On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 18:08:38 +0800, Zak B. Elep <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: .. > The OS is a simple abstraction, though quite complex in meaning. And > regardless of it being the nicest, most technologically advanced > piece-of-hacker's-minds purchaseable by commercial abstractions, it > doesn't mean a damn thing, when you don't even get the decent freedom of > extending it much more when you don't even have access to the source.
But you see, there's my point. While it's true that the OS kernel is very important, how many people actually extend the kernel itself? almost all of us do our extension/source code work at userspace. If you actually really enhance the kernel yourself, good for you. But speaking from my own experience and that of others, most of us work in userspace. I don't think the OS is *just* the kernel (one place where I agree with M$). And this might sound radical or inflammatory, but personally I don't think the *kernel* is all that important (!!!) -- you can run the familiar tools on most any kernel, be it Windows, MacOS X, Hurd..... and, with the Free *userspace* you can do almost everything. You're not really losing any freedom. Of course there are notable exceptions -- e.g. it would be very tough to do a flash-based router with Windows -- but by and large, the OS kernel is not going to be an issue unless you need something specific, e.g. drivers not supported by some other kernel. (of course you can write the drivers yourself if you have the freedom to do so) I agree with your point about giving up freedom. Very Stallman. but as I said in my earlier post, not everybody can be Stallman. The point of "having the freedom" as a differentiator between say M$ and Linux or *BSD is an ethical one. I *don't* think it's a technical one. -- Philippine Linux Users' Group (PLUG) Mailing List [email protected] (#PLUG @ irc.free.net.ph) Official Website: http://plug.linux.org.ph Searchable Archives: http://marc.free.net.ph . To leave, go to http://lists.q-linux.com/mailman/listinfo/plug . Are you a Linux newbie? To join the newbie list, go to http://lists.q-linux.com/mailman/listinfo/ph-linux-newbie
