linus vs gnu+linux (Re: Free software on wikipedia)

[Alfred M. Szmidt]

   Again i will try to bring up discussion about "WTF that GNU is?".

A operating system, much like BSD.  That several millions of users use
without knowing about it.

   1. 10+ years of the discussion:
   <http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-kernel&m=104931588910174&w=2>
   <http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-kernel&m=104931588909978&w=2>

Yes, and people have argued for as long about micro- vs
monolhitic-kernels, emacs vs vi, unix vs vms, and what not.  Some
people like to discuss things, me included.

   2. FSF problems with GCC:
   <http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.linux.kernel/450746>
   <http://www.kernel.org/git/?p=linux/kernel/git/josh/sparse.git;a=blob;f=FAQ;h=aad658282a72477837629e7f521ed4cced5f45dc;hb=HEAD>

Looks more like Jörn not being willing to sign a 2 sided piece of A4.
Copyright assignments are important if you wish to be able to enforce
the license of a project without having to talk to each copyright
holder.

   3. FSF problems with glibc maintainer -- mister Drepper
   (look at wikipedia).

Wikipedia doesn't have the full story.  But conflicts happen in any
project, big or small, and some conflicts are less pretty since
sometimes you have two strong willed people.

Also note that the GNU C library is not Ulrich's project, he might be
one of the caretakers of it, but in the end it is the head of the GNU
project that decides who is and who is not the maintainer. If Ulrich,
or anyone else, doesn't agree to follow the policies of the GNU
project, then they should stop down as maintainers, it is quite that
simple.  That is what a GNU maintainer does, sees to that the policies
of the GNU project are followed.

   4. Read carefully, who (David MacKenzie) is deserving
   acknowledgment for GNU tools here:
   <http://packages.debian.org/changelogs/pool/main/a/apache/apache_1.3.34-4/apache.copyright>

Well, yes, since David and Larry wrote a tool for the GNU project,
like many other hackers.  Many GNU programs output who wrote the tool,
you can type `tool --version' and see, this is what `diff --version'
outputs: Written by Paul Eggert, Mike Haertel, David Hayes, Richard
Stallman, and Len Tower.

   Maybe i'm too young to understand something more, than i do, anyway
   after 6+ years of being with *-linux-gnu-*, i think FSF+RMS is
   wrong.

It would be most interesting to hear why you think the FSF and/or RMS
are wrong; and about what they are wrong about.  But don't confuse the
two, the FSF is not RMS, nor is RMS the FSF.

You think that the GNU project is crap, but you haven't articulated
why you belive so.  Nobody is forcing you to use GNU, you could
equally use OpenBSD or similar, which is also a free operating system.
Or you could build a operating system using the tools you suggested
and use that.

Cheers.