Although GNU-Darwin can be viewed as a standalone OS for x86 and PowerPC architectures, it is also a source of free software to Apple users.The FreeBSD ports system was used to build over 15,000 software packages for Darwin and Mac OS X users. The ports system is a natural fit with Darwin and Mac OS X, because it orginates from the FreeBSD project. Standards compliance is very high in the ports system, which means that most of the packages build with little or no modification, and users get a familiar Unix-style installation. We GPL all of our original code, and most of the software which we distribute is GPL. We distribute an enhanced Darwin OS, and we provide a free software overlay which can be used by Darwin and Mac OS X users alike. It can also be used instead of Apple’s proprietary overlay, Mac OS X, if the users chooses that. GNU-Darwin has brought many thousands of free software titles to Darwin and Mac OS X, so that Apple users can experience the benefits of free software.
The article is at Kuro5hin.
You know, GNU Darwin might really have something, but every time I try to read about it all I find is a lecture on GNU’s philosophy and a list of reasons why GNU hates the APSL.
I begin reading only to find them once again redefining the semantics of the word “free” and telling me to read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/apsl.html
They contend Darwin isn’t a true “open source” operating system even though the APSL is an OSI approved license.
I don’t understand how the GNU project can look a gift horse in the mouth, write a paper about how the way in which the horse is offered goes against their philosophy, then take the horse anyway.
Because he targets the distro at developers, and then says, don’t do any development on it because it isn’t license-pure….
Anyhow, IMHO, there’s no compelling reason to do *anything* with *Darwin. Go download a couple of the Hurd snapshot ISO’s and go to it. They’re much more innovative. While there aren’t as many packages, there are quite a few.
And libdiskfs could use some work. 😀
OMG it sounds so innovative and really makes me want to join the GNU Darwin project.. NOT. IMHO I do not believe that GNU Darwin is trying to promote equal use I believe that it is trying to push the beliefs of RMS on us. Stallmanites are the only reason that LINUX has not gotten any further than what it has. They want it to be pure and free and want many commercial companies to offer their products free and to open up the source code. I hate to tell you this, but Adobe will not release its source code to photoshop or any of its other products Microsoft will not open its source code for Office. If Apple had gone GPL you would have found that many of the ISVs would have dropped Macintosh support. There is no problem with the APSL, the only true problem comes with the GPL, I consider the BSD License and the APSL to be true Free Software licenses. I hate the rhetoric from GNU Darwin as much as I do from RMS. The DMCA has its problems but it is there to protect developers and copyright holders. If RMS and his best buddy Proclus cant understand that they need to just go back to their little corner.
I am just a user but UI is darn ugly.
“There is no problem with the APSL, the only true problem comes with the GPL, I consider the BSD License and the APSL to be true Free Software licenses.”
Then remove /src/gnu and the rest of your GPL programs from your BSD systems and see how far you get.
It’s spineless folks who hate rhetoric and ideals that let big buisnesses take our freedom from us.
I’d rather sit in the corner with RMS and proclus than bow to
the DMCA, Apple, or <insert newest free software exploiter here>
bye
… idiots
There is one, and only one, truly free (As in speech) category of software and that is software that has been placed in the public domain.
GPL is not, has not, and will never be free (As in speech) software because “free software” and “licenses” are utterly incompatible.
It isn’t RMS, the GPL, GNU, or anything else about the FSF that annoys me, it’s this one simple hypocrisy.
When GNU sets all its software in the public domain and removes its GPL licenses THEN I’ll start listening to what RMS and others have to say about championing the “free” software movement. If they can’t, or won’t, then their software has no more idealogical value than Microsoft’s.
Practice what you preach, or quit preaching.
Err, please read the three-clause BSD license and point out for us what exactly makes it less free than public domain.
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/bsd-license.php
Thanks!
And if he does does anyone care?
Every single thread in his “Free Darwin!” rant at SF rips him to shreds, except for one poster more idiotic than him.
He repeats the same hack-kneed propaganda again and again. His responses seem canned.
“Darwin certainly has interesting technical qualities, such as the IOKit, NetInfo, the real time kernel, and the potential for parallel processing.”
“This antagonism towards Apple in the free software community has been aggravated by Apple’s DMCA fiasco.”
“Blah, blah, blah…”
“Although GNU-Darwin can be viewed as a standalone OS for x86 and PowerPC architectures, it is also a source of free software to Apple users.”
Can be? You abandoned the PPC port–how can it be a source of free software for Apple users when Apple users use PowerPCs?
This is the most irrelevent and easily dismissed example of an ideology gone bad…
Clause 2 for example “Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice…”. You don’t have to do that with public domain code.
Clause 1 makes it doubtful you can wholesale take code and give it a new license (as many GNUbies seem to think): “Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.”
AFAIK unless the license says you can add or change the license, you can’t. Public domain code you can do that plus anything really except claim it’s yours.
The other point of the BSD license is to include the disclaimers, ie. use at your own risk.
Can anyone explain to me, what GNU-Darwin is? My feeling is, that it is a GPL’d remake of the Darwin microkernel architecture, made famous by MacOS X, but not limited to that. I know MacOS X has a BSD implementation on top of Darwin; does GNU-Darwin for x86 include this BSD? If I were to install it, would I then have a BSD system? I went to http://gnu-darwin.org/x86.shtml thinking I could throw together a fast install on a Bochs box and find out for myself, but ha! ha! just *look* at those instructions. Maybe later. Like, well after graduation. It sounds interesting, but I would really like to hear more about it (from the knowledgeable) than just license noise and GNUspeak.
“”Err, please read the three-clause BSD license and point out for us what exactly makes it less free than public domain.””
Ian’s comment sums it up quite nicely.
Either I am able to use, alter, distribute code/binaries in any way I see fit without having to comply to a license or the code/binary is _NOT_ “free” as in speech. Any controlling influence whatsoever immediately eradicates the “freedom” of any code/binaries.
Nobody actually wants “free”, “free” is just not desirable. In the real world “free” is a world without controls, without government, in fact without any restrictions of any kind. “free” is scary as hell and would only last until one person decided to impose their will upon another (Around 5 seconds, if that).
What stops someone from killing you in the street because they happened to like your jacket? I guarantee it isn’t because they are “free”. Religion, morality, law, community? It isn’t possible to have these controlling influences and also have true “freedom”. I for one like having those controls around, despite feeling some of them should be altered.
What we actually mean when we say “freedom” is changing those controls, that exist in every aspect of our lives, to something that better suits ourselves. This is precisely what GNU/BSD and the other “free” software licenses do. The controlling influence has changed to something people are happier to accept, but those controls have not disappeared. In other words they do not create “free” software, just an illusion of it that some are pleased to view as the real thing.
Shaniac: Sorry for the further off topic post.