Hey, I think Cygnus is cool too, but this just doesn't make much sense to me. The title of the press release is "CYGNUS ANNOUNCES EMBEDDED LINUX OFFERING; PRE-EMPTS LINUX FRAGMENTATION", and it's subtitled "New EL/IX API Enables Developers to Extend Linux into Embedded Computing Environments". There are two misleading statements here: first, that Linux is about to fragment and we need Cygnus to save us, and second, that Linux isn't capable of running in an embedded system right now. The first one is just plain stupid; that one's easy. The second one is a little more fuzzy.
It's true that the stock kernels are missing some stuff that some embedded projects need. Maybe you need flash-disk drivers or real-time scheduling. And if Cygnus wants to jump in and provide these services, that's great (just so we all realize they're not the only ones). But a stock Linux kernel works great for a lot of embedded systems.
The real point here seems to be building some kind of a bridge between Cygnus' eCos embedded OS and Linux, so that apps that are a little too heavy for eCos can move to Linux and keep a common API. That's cool, too. But this press release portrays that as the savior of the embedded-linux world, and that's just degrading. It makes me respect Cygnus a little less.
When I asked O'Reilly in July about a new revision of Rubini's book, they told me that he wasn't doing the next revision and they were in search of somebody to do it.
I really wish that a 2.2 version of the book was available. It sucks having to second-guess everything you read: "the book says foo. Guess I better go hunt on the web for a while to see if that's still the case".
For me, the biggest issue is whether or not I can switch providers if mine doesn't provide a good level of service. For me, that means DSL, because I'm not forced to deal with USWest's ISP. I get static IPs, an ISP that really knows their stuff, and tons of bandwidth. And if my provider ever pisses me off, I'm gone.
On the very first page, the author says "My advice is: Don't let ideology get in the way of business," and then he's promptly abandoned by a vendor who changes the licensing model. Amazingly, he can't seem to put this together to realize that open-source ideologies often make good business sense. If he hadn't gone proprietary, he wouldn't have been left in the cold by the controlling vendor. A mildly interesting article, but he misses the most obvious lesson.
But do "revived" brain cells help you do useful things? Or, perhaps, are those simply "idiot" cells that the more advanced brain cells have killed out of mercy? It sure would be disappointing to go get my "brain cell revival" treatment, and find out that those were the brain cells that thought BASIC was cool.
Or maybe those are "evil" cells that want me to kill and devour my roommates?
...ran a story on Linux just because 2.2 was released and it was such a momentous achievement. Now 2.4 is around the corner and no one seems really worked up, which means less press for us.
Good.
Why? Because it's a kernel, not a car. The Linux kernel shouldn't depend on a public relations blitz to be good. It should be good because the code kicks ass. Having the media sit up and take notice is fine. I'll be thrilled when 2.4 is out. But I wish the media would take the view that free software is like a steamroller. It just keeps grinding forward, getting slightly better every day, while commercial software is constantly running this way and that trying to chase dollars.
Sigh. Unfortunately this method would also be against the license agreement. Remember, the license specifically forbids using the beta compiler for anything besides evaluation and testing.
There's a difference between what they print and what's legally binding. It's probably time for a lawyer to weigh in here, but from what little I know I strongly suspect that sentence can't be legally binding. If it's not legally binding, it may as well not be there. So I wouldn't be breaking any promises by offering object code to folks who might use it in ways that don't exactly please almighty Compaq.
Your high moral standards are admirable. But if that license wouldn't stand a strong legal breeze, I don't think your eternal soul is in any danger:)
I said: I hope that the GCC/EGCS folks download this compiler, compile a bunch of test cases with both it and GCC/EGCS, and then find all the good bits in the final assembler and put those sort of optimizations into GCC/EGCS.
jwb responds: I don't hope for anything of that sort. I believe that such an action would constitute reverse engineering of the Compaq compiler, and would therefore be against the explicit language of the license agreement.
Then I would say, get a third party to download the compiler, agree to the license agreement, compile the test cases, and then send the object files over to the GCC/EGCS folks. Do you really think that just because Compaq happened to implement a certain optimization that nobody else should be permitted to? That's just not right. And don't you think that other commercial compiler authors are looking at their competition's optimizations?
There's nothing immoral about reverse engineering.
I hope that the GCC/EGCS folks download this compiler, compile a bunch of test cases with both it and GCC/EGCS, and then find all the good bits in the final assembler and put those sort of optimizations into GCC/EGCS.
And then we can all tell Compaq where to put their non-free compiler.
A. It's impossible to determine whether a blank piece of media is destined to be used to duplicate copyrighted material.
B. At over $2 per CD-R, I'd buy my media from Afghanistan if I had to.
C. Copyrighted material can be stored on lots of other media- attempting to tax one media is a slippery slope... what, are you going to add a $200 tax on hard drives because you could store music on them?
Why doesn't somebody track down the MS sound driver spec and write a pseudo-driver that simply redirects the digital data back toward a userspace utility, which then saves the clean data in a file? Then you could... sanitize... any "secure" format on any computer, even one with no soundcard.
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There is an article at EE Times about this.
Hey, I think Cygnus is cool too, but this just doesn't make much sense to me. The title of the press release is "CYGNUS ANNOUNCES EMBEDDED LINUX OFFERING; PRE-EMPTS LINUX FRAGMENTATION", and it's subtitled "New EL/IX API Enables Developers to Extend Linux into Embedded Computing Environments". There are two misleading statements here: first, that Linux is about to fragment and we need Cygnus to save us, and second, that Linux isn't capable of running in an embedded system right now. The first one is just plain stupid; that one's easy. The second one is a little more fuzzy.
It's true that the stock kernels are missing some stuff that some embedded projects need. Maybe you need flash-disk drivers or real-time scheduling. And if Cygnus wants to jump in and provide these services, that's great (just so we all realize they're not the only ones). But a stock Linux kernel works great for a lot of embedded systems.
The real point here seems to be building some kind of a bridge between Cygnus' eCos embedded OS and Linux, so that apps that are a little too heavy for eCos can move to Linux and keep a common API. That's cool, too. But this press release portrays that as the savior of the embedded-linux world, and that's just degrading. It makes me respect Cygnus a little less.
When I asked O'Reilly in July about a new revision of Rubini's book, they told me that he wasn't doing the next revision and they were in search of somebody to do it.
I really wish that a 2.2 version of the book was available. It sucks having to second-guess everything you read: "the book says foo. Guess I better go hunt on the web for a while to see if that's still the case".
For me, the biggest issue is whether or not I can switch providers if mine doesn't provide a good level of service. For me, that means DSL, because I'm not forced to deal with USWest's ISP. I get static IPs, an ISP that really knows their stuff, and tons of bandwidth. And if my provider ever pisses me off, I'm gone.
Can you do that with cable modems?
On the very first page, the author says "My advice is: Don't let ideology get in the way of business," and then he's promptly abandoned by a vendor who changes the licensing model. Amazingly, he can't seem to put this together to realize that open-source ideologies often make good business sense. If he hadn't gone proprietary, he wouldn't have been left in the cold by the controlling vendor. A mildly interesting article, but he misses the most obvious lesson.
Excellent.
There's hope for me yet.
But do "revived" brain cells help you do useful things? Or, perhaps, are those simply "idiot" cells that the more advanced brain cells have killed out of mercy? It sure would be disappointing to go get my "brain cell revival" treatment, and find out that those were the brain cells that thought BASIC was cool.
Or maybe those are "evil" cells that want me to kill and devour my roommates?
Hmmm. Maybe steamroller doesn't sound too good (read The First 20 Million is Always the Hardest). Maybe it's more like a tank doing about 70 MPH.
...ran a story on Linux just because 2.2 was released and it was such a momentous achievement. Now 2.4 is around the corner and no one seems really worked up, which means less press for us.
Good.
Why? Because it's a kernel, not a car. The Linux kernel shouldn't depend on a public relations blitz to be good. It should be good because the code kicks ass. Having the media sit up and take notice is fine. I'll be thrilled when 2.4 is out. But I wish the media would take the view that free software is like a steamroller. It just keeps grinding forward, getting slightly better every day, while commercial software is constantly running this way and that trying to chase dollars.
OK, I take it back. ThinkGeek is cool :) The secure submission part is there now. Looks like it was just a badly timed misconfiguration on their end.
My order's going in now.
I was thrilled to finally get into ThinkGeek and wandered around putting together an armload of stuff.
... insecure submission of credit card numbers?
Proceed to checkout, and
Bad. No order for you.
Sigh. Unfortunately this method would also be against the license agreement. Remember, the license specifically forbids using the beta compiler for anything besides evaluation and testing.
:)
There's a difference between what they print and what's legally binding. It's probably time for a lawyer to weigh in here, but from what little I know I strongly suspect that sentence can't be legally binding. If it's not legally binding, it may as well not be there. So I wouldn't be breaking any promises by offering object code to folks who might use it in ways that don't exactly please almighty Compaq.
Your high moral standards are admirable. But if that license wouldn't stand a strong legal breeze, I don't think your eternal soul is in any danger
I said: I hope that the GCC/EGCS folks download this compiler, compile a bunch of test cases with both it and GCC/EGCS, and then find all the good bits in the final assembler and put those sort of optimizations into GCC/EGCS.
jwb responds: I don't hope for anything of that sort. I believe that such an action would constitute reverse engineering of the Compaq compiler, and would therefore be against the explicit language of the license agreement.
Then I would say, get a third party to download the compiler, agree to the license agreement, compile the test cases, and then send the object files over to the GCC/EGCS folks. Do you really think that just because Compaq happened to implement a certain optimization that nobody else should be permitted to? That's just not right. And don't you think that other commercial compiler authors are looking at their competition's optimizations?
There's nothing immoral about reverse engineering.
I hope that the GCC/EGCS folks download this compiler, compile a bunch of test cases with both it and GCC/EGCS, and then find all the good bits in the final assembler and put those sort of optimizations into GCC/EGCS.
And then we can all tell Compaq where to put their non-free compiler.
A. It's impossible to determine whether a blank piece of media is destined to be used to duplicate copyrighted material.
B. At over $2 per CD-R, I'd buy my media from Afghanistan if I had to.
C. Copyrighted material can be stored on lots of other media- attempting to tax one media is a slippery slope... what, are you going to add a $200 tax on hard drives because you could store music on them?
A+B+C = somebody's smoking crack.
This must be some definition of "work" that I'm not familiar with.
Why doesn't somebody track down the MS sound driver spec and write a pseudo-driver that simply redirects the digital data back toward a userspace utility, which then saves the clean data in a file? Then you could... sanitize... any "secure" format on any computer, even one with no soundcard.