🚀 go-pugleaf

Kevin Everets <kevin.everets@alcatel.com> writes:
>
> > He wants the GNU label place over everything on a typical Linux
> > distro, above TeX, above netbase &c.  He wants to elevate it to a
> > level of importance equal to the kernel.
> 
> He seems to want the GNU label to be the label people use for a
> typical GNU distro (which happens to use Linux) as the point of view
> being presented is that GNU is the system.

But the system is _much_ more than just GNU.  Many have stated this,
but the pro-`GNU/Linux' factions ignores it; are y'all being
deliberately obtuse?

>  Why should the kernel be elevated above the windowing system, or
> the Desktop Environment?

Because it's the sine qua non.  A kernel without a windowing system
can still perform work; a kernel without a desktop can still perform
work; a desktop without a kernel is worthless.

> Out of curiosity: if you took a Solaris system, and put the Linux
> kernel in it, would you call that the Linux OS?  My guess is that
> you would.

Yup--'cause it'd be a Linux system in that case, using the Solaris
utilities (note that doing this, were it even possible, would be ten
types of foolish).

> > > The GNU page on Linux seems to express fairly well the GNU
> > > project's position on this: they were the first to begin the
> > > massive attempt to develop a complete free Unix-like system.
> > 
> > And the first to fail in a very big and embarassing way...
> 
> I'm pretty sure that it's far from a failure... it's still under
> development (and is in use).  I guess you have a different
> definition of failure than I do.

After nearly twenty years of effort, while Linux became popular well
before its tenth birthday.  GNU has failed to capture the imagination
and hearts of the world.  The GNU tools have succeeded, but the GNU
environment has not.  The kernel is dodgy and inefficient, and still
not ready for production use, nearly twenty years after work started.

There's no great shame in that; I never finished the encryption
program I was so proud of at age 16.  In fact the GNU Project should
rightly be _very_ proud of the toolset which it produced.  But it has
not yet produced a working operating environment, or indeed a truly
working operating system.

Meanwhile, Linus Torvalds and many others produced a working OS, and
still others combined that with the GNU tools and _many_ other
components to produce an incredible working environment (one which I
find the best in the world).  Insofaras the GNU Project contributed to
that, it should be proud.

But it has not produced Gnu's Not Unix...

> You're right: no single GNU tool is an attempt at a full OS.  A full
> GNU OS includes (at least some of) them, though.  Why name a
> collection by a single component?

You might name it after the most important one.  Or you might name the
collection as a whole.  The first yields the name Linux.  The second
yields RedHat, Mandrake, Debian &c.  No-one calls a car a
Wheel/Engine.

> > In the latter case, what I'm talking about is the Linux OS with all
> > the myriad bits of free software, GPLed, LGPLed, BSDLed &c. which make
> > up my system.  Thus, I call it Linux.  Although I could, I suppose,
> > call it BSD/MIT/GNU/Knuth/Linux.  Which would be silly, and dumb.
> 
> Calling it Linux/X/TeX/LibC would be dumb too... and that's why no one
> is suggesting it.

Then why call it GNU/anything?  That's just as dumb.

> You appear to be of the opinion that the kernel is the most
> important piece of an operating system, and thus should be the name
> of the operating system, which is well within your right to do.

The kernel _is_ the OS, by the actual definition of an operating
system (i.e. a resource manager which allocates disk, memory and
cycles, and controls access to the hardware).

The operating _environment_, OTOH, may be compared to e.g. Windows or
Mac OS X (an unfortunate name).  Indeed, I'd be more comfortable
calling Solaris + GNU tools GNU/Solaris, as in that case the GNU bits
are a non-default addition, whereas to my knowledge every Linux system
contains GNU tools.

> I would worry, however, about things like Lindows which by your
> definition is the Linux OS.  If viruses get written for Lindows
> (being as by default that Operating System runs as root, and so it
> would be easy to do), then many lament that Linux will get a bad
> name.

The word `hacker' is popularly negative, yet I use it still.  The word
`host' has been replaced with `server,' yet I use it still.  Heck, I
call K�ln by its real name, not Cologne.  I'm not over-concerned with
popular usages:-)

> If you instead hold the position that Lindows is an Operating System
> in its' own right (that happens to use Linux, many GNU programs, and
> some BSD ones in addition to their own extensions), then there's no
> issue: Lindows is insecure.

I hold that it's an operating environment, not an operating system.

> This paragraph is redundant; you've stated your position that the
> kernel is the most important piece of software and so should be the
> only thing that names the system.  Why bother writing this out again?

It's called re-iteration of the point, and is often used to illuminate
some new aspect of one views.

Actually, I'd prefer to have different names for the kernel, the many
tools which are distributed therewith and for the operating
environment made up of both; this would clear up all confusion.  And,
indeed, it's my own usage: Linux is the OS; GNU/X/TeX/what-have-you
are various tools; RedHat (in my case) is the operating environment.

> You seem to be very bitter yourself, though I don't understand your
> stake in it.

I'm bitter because I believe in free software and can see that its
cause is being more and more marginalised due to the actions of its
adherents.  I want free software to succeed.  I want the FSF and the
GNU Project to succeed.  Recent actions have made that great dream
less and less likely.

-- 
Robert Uhl <ruhl@4dv.net>
To add to the confusion, there are many even less specific `-illions'
out there, like `a bazillion,' which, I've been told, can be as high
as 100,000,000 if you're counting jellybeans, and as low as 32 if
you're counting, say, gunshot wounds.            --Howard Taylor