From owner-freebsd-advocacy Tue Apr 17 17:47: 4 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org Received: from mooseriver.com (erie.mooseriver.com [205.166.121.26]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0052837B422 for ; Tue, 17 Apr 2001 17:47:02 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jgrosch@mooseriver.com) Received: (from jgrosch@localhost) by mooseriver.com (8.11.2/8.11.2) id f3I0l0T79940; Tue, 17 Apr 2001 17:47:00 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jgrosch) Date: Tue, 17 Apr 2001 17:47:00 -0700 From: Josef Grosch To: David Johnson Cc: freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Windriver, Slackware and FreeBSD Message-ID: <20010417174700.A79803@mooseriver.com> Reply-To: jgrosch@mooseriver.com References: <3ADCDCA7.A01F5F40@acuson.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 1.0.1i In-Reply-To: <3ADCDCA7.A01F5F40@acuson.com>; from djohnson@acuson.com on Tue, Apr 17, 2001 at 05:15:35PM -0700 Sender: owner-freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Tue, Apr 17, 2001 at 05:15:35PM -0700, David Johnson wrote: > Today's announcement of the abandonment of Slackware caught me by > surprise. All Slackware employees laid off. Slackware was *profitable* > for Walnut Creek and BSDi. I think they've lost more in good will than > they will gain. That, plus some blatant GPL baiting, makes Windriver > pretty slimy. > > So, how is FreeBSD going to fare? Will they be canned as well? Will they > try to distance themselves from Windriver? I think it would serve > Windriver right if Slackware, FreeBSD and the ftp.freesoftware.com > people upped, left, and started over with their own company. It's sad to see that WindRiver has chosen not to hire the Slackware developers that were employed at Walnut Creek/BSDi. They did great things. WindRiver has stated that they will continue to support FreeBSD just as Walnut Creek/BSDi did. See this link; http://www.windriver.com/press/html/bsdi_faq.html To be perfectly honest, I am a little suspicious of WindRiver. I hear them talk the talk, I want to see them walk the walk. I think the real reason they bought BSDi is because in the embedded systems space they rule, but they have seen the embedded Linux system making inroads into their market. They decided that they need an Open Source System to compete. The BSD license is more business friendly so why not buy a troubled BSD company. I guess the suits at WindRiver decided that the baggage that BSDi came with, namely FreeBSD, was not going to be too much trouble besides if they treat FreeBSD nice they might get good karma points with the Open Source people. Lord knows with WindRivers licensing and pricing structure they are going to need all the good karma points they can get. Time will tell. Josef -- Josef Grosch | Another day closer to a | FreeBSD 4.3 jgrosch@MooseRiver.com | Micro$oft free world | www.bafug.org To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message