On Wed, Jul 03, 2002 at 12:36:38PM +0200, Anders Johansson wrote:
I ditched windows because it was bad software, not because it was expensive, or had restrictive licenses. Back then I was only barely aware software even had a license. It was something I just clicked OK to and proceeded to ignore.
The main attraction of gnu/linux is and will always be quality. If linux hadn't been any good the license wouldn't have mattered, few people except hobbyists would have used it. We'd all be running windows or *BSD (why did linux "win" over *BSD? I can't imagine it was because of the licensing) waiting with baited breath for the Hurd to become usable.
I think the GPL did have a part to play in Linux winning over *BSD and it is important for me. I am guessing here, but maybe a lot of developers didn't like the idea of MS or other companies taking their work and selling it back to them (think TCP/IP). The GPL prevents that. You are right that if Linux was not even usable, then few would look at the license. But given equal quality software choices between GPL and non-GPL, I'll take GPL every time. A large part of my job is managing networks, and the biggest pain in my ass is tracking software licenses. I know people complain about all the different open source licenses, but there are just as many variations of commercial licenses. And with the BSA kicking down doors to do software audits, my goal is to replace commerically licensed software every place I can. A support license a for small number of servers is easy to manage and live with, but tracking licenses of hundreds or thousands of individual computers is almost impossible. Even the commercial software products that aim to do this fail in every case I've seen.
With a license you're essentially buying a support contract. If you want support for a hundred machines you are always going to have to pay for a hundred machines, regardless of the solution you choose.
Not really. Most commerical software licenses give you the right to *run* the binary program on a single computer. You usually get little or no support, and often have to pay high fees for any support in addition to the software license. Futher, you are not allowed to understand what the program does in too much detail. That would be illegal reverse engineering, copyright violation, or other crime (at least in the U.S. with the DMCA, UCITA, etc.). Recent history has shown that can't *trust* many commercial software companies. I think the contrast is stark when compared with the GPL.
Noone is ever going to install Lindows in a 10.000 computer server farm.
Let's hope you are right about that ;) Best Regards, Keith -- LPIC-2, MCSE, N+ Right behind you, I see the millions Got spam? Get spastic http://spastic.sourceforge.net