Re: Debian FreeBSD
On Fri, Nov 19, 1999 at 05:53:05PM +1100, Hamish Moffatt wrote:
> On Thu, Nov 18, 1999 at 10:18:36PM -0600, Andrew G . Feinberg wrote:
> > It doesn't, but giving companies the option to take _OUR_ work propriatary
> > is _bad_ _bad_ _bad_. The BSD license lends itself to this, and I
> > guarantee it will happen if we follow this path.
>
> As a FreeBSD zealot I know says,
who listens to freebsd bigots anyway?
> the BSD license encourages you to contribute your changes back freely;
> the GPL beats you over the head with a brick until you do.
that's not exactly true. the GPL doesn't force you to give your changes
back. it merely requires you to make source available if you ever
redistribute a work based on existing GPL-ed code. use it in-house only
and you don't have to release the source.
also, the GPL doesn't ever require you to give your changes back to the
original author. it requires you to give source to the same people you
gave/sold binaries to, and it prevents you from imposing restrictions on
what those people can do with that code. nothing more, nothing less.
> To some, the GPL is less free than the BSD license.
that's because they take a dim-witted and short-sighted view of the
issue.
FWIW, i think that Debian FreeBSD is a good idea. if nothing else, it
will be a way of comparing the linux kernel and the freebsd kernel, as
there will be no userland differences to skew comparisons. Freebsd
people say that their kernel is more stable than the linux kernel - if
so, that's good. linux has been quite flaky since 2.2 was released and
there seems to be a distinct lack of committment to the idea that the
stable release kernel should have bugfixes only and NOT introduce new
bugs with new features or major changes.
the BSD license is certainly a free software license by any definition
of the term. and rabid loonies who worry that some evil company might
take the kernel from debian freebsd and make it proprietary are
completely missing the point that those evil companies can get the same
kernel direct from the ftp.freebsd.org.
but what it all boils down to is that if people want to work on a
project, nobody has the right to stop them.
The last thing i want to say is that i choose to run debian systems, not
necessarily linux systems. there's an important distinction there...i
am far more likely to consider changing the kernel i use than i am to
consider changing the rest of the operating system. i can contemplate
the idea of using something other than linux, but don't think i could
willingly or happily use something other than debian.
in short: debian rules, no matter what kernel it's running on.
craig
--
craig sanders
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