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Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

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Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#231

Post by BlackDeath3 »

sepeth wrote: post #222
BlackDeath3 wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>freedom is more important than to have good softwares Yes, I agree, freedom to have the essentials for human survival is a lot more important than having instant access to the latest BF4 patch. Care to provide a bit of qualification and relevance to your broad, context-free, ill-defined statement?

You can find the context by accessing the outer scope (parent comment(s)), you will also need to read the email.

I think I have a workable understanding of the context.

If the comment was meant to say that "free software is more important than good software", then it would be great to get a bit of elaboration and qualification for such a contentious statement.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#232

Post by guscost »

Avshalom wrote: post #197
guscost wrote: post #158

The problem I have with the copyleft movement is an impression that they want developers to have less freedom than end users. As an end user I get free access to all GPL source code, but as a developer I can only use that source code to make new software if I follow certain rules. It's as if there was a "free recipes" movement arguing that since their method for cultivating cayenne peppers was under GPL, KFC should b…

The GPL/Four Freedoms more or less rejects the distinction between developer and user.

That seems to make about as much sense as rejecting the distinction between cooking chicken and eating it.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#233

Post by Someone »

burntsushi wrote: post #175
Someone wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the FSF would argue that desperate cases require desperate remedies. You shouldn't expect your army to behave nicely at all times, even while defending your freedom. RMS isn't disrespecting others, he just has been at war so long that he isn't aware of their sensitivities.

What desperate cases?

The fight for users to be able to change their software, for example to add a 'print is done' feedback message to the software driving the print queue (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman#Background:_ev...)

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#234

Post by epistasis »

geocar wrote: post #185
stonemetal wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What would you have had him do differently? The only code that helps us and not our adversaries is copylefted code. I would have him not view people on the other side as advisaries. Sure FreeBSD and Konquer didn't gain much from Apple deciding to use their code, but they also didn't lose anything either. It isn't a zero sum game.

> Sure FreeBSD and Konquer didn't gain much from Apple deciding to use their code, but they also didn't lose anything either. I disagree. In fact, I think the GPL probably saved the World Wide Web. That Konquerer was GPL was the single advantage it had over anything else. It used to be a buggier, and slower, and generally worse web browser, but every time someone made an improvement, the GPL made those improvements F…

>That Konquerer was GPL was the single advantage it had over anything else.

This is simply not true, and if it were, you'd be implying that Apple chose Konquerer over Mozilla because they preferred GPL to MPL. In reality, Konquerer had a much cleaner architecture that Apple thought they had a better chance of adapting to OS X.

The GPL had nothing to do with any of these events, the key feature was open source, not GPL. And if Apple had not turned Konquerer into a first-class user agent, Mozilla still would have had a first class open source user agent.

I think the web is one place where the GPL has demonstrated that GPL is not a key desirable feature in open platforms. GPL has had remarkably little to do with any of the web, as it is only used in one of three major user agents, and in almost none of the web-specific server stack.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#235

Post by Sanddancer »

dman wrote: post #188
codex wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a function of the size of the market. When Stallman was programming computers, the number of computers was quite small and it was much more expensive to create software. These days, especially after the PC revolution, creating and modifying software is much cheaper, especially relative to the demand for software, which is much higher.

Do you think the widespread availability of a free and high quality compiler had something to do with the PC revolution?

No. The PC revolution was built on compilers like Borland's Turbo Pascal and Microsoft C. GCC was very much a latecomer to the PC revolution.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#236

Post by ZeroGravitas »

dragonwriter wrote: post #78
lmkg wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is it bad I just don't care that LLVM has enabled non-free software? Because it has done a h ck of a lot for opensource software.* This presents an interesting (to RMS) quandary. I take it as a given that he prioritizes the freedom of software over its technical merits (as discussed in other threads). But, even just from the freedom perspective: LLVM increases the amount of proprietary software produced, and also i…

RMS appears to believe that the creation and distribution of non-Free software is a categorical and unscionable evil, such that anything that anything that encourages it (whatever other benefits it provides) is categorically morally wrong, and anything that discourages it is categorically morally obligatory.

There a bunch of facts that contradict this, e.g. the exstance of the LGPL, RMS supporting BSD licencing of Xiph codecs etc.

His approach is a lot more nuanced and tactical than it is often portrayed.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#237

Post by belorn »

SomeCallMeTim wrote: post #169
rwg wrote: post #32

When I finally realized that the FSF is really about being a social movement and that creating useful software is a non-primary goal (or maybe even a non-goal), my level of annoyance with RMS greatly decreased. Of course, along with that, my level of give-a-shit about the FSF and the GNU project decreased proportionally. Stallman wants you to use Free software because it's free-as-in-ideology, not because it necessar…

I have to agree. I love free; what doesn't feel "free" to me is the GPL, since I can't use just about anything GPL in my job. My job involves creating non-free software. Given the GPL's goals, it's not a surprise at all that I can't use it. But it strikes me as ironic that RMS talks about "freedom" when really he's advocating restricting your freedom to use the software. I understand it's in pursuance of a "greater g…

Not an other post about what "freedom" means :(.

Please read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights and in particularly about the right to be left alone (negative rights).

Freedom of speech, private property, freedom from violent crime, freedom of worship, habeas corpus, a fair trial, freedom from slavery are just a few freedoms that can only be implemented by restricting others. You can't have freedom from slavery without restricting slave owners their right to enslave. Thus the term negative rights had to be made by philosophers and political scientists.

The proprietary model is to trade software for money, and then threaten your customers with lawsuit if they share or modify the program. GPL provide software under the freedom from those threats, with the use of negative rights (ie, the user of the program has a right to be left alone). If you can not make software without threatening your users, don't try to start by taking GPL software.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#238

Post by belorn »

epistasis wrote: post #125
pmr_ wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are correct in that the license is free, but it isn't a copyleft license. This is a purely political decision: RMS wants gcc not only to be free software but he also wants it to be unusable to create non-free derivatives thus making it an active tool in furthering free software. clang undermines this because you can create non-free software based on it thus making it a tool that can easily be used to restrict fre…

> clang undermines this because you can create non-free software based on it thus making it a tool that can easily be used to restrict freedom. It seems that implicit in this claim is that if non-free software exists, its mere existence restricts freedom. Would that be a fair statement of anybody's position in this debate, or have I gone off the rails?

When non-free software is distributed, it is done so under the threat that the recipient will be thrown in jail if they share or modify the software.

Will the threat itself restrict freedom? Yes. Can threats cause harm? yes. However, so long its not distributed, no one is threatened.

So, on your question, no, its mere existence will not restricts freedom. The restriction happens once it has been distributed.

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#239

Post by belorn »

fleitz wrote: post #131
pmr_ wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are correct in that the license is free, but it isn't a copyleft license. This is a purely political decision: RMS wants gcc not only to be free software but he also wants it to be unusable to create non-free derivatives thus making it an active tool in furthering free software. clang undermines this because you can create non-free software based on it thus making it a tool that can easily be used to restrict fre…

Exactly, if you read the whole thing it sounds like George Bush > They have been supported by Apple, the company which hates our freedom so much that its app store for the ithings _requires_ all apps to be nonfree. > The only code that helps us and not our adversaries is copylefted code. Free software released under a pushover license is available for us to use, but available to our adversaries just as well. > If tha…

Let me just say that your comment sound as Hitler, and we can be done with Association fallacies altogether.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_Hitlerum

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_fallacy

Re: Richard Stallman - Re: clang vs free software

#240

Post by gress »

teddyh wrote: post #203
gress wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I totally believe in cooperation and mutual aid. I believe it's critical for that to be based on trust and individual choice, or it is meaningless. This is why I don't like RMS's attempt to force it on us.

In that case, you ought, logically, to be against all forms of copyright and patents.

I am against patents, and I agree that by implication copyright is harmful too. I tend not to be an absolutist so am still considering my position on it, but I can't really defend copyright strongly.
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