9 ms·

i'm chuckling a bit. but then the whole GNU ecosystem is about catering to a tiny minority with special priorities... inside of an even tinier minority of users

by jheriko 12y ago

i'm chuckling a bit. but then the whole GNU ecosystem is about catering to a tiny minority with special priorities... inside of an even tinier minority of users of open source OSes. I'm sure I am just an outsider who doesn't really understand the needs or the motivations... Linux does well in the server world, and Apple get a lot of attention, but even then, between them, they account for something like 4% of OS installs. I'm also not sure there is much need for GNU. The licenses are absolutely awful for things that claim to be free... sometimes if something is using LGPL with exceptions it will see some serious reuse (Qt as an example) but the GPL license is a great way to stop a project ever reaching its full potential due to its viral nature.

yellowapple 12y ago
> they account for something like 4% of OS installs. From a desktop perspective, yes, but Linux at this point has a majority stake in pretty much every other realm of computing.
madez 12y ago
Do you realize that mobile devices like smartphones and tablets most often have a linux-based or an apple-delivered OS? Following Gartner [1], 60% of all devices shipped in 2014 have an OS based on Linux or delivered by Apple. Do you think that a law that prohibits making other people slaves is non-free in nature? Because the GPL prohibits something similiar. [1] https://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2954317 https://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2954317
- stonogo 12y ago
  Your invocation of slavery to generate sympathy for your political goals is disgusting.
  - joshuapants 12y ago
    No, it's quite similar. The GPL doesn't inhibit freedom, it inhibits the power to erode freedom.
    - oldmanjay 12y ago
      The only way you can consider this "quite similar" is if you are using a rhetorical flourish to manipulate the listener emotionally. Which is, of course, what is being done here, and not for the first time on this particular topic. Just remember, hyperbole serves no master. Employ it at the risk of having it employed right back against you.
      - cgag 12y ago
        The way I consider it quite similar is that the freedom to own slaves isn't a real freedom, neither is the freedom to use my code to restrict other people's freedom in computing.
        deleted 12y ago
        [deleted]
      - pessimizer 12y ago
        Can't you just accept that other people are honestly seeing something that you're (not seeing/see but don't agree with) rather than accusing people who disagree with you on this of being cynically dishonest?
        fleitz 12y ago
        Are drivers licenses also a form of slavery because you're not allowed to drive with out one, and in order to keep it you have to follow most of the rules of the road? Most people would say that it's ridiculous to compare drivers licenses to slavery, even libertarians will tell you it's a loss of freedom but few would compare it to slavery, because for the most part drivers licenses and slavery have nothing in common.
      - baghira 12y ago
        Slavery is discussed in political philosophy all the time, even in "Anarchy, State, and Utopia" by Nozik (with which I happen to disagree, but that's nor here nor there). I did not read the first message as an hyperbole, but simply as a consequence of the fact that "enjoying freedoms while preventing others from enjoying them" brings slavery to mind quite often. It's an unfortunate, possibly unnecessary metaphor, but not necessarily a piece of rhetoric (although, like everything under the sun, it surely has been used to that effect as well).
  - madez 12y ago
    A law that prohibits slavery was just the first - and now after thinking about it a very good - analogy for the situation at hand. A better one is welcome :) I wasn't advertising any political goals. I just thought that the idea behind the GPL wasn't understood and wanted to make it clearer.
  - vcxzxcv 12y ago
    You're the one who brought politics into this.
- jheriko 12y ago
  do you realise i develop for these platforms amongst others? i don't just pull my opinion out of my arse, at least not entirely... :) your source of figures is very dodgy. you need to account for the devices that aren't brand new, and especially third world and the millions and millions of cheap androids and desktop pcs. looking at america or limiting to new purchases is very special and has nothing to do with the wider market (its not uncommon for people to have a "who buys these things new? what a bunch of idiots" mentality in poorer parts of the world). Apple do much better in the US than anywhere else, and new purchases are not the majority of devices in use in the wild. try a google search like this: https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=desktop%20market%20share https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1... and pick from many many sources of more useful figures as you can see from very many sources, aside from OS X - which is not really a linux, gnu/linux may as well not exist.
SEJeff 12y ago
Lets see, how much do you see Windows on: - in-car infotainment systems - in-flight infotainment systems - running digital billboards - mobile phones (hello android, meego, maemo, webos, etc) - smart televisions - smart dvd/blue ray players - etc You see Linux out in force on all of the above mentioned hardware platforms. The global Linux installbase absolutely dwarfs Windows in comparison by the simple nature that Linux runs on more hardware architectures than any general purpose operating system ever created (which rules out iTron, eTron, and the tron variants). Pretty much all of the new IoT "smart devices" are some Linux variant as well. I could go on and on, but really think you miss the forest for the trees here. Yes Windows beats the snot out of Linux on the Desktop. The desktop is quickly becoming irrelevant as the world becomes more connected.
- Sanddancer 12y ago
  in-car infotainment? Fiat, Nissan, Kia, etc all use Windows [1] in-flight infotainment? Let's start with Alaska [2] digital billboards? Given the number of snarky pics on the internet of billboards rebooting, etc, are you really gonna even try to go there? Windows has a lot of play in the embedded world too. Yeah, certain areas not as much as others, but it definitely is out there. [1] http://www.microsoft.com/windowsembedded/en-us/windows-embedded-automotive-7.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/windowsembedded/en-us/windows-embed... [2] http://blogs.windows.com/business/2015/03/26/unveiling-a-new-modern-inflight-entertainment-experience-for-alaska-airlines-powered-by-windows/ http://blogs.windows.com/business/2015/03/26/unveiling-a-new...
  - vcxzxcv 12y ago
    >microsoft.com >blog.windows.com Mind if I ask for non-biased sources? The first one has no date and the second is only for alaska airlines.
- jheriko 12y ago
  Don't confuse the very privileged western society that I'd guess you have direct experience of, with the whole world. Its not the same. America and new purchases are the tip of the iceberg of the market... maybe those kinds of statistics will be accurate in 15 years time when everything trickles down. Nobody has a mobile phone with a fancy OS to a reasonable approximation, and if they do they are all androids (which you can call it linux all you want, but Google did a whole pile of work to make it viable and has locked up and made it difficult to work with the usual tools people associate with that environment)
cgag 12y ago
If you like other people controlling your computer/data and only being able to work with their permission, then no, I guess you don't need free software. Market share on desktops might be low, though I don't actually care. I care that when microsoft or apple decide you can't install software outside of their app stores, when they decide you can only use DRM enabled video players, etc, that there's somewhere to turn.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
wildfire 12y ago
Wow. Thanks for bringing back visions of the 1990s. These arguments were tiresome then; they are boring now. You are conflating GNU, GPL and LGPL. The GNU system may never be as successful as you think. But portions like The GNU Compiler Collection (gcc, go, etc.) and GnuPG (GNU Privacy Guard) and thinks like GNU Emacs are the standard which others are measured against. Second the "absolutely awful" licenses; being under the GPL has certainly hindered Linux adoption. And Samba. And ... The GPL and LGPL are amongst the, if not the, most successful software licences in history. What's more they are one of the few that has resulted in more freedom. Things such as Netgear's WRT-54G are classic examples of where these "awful licences" have changed the world for the better.
- dietrichepp 12y ago
  The GPL in practice hasn't always resulted in more freedom compared to other licenses. For example, GCC is purposefully designed to be non-modular, to prevent people from developing proprietary front ends. You may agree or disagree with the trade-off, but observe the LLVM project: you have the freedom to manipulate IR outside the compiler. With GCC, you have permission to manipulate IR outside the compiler, but they've gone out of their way to make it difficult for you, so you might as well give up. LLVM's license makes the idea of impeding proprietary front ends a non-starter.
  - baghira 12y ago
    But that is not a result of the licensing, it is a result of a design decision. While it may very well be that such a design decision was made to avoid GCC being used with proprietary front-ends (along with the fact that GCC is simply an older project), it does not provide an argument against GPL, at best against some choices made by the FSF. And after all, the LLVM license is the reason why people have to hope that Apple will open Swift, as opposed to that being a fait accompli. And the LLVM license is the reason why hardware vendors will be able to build proprietary back-ends. In my book neither of these facts increases freedom.
  - jheriko 12y ago
    as much as i dislike GPL, i think that the success of LLVM/Clang comes from being a much superior platform to GCC. having built languages targetting both GCC was frought with "Who on earth implements this like this" moments. LLVM was painless, everything was obvious and the level of obfuscation is minimal... the documentation was helpful occasionally, rather than vitally necessary.
baldfat 12y ago
I down voted because of the strong statements that didn't seem fact checked before posting. Also posting an exact percentage of 4% when you didn't look. I don't care much for Apple but they are owning "Consumer" OS metrics right now. Tech Crunch states that OS X has a 13.6% market share of consumers purchases. http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/07/mac-achieves-highest-u-s-pc-market-share-ever-in-q3-2014-according-to-idc/ http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/07/mac-achieves-highest-u-s-pc... I myself use Linux and Windows machines. I prefer my own hackery terminals and tiled window manager for my desktop so I am in that tiny minority. I do not support most of RMS (Richard Stallman) says but Absolutly GNU has been a technology changer and all Open Source which effects all operating systems today owe a debt to GNU and that license. So please don't just post bah humbug without backing up why you would say such harsh things about anything. The more you disagree the more that is needed to be communicated on the your part to start a conversation.
orthecreedence 12y ago
I like to think of it this way: if I'm writing an open-source library that I want others to include in their projects, the best way to get adoption (or to just make fellow dev's lives easier) is MIT/BSD/similar-style licensing. I personally don't mind if people cut or carve up my code, use it in closed-source, etc as long as they keep my name on it. When it comes to building an actual app that's open-source (and not meant to be included in other projects), GPL is a really great way to go. In my mind, it protects the end-users of the app such that it can never be infected by closed-source software, via me or by anyone else, as long as it stays GPL. For things like protecting a project against the hooked tentacles of the US government's spy machine, it's a great tool. Sure I can put in backdoors, but everyone in the world will see it.

by jheriko 12y ago

yellowapple 12y ago

> they account for something like 4% of OS installs. From a desktop perspective, yes, but Linux at this point has a majority stake in pretty much every other realm of computing.

madez 12y ago

Do you realize that mobile devices like smartphones and tablets most often have a linux-based or an apple-delivered OS? Following Gartner [1], 60% of all devices shipped in 2014 have an OS based on Linux or delivered by Apple. Do you think that a law that prohibits making other people slaves is non-free in nature? Because the GPL prohibits something similiar. [1] https://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2954317 https://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2954317

stonogo 12y ago
Your invocation of slavery to generate sympathy for your political goals is disgusting.
- joshuapants 12y ago
  No, it's quite similar. The GPL doesn't inhibit freedom, it inhibits the power to erode freedom.
  - oldmanjay 12y ago
    The only way you can consider this "quite similar" is if you are using a rhetorical flourish to manipulate the listener emotionally. Which is, of course, what is being done here, and not for the first time on this particular topic. Just remember, hyperbole serves no master. Employ it at the risk of having it employed right back against you.
    - cgag 12y ago
      The way I consider it quite similar is that the freedom to own slaves isn't a real freedom, neither is the freedom to use my code to restrict other people's freedom in computing.
      - deleted 12y ago
        [deleted]
    - pessimizer 12y ago
      Can't you just accept that other people are honestly seeing something that you're (not seeing/see but don't agree with) rather than accusing people who disagree with you on this of being cynically dishonest?
      - fleitz 12y ago
        Are drivers licenses also a form of slavery because you're not allowed to drive with out one, and in order to keep it you have to follow most of the rules of the road? Most people would say that it's ridiculous to compare drivers licenses to slavery, even libertarians will tell you it's a loss of freedom but few would compare it to slavery, because for the most part drivers licenses and slavery have nothing in common.
    - baghira 12y ago
      Slavery is discussed in political philosophy all the time, even in "Anarchy, State, and Utopia" by Nozik (with which I happen to disagree, but that's nor here nor there). I did not read the first message as an hyperbole, but simply as a consequence of the fact that "enjoying freedoms while preventing others from enjoying them" brings slavery to mind quite often. It's an unfortunate, possibly unnecessary metaphor, but not necessarily a piece of rhetoric (although, like everything under the sun, it surely has been used to that effect as well).
- madez 12y ago
  A law that prohibits slavery was just the first - and now after thinking about it a very good - analogy for the situation at hand. A better one is welcome :) I wasn't advertising any political goals. I just thought that the idea behind the GPL wasn't understood and wanted to make it clearer.
- vcxzxcv 12y ago
  You're the one who brought politics into this.
jheriko 12y ago
do you realise i develop for these platforms amongst others? i don't just pull my opinion out of my arse, at least not entirely... :) your source of figures is very dodgy. you need to account for the devices that aren't brand new, and especially third world and the millions and millions of cheap androids and desktop pcs. looking at america or limiting to new purchases is very special and has nothing to do with the wider market (its not uncommon for people to have a "who buys these things new? what a bunch of idiots" mentality in poorer parts of the world). Apple do much better in the US than anywhere else, and new purchases are not the majority of devices in use in the wild. try a google search like this: https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=desktop%20market%20share https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1... and pick from many many sources of more useful figures as you can see from very many sources, aside from OS X - which is not really a linux, gnu/linux may as well not exist.

SEJeff 12y ago

Lets see, how much do you see Windows on: - in-car infotainment systems - in-flight infotainment systems - running digital billboards - mobile phones (hello android, meego, maemo, webos, etc) - smart televisions - smart dvd/blue ray players - etc You see Linux out in force on all of the above mentioned hardware platforms. The global Linux installbase absolutely dwarfs Windows in comparison by the simple nature that Linux runs on more hardware architectures than any general purpose operating system ever created (which rules out iTron, eTron, and the tron variants). Pretty much all of the new IoT "smart devices" are some Linux variant as well. I could go on and on, but really think you miss the forest for the trees here. Yes Windows beats the snot out of Linux on the Desktop. The desktop is quickly becoming irrelevant as the world becomes more connected.

Sanddancer 12y ago
in-car infotainment? Fiat, Nissan, Kia, etc all use Windows [1] in-flight infotainment? Let's start with Alaska [2] digital billboards? Given the number of snarky pics on the internet of billboards rebooting, etc, are you really gonna even try to go there? Windows has a lot of play in the embedded world too. Yeah, certain areas not as much as others, but it definitely is out there. [1] http://www.microsoft.com/windowsembedded/en-us/windows-embedded-automotive-7.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/windowsembedded/en-us/windows-embed... [2] http://blogs.windows.com/business/2015/03/26/unveiling-a-new-modern-inflight-entertainment-experience-for-alaska-airlines-powered-by-windows/ http://blogs.windows.com/business/2015/03/26/unveiling-a-new...
- vcxzxcv 12y ago
  >microsoft.com >blog.windows.com Mind if I ask for non-biased sources? The first one has no date and the second is only for alaska airlines.
jheriko 12y ago
Don't confuse the very privileged western society that I'd guess you have direct experience of, with the whole world. Its not the same. America and new purchases are the tip of the iceberg of the market... maybe those kinds of statistics will be accurate in 15 years time when everything trickles down. Nobody has a mobile phone with a fancy OS to a reasonable approximation, and if they do they are all androids (which you can call it linux all you want, but Google did a whole pile of work to make it viable and has locked up and made it difficult to work with the usual tools people associate with that environment)

cgag 12y ago

If you like other people controlling your computer/data and only being able to work with their permission, then no, I guess you don't need free software. Market share on desktops might be low, though I don't actually care. I care that when microsoft or apple decide you can't install software outside of their app stores, when they decide you can only use DRM enabled video players, etc, that there's somewhere to turn.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

wildfire 12y ago

Wow. Thanks for bringing back visions of the 1990s. These arguments were tiresome then; they are boring now. You are conflating GNU, GPL and LGPL. The GNU system may never be as successful as you think. But portions like The GNU Compiler Collection (gcc, go, etc.) and GnuPG (GNU Privacy Guard) and thinks like GNU Emacs are the standard which others are measured against. Second the "absolutely awful" licenses; being under the GPL has certainly hindered Linux adoption. And Samba. And ... The GPL and LGPL are amongst the, if not the, most successful software licences in history. What's more they are one of the few that has resulted in more freedom. Things such as Netgear's WRT-54G are classic examples of where these "awful licences" have changed the world for the better.

dietrichepp 12y ago
The GPL in practice hasn't always resulted in more freedom compared to other licenses. For example, GCC is purposefully designed to be non-modular, to prevent people from developing proprietary front ends. You may agree or disagree with the trade-off, but observe the LLVM project: you have the freedom to manipulate IR outside the compiler. With GCC, you have permission to manipulate IR outside the compiler, but they've gone out of their way to make it difficult for you, so you might as well give up. LLVM's license makes the idea of impeding proprietary front ends a non-starter.
- baghira 12y ago
  But that is not a result of the licensing, it is a result of a design decision. While it may very well be that such a design decision was made to avoid GCC being used with proprietary front-ends (along with the fact that GCC is simply an older project), it does not provide an argument against GPL, at best against some choices made by the FSF. And after all, the LLVM license is the reason why people have to hope that Apple will open Swift, as opposed to that being a fait accompli. And the LLVM license is the reason why hardware vendors will be able to build proprietary back-ends. In my book neither of these facts increases freedom.
- jheriko 12y ago
  as much as i dislike GPL, i think that the success of LLVM/Clang comes from being a much superior platform to GCC. having built languages targetting both GCC was frought with "Who on earth implements this like this" moments. LLVM was painless, everything was obvious and the level of obfuscation is minimal... the documentation was helpful occasionally, rather than vitally necessary.

baldfat 12y ago

I down voted because of the strong statements that didn't seem fact checked before posting. Also posting an exact percentage of 4% when you didn't look. I don't care much for Apple but they are owning "Consumer" OS metrics right now. Tech Crunch states that OS X has a 13.6% market share of consumers purchases. http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/07/mac-achieves-highest-u-s-pc-market-share-ever-in-q3-2014-according-to-idc/ http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/07/mac-achieves-highest-u-s-pc... I myself use Linux and Windows machines. I prefer my own hackery terminals and tiled window manager for my desktop so I am in that tiny minority. I do not support most of RMS (Richard Stallman) says but Absolutly GNU has been a technology changer and all Open Source which effects all operating systems today owe a debt to GNU and that license. So please don't just post bah humbug without backing up why you would say such harsh things about anything. The more you disagree the more that is needed to be communicated on the your part to start a conversation.

orthecreedence 12y ago

I like to think of it this way: if I'm writing an open-source library that I want others to include in their projects, the best way to get adoption (or to just make fellow dev's lives easier) is MIT/BSD/similar-style licensing. I personally don't mind if people cut or carve up my code, use it in closed-source, etc as long as they keep my name on it. When it comes to building an actual app that's open-source (and not meant to be included in other projects), GPL is a really great way to go. In my mind, it protects the end-users of the app such that it can never be infected by closed-source software, via me or by anyone else, as long as it stays GPL. For things like protecting a project against the hooked tentacles of the US government's spy machine, it's a great tool. Sure I can put in backdoors, but everyone in the world will see it.