6 ms·

And several other Mac features were stopped before they made it into the official release. This is Richard Stallman's policy: "GNU Emacs should never offer peop

And several other Mac features were stopped before they made it into the official release. This is Richard Stallman's policy: "GNU Emacs should never offer people a practical reason to use some other system instead of GNU. Therefore, when someone implements a useful new feature but only for a non-GNU system, we do not accept it that form." https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-12/msg01407.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-12/msg01... https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-12/msg01572.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-12/msg01...

saidajigumi 10y ago
Yes, yes. Hold Emacs hostage Mr. Stallman. That'll make everyone stay up all night hacking to bring your lackluster platform to parity with its competition. There's a real need for innovation and great ideas to better support all manner of open community resources, free software and beyond. But stupid control games are totes better than all that.
- vesak 10y ago
  >That'll make everyone stay up all night hacking to bring your lackluster platform to parity with its competition. Do you know any other platform that managed to form a foundation for org-mode? Until there is, emacs may not be called a "lackluster platform".
  - saidajigumi 10y ago
    I'm not referring to Emacs with that, but rather to Stallman holding Emacs functionality hostage to boost GNU OS platform(s). Which are definitely lackluster.
    - ekianjo 10y ago
      Its not because its not shiny and not pricey that its lackluster. At least you can customize stuff on your OS instead of having to follow the only way designed by Apple.
- madeofpalk 10y ago
  Eh. It's RMS being RMS. I think he's ridiculously dogmatic and unpractical, but you can't be surprised by this - he has his ideologies to push with fervent absolutism. I doubt he's all that concerned about the market share of his text editor.
kitsunesoba 10y ago
If the goal is to encourage people to use GNU software and potentially even migrate to a full GNU system, I find this policy counterintuitive. It comes off as needless and antagonistic and it pushes me further away from GNU and towards free software that's not so tangled up in rigid philosophies, or worse, proprietary software.
- beedogs 10y ago
  Then, by all means, go use whatever software you want. There's a place for ideological purists in software and I for one am glad RMS is around.
- raverbashing 10y ago
  Did you expect anything tasteful or coherent from RMS?
- gutnor 10y ago
  > It comes off as needless and antagonistic That's because that comes directly from the commercial companies rulebook. Apple (for example) will not make an application that runs better on Android or Windows than on one of its OS. It would not be beside any of the big brand to remove something that was working before just because that remove a tiny bit of interest in their own platform. That makes cruel business sense ... and they are also hated for it when it happens.
- pYQAJ6Zm 10y ago
  If you discover Emacs on macOS, and like among other things the multicolor feature, then decide to try the Full GNU Experience™ and find that that feature is not supported on the flagship (!) GNU product, well, then maybe you’ll be back to macOS after all. Let’s not forget that thanks to its libre licensing this is a strategic issue, but not a technical one – recovering the removed features on macOS is a few patches away.
Annatar 10y ago
Thank you for this. It validates and reaffirms my hate of GNU. GNU is not UNIX, and no amount of "freedom" peddling changes the fact that it purposely violates UNIX principles. The only thing that could change that is their code (for example ditching info in favor of man pages, removing the z option in GNU tar, or dropping --long-options), and that's one thing they'll never change. I'm so glad I don't have to put up with the likes of Stallman "setting me free" by removing features GNU/Linux doesn't support.
- icebraining 10y ago
  Is there any non-dead UNIX that doesn't, nowadays? The BSD tar also has -z, as does SmartOS. As much as I enjoy "cat -v considered harmful", it seems the battle is lost for UNIX itself. http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/ http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/
  - Annatar 10y ago
    At least on FreeBSD, I'm on BSD (don't have to use GNU), and on illumos / SmartOS I'm on AT&T System V release 4.0. As long as those alternatives exist GNU holds no power over me and provides no value that I care about, or need. Both BSD and SmartOS are free software.
- crististm 10y ago
  Remove z option in tar? Where did that come from?
  - Annatar 10y ago
    From the fact that tar is a tape archiver, and according to the UNIX philosophy of "do one thing and do it well" it should empathically not dub as a (de)compressor. GNU implements tools inside of other tools. Emacs is a perfect example if that.
    - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
      GNU didn't originate from a unix mindset. You should know this. That doesn't mean their software is bad. Also, Emacs is incredibly useful, and one of the best general-purpose text editors out there.
robert_tweed 10y ago
Seems to be a lot of hate for this policy, but the goal is simply universal interoperability, which is laudible. Otherwise we might as well go back to the days of IE6, since apparently there is absolutely no problem with Embrace-Extend-Extinguish, as long as we can have emojis on our Macbooks. Edit: I should add that, since it doesn't appear to be a true interop issue, it may not be a sound decision here. I'm defending the rationale for the policy, not this particular application of it.
- eloisant 10y ago
  The goal is "the lowest common denominator", while when making a cross-platform software it makes sense to have features that use the strength of each platform.
- Singletoned 10y ago
  > the goal is simply universal interoperability No, the goal is that "GNU Emacs should never offer people a practical reason to use some other system instead of GNU". Universal interoperability is just a side effect.
  - robert_tweed 10y ago
    You've got it backwards. Stallman may be disagreeable at times, but he's no fool. It's written this way to address the root cause of interop issues, which are themselves a secondary effect. Of course he wants people to choose GNU, but most importantly, he wants to preserve people's freedom to choose GNU, which means it must not become a second-class citizen to proprietory additions from Apple, Microsoft, or anyone else. If it's portable to GNU, the issue goes away. He says so explicitly.
    - raverbashing 10y ago
      And nobody will pick the GNU solution when the non-GNU solution works better regardless of the OS
  - bbatha 10y ago

saidajigumi 10y ago

Yes, yes. Hold Emacs hostage Mr. Stallman. That'll make everyone stay up all night hacking to bring your lackluster platform to parity with its competition. There's a real need for innovation and great ideas to better support all manner of open community resources, free software and beyond. But stupid control games are totes better than all that.

vesak 10y ago
>That'll make everyone stay up all night hacking to bring your lackluster platform to parity with its competition. Do you know any other platform that managed to form a foundation for org-mode? Until there is, emacs may not be called a "lackluster platform".
- saidajigumi 10y ago
  I'm not referring to Emacs with that, but rather to Stallman holding Emacs functionality hostage to boost GNU OS platform(s). Which are definitely lackluster.
  - ekianjo 10y ago
    Its not because its not shiny and not pricey that its lackluster. At least you can customize stuff on your OS instead of having to follow the only way designed by Apple.
madeofpalk 10y ago
Eh. It's RMS being RMS. I think he's ridiculously dogmatic and unpractical, but you can't be surprised by this - he has his ideologies to push with fervent absolutism. I doubt he's all that concerned about the market share of his text editor.

kitsunesoba 10y ago

If the goal is to encourage people to use GNU software and potentially even migrate to a full GNU system, I find this policy counterintuitive. It comes off as needless and antagonistic and it pushes me further away from GNU and towards free software that's not so tangled up in rigid philosophies, or worse, proprietary software.

beedogs 10y ago
Then, by all means, go use whatever software you want. There's a place for ideological purists in software and I for one am glad RMS is around.
raverbashing 10y ago
Did you expect anything tasteful or coherent from RMS?
gutnor 10y ago
> It comes off as needless and antagonistic That's because that comes directly from the commercial companies rulebook. Apple (for example) will not make an application that runs better on Android or Windows than on one of its OS. It would not be beside any of the big brand to remove something that was working before just because that remove a tiny bit of interest in their own platform. That makes cruel business sense ... and they are also hated for it when it happens.
pYQAJ6Zm 10y ago
If you discover Emacs on macOS, and like among other things the multicolor feature, then decide to try the Full GNU Experience™ and find that that feature is not supported on the flagship (!) GNU product, well, then maybe you’ll be back to macOS after all. Let’s not forget that thanks to its libre licensing this is a strategic issue, but not a technical one – recovering the removed features on macOS is a few patches away.

Annatar 10y ago

Thank you for this. It validates and reaffirms my hate of GNU. GNU is not UNIX, and no amount of "freedom" peddling changes the fact that it purposely violates UNIX principles. The only thing that could change that is their code (for example ditching info in favor of man pages, removing the z option in GNU tar, or dropping --long-options), and that's one thing they'll never change. I'm so glad I don't have to put up with the likes of Stallman "setting me free" by removing features GNU/Linux doesn't support.

icebraining 10y ago
Is there any non-dead UNIX that doesn't, nowadays? The BSD tar also has -z, as does SmartOS. As much as I enjoy "cat -v considered harmful", it seems the battle is lost for UNIX itself. http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/ http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/
- Annatar 10y ago
  At least on FreeBSD, I'm on BSD (don't have to use GNU), and on illumos / SmartOS I'm on AT&T System V release 4.0. As long as those alternatives exist GNU holds no power over me and provides no value that I care about, or need. Both BSD and SmartOS are free software.
crististm 10y ago
Remove z option in tar? Where did that come from?
- Annatar 10y ago
  From the fact that tar is a tape archiver, and according to the UNIX philosophy of "do one thing and do it well" it should empathically not dub as a (de)compressor. GNU implements tools inside of other tools. Emacs is a perfect example if that.
  - qwertyuiop924 10y ago
    GNU didn't originate from a unix mindset. You should know this. That doesn't mean their software is bad. Also, Emacs is incredibly useful, and one of the best general-purpose text editors out there.

robert_tweed 10y ago

Seems to be a lot of hate for this policy, but the goal is simply universal interoperability, which is laudible. Otherwise we might as well go back to the days of IE6, since apparently there is absolutely no problem with Embrace-Extend-Extinguish, as long as we can have emojis on our Macbooks. Edit: I should add that, since it doesn't appear to be a true interop issue, it may not be a sound decision here. I'm defending the rationale for the policy, not this particular application of it.

eloisant 10y ago
The goal is "the lowest common denominator", while when making a cross-platform software it makes sense to have features that use the strength of each platform.
Singletoned 10y ago
> the goal is simply universal interoperability No, the goal is that "GNU Emacs should never offer people a practical reason to use some other system instead of GNU". Universal interoperability is just a side effect.
- robert_tweed 10y ago
  You've got it backwards. Stallman may be disagreeable at times, but he's no fool. It's written this way to address the root cause of interop issues, which are themselves a secondary effect. Of course he wants people to choose GNU, but most importantly, he wants to preserve people's freedom to choose GNU, which means it must not become a second-class citizen to proprietory additions from Apple, Microsoft, or anyone else. If it's portable to GNU, the issue goes away. He says so explicitly.
  - raverbashing 10y ago
    And nobody will pick the GNU solution when the non-GNU solution works better regardless of the OS
- bbatha 10y ago