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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.mira.net.au!news.vbc.net!samba.rahul.net!rahul.net!a2i!olivea!spool.mu.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!gatech!newsfeed.internetmci.com!in2.uu.net!news.u.washington.edu!somsky From: somsky@dirac.phys.washington.edu (William R. Somsky) Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.development.system,comp.unix.bsd.386bsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc,comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc,comp.os.linux.advocacy Subject: Re: Historic Opportunity facing Free Unix (was Re: The Lai/Baker paper, benchmarks, and the world of free UNIX) Date: 16 Apr 1996 19:09:44 GMT Organization: University of Washington Lines: 26 Message-ID: <4l0r9o$4th@nntp5.u.washington.edu> References: <NELSON.96Apr15010553@ns.crynwr.com> <NELSON.96Apr15173839@ns.crynwr.com> <yfg68b0fpqo.fsf@time.cdrom.com> <NELSON.96Apr16100200@ns.crynwr.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: dirac.phys.washington.edu Xref: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au comp.os.linux.development.system:21470 comp.unix.bsd.386bsd.misc:610 comp.unix.bsd.bsdi.misc:3226 comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc:3044 comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc:17439 comp.os.linux.advocacy:45700 In article <NELSON.96Apr16100200@ns.crynwr.com>, Russell Nelson <nelson@ns.crynwr.com> wrote: > > We must win the desktop. You disagree. Oh well. > WHY?!? Why must we "win the desktop"? There is _absolutely_ no reason to believe that Free Unices can only succeed by "winning the desktop", unless you narrowly define success as "winning the desktop". Free Unices can survive and succeed perfectly well in the niche market of those of us who want a _UNIX_ without a lot of excess fluff and baggage purely for the sake of trying to win over windows users. Now, this doesn't mean work can't work be done on some of this -- as long as it's well-done, optional, and doesn't detract from the real Unix core, I'd welcome it -- but as soon as you make "winning the desktop" your sole, overriding, and obsessive concern, you'll start sacrificing everything else that others of us want Free Unices to be to this tin idol of yours. Well, anyway... I guess I better step down off of this soapbox before I fall and break my neck... I'm sure I'll have plenty of offers from people willing to do it for me... ________________________________________________________________________ William R. Somsky somsky@phys.washington.edu Department of Physics, Box 351560 B432 Physics-Astro Bldg Univ. of Washington, Seattle WA 98195-1560 206/616-2954