Richard Stallman, without whom we wouldn't even be having this conversation. He's famous for bugging people with his uncompromising attitudes. But I for one applaud him completely for that, and thank him sincerely.
I heartily agree. Thanks for providing such an excellent example. People's aversion to change, or accepting new ideas, or their "difficult" authors - even when proven brilliant and world-changing - is something that frequently saddens me.
One cannot mention Stallman without some fool popping up and saying, "But I heard he puts kittens in microwave ovens for kicks," or "But I heard somebody disagreed with him once, so I refuse to listen," or "Isn't he that commie who says programmers should work for free?" or "But he wants to take away my SUV!"... There is a line in Batman Begins that sums it up: roughly We always fear what we do not understand.
What is even scarier are the people who work in this industry who don't even recognise the name. Yes, they exist...
I mean "pull rank" in the way that he often does in this context - that may not amount to much more than firmly stating his position. This happens on the list with some frequency and effect. He didn't say anything in the cited thread, and I don't know what his current position is... Maybe he's already done what I am suggesting and I just missed it.
I have very little tolerance for bad behaviour myself, but here's why I don't think "refusing to merge his code" is a useful reaction to any abrasiveness on the part of Hans:
1. it pointlessly weakens Linux 2. Hans and his team have done a lot of very difficult and competent work 3. the 'punishment' won't work anyway 4. every public forum attracts flame wars and ad hominems. LKML is no exception; and any grown-up developer should know what to expect and not take umbrage (including Hans).
It could still be refused or delayed for valid technical reasons. But if Hans' comments on the list offend people to the point where they reject his huge contributions, that's worse for Linux than a few strongly worded posts on Reiser's part.
features and performance are *not* the top priorities in Linux, the top priority is maintainability.
There is little to indicate Namesys' code is less maintainable than anyone else's. Most indications are that it is probably significantly better than many subsystems. Reiser4 in particular has been redesigned for modularity, etc...
I've heard people complain about reiser3 who were presumably burned by early versions. Never had any problems myself in 30 or 40 reiser systems (desktops, laptops, servers).
By all accounts Reiser4 deserves to be in the kernel -- it's great forward-looking technology; reiser3 is a great success. Unfortunately Reiser4 seems caught in the crossfire of egos, and nobody wants to rise above petty squabbles (and I'm not blaming Hans. He's the guy who's invested all the energy and no small amount of intelligence into the product, for grot's sake).
It's time, IMHO, for Linus to pull rank and just order it merged.
When you say "PostgreSQL is the better database", what are you comparing to? MySQL 5 or their MaxDB product? A comparison between PgSQL and the latter would be enlightening.
Re: the GPL, nothing written on debian-legal can change the fact that the GPL cannot be read to prohibit their requirement that redistributed products that use the GPL'd MySQL database must also be open source. MySQL's position is legally and morally in keeping with the spirit of the GPL: protecting users.
People who want GPL can have GPL for open source projects, or applications that are not redistributed.
People who want a more traditional license, with freedom to redistribute products using MySQL without opening source, can have that too.
Why do you call this doubly accommodating arrangement "crap"?
Sure, PostgreSQL's BSD license is less restrictive, but why should MySQL (or anyone else) have to use that, if they don't want to? (The GPL is framed to guarantee certain freedoms to users; the BSD license grants complete freedom to those making products from the source, but does not protect users at all. I thought everyone had figured this out by now?)
the hype of their early days has failed to solidify
Nice to hear someone else echo the sentiments of my last year's jeremiad. It's still amazing how many professionals fall for it. How ridiculous being forced to replace your equipment every year, and yet still not getting the quality we take for granted with 35mm... let alone medium format.
alexa.org pegs them at #44 rank
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Somehow a Forth interpreter made it into the first Mac, as did Postscript, but Smalltalk just didn't.
As far as I know, Apple never shipped a Forth interpreter with Mac system software (although Power Macs around 10 years later did include one as part of Open Firmware, used during booting only).
A couple of years after Mac's introduction, Apple certainly did ship a complete Smalltalk environment for 68K Macs, as did several third party vendors.
PostScript was never part of the MacOS imaging model (and with OS X, still isn't) and in any case did not arrive on the scene for a year after 'the first Mac'. Once the LaserWriter shipped, the printer driver gained a primitive PS generator for the Mac's QuickDraw model.
(Much later, some imagesetter vendors and preflighting/soft proofing applications, and Ghostscript, of course, included PostScript implementations for specialised purposes. Even Adobe's graphic arts applications did not embed anything approaching a full PostScript implementation until quite recently.)
Marcin Wichary has compiled a great deal of Lisa information, from screenshots, ads, brochures and articles to posters and videos, at his site GUI Gallery Guidebook. Recent postings include 17 exclusive Lisa posters for download and enjoyment, and an interview with Dan Smith that reveals "The original trash can for Apple Lisa was supposed to have been an old, beat up alley trashcan, with the lid half open, flies buzzing around it and appropriate sounds as user put something inside."
The summary only claims that the 'interesting but quite unintuitive use of the switch/case construct' is originally Duff's device, not application to coroutines.
Tom Tomorrow's This Modern World:
The Department of Homeland Security Presents... Evacuation Plans for Major American Cities. Featuring our New Mascots, Fluffy the Preparedness Bunny and Happy the Readiness Mouse!
My tongue in cheek point about the Minister was meant to illustrate that he has never connected the dots between the flaky infrastructure that runs his department and the flaky infrastructure being chosen to defend "the realm".
don't give me lame-ass quotes and figures about how your Debian box that runs as a web server off of your xDSL line hasn't crashed in months
While I have plenty of lame-ass multi-year uptimes to quote from my own experience, I'd rather talk about Vxworks, NetBSD, embedded Linux, or a host of other embedded RTOS (often UNIX based) that are appropriate examples with appropriate operational records. Windows of any flavour has no appropriate operational record; the very thought of it is laughable. NASA doesn't send it to space and if I were a Navy sailor I wouldn't put my life in its hands either.
mission-critical hardware and software are a totally different environment,
Which is kind of the whole point, isn't it.
and I'm sure that with whatever OS is used for such tasks that thousands of man-hours are devoted to ensuring that system failures are the extreme exception
On the face of it, this seems sane; yet, with their reputation and future at stake, why has M$ so far failed to apply these "thousands of man-hours" to security and reliability of their costly products? Their record inspires no confidence whatsoever. I think if just one intelligent-man-hour had gone into this decision, things might have turned out a whole lot rosier for the Royal Navy.
The computers there are nothing more than graphical data and situational displays.
And why should these therefore be left prone to failure? Would you fly in an airliner that ran Windows for flight control? What if it just ran Windows for its "graphical data and situational displays"? By singling out the "relative unimportance" of these displays by way of defending an inappropriate technology choice (for any role), is a backwards to win the argument. But thanks for trying.
Is the closed source code of Windows preventing us from actively defending our systems?
Does this question really need to be asked any longer?
Has this story teleported us all back to the year 2000? Hit the reset button? Is Slashdot's new motto "No hugging, no learning"?
b) The US Navy is running an unsecurable OS for the most advanced surface ships in the world - with nuclear reactors to boot.
I thought this was common knowledge. I didn't really expect a "pro-business" administration to do anything about it, did you? It's actually one of the few things that makes the rest of us feel safer.
The Royal Navy's new, state-of-the-art destroyer has been fitted with combat
management software that can be hacked into, crashes easily and is
vulnerable to viruses, according to one of the system's designers who was
fired after raising his concerns.... he told Channel 4 news that "the use of Windows For Warships puts
the ship and her crew at risk, and the defence of the realm".
There are also plans to install a similar Microsoft Windows-based
computerised command system on Britain's nuclear submarines. Wilson said:
"It is inconceivable that we could allow the possible accidental release of
nuclear missiles. The people who survived such an exchange, if any, would
certainly regard such a thing as a crime against humanity. And I can't help
feeling that even planning to deploy such systems on Windows, with its
unreliability and lack of security, is itself some sort of crime in
international law."
Also see The Register which quotes an upbeat Armed Forces Minister:
Fabricant had asked if there had been an external review of the Type 45 decision, and from Ingram's answer we can perhaps infer 'No'. He then asked for a cost comparison between Unix and Windows 2000 as the CMS OS, and Ingram simply said: "The cost of implementing an operating system for the Combat Management System in the Type 45 is a matter for the prime contractor, BAE Systems, and their sub-contractor. The Department does not have, or require, visibility of costs at that level of detail."
Fabricant also asked what systems had been put in place to cope with a failure, and what steps had been taken to ensure the Win2k CMS in the Type 45 was reliable. Aside from affirming that Win2k was "the lowest risk choice" and that BAE was on top of "residual risks" (Are these cookies? Spyware?), Ingram said: "The system design has built-in redundancy, with automatic, and transparent, switch-over to a back-up system if the primary system has a problem. This would provide continuity of operation and ensure that no data was lost. The system design also ensures that comprehensive hardware mechanisms will be in place to avoid any other safety or technical issues."
Perhaps the Minister can now explain why his desktop PC doesn't even run properly.
... the Royal Navy is all set to go to sea with Windows on warships. Am I alone in thinking that this has to be one of the most terminally stupid IT decisions of the century?
...this was first attempted in the mid-1990s. There was a wonderful description of the then-latest generation of a US missile cruiser, the USS Yorktown, having to be frequently rebooted because its underlying network of computers running Windows NT crashed somewhat inconveniently.
Apparently the design meant that critical systems such as steering could be lost in mid-battle.
So here we are again. This time the dec
Re:hardware is much, ah, *harder* than software
on
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Writing software or even reverse engineering formats looks much easier by comparison.
Of course, I was assuming that 'our' brains, with our education and knowledge intact, would be looking at the problem. Now imagine some kid with no education in numeracy, let alone mathematics or computer science, having to operate a computer and reverse engineer the file formats on it... So maybe we would need to carry forward libraries, and enough materials for people to learn the sciences necessary too. Oh, I know, let's just not have that apocalypse.
They quietly release full-function betas before announcing them, and the betas offer features that really are revolutionary. No Gmail wasn't the first web mailer, but it redefined what a web mail program was capable of. No Google didn't make the first map, but maps.google blows everyone else away.
All true - but now that Google is a public company, I expect this focus to increasingly wander, because a whole set of concerns intrude that have nothing to do with shipping quality. That's got a lot to do with M$'s problem (and Adobe's, etc), methinks... Meeting quarterlies. Thousands of managers focused on CYA. All that irrelevant, expensive self-serving machinery.
Ah yes, you're right. Per GPL text I see that those commands are 'suggestions' and not part of the license itself. However I still don't understand the difficulty technical or otherwise in including a source-download feature.
(Actually GNU programs do implement those recommendations: bc, for instance.)
$ bc bc 1.06 Copyright 1991-1994, 1997, 1998, 2000 Free Software Foundation, Inc. This is free software with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. For details type `warranty'.
they certainly don't have to release a documentary on themselves
Yes, I realise this, but I was mainly pointing out what the reaction 'burn it!' says about the psychology of the executives. I don't have a problem with 'not releasing it', although I lament the absence of transparency among most corporate players. One doesn't have to be Michael Moore to know that they have plenty to hide. A string of high profile convictions lately is only the tip of the iceberg... How does this relate to software development, you ask? Well, it's more about what is good for the people who buy the software. Whereas business is preoccupied with what's good for business.
Slashdot Mirror
I heartily agree. Thanks for providing such an excellent example. People's aversion to change, or accepting new ideas, or their "difficult" authors - even when proven brilliant and world-changing - is something that frequently saddens me.
One cannot mention Stallman without some fool popping up and saying, "But I heard he puts kittens in microwave ovens for kicks," or "But I heard somebody disagreed with him once, so I refuse to listen," or "Isn't he that commie who says programmers should work for free?" or "But he wants to take away my SUV!"... There is a line in Batman Begins that sums it up: roughly We always fear what we do not understand.
What is even scarier are the people who work in this industry who don't even recognise the name. Yes, they exist...
I mean "pull rank" in the way that he often does in this context - that may not amount to much more than firmly stating his position. This happens on the list with some frequency and effect. He didn't say anything in the cited thread, and I don't know what his current position is... Maybe he's already done what I am suggesting and I just missed it.
I have very little tolerance for bad behaviour myself, but here's why I don't think "refusing to merge his code" is a useful reaction to any abrasiveness on the part of Hans:
1. it pointlessly weakens Linux
2. Hans and his team have done a lot of very difficult and competent work
3. the 'punishment' won't work anyway
4. every public forum attracts flame wars and ad hominems. LKML is no exception; and any grown-up developer should know what to expect and not take umbrage (including Hans).
It could still be refused or delayed for valid technical reasons. But if Hans' comments on the list offend people to the point where they reject his huge contributions, that's worse for Linux than a few strongly worded posts on Reiser's part.
There is little to indicate Namesys' code is less maintainable than anyone else's. Most indications are that it is probably significantly better than many subsystems. Reiser4 in particular has been redesigned for modularity, etc...
I've heard people complain about reiser3 who were presumably burned by early versions. Never had any problems myself in 30 or 40 reiser systems (desktops, laptops, servers).
It's time, IMHO, for Linus to pull rank and just order it merged.
no text
and their 5% (?).
Re: the GPL, nothing written on debian-legal can change the fact that the GPL cannot be read to prohibit their requirement that redistributed products that use the GPL'd MySQL database must also be open source. MySQL's position is legally and morally in keeping with the spirit of the GPL: protecting users.
Why do you call this doubly accommodating arrangement "crap"?
Sure, PostgreSQL's BSD license is less restrictive, but why should MySQL (or anyone else) have to use that, if they don't want to? (The GPL is framed to guarantee certain freedoms to users; the BSD license grants complete freedom to those making products from the source, but does not protect users at all. I thought everyone had figured this out by now?)
Nice to hear someone else echo the sentiments of my last year's jeremiad. It's still amazing how many professionals fall for it. How ridiculous being forced to replace your equipment every year, and yet still not getting the quality we take for granted with 35mm... let alone medium format.
Details here. Do they still use MySQL?
As far as I know, Apple never shipped a Forth interpreter with Mac system software (although Power Macs around 10 years later did include one as part of Open Firmware, used during booting only).
A couple of years after Mac's introduction, Apple certainly did ship a complete Smalltalk environment for 68K Macs, as did several third party vendors.
PostScript was never part of the MacOS imaging model (and with OS X, still isn't) and in any case did not arrive on the scene for a year after 'the first Mac'. Once the LaserWriter shipped, the printer driver gained a primitive PS generator for the Mac's QuickDraw model.
(Much later, some imagesetter vendors and preflighting/soft proofing applications, and Ghostscript, of course, included PostScript implementations for specialised purposes. Even Adobe's graphic arts applications did not embed anything approaching a full PostScript implementation until quite recently.)
Marcin Wichary has compiled a great deal of Lisa information, from screenshots, ads, brochures and articles to posters and videos, at his site GUI Gallery Guidebook. Recent postings include 17 exclusive Lisa posters for download and enjoyment, and an interview with Dan Smith that reveals "The original trash can for Apple Lisa was supposed to have been an old, beat up alley trashcan, with the lid half open, flies buzzing around it and appropriate sounds as user put something inside."
The summary only claims that the 'interesting but quite unintuitive use of the switch/case construct' is originally Duff's device, not application to coroutines.
Have you Voted NO yet?
Only if you confuse 'reputation' with 'loudmouth /. trolling'.
Have you Voted yet?
n/t
don't give me lame-ass quotes and figures about how your Debian box that runs as a web server off of your xDSL line hasn't crashed in months
While I have plenty of lame-ass multi-year uptimes to quote from my own experience, I'd rather talk about Vxworks, NetBSD, embedded Linux, or a host of other embedded RTOS (often UNIX based) that are appropriate examples with appropriate operational records. Windows of any flavour has no appropriate operational record; the very thought of it is laughable. NASA doesn't send it to space and if I were a Navy sailor I wouldn't put my life in its hands either.
mission-critical hardware and software are a totally different environment,
Which is kind of the whole point, isn't it.
and I'm sure that with whatever OS is used for such tasks that thousands of man-hours are devoted to ensuring that system failures are the extreme exception
On the face of it, this seems sane; yet, with their reputation and future at stake, why has M$ so far failed to apply these "thousands of man-hours" to security and reliability of their costly products? Their record inspires no confidence whatsoever. I think if just one intelligent-man-hour had gone into this decision, things might have turned out a whole lot rosier for the Royal Navy.
The computers there are nothing more than graphical data and situational displays.
And why should these therefore be left prone to failure? Would you fly in an airliner that ran Windows for flight control? What if it just ran Windows for its "graphical data and situational displays"? By singling out the "relative unimportance" of these displays by way of defending an inappropriate technology choice (for any role), is a backwards to win the argument. But thanks for trying.
Does this question really need to be asked any longer?
Has this story teleported us all back to the year 2000? Hit the reset button? Is Slashdot's new motto "No hugging, no learning"?
I thought this was common knowledge. I didn't really expect a "pro-business" administration to do anything about it, did you? It's actually one of the few things that makes the rest of us feel safer.
Britain has the same problem, by the way:
Also see The Register which quotes an upbeat Armed Forces Minister:
Perhaps the Minister can now explain why his desktop PC doesn't even run properly.
Les Hatton gives his opinion at IT Week:
Of course, I was assuming that 'our' brains, with our education and knowledge intact, would be looking at the problem. Now imagine some kid with no education in numeracy, let alone mathematics or computer science, having to operate a computer and reverse engineer the file formats on it... So maybe we would need to carry forward libraries, and enough materials for people to learn the sciences necessary too. Oh, I know, let's just not have that apocalypse.
All true - but now that Google is a public company, I expect this focus to increasingly wander, because a whole set of concerns intrude that have nothing to do with shipping quality. That's got a lot to do with M$'s problem (and Adobe's, etc), methinks... Meeting quarterlies. Thousands of managers focused on CYA. All that irrelevant, expensive self-serving machinery.
(Actually GNU programs do implement those recommendations: bc, for instance.)
Yes, I realise this, but I was mainly pointing out what the reaction 'burn it!' says about the psychology of the executives. I don't have a problem with 'not releasing it', although I lament the absence of transparency among most corporate players. One doesn't have to be Michael Moore to know that they have plenty to hide. A string of high profile convictions lately is only the tip of the iceberg... How does this relate to software development, you ask? Well, it's more about what is good for the people who buy the software. Whereas business is preoccupied with what's good for business.