From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Apr 13 18:52:05 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id SAA16578 for freebsd-chat-outgoing; Mon, 13 Apr 1998 18:52:05 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from snark.thyrsus.com (esr@[192.190.237.102]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id BAA16503 for ; Tue, 14 Apr 1998 01:51:45 GMT (envelope-from esr@snark.thyrsus.com) Received: (from esr@localhost) by snark.thyrsus.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) id VAA15237; Mon, 13 Apr 1998 21:56:48 -0400 Message-ID: <19980413215647.37918@snark.thyrsus.com> Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1998 21:56:47 -0400 From: "Eric S. Raymond" To: Wes Peters Cc: "Justin T. Gibbs" , chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Open Source Products Reply-To: esr@thyrsus.com References: <199804131719.LAA21122@narnia.plutotech.com> <35326353.4E30451B@xylan.com> <19980413201541.65522@snark.thyrsus.com> <3532AD36.2968F8B6@xylan.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 0.85e In-Reply-To: <3532AD36.2968F8B6@xylan.com>; from Wes Peters on Mon, Apr 13, 1998 at 06:26:31PM -0600 Organization: Eric Conspiracy Secret Labs X-Eric-Conspiracy: There is no conspiracy Sender: owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Wes Peters : > A third scenario that is less likely but would still help would be > convergence of the disparate groups back into one organization. It's > really too bad we have to have three web sites, three ftp server > organizations, three differing (and more or less successful) CD-ROM > programs, etc., for what are very similar products. That's the key thing, IMO. The fact that the BSD crowd is split into squabbling spinoff-group-of-the-week factions, while Linux looks pretty much like one big happy family united under benign Daddy Torvalds, negates every single technical advantage you guys have. > At some time, once Linux starts getting really entrenched in a couple > of highly visible businesses, somebody's going to hit a snag running > a TurboLinux application on a RedHat server or some such silly bunch > of rot, and they're going to tell some hare-brained "journalist" > about it, and the PC rags are going to have a heyday. "See, we told > you this Linux stuff was for the birds, trust Microsoft. Their > products are perfect, and their dedicated support staff will take care > of you." It would be *very* unwise to hope for this. For one thing, if your story about BSD being preferable for highly-stressed, high-throughput network servers is true, it's about as likely you'll get bit as a Linux box will. And, in any case, if you think the pinheads who inhabit the trade press wouldn't rush to interpret a conspicuous Linux failure as a slam on *all* open-source/Unix OSs, you're dreaming. -- Eric S. Raymond "Taking my gun away because I might shoot someone is like cutting my tongue out because I might yell `Fire!' in a crowded theater." -- Peter Venetoklis To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message