Re: Story Time

On 06/07/07 08:15, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
[snip]

To use any code that is not public domain, you must agree to the license. In this case, the General Public License says that "you" can freely use "his" code, but that if you distribute the subsequent binaries to anyone else, you must share your changes with "them".

Think of it as payment for "his" code.
Payment? I thought this was "free" software. That is what they
like to claim.
Shows how little you know of the GPL.

Are you saying they don't claim GPLed software is "free"?

The phrase usually used it "free as in speech, not (necessarily) free as in beer". In fact, the GPL encourages you to charge money for shipping your code to your distributees.

"free" is "free". Why hide behind fancy rhetoric unless you have
something to hide? Is it "free" software or not? Code released
under the BSD license is "free", the only strings attached relate
to the text of the copyright message and in no way restrict what
you may or may not do with the code. The only thing more free is
public domain.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libre

The English word "free" is used for both the Latin words /libre/ (freedom) and /gratis/ (no cost, "for nothing").

GPL software *can be* /gratis/ but it *is* /libre/.

The GPL grants liberty (the power of choice) to programmers, not cheapness (not costing or charging anything).

If you still don't understand, then either:
a) I'm not good at explaining, or
b) you have closed your mind.

[snip]

And there are other GNU Programs that
while living up to the letter of the agreement do not live up to the
spirit in that they have made the source code they provide useless
without paying them for the tools to work with it.
Tivo?
Don't know about Tivo as not being a television addict I have never
used one. I was thinking of something totally software.
It runs on Linux (and that code is available to customers) but you can't modify the code, because Tivo will only run if the hash key of the compiled binary matches a pre-calculated number.

So, it is like I said, the GPL didn't protect the "freedom" of this code.
Just one more to add to my long (and growing) list.

So, because the GPL is imperfect in corner cases, you don't like it anywhere????

The RH "commercial" version does have some closed-source features,
And this doesn't violate the GPL? Strange!
Absolutely not.

The GPL'ed code is available, and the closed-source code isn't.

I thought modification to GPLed code had to be GPLed?

Who says that RH's closed-source apps are derived from open-source apps?

Just like running Oracle on Linux.

We are not talking about none GPLed applications here. There are
difference ins the kernel between the two versions. The kernel is
GPLed and any modification are supposed to be GPLed as well.

Umm, yeah. Are we talking about the same thing? I'm referring to apps and you mention the kernel.

but CentOS makes a (rather popular) fully functional distro using the same sources that RH Advanced/Enterprise Server uses.
Oh great, yet another Linux distro. What was it you said about Unix Wars?
And it's *fully* source-and-binary compatible with Red Hat.

It's still yet another fork in the trail. Something that many call
a bad thing for BSD. So, how long before it stops being compatible
because they decide they do not agree with the direction RH is going?

Only the big distro makers (RH, SuSE, Debian, Ubuntu) write their own apps. And those are usually installers and management tools.

The others are (usually) specialized derivatives or "we can do better" forks.

However, all current Linux distros use roughly the same versions of the kernel and libraries and apps.

Or will the GPL prevent that? :-)

The GPL encourages forking. But nobody wants to deviate from the core kernel/libs/apps because then it's not useful.

Still, though, there are a few notable code forks that I can think of off the top of my head:

The leader of XFree wasn't keeping up with patches and wasn't allowing new, modern, features in. *Then* he arbitrarily changed the license, making part of it non-GPL-compatible. So, some of the developers forked the last GPL-compatible version into x.org, added the new features and all the distros quickly switched. I *think* the BSDs also eventually switched.

The accounting app SQL-Ledger was dominated by one man, who was applying very few user-submitted security patches and feature enhancements. So, some in the user base forked it into LedgerSMB, applied the security patches and are cleaning up the code while adding enhancements.

Some of the developers of the X compositing window manager /Compiz/ had a disagreement as to the direction of the project. So, some forked it into /Beryl/. Both followed the relevant standards, so GNOME would work with either, but they each had a different emphasis. There has been a rapprochement, and they are now working to merge their features.

Thus, it's sort of a neutral platform where binary compatibility is almost guaranteed.
Your joking, right? Debian won't run RedHat. RedHat won't run Slackware,
etc.
There *is* a high likelihood, if all the distro versions are of the same vintage.
A high likelihood is not much use if it turns out you have the wrong
version. I have Knoppix on a mach8ine at home for testing things and
I find very little that will actually work with it.
Running off a CD/DVD?

No, installed on a hard disk from a CD. (One thing that Linux distros
seem to do well is install. Although the latest CD from Sun was also
impressive!)

Hmmm. What kind of "things" are you trying to run on it? RPM files? Built-from-source?

[snip]
what particular Linux Distro is used. Plain and simple, they got it wrong
and probably have no intention of fixing it because they think it is
everyone else that is wrong.

On what basis do you make that bold assertion?

Extremely
inefficient IP stack because of NIH Syndrom.
None of the benchmarks I've seen show that it's "bad". Maybe the particular driver for the NICs you were using...
Must be using the wrong benchmarks. Every one I ever ran showed Linux
way behind.
Got any urls? No, really. The kernel team *always* wants to fix problems.

Then let them do their own work. I have no interest in fixing Linux.
I prefer to use other options that just work.

Did I ask for code? NO.

A url with a graph showing that a recent FreeBSD is substantially faster than a recent Linux, along with the methodology, is all that "they" need.

[snip comments about pimply-faced teenagers]

--
Ron Johnson, Jr.
Jefferson LA USA

Give a man a fish, and he eats for a day.
Hit him with a fish, and he goes away for good!
.

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