Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

gcc.gnu.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 338 posts

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#42

Post by TorKlingberg »

intermatrigator wrote: post #11
beering wrote: post #2

The people who campaign for GPL software authors to change their license seem to assume that the authors of the software naively chose the GPL, as opposed to choosing it for its particular spirit. That's really important distinction that people don't realize about the GPL - it's designed to protect the rights of the END USERS. And that's great when the end user is you and me, but it's also not surprising that we, as…

end users do not give a shit about source code (or software licensing at all).

End users that don't want to modify the source code them selves still have the option to use a forked version made by somebody else.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#44

Post by surrealize »

This message conflates two issues in an unfortunate way. One issue is the licensing of GCC, the other issue is the architecture of GCC (how modular it is).

No one is arguing that GCC should change licenses. But he seems to think that making GCC more modular would somehow make it less free:

> If GCC were to change from a free compiler into a platform for nonfree compilers, it would no longer serve the goal of freedom very well.

There are two embedded assumptions here. First, that making GCC more modular would result in people creating non-free compilers with it (presumably by connecting a non-free component with GCC using an IR rather than linking directly, to get around the GPL). And second, that such use would become more prevalent than just using GCC itself (which is what would "change" GCC from a free compiler into a platform for nonfree compilers).

I imagine a few people would use GCC components that way, if it became more modular. But would that use be a significant one? That's unknown. And would that use "no longer serve the goal of freedom"? If a large number of nonfree tools appear that generate and consume a GCC IR, that could boost GCC as well.

The GPL seems to be able to defend freedom just fine for all the other gnu software, even the modularly-architected projects. I don't see why it can't ultimately do the same for GCC.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#46

Post by Anderkent »

intermatrigator wrote: post #11
beering wrote: post #2

The people who campaign for GPL software authors to change their license seem to assume that the authors of the software naively chose the GPL, as opposed to choosing it for its particular spirit. That's really important distinction that people don't realize about the GPL - it's designed to protect the rights of the END USERS. And that's great when the end user is you and me, but it's also not surprising that we, as…

end users do not give a shit about source code (or software licensing at all).

Well yes, that's the basis for Stallman's argument. If end users cared about free code, we wouldn't need to enforce it from the other side - nonfree software would have no users.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#48

Post by Anderkent »

phamilton wrote: post #21

He's basically saying: "We must avoid design decisions that allow users to do X, because we disagree with X". Everyone has their own definition of "Free", but to me that seems very similar to Walled Garden decisions regarding my freedom as an end user. You could just as easily say: "We don't want to allow unsigned code to run, because we disagree with not signing code" I guess the difference is that you can fork gcc…

>I guess the difference is that you can fork gcc and start a parallel project. Or you can just let it die as llvm and clang become more and more efficient.

And watch as over a decade or two you lose any control over what software you run that you still might have.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#49

Post by jimktrains2 »

Touche wrote: post #24
kwantam wrote: post #5

Context: This discussion originated on the emacs-devel mailing list, where there was a discussion of adding code to company-mode (text completion) explicitly supporting Clang [1]. It was pointed out [2] that RMS has in the past shown a disinclination to incorporate Clang support into GNU projects because of his perception of its encouragement of proprietary software riding the coattails of open source (but not Free)…

Clang is free software.

It[0] doesn't seem like a free[1] license.

[0]: http://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/cfe/trunk/LICENSE.TXT

[1]: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

Edit: Yes, it is a free license, as other's have pointed out.

Post reply on HN