How in the Sam Hill would this increase the accident rate? Plug in your CD-R of favorites, and you won't be fiddling with it for 10 hours. Safer than a radio, where you're changing stations to avoid commercials, or a CD or tape player, where you're changing tapes, having to rewind, or trying to skip songs. Safer than having tapes and CDs scattered about, one of which might slide under your feet, or might fly and hit someone in an accident.
>Just because someone is trying to make a dollar doesn't mean they are out to get you.
Yes, but if you want to hop on the open source bandwagon (like Apple just did), the price is at least some respect for the tenets. For example, at least don't inconvenience people for no gain of your own. If I can use this codec on Windows, it's not an Apple exclusive -- so what does it cost Apple to allow it to run on Linux? Nothing. So why should they disallow it?
>The idea is already WELL KNOWN. It is just a matter of someone getting one of these things to market.
The basic idea is well-known, an optimal implementation less so. Most of the MP-3 players I know of are the size and cost of desktop computers, since in fact they are desktop computers. Getting the appropriate computing power into a small package -- preferably one not much larger than a typical audio CD player -- is not so well known, nor is the optimal minimal operating system.
That the Clarion system does not do this yet means either that the software upgrade isn't easy, it doesn't have the processing power, or Clarion for their own reasons has chosen not to do this. As a result, there's a market.
This unit is a player, not a recorder, so it should not be subject to (2). (1) might be another issue, not because of the cost of the CD-Rs, but that they might have to refuse to play anything not recorded on an "audio grade" CD-R, and thus have to modify the device to do so. (Grrr)
From the article: > Some open-source advocates "have been known to say if (their) effort produces better technology it'll succeed in marketplace, and if so (they're) right, and if not (they're) wrong," [RMS] says.
RMs then goes on talking about this "right" and "wrong" in the moral sense, when clearly Open Source advocates mean it in the correct/incorrect sense -- correct about open source being the way to technically better software. If you're interviewed, shouldn't you have some clue about the issues you yourself bring up?
>The main idea of Linus was to bring a new free, powerful OS. And this OS was to be integrated to the GNU.
No, it wasn't. The FSF continued work on HURD because Linus didn't plan to port Linux off the x86 platform. Linus's goal was a free Unix, which he was going to call Freax (sp?) Someone else put the Linux moniker on it, and it stuck. RMS has only raised the GNU/Linux name now that it's popular, a clear case of sour grapes. Using the GPL does not make your program GNU. Nor does using gcc make your program GNU -- proprietary programs aren't named after the compilers used to build them.
RMS is probably pissed not just because of the name, but because Linus and apparently the majority of Linuxers disagree with RMS's anti-IP stance. Apparently RMS believes that changing the name will help spread his views.
>Can someone translate the phrase "MP3 is not scalable" into English?
Umm, you can't make a Beowulf cluster out of them?
Seriously, though, I think it means that when broadcasting it, you can't easily adjust the quality to the bandwidth available, and thus transmit lower-quality sound if that's all that will go through or higher quality when you have a high-bandwidth connection.
>Of course business can't "crush" OSS in any real sense, short of social domination.
RMS can tell you it already has done so, back in the late 70's/early 80's. Not by force, but by hiring away the best and brightest.
I think it's really the growth of the internet and the advancement in the capabilities of computers that has made OSS more viable this time around. Fast downloads, a "supercomputer" on everyone's desk, and numerous free development tools means that the barriers to creation and distribution of open source are much lower than they were. Also, going proprietary has gotten tougher, as the sophistication of applications has gotten higher, not to mention Microsoft's competition-crushing nature.
>Open Source has survived the "slings and arrows" thrown at it to date.
It seems to me that it's Open Sourcers who are the ones throwing the slings and arrows. It's open sources who compare selling proprietary software to slavery, who call people like Tim O'Reilly parasites, etc.
If open source is "all that and a bag of chips," it will become the dominant paradigm, no insulting people necessary. If it doesn't, then proprietary folks are providing useful services, and shouldn't have to endure the self-righteous indignation of people who aren't provide those useful services themselves.
>I think I've decided, after something like 15 years of professional software engineering, that what RMS is reputed to believe is actually right. Commerce is fraud.
Yep, nothing good ever was produced for hire/profit.
The Mona Lisa? Crap! The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel? They oughta just spread paint remover on that sucker and get rid of it. The Golden Gate Bridge, Fulton's steamboat, Stephenson's rocket; all should have been melted down into scrap iron. And as for software, I guess people just think they're having fun when they play Quake, Starcraft, Warcraft, Age of Empires, Civilization,... And those buildings designed with AutoCAD? All are just about to collapse, I'm sure.
I'll grant that money can motivate people in the wrong direction. But the primary motivation of most hackers isn't necessarily to help others, particularly less computer literate others, it's more typically to do something that hacker needs.
While often inaccurate and with large gaps, the web is the world's largest encyclopedia. I did a web search on "Will Rogers organized party democrat", and quickly found multiple sites that also attributed that quote to Rogers.
The Web has made me obsolete as a source of useless trivia...
Both Sendmail and Ghostscript make money selling proprietary versions, and thus violate Stallman morals.
>But why should I play YOUR game.
It isn't my game, it's the question of whether companies can survive on open source. So Red Hat becomes an example of one company which supports ~100 people, and that mainly by selling support for software written mainly by other people.
You Stallmanites* claim companies should just completely open their source and they'll make money. We Torvalders want a real examples, where the money is being made on a product primarily or at least largely coded by the company, not on a hook (Netscape makes some money selling Netcenter advertising) or by selling proprietary extensions.
Let to add a different take to this than everyone else. Piracy runs almost exactly counter to what RMS wants! First, it's free beer, not free speech. Source code is not being distributed. Second, by making software free as in beer, it takes away a large part of the incentive to move to free as in speech software. If you can get commercial programs for free, then your incentive to get an open source program and fix the few problems that bother you is much reduced. And since your fixes aren't in there, there are more things that I'd need to fix in order to use it, so the bar is raised for me too.
>Open source is a distinct lack of certain restrictions, not a set in stone method of coding and delivery, and certainly not a lack of revenue (if you claim this, then why is Red Hat still in business?)
Um, because they sell SUPPORT? Red Hat pays for the development of a miniscule fraction of the software they sell, they don't sell their own open source product. The major vendor for the huge Linux effort, the combined product of what, 10,000 people, supports a grand total of... 80 people. Ooo, I'm impressed.
STOP making this bogus claim about Red Hat as a shining example of profiting by open source. And don't bring up Netscape either; they continue to work on browsers to keep themselves in the proprietary web server market.
Call me an idiot, but how exactly does one switch to kde? Simply by adding kwm & as the last line in.Xdefaults? Is there good documentation of what exactly happens when one types startx? Ditto on how to modify the menus, etc. in Gnome/KDE/AfterStep?
I can do the compiles, but I haven't quite grokked this whole X structure thing.
isn't microstation unix based ??
on
GPL CAD to Linux
·
· Score: 1
Bentley has a Linux port of the previous version of Microstation, but it is no-support, academic- only.
Seems to me for something like CAD, the best way for it to go GPL is for an organization like AIA (architects) to buy one of the smaller CAD companies. The higher-end stuff is largely of interest to professionals, open source will probably only get us a fairly low-end package.
>There are no known cures for Altzheimers Disease, and there probably never will be.
While technically correct, for the purposes of this discussion, "cure" can also mean something that will prevent the damage from occuring in the first place, or that prevents further damage from occuring. The issue is whether biotech research will be done, or done as effectively, if the profit motive is removed.
>Why is everyone perpetuating the myth that free software *needs* the support and interest of the corporate world?
1) Some of us need it to be able to convince bosses we should use freed software instead of NT et al.
2) While need is too strong a term, free software could be helped by corporate types who work to improve free software for their own needs. This gets us what we want faster.
Didn't Stallman do almost all of his GNU project work on non-free operating systems? Seems to me, that to achieve his goal, instead of starting with toggling in a bootstrap loader, he took the shortcut of using non-free OSes to build his compiler, and of course copied ideas people came up with in proprietary software. Moreover, I'm sure many of the contributors to open source software had the opportunity and resources to assist open source from working on proprietary stuff. Now, having gotten to where he/GNU is by using those shortcuts, he condemns all of us who would achieve our goals working with non-free software.
So to achieve his goals, it was ok to take shortcuts; yet it's not OK for the rest of us to do so. Sorry, I don't buy it.
Open source/free software is a great idea in and of itself. You don't need to condemn proprietary software to believe this.
A fundamental flaw to Muth's whole thinking is calling this "work." For many of us, programming projects of our own choice (as opposed to those assigned by an employer) are play, not work. And people will play for free.
Obligatory Star Wars (Empire Strikes Back) quote: Luke: "I -- I don't believe it!" Yoda: "That... is why you fail."
And of course, there are others who get paid who will improve the tools they're working with. I've found that employers are often more willing to pay more in salary than to buy productivity-enhancing tools.
>But if everyone I worked with spoke Chinese, I wouldn't piss and moan that they didn't understand my english.
Even if it required that you spend hundreds of dollars (buying MS Office) to understand their "Chinese"? Even though they are capable of speaking English? Even though this "Chinese" changes every couple of years, each time requiring additional outlays of cash and time spent learning it?
It's rather like sending all your vital letters postage due...
Slashdot Mirror
How in the Sam Hill would this increase the accident rate? Plug in your CD-R of favorites, and you won't be fiddling with it for 10 hours. Safer than a radio, where you're changing stations to avoid commercials, or a CD or tape player, where you're changing tapes, having to rewind, or trying to skip songs. Safer than having tapes and CDs scattered about, one of which might slide under your feet, or might fly and hit someone in an accident.
>Just because someone is trying to make a dollar doesn't mean they are out to get you.
Yes, but if you want to hop on the open source bandwagon (like Apple just did), the price is at least some respect for the tenets. For example, at least don't inconvenience people for no gain of your own. If I can use this codec on Windows, it's not an Apple exclusive -- so what does it cost Apple to allow it to run on Linux? Nothing. So why should they disallow it?
>The idea is already WELL KNOWN. It is just a matter of someone getting one of these things to market.
The basic idea is well-known, an optimal implementation less so. Most of the MP-3 players I know of are the size and cost of desktop computers, since in fact they are desktop computers. Getting the appropriate computing power into a small package -- preferably one not much larger than a typical audio CD player -- is not so well known, nor is the optimal minimal operating system.
That the Clarion system does not do this yet means either that the software upgrade isn't easy, it doesn't have the processing power, or Clarion for their own reasons has chosen not to do this. As a result, there's a market.
This unit is a player, not a recorder, so it should not be subject to (2). (1) might be another issue, not because of the cost of the CD-Rs, but that they might have to refuse to play anything not recorded on an "audio grade" CD-R, and thus have to modify the device to do so. (Grrr)
From the article:
> Some open-source advocates "have been known to say if (their) effort produces better technology it'll succeed in marketplace, and if so (they're) right, and if not (they're) wrong," [RMS] says.
RMs then goes on talking about this "right" and "wrong" in the moral sense, when clearly Open Source advocates mean it in the correct/incorrect sense -- correct about open source being the way to technically better software. If you're interviewed, shouldn't you have some clue about the issues you yourself bring up?
>The main idea of Linus was to bring a new free, powerful OS. And this OS was to be integrated to the GNU.
No, it wasn't. The FSF continued work on HURD because Linus didn't plan to port Linux off the x86 platform. Linus's goal was a free Unix, which he was going to call Freax (sp?) Someone else put the Linux moniker on it, and it stuck. RMS has only raised the GNU/Linux name now that it's popular, a clear case of sour grapes. Using the GPL does not make your program GNU. Nor does using gcc make your program GNU -- proprietary programs aren't named after the compilers used to build them.
RMS is probably pissed not just because of the name, but because Linus and apparently the majority of Linuxers disagree with RMS's anti-IP stance. Apparently RMS believes that changing the name will help spread his views.
>(and btw, XFree is part of the GNU system)
? XFree is released under a different license by a different group. How is it GNU?
>Can someone translate the phrase "MP3 is not scalable" into English?
Umm, you can't make a Beowulf cluster out of them?
Seriously, though, I think it means that when broadcasting it, you can't easily adjust the quality to the bandwidth available, and thus transmit lower-quality sound if that's all that will go through or higher quality when you have a high-bandwidth connection.
>Of course business can't "crush" OSS in any real sense, short of social domination.
RMS can tell you it already has done so, back in the late 70's/early 80's. Not by force, but by hiring away the best and brightest.
I think it's really the growth of the internet and the advancement in the capabilities of computers that has made OSS more viable this time around. Fast downloads, a "supercomputer" on everyone's desk, and numerous free development tools means that the barriers to creation and distribution of open source are much lower than they were. Also, going proprietary has gotten tougher, as the sophistication of applications has gotten higher, not to mention Microsoft's competition-crushing nature.
>Open Source has survived the "slings and arrows" thrown at it to date.
It seems to me that it's Open Sourcers who are the ones throwing the slings and arrows. It's open sources who compare selling proprietary software to slavery, who call people like Tim O'Reilly parasites, etc.
If open source is "all that and a bag of chips," it will become the dominant paradigm, no insulting people necessary. If it doesn't, then proprietary folks are providing useful services, and shouldn't have to endure the self-righteous indignation of people who aren't provide those useful services themselves.
>I think I've decided, after something like 15 years of professional software engineering, that what RMS is reputed to believe is actually right. Commerce is fraud.
... And those buildings designed with AutoCAD? All are just about to collapse, I'm sure.
Yep, nothing good ever was produced for hire/profit.
The Mona Lisa? Crap! The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel? They oughta just spread paint remover on that sucker and get rid of it. The Golden Gate Bridge, Fulton's steamboat, Stephenson's rocket; all should have been melted down into scrap iron. And as for software, I guess people just think they're having fun when they play Quake, Starcraft, Warcraft, Age of Empires, Civilization,
I'll grant that money can motivate people in the wrong direction. But the primary motivation of most hackers isn't necessarily to help others, particularly less computer literate others, it's more typically to do something that hacker needs.
While often inaccurate and with large gaps, the web is the world's largest encyclopedia. I did a web search on "Will Rogers organized party democrat", and quickly found multiple sites that also attributed that quote to Rogers.
The Web has made me obsolete as a source of useless trivia...
>...Sendmail, Inc and Ghostscript?
Both Sendmail and Ghostscript make money selling proprietary versions, and thus violate Stallman morals.
>But why should I play YOUR game.
It isn't my game, it's the question of whether companies can survive on open source. So Red Hat becomes an example of one company which supports ~100 people, and that mainly by selling support for software written mainly by other people.
You Stallmanites* claim companies should just completely open their source and they'll make money. We Torvalders want a real examples, where the money is being made on a product primarily or at least largely coded by the company, not on a hook (Netscape makes some money selling Netcenter advertising) or by selling proprietary extensions.
Let to add a different take to this than everyone else.
Piracy runs almost exactly counter to what RMS wants! First, it's free beer, not free speech. Source code is not being distributed. Second, by making software free as in beer, it takes away a large part of the incentive to move to free as in speech software. If you can get commercial programs for free, then your incentive to get an open source program and fix the few problems that bother you is much reduced. And since your fixes aren't in there, there are more things that I'd need to fix in order to use it, so the bar is raised for me too.
Yeah, Y2K is nonsense. Just do
sed s/Y/K/g
to all the files that need the Y's changed to K's, and you're done.
:-)
>Open source is a distinct lack of certain restrictions, not a set in stone method of coding and delivery, and certainly not a lack of revenue (if you claim this, then why is Red Hat still in business?)
... 80 people. Ooo, I'm impressed.
Um, because they sell SUPPORT? Red Hat pays for the development of a miniscule fraction of the software they sell, they don't sell their own open source product. The major vendor for the huge Linux effort, the combined product of what, 10,000 people, supports a grand total of
STOP making this bogus claim about Red Hat as a shining example of profiting by open source. And don't bring up Netscape either; they continue to work on browsers to keep themselves in the proprietary web server market.
Call me an idiot, but how exactly does one switch to kde? Simply by adding kwm & as the last line in .Xdefaults? Is there good documentation of what exactly happens when one types startx? Ditto on how to modify the menus, etc. in Gnome/KDE/AfterStep?
I can do the compiles, but I haven't quite grokked this whole X structure thing.
Bentley has a Linux port of the previous version of Microstation, but it is no-support, academic- only.
Seems to me for something like CAD, the best way for it to go GPL is for an organization like AIA (architects) to buy one of the smaller CAD companies. The higher-end stuff is largely of interest to professionals, open source will probably only get us a fairly low-end package.
>There are no known cures for Altzheimers Disease, and there probably never will be.
While technically correct, for the purposes of this discussion, "cure" can also mean something that will prevent the damage from occuring in the first place, or that prevents further damage from occuring. The issue is whether biotech research will be done, or done as effectively, if the profit motive is removed.
>Why is everyone perpetuating the myth that free software *needs* the support and interest of the corporate world?
1) Some of us need it to be able to convince bosses we should use freed software instead of NT et al.
2) While need is too strong a term, free software could be helped by corporate types who work to improve free software for their own needs. This gets us what we want faster.
Didn't Stallman do almost all of his GNU project work on non-free operating systems? Seems to me, that to achieve his goal, instead of starting with toggling in a bootstrap loader, he took the shortcut of using non-free OSes to build his compiler, and of course copied ideas people came up with in proprietary software. Moreover, I'm sure many of the contributors to open source software had the opportunity and resources to assist open source from working on proprietary stuff. Now, having gotten to where he/GNU is by using those shortcuts, he condemns all of us who would achieve our goals working with non-free software.
So to achieve his goals, it was ok to take shortcuts; yet it's not OK for the rest of us to do so. Sorry, I don't buy it.
Open source/free software is a great idea in and of itself. You don't need to condemn proprietary software to believe this.
Whoops, am I getting my companies wrong? Ellison is CEO of Oracle...
A fundamental flaw to Muth's whole thinking is calling this "work." For many of us, programming projects of our own choice (as opposed to those assigned by an employer) are play, not work. And people will play for free.
Obligatory Star Wars (Empire Strikes Back) quote:
Luke: "I -- I don't believe it!"
Yoda: "That... is why you fail."
And of course, there are others who get paid who will improve the tools they're working with. I've found that employers are often more willing to pay more in salary than to buy productivity-enhancing tools.
>Even the great plagarist
Bell's Second Law of USENET*: Spelling and grammar flames almost invariably contain similar errors.
It's "plagiarist."
(Bell's First Law of USENET: No matter how farcical or satirical your message, someone out there will think you were serious.)
* Obviously we're not on USENET, but the laws are much the same...
>But if everyone I worked with spoke Chinese, I wouldn't piss and moan that they didn't understand my english.
Even if it required that you spend hundreds of dollars (buying MS Office) to understand their "Chinese"? Even though they are capable of speaking English? Even though this "Chinese" changes every couple of years, each time requiring additional outlays of cash and time spent learning it?
It's rather like sending all your vital letters postage due...