Erick Raymond has produced a very nice rebuttal of SCO's claims. In particular he draws attention to a number of logical problems with their case, for example:
SCO themselves loaned an SMP system to Alan Cox so that he could implement SMP in the Linux kernel.
SCO claims that the Linux community couldn't do scaling with > 4 processors without access to Unix intellectual property. However, Linux can do this, but SCO's OpenServer and UnixWare products cannot. So according to SCO, the Linux community stole SCO's IP so that they could do with it something that SCO was not able to do.
The Bell Labs Unix code, of which SCO is now the owner, is not capable of SMP.
Re:The best parts
on
Spam, Milord
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· Score: 2, Insightful
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, can the Minister think of a name for the enormous amount of unsolicited ordinary mail we receive?
Lord Sainsbury of Turville: My Lords, when I have a moment I shall bend my mind to that question.
Definitely sarcasm.
It's not really sarcasm, as we understand it here in the UK. It's a polite attempt at urbane humour in the context of a debate most Lords would find rather perplexing, just as Lord Mackie's "request" was.
Re:Pay for downloading iso???
on
Libranet 2.8 Review
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· Score: 2, Informative
No it has not. You cannot download SuSE ISOs. You can download a live CD (for nothing) and then use that to install your distribution via FTP. This has been the case basically forever.
I have this game on the PS2, but it's also available for the Xbox now. It's not a game that is hugely popular; magazine reviews tend to praise it without really going into the details. Typically it will score 8/10 in summaries. But it is without a shadow of a doubt the most terrifying game I have ever played. Having said that, it's not that anything really happens; it's just that it is so atmospheric. I have now reached the point where I don't want to play it. I've only ever once tried to play it after dark. Now I'm too scared to play it even in the daytime.
A word to the wise: apparently it's going to be made into a movie. I strongly recommend you pick this up and have a go with it before the movie comes out; there's no way a film will be able to convey the sheer oppressiveness of the atmosphere, and it will descend into some crappy Hollywood nonsense. Play the game first, to really understand the meaning of the word "fear!
Even a cursory reading of the article shows that RMS showed lots of interest in KDE. Surely you took the trouble to read the article before rushing to insult one of the most important people in computing history?
I never understand this argument. Perhaps you can clear it up for me? You want to download 5 or 6 CDs worth of stuff from SuSE. They say, "you can't do that; instead you have to download one bootable CD and then complete the rest of the install via FTP using Yast which is on that CD". Surely you're downloading the same amount either way?
That certainly sounds unreasonable, and I don't blame you for dropping Red Hat. The main thing is that there are alternatives in the Linux world. When you say, "The lines are getting fuzzier these days, fellow geeks.", you mean the lines between Red Hat and Microsoft are getting fuzzier. As you suggest, there are loads of other Linux companies out there.
What I like about the Linux world is that we don't need to fight huge battles against Red Hat - although vigilance is always required, IMO. We can let the market punish Red Hat if their policies are unreasonable. This has already started with your company's decision to ditch them.
I use SuSE too. I read a dodgy review and I was trying to decide if I really wanted 8.2, but this positive article has pushed me over the edge. I'm getting it first thing on Saturday!
Ignore the command-line until you want to bother with it. I prefer to use it because that's the way I learned, but it'll take longer if you're used to the pointy-clicky approach.
Now to the point of my post. Games. I'm not even going to create a link, because I'm not a sadist. But I will say two words: "Frozen Bubble". Seriously, there are games, but if you're really into games you'll want to keep Windows around.
You should try reading the article, which is only one page, or reading the whole study which comprises thirty pages. The numerical study, which I agree is meaningless, only comprises a very small part of the whole document. It's hard to see exactly what the author was trying to achieve with it as the rest of it stands very well on its own.
Yeah, I see your point, but the real issue here is that it's completely meaningless for the article to compare "percentages" of the licences. What on earth could that possibly mean? When I read it earlier, I thought the article was very interesting in the main, except for this completely idiotic "numerical analysis" tacked onto the front - as if that somehow gives the qualitative analysis validity. Bizarre.
Even if you can't or won't or don't want to modify the source code, you get benefits from the fact that other people can. That's one of the key benefits of Free SW.
If you read the article, it makes it clear throughout that the GPL is far less restrictive than the EULA you must agree to to use XP. Nobody doubts that anyway.
The whole article is 30 pages long. The section you quoted is just a reference to one aspect of the GPL.
My point is that the only part that the creators of free software are interested in is:
Write free software
You added the stuff about business models. My point is that even without the business model part (the Profit! part, if you like), the excellent software is still there. As far as I can see, it's not going to go away.
It's not terribly hard to make good software. Therefore, it is easy to make good, free software, if your time is worth nothing.
My list included Linux and Apache. Are you suggesting that it wasn't terribly hard to write them? What are you talking about? The fact is that those excellent tools exist, despite the fact that the developers didn't get paid to write them.
That's the difference in the business model.
This doesn't mean anything in the context of what I said and what you said.
The first poster said that you had to pay for good software. I was pointing out that this is not true, given the examples I mentioned. Nothing you have said addresses this point.
All of these are excellent products and I can have them for nothing if I want. How do you explain how they got to be excellent products, given your "business model" argument?
Just as a matter of interest, how long has MS Windows had translucent windows? (I mean included with the OS, not as an extra application). I've never used them so I don't know.
You do know that Africa is a big place, don't you? Lots of different countries, loads of different peoples, languages, ecosystems and climates and everything else?
Perhaps there might be some Africans who need one thing, and others who need something else?
Slashdot Mirror
I highly recommend reading ESR's comment.
It's not really sarcasm, as we understand it here in the UK. It's a polite attempt at urbane humour in the context of a debate most Lords would find rather perplexing, just as Lord Mackie's "request" was.
No it has not. You cannot download SuSE ISOs. You can download a live CD (for nothing) and then use that to install your distribution via FTP. This has been the case basically forever.
I have this game on the PS2, but it's also available for the Xbox now. It's not a game that is hugely popular; magazine reviews tend to praise it without really going into the details. Typically it will score 8/10 in summaries. But it is without a shadow of a doubt the most terrifying game I have ever played. Having said that, it's not that anything really happens; it's just that it is so atmospheric. I have now reached the point where I don't want to play it. I've only ever once tried to play it after dark. Now I'm too scared to play it even in the daytime.
A word to the wise: apparently it's going to be made into a movie. I strongly recommend you pick this up and have a go with it before the movie comes out; there's no way a film will be able to convey the sheer oppressiveness of the atmosphere, and it will descend into some crappy Hollywood nonsense. Play the game first, to really understand the meaning of the word "fear!
Even a cursory reading of the article shows that RMS showed lots of interest in KDE. Surely you took the trouble to read the article before rushing to insult one of the most important people in computing history?
I never understand this argument. Perhaps you can clear it up for me? You want to download 5 or 6 CDs worth of stuff from SuSE. They say, "you can't do that; instead you have to download one bootable CD and then complete the rest of the install via FTP using Yast which is on that CD". Surely you're downloading the same amount either way?
What I like about the Linux world is that we don't need to fight huge battles against Red Hat - although vigilance is always required, IMO. We can let the market punish Red Hat if their policies are unreasonable. This has already started with your company's decision to ditch them.
Ignore the command-line until you want to bother with it. I prefer to use it because that's the way I learned, but it'll take longer if you're used to the pointy-clicky approach.
Now to the point of my post. Games. I'm not even going to create a link, because I'm not a sadist. But I will say two words: "Frozen Bubble". Seriously, there are games, but if you're really into games you'll want to keep Windows around.
You should try reading the article, which is only one page, or reading the whole study which comprises thirty pages. The numerical study, which I agree is meaningless, only comprises a very small part of the whole document. It's hard to see exactly what the author was trying to achieve with it as the rest of it stands very well on its own.
Yeah, I see your point, but the real issue here is that it's completely meaningless for the article to compare "percentages" of the licences. What on earth could that possibly mean? When I read it earlier, I thought the article was very interesting in the main, except for this completely idiotic "numerical analysis" tacked onto the front - as if that somehow gives the qualitative analysis validity. Bizarre.
Where does it say that there is no "warrant[y] because there is no fee"?
Hang your head in shame!! You call yourself a geek??
PHB stands for the "Pointy Haired Boss", of dilbert fame.
Even if you can't or won't or don't want to modify the source code, you get benefits from the fact that other people can. That's one of the key benefits of Free SW.
In this context, it means "discredits".
You're right about this, but the other 28 pages are a detailed examination of what the two licences say!
"Discredits" is a good definition in this context. The expression is in common use in England too.
If you read the article, it makes it clear throughout that the GPL is far less restrictive than the EULA you must agree to to use XP. Nobody doubts that anyway.
The whole article is 30 pages long. The section you quoted is just a reference to one aspect of the GPL.
SuSE based on Wine? I've used SuSE for years and I've never run Wine at all in that time.
You added the stuff about business models. My point is that even without the business model part (the Profit! part, if you like), the excellent software is still there. As far as I can see, it's not going to go away.
My list included Linux and Apache. Are you suggesting that it wasn't terribly hard to write them? What are you talking about? The fact is that those excellent tools exist, despite the fact that the developers didn't get paid to write them.
This doesn't mean anything in the context of what I said and what you said.
The first poster said that you had to pay for good software. I was pointing out that this is not true, given the examples I mentioned. Nothing you have said addresses this point.
All of these are excellent products and I can have them for nothing if I want. How do you explain how they got to be excellent products, given your "business model" argument?
Just as a matter of interest, how long has MS Windows had translucent windows? (I mean included with the OS, not as an extra application). I've never used them so I don't know.
The article addresses this. It talks about using the number of times that tracks are downloaded to determine who gets what.
You do know that Africa is a big place, don't you? Lots of different countries, loads of different peoples, languages, ecosystems and climates and everything else?
Perhaps there might be some Africans who need one thing, and others who need something else?
Naughton's article in "The Observer"