once, and then it's over and you have to actually use the system. Unless Lycoris has done some kind of magic that I don't already know about (after 10+ years of using Linux), something tells me the installed system will look like all the others. Dunno...
Again, I wish them luck. Debuting a distro after the Linux bubble has burst takes guts.
Well, Paul Allen is running a business, so I would imagine he'll do whatever it takes to make his products comply with the law and still be cool enough to be compelling to buyers. I can't fault him for that (not that I'm implying you are faulting him, of course). If Moxi was to stay in business, they'd have to do the same thing. Besides, I don't see how the government legislation stuff could prevent a company from making cool products. Those rules govern copy protection as far as I recall. You can still pump multimedia stuff around your home with something that has copy protection. I don't like it any more than the next guy, but if I can't convince my reps in D.C. to think otherwise, it's something I'll have to live with until I can punish the folks who voted for the legislation by voting them out of office.
I probably got off on a tangent that has nothing to do with your comment, though. Sorry...
Unfortunately, you think you answered my question but really did not.
Going to a trade show and winning an award or two does not imply that a company has a good business plan. It just implies that they have cool technology and a marketing department that saw fit to pay to be in a trade show. I've been to many trade shows in my time. Although on the surface they seem like good marketing opportunities (and to an extent, they are), the bulk of the folks that attend them are in it for the spiffs, not for the next cool technology. I congratulate Moxi on winning "best of show". From a business perspective that means about as much as Mandrake winning an award for "best Linux distribution". Stack all the awards up as high as you want; Mandrake can't run its own business, so despite its coolness it still feels the need to beg for money every few quarters. It's pathetic, especially considering their market share. There's a good example of a company with a killer product and severe cluelessness about how to successfully run a business.
So, I don't think I asked a dumb question. You probably know as much about Moxi's business plan as I do, yet because they have cool technology and won an award at one trade show you assume they had their collective fecal matter together. I maintain that companies who have solid business plans and are fairly certain they can make a killing in the market on their own do not typically merge or sell themselves with/to other companies. It happens, but not often. Hence my question.
As for your examples of business plans, sorry, but those are not business plans: they're ideas for businesses. They say nothing about implementation, marketing, sales efforts, funding, management of the funding, forecasts, etc. There's more to a business plan than an idea. I have tons of potentially million dollar ideas, but I'll be ding damned if I'll ever do anything with them because I have no clue about how to bring them to market, keep them in the market, and sustain a business indefinitely with any of them.
Re:Bit the dust???
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Is MOXI Toast?
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· Score: 3, Insightful
Who's to say Moxi's business plan didn't suck?
Just because a company has cool technology, that doesn't mean the company has any clue about bringing that technology to a wide market. If technology is all that was required to make a product sell we'd have a much cooler bevy of gadgets to play with. As it stands, cool technology in the hands of technology buffs and geeks has proven to be less than successful.
As much as most techies would like to think to the contrary (not necessarily you, Jeff, but others "out there"), cool technology needs sales and marketing dorks as well as pointy haired bosses to push this stuff out to the market in a manner that is familiar to other sales and marketing dorks and pointy haired bosses. You must speak the language before communication can truly flow... By being absorbed into a bigger, flashier company, this technology -- perhaps in slightly altered form (why would Digeo buy Moxi if it only wanted to kill its technology??) -- may have a better chance of becoming ubiquitous. The only geeky startup that I've ever seen do well without dreaded non-technical upper management is Google, and even they are getting an upper management staff to "dork-ize" the business so they can move up the food chain. It's an unfortunate fact of business, at least in the US.
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OpenBSD sucks. Theo de Raadt sucks. OpenSSH sucks too. No exploits in the default install for 48 hours! Time to move to NetBSD and Kerberos5.
So let's see... OpenBSD and OpenSSH have had a few exploits over the past few weeks. Linux et al have had... um, can somebody count them up for me? I don't have enough free time to do so.
All of the things you threw out in your email did nothing to change the laws either.
My point remains. There are ways to get laws changed, and then there are ways to try to look like a hero while actually doing nothing but getting a photo op. Me, I'll revere the folks who take action, not the folks who cause mischief. All of the examples you mentioned entailed mischief and did absolutely, positively, undeniably nothing to change anything.
Hey, maybe Bruce can dress in an Indian costume and rip up his Selective Service card while tossing handfuls of Boston tea onto a Chinese tank. That would be about as effective as his little stunt would have been, plus it would give me some cool pictures to laugh at.
Violating the law in front of a crowd won't get the law changed. It'll only get Bruce in trouble.
...is that the loser who made this all happen has a heartattack and can't get through to 911 emergency services because his/her own virus/hack/whatever is tying up the line.
Sometimes these pranks go too far.
That's easy... Representatives are more interested in getting re-elected than actually doing the country any good. Computer oriented laws are today what gun control laws were a decade or so ago: quick, easy opportunities for representatives to make it look like they're doing something really good when in fact it's all a bunch of crap.
When politicians start getting unpopular you'll see lots of "buzzword" bills being pushed through Congress. Right now Capitol Hill is the focal point of major flamage with the lameness of our defenses against terrorism and the way the White House appears to be slapping CEOs on the wrist and setting them free after they've effectively collapsed our economy. I'm sure more "buzzword" bills are on their way...
Man, I want some of what you're smokin', dude!
The single biggest hinderance in the adoption of Linux as a viable desktop OS is most likely its inability to run MS applications efficiently. WINE comes close (CodeWeaver's version especially), but it still isn't "there". And don't give me a bunch of hooey about VMWare; that's not emulation, that's actually running Windows. A clean emulation layer that doesn't require hundreds of megs of disk space and costs about $50 would be a friggin' GODSEND for Linux. I hope to hell they actually do that... I'd be one of the first people to buy the damn thing!
1) Red Hat and Mandrake were/are not excluded from UnitedLinux. All Linux companies are welcome to join. They may not have been in on the initial UL chats, but had they been included I wouldn't be even slightly surprised if at least Red Hat would have caused the talks to go nowhere with their "we're the standard, be like us" mentality. Leaving the Red Hats of the world out of the round #1 discussions was probably the only way UL got as far as they did.
/usr/ports/[directory name]" then "make install" is all it takes. System updates? "cd /usr/src", then "make world" (assuming all sources are on the system, which is VERY easy to make happen).
2) You oversimplify the issues of divergent Linux distros. If you think the main reason people leave distros like Mandrake is because of packaging issues, you're not looking at the big picture. I've tried just about all of the major Linux distros at any particular time (including SLS, TAMU, MCC, etc. from the days of the original Linux distros) and the only reason I have migrated from one to the other was because of operational issues and/or stability, not package management. The latter could have influenced my decision to move on, but it was never the majority reason.
3) You ignore the other direction people are going in (such as myself): *BSD. You toot your horn about Gentoo without acknowledging what Gentoo itself acknowledges: its package management system is based heavily on *BSD's "ports" system. Besides being sick of being told I can't use Linux unless I subscribe to the Linux religion, I find that the *BSDs (although not really compatible with each other) are simple to use, no more difficult to set up than your average mid-level-techie Linux distro, and I can get almost all of the same software running on it as I can on Linux. A simple "cd
I'll agree with you on the point that there is no GPL violation here. What I find particularly interesting is the fact that RMS himself is endorsing just such boycotts and restrictions, and he's responsible for the license that these actions would violate. Kind of odd if you'd ask me.
Now, on to Caldera.
The concept of per-seat licenses is nothing new, and to be honest it's what many large companies want. If you think Caldera did that to make tons of money, look at their numbers. There's more behind a per-seat license than money. Perception is everything, and other than the IBMs and Calderas of the world, the Linux realm *appears* to be dominated by hackers and zealots. This is not the case, of course -- not everyone who uses Linux considers it a religious or political revolution -- but that's the perception.
As for what Caldera has done for the Linux community... I guess the work they've done on the following don't matter:
PPP
IPX
PCMCIA
RPM
Red Hat's graphic tools (netcfg, printtool, etc.)
OpenSLP
OpenWBEM
Saving Netscape on Linux (would Mozilla even exist?)
NFS
SPX
Financial support for XFree86
I'm sure there are others, but as with all the other times I (and other folks) have posted such information here on Slashdot, it will probably all be ignored anyway so why bother...
Okay then, let's get picky.
If you distribute an application that is built from GPL'd source code, you must make that source code available to anyone who wants it. You can charge for the media you use to distribute it, and you can charge for the service of assembling and sending out the source code (last time I checked, the FSF charges around $200 to copy its sources to a tape, and you must supply the tape), but you can not make any part of the GPL'd source code unavailable. If you only use the GPL'd application internally (i.e. you don't distribute it), you can do whatever you want with the sources. That's my understanding.
If you see parts of the GPL that say otherwise, do everyone a favor and post them here with your interpretation of how the exceptions work.
The GPL mandates that you keep source code open to any and all who want it, and it says absolutely nothing about mandating binary distribution.
UnitedLinux says the source code for GPL'd apps will be available to all without restrictions as mandated by the GPL itself, but binaries that are certified as being UnitedLinux compliant that are not covered by the GPL will be held back.
You're saying by giving away the GPL'd source code (which is compliant with the GPL) but not the binaries (which is also compliant with the GPL) equals an almost-corporate-hijacking of the GPL.
Ummm... Huh?
UnitedLinux is a base from which Linux distributions will be produced.
Want a developer platform? Get SuSE 9.0, or OpenLinux 4.0, or Turbolinux WhateverItWillBe, etc.
You don't develop directly on top of UnitedLinux, folks... You develop on a distribution that is built from UnitedLinux.
Now for pete's sake QUIT BITCHING ABOUT BINARY DISTRIBUTION!! You'll have the sources, and you'll have Linux distributions that are built from UnitedLinux. If you want more, I can't imagine what it could possibly be!
DAMN this is getting old quick!
What disappoints me most about RMS is that he promotes the GPL but will then turn around and tell developers they should be selective about the freedoms they allow in their GPL'd software.
Has RMS read the license he helped create? This guy is supposed to be all for people using/patching/distributing GPL'd software. His latest tirade makes me believe he's becoming a hypocrite to his own political/philosophical movement.
I'm sorry, but I'm going to stick to my guns here. RMS had done good things, but as with most of our so called spokespeople (on the Free Software side as well as the Open Source side) he'd probably help out free software more by just sitting back and being quiet. When it gets to the point where he's so emotional about a certain group's usage of GPL'd software that he encourages people to make their sources free only for developers he approves of, it's time to put him to bed. He is contradicting himself and the license he's trying to get developers to use.
I'm embarassed for the guy. I would have expected much more intelligence and integrity from someone of his stature.
It doesn't seem that anything would stop you from doing that, nor do the UL folks give a rat's patootie if you do. Just don't call it "United Linux". I thought this was made quite clear in the conference call (perhaps lots of folks that have been posting didn't bother to call in. That's understandable. If the Linux media has any credibility whatsoever this will all be clarified in the various news publications, online or otherwise).
Seems simple to me.
Excuse me, but what exactly is your beef?
All you're restricted from using is the brand. This is a problem? I guess you also can't sleep at night because Linux can't use the UNIX trademark?
Who cares?? Compile the sources and say they're "UnitedLinux compatible". As long as you don't say "compliant" (which implies passing the certification tests) everything should be peachy.
You're reading drama into a situation that has none. Promote your favorite distros as much as you want, but don't do so at the unnecessary expense of others, especially when those others are putting forth an honest effort to help Linux.
Considering how Taco categorized the announcement as being "...from the who-really-cares department", no, I don't think he's joking. It seems he doesn't see a need for UL.
If he does see a need, his categorization of this announcement as well as his jab at the end will be that much more confusing.
When an ISV has to port a software package to Linux, it has to port it so it'll run on multiple different platforms. As much as most of the folks here want to say "just port to Red Hat, that's what everyone uses", the fact is porting to Red Hat locks out a large chunk of the potential market for software. Porting to all distros doesn't make sense either, though.
Try as you may to state otherwise, the fact remains that glibc is glibc, libm is libm, the kernel is the kernel, etc. Red Hat, Caldera, et al differentiate themselves using little chunks of code like package managers and installers, but when the system is installed it's all just Linux. The idea that an ISV has to port something to lots of different flavors of the same OS is silly. It's not like the old days of UNIX where the different flavors actually WERE different. Linux systems should be able to run Linux apps without going through ridiculous gyrations with filesystem heirarchies, RPM versions, etc.
Currently, ISVs can't rely on the base system of all Linux distros being consistent. An effort like United Linux offers a predictable, consistent base on which ISVs can port their software.
UL won't take over the entire Linux market, but it should. There's absolutely no reason companies like Red Hat, Sun, and HP can't use UL as the base for its distro (remember, Red Hat doesn't shine because it uses a special Red Hat glibc; it's the installer, the package management, and the branding that Red Hat is known for, not the base system). With the rising cost of creating, maintaining, and supporting these Linux distros that so many of you love to get for free, eventually companies like Red Hat, Sun, and HP will need to consider cutting what is literally a pointless duplicated effort.
All ISVs and OEMs care about from a technical standpoint is the base system and its ability to run apps or run on an OEM's hardware. That's it. The marketing folks love brand names, but what's under the hood is spooky magic to them so they don't care. If all Linux distros (at least RPM based distros) adopted UL as its base, Linux may actually have a chance to take over the IT world.
In my view, the folks who DON'T adopt UL are the ones that will be fragmenting Linux. No single point of failure, support organizations worldwide... UL just makes sense.
I'm with you.
Perhaps some folks think SciFi has to include battles between spaceships, alien invasions/cultures, lots of computers for folks to scrutinize ("...is that GNOME on that system? I think it may be..."), etc. Gattaca deals with actual human beings -- not spaceships, aliens, pod races, blahblahblah -- and does so in an intelligent, stylish way that is not only cool to watch but is also representative of a future that I can actually buy into (as opposed to a future where people live in deserts, fly floating cars, hire flying bug things to run stores, or whatever). What makes Gattaca so cool is that it's believable. I can't say that for the Buck Rogers, Star Trek, Star Wars, MIB, etc. genre of movies.
I don't know if Gattaca qualifies as being #2, but it definitely deserves a single digit rating (no, not "0").
I couldn't agree more...
Ever try to get the Debian group to commit to a date for anything? They're practically indignant about putting out software when they feel like it, and if you don't like that you should go elsewhere. Yeah, I want folks like that backing my mission critical systems (I'm just using the Debian group as an example. There are other development groups out there who have a similar attitude toward release schedules and updates)...
When the OSS world grows up I'll trust them with my flights. Until then, they can make editors and MP3 players all they want and I'll be perfectly happy...
You know, it's possible that they were part of the layoff. Caldera did drop 73 people, after all. Upper management isn't necessarily immune to cuts.
If people really want to figure out this puzzle, look to see if Caldera replaces Drew Spencer and Harrison Colter. If not, they were part of the cut. If Caldera hires a new CTO and a new chief legal counsel, then it's safe to conclude that Drew and Harrison quit unexpectely.
Don't jump to conclusions.
Linux has been ported to uCsimms, Palm devices, inventory devices (wireless inventory machines at Hahn have been running eDesktop for a while now), TiVos, web cameras, you name it.
This doesn't sound all that new to me...
There's a reason why it's so much like Lizard... It's not a copy of Lizard: it IS Lizard. Joe Cheek et al just took Caldera's installer, made a few very minor tweaks (like removing a few stages and twiddling with a few graphic files), then they called it RLizard.
This isn't just the installer, either. Lycoris' distro is built from OpenLinux. Sure, some other stuff was tweaked, but Lycoris at least USED to acknowledge that their distro is an altered version of OpenLinux.
I wish them all the luck in the world. Maybe they'll be the next Mandrake (taking someone else's distro, altering it, then making a name for themselves). I think the days of introducing new distros is long gone at least from a business perspective, but hey, that's just me. If they can pull it off, more power to 'em. I lost my lust for trying new distros a long time ago so I probably won't bother, but I guess there are still newbies out there who want to try Linux and think that a simple installation is all that matters.
Personally, after Linux is installed, I think that the distros are more alike than different. That's just me, though. An installation is done once, and then it's over and you have to actually use the system. Unless Lycoris has done some kind of magic that I don't already know about (after 10+ years of using Linux), something tells me the installed system will look like all the others. Dunno...
Again, I wish them luck. Debuting a distro after the Linux bubble has burst takes guts.
Well, Paul Allen is running a business, so I would imagine he'll do whatever it takes to make his products comply with the law and still be cool enough to be compelling to buyers. I can't fault him for that (not that I'm implying you are faulting him, of course). If Moxi was to stay in business, they'd have to do the same thing. Besides, I don't see how the government legislation stuff could prevent a company from making cool products. Those rules govern copy protection as far as I recall. You can still pump multimedia stuff around your home with something that has copy protection. I don't like it any more than the next guy, but if I can't convince my reps in D.C. to think otherwise, it's something I'll have to live with until I can punish the folks who voted for the legislation by voting them out of office.
I probably got off on a tangent that has nothing to do with your comment, though. Sorry...
I'm partial to "Shatner's Fart" as a band name, myself...
Unfortunately, you think you answered my question but really did not.
Going to a trade show and winning an award or two does not imply that a company has a good business plan. It just implies that they have cool technology and a marketing department that saw fit to pay to be in a trade show. I've been to many trade shows in my time. Although on the surface they seem like good marketing opportunities (and to an extent, they are), the bulk of the folks that attend them are in it for the spiffs, not for the next cool technology. I congratulate Moxi on winning "best of show". From a business perspective that means about as much as Mandrake winning an award for "best Linux distribution". Stack all the awards up as high as you want; Mandrake can't run its own business, so despite its coolness it still feels the need to beg for money every few quarters. It's pathetic, especially considering their market share. There's a good example of a company with a killer product and severe cluelessness about how to successfully run a business.
So, I don't think I asked a dumb question. You probably know as much about Moxi's business plan as I do, yet because they have cool technology and won an award at one trade show you assume they had their collective fecal matter together. I maintain that companies who have solid business plans and are fairly certain they can make a killing in the market on their own do not typically merge or sell themselves with/to other companies. It happens, but not often. Hence my question.
As for your examples of business plans, sorry, but those are not business plans: they're ideas for businesses. They say nothing about implementation, marketing, sales efforts, funding, management of the funding, forecasts, etc. There's more to a business plan than an idea. I have tons of potentially million dollar ideas, but I'll be ding damned if I'll ever do anything with them because I have no clue about how to bring them to market, keep them in the market, and sustain a business indefinitely with any of them.
Who's to say Moxi's business plan didn't suck?
Just because a company has cool technology, that doesn't mean the company has any clue about bringing that technology to a wide market. If technology is all that was required to make a product sell we'd have a much cooler bevy of gadgets to play with. As it stands, cool technology in the hands of technology buffs and geeks has proven to be less than successful.
As much as most techies would like to think to the contrary (not necessarily you, Jeff, but others "out there"), cool technology needs sales and marketing dorks as well as pointy haired bosses to push this stuff out to the market in a manner that is familiar to other sales and marketing dorks and pointy haired bosses. You must speak the language before communication can truly flow... By being absorbed into a bigger, flashier company, this technology -- perhaps in slightly altered form (why would Digeo buy Moxi if it only wanted to kill its technology??) -- may have a better chance of becoming ubiquitous. The only geeky startup that I've ever seen do well without dreaded non-technical upper management is Google, and even they are getting an upper management staff to "dork-ize" the business so they can move up the food chain. It's an unfortunate fact of business, at least in the US.