Richard stallman which linux

RMS: Some parts of. NET are free, for a few years. But Microsoft refuses to promise not to attack. NET users with its patents. So using them is somewhat risky. We advise against developing software with.

As for Visual Studio, it is a proprietary program. So it is not a solution, but an instance of the problem. The solution would be to replace it with free software. It is not why to thank Microsoft. Sure, it can increase the success of the system. But we have a deeper goal that is worth more than success: free computing. Our goal is to free users, that proprietary programs stop depriving them of their freedom. But it has not yet come to freedom, because Visual Studio still submits it.

You need to develop a free program to replace Visual Studio. LxA: But the most striking thing is that lately there is rumor about a possible internal discussion to "open the code" of Windows, what do you think of this possible free Windows? RMS: I fight for free software, that is, for freedom and the community of users. Therefore, I do not use the words "open" or "close" to talk about the software.

On a practical level, if a program is "open source," it is almost always free; the exceptions are few. So if they release "open source" Windows, it will almost certainly be free. If Windows is free software one day, it will basically be ethical. More clearly, its mode of distribution will be ethical. We would have to see if it has any other ethical issues, but I wouldn't reject it just because it comes from Microsoft.

I have no prejudice against Microsoft, or Apple, or anyone. I judge each developer according to their conduct Can you explain why? I don't know what Torvalds said about it.

LxA: Contributing to free software can not only be done by programming. Do you know her? RMS: I don't know him, but this news pleases me a lot. LxA: What would you say to people who think only of contributing lines of code? RMS: There are many ways to help and support the free software movement. If you know how to program well, please help us programming. If not, please help us in another way. LxA: You have changed the world, your philosophy has transcended beyond software, reaching hardware, and even projects that have nothing to do with computers music, books, etc.

It has also served to spread the philosophy of releasing the code to other fields such as biology free seeds, Glowing Plant, OpenWorm. RMS: If they say "open," they are probably not interested in freedom and not promoting our philosophy. In some of these fields, user freedom is not raised as an important issue. There are many moral issues in life; I do not insist on formulating all in terms of one.

If the injustice of proprietary software has no major parallel in any field, I congratulate that field. LxA: We are aware of the difference between open source and free software, but would you like to see the GPL license in the future in fields such as medicine, biology,…? Then it is only applicable to works subject to copyright. Copyright law does not apply to drugs or seeds. Some, confused by the incoherent concept of "intellectual property", assume that patent law is similar to copyright law.

So they think to directly adapt the copyright in a patent left. In fact, these two laws are totally different, they have nothing in common. It should not be repeated unless it is in quotation marks. It is not possible to adapt the left of author directly to patents. A house is built from lots of little general parts that are cut and put together in situ.

They have to be put together from the bottom up. Thus, when the foundation has not been built, no substantial part has been built; all you have is a hole in the ground. By contrast, an operating system consists of complex components that can be developed in any order. When you have developed most of the components, most of the work is done. This is much more like the International Space Station than like a house.

If most of the Space Station modules were in orbit but awaiting one other essential module, that would be like the GNU system in A computer system is not much like a human body, and no part of it plays a role comparable to that of the brain in a human.

Linus Torvalds made an important contribution to the operating system we use; the GNU Project started earlier and contributed much more. We expected to release the GNU system packaged for installation, but this plan was overtaken by events: in others were already packaging GNU variants containing Linux. The founder of Debian had already chosen that name. The GNU Hurd kernel never became sufficiently ready; we only recommend it to those interested in working on it.

We are now developing an advanced Scheme-based package manager called Guix and a complete system distribution based on it called the Guix System Distribution or GuixSD. This includes repackaging a substantial part of the GNU system. Like any modern kernel, Linux is a base for running programs; user interfaces belong elsewhere in the system. This is an example of a frequent way of hiding a fallacy: to bury it inside a misleading analogy.

If you feel even more strongly about giving credit where it is due, you might feel that some secondary contributors also deserve credit in the system's name. If so, far be it from us to argue against it. There is no one obvious right place to set the threshold, so wherever you set it, we won't argue against it.

Different threshold levels would lead to different choices of name for the system. GNU is different because it is more than just a contributed program, more than just a collection of contributed programs. GNU is the framework on which the system was made. GNU is a small fraction of the system nowadays, and Linux is an even smaller fraction. But they are the system's core; the system was made by combining them.

GNU is not comparable to Red Hat or Novell; it is not a company, or an organization, or even an activity. Linus Torvalds wrote Linux independently, as his own project. We're not talking about a distinct GNU version of Linux, the kernel.

We're talking about a version of GNU, the operating system, distinguished by having Linux as the kernel. It is right and proper to mention the principal contribution first.

The GNU contribution to the system is not only bigger than Linux and prior to Linux, we actually started the whole activity. Well, it's not Linux either. We can't make them do this right, but we're not the sort to give up just because the road isn't easy. Given that most of the community which uses GNU with Linux already does not realize that's what it is, for us to disown these adulterated versions, saying they are not really GNU, would not teach the users to value freedom more.

They would not get the intended message. They would only respond they never thought these systems were GNU in the first place. The way to lead these users to see a connection with freedom is exactly the opposite: to inform them that all these system versions are versions of GNU, that they all are based on a system that exists specifically for the sake of the users' freedom. If the Linux User Group in your area has the problems described above, we suggest you either campaign within the group to change its orientation and name or start a new group.

The people who focus on the more superficial goals have a right to their views, but don't let them drag you along! To do it again now does not seem useful; it would be a lot of work, and unless the new distribution had substantial practical advantages over other distributions, it would serve no purpose.

The people who had made the changes showed little interest in cooperating with us. Yet these people, developing a system that was primarily based on GNU, were the first and still practically the only group that was unwilling to work with us. Actually we didn't. We began talking privately with developers and distributors about this in , and made a more public campaign in Unlike commercial software, which is proprietary, free-software programmers don't have to solve the same problems over and over.

They keep improving on the work that came before, like the scientific method. However, in Stallman's eyes, the programming community is more interested in talking about practical issues, like performance -- an anathema to Stallman. And this conflict is partly why Stallman is marginalized.

Most people don't want to talk about freedom. There's been a splintering of the movement: away from free software created by ideologues to open-source software created by business-friendly pragmatists like Torvalds. People are no longer exposed to the philosophical views of the GNU project. Does nomenclature matter to the geeks on the show floor? The Linux Free-for-All 3. Linux On Board 3. Linux Meets Main Street 2.

Topics Discoveries. It was not a project to develop a text editor, although we developed one. Many people have made major contributions to the free software in the system, and they all deserve credit for their software. But the reason it is an integrated system —and not just a collection of useful programs—is because the GNU Project set out to make it one. We made a list of the programs needed to make a complete free system, and we systematically found, wrote, or found people to write everything on the list.

We even developed a chess game, GNU Chess, because a complete system needs games too. By the early 90s we had put together the whole system aside from the kernel. Developing this kernel has been a lot harder than we expected; the GNU Hurd started working reliably in , but it is a long way from being ready for people to use in general. Fortunately, we didn't have to wait for the Hurd, because of Linux.

Making them work well together was not a trivial job.