People naturally want to preserve the human race, not plants, animals, or the planet, per se.
There are plenty of people who think nature and other species have an intrinsic value, e.g. Arne Naess. It is also an important element of the beliefs of many indeginous peoples (see animism).
I think most have some kind of feeling that there are other values in nature worth fighting for beyond the survival of the human race. I'm pretty sure that most people who are concerned about the environment primarily aren't too troubled about the rational stuff, like the long term survival of mankind. What people care about is those majestic rain forrest trees being cut down or those poor gorillas being shot by poachers. If it was only about preserving the human race, few people would be interested. People are usually pretty immune to rational arguments -- just look at how hard it is to get people to stop smoking (or not starting in the first place).
Well, for starters, I doubt Linus would ever
accept a patch with chinese (or any other non-english language) variable names. To be able to hack Linux you need to know at least enough English to understand what the existing code does. So, using English for your own code shouldn't be that big a problem.
i18n is great, utf-8 is great, but using non-english languages when hacking free software is not so great -- at least if you want to share your code.
At one point, the macro language used in MS Word (WordBasic or whatever) was translated into Swedish in the Swedish version. Everything
was translated, including IF-THEN-ELSE statements etc. It was completely useless.
I'm not sure what gcc would say if you started using non-ascii utf-8 in your variable names though...
Exactly. I have a shirt that says "I hate purple", but I've never been threatened or attacked by people whose favorite color is purple. Most people just laugh.
On the other hand, when I wear my "shoot all black people" t-shirt, people start getting violent. Those anti-racist really are an uptight bunch of people.
Do you also expect your phone at work to be wire-tapped? Is it really unreasonable to expect your employer to have at least enough trust in you that they don't feel the need to monitor your phone calls, instant messages, email etc?
Opera probably has the best keyboard interface of the graphical browsers. Mozilla can be used without a mouse, but it's painful.
I've promised myself that one day, I'll hack Mozilla to make it work just like lynx/links, but I haven't had the time yet.
There are some -- dmoz.org, open encyclopedia projects, project
Gutenberg and others. But software development is different from
most other human activities in a way that makes it more suitable
for open-source style development and cooperation.
Software is almost completely technical (as opposed to artistic).
This means that it's easier to accept others modifying your work,
improving it and using parts of it in their own work. It's also
easier to cooperate over the Internet with people you don't know.
This is not the case with art, music, litterature etc.
Software is completely digital. All you need is a computer to
develop and use software. You can share information about anything
over the net -- tips, blue prints, recipies etc, but you can't share
the end product. You can share and help improve cookie recipies over the
Internet, but you can't share the actual cookies.
This doesn't mean that you can't collaborate over the internet on
artistic or non-digital projects, just not in the same way as
open source software. But I think it's hard for other types of
projects to be as successful.
Normally, no.
But there is actually a Linux
driver for Prism2 based cards that supports
BSS mode, ie it lets your linux box + Prism2 card
act as an access point.
Strangely enough, Hotmail works fine with lynx
(although it's a bit annoying). Of course you
need SSL support and you have to accept all those
invalid cookies. Also, when you get to a
redirection link
(http://lw9fd.law9.hotmail.msn.com/...&js=no)
, you need to change the last part
to js=yes (use shift-e to edit the link).
The new interface actually made things better for
us lynx users; IIRC a lot more features (e.g.
deleting mail) relied om JavaScript before but
they don't anymore.
Not that I recomend using Hotmail with lynx (or
using Hotmail at all) but if you're stuck with a
Hotmail email address and computer
illiterate friends, to whom email==hotmail, you
can at least check you're email.
Throughout history languages have borrowed words
from eachother -- this is nothing new. As a Swede
this is very apparant, as the Swedish language
contains words that are originaly German or
French. As culture/society/technology advances
new words are needed. Usually the word used where
the advancement was made is spread along with the
advancement, and adopted into other languages.
However, nowdays changes occur at such a fast
pace that there is no time to integrate the new
word into the language. Both the spelling, the
pronounciation and sometimes even the inflection
from the original language are kept. This can make
it feel awkward to use both in writing and in
speech. But if you try to translate the word it
can often feel even more awkward and harder to
understand. If you use the English word, at least
everyone knows what you're talking about. Its
also a pain to have to learn every word twice.
The question is whether the introduction of new
IT related words will one day slow down so all
non English languages get a chance to catch up,
or if English word will continue to pollute all
other languages until we're all basically
speaking English, but using different grammar.
Being GPL compatible is not one of Debians requirements on the packages in main, DFSG-compliance is. As an example, Qt2 is included in Potato/main since the QPL meets the requirements of the DFSG, but (according to Debian) it isn't GPL-compatible.
OK, I admit, it was a while since I read the GPL, and I've only skimmed through the QPL, so I can't really tell if you're right or wrong wrt the legal issues (furthermore IANAL and English isn't my native language, so reading the licenses would probably not help much).
However, according to RMS, the QPL (and the use of Qt) is in fact incompatible with the GPL. RMS is possibly a bit biased, but he did write the GPL, so either he's lying or at least the intention of the GPL makes it incompatible with linking to Qt. (This doesn't mean there aren't any unintentional loop holes). You claim that it is legal to distribute GPL'd programs that link to Motif (without adding an exception, I assume), do you have any examples? IIRC emacs (at some point?) was distributed with an added exception that explicitly allowed linking to Motif.
What I feel is most disturbing about your post is that you seem to imply that the Debian developers are using the legal (non)issue just as an excuse for not distributing KDE, since they simply hate KDE for some unspecified reason. This sounds more like a conspiracy theory than reality to me. Debian is the most open and democratic open-source project I know of. Anyone can join Debian -- just say "Hi, I want to package foo", and you will be given one vote like everyone else. If Debian is excluding KDE driven by hatred, that means that a majority of Debian developers either share these feelings, don't care or simply aren't aware of it. What makes this even more unrealistic is the fact that AFAICT Debian is the distro that has the largest variety and alternatives of packages. Just look at the list of texteditors or window managers in Debian. It seems more likely that the evil Debian developers you discribe would say: "we will only include $MY_FAVORITE_EDITOR. All other editors have broken licenses.".
As I said earlier, I can't really tell if distributing KDE is legal or not. But I think it's pretty clear that your description of Debian is unfair and untrue.
Note: I am use Debian, but I'm not a developer, and I neither use nor develope KDE or Gnome.
However, Bruce Perens's chapter in the book Open Sources (you can read it online) contains a nice overview of the most common open-source licenses. That's probably the closest you'll get. Also, search/. for previous discussions on the subject (especially the Ask Slashdot section, eg this one). Who knows, you might find one or two helpful comments.
When it comes to bi-directional web-browsing, have you checked out Mozilla? There seems to be some work on bi-directional text, but I don't know if/how it's working. Maybe you should get in touch with them, and maybe offer them your help?
While localization is nice and makes computers accesible to more people, the most important thing isn't the language of the menues, buttons and other parts of the UI, or even to translate documentation. What's most important for me as a non-english user is that the software works with my language, that I can use my alphabet when creating documents and writing text, that my web browser shows web pages in my language correctly, that I can check the spelling of my own language etc
It isn't that difficult to learn enough English to be able to use English software. Instead, using computers and of course, the Internet, is a great way to learn English. Not knowing English means most of the content on the web is totally useless to you. Also, any non-english content on the web is totally useless for anyone who doesn't speak that specific language.
So, while I think it's vital that people can use their own languages so that they survive, you need to speak English to communicate with the rest of the world.
I don't understand. In what way is the merger between Warner Music and EMI vertical? I may be completely wrong, but I've always understood it as that they're both record companies, and thus competitors in the same market.
Another reason why this is bad is that EMI was (AFAIK) the only free-standing record company among the five giants.
It was a long time since I installed Debian, but I think the problem is that you also need to get the base system, which basicly is a large tgz-file containing the most basic parts of a GNU/Linux system. From there you can use apt to download everything else.
I'm not sure how well the potato boot disks are working, you can always use the slink disks instead, and then install potato from there.
If I understood this correctly, the vending machines would use some kind of thermometer to measure the temperature. In that case, all you have to do is find the thermometer and apply some ice or something. I wonder how low the price can get. . .
It's interesting, Joe Pranevich's piece about what's new in Linux 2.4 at www.linuxtoday.org didn't make it to/., but when a crappy C|Net article, which is more or less a summary of Joe's article, appears -- that's news. One would think that us/. geeks would be more interested in Joe's, more technical and detailed article, than C|Net's easy-digestible version.
I mean, the time when it instantly was "News for Nerd", whenever mainstream press (or something remotely resembling it) just mentioned Linux in an article is long gone. IMO Joe's article is much more NfN. Stm., than the C|Net one. </slightly OT>
<extremely OT> Sorry, but I've always wondered: Why do C|Net have that pipe in their name (or is it just the logo)? What is it supposed to mean? </extremely OT>
I know nothing about law, but I think there's some (very obscure) part of copyright law (at least in Sweden) that allows you to make photocopies of an out of print book, which you can't find a copy of -- at least for educational use.
At least that's what one of my teachers once claimed when he made copies for the whole class of 50+ pages out of an old schoolbook of which he didn't have more than a hand full of copies.
Try Rosegarden. The new version (3.0) will be a complete rewrite, but development seems a bit slow (I think the main developer is away for a while). There's also kooBase, which I haven't been able to compile yet, and Jazz (shareware)
This page is a good place for music/sound software for Linux.
Slashdot Mirror
I think most have some kind of feeling that there are other values in nature worth fighting for beyond the survival of the human race. I'm pretty sure that most people who are concerned about the environment primarily aren't too troubled about the rational stuff, like the long term survival of mankind. What people care about is those majestic rain forrest trees being cut down or those poor gorillas being shot by poachers. If it was only about preserving the human race, few people would be interested. People are usually pretty immune to rational arguments -- just look at how hard it is to get people to stop smoking (or not starting in the first place).
i18n is great, utf-8 is great, but using non-english languages when hacking free software is not so great -- at least if you want to share your code.
At one point, the macro language used in MS Word (WordBasic or whatever) was translated into Swedish in the Swedish version. Everything was translated, including IF-THEN-ELSE statements etc. It was completely useless.
I'm not sure what gcc would say if you started using non-ascii utf-8 in your variable names though...
On the other hand, when I wear my "shoot all black people" t-shirt, people start getting violent. Those anti-racist really are an uptight bunch of people.
Do you also expect your phone at work to be wire-tapped? Is it really unreasonable to expect your employer to have at least enough trust in you that they don't feel the need to monitor your phone calls, instant messages, email etc?
Opera probably has the best keyboard interface of the graphical browsers. Mozilla can be used without a mouse, but it's painful. I've promised myself that one day, I'll hack Mozilla to make it work just like lynx/links, but I haven't had the time yet.
Better yet, teach her to do 'fakeroot debian/rules binary'. This will do everything for you and create a nice deb-package ready to install.
- Software is almost completely technical (as opposed to artistic).
This means that it's easier to accept others modifying your work,
improving it and using parts of it in their own work. It's also
easier to cooperate over the Internet with people you don't know.
This is not the case with art, music, litterature etc.
- Software is completely digital. All you need is a computer to
develop and use software. You can share information about anything
over the net -- tips, blue prints, recipies etc, but you can't share
the end product. You can share and help improve cookie recipies over the
Internet, but you can't share the actual cookies.
This doesn't mean that you can't collaborate over the internet on artistic or non-digital projects, just not in the same way as open source software. But I think it's hard for other types of projects to be as successful.Normally, no. But there is actually a Linux driver for Prism2 based cards that supports BSS mode, ie it lets your linux box + Prism2 card act as an access point.
The new interface actually made things better for us lynx users; IIRC a lot more features (e.g. deleting mail) relied om JavaScript before but they don't anymore.
Not that I recomend using Hotmail with lynx (or using Hotmail at all) but if you're stuck with a Hotmail email address and computer illiterate friends, to whom email==hotmail, you can at least check you're email.
Gotmail is pretty cool too.
The question is whether the introduction of new IT related words will one day slow down so all non English languages get a chance to catch up, or if English word will continue to pollute all other languages until we're all basically speaking English, but using different grammar.
Apparently you don't.
But if you're not interested in Debian news, why haven't you excluded Debian in you preferences?
zerblat uses Debian.
However, according to RMS, the QPL (and the use of Qt) is in fact incompatible with the GPL. RMS is possibly a bit biased, but he did write the GPL, so either he's lying or at least the intention of the GPL makes it incompatible with linking to Qt. (This doesn't mean there aren't any unintentional loop holes). You claim that it is legal to distribute GPL'd programs that link to Motif (without adding an exception, I assume), do you have any examples? IIRC emacs (at some point?) was distributed with an added exception that explicitly allowed linking to Motif.
What I feel is most disturbing about your post is that you seem to imply that the Debian developers are using the legal (non)issue just as an excuse for not distributing KDE, since they simply hate KDE for some unspecified reason. This sounds more like a conspiracy theory than reality to me. Debian is the most open and democratic open-source project I know of. Anyone can join Debian -- just say "Hi, I want to package foo", and you will be given one vote like everyone else. If Debian is excluding KDE driven by hatred, that means that a majority of Debian developers either share these feelings, don't care or simply aren't aware of it. What makes this even more unrealistic is the fact that AFAICT Debian is the distro that has the largest variety and alternatives of packages. Just look at the list of texteditors or window managers in Debian. It seems more likely that the evil Debian developers you discribe would say: "we will only include $MY_FAVORITE_EDITOR. All other editors have broken licenses.".
As I said earlier, I can't really tell if distributing KDE is legal or not. But I think it's pretty clear that your description of Debian is unfair and untrue.
Note: I am use Debian, but I'm not a developer, and I neither use nor develope KDE or Gnome.
However, Bruce Perens's chapter in the book Open Sources (you can read it online) contains a nice overview of the most common open-source licenses. That's probably the closest you'll get. Also, search /. for previous discussions on the subject (especially the Ask Slashdot section, eg this one). Who knows, you might find one or two helpful comments.
When it comes to bi-directional web-browsing, have you checked out Mozilla? There seems to be some work on bi-directional text, but I don't know if/how it's working. Maybe you should get in touch with them, and maybe offer them your help?
It isn't that difficult to learn enough English to be able to use English software. Instead, using computers and of course, the Internet, is a great way to learn English. Not knowing English means most of the content on the web is totally useless to you. Also, any non-english content on the web is totally useless for anyone who doesn't speak that specific language.
So, while I think it's vital that people can use their own languages so that they survive, you need to speak English to communicate with the rest of the world.
Another reason why this is bad is that EMI was (AFAIK) the only free-standing record company among the five giants.
It was a long time since I installed Debian, but I think the problem is that you also need to get the base system, which basicly is a large tgz-file containing the most basic parts of a GNU/Linux system. From there you can use apt to download everything else.
I'm not sure how well the potato boot disks are working, you can always use the slink disks instead, and then install potato from there.
Because they didn't anticipate that some other entity would want to use their packaging system when they chose the name?
If I understood this correctly, the vending machines would use some kind of thermometer to measure the temperature. In that case, all you have to do is find the thermometer and apply some ice or something. I wonder how low the price can get. . .
Sorry. I was obducted by little gray men and suffered from missing time.
It's interesting, Joe Pranevich's piece about what's new in Linux 2.4 at www.linuxtoday.org didn't make it to
I mean, the time when it instantly was "News for Nerd", whenever mainstream press (or something remotely resembling it) just mentioned Linux in an article is long gone. IMO Joe's article is much more NfN. Stm., than the C|Net one.
</slightly OT>
<extremely OT>
Sorry, but I've always wondered: Why do C|Net have that pipe in their name (or is it just the logo)? What is it supposed to mean?
</extremely OT>
At least that's what one of my teachers once claimed when he made copies for the whole class of 50+ pages out of an old schoolbook of which he didn't have more than a hand full of copies.
I wonder when Beta is coming. . .
This page is a good place for music/sound software for Linux.