Porblems with open source projets and Sun was RE: [SunRescue] Anyone need some computing time or shell?

[Chris Byrne]

The real problem here is that many of these folks either have had no
experience with "real computers" or their experiences have been bad,
especially with regards to avialability of open tools to work on open
projects.

Remember, SUN is an oddity in the commercial UNIX world, in that they
architected a lot of openness into the system from the beginning (thank you
Bill Joy and Andy Bechtolsheim). Most UNIX vendors even now keep a rather
tight control on their intellectual property.

And even Sun has it's problems. I mean not shipping the system with a
compiler until Solaris 8, (yes I know many other vendors do the same thing)
isn't exactly the way to endear yourself to open source proggrammers.
And the SCSL wasn't exactly the most well concieved project either. Hlafway
between open and losed is even worse than one or the other to most
OpenSource types. Just look at the problems KDE hsa had if you dotn believe
me, and that has always been an open project.

Add to that the simple cost of adequate hardware, the operating system, and
a working set of utilities, and for a long time Freee Software developers
haven't really had much of a platform to work with. That's why most open
source developement occurred in colleges and universities, or on PC's with
BSD ports.

It's only in the last couple of years that Sun hardware has reached the
level of affordability for most developers. You'll notice that the number of
sun ports has gone WAY up in that time.

Admitedly there is quite a bit of an attitude issue out there, especially
from the "information wants to be free" crowd, but I think the real solution
to this issue is providing more access to Sun hardware and software. The
developers will naturally follow.

Chris Byrne



-----Original Message-----
From: rescue-admin at sunhelp.org [mailto:rescue-admin at sunhelp.org]On
Behalf Of David Rouse
Sent: Sunday, March 18, 2001 14:25
To: rescue at sunhelp.org
Subject: Re: [SunRescue] Anyone need some computing time or shell?


On 3/16/01 at 3:04 AM, Reagen Ward <ward at zilla.nu> wrote:

>On Thu, Mar 15, 2001 at 08:02:49PM -0500, David Rouse wrote:
>>I know the netatalk folks have been looking for hardware.
>
>I wish I had known the netatalk project was in need, as I use it
>regularly.  Any idea what they're lacking?  I sure owe them.
>

I'm not on the developer email list, just the admin, but there has been
mention of the need for Solaris hardware time, especially ultra.

>Here's a short rant concerning offering resources to OSS projects:
>

Again I'm not a developer, but it does seem that there is an X86/Linux bias
with a lot of OS developers. It is a real treat when someone comes along
with Solar Exclipse (the Solaris port of Quake).

--
drouse
--
David Rouse                            * Our World - Your World - RouseWorld
david at rouseworld.org                   * www.rouseworld.org

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