Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1998 01:59:20 -0400 From: "Eric S. Raymond" <esr@thyrsus.com> To: Anatoly Vorobey <mellon@pobox.com> Cc: chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Open Source Products Message-ID: <19980414015920.30944@snark.thyrsus.com> In-Reply-To: <19980414065232.07017@doriath.org>; from Anatoly Vorobey on Tue, Apr 14, 1998 at 06:52:32AM %2B0000 References: <199804131719.LAA21122@narnia.plutotech.com> <35326353.4E30451B@xylan.com> <19980413201541.65522@snark.thyrsus.com> <3532AD36.2968F8B6@xylan.com> <19980413215647.37918@snark.thyrsus.com> <19980414065232.07017@doriath.org>
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Anatoly Vorobey <mellon@pobox.com>: > To play a devil's advocate and assume your part, I can imagine 2 > possible answers (please bring more if you have them; I'm quoting > what I heard from other people propheting BSD death): > a) BSD won't really die, but Linux will grow so > much noone will notice BSD or know what it is; b) Linux will > quickly support all the hardware/be supported by software companies, > so everyone will have to either use Microsoft OSes or Linux. None of the above. What I expect will happen (not `want', but `expect') is that the BSDs will run out of development energy because the people who would otherwise join them will decide it makes more sense to be where the crowds (and the attention, and the money) are, over in Linuxland. OK, you can come back at me with "If that's the way it works, why hasn't Windows won?" But the cases aren't parallel. There's a lot of stuff you just can't do in Windows. Moving to Linux, OTOH, doesn't lose developers a lot and lets them respect themselves in the morning. ;-) I'm sorry but I just don't find unified userland much of a draw. The flip side of unified userland is that you throw away Linux's potential to be all things to all people. Similarly, the idea that I can make all with a single command is technically sweet but kind of pointless unless I'm an OS integrator myself. It certainly ain't gonna do jack for the end-user. That said, you've done the best job of anyone here of raising doubt about my pessimistic BSD-will-die scenario in my mind. That figure of 25,000 registered users is very encouraging. BTW, I understand I actually have code in the FreeBSD kernel. Somebody told me you guys use a variant of the PC speaker driver I wrote for SysV way back when. If this is still true, it's very amusing considering where I spend most of my hacking time these days. I don't have code in the *Linux* kernel... :-) -- <a href="http://sagan.earthspace.net/~esr">Eric S. Raymond</a> Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their consciences. -- C. S. Lewis To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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