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Xref: sserve comp.os.386bsd.misc:2948 comp.os.linux.misc:20706 Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!msuinfo!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!gatech!newsxfer.itd.umich.edu!zip.eecs.umich.edu!yeshua.marcam.com!charnel.ecst.csuchico.edu!xmission!u.cc.utah.edu!cs.weber.edu!terry From: terry@cs.weber.edu (Terry Lambert) Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.misc,comp.os.linux.misc Subject: Re: Usefulness of BSD/Linux Source Knowledge (was BSD vs. LINUX) Date: 31 Jul 1994 18:43:59 GMT Organization: Weber State University, Ogden, UT Lines: 44 Message-ID: <31grdf$o8g@u.cc.utah.edu> References: <michaelv.775258838@ponderous.cc.iastate.edu> <1994Jul28.025818.6937@escape.widomaker.com> <1994Jul31.044558.12981@cs.brown.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.weber.edu In article <1994Jul31.044558.12981@cs.brown.edu> mhw@cs.brown.edu (Mark Weaver) writes: ] This is the vendors' way of competing with the free OSes. By ] creating a generation of programs that are written to work with ] SysV and Motif, they are giving the market a strong reason to buy ] commercial OSes. The painful move to Solaris was a necessary and ] calculated move on Sun's part. This is false. First of all, venders aren't "competing" in the same space as the free UNIX(R) clones; the clones leave a lot to be desired in terms of support, commercial apps, etc. At best, the clones are research platforms for computer scientists; at worst, they are simply "hackerware". ] NetBSD, FreeBSD, and Linux should not be fighting against each ] other. They're all remarkable accomplishments, and all have their ] characteristic advantages and disadvantages. Many say that the ] enemy is Microsoft, and this is true. But I also say the enemy ] are the vendors that try to sell for big bucks what we all enjoy ] for free. Cut it out. Why do you think many commercial organizations enforce the non-compete agreements against their engineers who want to do research outside the scope of their job responsibilities? The only effect your posting will have is to prevent commercial grade engineers from participating by making their managment unduly paranoid. This type of adversarial crap is what causes legal problems. A legally naieve but technically knowledgable member of the research community implies that the "target market" of a research project is something other than research, and a technically naieve but legally knowledgable member of a commercial interest goes off the deep end. I simply can't understand why researchers can't respect themselves for doing research, and have to imply a commercial bent to everything to assuage their egos. Research is by tself a laudable goal, and publically available results up the baseline for *all* commercial interests, with a net benefit to *everyone*. Terry Lambert terry@cs.weber.edu --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers.