From owner-freebsd-newbies Wed Aug 4 0:43: 8 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-newbies@freebsd.org Received: from atlrel2.hp.com (atlrel2.hp.com [156.153.255.202]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8A41B1504C for ; Wed, 4 Aug 1999 00:43:04 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from MICHAEL_HEITMEIER@HP-Germany-om12.om.hp.com) Received: from isoit644.bbn.hp.com (root@isoit644.bbn.hp.com [15.136.88.78]) by atlrel2.hp.com (8.8.6 (PHNE_17135)/8.8.5tis) with ESMTP id DAA12307; Wed, 4 Aug 1999 03:42:04 -0400 (EDT) From: MICHAEL_HEITMEIER@HP-Germany-om12.om.hp.com Received: from localhost (root@localhost) by isoit644.bbn.hp.com (8.8.6 (PHNE_17135)/8.8.6 TIS Openmail) with SMTP id JAA15512; Wed, 4 Aug 1999 09:42:26 +0200 (METDST) X-OpenMail-Hops: 1 Date: Wed, 4 Aug 1999 09:42:15 +0200 Message-Id: Subject: RE: basic info on freebsd needed... MIME-Version: 1.0 To: FreeBSD-Newbies@FreeBSD.ORG, hamellr@dsinw.com Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; name="BDY.TXT" Content-Disposition: inline; filename="BDY.TXT" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-newbies@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org > Yes I enjoy the ease of use of Windows and yes I also enjoy the stability > of FreeBSD and the freedom it gives me to configure things. Now can I have > both please? Yes, but it'll take people like you to get off their asses, stop complaining and making FreeBSD into what THEY want it to be. Complaining and bitching gets nowhere, even less so when they don't even contribute to the project itself. If you want to change it, learn to program, start committing to the tree, run the bleeding edge software, recompile Linux software into native FreeBSD ports. Make user-friendly configuration scripts that have all kinds of pretty pictures and play Tetris while you're installing, write documentation that holds a users hands while they install FreeBSD and shows all the ins and outs involved and the consequences of every action they can take. After all.... Microsoft has thousands of junior and contract programmers doing just that.... Rick Well, I did not intend this to be a complaint, so cool your jets. Of course you are correct, if anybody who wanted a particular feature would get their act together and wrote it then Windows would be dead by now. The point of the post was to contrast the various camps and to show in an ironic way how various factors collaborate to keep FreeBSD in the hobby/niche area. Funny then how much official FreeBSD communication (Web/newsletter) is spent on 'advocacy'. If it was truly just a hobby, then why try to convince other people of its merits? I'm afraid this kind of double standard, pushing it as the best OS there is and retreating into "we do what we want to" and "it's only missing features because you don't help" every time somebody suggests something remotely resembling a new feature won't help. Make up your mind: hobby or service. If it's a service then start listening to the people using it because the next generation of users will thrive on the experience of the current users. If it's a hobby then stop any advocacy and most importantly stop selling it. If you expect me to pay (I have) and shut up (I won't) then I'm afraid you're behaving like the proverbial Microsoft. The least I expect that happens with my money is that it funds future development and therefore buys me the right to give inputs. What else does it mean when 'Walnut Creek passes part of the money paid back to the FreeBSD project' ? (thanks for the quote, Adam) Do you think I just pay because I'm such a nice person and it's oh so nice to fund these nice programmers with their nice hobby? Face it: FreeBSD has become a commercial product and you cannot have it both ways. If you value the people who code that much higher than the people who pay I'm afraid that thinking is stuck in pre-industrial times where division of labour as a concept was still to be discovered. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message