Damages are for a court to decide. To be sure, EULAs and licenses may contain boilerplate specifying violation penalties but it doesn't necessarily follow that they can be enforced. One of the design goals of the GPL is to be valid in as many jurisdictions as possible. Including a damages cause would weaken that. It may be contrary to it's designers' strategies as well. Both the SFLC and FSF have said that most GPL violations are resolved quietly.
All I'm saying is that Jackson's misdeeds don't automatically mean that MS' activities in the US are Simon pure or that the government didn't have a case. I was actually quite annoyed at Jackson because I believe MS should have been MaBelled to the dogs and back and his screw up foreclosed any chance of that happening.
Judges are human and can get disgusted same as anyone else. MS pulled a lot of shenanigans and were caught in many out and out falsehoods during the trial. Jackson's stupidity was in running his mouth rather than saving his (properly formulated) opinion of MS for the bench. MS has also been found guilty of abusing a monopoly and Europe and are trying every trick in the book to blunt that. The legal machinery of other economies busting MS for the same thing tends make the findings here look more credible.
Most who use and create FOSS won't promise you better than the windows stuff you're using now. They'll start and improve their projects and occasionally rival commercial products. Sometimes it so happens the FOSS world will create something you like, use and enjoy!
One of the goals for KDE4 is to remove inherent dependencies on X11 and other UNIXisms and make the primary dependencies of KDE apps QT, kdelibs, and some other non-X11 libs. Furthermore, QT4 will be available as a GPLed library on unix-type, Windows, and OS X platforms. To make a long story short, the Windows and OS X versions of KDE applications won't need X11 or UNIX compatibility layers to run. Now I must hasten to point out that the KDE Workspace isn't being ported away from Linux and Unix. It doesn't make much sense to run kdesktop, kwin, and the panels on the other platforms. KDE4 on Windows and Mac OS X will be a set of libraries and services that let the major KDE apps run so you have things like Amarok, Konqueror, and yes, Krita on (natively) Windows.
The version of Gimp I'm using right now has a slider for brush size. It is the current development prerelease and I don't know how long it has had the feature but the feature seems a bit on the obvious side and has likely been present for at least the 2.x series of the app.
YMMV depending on the window manager you use. With kwin, I can give Gimp it's own desktop and use tab to bring up and dismiss all windows. It is also common with X window manager windows in general to "pin" them which means they stay in the foreground even you are doing work in the background. It is handy to pin tool windows, put them somewhere convenient (so I can work on the canvas with the window handy), then dismiss entirely when I won't need something else for awhile. Basically, Gimp was developed on X-Window and is a reasonably civilized app with a good Window manager.
Thing is, we hear day in and day out that not being UI identical to PhotoShop down to 6 submenus deep means that Gimp is utter crap. All these Photoshop experts never remember that they were once newbs and spent a few months or years deeply learning Photoshop. There are legitimate criticisms of Gimp, it has an 8-bit per channel colorspace limitation which very much limits the applications it is appropriate for and there isn't much in the way to color accurately use it's output in professional publishing even if it didn't have the 8-bit limitation.
So actually, the more whingy of the PhotoShop users could use some reminding that from other eyes their tool of choice isn't necessary UI nirvana.
They have it in Krita. Due to the years it has been around, Gimp has more bells and whistles but Krita has the advantage of being designed with 32bit colorspaces from the ground up. Now Gimp is supposed to be refactored around a library called GEGL that will address that and some other issues. This has been "coming soon" for a number of years now. I bet Krita reaches feature parity with Gimp before Gimp's colorspace limitations are fixed.
Come KDE4, it will be easily possible to run Krita in OS X and Windows. That increase in userbase usually seems to draw more developer attention.
I was supposing the DRM doesn't care what files Samba accesses and so it is no threat to the manufacture to include a GPLv3 Samba because a modified Samba will have no more and no less rights than the unmodified Samba that comes with the device. Suppose, for instance, the device is a game console that runs a sandboxed version of Linux. The DRM may prevent access to the underlying video hardware or to various interesting bits outside the sandbox. Since the Samba the device comes with plays no part in this and has no special privileges, it is no threat to this manufacturer to include a GPLv3 Samba (unless of course he has some juicy network file server patents he wants to be a troll with.....). The user can replace and run it to his heart's content.
Now if this only somewhat hypothetical console ran a GPLv3 kernel then your arguments would have more force. The anti-DRM provisions of the GPL aren't meant to put an end to any and all DRM on a device you may run such code on. It is possible for DRM on a device to be orthoganal to many categories of GPLv3 code that might run on it. The anti-DRM provisions are only meant to ensure you can modify and run that GPLv3 code with the same abilities as manufacturer supplied GPLv3 code.
How was it shoddy? Jackson's penalty (the breakup of MS) was overturned (due to his stupidity) but the government's legal win was not. MS was found guilty of abusing their monopoly position. It is true they got a slap on the wrist but found guilty they were.
It doesn't affect MS' own products at all unless they directly incorporate GPL code (not happening). What could happen is that if MS distributes these coupons which are then redeemed for a version of SLED with GPLv3 code then any downstream user of the GPLv3 code has a (possibly) potent legal defense if MS later attempts a patent suit. Basically, this is revenge for Ballmer crowing that the only legal Linux is through a vendor they've made one of their deals with.
They have however put up a WebKit cvs server with a reasonably well documented codebase up. I suppose they may be in technical breach of the LGPL but since the khtml guys have been getting sufficiently good information to port some of Apple's enhancements back from Webkit that may be why they aren't terribly fussed. The khtml guys are looking to improve their own project rather Safari or WebKit (which is fair enough IMHO. Apple got a clean rendering engine on the cheap when they needed one fast). Apple has been co-operating with this. Some within KDE even want to adopt WebKit and then use it as an upstream project.
As for that "explicit permission" I suppose the use of the LGPL would make a pretty good defense if someone were to go digging around for relevant info that the WebKit source isn't giving them. It doesn't seem terribly likely to come up and it would open a can of worms for Apple.
All Apple has to do is not foreclose running modified versions of any GPLv3 software they ship. Their recent history with GPLv2 stuff has been reasonably classy. OS X kernel and most of the userland isn't covered by any form of the GPL. Tivoization generally refers to locking down Free software with hardware DRM so that only the manufacturer of a device can modify the software. Apple isn't doing this. Apple doesn't ship any GPLv3 kernels or bootloaders on their hardware so they aren't tivoizing. Apple DOES use hardware DRM to disallow (legally) booting OS X on non-Apple approved hardware. Some don't like this but it isn't tivoization. They also seem to be backing away from their open Darwin BSD environment since hacked Darwin bits have been used to replace the parts of OS X that participate in DRM checks but that isn't tivoization either but even if it is, Apple is the copyright holder of a non-GPLv3 codebase and can do with it as they like. I say that isn't Tivoization because while core bits of OS X are based on OSS, these are permissible proprietary forks.
Now Apple has used GPL and LGPLed code for things like web browsers and smb daemons but modifications to those don't affect the things Apple wants to protect. IMHO, GPLv3 doesn't seem to be an anti-DRM threat to them if they use such code as they have used GPLv2 in the past. They may not like the patent provisions but that is another kettle of fish and doesn't have anything to do with tivoization.
Technically speaking, wouldn't this manufacturer only have to make it possible to run modified Sambas and other modified GPLv3 bits they might of used? Say the rest of the userland was some modified BSD code, that could still stay shut?
In practice, I imagine such DRM would be done by signing an entire firmware image. Future practitioners of such DRM would just have to isolate the bits that really need to be sooper-sekrit if they want to use GPLv3 code.
This is precisely why devices like the iPhone completely fail to excite me: the screwed up technical market for cell phones in the US. If I don't like my carrier then I'm faced with the loss of my mp3 player, personal organizer, GPS, and whatever other functions my all-in-one WonderWidget does. I only use my phone for making and receiving calls. When I can swap phones and carriers as easily as I can with landlines then I'll be interested in phones that do more than just handle calls.
SCO didn't obtain anything directly from AT&T. Novell bought SYSV Unix from AT&T and took over as the licensor of interest. Novell in turn allowed what is commonly called oldSCO (The Santa Cruz Organization) to act as their sales agent. THAT contract allowed oldSCO to sell UNIX licenses on behalf of Novell. All monies from such sales were to be turned over to Novell and then Novell would pay them a 5% commission. oldSCO also got the ability to exercise the copyrights on the official UNIX manuals as part of this arrangement. At no time did oldSCO ever have possession of the SYSV copyrights (those were specifically reserved by Novell). The SCO going around calling itself SCO is "The SCO Group". "The SCO Group" is actually what used to be Caldera Linux. Caldera bought the UNIX sub licensing business from oldSCO (which is now called Tarantella and is also now a Sun subsidiary) then changed their name to "The SCO Group". In "SCO Group" form they have made no end of self-serving wild claims about both the original AT&T contracts and the nature of oldSCO's contract with Novell. The CEO of SCO Darl McBride and his boss Ralph Yarro have long and sordid histories of trying to hit the Lawsuit Lottery.
The article in the $echo newsletter came out because of some ancient FUD. One of the uglier things to happen in the Unix wars was to cast doubt on the legality of your competitor's code (My how things stay the same!). The article was an attempt to put a stop to it since the FUD also affect AT&T's UNIX business. AT&T was indeed legally sloppy. The SCO Group's problem is that the Nazgul are not and are getting depos from many of the actual people involved with those contracts.
Well, I've always said that the only thing compatible with every version of Office is to just HAVE every version of Office. You'll probably need three virtual machines to pull it off but you can't have everything....
I suspect for ODF the Office 97 users are out of luck.
So your legal theory is that what the FSF has published about the GPL can be used as evidence to explain what the license "really" says? That would render contracts rather meaningless if one party can hold the other party responsible for things outside the contract. I think the most likely outcome would be a judge admonishing the first party for not including all of the terms in the contract itself.
I don't think that is what the parent is driving at. For instance, SCO is trying get a VERY self-serving and contradictory take on the original AT&T Unix licensing agreements past the Utah court. Basically, SCO is trying to claim that things like IBM's JFS filesystem by virtue of having been an extension of AIX which is a partial fork of AT&T that IBM had no right to contribute it to Linux. IBM has cited an article in AT&T's "$echo" newsletter that states AT&T doesn't consider a licensees home-grown extensions of Unix as AT&T's property. The "$echo" newsletter article doesn't change or extend the contract. It clarifies that a licensee's wholly original add-ons to UNIX belong soley to the licensee. In short, it is evidence of AT&T's intent in executing their UNIX contracts. Why wouldn't a judge consider it? In the same way, the FSF's public statements and preamble to GPL consistently state what their intentions were in drafting the GPL. The intent isn't to retroactively extend the GPL, the intent is to foreclose creative and self-serving interpretations like SCO has tried to do with AT&T's Unix licensing agreements.
Incidentally, SCO has tried to claim the GPL is unconstitutional. In recent years (snort!) they have backed off trying to do this. SCO still distributes GPL code and Fyodor of nmap has revoked their license to distribute since he takes telling a Federal judge that the GPL is constitutionally invalid as a public rejection of the GPL; it is argued that merely saying you don't like the GPL doesn't remove the protections that it grants and I agree but telling a real judge in a real court that you don't think the license valid or binding is a whole other kettle of fish. I'm not sure how legally sound that is but SCO did cease distributing nmap; I'll bet that was the wake-up call to lay off the GPL-is-unconstitutional garbage.
Office 2007 is displacing the versions of Office this plugin supports. Any word when this will be extended to the latest Office? Or does is it already compatible?
".odt" is "Open Document Text. ".ods" is "Open Document Spreadsheet" and ".odp" is "Open Document Presentation". There are some other ".odX" extensions for things like vector drawings and "Master Documents". The entire family of XML based document formats is "ODF".
It doesn't surprise me in the least that such goings on are common at Best Buy but any computer repair shop that doesn't have good supervision is prone to this. A lot of so-called techs are just good ole boys doing what has a paycheck in it this week. A tech I used to work with delighted in calling the whole service dept. over when he came across some extra unusual porn. They did end up firing the guy but it wasn't for digging through the customer's files. The manager would just tell him to knock it off.
In the end what you are doing is turning over a box with a good chunk of your personal life over to someone in a fairly low paid service job. The brighter and better ones were graduated from end-user PCs to servers and called "engineers". It is a total abuse of what it truly means to be an engineer but most of those guys were above that sort of thing.
There will only be the year when people realize that most everyone else is running Linux, too.
That would be nice but it isn't necessary. Linux only has to get as big in it's domain as Firefox is in web browsing. Firefox has enough market and mind share that most websites can't afford to ignore it. A nice side effect is that if a site works well in Firefox then it will also work well for Safari, Opera, or whatever standards compliant browser you like. So to continue this line of thought, Linux only has to match OS X in market share. If desktop Linux had those sorts of percentages then application houses and hardware manufacturers have to pay commensurate attention.
I'm not saying that will necessarily happen either but it is an easier goal than almost completely displacing Windows. Linux doesn't have to completely displace Windows. It just has to be big enough to shrug off market and legal assaults. A healthy desktop share for Linux would have the same effect Firefox has in web browsing too: It will be easier for other OSes to be fully functional desktops in the face of the large share MS would still have.
ATI drivers suck in both Windows and Linux although I'll allow that the install on the Windows side is probably easier. As for the apps, I NEVER advise anyone to approach Linux as a substitute for Windows; it is it's own environment with it's own strengths and weaknesses.
As far as hardware goes, boot prospective boxes with a recent version of Knoppix or other heavy-functionality livecd. If that goes well THEN go for the full install. Otherwise, replace or research the problem components before committing to a hard drive install. Joe Random hardware tends as you say to be iffy (can be true of Windows too!). I always check anything I buy for Linux compatibility first.
If your idea of a functional machine is one that runs all your old familiar Windows apps then that a Windows machine is the best thing for you and your workplace. Just keep the thing behind a firewall, keep the OS and apps patched, and approach anything that touches the network like email and web surfing with a touch of paranoia.
The only reason Linux even has those "sort-of-look-the-same-apps" is because if we held our breath waiting for Windows dev houses to take care of us we'd turn pretty blue. As you define the problem, I don't know what the answer is. At least most of those sorta-kinda apps are good enough for some people.
I don't discuss with zealots, and that's the kind of person with whom I now believe I'm dealing.
Pot. Kettle. Black.....and likewise.
I'm sorry that you don't understand why your behavior is offensive, because that means you won't learn to repair.
Again, right back at you. You yourself are doing something offensive: You make controversial statements and when others disagree with you (which makes me no zealot) you then say that it isn't quite what you meant. If you're going to say things like "I believe GPLv3 is GPL's swan song, and I can't be happier that it's going away. It's time for people who write open source to stop closing it." then why are you surprised to get contrary answers? That's rhetorical. You aren't responding after all. Get the beam out of your own eye first before talking to others about their behavior. That statement both makes a contrary assertion "I believe GPLv3 is GPL's swan song." (which is fine BTW. I don't agree but it is fine.) and impugns the motives of those who write GPL software "It's time for people who write open source to stop closing it." Perhaps you meant something else? That it only makes you sad and not seriously miffed? There are only so many ways that can be taken and most them are well past simple disagreement. It is IMHO a rather ugly take on what the intentions of GPL authors are. I didn't take something the way you wanted me too. Big deal. It IS the way you come off.
I have this take on what you say because for all that you protest "I'm no hardcore BSD advocate" you sound like you're channeling Brett Glass: "Real men don't give code to just some people." You say that you use several licenses out of rightness flexibility? You have specifically cited BSD, MIT, and proprietary licenses associated with SDKs as being acceptable for your use while using arguments typically advanced by BSD advocates as to why the GPL sucks. You've also been rather arrogant about how long you've been coding OSS. You're right because you have seniority of all things? I've disrespected an elder?!?
I'm going to take you at your word and not expect an answer. If I get one, don't presume to lecture me. Read your own words. I'll tone down if you will; or just drop the matter with this post.
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Damages are for a court to decide. To be sure, EULAs and licenses may contain boilerplate specifying violation penalties but it doesn't necessarily follow that they can be enforced. One of the design goals of the GPL is to be valid in as many jurisdictions as possible. Including a damages cause would weaken that. It may be contrary to it's designers' strategies as well. Both the SFLC and FSF have said that most GPL violations are resolved quietly.
All I'm saying is that Jackson's misdeeds don't automatically mean that MS' activities in the US are Simon pure or that the government didn't have a case. I was actually quite annoyed at Jackson because I believe MS should have been MaBelled to the dogs and back and his screw up foreclosed any chance of that happening.
Judges are human and can get disgusted same as anyone else. MS pulled a lot of shenanigans and were caught in many out and out falsehoods during the trial. Jackson's stupidity was in running his mouth rather than saving his (properly formulated) opinion of MS for the bench. MS has also been found guilty of abusing a monopoly and Europe and are trying every trick in the book to blunt that. The legal machinery of other economies busting MS for the same thing tends make the findings here look more credible.
Most who use and create FOSS won't promise you better than the windows stuff you're using now. They'll start and improve their projects and occasionally rival commercial products. Sometimes it so happens the FOSS world will create something you like, use and enjoy!
One of the goals for KDE4 is to remove inherent dependencies on X11 and other UNIXisms and make the primary dependencies of KDE apps QT, kdelibs, and some other non-X11 libs. Furthermore, QT4 will be available as a GPLed library on unix-type, Windows, and OS X platforms. To make a long story short, the Windows and OS X versions of KDE applications won't need X11 or UNIX compatibility layers to run. Now I must hasten to point out that the KDE Workspace isn't being ported away from Linux and Unix. It doesn't make much sense to run kdesktop, kwin, and the panels on the other platforms. KDE4 on Windows and Mac OS X will be a set of libraries and services that let the major KDE apps run so you have things like Amarok, Konqueror, and yes, Krita on (natively) Windows.
The version of Gimp I'm using right now has a slider for brush size. It is the current development prerelease and I don't know how long it has had the feature but the feature seems a bit on the obvious side and has likely been present for at least the 2.x series of the app.
YMMV depending on the window manager you use. With kwin, I can give Gimp it's own desktop and use tab to bring up and dismiss all windows. It is also common with X window manager windows in general to "pin" them which means they stay in the foreground even you are doing work in the background. It is handy to pin tool windows, put them somewhere convenient (so I can work on the canvas with the window handy), then dismiss entirely when I won't need something else for awhile. Basically, Gimp was developed on X-Window and is a reasonably civilized app with a good Window manager.
Thing is, we hear day in and day out that not being UI identical to PhotoShop down to 6 submenus deep means that Gimp is utter crap. All these Photoshop experts never remember that they were once newbs and spent a few months or years deeply learning Photoshop. There are legitimate criticisms of Gimp, it has an 8-bit per channel colorspace limitation which very much limits the applications it is appropriate for and there isn't much in the way to color accurately use it's output in professional publishing even if it didn't have the 8-bit limitation.
So actually, the more whingy of the PhotoShop users could use some reminding that from other eyes their tool of choice isn't necessary UI nirvana.
They have it in Krita. Due to the years it has been around, Gimp has more bells and whistles but Krita has the advantage of being designed with 32bit colorspaces from the ground up. Now Gimp is supposed to be refactored around a library called GEGL that will address that and some other issues. This has been "coming soon" for a number of years now. I bet Krita reaches feature parity with Gimp before Gimp's colorspace limitations are fixed.
Come KDE4, it will be easily possible to run Krita in OS X and Windows. That increase in userbase usually seems to draw more developer attention.
I was supposing the DRM doesn't care what files Samba accesses and so it is no threat to the manufacture to include a GPLv3 Samba because a modified Samba will have no more and no less rights than the unmodified Samba that comes with the device. Suppose, for instance, the device is a game console that runs a sandboxed version of Linux. The DRM may prevent access to the underlying video hardware or to various interesting bits outside the sandbox. Since the Samba the device comes with plays no part in this and has no special privileges, it is no threat to this manufacturer to include a GPLv3 Samba (unless of course he has some juicy network file server patents he wants to be a troll with.....). The user can replace and run it to his heart's content.
Now if this only somewhat hypothetical console ran a GPLv3 kernel then your arguments would have more force. The anti-DRM provisions of the GPL aren't meant to put an end to any and all DRM on a device you may run such code on. It is possible for DRM on a device to be orthoganal to many categories of GPLv3 code that might run on it. The anti-DRM provisions are only meant to ensure you can modify and run that GPLv3 code with the same abilities as manufacturer supplied GPLv3 code.
How was it shoddy? Jackson's penalty (the breakup of MS) was overturned (due to his stupidity) but the government's legal win was not. MS was found guilty of abusing their monopoly position. It is true they got a slap on the wrist but found guilty they were.
It doesn't affect MS' own products at all unless they directly incorporate GPL code (not happening). What could happen is that if MS distributes these coupons which are then redeemed for a version of SLED with GPLv3 code then any downstream user of the GPLv3 code has a (possibly) potent legal defense if MS later attempts a patent suit. Basically, this is revenge for Ballmer crowing that the only legal Linux is through a vendor they've made one of their deals with.
They have however put up a WebKit cvs server with a reasonably well documented codebase up. I suppose they may be in technical breach of the LGPL but since the khtml guys have been getting sufficiently good information to port some of Apple's enhancements back from Webkit that may be why they aren't terribly fussed. The khtml guys are looking to improve their own project rather Safari or WebKit (which is fair enough IMHO. Apple got a clean rendering engine on the cheap when they needed one fast). Apple has been co-operating with this. Some within KDE even want to adopt WebKit and then use it as an upstream project.
As for that "explicit permission" I suppose the use of the LGPL would make a pretty good defense if someone were to go digging around for relevant info that the WebKit source isn't giving them. It doesn't seem terribly likely to come up and it would open a can of worms for Apple.
All Apple has to do is not foreclose running modified versions of any GPLv3 software they ship. Their recent history with GPLv2 stuff has been reasonably classy. OS X kernel and most of the userland isn't covered by any form of the GPL. Tivoization generally refers to locking down Free software with hardware DRM so that only the manufacturer of a device can modify the software. Apple isn't doing this. Apple doesn't ship any GPLv3 kernels or bootloaders on their hardware so they aren't tivoizing. Apple DOES use hardware DRM to disallow (legally) booting OS X on non-Apple approved hardware. Some don't like this but it isn't tivoization. They also seem to be backing away from their open Darwin BSD environment since hacked Darwin bits have been used to replace the parts of OS X that participate in DRM checks but that isn't tivoization either but even if it is, Apple is the copyright holder of a non-GPLv3 codebase and can do with it as they like. I say that isn't Tivoization because while core bits of OS X are based on OSS, these are permissible proprietary forks.
Now Apple has used GPL and LGPLed code for things like web browsers and smb daemons but modifications to those don't affect the things Apple wants to protect. IMHO, GPLv3 doesn't seem to be an anti-DRM threat to them if they use such code as they have used GPLv2 in the past. They may not like the patent provisions but that is another kettle of fish and doesn't have anything to do with tivoization.
Technically speaking, wouldn't this manufacturer only have to make it possible to run modified Sambas and other modified GPLv3 bits they might of used? Say the rest of the userland was some modified BSD code, that could still stay shut?
In practice, I imagine such DRM would be done by signing an entire firmware image. Future practitioners of such DRM would just have to isolate the bits that really need to be sooper-sekrit if they want to use GPLv3 code.
This is precisely why devices like the iPhone completely fail to excite me: the screwed up technical market for cell phones in the US. If I don't like my carrier then I'm faced with the loss of my mp3 player, personal organizer, GPS, and whatever other functions my all-in-one WonderWidget does. I only use my phone for making and receiving calls. When I can swap phones and carriers as easily as I can with landlines then I'll be interested in phones that do more than just handle calls.
SCO didn't obtain anything directly from AT&T. Novell bought SYSV Unix from AT&T and took over as the licensor of interest. Novell in turn allowed what is commonly called oldSCO (The Santa Cruz Organization) to act as their sales agent. THAT contract allowed oldSCO to sell UNIX licenses on behalf of Novell. All monies from such sales were to be turned over to Novell and then Novell would pay them a 5% commission. oldSCO also got the ability to exercise the copyrights on the official UNIX manuals as part of this arrangement. At no time did oldSCO ever have possession of the SYSV copyrights (those were specifically reserved by Novell). The SCO going around calling itself SCO is "The SCO Group". "The SCO Group" is actually what used to be Caldera Linux. Caldera bought the UNIX sub licensing business from oldSCO (which is now called Tarantella and is also now a Sun subsidiary) then changed their name to "The SCO Group". In "SCO Group" form they have made no end of self-serving wild claims about both the original AT&T contracts and the nature of oldSCO's contract with Novell. The CEO of SCO Darl McBride and his boss Ralph Yarro have long and sordid histories of trying to hit the Lawsuit Lottery.
The article in the $echo newsletter came out because of some ancient FUD. One of the uglier things to happen in the Unix wars was to cast doubt on the legality of your competitor's code (My how things stay the same!). The article was an attempt to put a stop to it since the FUD also affect AT&T's UNIX business. AT&T was indeed legally sloppy. The SCO Group's problem is that the Nazgul are not and are getting depos from many of the actual people involved with those contracts.
Well, I've always said that the only thing compatible with every version of Office is to just HAVE every version of Office. You'll probably need three virtual machines to pull it off but you can't have everything....
I suspect for ODF the Office 97 users are out of luck.
So your legal theory is that what the FSF has published about the GPL can be used as evidence to explain what the license "really" says? That would render contracts rather meaningless if one party can hold the other party responsible for things outside the contract. I think the most likely outcome would be a judge admonishing the first party for not including all of the terms in the contract itself.
I don't think that is what the parent is driving at. For instance, SCO is trying get a VERY self-serving and contradictory take on the original AT&T Unix licensing agreements past the Utah court. Basically, SCO is trying to claim that things like IBM's JFS filesystem by virtue of having been an extension of AIX which is a partial fork of AT&T that IBM had no right to contribute it to Linux. IBM has cited an article in AT&T's "$echo" newsletter that states AT&T doesn't consider a licensees home-grown extensions of Unix as AT&T's property. The "$echo" newsletter article doesn't change or extend the contract. It clarifies that a licensee's wholly original add-ons to UNIX belong soley to the licensee. In short, it is evidence of AT&T's intent in executing their UNIX contracts. Why wouldn't a judge consider it? In the same way, the FSF's public statements and preamble to GPL consistently state what their intentions were in drafting the GPL. The intent isn't to retroactively extend the GPL, the intent is to foreclose creative and self-serving interpretations like SCO has tried to do with AT&T's Unix licensing agreements.Incidentally, SCO has tried to claim the GPL is unconstitutional. In recent years (snort!) they have backed off trying to do this. SCO still distributes GPL code and Fyodor of nmap has revoked their license to distribute since he takes telling a Federal judge that the GPL is constitutionally invalid as a public rejection of the GPL; it is argued that merely saying you don't like the GPL doesn't remove the protections that it grants and I agree but telling a real judge in a real court that you don't think the license valid or binding is a whole other kettle of fish. I'm not sure how legally sound that is but SCO did cease distributing nmap; I'll bet that was the wake-up call to lay off the GPL-is-unconstitutional garbage.
Office 2007 is displacing the versions of Office this plugin supports. Any word when this will be extended to the latest Office? Or does is it already compatible?
".odt" is "Open Document Text. ".ods" is "Open Document Spreadsheet" and ".odp" is "Open Document Presentation". There are some other ".odX" extensions for things like vector drawings and "Master Documents". The entire family of XML based document formats is "ODF".
It doesn't surprise me in the least that such goings on are common at Best Buy but any computer repair shop that doesn't have good supervision is prone to this. A lot of so-called techs are just good ole boys doing what has a paycheck in it this week. A tech I used to work with delighted in calling the whole service dept. over when he came across some extra unusual porn. They did end up firing the guy but it wasn't for digging through the customer's files. The manager would just tell him to knock it off.
In the end what you are doing is turning over a box with a good chunk of your personal life over to someone in a fairly low paid service job. The brighter and better ones were graduated from end-user PCs to servers and called "engineers". It is a total abuse of what it truly means to be an engineer but most of those guys were above that sort of thing.
There will only be the year when people realize that most everyone else is running Linux, too.
That would be nice but it isn't necessary. Linux only has to get as big in it's domain as Firefox is in web browsing. Firefox has enough market and mind share that most websites can't afford to ignore it. A nice side effect is that if a site works well in Firefox then it will also work well for Safari, Opera, or whatever standards compliant browser you like. So to continue this line of thought, Linux only has to match OS X in market share. If desktop Linux had those sorts of percentages then application houses and hardware manufacturers have to pay commensurate attention.I'm not saying that will necessarily happen either but it is an easier goal than almost completely displacing Windows. Linux doesn't have to completely displace Windows. It just has to be big enough to shrug off market and legal assaults. A healthy desktop share for Linux would have the same effect Firefox has in web browsing too: It will be easier for other OSes to be fully functional desktops in the face of the large share MS would still have.
See this earlier post of mine regarding a hellacious time I had with the SATA drivers installing XP on a Toshiba laptop:
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http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=241957&cid=19
ATI drivers suck in both Windows and Linux although I'll allow that the install on the Windows side is probably easier. As for the apps, I NEVER advise anyone to approach Linux as a substitute for Windows; it is it's own environment with it's own strengths and weaknesses.
As far as hardware goes, boot prospective boxes with a recent version of Knoppix or other heavy-functionality livecd. If that goes well THEN go for the full install. Otherwise, replace or research the problem components before committing to a hard drive install. Joe Random hardware tends as you say to be iffy (can be true of Windows too!). I always check anything I buy for Linux compatibility first.
If your idea of a functional machine is one that runs all your old familiar Windows apps then that a Windows machine is the best thing for you and your workplace. Just keep the thing behind a firewall, keep the OS and apps patched, and approach anything that touches the network like email and web surfing with a touch of paranoia.
The only reason Linux even has those "sort-of-look-the-same-apps" is because if we held our breath waiting for Windows dev houses to take care of us we'd turn pretty blue. As you define the problem, I don't know what the answer is. At least most of those sorta-kinda apps are good enough for some people.
I thought 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, and last year were supposed to be "The Year of The Linux Desktop.
Articles titled like this just make Linux look bad when 2008 comes along and MS still has >90% desktop share.
I don't discuss with zealots, and that's the kind of person with whom I now believe I'm dealing.
Pot. Kettle. Black.....and likewise.I'm sorry that you don't understand why your behavior is offensive, because that means you won't learn to repair.
Again, right back at you. You yourself are doing something offensive: You make controversial statements and when others disagree with you (which makes me no zealot) you then say that it isn't quite what you meant. If you're going to say things like "I believe GPLv3 is GPL's swan song, and I can't be happier that it's going away. It's time for people who write open source to stop closing it." then why are you surprised to get contrary answers? That's rhetorical. You aren't responding after all. Get the beam out of your own eye first before talking to others about their behavior. That statement both makes a contrary assertion "I believe GPLv3 is GPL's swan song." (which is fine BTW. I don't agree but it is fine.) and impugns the motives of those who write GPL software "It's time for people who write open source to stop closing it." Perhaps you meant something else? That it only makes you sad and not seriously miffed? There are only so many ways that can be taken and most them are well past simple disagreement. It is IMHO a rather ugly take on what the intentions of GPL authors are. I didn't take something the way you wanted me too. Big deal. It IS the way you come off.
I have this take on what you say because for all that you protest "I'm no hardcore BSD advocate" you sound like you're channeling Brett Glass: "Real men don't give code to just some people." You say that you use several licenses out of rightness flexibility? You have specifically cited BSD, MIT, and proprietary licenses associated with SDKs as being acceptable for your use while using arguments typically advanced by BSD advocates as to why the GPL sucks. You've also been rather arrogant about how long you've been coding OSS. You're right because you have seniority of all things? I've disrespected an elder?!?
I'm going to take you at your word and not expect an answer. If I get one, don't presume to lecture me. Read your own words. I'll tone down if you will; or just drop the matter with this post.