I do not see that big of a difference between Opera and Firefox as far as speed. I have Opera on my system but I use Firefox all the time. I do not like Opera's UI as much as Firefox's and the Plugins for FireFox make it for me. Yes some are junk but that is always going to happen with plug ins or apps. I don't miss that feature in Thunderbird but it would be nice. The new version of Thunderbird is a big step. Gimp vs Paint.NET? Gimp is a lot more powerful than Paint.net. My wife is a big Gimp User and she also has Photoshop Elements and Paint.net, if you want a simple Paint program than yes Paint.net is probably better. If you want to really do a lot of heavy graphics work the GIMP is a lot better. If you need the super heavy duty graphics then CS4 wins.
But that it the point. None of those programs are JUNK. They are all very good tools and very cheap. Paint.net is also available for free and you can get the Source. Is it FOSS? I have not checked to see if it really FOSS but hey it is free as in Beer and I can get the Source so it is pretty close and is also not junk. The point is that not all FOSS is junk and not all Closed source programs are gems.
" having them provide the specs and help with the driver is the best by far." It is the only way that it has worked by far at least for complex devices like video cards. Just what precentage of the code for Intel and ATi video cards are from Intel and Ati?
"Gaming will work itself out if Wine continues apace." Not really it will always be a race and Wine will always loose. It is a stop gap and nothing more. Also it is nothing but running proprietary software on top of free.
Right now the problem is a lack of an effective market for none free software on Linux. Frankly that is the genius of the app store. You can say that the Internet is an app store but it really isn't effective as one. With an app store people can be a little secure that they are getting what they pay for and developers can just worry about developing and not running a web store. I think Ubuntu should start an app store and integrate it with synaptic. Even allowing people to "donate" to foss projects buy letting a FOSS project charge for binaries would be great. Imagine if 5% of Thunderbird or GIMP users paid $.99 for their binaries. It could provide at least a little money for development costs. Or if users could pay $5 for legal in the US codecs for Linux? You could inspire a large increase in the quanity of software solutions available to Linux and that is good for everybody. Choice is good.
Not true. I am all for commercial and FOSS development because I see it as a win win. The truth is that FOSS can produce very good programs. Firefox is a great browser. Thunderbird is a very good email client. Gimp is a very good graphics program. I will not argue that Photoshop is better but Gimp is much more powerful than Photoshop Elements. I really like DeeVeeDee for making DVDs is super easy to use. VLC Audacity Adium 7Zip and on and on. There is a lot of very good FOSS software out there. Now is there a lot of total crap? You bet but there is a ton of total crap closed source software as well.
I miss typesd what I meant to write was. The video playback could is probably more difficult to deal with but I have not looked at that code. QT does help with that abstraction http://doc.trolltech.com/4.4/phonon-videowidget.html On Linux it uses Gstreamer on Windows DirectShow and on the Mac QuickTime so I doubt that it supports everything that VLC does but it is there.
To me the very idea of not including the cost is silly. Often good enough is all you need in a tool. If you need a shovel a good shovel that will last years and not break and only costs $20 is a better choice than the best shovel that does all that but has a super paint that will never get dull but costs $200. For a lot of people VBox will do everything they need and is free. Hey it is is free so as I said you should probably try it first and only not use it if it doesn't do something you need. Kind of like in your case.
No they didn't The ones that they had where not very practical. That is one reason why the Eisenhower pushed so hard to not go nuts building ICBMs because we had more than we needed. The SS-6 Which had just gone on alert in 1959 took two days to get ready to launch and was easy to notice. The USSR had four on alert in 1962. http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/russia/r-7.htm It's replacement the SS-8 didn't enter service until 1965. http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/russia/r-9.htm The only bomber that could really reach the US was the Bear but they where few and the US Air Defenses where actually pretty good at that time. The M-4 could only reach the US on a one way trip and the USSR didn't make many of them. They did use them a lot for propaganda. The Bager was a good bomber but the USSR lacked forward bases for them so they where only really a threat to Europe, Japan, and US naval forces. So the USSR really had only 4 ICBMs that might hit the US and those took a very long time to launch. They did have around 100 Bears and maybe 20 Bisons that could have reached the US but how many would have gotten through the almost completely intact US Air Defensives is up for debate. At the time of Cuban Missile Crisis the US several delevery systems that could threaten the USSR. The B-52 fleet was still a real threat. The B-47 fleet while winding down where still active and could hit the USSR from their forward bases. The B-58 was active and could hit the USSR as well. The Atlas was in service. 32 Atlas Ds 32 Atlas Es 80 Atlas Fs http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SM-65_Atlas#Service_history There was around 60 Titan Is in service, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HGM-25A_Titan_I The US has a massive advantage in Bombers and ICBMs at that time. In the area of SLBM the US had just about as big of an advantage And the Polaris was in service and the US had 9 SSBNs in service http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Washington_class_submarinehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethan_Allen_class_submarine The USSR had 21 Golf class SSBs and 8 Hotel SSBNs So the USSR had a 3 to 1 advantage in the number of boats but that doesn't really tell the whole story. The USSR's SLBM was the R-13 which had a range of less the 400 miles. Not only that but the Subs had to surface to launch and it took up 10 minutes to launch. The math gets worse for the USSR because each sub only carried 3 R-13s. So the USSR could only threaten coastal areas of the US and had to surface within 300 miles of the coast of the US to launch. The Hotel class was very loud and had very low performance and reliability issues. The Golf was not nuclear so it had to snorkel often. The US ASW forces at the time where the best in the world and I doubt that they would averaged even once shot each. The US force was composed of all nuclear boats. They had much higher performance than the Hotel class. When you look at the missile things really start to shift for in the direction of the US. The US boats carried 16 Polaris missiles. The A-1 had a range of over 1000 miles and could be launched while the sub stayed submerged. So while they USSR had three times the number of boats the US boats carried five times as many missiles and they had three times the range. There are reports that they warheads on the Polaris may not have not been reliable but thank goodness we will never found out. The simple fact is that the US had a huge advantage and the USSR was really trying to bluff their way into Cuba so they could have a real threat to the US. And this is leaving uncounted the other strike options the US had. The tact
Actually I think that VLC has moved to QT for the interface so the GUI should port. The video playback code me be more difficult to deal with but I have looked at the code. Even if the "Build" is identical and it will never be you still need someone to build and test the software!
That is one way to look at it. I have used Virtual Box and I find that it getting bumped down for ease of use is a bit silly. It isn't hard to use at all. It maybe slightly more difficult to install but once installed it is trivial to use. So lets drop ease of use and "value" from the matrix. If you do that they tie at 8.6 for the top spot. Before you dismiss Virtual Box out of hand take a good look at the matrix. The only area outside of ease of use that VirtualBox got less than a 9 on was VM management where it got an 8. Also take a look at the weights of each column. Ease of use is 25% while cost is only 10%. I think the cost and the Ease of use are both interesting metrics. With a cost of Free I can see no reason not to try VirtualBox first. If you find the ease of use and VM management good enough for your task then you have a huge win. The other may have demo systems you can try for a limited amount of time but they will still cost you money so VirtualBox really should be the first system on anybody's list to try.
There are some benefits to this but not much more than if they stored the userdata and setting in the correct place. By separating the data you make backing up easier. You just back up the users documents folder and get all their data. It also makes security easier because you can not allow writing to the execuatables without specific permission. There are of course better ways IMHO to do security than that method but it is pretty easy to use.
Actually I wonder if Lap-Link could be sited as pior art for this. And early version of Lap-Link had the user a way for the user to copy from the serial port to a file so lap-link could send the lap-link program to the target PC over the serial cable. That would seem to send the "overlay" over the network to activate the software. It wasn't used for security which may not make it valid in this case.
So here is a problem. I give out a bunch of OpenSuse disks to people. I am now have the legal responsibility to provide them with the source code. I wonder if every Linux supporter that gives a friend a CD has now probably violated the GPL by not telling their friend that they could ask them for the source and then provide them with the source! So how many of the biggest Linux supporters have violated the GPL?
"Alternatively, couldn't you also provide a text file on the CD, with links to the source as provided by the maintainers of the software?" No that I see as problem.
Trust me the right to second sale isn't as clear cut in case law as you might think. I have been involved in a case like the one I described and it ended up costing A LOT. Also no sane company trusts in the concept of Fair Use to cover them anymore. I think the whole think is a lot fuzzier than a lot of people are comfortable with. So far the FOSS supporters have seemed to be working within common sense and good manners to resolve any "issues" but there is a lot of wiggle room that makes me nervous. Here is an example. A small PC store started to include a CD of FOSS programs like Gimp, FireFox, Thunderbird, 7Zip, Putty, and other good software that everybody in the know downloads. It is a nice introduction to FOSS for the customers. Now it seems to me that the store is now responsible to keep the source code for many of those programs available to the people they gave the disk to. At that point I just wouldn't do it since it could be a huge legal hassle and risk for no real gain to me.
Okay let me give you an example. A small PC shop starts to offer PCs with Ubuntu pre installed. Ubuntu makes the source available but that doesn't seem good enough. So the small shop has to offer the source as well? They must take the time to keep the latest source available? Sure nobody will probably ever ask them but they would have the legal requirement to do so.
If I give somebody a PC with Ubuntu on it to help them out I am now distributing LINUX and must provide them with info on how I will give it to them? Or a User group handing out Fedora CDs? What you see as so clear from a business point of view is full of peril. I was thinking of offering a disk of Good FOSS to our customers free of charge but now it looks as if I would have to host source repositories to keep it legal.
So thing if I make a gadget that uses a Linux SBC computer I don't have to make the source available on it since I didn't "Install it" on the SBC I just bought the boards? All I have to do is pass on the GPL and the link info? I bet a lot of people will not agree with that one. So If I sell a PC with Ubuntu on it pre installed I don't have to provide the source if I bought it pre installed. But if I re install it I do? What about if I update it? I am not sure that is correct. So if I buy a Dell with Ubuntu on it and for some reason I reinstall Ubuntu on it then put it on ebay I must provide the new owner with all the source code for all the software that I have installed on it. The Ubuntu repositories wouldn't count.
And if FLOSS dashboards inc goes belly up and Joe never bothered to get the code? Or if Joe sells it to Betty and Betty sells it to Mike and he wants the source? I do agree that Bruce doesn't want to sue honest mistakes. The problem is that Bruce isn't the only FOSS vendor. Companies can not work hoping that everybody will be as reasonable as Bruce. Someday someone will bet a burr up their backside and a company that though that they where doing the right thing will be in a long expensive court case over something silly. Or some poor sap will sell a Linux gadget on ebay and get sued for not providing the source when they didn't even know that the gadget had Linux on it.
Just to play the devil's advocate. Joe buys a cool FOSS based digital dash for FLOSS dashboards inc and puts it in his car. He then sells the car five years latter. Does he have to include the source?
GM buys a lot of cool FOSS based digital dashboards and puts them in a lot of cars....
In this case the only difference is in the numbers.
If I buy a single board computer with Linux does the SBC manufactures site with links to Linux source cover me?
If I put together a Home networking package at the local computer store I run that included a Linux based router do I have to provide the source code?
These are some gray areas. I mean nobody would bust a guy that sells a linksys router but doesn't include the source but what about a guy that sells PCs with Ubuntu preinstalled?
When do you become the "distributor". Me personally with probably always just include the source but one does wonder.
Well of course if some chowder head links play_DRM_video.o into busybox they should get slapped. And yes you must play by the rules so that is a given. I just hate the idea 500 copies of the source for some out of date version of some code I wrote five years ago floating around the web. Of course if I stop working on it then having lots of copies of it floating around can be a good thing. I guess I can see the pluses and minuses. I can also see how some developer could make an honest mistake and not post there copy. If I buy a SBC with Linux on it and use it for my product I might think that they tar ball the vendor of the SBC has his site covers me. I would be wrong but it would be an honest mistake. Going back and making sure that every piece of code that is on an SBC is available while not a nightmare could be a bit of a task. You can also get bad advice when you start doing that kind of development. When I was talking to my vendor about freeing up some space on the flash image he suggested that I static link my code! This code was not something I wanted to release as GPL. When I asked the vendor actually said, "who will ever know". I didn't take that option. As with most things in life it is easy to make an honest mistake or get bad advice when dealing with GPL code. On another project we thought that must including the DIFF of our patch and saying what GPL code we where using was good enough. We latter decided to just put the tarball on the CD along with the GPL just to be safe.
I wonder if you could answer a question for me? If the source for the GPL software is unmodified and freely available from other sources why should the vendor have to duplicate it's availability? No it doesn't cost an arm and a leg to throw up a tarball of busybox to be nice and legal but what benefit does it have to the community? Including the GPL it's self I see as vital but the making yet another copy of the source available seems iffy at best. Just wondering about your thoughts on this. I have contributed some FOSS code to a few projects and I feel that feel that feeding code improvments back into the project is much more important than making another copy of already available source available.
If they made any patches. I really doubt that they did. Have you ever used busybox? It is great but the way most people will use it on a device is to use a menuconfig and include only the commands that they need for the device. That is about the only "change" most developers will make to busybox because that is really all they need to do. Yes if they made any patches they should contribute them back but do we know that the did?
Have you ever used busybox? I doubt that they tweaked it but if they did contributing the code to maintainer would seem to be the better choice that putting a link on your website.
The problem with busybox and I don't really think it is a big problem is that each device will more or less use a custom version. When you build busybox you have the option to pick and choose what commands you put in your build. So do you need to have a link to your config or just the standard source package? What is the "source" in this case and what is a modification. Frankly just including the config to be safe isn't an issue for most companies. The problem is jumping through hoops to make sure you are not breaking the agreement. It is extremely likey that these devices are using a stock busybox that they just did a menuconfig on.
For now. But the games themselves are getting harder and expensive all the time. This trend can not continue. The iPhone and iPod touch show that simple games can be extremely profitable and frankly low risk. But I could be wrong.
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I do not see that big of a difference between Opera and Firefox as far as speed. I have Opera on my system but I use Firefox all the time. I do not like Opera's UI as much as Firefox's and the Plugins for FireFox make it for me. Yes some are junk but that is always going to happen with plug ins or apps.
I don't miss that feature in Thunderbird but it would be nice. The new version of Thunderbird is a big step.
Gimp vs Paint.NET? Gimp is a lot more powerful than Paint.net. My wife is a big Gimp User and she also has Photoshop Elements and Paint.net, if you want a simple Paint program than yes Paint.net is probably better. If you want to really do a lot of heavy graphics work the GIMP is a lot better. If you need the super heavy duty graphics then CS4 wins.
But that it the point. None of those programs are JUNK. They are all very good tools and very cheap.
Paint.net is also available for free and you can get the Source. Is it FOSS? I have not checked to see if it really FOSS but hey it is free as in Beer and I can get the Source so it is pretty close and is also not junk.
The point is that not all FOSS is junk and not all Closed source programs are gems.
" having them provide the specs and help with the driver is the best by far."
It is the only way that it has worked by far at least for complex devices like video cards.
Just what precentage of the code for Intel and ATi video cards are from Intel and Ati?
"Gaming will work itself out if Wine continues apace."
Not really it will always be a race and Wine will always loose. It is a stop gap and nothing more. Also it is nothing but running proprietary software on top of free.
Right now the problem is a lack of an effective market for none free software on Linux. Frankly that is the genius of the app store. You can say that the Internet is an app store but it really isn't effective as one. With an app store people can be a little secure that they are getting what they pay for and developers can just worry about developing and not running a web store.
I think Ubuntu should start an app store and integrate it with synaptic. Even allowing people to "donate" to foss projects buy letting a FOSS project charge for binaries would be great. Imagine if 5% of Thunderbird or GIMP users paid $.99 for their binaries. It could provide at least a little money for development costs. Or if users could pay $5 for legal in the US codecs for Linux? You could inspire a large increase in the quanity of software solutions available to Linux and that is good for everybody.
Choice is good.
Not true.
I am all for commercial and FOSS development because I see it as a win win. The truth is that FOSS can produce very good programs.
Firefox is a great browser.
Thunderbird is a very good email client.
Gimp is a very good graphics program. I will not argue that Photoshop is better but Gimp is much more powerful than Photoshop Elements.
I really like DeeVeeDee for making DVDs is super easy to use.
VLC
Audacity
Adium
7Zip
and on and on.
There is a lot of very good FOSS software out there. Now is there a lot of total crap? You bet but there is a ton of total crap closed source software as well.
I miss typesd what I meant to write was. The video playback could is probably more difficult to deal with but I have not looked at that code.
QT does help with that abstraction
http://doc.trolltech.com/4.4/phonon-videowidget.html
On Linux it uses Gstreamer on Windows DirectShow and on the Mac QuickTime so I doubt that it supports everything that VLC does but it is there.
To me the very idea of not including the cost is silly. Often good enough is all you need in a tool.
If you need a shovel a good shovel that will last years and not break and only costs $20 is a better choice than the best shovel that does all that but has a super paint that will never get dull but costs $200.
For a lot of people VBox will do everything they need and is free. Hey it is is free so as I said you should probably try it first and only not use it if it doesn't do something you need. Kind of like in your case.
No they didn't The ones that they had where not very practical.
That is one reason why the Eisenhower pushed so hard to not go nuts building ICBMs because we had more than we needed.
The SS-6 Which had just gone on alert in 1959 took two days to get ready to launch and was easy to notice. The USSR had four on alert in 1962. http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/russia/r-7.htm
It's replacement the SS-8 didn't enter service until 1965. http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/russia/r-9.htm
The only bomber that could really reach the US was the Bear but they where few and the US Air Defenses where actually pretty good at that time. The M-4 could only reach the US on a one way trip and the USSR didn't make many of them. They did use them a lot for propaganda.
The Bager was a good bomber but the USSR lacked forward bases for them so they where only really a threat to Europe, Japan, and US naval forces.
So the USSR really had only 4 ICBMs that might hit the US and those took a very long time to launch. They did have around 100 Bears and maybe 20 Bisons that could have reached the US but how many would have gotten through the almost completely intact US Air Defensives is up for debate.
At the time of Cuban Missile Crisis the US several delevery systems that could threaten the USSR.
The B-52 fleet was still a real threat.
The B-47 fleet while winding down where still active and could hit the USSR from their forward bases.
The B-58 was active and could hit the USSR as well.
The Atlas was in service.
32 Atlas Ds
32 Atlas Es
80 Atlas Fs http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SM-65_Atlas#Service_history
There was around 60 Titan Is in service, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HGM-25A_Titan_I
The US has a massive advantage in Bombers and ICBMs at that time.
In the area of SLBM the US had just about as big of an advantage
And the Polaris was in service and the US had 9 SSBNs in service http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Washington_class_submarine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethan_Allen_class_submarine
The USSR had 21 Golf class SSBs and 8 Hotel SSBNs So the USSR had a 3 to 1 advantage in the number of boats but that doesn't really tell the whole story.
The USSR's SLBM was the R-13 which had a range of less the 400 miles. Not only that but the Subs had to surface to launch and it took up 10 minutes to launch. The math gets worse for the USSR because each sub only carried 3 R-13s. So the USSR could only threaten coastal areas of the US and had to surface within 300 miles of the coast of the US to launch. The Hotel class was very loud and had very low performance and reliability issues. The Golf was not nuclear so it had to snorkel often. The US ASW forces at the time where the best in the world and I doubt that they would averaged even once shot each.
The US force was composed of all nuclear boats. They had much higher performance than the Hotel class. When you look at the missile things really start to shift for in the direction of the US. The US boats carried 16 Polaris missiles. The A-1 had a range of over 1000 miles and could be launched while the sub stayed submerged. So while they USSR had three times the number of boats the US boats carried five times as many missiles and they had three times the range. There are reports that they warheads on the Polaris may not have not been reliable but thank goodness we will never found out.
The simple fact is that the US had a huge advantage and the USSR was really trying to bluff their way into Cuba so they could have a real threat to the US.
And this is leaving uncounted the other strike options the US had.
The tact
Actually I think that VLC has moved to QT for the interface so the GUI should port. The video playback code me be more difficult to deal with but I have looked at the code.
Even if the "Build" is identical and it will never be you still need someone to build and test the software!
That is one way to look at it.
I have used Virtual Box and I find that it getting bumped down for ease of use is a bit silly. It isn't hard to use at all. It maybe slightly more difficult to install but once installed it is trivial to use.
So lets drop ease of use and "value" from the matrix.
If you do that they tie at 8.6 for the top spot.
Before you dismiss Virtual Box out of hand take a good look at the matrix.
The only area outside of ease of use that VirtualBox got less than a 9 on was VM management where it got an 8.
Also take a look at the weights of each column. Ease of use is 25% while cost is only 10%.
I think the cost and the Ease of use are both interesting metrics. With a cost of Free I can see no reason not to try VirtualBox first. If you find the ease of use and VM management good enough for your task then you have a huge win. The other may have demo systems you can try for a limited amount of time but they will still cost you money so VirtualBox really should be the first system on anybody's list to try.
There are some benefits to this but not much more than if they stored the userdata and setting in the correct place.
By separating the data you make backing up easier. You just back up the users documents folder and get all their data.
It also makes security easier because you can not allow writing to the execuatables without specific permission.
There are of course better ways IMHO to do security than that method but it is pretty easy to use.
Not to mention that this whole thing just gives me the willies.
I mean just how creepy of a story can you get than this.
Actually I wonder if Lap-Link could be sited as pior art for this.
And early version of Lap-Link had the user a way for the user to copy from the serial port to a file so lap-link could send the lap-link program to the target PC over the serial cable.
That would seem to send the "overlay" over the network to activate the software.
It wasn't used for security which may not make it valid in this case.
But then you, the distributor is depending on someone else to host the source which everybody is saying is in violation of the GPL.
So here is a problem.
I give out a bunch of OpenSuse disks to people. I am now have the legal responsibility to provide them with the source code. I wonder if every Linux supporter that gives a friend a CD has now probably violated the GPL by not telling their friend that they could ask them for the source and then provide them with the source!
So how many of the biggest Linux supporters have violated the GPL?
"Alternatively, couldn't you also provide a text file on the CD, with links to the source as provided by the maintainers of the software?"
No that I see as problem.
Trust me the right to second sale isn't as clear cut in case law as you might think. I have been involved in a case like the one I described and it ended up costing A LOT.
Also no sane company trusts in the concept of Fair Use to cover them anymore.
I think the whole think is a lot fuzzier than a lot of people are comfortable with. So far the FOSS supporters have seemed to be working within common sense and good manners to resolve any "issues" but there is a lot of wiggle room that makes me nervous.
Here is an example.
A small PC store started to include a CD of FOSS programs like Gimp, FireFox, Thunderbird, 7Zip, Putty, and other good software that everybody in the know downloads. It is a nice introduction to FOSS for the customers. Now it seems to me that the store is now responsible to keep the source code for many of those programs available to the people they gave the disk to.
At that point I just wouldn't do it since it could be a huge legal hassle and risk for no real gain to me.
Okay let me give you an example.
A small PC shop starts to offer PCs with Ubuntu pre installed. Ubuntu makes the source available but that doesn't seem good enough. So the small shop has to offer the source as well?
They must take the time to keep the latest source available? Sure nobody will probably ever ask them but they would have the legal requirement to do so.
If I give somebody a PC with Ubuntu on it to help them out I am now distributing LINUX and must provide them with info on how I will give it to them?
Or a User group handing out Fedora CDs?
What you see as so clear from a business point of view is full of peril.
I was thinking of offering a disk of Good FOSS to our customers free of charge but now it looks as if I would have to host source repositories to keep it legal.
So thing if I make a gadget that uses a Linux SBC computer I don't have to make the source available on it since I didn't "Install it" on the SBC I just bought the boards? All I have to do is pass on the GPL and the link info?
I bet a lot of people will not agree with that one.
So If I sell a PC with Ubuntu on it pre installed I don't have to provide the source if I bought it pre installed. But if I re install it I do? What about if I update it?
I am not sure that is correct.
So if I buy a Dell with Ubuntu on it and for some reason I reinstall Ubuntu on it then put it on ebay I must provide the new owner with all the source code for all the software that I have installed on it. The Ubuntu repositories wouldn't count.
And if FLOSS dashboards inc goes belly up and Joe never bothered to get the code?
Or if Joe sells it to Betty and Betty sells it to Mike and he wants the source?
I do agree that Bruce doesn't want to sue honest mistakes. The problem is that Bruce isn't the only FOSS vendor. Companies can not work hoping that everybody will be as reasonable as Bruce.
Someday someone will bet a burr up their backside and a company that though that they where doing the right thing will be in a long expensive court case over something silly.
Or some poor sap will sell a Linux gadget on ebay and get sued for not providing the source when they didn't even know that the gadget had Linux on it.
That is a given sort of. There are gray areas.
Does BestBuy have to make the source available for the Linksys router they sell available as well as Linksys?
If I make a routers using a gumstix and sell it do I have to duplicate the source repository of that gumstix already makes available?
What if I OEM the Linksys router and put a different name on it and resell it?
What if I sell my Linksys router on eBay?
Because the license says so it a second grade answer. I was looking more for what benefit making yet another copy of unmodified code available.
Just to play the devil's advocate.
Joe buys a cool FOSS based digital dash for FLOSS dashboards inc and puts it in his car. He then sells the car five years latter. Does he have to include the source?
GM buys a lot of cool FOSS based digital dashboards and puts them in a lot of cars....
In this case the only difference is in the numbers.
If I buy a single board computer with Linux does the SBC manufactures site with links to Linux source cover me?
If I put together a Home networking package at the local computer store I run that included a Linux based router do I have to provide the source code?
These are some gray areas. I mean nobody would bust a guy that sells a linksys router but doesn't include the source but what about a guy that sells PCs with Ubuntu preinstalled?
When do you become the "distributor".
Me personally with probably always just include the source but one does wonder.
Well of course if some chowder head links play_DRM_video.o into busybox they should get slapped.
And yes you must play by the rules so that is a given. I just hate the idea 500 copies of the source for some out of date version of some code I wrote five years ago floating around the web. Of course if I stop working on it then having lots of copies of it floating around can be a good thing. I guess I can see the pluses and minuses. I can also see how some developer could make an honest mistake and not post there copy. If I buy a SBC with Linux on it and use it for my product I might think that they tar ball the vendor of the SBC has his site covers me. I would be wrong but it would be an honest mistake. Going back and making sure that every piece of code that is on an SBC is available while not a nightmare could be a bit of a task.
You can also get bad advice when you start doing that kind of development. When I was talking to my vendor about freeing up some space on the flash image he suggested that I static link my code! This code was not something I wanted to release as GPL. When I asked the vendor actually said, "who will ever know". I didn't take that option.
As with most things in life it is easy to make an honest mistake or get bad advice when dealing with GPL code.
On another project we thought that must including the DIFF of our patch and saying what GPL code we where using was good enough. We latter decided to just put the tarball on the CD along with the GPL just to be safe.
I wonder if you could answer a question for me?
If the source for the GPL software is unmodified and freely available from other sources why should the vendor have to duplicate it's availability?
No it doesn't cost an arm and a leg to throw up a tarball of busybox to be nice and legal but what benefit does it have to the community?
Including the GPL it's self I see as vital but the making yet another copy of the source available seems iffy at best.
Just wondering about your thoughts on this. I have contributed some FOSS code to a few projects and I feel that feel that feeding code improvments back into the project is much more important than making another copy of already available source available.
If they made any patches. I really doubt that they did. Have you ever used busybox? It is great but the way most people will use it on a device is to use a menuconfig and include only the commands that they need for the device. That is about the only "change" most developers will make to busybox because that is really all they need to do.
Yes if they made any patches they should contribute them back but do we know that the did?
Have you ever used busybox?
I doubt that they tweaked it but if they did contributing the code to maintainer would seem to be the better choice that putting a link on your website.
The problem with busybox and I don't really think it is a big problem is that each device will more or less use a custom version.
When you build busybox you have the option to pick and choose what commands you put in your build.
So do you need to have a link to your config or just the standard source package? What is the "source" in this case and what is a modification.
Frankly just including the config to be safe isn't an issue for most companies.
The problem is jumping through hoops to make sure you are not breaking the agreement.
It is extremely likey that these devices are using a stock busybox that they just did a menuconfig on.
For now. But the games themselves are getting harder and expensive all the time. This trend can not continue. The iPhone and iPod touch show that simple games can be extremely profitable and frankly low risk.
But I could be wrong.