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Date:      Tue, 14 Sep 1999 12:35:03 -0700
From:      "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@zippy.cdrom.com>
To:        Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org>
Cc:        "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@zippy.cdrom.com>, Jonathan Lemon <jlemon@americantv.com>, chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: FreeBSD Distributions: Leveling the playing field 
Message-ID:  <83679.937337703@localhost>
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 14 Sep 1999 12:53:48 MDT." <4.2.0.58.19990914122930.04ad8c20@localhost> 

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> If there were not an intimate association between you and Walnut Creek 
> CD-ROM, I would  not be concerned. But because you are an employee

*shrug* - can't help you there, sorry.  I've explained all this about
as much as it's possible to explain it and I don't see any future
alternations in this situation happening, so there you have it.

> Many things written by others are released on CD-ROMs labeled "FreeBSD" 
> now. They include everything from XFree86 to GCC to a plethora of editors,

I don't see the relevance of this point.

> network utilities, and other tools. The installation program even
> invokes some of these products -- e.g. the XFree86 installer! So, 

So?

> What you seem to be concerned about, in this case, is the possibility
> that a third party component or utility will be mistaken for the FreeBSD 
> project's work. Again, the current release already creates this problem

No, I'm worried that there will be a whole third party distribution
which will be mistaken for the FreeBSD Project's release.  If somebody
really wants to think we wrote XFree86 all by ourselves and are major
coding studs, well, I won't lose any sleep over that though folks like
David Dawes sure might. :)

> It is very likely that many things which were done as part of that
> distribution would be contributed. But this should not be a requirement.

As long as the component itself was not a requirement to installing
the product, I'd agree.  If you make your hypothetical new installer a
requirement and now all the users of "FreeBSD HyperBrett" are going
through a substantially different installation experience and posting
emails to -questions which say things like "I'm at the default smell
configuration menu and I can't decide between (M)usty library and
(D)amp basement, has anyone tried these two smells yet?", well, the
people who staff those lists are going to be exceedingly confused.

If you were to donate the installer to the project and everybody
agreed that setting the default smell and viscosity of one's desktop
were fabulous options which they really wish had been in there all
along, well, then your installer would be the new default and the only
"odd questions" they'd get in -questions would be from people using
the old installer, to which of course they'd just yell "upgrade" and
go on to the next message.  No problem.

- Jordan


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