@AC 15:23
"What total bollox. Are you really saying that less good stuff is released under BSD _because_ it's BSD?"
Cool.. make up something I never said, and then call it bollox. Easy to do isn't it?
"What about OpenSSL? Incidentally, the last time I looked, he OpenSSL project has never NEVER received a single monetary contribution from any of the Linux distributions. Not one. Read into that what you will."
And none of the Linux contributors (with the exception of a small minority who work for the companies concerned) have received anything either. And your point is?
"Or the other OpenBSD projects like CARP or pf - yet another one that the Linux people are very happy to take but totally unwilling to financially contribute back to."
And BSD folk (not to mention thousands of companies around the world) are very happy to use gcc. Again, I'm looking for your point here....
"What about Apache (not BSD, of course, but certainly not GPL either). I mean, NOBODY uses Apache do they?"
Yes, people use Apache, I use Apache, and it's excellent, but it doesn't invalidate my assertion that we would not have the wealth of open-source software currently available to us if the GPL didn't exist. More likely we would be awash with shareware/binary drivers with people spending most of their time waiting for version XXX of driver YYY so they can use kernel ZZZ. Even worse than with Windows - at least there are a finite number of versions of Windows, and the binary compatibility is 'reasonable'. Yeah, before you say it, I know the official BSD interfaces don't churn nearly as much as the Linux ones, but anyone can roll their own incompatible version and keep it closed source...
"Oh, and the GPL people also have a habit of taking BSD code, modifying it, releasing the changes under GPL and therefore preventing the changes being put back into the original BSD code! All very friendly and helpful - NOT."
Shit happens when you author under a license that allows shit to happen (and sometimes even when you don't, but that's called copyright infringement). That's hardly the fault of the GPL community, any more that it's the fault of Apple for keeping some/all their kernel changes to themselves. In any case, if GPL developers happen to be breaking copyright law, then that is not the fault of the GPL.
Amazing how people think there is some big competition between Linux and BSD, on the basis of one or two emails to the odd mailing list. This is perpetuated by people like Steve Balmer with their Good vs Bad/Caps vs Commies type attitude to it all. To me this is just a bunch of guys working on stuff which they are enthusiastic about. Unlike in their jobs they have the opportunity to do things their way. I have contributed stuff under a mixture of licenses, sometimes GPL, sometimes not. If I want to totally give something away I tend to just not give it a license and declare it public domain, which has fewer restrictions than BSD. That means people can even say they wrote it if they get off on that.
But... I *still* just don't understand the people slagging off GPL. If you have such a problem with it, why don't you just work on improving *BSD to the point where Linux is irrelevant? What? No time this w/e? Busy with the kids? Fine! Then how about you just shut the f*** up and let other people get on with it.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
