On Thu, 1 Nov 2001 19:33:12 -0800 (PST), [EMAIL PROTECTED] (David E. Fox) wrote: > > RMS is the kind of guy who is very easily misunderstood. He is also the kind > > of guy that tends to go a little overboard with things. In some cases, he > > mellows > > I've met RMS as well on two separate occasions. His last talk at SVLUG here > in Sunnyvale (probably over a year ago) he was (at least in my opinion) over- > doing the GPL advocacy thing, like trying to ensure that people only have > GPL on their system (advocating exclusion of proprietary things even where > they might be useful on Linux systems -- things like Star Office, netscape, > etc.) And, he was pushing Debian as 'the' GNU/Linux. Not that I don't advocate > Debian - it's a very respectable distribution with many advantages -- but the > 'GNU/Linux' is to me a misnomer. Yes, there's a lot of GNU, and perhaps Linux > would be less than what it is today without it, but there's a lot of extra > non-GNU stuff in a typical Linux distro, and I don't think Debian has an > edge on having a higher percentage of GNU than does any of the other distros > out there.
Debian is 'the' GNU/Linux because it has an official policy of only including something if it is GPL. KDE was excluded for some years until TrollTech relicensed QT under the GPL. RMS uses "GNU" in a broad sense, referring to the GNU system and to programmes which are under GNU licenses (GPL/LGPL). This forms the vast bulk of any distro, including the most critical portions. Linux is a kernel that cannot work on its own. Its Windows equivalent would be krnl386.exe. The GNU system includes such staples as Glibc, Gcc, Bash, Emacs, Midnight Commander and almost all of the shell commands. A system cannot function without these. The GNU system also includes GNOME and XFree86 (which is MIT licensed, not GPL). Linux itself is GPL, with an exception for addable modules. Add to this everything which is GPL or LGPL (including QT and KDE) and you have a system which would be over 90% GNU, including all the vital components. The remainder are add-ons, things which can very easily be done without. Windows isn't judged by the licenses of external, non-essential applications, so why should GNU/Linux? -- Sridhar Dhanapalan "There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." -- Ken Olson, President, Chairman and Founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977
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