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Who controls glibc?

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Re: Who controls glibc?

#461

Post by Jasper_ »

will4274 wrote: post #285
Jasper_ wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone that was not aware of the gag rule before the mailing list thread brought it up, I thought it was an abortion joke, especially with the "we would be required to say this is not an acceptable way of terminating a program". It is in the man page for abort(). The context clues are there, but the wrong ones. So, on that level, it fails as a joke: if you aren't aware of the policy it's trying to criticize and m…

And yet, you're now aware of the gag rule and GNUs opposition. So, on that level, it's succeeding.

Yes, after the original writer had to explain it when it came up through a heated mailing list discussion about removing it partly because some misinterpreted it. That's not the excellence in communication you probably think it is. And it doesn't belong in a manual.

Re: Who controls glibc?

#462

Post by quotemstr »

im3w1l wrote: post #294
quotemstr wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last time I checked, musl didn't support random important things. Consider dlclose: unsupported due to an unfounded (IMHO) assertion that it's not possible to implement such a thing safely. Nevertheless, people _have_ been unloading shared libraries for decades, so musl asserting that it's impossible makes me question musl's other technical decisions.

There's a lot of not-safe-but-works-99.9%-of-the-time patterns out there that have been used for decades.

Unloading shared libraries is safe. If you insist that it's not, even though it actually works in a real, robust, not probabilistic way, all you're going to do is make me question your technical judgement.

Re: Who controls glibc?

#463

Post by tinus_hn »

tptacek wrote: post #173

Lots of people seem to be rooting around like truffle hogs looking for the partisan politics embedded in this story, but you won't find any. The conflict happening here is between maintainers, who don't want a dated left-leaning joke embedded in the glibc documentation, and Stallman, who does. If there's "political correctness" involved, it's right-leaning. But, as a left-leaning pro-choice person: there's no "politi…

It’s also a reaction against political correctness culture and social justice warriors.

Re: Who controls glibc?

#464

Post by davexunit »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #321
davexunit wrote: post #164

RMS needs to be removed from his dictator position in GNU. This is just one of many times that he has hurt a GNU project. He has held many projects back because he is so behind the times and stubborn, not to mention holding the FSF back. This behavior isn't limited to mailing lists, either. He breaks LibrePlanet conference rules every year to interject and rant during talks he disagrees with. I appreciate him for fou…

Basically, he started a political project that produces software furthering his political views. You like the software, but dislike the politics, so you want to take the software and get rid of politics. The more I read the views like that, the more I understand GNU's insistence on GPL and copyright sign-offs for contributions. For instance, GPL's whole point is to prevent you from taking the software and removing th…

I like the software and the politics. I have completed FSF copyright assignment paperwork. I contribute to GNU projects. I worked for the FSF. But RMS is toxic to both GNU and the FSF at this point.

Re: Who controls glibc?

#466

Post by jlv2 »

concrete-faucet wrote: post #404

If RMS thinks that dumb jokes in documentation are worth having, I say we wholeheartedly embrace it. For example: * GNU/Hurd - almost as traumatic as childbirth. or * childbirth - if it takes as long as it takes to write GNU/Hurd, may God have mercy on your soul. or * RMS - I know how to program computers (maybe), so obviously I am an expert on female reproductive issues.

My wife and I were at a garden party in the early 90s where RMS was at also. We were talking about various things and somehow the fact that my wife was pregnant with our first child came up. RMS started talking about how maybe people shouldn't just be allowed to have children. In particular, he brought up that some towns require people to have dog licenses before they can own a dog. He pondered that the government maybe should require reproduction licenses before allowing people to have children.

Granted some people can make terrible parents, but I don't think allowing the government a voice in deciding whom can be parents is a better solution.

My son (now 26) is a EFF member and free software advocate.

Re: Who controls glibc?

#467

Post by tptacek »

tinus_hn wrote: post #463
tptacek wrote: post #173

Lots of people seem to be rooting around like truffle hogs looking for the partisan politics embedded in this story, but you won't find any. The conflict happening here is between maintainers, who don't want a dated left-leaning joke embedded in the glibc documentation, and Stallman, who does. If there's "political correctness" involved, it's right-leaning. But, as a left-leaning pro-choice person: there's no "politi…

It’s also a reaction against political correctness culture and social justice warriors.

No, it isn't. It doesn't even make sense in that light. The "reaction" here was to remove a political statement. This is what I mean people people rooting like truffle hogs for a political faction to cheerlead.

Re: Who controls glibc?

#468

Post by guilt »

I seriously wonder why C libraries have to deal with political issues now. Pretty sure a fork() of this library is the apt thing to do here.

Aren't there eglibc, musl and a variety of other implementations people use already?

Re: Who controls glibc?

#469

Post by zeveb »

majewsky wrote: post #414
dfox wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My feeling is that most of GNU manuals in texinfo format are borderline useless because the structure is simply wrong, the random jokes are somewhat tangential issue.

Word. GNU texinfo is so fucking confusing that I only ever invoke it as info --subnodes -o - $PROGRAM | less That dumps the entire manual for $PROGRAM into `less`, where I can then use regex-searches like a normal humanbeing.

It's wonderful to use in emacs, and back before I started using emacs ISTR that pinfo was a great way to read info.

I used to hate how GNU manpages would point me at the info docs, but honestly nowadays I prefer info. It really is nice — like a pre-CSS, pre-JavaScript HTML, only it can be beautifully typeset too.

Re: Who controls glibc?

#470

Post by jboynyc »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #321
davexunit wrote: post #164

RMS needs to be removed from his dictator position in GNU. This is just one of many times that he has hurt a GNU project. He has held many projects back because he is so behind the times and stubborn, not to mention holding the FSF back. This behavior isn't limited to mailing lists, either. He breaks LibrePlanet conference rules every year to interject and rant during talks he disagrees with. I appreciate him for fou…

Basically, he started a political project that produces software furthering his political views. You like the software, but dislike the politics, so you want to take the software and get rid of politics. The more I read the views like that, the more I understand GNU's insistence on GPL and copyright sign-offs for contributions. For instance, GPL's whole point is to prevent you from taking the software and removing th…

When "the politics" has become an ego show, there's sadly not much of a political project left...
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