Date: Sun, 29 Jun 2003 09:35:08 -0500 From: "sektie" <sektie@codersluts.net> To: Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org>, swear@attbi.com (Gary W. Swearingen), FreeBSD Chat <freebsd-chat@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: RMS says: "Use BSD, for goodness sake!" Message-ID: <20030629142052.M48323@codersluts.net> In-Reply-To: <4.3.2.7.2.20030627133739.035722d0@localhost> References: <3EFBFEBD.B8772772@mindspring.com> <4.3.2.7.2.20030625214311.00e5e240@localhost> <20030626110336.GW34365@iconoplex.co.uk> <20030626113553.GA53078@packet.org.uk> <20030626122023.GB763@nitro.dk> <20030626124601.GB57378@iconoplex.co.uk> <3EFBFEBD.B8772772@mindspring.com> <4.3.2.7.2.20030627133739.035722d0@localhost>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
> YES, we absolutely do need to bring older code up to date -- or even > re-program the wheel if necessary. To insist upon blind forward "progress" > while the enemy is in fact nipping at our flanks is to ensure > defeat. The price of not standing up for principle now will be to > lose our very REAL freedom in exchange for Stallman's false "freedom." Before I get started, let me set one thing straight. I'm not a fan of the GPL. I hate it probably as much as you do. But don't you think you're being just a little psychotic nazi-ish about the whole thing? I mean, really now. Although the idea of running a system with absolutely no GPLed code on it sounds nice, how much difference does it really make? It sounds like a neat pet project in case the committers get really bored or run out of things to do, but I don't see that happening any time soon. What would you rather have - a stable, well supported OS, or a server that you have to reboot every 2 days because it's being tempramental (but it *must* be superior because it has no GPL'ed code)? I go for functionality, stability, and standards. One of the things I love about FreeBSD is the fact that I'm always going to know where stuff is and how it works. None of this IRIX crap (forgive me, I'm bitter, I've been thrown into an IRIX situation at work and it's made me quite irate)! where strace isn't strace and rsync isn't rsync. FreeBSD is so bloody standard. I don't have to think about "this is the way it works on this OS". When you work at a place where you're having to work on 8 bazillion different types of UNIX, you start to understand how truely wonderful standards are. I don't really mind using gcc or any of the other utilities mentioned. It's not like I plan on modifying them. Our dependancy on GPL really isn't that bad though, all things considered. A few things could be moved to base (like tcpdump). I'm really lovin' on the FreeBSD folks for moving perl out of base. :) ciao. Randi Harper sektie@codersluts.net http://perlpimp.codersluts.net/
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20030629142052.M48323>