Linux-Advocacy Digest #112, Volume #32 Sun, 11 Feb 01 01:13:02 EST
Contents:
Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux (T. Max Devlin)
Re: NTFS Limitations (Was: RE: Red hat becoming illegal?) ("Tom Wilson")
Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Interesting article ("Chad Myers")
Re: user satisfaction with Linux OS (T. Max Devlin)
Re: NTFS Limitations (Was: RE: Red hat becoming illegal?) ("Chad Myers")
Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux ("Erik Funkenbusch")
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 04:45:51 GMT
Said Erik Funkenbusch in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Sat, 10 Feb 2001
17:59:38 -0600;
><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>news:963qin$i8f$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> Erik Funkenbusch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>
>> >> In effect MS will control what I can do with MY computer and the OS,
>> >> which i gave money for (lots of it, to boot).
>>
>> > You don't own the OS, you only own the license, even with Linux.
>>
>> Look, funkybreath, quit talking about linux. Every time you say
>> *anything* about linux, you make yourself look like a complete idiot.
>
>Are you stating specifically that you do in fact own the intellectual
>property contained in a Linux distribution?
Just a copy of it.
>That goes against the comments
>embedded in the source code and against the GPL. The copyright owner owns
>the software, not the licensee.
No, the copyright owner owns the intellectual property, not the
software. According to some theory, there is a magical 'original copy'
which the author always owns, but the fact is that is a crutch for those
who can't grasp abstractions. In reality, if you purchased a 'software
package', then you own that software package. Trying to confuse things
with epistemological double-speak has no bearing on the matter.
>Your statements to the contrary here are the ones looking idiotic.
Thanks for your time. Hope it helps.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: "Tom Wilson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: NTFS Limitations (Was: RE: Red hat becoming illegal?)
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 04:43:26 GMT
"Chris Ahlstrom" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Tom Wilson wrote:
> >
> > The very fact that feature is being proposed is enough to conjure up
past
> > memories of subscription based software from the early eighties. It is
a
> > blatant rip-off and causes your TCO to skyrocket. Actually, i'm
surprised
> > its' taken this long, with the Internet being what it is now, for
someone
> > to seriously pursue such a course again. The consumer sector said no,
> > resoundingly, to DIVX and i'm hoping that the commercial sector takes
the
> > same tact with this profit mongering.
> >
> > I've heard some of the jucier technical details of .NET and, as a
> > developer, I see the potential. I also see the scenario I just ranted
on.
> > We've made the decision not to develop for it and we won't. If it takes
> > off, and I don't see it doing so... One of the alternative OS's will
just
> > have to be modified to counter it. Be it Linux or BSD.
>
> As I understand it, .NET will be accessible to any OS, it's just that
> Windows tools will be the first down the pike. Of course, that
> common-language substrate will be lowest-common-denominator, and
> Microsoft will change it whenever they see fit, giving developers fits.
> It'll be as stable as OLE/COM/COM+/ActiveX/DCOM.....
As best I can determine it IS OLE/COM/COM+/ActiveX/DCOM. Nothing new. Just
a label and more promises with that little subscription wrinkle added.
With all of the Fear Uncertainty and Doubt talk being bandied about, I'd go
so far as to say MS isn't so much spreading it as feeling it at this point.
Win ME, 2K, Whistler, all released within a short amount of time. Now we
have a conglomeration of existing technologies repackaged as .NET. Throw in
all of the recent Linux trashing and you've got one very concerned company.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux
Date: 11 Feb 2001 04:49:26 GMT
Erik Funkenbusch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:96542p$ri9$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> Erik Funkenbusch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>> > news:963qin$i8f$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> >> Erik Funkenbusch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> >>
>> >> >> In effect MS will control what I can do with MY computer and the OS,
>> >> >> which i gave money for (lots of it, to boot).
>> >>
>> >> > You don't own the OS, you only own the license, even with Linux.
>> >>
>> >> Look, funkybreath, quit talking about linux. Every time you say
>> >> *anything* about linux, you make yourself look like a complete idiot.
>>
>> > Are you stating specifically that you do in fact own the intellectual
>> > property contained in a Linux distribution? That goes against the
> comments
>> > embedded in the source code and against the GPL. The copyright owner
> owns
>> > the software, not the licensee.
>>
>> Im stating that according to the licensing structure, I can do whatever
> the
>> hell I want with it, including sell it for profit. Thats almost exactly
> as
>> good as owning it.
> But it's not owning it. And you can't do "whatever the hell [you] want with
> it". For instance, you can't link it to proprietary code and distribute it,
> nor can you modify it and remove copyrights or the license.
I most certianly can link it to proprietary code and distribute it, you
idiot. Time to read a bit more carefully, funkybreath.
What I cannot do is cause the open source code that falls under the GPL
to be non-functional in the face of proprietary, CLOSED SOURCE code.
For example, I could not make the operating system non-functional without
the presence of internet explorer.
:)
=====.
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 04:55:22 GMT
Said Erik Funkenbusch in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Sat, 10 Feb 2001
[...]
>Le Tocq is not a Microsoft spokesperson. He's an analyst for the gartner
>group and is only saying what he "suspects".
>
>> "When you subscribe to a cable channel, it's not like you get HBO
>> version 1 and a year from now HBO version 2, you subscribe to HBO," Le
>> Tocq said. "It may change over time but there's no versions associated
>> with it."
>
>You stated specifically, as fact that this was true. Now you are trying to
>use the words of some analyst giving his opinion and claiming it's fact.
>It's not.
Prove it. You don't need to prove a negative, and prove it cannot be
true. Just provide us a single reason, besides Microsoft's bald-faced
insistence which nobody believes, to believe that it is not true.
Providing just one slightly convincing reason might even qualify as real
discussion, and make your presence in this newsgroup less of a useless
burden.
[...]
>The fact is, even if you replace every component, you've got 50 days to
>activate it. You can do so at your leisure.
The fact is, nobody cares. We don't want to do it at all, and see no
benefit to doing so. Microsoft pretends it is piracy, not the potential
for recurrent billing, which makes this kind of thing necessary. But
its a lie, is all. Breaking Microsoft's "you must buy a new copy for
every computer" trade secret agreement is *not* piracy. Microsoft again
pretends, as they have always done, and did at the anti-trust trial
where they were convicted of monopolizing, that they have privileges
from copyright law which they simply do not have.
[...]
>> ...the prior generations of Windows have been notoriously corruptible,
>> forcing users who tinker with their system to reinstall the OS and
>> applications from scratch several times per year. "I don't believe
>> people will try to get around it for piracy reasons, I do think they
>> will try to get around it for nuisance reasons," he said."
>
>You've never used Win2k, have you? In the year since the final release,
>I've never reinstalled it, and I've never heard of anyone needing to do so.
But you used to say the same thing about WinDOS, I'm sure, before the
official sock puppet briefs were changed to promote NT 4 and then W2K.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 04:59:36 GMT
Said Mike Martinet in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Sat, 10 Feb 2001
18:43:51 -0700;
>Ray Chason wrote:
>>
>> Because of that, Le Tocq said Microsoft is not getting the upgrade
>> revenue on Office, which is almost half of the company's total
>> revenue. "Microsoft is hurting big time because Office is not
>> getting renewed and they are pulling out all the stops so the cash
>> their company depends on keeps coming in."
>>
>> THIS is why Linux is my primary OS. THIS is why I put up with Linux's
>> various user-interface and hardware-compatibility bogosities. THIS is
>> why I use Linux, even more so than actually being able to fix my computer
>> when it breaks, even more so than having fewer crashes than Win9x. Linux
>> to me is about being able to use my computer--my property ferchrissakes--
>> without having to get Microsoft's permission first.
>>
>> Call me a Linonut, if you must. But we'll see who's the nut this time
>> next year when I'm still using my computer, and flatfoot can't because
>> she didn't pay her Bill bill.
>>
>
>By flatfoot, Do you mean flatfish with the Hayes abort string in his/her
>moniker? Flatfish is a she?
Nobody knows. It is a troll who has posted to cola under more than a
dozen monikers. One of the most prevalent ones was 'claire lynn', and
one of the earliest ones was also a female alias. So most people refer
to it as 'she', since if its female, it lets on that we haven't
forgotten its dishonesty, and if its a male, its probably chauvinistic
and might get annoyed at being called a female.
>Hm...
>
>I like the 'Bill bill'. That made me smile.
Me too. LOL.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 05:08:32 GMT
Said mlw in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Sat, 10 Feb 2001 07:18:15 -0500;
>Mike Martinet wrote:
>
>> In my experience, copy protection just doesn't work - either at home or
>> work. People blithely trade registration numbers and disks and software
>> with dongles gets replaced with applications that don't require keeping
>> track of a serial-port plug. I can't imagine home users being happy
>> about MS using their machines against them.
>>
>> I think in about 2 years there's going to be a hell of a lot of business
>> for people who know how to set up Linux.
>
>I read an interesting article a few years back, about software piracy. (If
>anyone recognizes the article by this description, I'd love to find a copy
>again.)
I don't know the specific article, but it is a principle I'm familiar
with. Most people who buy the 'piracy' chant just aren't thinking hard
enough.
>The premise of the article was that the current thinking, every pirated CD is a
>net loss to company profits, was wrong and that there are actually two types of
>piracy: Counterfeit and sharing.
>
>Counterfeit software causes loss in company revenue because customers who have
>proven likely to purchase the product, are paying money to an entity that has
>no rights to collect money for the product.
Indeed, this is piracy.
>The sharing piracy, i.e. friends passing around a CD, does not hurt company
>profits because the people copying the software are NOT likely to purchase the
>software, and are not likely to call for technical support. It goes further to
>suggest that casual piracy actually helps the software companies profits by
>making the program more popular, and thus more likely to be purchased by those
>LIKELY to purchase software. It also points out that the people who copy
>software are often the "gurus" who have the authority to recommend software.
>
>In my experiences, I think this is true. I know lots of people that have an
>illegal copy of something that is more expensive than they would buy on their
>own, but have had their company buy it because it is something they want to
>use.
>
>I had an old pirated copy of SoftIce, a friend lent it to me when I was trying
>to track down a bug on a contract job. Ever since then, however, SoftIce is one
>of the first packages on my "must have" list when I do Windows software. So did
>NuMega lose the cost of that one floppy, or did they gain the income of the
>hundred or so copies my use of the product caused?
>
>This is a VERY common scenario, and I bet everyone reading this recognizes it
>as true.
The idea that 'software piracy' costs a large established vendor money
is flawed in just the way you describe. It gets a bit trickier when you
consider the smaller producer, particularly one with a product which is
very valuable to have, but isn't actually used routinely all the time by
the consumer. Its the classic provisioning problem which plagues the
economics of any company trading in things which have no physical
existence, like services and bandwidth.
The argument does still hold, however, as the broad installed base which
a small or medium sized producer can benefit from with 'sharing'
(basically, treating software as any other copyrighted work, without use
of trade secret-style licensing to restrict the owner's rights) is
vastly larger than spending millions of dollars on advertising would
provide.
>I wonder what will happen when everyone is forced to pay for M$ upgrades?
I would say that chances are very great we'll never get to that point.
>My
>bet is that market demand driven by CD sharing will not happen, and that will
>hurt Microsoft. By focusing on the consumer, and limiting his or her rights to
>do what they want with their computer, in an effort to get money from a group
>of people who are NOT likely to purchase software in the first place, may sway
>the influential computer user elsewhere.
That is certainly what would happen in an open market. But a free and
competitive market doesn't spawn stuff like Microsoft's upgrade policies
to begin with.
The interesting question is what happens if we should treat software as
any other copyrighted work, and then consider the issues and
ramifications of the stuff going on with Napster and DVD....
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: "Chad Myers" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Interesting article
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 05:01:38 GMT
"Jim Richardson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> On Sat, 10 Feb 2001 19:23:17 GMT,
> Chad Myers, in the persona of <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
> brought forth the following words...:
>
> >
> ><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> >news:962oma$7gd$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> >> In article <pM2h6.6086$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
> >> Chad Myers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >> >
> >> >"Giuliano Colla" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> >> >news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> >> >> Well, I'm fed up with tpc.org. It's a site handled by a number of
> >> >> companies to advertise their products, and it has nothing to do with
> >> >> "independent benchmarks". Only a clueless ignorant Windows supporter
> >> >> could stop considering its useless data.
> >> >> Leave it aside and try with another one.
> >> >
> >> >Another example of "Windows won the benchmark, so the benchmark must
> >> >suddenly be wrong".
> >> >
> >> >It's really sad when you guys can't accept a major fact. Just because
> >> >you don't like that Windows is the highest performing transactional
> >> >processing OS doesn't mean that you can just throw it away.
> >> >
> >> Another example of Chad ignoring the answers he doesn't like so he
> >> can complain about the other person "Changing the subject" away from
> >> his original lie.
> >
> >What answers? Some guy who simply can't except the fact that Windows
> >dominates over Unix so he wishes to simply close his eyes and make
> >it go away?
> >
> >Perhaps you should open your eyes and read once in awhile.
> >
>
> Windows won one benchmark, this is domination?
In this benchmark, I didn't say as a whole.
However, now that you mention it, Windows owns a significant portion
of the server market and is making in-roads in the enterprise market
as well. Perhaps not domination, but certainly making a mark.
The server and enterprise server market is not a space soley of
Unix anymore.
> was it domination when linux tromped windows into the dirt in the
> Spec99 tests?
A web server test vs an enterprise database transaction processing test
are hardly similar.
So, Linux may be a faster web server in certain circumstances.
Perhaps, maybe, in 5 years, Windows will be the back-end workhorse
server and Linux will be serving up the web pages.
> We will ignore for now the fact that the windows cluster was running a
> database which would have been a poor choice for many uses, given the lack of
> write abilities on the whole db by anymachine at any time. It would work nice
> for a system that just served thousands of pages, without making changes to
the
> db. But it's not a model that works for many other needs.
Well, without knowing much about the details, I wouldn't be so quick to
say that writes are impossible. Windows clustering is pretty good and
I'm know they have a shared disk implementation which makes writes inherent
and possible. In fact, a large part of the tpc tests are writes (processing
transactions includes writes in their test, from what I understand).
Simply dismissing as "just clustering" is ignorant. Windows clustering
is top notch and provides unlimited scaling potential with near 100%
availability (if not 100%) for a fraction of the cost of a similar Unix
box. That's a Big Deal(tm).
Linux eeked out 3% on a web server trial, big whoop.
> But, for future reference, winning one benchmark is dominating, according to
> Chad.
Nice attempt at trivilizing. Just another example of the blatant and
childish attempts to trivialize the TPC benchmark and compare it on the
same level as a web server trial.
-Chad
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: user satisfaction with Linux OS
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 05:17:59 GMT
Said Adam Warner in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Sun, 11 Feb 2001 03:52:58
>Hi T. Max,
>
>hgonzalo2564 told us that he or she is trying to measure User satisfaction
>in use of the Linux Operating System.
>
>hgonzalo2564 will be analysing user satisfaction using data from Linux
>advocates, Windows advocates and trolls.
Actually the choices are Linux or Mac advocates, though there is
absolutely nothing to prevent anyone from misreporting.
>I fail to see how correct
>interpretation of these self-selected individuals could give meaningful data
>about general user satisfaction in the use of Linux--or meaningful data to
>compare with user satifaction of other operating systems by using another
>sample of self-selected individuals from other advocacy groups. The data
>will be of extremely dubious quality. Imagine if flatfish filled out a few
>of the surveys.
Would flatfish fill it out for Linux or Mac or both? The choice itself
is the meaningful data in that example. And the fact is that it is
possible to account for certain affects of such behavior statistically.
>Since you have stated that such correct interpretation is elementary I'm
>fully open to learning such an elementary technique.
Well, the basic idea is that you presume the answers themselves are
conceptually important. But if the intent is simply to compare two
groups' responses, it doesn't matter a bit how accurate either group's
responses are, there is still useful information which can be extracted
by comparing the two.
I'm not saying that's certainly the case here; this person may indeed
have no idea how to accurately understand any statistical data, let
alone such subtle indications. And a sample size of only 100 would
indicate that his self-selected sampling would be bogus for many
purposes. But still, conceivably, not all. I didn't do the few seconds
of point-and-click it would have taken to give him data, as I'm not a
regular Linux user yet, and haven't used a Mac routinely in years. But
its possible, whether its likely or not, that his study will have some
validity. For all you know, he's throwing out all data except those
that say their system is the absolute best, or absolute worst, in all
categories, and merely attempting to analyze the number of such
responses as an indication of how bogus self-selected samples are.
He did indicate, after all, that there was some research supporting such
a supposedly senseless on-line survey.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: "Chad Myers" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: NTFS Limitations (Was: RE: Red hat becoming illegal?)
Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2001 05:03:40 GMT
"Tom Wilson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:OLoh6.1188$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>
> "Chris Ahlstrom" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > Tom Wilson wrote:
> > >
> > > The very fact that feature is being proposed is enough to conjure up
> past
> > > memories of subscription based software from the early eighties. It is
> a
> > > blatant rip-off and causes your TCO to skyrocket. Actually, i'm
> surprised
> > > its' taken this long, with the Internet being what it is now, for
> someone
> > > to seriously pursue such a course again. The consumer sector said no,
> > > resoundingly, to DIVX and i'm hoping that the commercial sector takes
> the
> > > same tact with this profit mongering.
> > >
> > > I've heard some of the jucier technical details of .NET and, as a
> > > developer, I see the potential. I also see the scenario I just ranted
> on.
> > > We've made the decision not to develop for it and we won't. If it takes
> > > off, and I don't see it doing so... One of the alternative OS's will
> just
> > > have to be modified to counter it. Be it Linux or BSD.
> >
> > As I understand it, .NET will be accessible to any OS, it's just that
> > Windows tools will be the first down the pike. Of course, that
> > common-language substrate will be lowest-common-denominator, and
> > Microsoft will change it whenever they see fit, giving developers fits.
> > It'll be as stable as OLE/COM/COM+/ActiveX/DCOM.....
>
> As best I can determine it IS OLE/COM/COM+/ActiveX/DCOM. Nothing new. Just
> a label and more promises with that little subscription wrinkle added.
Well, then you really have no idea what you're talking about then.
You probably don't know what OLE, COM/ActiveX, DCOM, or COM+ are in the
first place, and you certainly don't have the slightest clue what .NET
is, as evidenced by the above paragraph.
In the future, please refrain from ebarassing yourself by making such
ignorant from-the-ass comments as above. At least take the time to read
one article, even one paragraph of an article that summarizes .NET before
even making a comment on it.
Thank you,
Chad
------------------------------
From: "Erik Funkenbusch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Whistler/.NET will Help Linux
Date: Sat, 10 Feb 2001 23:37:18 -0600
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:9655km$2qr$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> >> Im stating that according to the licensing structure, I can do whatever
> > the
> >> hell I want with it, including sell it for profit. Thats almost
exactly
> > as
> >> good as owning it.
>
> > But it's not owning it. And you can't do "whatever the hell [you] want
with
> > it". For instance, you can't link it to proprietary code and distribute
it,
> > nor can you modify it and remove copyrights or the license.
>
> I most certianly can link it to proprietary code and distribute it, you
> idiot. Time to read a bit more carefully, funkybreath.
Stop being such a moron.
> What I cannot do is cause the open source code that falls under the GPL
> to be non-functional in the face of proprietary, CLOSED SOURCE code.
No. I will quote:
http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html
"2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it,
thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such
modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you
also meet all of these conditions: "
...
"b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or
in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be
licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of
this License. "
Which means that you either a) License your proprietary code as GPL if you
link to it, or b) if you don't have the right to relicense the proprietary
code, you can't distribute the proprietary code that is linked with GPL'd
code.
So stop making a fool of yourself.
> For example, I could not make the operating system non-functional without
> the presence of internet explorer.
There is no such clause in the GPL. None at all.
------------------------------
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End of Linux-Advocacy Digest
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