Re: configure script

[David Kastrup]

ams@kemisten.nu (Alfred M. Szmidt) writes:

> * David Kastrup writes:
> > ss@janiika.com (Sami Sihvonen) writes:
> >> You mean GNU/Linux, not Linux? :-) Really a shame for GNU/Linux
> >> and Linus Torvalds that they don't notice all the efforts made
> >> by GNU-Project and Free Software Foundation.
> 
> No, because it is making an distinction between the kernel, Linux, and
> the system, GNU, which if you combine you get a GNU system using
> Linux,

Right.

> GNU/Linux.

Wrong.  The name is what the one putting it together calls it.  It is
a GNU system, you might also call it a GNU/Linux system, but it is
not just "GNU/Linux" just as I am not just "Kastrup".  I have a given
name.

> > A painting is named by painter, not by the paint manufacturer.
> > Regardless how good or indispensible the paints have been for the
> > work.
> 
> If a painting is named by the painter, then RMS has all the right to
> name the "painting", Linus' _ONLY_ contribution was Linux,

And that's what he named "Linux".  And RMS does not object to that.
He objects to distribution creators to call their systems Linux
systems.

> RMS (and all the people that have contributed to the GNU project)

The people that have contributed to the GNU project are not asked
their opinion.  It does not count.  RMS talks on behalf of the GNU
project, not its contributors.

> busted his ass of (to put it in mild terms) to produce what you take
> for granted (GCC, GDB, GLIBC, Emacs, etc).

Since the opinion of the contributors does not count, you may just
talk just of RMS' ass being busted off.  It certainly is true that
hardly anybody has sacrificed as much of his life and money into Free
Software.  That demands high respect.  It does not demand sharing his
opinions.

> Linus' contribution is an small smudge on the canvas,

We are not just talking Linus here.  I find the hypocrisy with which
all the contributors to Linux are swept under the rug in order to
claim that "Linux" is merely a single person's work not worth to be
mentioned, while the GNU project has done everything, and so a single
person (namely RMS) should be entitled to do all the calling,
appalling.

> RMS' (and not to forget everyone who have contributed to the GNU
> project)

They are not to be consulted, according to RMS.

> is the whole canvas, including the paint, brushes, water to clean
> the brushes and actually painting the painting, where Linus "just"
> signed it.

Oh, sure, and all the other contributors to the kernel, the system
utilities, the networking (which was taken mostly from BSD), the
windowing system, and whatever else, they should feel fine not to get
credit.  They are not to be consulted.

> > That RMS quite shamelessly tries to hijack _all_ credit he can
> > think of and feels comfortable with ignoring everybody else's
> > contribution to Free systems as long as he gets his in, is quite
> > hypocritical.
> 
> This has nothing to do with RMS getting more credit, the man has
> enough credit to last a life time and more.

You bet he does.  Which makes the whole thing so much more absurd.

> This has to do with the rest of the people that helped with the GNU
> project.

They don't have a voice in this, according to RMS.

> 
> > RMS never had any naming qualms when he subsumed X, or the BSD
> > networking utilities and stacks, or Mach kernel, or whatever else
> > into GNU/Hurd.
> 
> You are comparing apples to oranges.  XFree86 gets credit (you haven't
> looked at the startup of XFree86 in a while have you?), so do all the
> network utilities, stacks etc, just take a look at the first few lines
> of the copyright header.  Here is a bit from GNU Mach:
> 
>  * Mach Operating System
>  * Copyright (c) 1991,1990,1989 Carnegie Mellon University
>  * All Rights Reserved.
> 
> And nobody has tried to deprive CMU from their credit, nor has anyone
> tried to deprive anyone from any other credit.  The only project that
> has been deprived of the credit is GNU.

Oh, you mean that when you start any GNU utility, the nasty Linux
distributors have cut away all of the startup messages and logos
referring to GNU?  That's a new one to me.

Could you please apply the same standards everywhere?  Everything
else is hypocrisy.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum
Email: David.Kastrup@t-online.de