From owner-freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Jun 6 14:15:35 2005 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BF07316A41C for ; Mon, 6 Jun 2005 14:15:35 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from bms@spc.org) Received: from arginine.spc.org (arginine.spc.org [83.167.185.2]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 64D2443D1D for ; Mon, 6 Jun 2005 14:15:35 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from bms@spc.org) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by arginine.spc.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3A66265319; Mon, 6 Jun 2005 15:13:35 +0100 (BST) Received: from arginine.spc.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (arginine.spc.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with LMTP id 95884-01-2; Mon, 6 Jun 2005 15:13:34 +0100 (BST) Received: from empiric.dek.spc.org (host81-134-123-217.in-addr.btopenworld.com [81.134.123.217]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by arginine.spc.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A898A6530A; Mon, 6 Jun 2005 15:13:33 +0100 (BST) Received: by empiric.dek.spc.org (Postfix, from userid 1001) id 2D5E26266; Mon, 6 Jun 2005 15:15:31 +0100 (BST) Date: Mon, 6 Jun 2005 15:15:31 +0100 From: Bruce M Simpson To: Matthias Buelow Message-ID: <20050606141531.GL734@empiric.icir.org> References: <285af087050603095356601a3d@mail.gmail.com> <200506061249.j56Cn1vd018910@lurza.secnetix.de> <285af08705060606255e26aa5b@mail.gmail.com> <42A454AF.3010908@incubus.de> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable In-Reply-To: <42A454AF.3010908@incubus.de> Cc: freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org, Maxi Combina Subject: Re: filesystems not properly unmounted [OT] X-BeenThere: freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: FreeBSD Evangelism List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 06 Jun 2005 14:15:35 -0000 [Cc list trimmed] On Mon, Jun 06, 2005 at 03:50:39PM +0200, Matthias Buelow wrote: > I don't understand this "we need to compete with Windows on the desktop" > thing. I've never considered Windows to be particularly useful as a > desktop environment, why should the Unix systems compete with it? I disagree. People are increasingly looking to open source systems to offer a real alternative to the 'dominant paradigm' of Windows. The points made about cross-porting environments such as UWin, Cygwin etc. seem irrelevant here. I have worked with all of them in depth, and I can testify that they are of limited usefulness -- Windows is totally different =66rom UNIX, inside and out. Those systems which don't adapt to the new rules of the game will fall by the wayside, or find themselves increasingly forced into a niche. FreeBSD is no exception to this. It would be the height of conceit to imagine that FreeBSD's destiny lies in the server space alone, and the amount of work that goes into this system serves to demonstrate that the grass roots developer base at large are aware of this, even if the pundits amongst them don't voice this as an opinion. Just because I prefer to run WindowMaker and lots of shell sessions on my open source UNIX machine doesn't mean that I shouldn't care about the way these things are headed, because ultimately the value of this technology (and thus the opportunities to work on it) is determined by how useful it is to people at large. Regards, BMS