On 05/04/2015 11:13 AM, Ken Schneider - openSUSE wrote:
it has become a test bed with the mentality
Excuse me? I always thought that _openSuse_ was the developmental test-bed for the commercial product that is Novell's SLED -- SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop & SLES -- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server. The latter is also available for IBM's zSeries. Novell bought the SUSE (then "SuSE") brands and trademarks in 2003. Attachemate bought Novell in 2011. I have little doubt that Attachemate/Novell expect their product to make money. Gien that openSuse is 'free' I'm happy toe live with the fact that its supported by by groups like this rather than me personally having to pay Novell. YMMV. Given that I've used quite a number of commercial implementation over UNIX since I began working with it in the mid 1970s, and given that in many of those cases i knew more about UNIX in general ans specifically more about UNIX than the people at the vendor support desk that my employers were pay as part of the support contract, I don't feel short-changed by using 'free' Linux. Given what I've learnt about the hiring and project management practices at many firms and the software development practices I've seen in government and commerce, where low cost and inexperience and LoC productivity is valued over planning, testability and maintainability, the people I see developing for Linux seem remarkable skilled and thoughtful, no matter how quirky their individual personalities. UNIX began as a counter-culture experiment. Through the late 1970s and early 1980s the "Berkeley" extensions were greatly demanded by the people buying boxes in that first microprocessor "boom", never mind that the code was awful, written by students and poorly supported. It was USEFUL! You disagree? Take a look at the original version of VI. The code was HORRIBLE in the extreme! I'll grant you that DMR and crew wrote great stuff, most of it being highly parsimonious. But that was the point. The V6/V7 FS was simple. Inefficient, slow, unreliable and inflexible; but it was only a few hundred lines of code. UNIX was then and continued to be in Bell, eventually becoming PLan9 and more, a test-bed for ideas. Linus started Linux in the same mould. That what we have with openSuse lets people try out mode ideas, contribute new ones, not least of all through the build service, does not surprise me in the least. -- A: Yes. > Q: Are you sure? >> A: Because it reverses the logical flow of conversation. >>> Q: Why is top posting frowned upon? -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org To contact the owner, e-mail: opensuse+owner@opensuse.org