Orn E. Hansen wrote:
This battle started, the very day M$ screwed up IBM, and they've been fighting to bury Unix ever since even by "taking" code from it, as well Linux code. And as I stated earlier, the biggest idiocy the Linux community ever did, was to embrace "Linux" instead of BSD, which they should have. As the Linux code has a very questionable "Xenix" origin, which is basically a MicroSoft/SCO original product.
MS-DOS 2.0 on-ward has more SCO Xenix code than many OSes. That's major reason why Microsoft had to license SCO UNIX (as well as code sharing for MS-DOS 5.0+/Windows 2.0+)! Sun had to re-license because they didn't have a perpetual USL UNIX license. No offense, but you have provided repeatedly _incorrect_ technical information (and legal ignorance) in this _entire_ thread. Please stop. You're a major source of FUD on the subject. suse@rio.vg wrote:
Excuse me? Linux was written from scratch. It had no connection to Xenix. Torvalds had no access to Xenix source code. You can track Linux's history from the consistent releases and patches posted directly to the internet. By going through the archive, you can literally watch how Linux was written.
Agreed! GNU exists, and existed in the early '80s, for a damn good reason**. And it's the reason why BSD is _not_ the foundation of Linux. At least before the 4.4BSDLite release. This is why I _hate_ these meta-discussions. Lots of FUD, ignorance, etc...
As to Linux instead of BSD, the license is a crucial difference.
Not just that. **NOTE: This is the reason why I was always _for_ the proliferation that Linux is a "GNU System." Not because I wanted to provide free advertising for the FSF, but because GNU is a _major_ legal separation from _all_ AT&T USL, UCB BSD, etc... developments. I think _every_ IT professional needs to know this _basic_ foundation.
Anyone can steal BSD code. By forcing companies to put their own additions to Linux back into the pool, it vastly accelerated Linux development.
BSD is a "leech license." It throws away protections for the developer, and lets others "leech." Most commercial BSD proponents donate _little_ back. How many major open source projects has Microsoft made with the BSD license? Less than a half-dozen (and most only in the last year -- largely to get developers to help them).
Otherwise, no company would bother putting their work back into the community.
Ironically enough, Gates' "Most of you steal your software" letter is the _foundation_ for the GNU project -- separate from USL and BSD.
Torvalds was also far more open and straightforward in dealing with people than BSD's developers, who tended to be rather insular, as most projects of the time were.
Whoa! Watch that generalization! Hubbard and the FreeBSD team, as well as various people on the NetBSD team, are excellent and friendly individuals. And as far as a BSD-like "ports" distribution (improved no less) in the Linux world via Gentoo and portage, Robbins (and Gentoo) often gets demonized because he now works at Microsoft. -- Bryan J. Smith Professional, technical annoyance mailto:b.j.smith@ieee.org http://thebs413.blogspot.com ----------------------------------------------------------- Americans don't get upset because citizens in some foreign nations can burn the American flag -- Americans get upset because citizens in those same nations can't burn their own