Linux-Advocacy Digest #597, Volume #27 Tue, 11 Jul 00 15:13:04 EDT
Contents:
Re: Richard Stallman's Politics (was: Linux is awesome! (Roberto Alsina)
Re: Steve/Mike's New Name And Old Ethics -was- What I've always said: Netcraft
numbers of full of it (Brian Langenberger)
Re: A MacOpinion of Open Source that REALLY HITS THE MARK (John Jensen)
Re: Where did all my windows go? ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: Richard Stallman's Politics (was: Linux is awesome! (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Linsux as a desktop platform (void)
Re: Windows98 (Tim Kelley)
Re: A MacOpinion of Open Source that REALLY HITS THE MARK
Re: Windows (The Ghost In The Machine)
Re: Linux lags behind Windows (Pete Goodwin)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Roberto Alsina <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: gnu.misc.discuss
Subject: Re: Richard Stallman's Politics (was: Linux is awesome!
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 17:53:59 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> Quoting Roberto Alsina from comp.os.linux.advocacy; Mon, 10 Jul 2000
> >"T. Max Devlin" escribió:
> [...]
> >> The GPL would only prevent it being used in one single
circumstance:
> >> profiteering.[...]
>
> >Uh.... suppose the BSD TCP stack was GPL.
> >
> >Now, suppose MS ported it to windows 3.11 and called it, say,
> >winsock.dll.
> >
> >Believe it or not, they would not be able to include winsock.dll as
part
> >of windows 3.11[1].
>
> Yes they could. They'd just have to release Win3.11 as GPL open
source.
> What's the problem?
Well,let's just say "be extremely unlikely to include" instead of
"not be able to include". Makes no difference, really.
> >No non-GPL application could EVER link to
> >winsock.dll.
> >No BSD application would be able to link to winsock.dll.
>
> I think this might lie on the library issue, and that gets too
contrary
> when dealing with commercial software. No BSD application, AFAIK,
ever
> has linked with winsock.dll, and I wouldn't expect it would come up
very
> often.
Why is that important?
> It would force Microsoft to GPL windows or not use TCP/IP, fine.
And then we would probably end where we were before TCP/IP became
the defacto standard, paying $10K for a bridge between netA and netB,
both proprietary.
> Again, I don't see the problem; Microsoft's decisions about how to
write
> their software are their concern, not anybody else's.
This is a very clear example where the non-GPL'd nature of a
software implementation has been wildly more succesful than a GPLed
one would have been, because the GPL version would not have been free
enough.
> >What would the internet be, then?
>
> Ummm. Useful for more than debating points of logic on Usenet and
> downloading porn?
More likely: totally proprietary, running something other than TCP/IP,
much smaller, and we would all be using something else (ARPANET?),
just 1000 of us, all from universities.
If for you that's "useful", fine with me.
--
Roberto Alsina (KDE developer, MFCH)
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
------------------------------
From: Brian Langenberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Steve/Mike's New Name And Old Ethics -was- What I've always said:
Netcraft numbers of full of it
Date: 11 Jul 2000 18:01:54 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
: Not 500,000,000 innocent people (like hemophiliacs and so forth)
: 500,000,000 people who are practicing a sick and deviant lifestyle.
: DP
I must've missed that part about how God hates impoverished african
heterosexuals.
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2000/aids/stories/overview/
Or maybe it's part of some "God hates the poor" undertone I missed.
If you must spew your small-minded bigotry on usenet, kindly
take it someplace else.
------------------------------
From: John Jensen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: A MacOpinion of Open Source that REALLY HITS THE MARK
Date: 11 Jul 2000 18:09:00 GMT
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
: On 11 Jul 2000 03:54:13 GMT, John Jensen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
: >That's just the thing. It is less an illusion on the Mac because the
: >culture supports a common set of GUI values. Things like the single menu
: >bar at the top of the screen (or the 1-button mouse) are (usually)
: >praised, while variant interfaces like KAI's tools are (usually)
: >criticized. Heck, there has been a bit of a cultural rift of late as the
: >Mac community decides how much of NeXT it can accept. Contrast that to
: >the UNIX (especially Linux) environment in which novelty is more highly
: >valued.
: >
: >The original essay explains how Linux is not Mac ... and to that extent it
: >is correct. The flaw (IMO) of the original article is that it did not
: >come to grips with what open source is on its own (open source) terms.
: No, the original essay was just plain erroneous.
Duh. No one in this thread has said that the article was accurate.
I just find the cultural divide between Mac and UNIX still evidenced by
this article and others(*) to be a little more interesting than the
observation of technical errors.
The divide goes both ways. To me it just shows that there might be two
markets. People who value simplicity and conformity might be happy
Thinking Different in the Macintosh way. People with a more unrestricted
view of Different might like the Open Soruce world.
In related news, Apple Alum Andy Hertzfeld will do a keynote at the
O'Reilly Open Source Software Convention(**).
Choose your music, not everyone has to like the same tune.
John
* - The Mac might have a 3-button mouse!
http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=642973615
** - Open Source and the Personal Computer Revolution
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/e_sess/864
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Where did all my windows go?
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 18:04:31 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Donovan Rebbechi) wrote:
> On Tue, 11 Jul 2000 16:27:56 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> >In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
> > [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Donovan Rebbechi) wrote:
> >> On Tue, 11 Jul 2000 04:25:37 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> >>
> >> (1) Your manner is completely obnoxious. Try to work on it. Either
> >that
> >> or your keyboard is broken.
> >
> >To bad.
>
> You can't even spell "too". I guess it must be your keyboard.
Sour grapes.
>
> --
> Donovan
>
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: gnu.misc.discuss
Subject: Re: Richard Stallman's Politics (was: Linux is awesome!
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 14:12:20 -0400
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Quoting Leslie Mikesell from comp.os.linux.advocacy; 10 Jul 2000
>In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>>>Yes, that's what I said. The GPL, in it's attempt to control the
>>>whole of a derived work, even the parts where the author of
>>>the GPL'd portion made no contribution, restricts these
>>>potentially useful works from being distributed. Even in
>>
>> No it doesn't. It just ensures that those that are exploiting
>> the common pool of software aren't doing so with the intent
>> to restrict the subsequent liberties of others.
>
>That is just one of many ways that GPL'd software can't be
>used.
That appears to be the one of concern, based on the extensive
discussion. These "many" other ways have not been brought up before.
Why are you bringing them up now? Particularly, why are you mentioning
them, but *not* bringing them up now, so that they can be examined to
determine if they are simply related examples or some reason to think
that preventing exploitation of the common pool and intent to restrict
subsequent liberties is to be considered tolerable?
>>>the case where the combined portion is much less restricted
>>>than the GPL'd portion.
>>
>> Freedom in general is preserved rather than allowing for
>> a single robber baron to be free to take advantage of
>> everyone. That is a serious problem with software. It's
>> marginal production cost tends towards zero and and
>> software tends to end up being an essential facility of
>> some sort. This is especially true of software that people
>> are motivated to hide from you (in terms of source).
>
>But why is it a problem? Who is it that has capitalized on
>some free software and become so rich that you hate them?
It is a problem because it could happen, not because it has. But it
has, not as clearly and definitively as you might insist must occur for
your to be convinced, but profiteering on software is not a rare thing
at all these days, and since all software is based on the work of others
as well as the author, all software being GPL is a good thing.
Why is it a problem? Who is it that has kept secret source in order to
mandate extraordinary concessions for the user and profiteer from their
inability to benefit from competition amongst the producers of the
software they use.
>I think making a well tested, freely usable base of code available
>has had the opposite effect in all cases that I can see. It
>lowers the barrier for competition and ends up making all
>versions better, including the branches that continue to be free.
>Please point out the example that convinced you that unrestricted
>usage of open source code is bad for anyone.
I concur that making software public domain would be better than GPL. I
don't believe that any other open source licenses are "well tested,
freely usable bases of code", because they allow someone using that code
to place restrictions on others re-use of that code, if they can combine
it with secret source code. If all branches are not all as free as the
original, then the software isn't freely usable by the end user,
regardless of how encumbering your mandate to protect other's freedoms
as much as your own might be.
--
T. Max Devlin
Manager of Research & Educational Services
Managed Services
[A corporation which does not wish to be identified]
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
-[Opinions expressed are my own; everyone else, including
my employer, has to pay for them, subject to
applicable licensing agreement]-
====== Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News ======
http://www.newsfeeds.com - The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World!
======= Over 80,000 Newsgroups = 16 Different Servers! ======
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (void)
Crossposted-To: comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.unix.advocacy
Subject: Re: Linsux as a desktop platform
Date: 11 Jul 2000 18:04:00 GMT
On Tue, 11 Jul 2000 12:45:02 GMT, Joe Ragosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>If being "state of the art" is more important to you than getting your
>work done, then pat yourself on the back.
>
>It's called buzzword compliance.
If you read my posts from the last several *years* in this group, you'd
see that getting *my* work done *requires* state-of-the-art operating
systems.
Anyway ... as I've pointed out, I can't get much done when my computer
is crashing all the time. Reliability isn't a buzzword in my world, it's
a requirement (and if you know how to make non-PMT OSs reliable, well,
you should be rich or at least famous). But that's just me. If you get
more work done on an old-style Mac than anything else, more power to you.
I just wish you'd give up this combative bullshit and just talk about what
is and what isn't. MacOS, for all its innovation, is a dated design,
which is why Apple is replacing it.
--
Ben
220 go.ahead.make.my.day ESMTP Postfix
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Tim Kelley)
Subject: Re: Windows98
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 18:24:00 GMT
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
On 11 Jul 2000 15:23:51 GMT, Paul Colclough <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] (David Cancio) wrote in
><LYl35.1231$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>One thing that annoys me in Linux is where programs install themselves - some
>go in /usr/local/bin, other go in /usr/sbin, others are in /usr/local/share,
>etc, etc. There doesn't seem to be much difference between the actual operating
>system components and accessories needed to run a decent desktop (eg. XFree86,
>KDE/Gnome/or whatever window manager) and other programs you install. You don't
>see many Windows programs installing themselves into c:\windows\system now do
>you? They all install neatly into c:\program files\ and you can pretty much
>find an installed program living in there in some sub-directory.
??? This is just crazy. There is a file system standard for linux and
it is followed pretty well.
Program binaries go in /usr/bin; data files go in /usr/share, config
files go in /usr/etc or /etc and $HOME; libraries go in /lib or /usr/lib.
Programs you compile yourself - those not part of your distribution -
go in /usr/local.
ust because a program does not install all its files into a single
directory does not mean it is willy-nilly. You're just not used to
it. There is no caprice at work here, it is just the logical result
of unix being a multi-user system and windows not being one.
Compare to windows where everything is completely random. Some things
go in \windows, some in \windows\system, some in \program files ... a
total mess. I've seen many programs try to install files in the root
directory. Many times windows programs won't even run if they are
installed in a custom location. Windows is absolute shit in this
regard, and unix is the model for how things should be done.
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.iww.org
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ()
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: A MacOpinion of Open Source that REALLY HITS THE MARK
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 18:42:16 GMT
On 11 Jul 2000 18:09:00 GMT, John Jensen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
>: On 11 Jul 2000 03:54:13 GMT, John Jensen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>: >That's just the thing. It is less an illusion on the Mac because the
>: >culture supports a common set of GUI values. Things like the single menu
>: >bar at the top of the screen (or the 1-button mouse) are (usually)
>: >praised, while variant interfaces like KAI's tools are (usually)
>: >criticized. Heck, there has been a bit of a cultural rift of late as the
>: >Mac community decides how much of NeXT it can accept. Contrast that to
>: >the UNIX (especially Linux) environment in which novelty is more highly
>: >valued.
>: >
>: >The original essay explains how Linux is not Mac ... and to that extent it
>: >is correct. The flaw (IMO) of the original article is that it did not
>: >come to grips with what open source is on its own (open source) terms.
>
>: No, the original essay was just plain erroneous.
>
>Duh. No one in this thread has said that the article was accurate.
>
>I just find the cultural divide between Mac and UNIX still evidenced by
>this article and others(*) to be a little more interesting than the
>observation of technical errors.
...once the basic details are mangled, it's hard to take the
rest of it seriously. This includes the 'cultural divide' and
it's actual impact.
[deletia]
--
The only motivation to treat a work derived from Free Software
as your sole personal property is to place some sort of market
barrier in front of your customers and to try and trap them.
|||
/ | \
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Subject: Re: Windows
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 18:54:17 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote on 10 Jul 2000 21:36:11 GMT <8kdfkb$369$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>I still say Windows sucks.
>
How doth Windows suck?
Let me count the ways....
[1] Horizontal scrolling lists in the file requester? What the hell
were they *thinking*? "Oh, it looks pretty"??
[2] Word as a document interchange. Proprietary, version-dependent,
unreadable by anyone but Microsoft. Good luck reading an Office2000
Word document if you have Word97...or was it Word97 with Word95?
[3] I suspect Excel has similar issues, but haven't heard as much
noise on this or other newsgroups. (Maybe that's a good thing.)
[4] Application opens window, application goes off and does something
else, window sits there and can't be moved or iconified. Dumb.
[5] I'm not sure what's causing it, but if an app opens a window while
I'm dragging another window (from a different app), the window
I'm dragging tends to jump *back* to where I started.
[6] Click-on-focus. This might be a personal preference.
[7] That damned registry. It not only saves such irreleventia (hm,
is that a word?) as window positioning, it also saves such things as
file type registration. Needless to say, this confuses things.
I've also heard horror stories about that registry. Do I trust it?
No.
[8] Let's play Randomly Change The Icons! I've only seen this once,
and on what I might call "unimportant files" -- but what makes one
think it won't happen again, this time on slightly more
important ones?
[9] Yeah, like I really really need detachable menu bars. (I don't
mind tearoffs, but why detach the bar and have it sitting around,
not relating to anybody? Very confusing to the user, IMO.)
And Netscape even *borrowed* this concept. WHY???
[10] The Start menu, to log out of the system. Yeah, that makes
a *lot* of sense; couldn't they think of something a little more
intuitive, like "Systemops", "Utility", "Control", or "Session"?
(KDE uses a big K on top of a gear, for what it's worth.)
[11] The Shutdown entry in the Start menu, to either
* Shut down the computer,
* Restart the computer, or
* Close all programs and log on as a different user.
Does this make sense to anyone? It doesn't make a lot
of sense to me...
[12] That bottom icon bar has a slight bug; Tooltips are supposed to
show the title of the window associated with the icon, but more often
than not, all I get is a tiny little yellow rectangle with
nothing in it -- and on some windows I get nothing at all,
even when the tooltips are working.
[13] Eenie meenie minie moo -- what do those right-hand icons do?
If you're lucky, something expected...
[14] Look Ma, no multiple desktops. (To be fair, there is add-on
software that can implement this; you'd think, though, that
Windows might have its own example.)
[15] "Hi, my name is Clippy"... Die.
[16] Outlook Express is expressly inconsistent with regards to including
text from another message, or from the current user while editing
included text from another message.
[17] Duh, is it COM, ADO, DAO, RDO, um....hell, what?
[18] If the wizard scripts are so brain-dead on occasion, why are
they called "wizards"?
[19] Slow text scroll. Granted, this isn't a big deal for most, but if
a program generates a lot of debug output to a console window,
this can bog down NT.
[20] "Your mouse has moved. Reboot? [Y/N]" mentality.
(It's not as bad as it was...Unreal Tournament, for example, didn't
ask for a reboot at all.)
[21] DHCP broadcast incompatibility. (I forget which is which, but one
of the two -- standard or Microsoft -- wants a broadcast addy
of all ones (255.255.255.255), and the other wants all zeroes.)
[22] "Hi, I'm IE 4.0 and I'm going to secretly replace half your system..."
[23] Scroll bars that like to play "snap back to original position"
if one moves the mouse bar too far from the horizontal or vertical.
This is another personal preference, but is annoying to me.
[24] J++ and those damned Java extensions. ("delegate"??)
[25] DLL Hell, which is (finally!) being allegedly fixed in Win2K.
I'm not hopeful.
[26] And how many megabytes of RAM does Win2K require, again?
[27] And how many GIGAbytes of disk space does Win2K require, again?
[28] "Monopoly? What monopoly? We just provide everything for you."
[29] The NT demogame "Pinball" is a CPU hog, even when it's just
sitting there. (At least SOL.EXE idles nicely.)
[30] 3.11 - 3.10 = 0.00. Fortunately, this got fixed some time back.
And these are off the top of my head. Some of them are fixed, some
of them are minor, some of them are painful but one can work around
them, and some of them are just plain dumb.
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- Windows. When it absolutely, positively, has to
spread fear, uncertainty, and doubt -- and I'm
not talking about a competitor, either...
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Linux lags behind Windows
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Pete Goodwin)
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 19:09:10 GMT
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Aaron Kulkis) wrote in <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>write like a fucking moron, and I'll call you a fucking moron.
>
>If you wish to be referred to by more..exemplary terms,
>then improve your comprehension of the world.
>
>Until then, don't complain about the terms that are used to
>describe your behavior, when, in fact, those terms are accurate.
By your incredibly idiotic and pathetic standards.
I don't need to improve my comprehension of the world, you need to clean
out that gutter mouth of yours.
Pete
------------------------------
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