*BSD News Article 74441


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From: mingo@pc5829.hil.siemens.co.at (Ingo Molnar)
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.networking,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: TCP latency
Followup-To: comp.os.linux.networking,comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Date: 22 Jul 1996 13:46:15 GMT
Organization: Siemens AG Austria
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Michael Hancock (michaelh@cet.co.jp) wrote:

[about divergence]

: Ok. I'll give you the kernel.  But there's version drift between different distributions 
: and there's quite a bit of difference in the applications and utilities being 
: distributed.  There's also quite a bit of differences in the future directions of the 
: various distributions.
: 
: I've had to deal with at least 2 different and incompatible versions of rpcgen in Linux 
: distributions.
: 
: As time passes, divergence increases.  It's inevitable.

the really "interesting" utilities (those which are actually useful :), 
are usually maintained by groups or persons, and seldom by the
distribution makers. So distributions are just a cute "representation"
of current independent software packages, salted with some handy
configuration tool and packaging system. But i wouldnt call that
"conceptual divergence".

Things like Caldera and other commertial products do diverge, but it's
their risk. Free Linux software doesnt diverge IMHO.

For example: there was 'rtin', now it's 'color rtin'. Or there was
'selection', now there is 'gpm with smooth scrolling graphical cursor'.
Or there was 'cdwrite 0.1', now there is a bunch of kick-*** utilities.
Thats the way i think free software is developing, and i see no 
divergence at all. Dunno about rpcgen.

Ok, there are some things that diverge, like the Linux libc and the GNU
libc. But thats again not 'fun driven', it's rather 'politics driven'.

: Do you really think that ...
: 
: 	"We are Linux, resistance is futile, you will be assimilated."
: 
: ... is going to work.  I don't think we can hope for more than selective adoption of each 
: other's strengths in the best case.

well thats more complicated. You cant really compare commercial software with
the free one. The 'fun effect' compromises everything. People code stuff worth
100 manyears in months, just for fun. And they cant do things doable in 1 
manmonth, just because it's boring. But so far (fortunatelly) there barely 
was a field that someone didnt find useful to explore. Usually, free software 
stops where it begins to be a 'job'. Commertial software stops (or gets very 
expensive) where complexity gets big.

So somehow i like the idea of commercial Linux distributions: high quality
free technology 'core elements' integrated together with hard commercial work. 
You dont have to agree :)

And the interesting thing is that free technology doesnt get lost. Thats the
big-big waste in commercial products: they code everything from scratch, 
zillion times, and in varying quality, to be very polite :).

-- mingo