I don't have the time or technical aptitude to implement something like this, but here's a proposal to subvert this absurd legal action: An internet-wide RAID-like filesystem.
Implement a daemon similar to NFS or CODA where the information that constitutes a file is distributed redundantly across all the co-operating hosts. The idea hear would be that no single host contains enough information to retrieve any specific file with integrity and the "fragments" of the file (eg. parity information, etc) is redundantly spread across many hosts. That way you can't ask one computer for a particular file and if a few computers are shutdown, there is no loss of information. If you ask the network as a whole, you can retrieve the file with integrity. Sorta like RAID but instead of being spread across a few hard drives, its spread across a dynamic array of computers on the net.
There would be no single point in the network that contains the "offending" file and the seizure of a handful of computers will have no effect on the integrity of the information.
I'd assume that there would be no authentication for this scheme, no file permissions either. THe only two file operations would be CREATE and READ. Rather than deleting files from this network FS, they would simply "expire" if no one is reading them.
Store the deCSS stuff in this network and it would be effectively undestructable.
Okay so where does that leave code written by minors and placed under the GPL? If the *author* cannot enter into a binding contract...
BTW, I recognize that Cowpland was talking about the user agreement for the website, but wouldn't it also apply to the GPL?
...And what about code written by insane people?
Re:GPL too entrenched to subvert in court?
on
Hole in GNU GPL?
·
· Score: 1
For the most part I agree with you. I think I over-stated my argument (ie. said more than I meant;-).
It's conceivable to me that, because so many people around the world are heavily invested in the common interpretation of what the GPL means, that a court would hesitate to invalidate the GPL because of some obscure loophole based on the meaning of the word "is" (or something similarly silly).
You're right... it might be hype. But for the first time in living memory, the hype includes Linux.
They did compare it to Pentium performance. Even if it falls short, I'm pretty confident that it'll run faster than a DragonBall or a Psion. Which makes me happy. I pen-based interface makes me happy too.
Also recognize that/. is a technically savvy audience. The architecture makes sense to us and it ran the most godawful of all Linux applications: Netscape.
There's nothing fanatical about being intrigued by the possibilities of this new platform.
It will never run as fast as a native x86 chip would (because it must execute extra instructions).
My Pentium 133 emulates a 6502 at about a bazillion times the speed of a 1 MHz Apple ][+. Technically, there is no reason an emulator can't run faster than the original hardware. Keep in mind, also, that Intel is stretching an outdated technology to the limit -- look at the ridiculous measures Intel goes to keeping its Pentium chips cool. Transmeta doesn't have the obstacles that Intel has in maintaining backward compatibility. Plus the chip is a 128 bit process natively. How long before Intel can provide that?
It's perfectly feasible that Transmeta could produce faster x86 "emulation" than the chips Intel provides. They also have a lot more room to innovate and provide new features. Plus the concept of a desktop PC is growing passe every day.
...I have yet to hear about any affordable and sufficiently fast connection via mobile unit
Apple just came out with an iBook with an 11MHz wireless connection which is faster than my LAN at work. No it doesn't work any further than 150' or something like that, but it *is* useful and people *do* buy it.
As for bemoaning that it's not running a "standards-conforming" browser -- well that's a classic example of not seeing the forest for the trees...
Re:GPL too entrenched to subvert in court?
on
Hole in GNU GPL?
·
· Score: 1
You're missing the point. If a corporation is restricting re-distribution modified GPL code you don't have to sue them.
Actually I was thinking of the situation where someone re-distributes enhancements to say gcc without releasing the source.
I appreciate, however, you pointing out that I was missing the point...
Re:GPL too entrenched to subvert in court?
on
Hole in GNU GPL?
·
· Score: 1
...in this case, what the words in the GPL actually mean...
Is that what semantics means? Good grief...
There are plenty of examples where the words of a contract were disgarded because they didn't reflect what the parties actually meant.
I believe the intent of the GPL is a radical departure from historial intellectual property laws but it is expressed using the "old-school" vocabulary. The intent of the GPL is clear... only by selectively applying certain semantics to the actual words of the GPL can one find loopholes.
Law isn't about documents -- its about the way people live. The GPL is an important and probably historical document but it may not be necessary in the future to cling to it in order to free our code. It's here, it's entrenched and people are using it as intended. In common law countries (ie. not France) the law has a knack for accepting the way people live... as law.
GPL too entrenched to subvert in court?
on
Hole in GNU GPL?
·
· Score: 1
I think the real issue, both in the USA and worldwide, is:
Would a court overturn the GPL given that it seems to work very well as intended?
It's entrenched and established and everyone understands its purpose. The problem with the GPL is it is (at the time, necessarily) expressed in the language of old-school intellectual property concepts. It's abundantly clear that RMS didn't want those rules to apply to GPL'd software and the entire world has accepted that premise.
Face it, you have to look *really* hard to find a loophole in the GPL and those loopholes are usually based on semantics.
The worrisome part of the GPL is not that someone will invalidate it by discovering a loophole. That just ain't gonna happen. What worries me is when a company or individual violates the GPL can we prove it in court?
Companies are not individuals and have no right as such.
There is an absurd body of USA case law (including Supreme Court decisions) that uphold the view that corporations are "manufactured" persons. They have rights, can enter into legal agreements, etc. Although corporations cannot vote in elections, the USA congress has happily implemented a number of workarounds to help large companies voice their "opinions". What infuriates many people is that while corporations enjoy many of the rights "real" people have, they aren't subject to many of the responsibilities of citizenship. No corporation for example can be drafted for military service or jury duty. The law is quite plain if a person is convicted of stealing or manslaughter or libel. The law is considerably shakier when it comes to punishing a company that commits these crimes.
In Canada, we recently has an insane ruling from the Supreme Court which declared that a Federal ban on alcohol advertising was unconstitutional because it infringed Freedom of Expression as guaranteed under our Charter of Rights and Freedoms. That is, it infringed the alcohol and liquor companies' freedom to express themselves. Now that companies can express themselves, perhaps they will fight for their right to vote and practise the religion of their shareholders. Maybe I'll live to see the day when companies can marry.
Getting back to the "loophole" mentioned in the discussion thread. If a company engages a contractor or employee to augment GPL'd software, and the company doesn't distribute that software I don't see anything that gives the employee the right to distribute it. First, the employee is acting as an agent for the corporation -- the corporation isn't licensing its augmented code to the developer. Ie. the corporation isn't "distributing" the source because the agent is part of the corporation.
Also consider what happens if the code is unstable or unsafe for widespread usage. I think the employee or contractor would be liable for the damage such code would entail.
"Jumping on the Linux bandwagon" has nothing to do with being cynical. They were one of the earliest software companies who realize the business sense in using/adopting Linux.
A better question would have been:
Could you outline Corel's plans for open-sourcing their future and past software products?
I actually live a couple of blocks away from Cowpland's house. My question would be:
We're having spaghetti next Wednesday. Would you and Marlen like to drop by? There's a couple of Linux ideas I'd like to bounce of you...
Just as AOL is now able to buy Time Warner, a well established company with much greater revenues and cash flow.
Not to dispel the jist of your point (because I tend to agree with it), but AOL generates about 5 times the net income of TW (on 1/5 of the revenue that TW generates). That is, AOL is (in a way) 25 times more profitable than Time Warner.
What saddens me about this is twofold:
The last thing the net needs is a media giant shoving our throats the same old crappy content that newspapers and TV have been providing for the past 20 or 30 years. It would benefit us all more (IMHO) if a company stood up and made it easier for individuals to provide content on the net (not that it's very hard right now...).
AOL's vision is focused on the individual sitting at a personal computer. The PC is aging technology. Do we want to stil be using desktop computers 20 years from now? Either this deal is going to be jeopardized by the death of the PC or it will prevent the acceptance of post-PC technologies. Either way, I'm pissed off.
A movement whose focus is the destruction of people's businesses and livelihoods can only lead to a battle -- no, rather, to a war consisting of many battles and many casualties.
It is a misrepresentation of the goals of the FSF to state that it's "focus is the destruction of [yadda, yadda]". The goal of the FSF and the GPL is to promote innovation in the software industry by removing proprietary obstacles. The only people who are threatened by the GPL are companies who make significant revenue from these proprietary obstacles.
Don't forget that most corporations in the world use software, but very few make it. The GPL ensures that software is widely available. I work as a software engineer for an embedded systems company: My desktop is RedHat 5.2 with egcs; I port to VxWorks using the gcc cross-compiler that WindRiver sold us (all GPL'd) and I install my code on a Motorola chassis using their embedded version of (the GPL'd) RedHat Linux. Motorola, WindRiver and my company have all benefited handsomely by the GPL. There is not a significant BSD-licensed tool in our shop.
The argument that the GPL removes the incentive to innovate might have some merit in an academic conversation, but the real world tells us that this is a false proposition.
For every 1 company you can name that is threatened by the GPL, I can name 25 that benefit from it. The fact is, the GPL is a very good thing for capitalism and industry. Despite your protestations, the BSD-style licenses are not going to overtake the GPL in popularity and consumers, developers and software users all over the world are reaping the benefits.
Also PHP has an SNMP (UCD I think) API for performing network management and monitoring from a web server.
BTW, in response to your questions: Is SNMP dead? We can only wish... Are there no graphical SNMP managers out there? No good ones for Linux... there's a tk version off UCD's webpage but that doesn't count.
That was apparently under discussion a while back. Though it would certainly level the playing field, I think it's more likely that the DOJ would break MS up along application lines -- one company for applications, one for the OS and one for Media perhaps.
The only reason I can see the DoJ favouring confiscation of Microsoft's intellectual property is that it would be much easier than trying to break up the company. Remember that AT&T was an amalgamation of separate companies before it was split up in 1984, so the decision to split up the company made more sense. Also AT&T settled (which Microsoft seems unwilling to do) so they were co-operating and helping with the dismantling of the company. Dismantling an unco-operative company that has always existed as a single entity will be an extremely laborious and expensive endeavour.
Similarly, mandating MS to open up their APIs seems to be a complicated and ongoing process. Does it help anyone if it takes 6 months of legal posturing before we get access to a contentious item of information? To me it seems that this proposal gives MS too much wiggle room.
The DoJ could send a team of 20 engineers into Microsoft and confiscate Windows within a month. It would be a trivial matter to test Microsoft's compliance with this penalty. Public what we got from them on the Web and... voila... the whole matter is settled. IBM, Compaq and Dell can start selling PCs with Windows with impunity. The WINE project will accelerate to insane levels. Ambitious young Microsoft engineers will start their own companies to offer "new and improved" windows. Microsoft will make money off their SQL Server and Internet Explorer (perhaps now they'll start porting this stuff to "alternative" OSs). All will be right in the world.
If the DoJ commoditizes Windows, then Microsoft will remain intact and can continue to compete the way they proposed Netscape compete: as a value add reseller. They'd also no longer be able to impose arbitrary pricing schemes (what with GNU Windows on the market...) or stifle innovation. They'd instead be forced to keep up with the popular innovations.
Apparently WINE needed some features added to the egcs compiler to get WINE to "work". This leaves us in the interesting position of Corel (ie. WINE) needing Cygnus (ie. Redhat) to implement features to help Corel's distro succeed against RedHat's.
Although I generally laud RedHat's business practices, I'm concerned about a couple of things. Cygnus was named the maintainer of egcs (i.e. gcc 3.0) which everyone depends on. Cygnus' revenue stream depended on making egcs work well for basically every platform on the planet. Does RedHat plan to use Cygnus just as a revenue generator or are they going to try to exert more control over egcs development to suit the RedHat platform? Will RedHat Linux (or just Linux in general) become the preferred platform for egcs?
Perhaps RH's plans include nothing more than bundling some of Cygnus' cool tools with their distro. This might leave many free software advocates up in arms, but it would be basically harmless (at least in the short term) to the free software interests.
At the Ottawa Linux Symposium, the Corel guys said that they were working with Cygnus to tune egcs for the WINE project. Now that Corel is positioning itself as a competitor to RH, how will the Cygnus buy out affect Corel and their distro?
What RedHat does with Cygnus will be very important to everyone in the free software community. If they go completely evil on us, it will leave the free software community spinning trying to setup a new egcs maintainer and give RH an unhealthy head start in a number of linux markets.
You said this a lot better than ESR did. His slag at RMS was childish and unhelpful. His apparent misapprehension of the difference between communism (a term that can barely be applied to China) and totalitarianism (very *definitely* a term that applies to China) is embarassing and unhelpful.
But we know how the American media, the American business class and a regretably significant portion of the American populace feels about "communism" and "foreigners". It appears that ESR has, because of his own knee-jerk biases, become a victim of a rather conventional (ie. we're *always* called "commies") form of FUD.
The original article plays on every red-blooded, God-lovin', homo-hatin', freedom-lovin' Mirkyns worst fears ("it's about control..."). Apparently these are ESR's secret fears too cuz his response is brazenly reactionary.
Yes, the PRC is a totalitarian country. Its worth noting, however, that the opposite of totalitarianism is democracy, not capitalism. The PRC is as capitalistic as any other country (with the exception, perhaps, of Russia and the USA).
ESR: I laud the contributions you have made to the free software movement. You've made a positive difference in the world. I thank you with profound genuineness. You are, however, a lousy spokesperson.
Perhaps as part of the deal, some Cygnus execs are going to move into senior roles at RH. Or some purists objected to how a RH/Cygnus merger will deal with Cygnus' non-GPL code.
If RedHat wouldn't use non-GPL QT, why would they suddenly start bundling Cold Fusion or whatever the hell that Cygnus product is called?
This is a good idea. Would one of the Linux distributors be willing to fund this extremely useful marketing (and engineering) initiative?
On a related note, let's not forget people: What Microsoft says or does has nothing to do with Linux. Since our goals (software that doesn't suck vs making money and achieving world domination) are different, we are left in an interesting position:
Linux is a competitive threat to Microsoft
Microsoft is not a competitive threat to Linux
This latest morsel of FUD demonstrates that Microsoft still doesn't realize that Linux and the Open Source movement have already succeeded at their stated goals. And in terms of competition, they don't realize that we've changed the rules of engagement.
This is going to sound like a joke, but if you think about it (hint, hint, Mr Gates), it rings true: The worst thing Microsoft could do to us is start contributing to the open source movement.
What's most disappointing about XML is the SUBDOC restriction. For a lot of industrial applications, this is an essential feature. It's used, for example, in the linuxdoc DTD.
Is that a formal feature of XML (parsing without a DTD)? There are many tools that attempt to parse SGML documents (and deduce the logical structure), but in many cases, they are just taking educated guesses. What feature of XML makes this possible?
Slashdot Mirror
Download a program to your computer
Port it to your architecture and configuration
Compile itself
Install itself
Run itself (as root nonetheless)
All without the user even noticing!
I don't have the time or technical aptitude to implement something like this, but here's a proposal to subvert this absurd legal action: An internet-wide RAID-like filesystem.
Implement a daemon similar to NFS or CODA where the information that constitutes a file is distributed redundantly across all the co-operating hosts. The idea hear would be that no single host contains enough information to retrieve any specific file with integrity and the "fragments" of the file (eg. parity information, etc) is redundantly spread across many hosts. That way you can't ask one computer for a particular file and if a few computers are shutdown, there is no loss of information. If you ask the network as a whole, you can retrieve the file with integrity. Sorta like RAID but instead of being spread across a few hard drives, its spread across a dynamic array of computers on the net.
There would be no single point in the network that contains the "offending" file and the seizure of a handful of computers will have no effect on the integrity of the information.
I'd assume that there would be no authentication for this scheme, no file permissions either. THe only two file operations would be CREATE and READ.
Rather than deleting files from this network FS, they would simply "expire" if no one is reading them.
Store the deCSS stuff in this network and it would be effectively undestructable.
Okay so where does that leave code written by minors and placed under the GPL? If the *author* cannot enter into a binding contract...
BTW, I recognize that Cowpland was talking about the user agreement for the website, but wouldn't it also apply to the GPL?
...And what about code written by insane people?
For the most part I agree with you. I think I over-stated my argument (ie. said more than I meant ;-).
It's conceivable to me that, because so many people around the world are heavily invested in the common interpretation of what the GPL means, that a court would hesitate to invalidate the GPL because of some obscure loophole based on the meaning of the word "is" (or something similarly silly).
You're right... it might be hype. But for the first time in living memory, the hype includes Linux.
/. is a technically savvy audience. The architecture makes sense to us and it ran the most godawful of all Linux applications: Netscape.
They did compare it to Pentium performance. Even if it falls short, I'm pretty confident that it'll run faster than a DragonBall or a Psion. Which makes me happy. I pen-based interface makes me happy too.
Also recognize that
There's nothing fanatical about being intrigued by the possibilities of this new platform.
It will never run as fast as a native x86 chip would (because it must execute extra instructions).
...I have yet to hear about any affordable and sufficiently fast connection via mobile unit
My Pentium 133 emulates a 6502 at about a bazillion times the speed of a 1 MHz Apple ][+. Technically, there is no reason an emulator can't run faster than the original hardware. Keep in mind, also, that Intel is stretching an outdated technology to the limit -- look at the ridiculous measures Intel goes to keeping its Pentium chips cool. Transmeta doesn't have the obstacles that Intel has in maintaining backward compatibility. Plus the chip is a 128 bit process natively. How long before Intel can provide that?
It's perfectly feasible that Transmeta could produce faster x86 "emulation" than the chips Intel provides. They also have a lot more room to innovate and provide new features. Plus the concept of a desktop PC is growing passe every day.
Apple just came out with an iBook with an 11MHz wireless connection which is faster than my LAN at work. No it doesn't work any further than 150' or something like that, but it *is* useful and people *do* buy it.
As for bemoaning that it's not running a "standards-conforming" browser -- well that's a classic example of not seeing the forest for the trees...
Actually I was thinking of the situation where someone re-distributes enhancements to say gcc without releasing the source.
I appreciate, however, you pointing out that I was missing the point...
Is that what semantics means? Good grief...
There are plenty of examples where the words of a contract were disgarded because they didn't reflect what the parties actually meant.
I believe the intent of the GPL is a radical departure from historial intellectual property laws but it is expressed using the "old-school" vocabulary. The intent of the GPL is clear... only by selectively applying certain semantics to the actual words of the GPL can one find loopholes.
Law isn't about documents -- its about the way people live. The GPL is an important and probably historical document but it may not be necessary in the future to cling to it in order to free our code. It's here, it's entrenched and people are using it as intended. In common law countries (ie. not France) the law has a knack for accepting the way people live
I think the real issue, both in the USA and worldwide, is:
Would a court overturn the GPL given that it seems to work very well as intended?
It's entrenched and established and everyone understands its purpose. The problem with the GPL is it is (at the time, necessarily) expressed in the language of old-school intellectual property concepts. It's abundantly clear that RMS didn't want those rules to apply to GPL'd software and the entire world has accepted that premise.
Face it, you have to look *really* hard to find a loophole in the GPL and those loopholes are usually based on semantics.
The worrisome part of the GPL is not that someone will invalidate it by discovering a loophole. That just ain't gonna happen. What worries me is when a company or individual violates the GPL can we prove it in court?
Companies are not individuals and have no right as such.
There is an absurd body of USA case law (including Supreme Court decisions) that uphold the view that corporations are "manufactured" persons. They have rights, can enter into legal agreements, etc. Although corporations cannot vote in elections, the USA congress has happily implemented a number of workarounds to help large companies voice their "opinions". What infuriates many people is that while corporations enjoy many of the rights "real" people have, they aren't subject to many of the responsibilities of citizenship. No corporation for example can be drafted for military service or jury duty. The law is quite plain if a person is convicted of stealing or manslaughter or libel. The law is considerably shakier when it comes to punishing a company that commits these crimes.
In Canada, we recently has an insane ruling from the Supreme Court which declared that a Federal ban on alcohol advertising was unconstitutional because it infringed Freedom of Expression as guaranteed under our Charter of Rights and Freedoms. That is, it infringed the alcohol and liquor companies' freedom to express themselves. Now that companies can express themselves, perhaps they will fight for their right to vote and practise the religion of their shareholders. Maybe I'll live to see the day when companies can marry.
Getting back to the "loophole" mentioned in the discussion thread. If a company engages a contractor or employee to augment GPL'd software, and the company doesn't distribute that software I don't see anything that gives the employee the right to distribute it. First, the employee is acting as an agent for the corporation -- the corporation isn't licensing its augmented code to the developer. Ie. the corporation isn't "distributing" the source because the agent is part of the corporation.
Also consider what happens if the code is unstable or unsafe for widespread usage. I think the employee or contractor would be liable for the damage such code would entail.
A better question would have been:
I actually live a couple of blocks away from Cowpland's house. My question would be:
Dear IBM,
Please, please create a usable open source java environment for linux.
Not to dispel the jist of your point (because
I tend to agree with it), but AOL generates
about 5 times the net income of TW (on 1/5
of the revenue that TW generates). That is,
AOL is (in a way) 25 times more profitable than Time Warner.
What saddens me about this is twofold:
shoving our throats the same old crappy content that newspapers and TV have been providing for the past 20 or 30 years. It would benefit us all more (IMHO) if a company stood up and made it easier for individuals to provide content on the net (not that it's very hard right now...).
It is a misrepresentation of the goals of the FSF
to state that it's "focus is the destruction of [yadda, yadda]". The goal of the FSF and the GPL is to promote innovation in the software industry by removing proprietary obstacles. The only people who are threatened by the GPL are companies who make significant revenue from these proprietary obstacles.
Don't forget that most corporations in the world use software, but very few make it. The GPL ensures that software is widely available. I work as a software engineer for an embedded systems company: My desktop is RedHat 5.2 with egcs; I port to VxWorks using the gcc cross-compiler that WindRiver sold us (all GPL'd) and I install my code on a Motorola chassis using their embedded version of (the GPL'd) RedHat Linux. Motorola, WindRiver and my company have all benefited handsomely by the GPL. There is not a significant BSD-licensed tool in our shop.
The argument that the GPL removes the incentive to innovate might have some merit in an academic conversation, but the real world tells us that this is a false proposition.
For every 1 company you can name that is threatened by the GPL, I can name 25 that benefit from it. The fact is, the GPL
is a very good thing for capitalism and industry. Despite your protestations, the BSD-style licenses are not going to overtake the GPL in popularity and consumers, developers and software users all over the world are reaping the benefits.
Also PHP has an SNMP (UCD I think) API
for performing network management and
monitoring from a web server.
BTW, in response to your questions:
Is SNMP dead? We can only wish...
Are there no graphical SNMP managers out there? No good ones for Linux... there's a tk version off UCD's webpage but that doesn't count.
The only reason I can see the DoJ favouring confiscation of Microsoft's intellectual property is that it would be much easier than trying to break up the company. Remember that AT&T was an amalgamation of separate companies before it was split up in 1984, so the decision to split up the company made more sense. Also AT&T settled (which Microsoft seems unwilling to do) so they were co-operating and helping with the dismantling of the company. Dismantling an unco-operative company that has always existed as a single entity will be an extremely laborious and expensive endeavour.
Similarly, mandating MS to open up their APIs seems to be a complicated and ongoing process. Does it help anyone if it takes 6 months of legal posturing before we get access to a contentious item of information? To me it seems that this proposal gives MS too much wiggle room.
The DoJ could send a team of 20 engineers into Microsoft and confiscate Windows within a month. It would be a trivial matter to test Microsoft's compliance with this penalty. Public what we got from them on the Web and
All will be right in the world.
If the DoJ commoditizes Windows, then Microsoft will remain intact and can continue to compete the way they proposed Netscape compete: as a value add reseller. They'd also no longer be able to impose arbitrary pricing schemes (what with GNU Windows on the market...) or stifle innovation. They'd instead be forced to keep up with the popular innovations.
Apparently WINE needed some features added to the egcs compiler to get WINE to "work". This leaves us in the interesting position of Corel (ie. WINE) needing Cygnus (ie. Redhat) to implement features to help Corel's distro succeed against RedHat's.
But it would address every one of the anti-competitive practices listed in the FoF
Can the federal court unilaterally impose the GPL on the Windows (95/98,NT,CE) source code?
Would this be more or less effective than trying to break up the corporation?
How would the court deal with parts of the source code that MS licensed from third parties?
Although I generally laud RedHat's business practices, I'm concerned about a couple of things. Cygnus was named the maintainer of egcs (i.e. gcc 3.0) which everyone depends on. Cygnus' revenue stream depended on making egcs work well for basically every platform on the planet. Does RedHat plan to use Cygnus just as a revenue generator or are they going to try to exert more control over egcs development to suit the RedHat platform? Will RedHat Linux (or just Linux in general) become the preferred platform for egcs?
Perhaps RH's plans include nothing more than bundling some of Cygnus' cool tools with their distro. This might leave many free software advocates up in arms, but it would be basically harmless (at least in the short term) to the free software interests.
At the Ottawa Linux Symposium, the Corel guys said that they were working with Cygnus to tune egcs for the WINE project. Now that Corel is positioning itself as a competitor to RH, how will the Cygnus buy out affect Corel and their distro?
What RedHat does with Cygnus will be very important to everyone in the free software community. If they go completely evil on us, it will leave the free software community spinning trying to setup a new egcs maintainer and give RH an unhealthy head start in a number of linux markets.
You said this a lot better than ESR did. His slag at RMS was childish and unhelpful. His apparent misapprehension of the difference between communism (a term that can barely be applied to China) and totalitarianism (very *definitely* a term that applies to China) is embarassing and unhelpful.
But we know how the American media, the American business class and a regretably significant portion of the American populace feels about "communism" and "foreigners". It appears that ESR has, because of his own knee-jerk biases, become a victim of a rather conventional (ie. we're *always* called "commies") form of FUD.
The original article plays on every red-blooded, God-lovin', homo-hatin', freedom-lovin' Mirkyns
worst fears ("it's about control..."). Apparently these are ESR's secret fears too cuz his response is brazenly reactionary.
Yes, the PRC is a totalitarian country. Its worth noting, however, that the opposite of totalitarianism is democracy, not capitalism. The PRC is as capitalistic as any other country (with the exception, perhaps, of Russia and the USA).
ESR: I laud the contributions you have made to the free software movement. You've made a positive difference in the world. I thank you with profound genuineness. You are, however, a lousy spokesperson.
Perhaps as part of the deal, some Cygnus execs
are going to move into senior roles at RH. Or
some purists objected to how a RH/Cygnus merger
will deal with Cygnus' non-GPL code.
If RedHat wouldn't use non-GPL QT, why would
they suddenly start bundling Cold Fusion or
whatever the hell that Cygnus product is called?
On a related note, let's not forget people: What Microsoft says or does has nothing to do with Linux. Since our goals (software that doesn't suck vs making money and achieving world domination) are different, we are left in an interesting position:
This latest morsel of FUD demonstrates that Microsoft still doesn't realize that Linux and the Open Source movement have already succeeded at their stated goals. And in terms of competition, they don't realize that we've changed the rules of engagement.
This is going to sound like a joke, but if you think about it (hint, hint, Mr Gates), it rings true:
The worst thing Microsoft could do to us is start contributing to the open source movement.
The one that ran on the least-expensive hardware
The cheapest to buy (or steal)
Preferred by techies
Eventually, Windows became much easier to use and (perhaps) technically superior to the Mac. This only added to its dominance.
If Linux vs NT is Jihad II, Linux already has a massive lead on these 4 fronts.
I guess the biggest piece missing is 3rd-party support -- but that's definitely coming. Life is sweet.
What's most disappointing about XML is the
SUBDOC restriction. For a lot of industrial
applications, this is an essential feature.
It's used, for example, in the linuxdoc DTD.
Is that a formal feature of XML (parsing without
a DTD)? There are many tools that attempt to
parse SGML documents (and deduce the logical
structure), but in many cases, they are just
taking educated guesses. What feature of XML
makes this possible?