Comments on: The proprietary sins of an average GNU/Linux user

By: Chris Carpenter

Chris Carpenter — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 16:51:26 +0000

Well, the first thing I want to say is great article. I completely agree with everything said, and I went through the same Dual-boot to wine to virtual machine situation.

Now, to respond to a couple comments:
First off, while there aren’t very many games that run natively under linux and are good, one of my favorite is a turn based strategy called Battle For Wesnoth.

http://www.wesnoth.org.

Also, while this one isn’t free(as in speech or beer), it does run well under WINE, because the developers try to fix any bugs that crop up with using wine with it. http://www.eve-online.com

Finally, I would like to say that HTML5 currently does NOT equal freedom. At least not with youtube. Youtube is currently using a proprietary codec, h.264, which firefox refuses to support for ethical reasons. However, that being said, many people hypothesize that google will make their own free as in freedom codec to use for HTML5.

By: Weevil

Weevil — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 18:03:13 +0000

If you’re using flash only to watch youtube, you might give the minitube player a try. No flash required, although their latest blogpost discusses some new proprietary measures from Adobe.

http://flavio.tordini.org/minitube

Anyway let’s go with this html5 freedom thing!

By: Keith

Keith — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 21:25:59 +0000

Ladies and Gentlemen,
This is a very interesting post, one that I just happened to come across as I was looking for “free screen savers” to enjoy on this Fedora box that I just got 100% functional.
The very thing that propelled me to use Linux in the first place was the recognition or realization that DOS based OS’s are so proprietary in everything and extremely hard to manipulate for the average end user from NTLDR on. These operating systems do not play well with others and are not flexible at all, while most other “free” OS’s and apps are extremely adaptive and flexible such as GRUB. I found myself paying allot of hard earned money for products that did not perform as well as I liked and gave me a limited number of chances to get it right before I ran out of licenses to, and had to purchase more chances.
There is a solid place for non free operating systems and applications though. Consider that the Linux distribution Fedora is funded by Red-Hat who pays developers to build on the free kernels and applications that I love so. Also Sun Micro-systems who develop and release tons and tons of “free” software such as Virtual box and Glass Fish not to mention Java and Open Office which are huge projects partially maintained by corporate dollars and partially maintained by volunteers. I personally would like to thank them both for their contributions of money and time.
As for the proprietary operating systems based on DOS who’s name is not worthy of mention in this blog concerning free computing. I do not plan on purchasing and, or running any of their products on any CPU after the death of the last hard drive with their operating system on it.
Kind regards,
KL

By: tetris4

tetris4 — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 22:22:42 +0000

Another news item from phoronix in regard to this post that put a smile on my face:

Open ATI Driver More Popular Than Catalyst

“…For the first time that we have ever hosted this Linux graphics survey, has an open-source ATI driver finally outpaced AMD’s official Catalyst Linux driver in terms of adoption…”

By: tetris4

tetris4 — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:18:51 +0000

Let me see if I can sum up a response here:

First of all, am glad to see that lots of users keep completely FREE systems. Am also happy to see that free equivalents are making their way into the new distributions and kernels.

Furthermore, switching to free formats is indeed a big challenge and a difficult task for the community, since proprietary formats are dominating the market. But that didn’t stop the community in the past!

I don’t believe in the availability of games as the way to persuade people to join FLOSS. I suspect this will happen after (if ever) GNU/Linux is popular enough for companies developing games to make a profit of it. But still, will these games be FREE? =) If not, then we are missing the point made here, right?

I am no fanatic nor an evangelist, many seem to get this idea from the article. I don’t know how I got into this position, defending about smg like this. Let me just clear out that I used the word “sin” as a metaphor, and tried to expand as objectively as I could on the argument I made.

People are, and should be, free to choose whatever suits their needs.

By: pol

pol — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 13:03:01 +0000

Wow! Great great review.

religion or no religion they are definitely sins

By: gedece

gedece — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 12:58:17 +0000

I don’t call them sins. I call them decisions. When the alternative is good, like with the open source ATI drivers I use, I’m all for free. I know they still lack some things, but I’m willing to wait for them to be included.

Gnash is lacking way more than the flash player, it plays some videos and music, but it doesn’t play webgames. So it’s a decision between giving up webgames or using flash.

It’s not a sin, because linux is not a religion.

By: F Fellini

F Fellini — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 11:14:45 +0000

My journey in Linux has come a long way away from the old days of Dos and Windows. Minix was my first unix experience, and I liked the multiuser and multitasking system, which is a great improvement from tinkering with writing TSRs for background number crunching tasks idle cpu time.
The state of affairs in Linux today is a far cry from the old days.
Understandably, peoples’ needs change reflecting different life stages and career needs. I have never had a need for playing games or myspace and youtube, while some users rightly find this a deal breaker because thats what they need the computer for. Certainly, people are finding use for computer in areas that they never imagined, like mobile computing as entertainment.
So far what is working is getting computer companies such as Dell, IBM, and so on to create products to fill the new needs that people have, which means getting component makers to cooperate on releasing firmware and drivers necessary to make Linux work better.
Another thing that works, although it is painful, is what KDE did. Just force people to use free software with the new changes that are coming up. Since it is free software contributions from users are of utmost importance as are paid-for panels in commercial software makers for usability testing.

By: Beer:30

Beer:30 — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 11:06:59 +0000

I’ll preface this with the comment the machine I am currently running has no windows or proprietary software currently installed.

Computers first and foremost tools. If the tool won’t do the job then it’s not a lot of use to you. If you need proprietary to get the job done then so be it. I don’t have a problem with people turning their machines into a physical embodiment of their beliefs but I’ve got a problem with people passing judgment on others for committing “sins” against a software philosophy. If it’s about freedom then we as a community can’t be against people deciding to run proprietary. Educate people but let them make their own choices.

Most end users don’t live at the extremes. You’re going to win over more people towards the FOSS philosophy by nudging them down the road one step at a time. Don’t force them over the cliff.

Free software is getting better all the time but it’s still not there for everyone. I’d rather have more people aware than fewer all in.

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 11:02:38 +0000

Open source 2D and 3D drivers for ATI graphics cards will be part of the Linux 2.6.32 kernel release.