No longer supporting Unixware / Open Server
Mendel Cooper
---
The SCO Group (SCOG) has posted two of my Linux Documentation Project
HOWTOs on one of its servers. These are the "Advanced-Bash HOWTO" (version
0.3, obsolete) and the "Software-Building HOWTO."
The URLs are:
http://docsrv.caldera.com:8457/en/AdvBashHowto/
http://docsrv.caldera.com:8457/en/Howto/Software-Building/Software-Building-HOWTO.html
I have asked SCOG to remove these documents of mine from their site. No
response.
Because of the open license that these documents were released under, I cannot
legaly force SCOG to remove them. However...
I will give no support to SCOG employees, customers, or users of Unixware or
Open Server. If you have any questions or need any help on the topics covered
by the above documents, you are to contact SCOG customer service.
Brian K. White
Gee that's mature.
People have been using sco unix for many many more years than the
current management has been in place. All those people, who made a
sound decision to work with a good company, suddenly they all get
"asshole" stamped on their foreheads out of the blue and deserve to be
mistreated?
And people wonder why I refuse to allow linux into the professional
work environments I'm responsible for? Happily though, I happen to
already know that your attitude is merely one of a very vocal but
happily very minor minority.
What would be your next move then, since you can't take back your
marbles? How about sabotage? How about putting subtle errors in the
how-to so that the directions are correct for everyone else, but if
executed on a sco box would fail, perhaps doing damage along the way?
Yeah man, that'll really stick it to those pig-vomit sco users. yeah
man. yeah.
Rock on, Beavis.
FyRE
[...]
>> I will give no support to SCOG employees, customers, or users of Unixware or
>> Open Server. If you have any questions or need any help on the topics covered
>> by the above documents, you are to contact SCOG customer service.
>
>Gee that's mature.
I'd say it's his right to do what he likes with his work. I guess you
subscribe to Darl's way of thinking though. What are you going to do
Brian, sue him for daring to speak ill of your beloved SCO?
[brace yourselves, Brian's come up with a classic here!]
>And people wonder why I refuse to allow linux into the professional
>work environments I'm responsible for? Happily though, I happen to
>already know that your attitude is merely one of a very vocal but
>happily very minor minority.
Ok, so you're fighting the tide (and no doubt wasting your employer's
money) plodding on with a dead, badly dated and virtually unsupported,
expensive OS in preference to Linux, right? Yet you're claiming the OP
is the one in a "minor minority"! Almost .sig material; you're a funny
little man Brian. Keep it up! ;-)
--
FyRE < "War: The way Americans learn geography" >
thegr...@theriver.com
> Re: No longer supporting Unixware / Open Server
>
> From: br...@aljex.com (Brian K. White)
> Reply to: Brian K. White
> Date: 28 Jan 2004 10:42:47 -0800
> Organization: http://groups.google.com
> Newsgroups:
> comp.unix.sco.misc
> Followup to: newsgroup
> References:
> <bv7gbp$i40$0...@206.25.50.11>
>Mendel Cooper <thegr...@theriver.com> wrote in message news:<bv7gbp$i40$0@206
>.25.50.11>...
>> Announcement to all SCO Group Customers and users of Unixware and Open Server
>.
>> ---
>>
>> The SCO Group (SCOG) has posted two of my Linux Documentation Project
>> HOWTOs on one of its servers. These are the "Advanced-Bash HOWTO" (version
>> 0.3, obsolete) and the "Software-Building HOWTO."
>>
>> The URLs are:
>>
>> http://docsrv.caldera.com:8457/en/AdvBashHowto/
>> http://docsrv.caldera.com:8457/en/Howto/Software-Building/Software-Building-H
>OWTO.html
>>
>> I have asked SCOG to remove these documents of mine from their site. No
>> response.
>>
>> Because of the open license that these documents were released under, I canno
>t
>> legaly force SCOG to remove them. However...
>>
>> I will give no support to SCOG employees, customers, or users of Unixware or
>> Open Server. If you have any questions or need any help on the topics covered
>> by the above documents, you are to contact SCOG customer service.
>Gee that's mature.
The readers of this thread will decide which post is mature.
>People have been using sco unix for many many more years than the
>current management has been in place. All those people, who made a
>sound decision to work with a good company, suddenly they all get
>"asshole" stamped on their foreheads out of the blue and deserve to be
>mistreated?
You have a vivid imagination. Simply because I refused to support Unixware
customers on documentation written for Linux, that stamps users of SCO
Unix as assholes? This is an example of your professional judgment?
>And people wonder why I refuse to allow linux into the professional
>work environments I'm responsible for? Happily though, I happen to
>already know that your attitude is merely one of a very vocal but
>happily very minor minority.
Responsible? You have decision-making responsibility? That's frightening.
The readers of this newsgroup can easily decide who is the professional here
and who is the quick-tempered fanatic.
>What would be your next move then, since you can't take back your
>marbles? How about sabotage? How about putting subtle errors in the
>how-to so that the directions are correct for everyone else, but if
>executed on a sco box would fail, perhaps doing damage along the way?
>Yeah man, that'll really stick it to those pig-vomit sco users. yeah
>man. yeah.
There's a name for this. It's called defamation of character. You might wish
to consult with your company's legal department about the implications of
that. Again, a sterling example of professionalism here.
>Rock on, Beavis.
It's possible to discern a number of things about the character of a person
behind a post. People who wouldn't consider stripping themselves naked in
public do so in their Usenet messages.
You have strong interpersonal and communications skills. Your well-developed
self-control prevents you from venting anger in an inappropriate manner. You
are popular with your subordinates and superiors. You are due for a fast-track
promotion.
Brian
> Mendel Cooper <thegr...@theriver.com> wrote...
>> Announcement to all SCO Group Customers and users of Unixware and Open
>> Server. ---
>> The SCO Group (SCOG) has posted two of my Linux Documentation Project
>> HOWTOs on one of its servers. These are the "Advanced-Bash HOWTO"
>> (version 0.3, obsolete) and the "Software-Building HOWTO."
>> The URLs are:
http://docsrv.caldera.com:8457/en/AdvBashHowto/
http://docsrv.caldera.com:8457/en/Howto/Software-Building/Software-Building-HOWTO.html
>> I have asked SCOG to remove these documents of mine from their site. No
>> response.
>> Because of the open license that these documents were released under, I
>> cannot legally force SCOG to remove them. However...
>> I will give no support to SCOG employees, customers, or users of Unixware
>> or Open Server. If you have any questions or need any help on the topics
>> covered by the above documents, you are to contact SCOG customer service.
> Gee that's mature.
Bwahahahahahahahahahaha...
That is rich coming from an SCO keener.
> People have been using sco Unix for many many more years than the
> current management has been in place. All those people, who made a
> sound decision to work with a good company, suddenly they all get
> "asshole" stamped on their foreheads out of the blue and deserve to be
> mistreated?
Out of the blue? Have you been keeping up with current events BW?
And how does requesting his intellectual property rights be respected make
the OP guilty of mistreatment?
> And people wonder why I refuse to allow linux into the professional
> work environments I'm responsible for?
Probably because you are a clueless twit.
Linux is superior in every way to SCO Unix - after all, we have that 80
lines of System V code running in our kernel...
Bwahahahahahahaha
> Happily though, I happen to already know that your attitude is
> merely one of a very vocal but happily very minor minority.
You wish.
SCO revenues from it's *legitimate* Unix business has halved in one year.
Minor minority - do you mean a minority of minors?
> What would be your next move then, since you can't take back your
> marbles? How about sabotage? How about putting subtle errors in the
> how-to so that the directions are correct for everyone else, but if
> executed on a sco box would fail, perhaps doing damage along the way?
> Yeah man, that'll really stick it to those pig-vomit sco users. yeah
> man. yeah.
Yeah, it's not like SCO is trying to hurt anybody.
What could the OP be thinking?
> Rock on, Beavis.
I thought SCO was the chumpion of intellectual property rights! Where do
they get off deploying a web page against the wishes of the author and
rightful owner.
Could it be that SCO has a double standard? You know, where on the one hand
the GPL and other open source licenses allow them to include all kinds of
cool services and applications they have never developed themselves but on
the other hand have actively castigated and deplored such licenses in every
public forum that will have them.
SCO lies cheats and steals!
Anybody that actively supports SCO is guilty by association of the same
crimes. I don't buy this "I'm only doing my job"... it sounds too much like
"I was only following orders."
So listen BW, the next time your feelings get hurt by some guy trying to
protect his clearly identified intellectual property, give your head a
shake and Grow Up!
I await the 6th of February with great anticipation... I think SCO is going
down!
If you think IBM and Linux supporters are tough, wait until you see what the
recent SCO investors are going to do; these guys make great white sharks
look like Victorian tea drinkers.
I smell blood, don't you?
8^)
The Other Brian
Joe Dunning
How many posts have I seen on this newsgroup justifying SCO
installations as "in the best interests of my customers"? Now you say
that you absolutely refuse to allow Linux into the ">work environments
I'm responsible for". No technical justification for this, just your
opinion on the attitudes of Linux users. Well, that's really a good
justification of the best interests of your customers, isn't it?
I mean, obviously Google, Amazon and others are suffering from their use
of Linux aren't they? Yet, you believe you know better than the IT
managers of those companies. Oh, yes, that's the way of the future:
absolutely refuse to allow Linux installations. I wish I had your
foresight.
Brian, you have shown that you are merely an SCO zealot.
Brian K. White
google amazon et al, can afford to have full time 24/7 on-site IT
staff that can immediately deal with the vagaries of life with linux,
and to highly customize their linux installations to minimize those
vagaries in the first place. The "technical justifications" are many
and I rarely get past the first one or two before a client decides
"Never mind I don't need that!" in those instances when they ask me to
explain our particular choice of OS. Yes, I do tell them the PRO's as
well as the cons, no I do not invent or even exagerate the cons, yes I
have used and continue to use linux myself enough to be quite
knowledgeable about it from first hand experience.
I don't think I'm too upset about what you think I've shown, since you
have shown merely that you do not think. Certainly you can't debate
your way out of a wet paper bag.
Joe Dunning
>j...@blahblah.invalid (Joe Dunning) wrote in message
news:<soXRb.46152$U%5.240446@attbi_s03>...
>> On 28 Jan 2004 10:42:47 -0800, Brian K. White <br...@aljex.com> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >And people wonder why I refuse to allow linux into the professional
>> >work environments I'm responsible for? Happily though, I happen to
>> >already know that your attitude is merely one of a very vocal but
>> >happily very minor minority.
>>
>> How many posts have I seen on this newsgroup justifying SCO
>> installations as "in the best interests of my customers"? Now you say
>> that you absolutely refuse to allow Linux into the ">work environments
>> I'm responsible for". No technical justification for this, just your
>> opinion on the attitudes of Linux users. Well, that's really a good
>> justification of the best interests of your customers, isn't it?
>>
>> I mean, obviously Google, Amazon and others are suffering from their use
>> of Linux aren't they? Yet, you believe you know better than the IT
>> managers of those companies. Oh, yes, that's the way of the future:
>> absolutely refuse to allow Linux installations. I wish I had your
>> foresight.
>>
>> Brian, you have shown that you are merely an SCO zealot.
>
>google amazon et al, can afford to have full time 24/7 on-site IT
>staff that can immediately deal with the vagaries of life with linux,
Linux does not need 24/7 support. If you think that you are showing your
ignorance. On the other hand, I don't see any SCO installations in
Netcraft's list of machines with longest uptimes.
>and to highly customize their linux installations to minimize those
>vagaries in the first place. The "technical justifications" are many
>and I rarely get past the first one or two before a client decides
>"Never mind I don't need that!" in those instances when they ask me to
>explain our particular choice of OS. Yes, I do tell them the PRO's as
>well as the cons, no I do not invent or even exagerate the cons, yes I
>have used and continue to use linux myself enough to be quite
>knowledgeable about it from first hand experience.
So we are to believe that you honestly tell your customers about the
pros and cons of Linux vs. SCO yet you also state that:
>> >.... I refuse to allow linux into the professional
>> >work environments I'm responsible for?
These two statements cannot be reconciled. You have shown your true
attitude here: you have some irrational bias against Linux and you are
most likely doing your customers a disservice when you advise them.
Either that or you are lying about not allowing linux into "the
professional work environments [you are] responsible for"
Even other posters on this newsgroup don't agree with you. How many
posts have we seen from multiple posters in this very newsgroup who say
that that SCO is dying and they are migrating customers to Linux.
>
>I don't think I'm too upset about what you think I've shown, since you
>have shown merely that you do not think. Certainly you can't debate
>your way out of a wet paper bag.
You can say that, but unsupported statements have zero value. On the
other hand, I have shown above how you have contradicted yourself --
destroying any shreds of credibility in the Linux/SCO issues that you
might have once had. Your response: you resort to a crude ad-hominem
attack.
J. L. Schilling
>
> I have asked SCOG to remove these documents of mine from their site. No
> response.
>
> Because of the open license that these documents were released under, I cannot
> legaly force SCOG to remove them. However...
>
> I will give no support to SCOG employees, customers, or users of Unixware or
> Open Server. If you have any questions or need any help on the topics covered
> by the above documents, you are to contact SCOG customer service.
One of the principal arguments advanced by open source software advocates
is that with proprietary software, if the vendor goes out of business or
decides not to support your platform any more, you're out of luck. But
with open source software, this can't happen. You always have access to
the source and rights to do with it what you want, and can thus always
continue to enhance/maintain/support it as long as you like and on
whatever platform you like.
So, based on this argument, announcements like this are meaningless.
Jonathan Schilling
Brian
<clipped for brevity>
> So, based on this argument, announcements like this are meaningless.
Haven't you heard? SCOG have renounced open source and the GPL.
Is it such a stretch that the community that supports open source are
renouncing SCOG?
Perhaps the solution for SCOG keeners is to support open source within your
own community. Is that not what the OP is asking?
Perhaps when SCOG is dissolved we can once again look to our cousins in the
closed source Unix community with a little more sympathy and understanding
but at the moment you guys are persona non grata.
If you are unhappy with this state of affairs, why don't you complain to the
mothership - perhaps Darl isn't aware that his actions are causing distress
to the drones.
Brian
Brian K. White
You are right it doesn't need 24/7 baybysitting. It only needs
attention when it crashes or gets holed. The rest of the time, yeah,
it's fine.
And it has already been pointed out how silly and irrelevant netcraft
is to this discussion. Just like the also irrelevant google example, I
happen to be talking about boxes that operate in a completely
dissimilar context than google or any other public web server, which
are the only types of boxes that can ever even show up on netcraft.
The back-room boxes and factory floor boxes and data-logger boxes and
point of sale boxes etc... most of them don't even see the internet.
Yet they have some of the longest uptimes you'll ever see in person.
Certainly the consistently longest average uptimes if not the longest
absolute.
> >and to highly customize their linux installations to minimize those
> >vagaries in the first place. The "technical justifications" are many
> >and I rarely get past the first one or two before a client decides
> >"Never mind I don't need that!" in those instances when they ask me to
> >explain our particular choice of OS. Yes, I do tell them the PRO's as
> >well as the cons, no I do not invent or even exagerate the cons, yes I
> >have used and continue to use linux myself enough to be quite
> >knowledgeable about it from first hand experience.
>
> So we are to believe that you honestly tell your customers about the
> pros and cons of Linux vs. SCO yet you also state that:
> >> >.... I refuse to allow linux into the professional
> >> >work environments I'm responsible for?
>
> These two statements cannot be reconciled. You have shown your true
> attitude here: you have some irrational bias against Linux and you are
> most likely doing your customers a disservice when you advise them.
> Either that or you are lying about not allowing linux into "the
> professional work environments [you are] responsible for"
I don't contradict anything. Please only accuse me of saying that
which I have said, and not that which you have read between the lines.
Whenever I get to decide, that is how I decide. When I don't get to
simply specify, and in the even rarer cases when even my
recommendation is overridden, I am productive and helpful and provide
excellent linux service. And frankly, the gap is closing and the
decision may soon reverse. Linux is getting better and sco is getting
worse (if you factor in the organization you have to deal with as part
of the total package, which I do. the actual software is still top
notch but who knows when the management will manage to screw that up
finally by dictating bad design to the developers to satisfy backwards
or even incomprehensible goals.)
Most recently a customer a few months ago wished to install a linux
box and samba was going to be the main purpose for the box. It needed
to be very reliable because their core business app was actually a
windows app that needed a central server to hold database files that
all pc's update. I recommended, in this order:
1) sco server with the sco version of the app and no more binaries
running on pc's accessing data over the lan via mapped network drives,
instead all data & bins running on the server and pc's just running
terminal emulators.
This would have been 1000% faster than what they were used to.
2) If you stay with windows version of app, then stay with a windows
file server, just beef it up and strip it down and lock it down so
nothing is running on it but antivirus and windows itself to provide
the file shares.
Unix, while generally superior to windows in most any way, would most
likely be a little more prone to unexpected or unusual problems if
used in this way because in the end, an smb server is an add-on thing
to unix and even the best ones don't precisely exactly duplicate
windows's behaviour 100% and with this form of extremely heavy traffic
made up of lots of little rapid transactions from many pc's to the
same files at the same time, it's just asking for trouble.
3) if you insist on a unix server for this, then make it sco +
facetwin for reliability and the astonishing facetwin lifetime free
actually knowledgeable support and the general lack of need for it in
the first place, or possibly linux + facetwin to get linux's better
disk performance and facetwins impeccable stability (but understand,
sitting on top of linux instead of sco, it can only be just so
reliable)
4) if you insist on linux + samba I am perfectly capable of setting it
up and resolving any problems, but I predict problems and the time
spent fixing them may approach or surpass the cost of the sco+facetwin
option.
He ended up doing 90% of the job with reckless abandon all on his own
and then calling me when in the middle of his first work day they
suddenly started having a flood of problems and the app wasn't working
at all and data was being botched up left and right from all the
failed writes...
In the end he pretty much lucked out. I resolved an obscure (but
reasonably well documented and not apparently new) issue with
fundamental differences in the way a windows box locks files and
records and the way unix does, and the various subtly different
behaviours that can optionally be specified in samba to try to satisfy
applications that fail when moved to a samba share, and it didn't take
me all day, and he didn't end up having to re-key in too much data.
I don't consider that a linux success story. I consider it a close
call and I garuntee it wouldn't have happened had my first or second
recommendation been accepted. It was a gamble that paid off. Most of
my customers do NOT want to gamble with their business if there is any
possible way to avoid it. And actually, the gamble is not over until
that box goes 4 or 5 years without a burp until finally some peice of
hardware starts to fail the way all the sco boxes have been doing. I
predict failure there for sure. But his theory there is "when this
cheap box dies I'll just restore the data from backup onto a new cheap
box" and what the heck, as long as the backups are known good and as
long as the setup of a box remains simple, maybe that's not an
inefficient plan.
>
> Even other posters on this newsgroup don't agree with you. How many
> posts have we seen from multiple posters in this very newsgroup who say
> that that SCO is dying and they are migrating customers to Linux.
>
What has that got to do with anything? I myself have been working on a
pet project off & on for over a year to put together a freebsd based
replacement for our current sco based package, but *not* because of
cost, which is what I daresay is the reason most people migrate from
sco to linux. It's because a large part of what made me proud to sell
and service sco has gone away in the last year, which was the history
of the company. I used to be able to say to a client how dependable
and long-standing the company was and assure them without blinking
"You are in good hands with them, no surprizes, whenever you need
something they will be there to supply it and at pretty much the same
terms as now and in the past". No way can I say that now. They may in
fact still be around and supplying upgrades and extra users & extra
cpu's etc... for my whole remaining career, but I don't know that so
it's moot. Based on this last year all I know is that "anything could
happen"
> >I don't think I'm too upset about what you think I've shown, since you
> >have shown merely that you do not think. Certainly you can't debate
> >your way out of a wet paper bag.
>
> You can say that, but unsupported statements have zero value. On the
> other hand, I have shown above how you have contradicted yourself --
> destroying any shreds of credibility in the Linux/SCO issues that you
> might have once had. Your response: you resort to a crude ad-hominem
> attack.
It would be wildly impractical for me to provide a general ledger tape
of all the failed and suceeded experiments over the last several years
just to provide you an account of incidents that lead to my current
opinions. I'd basically have to go and re-enact them all only this
time filming it all. So I won't
Notice that I do not ask you to support any statements about linux's
dependability. I don't need to. I actually use both sco and linux and
you can't say anything that would undo the first-hand comparison I
have simply and plainly witnessed. (And I assure you, it's not a linux
knowledgeability issue. Being 34 and picking up unix kind of late, I
am among the first wave of people who initially learned unix more on
linux than on anything else. Hopefully that sheds a little perspective
on my stances.) Conversely, have you used sco much?
J. L. Schilling
>
> Perhaps when SCOG is dissolved we can once again look to our cousins in the
> closed source Unix community with a little more sympathy and understanding
> but at the moment you guys are persona non grata.
So you're saying that some open source projects are going to drop support
for all closed source Unixes, including Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, etc.? Cool!
And then a few projects will drop support for Red Hat, since they're
really ticked off that RH abandoned the Red Hat Linux product for their
expensive commercial RH AS line. And then some other project will drop
support for SuSE because they got bought by Novell which also owns
Ximian which runs Mono which will help .NET take over the world.
And then FSF GCC will drop support for all Linux distros that don't
call themselves GNU/Linux. And so on ...
The point I'm trying to make is, open source means "open", it doesn't
mean "open except for all the platforms the maintainers don't approve
of today". If it starts to mean the latter, game over.
Jonathan Schilling
FyRE
wrote:
[...]
>> Linux does not need 24/7 support. If you think that you are showing your
>> ignorance. On the other hand, I don't see any SCO installations in
>> Netcraft's list of machines with longest uptimes.
>
>You are right it doesn't need 24/7 baybysitting. It only needs
>attention when it crashes or gets holed. The rest of the time, yeah,
>it's fine.
In my experience Linux "crashes" are always due to:
(a) Hardware failures (most often, dying RAM).
(b) Forcing the wrong driver modules in for hardware.
(c) Administer's incompetence/ignorance.
However, if you're not just lying (again) and can actually produce an
example of Linux "just crashing for no reason" I'd be interested in
hearing about it. I won't hold my breath though, based on your
previous articles I suspect all your problems would fall under option
(c) above.
>And it has already been pointed out how silly and irrelevant netcraft
>is to this discussion. Just like the also irrelevant google example, I
>happen to be talking about boxes that operate in a completely
>dissimilar context than google or any other public web server, which
>are the only types of boxes that can ever even show up on netcraft.
...since obviously huge, busy database-driven e-commerce sites and the
World's largest search engine don't require very stable servers...
>The back-room boxes and factory floor boxes and data-logger boxes and
>point of sale boxes etc... most of them don't even see the internet.
>Yet they have some of the longest uptimes you'll ever see in person.
I'll have you know that I *know* for a fact that the vast majority of
robot-controllers and sensor monitoring hardware used on factory
floors are still using DOS (and in some cases Windows 3.1/WFW). That's
when they run any "normal" operating system and not V+, LynxOS etc.
The hardware used is also built to very different tolerances than a
family PC, or rack-mounted server unit.
>Certainly the consistently longest average uptimes if not the longest
>absolute.
Unlikely. In both the situations the machines would be almost
certainly power cycled at least once per year, and probably more
often. Why leave a POS terminal running over xmas when no-one's going
to be using it?
[...]
>Most recently a customer a few months ago wished to install a linux
>box and samba was going to be the main purpose for the box. It needed
Good idea. You realize you can already BUY Linux powered boxes already
set up for this very purpose (plus smtp, pop, www, firewall, net
access etc) with a nice web interface to control everything? Cost well
under 1000 pounds, and any fool can administer them.
>to be very reliable because their core business app was actually a
>windows app that needed a central server to hold database files that
>all pc's update. I recommended, in this order:
...here it comes... ;-)
>1) sco server with the sco version of the app and no more binaries
>running on pc's accessing data over the lan via mapped network drives,
>instead all data & bins running on the server and pc's just running
>terminal emulators.
>This would have been 1000% faster than what they were used to.
Big surprise there. Brian the rabid SCO fan recommends... SCO. Hope he
was wearing dark glasses so the "mark" couldn't see the dollar signs
in his eyes as he tried to push his wares.
>2) If you stay with windows version of app, then stay with a windows
>file server, just beef it up and strip it down and lock it down so
>nothing is running on it but antivirus and windows itself to provide
>the file shares.
Brian, you are truly an idiot. Ever heard of CAL licensing costs?
Security issues, performance issues, stability issues etc. Why on
Earth would anyone ask your advice?!
>Unix, while generally superior to windows in most any way, would most
>likely be a little more prone to unexpected or unusual problems if
>used in this way because in the end, an smb server is an add-on thing
>to unix and even the best ones don't precisely exactly duplicate
>windows's behaviour 100% and with this form of extremely heavy traffic
>made up of lots of little rapid transactions from many pc's to the
>same files at the same time, it's just asking for trouble.
More uninformed rubbish. Of course, Brian won't actually be able to
back up any of his ludicrous claims with facts.
>3) if you insist on a unix server for this, then make it sco +
>facetwin for reliability and the astonishing facetwin lifetime free
>actually knowledgeable support and the general lack of need for it in
>the first place, or possibly linux + facetwin to get linux's better
>disk performance and facetwins impeccable stability (but understand,
>sitting on top of linux instead of sco, it can only be just so
>reliable)
More baseless claims that Linux is not stable. Obviously, no facts
here either. Maybe this would be linked to Brian not making a
percentage on pushing a Linux OS... hmm...
>4) if you insist on linux + samba I am perfectly capable of setting it
>up and resolving any problems,
I'm very sceptical of this. Personally I wouldn't trust you to sit the
right way round on a toilet without someone keeping an eye on you.
>but I predict problems and the time
>spent fixing them may approach or surpass the cost of the sco+facetwin
>option.
If there are problems with Samba, and they can be "fixed" then the
cause of the problems would be your own incompetence.
>He ended up doing 90% of the job with reckless abandon all on his own
>and then calling me when in the middle of his first work day they
>suddenly started having a flood of problems and the app wasn't working
>at all and data was being botched up left and right from all the
>failed writes...
>
>In the end he pretty much lucked out. I resolved an obscure (but
>reasonably well documented and not apparently new) issue with
>fundamental differences in the way a windows box locks files and
>records and the way unix does, and the various subtly different
>behaviours that can optionally be specified in samba to try to satisfy
>applications that fail when moved to a samba share, and it didn't take
>me all day, and he didn't end up having to re-key in too much data.
So, the "obscure" but well documented, old issue was solved by the
guru Brian, eh? Why not point your poor misinformed clients at someone
who actually knows what they're doing in future? Anyone who isn't
aware of the issues with file locking (particularly on mdb lock files)
and the simple switches and force create modes to fix it shouldn't be
fiddling around with the company Samba setup.
>I don't consider that a linux success story.
No, nor would I Brian. I'd call it a tale of the "Greedy SCO reseller
attempting, and failing to push his products at someone who didn't
want them". You've just proven your utter incompetence (again) to
everyone in the group.
>I consider it a close
>call and I garuntee it wouldn't have happened had my first or second
>recommendation been accepted. It was a gamble that paid off. Most of
>my customers do NOT want to gamble with their business if there is any
>possible way to avoid it.
It sounds as though avoiding Brian K White would be a good first step.
I can imagine your sales patter:
Customer: I'd like to implement Samba on Linux to allow
high-performance, cheap network storage (and print services).
Brian: You don't want that mate. Why not pay for some nice SCO
software? Sure, it's grotesquely overpriced and the vendor will send
you threatening letters every so often, and the Samba developers don't
want their software used on the platform. But I make a few dollars,
and it's almost as fast as Linux (if Linux is on a slower machine).
Customer: I'd heard SCO were no longer producing software? Why pay for
that when I can use Linux to do the same job?
Brian: Well, erm, because I know how to set it up, and I can sell you
licenses for each user in your company accessing the Samba server.
Customer: I think I'll do it myself...
>And actually, the gamble is not over until
>that box goes 4 or 5 years without a burp until finally some peice of
>hardware starts to fail the way all the sco boxes have been doing. I
>predict failure there for sure. But his theory there is "when this
>cheap box dies I'll just restore the data from backup onto a new cheap
>box" and what the heck, as long as the backups are known good and as
>long as the setup of a box remains simple, maybe that's not an
>inefficient plan.
Bloody hell. Brian actually "gets it" at last!
>> Even other posters on this newsgroup don't agree with you. How many
>> posts have we seen from multiple posters in this very newsgroup who say
>> that that SCO is dying and they are migrating customers to Linux.
>>
>
>What has that got to do with anything?
Yeah, because obviously convincing your (poor misguided) customers to
use a dead OS is nothing to worry about. Once you have their cash,
what the hell, eh? ;-)
>I myself have been working on a
>pet project off & on for over a year to put together a freebsd based
>replacement for our current sco based package, but *not* because of
>cost, which is what I daresay is the reason most people migrate from
>sco to linux.
Hmm, of course that's the reason, yes. Huge corporations spending
millions on software would obviously plump for Linux to save a couple
of thousand pounds. It's not the support from IBM, SuSE/Novell, HP,
Dell, Redhat or (now) Sun microsystems. It's not the fact it vastly
outperforms SCO (and *BSDs which make compromises for security
reasons), is being developed much faster and isn't sold by a bunch of
stock-pumping, profiteering gluttons. Oh no, it's the price ;-)
>Notice that I do not ask you to support any statements about linux's
>dependability. I don't need to. I actually use both sco and linux and
>you can't say anything that would undo the first-hand comparison I
>have simply and plainly witnessed. (And I assure you, it's not a linux
>knowledgeability issue. Being 34 and picking up unix kind of late, I
>am among the first wave of people who initially learned unix more on
>linux than on anything else. Hopefully that sheds a little perspective
>on my stances.)
So, you've been using Unix since you were what, 33? From what I've
read here, I wouldn't want someone like you anywhere near a server
room full of Linux boxes. You obviously don't know what you're doing,
you admit to telling your customers abject lies, and have an almost
religious fervor for a dead OS.
FyRE
Schilling) wrote:
[...]
>And then a few projects will drop support for Red Hat, since they're
>really ticked off that RH abandoned the Red Hat Linux product for their
>expensive commercial RH AS line.
An obvious lie. Redhat develop Fedora, which is actually free. They
also employ a number of lead Kernel developers and make their tools
available to the community.
>And then some other project will drop
>support for SuSE because they got bought by Novell which also owns
>Ximian which runs Mono which will help .NET take over the world.
Now you're just being silly.
>And then FSF GCC will drop support for all Linux distros that don't
>call themselves GNU/Linux. And so on ...
>
>The point I'm trying to make is, open source means "open", it doesn't
>mean "open except for all the platforms the maintainers don't approve
>of today". If it starts to mean the latter, game over.
No Jonathan. GPL'ed software is freely available for users and vendors
who abide by the terms of the GPL. SCO refuse to acknowledge the GPL,
and continue to violate it. If you want to use my software, you must
respect my wishes. Personally I'd like a clause added to the GPL to
specifically exclude its use on SCO platforms (not that there's that
many left ;-) I'm sure everyone who has released any software under
the GPL would be happy to accept this change in the licence.
to...@pcunix.com
>The point I'm trying to make is, open source means "open", it doesn't
>mean "open except for all the platforms the maintainers don't approve
>of today". If it starts to mean the latter, game over.
Exactly.
Just like freedom of speech: you don't get to tell the Nazis or the
Namblas etc. that they can't express their opinions. And George
Bush shouldn't be able to keep people carrying signs he doesn't like
away from his public appearances.
Open Source needs to be the same: it's either open or it isn't.
Vaguely related: I'm sending the ACLU $100.00 today. I wish we didn't
need the ACLU, but sadly, we do. There are serious problems in
the USA right now, and some of them (Patriot Act, DMCA etc.) are
technology related and pose a much more serious threat to Open
Source than this SCO crap does.
However, SCO is making noises about the GPL that are very
disturbing. I've warned about this before:
http://aplawrence.com/Opinion/beardedrevolutionaries.html
and some here have chuckled over my "wild conspiracy theories.
I hope you'll all be able to keep chuckling. Republican Congress
Critters are pro-business, and Linux *is* a threat..
--
to...@pcunix.com Unix/Linux/Mac OS X resources: http://aplawrence.com
Get paid for writing about tech: http://aplawrence.com/publish.html
to...@pcunix.com
>In my experience Linux "crashes" are always due to:
>(a) Hardware failures (most often, dying RAM).
>(b) Forcing the wrong driver modules in for hardware.
>(c) Administer's incompetence/ignorance.
And my experience is the same for SCO :-)
However: I have also found that under truly adverse conditions
(which is me using the box for various experiments and tests)
SCO holds up better than Linux. That doesn't make me hesitate
a minute to deploy Linux to customers because nobody in their
right mind would do the things I do to a production machine. It's
not fair to randomly change hardware, add conflicting drivers,
use drivers written by an incompetent boob (yours truly),
crash things on purpose, etc. But: SCO takes this abuse better
than Linux in my experience.
>Unlikely. In both the situations the machines would be almost
>certainly power cycled at least once per year, and probably more
>often. Why leave a POS terminal running over xmas when no-one's going
>to be using it?
Because often they don't even know where the server is..
thegr...@theriver.com
> Re: No longer supporting Unixware / Open Server
>
> Reply to: J. L. Schilling
> Date: 29 Jan 2004 05:38:13 -0800
> Organization: http://groups.google.com
> Newsgroups:
> comp.unix.sco.misc
> Followup to: newsgroup
> References:
> <bv7gbp$i40$0...@206.25.50.11>
You, and a couple of other people are entirely missing the point.
My Open Source Documentation will *still be available* on the SCOG site.
Under the open license I can't force its removal. Can't, even if I wanted to.
Unfortunately, SCOG posts a legacy version of my "Advanced Bash Scripting
Guide," three years and about a dozen and a half revisions out of date. I
guess they figure since they "inherited" it from Caldera, it's their
property now... If you, or Brian K. White, or Darl McBride wants access
to the document, it's still there (and better yet, the latest update
is on the Linux Documentation Project site, http://www.tldp.org). And
the "source code" -- oh yes -- the complete Docbook/SGML source is
downloadable from my home site for you or all the world. Open Source,
available to you even if I decide I don't particularly like you (or the
horse you rode in on).
Now, support is an entirely different matter. Why should I waste my
time and effort supporting SCOG customers when SCOG is doing its best
to destroy Linux and Open Source? Why do I have any kind of obligation,
moral or otherwise, to support anyone who is trying to deny me, as an
independent author and developer, the right to create and distribute
my work?
Note that I certainly don't have a *legal* obligation to support SCOG. I
never entered into a contract with them. In view of their comments that
contracts are a weapon to be used against their partners, I would have
doubts about the sanity of anyone entering a contractual relationship
with them.
to...@pcunix.com
>Now, support is an entirely different matter. Why should I waste my
>time and effort supporting SCOG customers when SCOG is doing its best
>to destroy Linux and Open Source? Why do I have any kind of obligation,
>moral or otherwise, to support anyone who is trying to deny me, as an
>independent author and developer, the right to create and distribute
>my work?
>Note that I certainly don't have a *legal* obligation to support SCOG. I
>never entered into a contract with them. In view of their comments that
>contracts are a weapon to be used against their partners, I would have
>doubts about the sanity of anyone entering a contractual relationship
>with them.
You don't have any particular obligation to support anyone, but
punishing the customers of a company you don't like is foolish.
It's this kind of childish nonsense that makes business people
hesitant to trust Linux.
Grow up. If someone from SCO called you for support, you might
have a valid point. To refuse their customers is ridiculous.
You are punishing folks who may very well use Linux now or in
the future, but your self righteousness might very well
push them to Windows instead.
Bill Vermillion
You say Linux does not need 24/7 support. You also say that you
don't see any SCO installation on Netcraft's list of machines with
longest uptimes. Well I don't see any Linux machines there
either. In the top 50 it is almost overwhelming BSD/OS [that's the
commercial supported version]. There are about a 1/2 dozen running
FreeBSD, and that's it. Even the Sun machines used to pop up there
now and then.
I support several OSes including a dwindling number of SCO clients.
But personally I'd never put SCO up as primarily a web server where
it would even be in running for being on one of those lists. It's
a good office/business server, but from my POV it is not what I'd
consider a server to use in and applications like you'd see on
Netcraft. So I don't see the point of bringing in Netcraft and
Linux. Am I missing something there.
>>and to highly customize their linux installations to minimize those
>>vagaries in the first place. The "technical justifications" are many
>>and I rarely get past the first one or two before a client decides
>>"Never mind I don't need that!" in those instances when they ask me to
>>explain our particular choice of OS.
That sounds like the customers needs vs wants were not specified
before the installation started. That's not a good way to go with
any OS, but I have seen many customers that start out that way.
Part of my job I feel is discussing with the customer so everything
is known beforehand.
>> Yes, I do tell them the PRO's as well as the cons, no I do not
>>invent or even exagerate the cons, yes I have used and continue
>>to use linux myself enough to be quite knowledgeable about it
>>from first hand experience.
>So we are to believe that you honestly tell your customers about the
>pros and cons of Linux vs. SCO yet you also state that:
>>> >.... I refuse to allow linux into the professional
>>> >work environments I'm responsible for?
>These two statements cannot be reconciled. You have shown your true
>attitude here: you have some irrational bias against Linux and you are
>most likely doing your customers a disservice when you advise them.
All Brian said was that he refuse to allow it in the environments
for which he's responsible. That's not much difference from
someone who has a bias saying "I will never own a Ford" [or
whatever the object of derision will be].
He's not doing them a dis-service if they want him to work for them
and he's not comfortable working in that environment. If the
customer wants Linux and he doesn't care to support it, he should
point them to someone who does.
>Either that or you are lying about not allowing linux into "the
>professional work environments [you are] responsible for"
Isn't just his preference of which OS to support?
>Even other posters on this newsgroup don't agree with you. How many
>posts have we seen from multiple posters in this very newsgroup who say
>that that SCO is dying and they are migrating customers to Linux.
And there are others who have migrated to other platforms other
than Linux - though Linux is the 'hot' brand now.
Bill
--
Bill Vermillion - bv @ wjv . com
Joe Dunning
>In article <cz2Sb.179512$na.292957@attbi_s04>,
>Joe Dunning <joedunning12...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>On 28 Jan 2004 19:47:26 -0800, Brian K. White <br...@aljex.com> wrote:
>
>>>j...@blahblah.invalid (Joe Dunning) wrote in message
>>news:<soXRb.46152$U%5.240446@attbi_s03>...
>
>>>> On 28 Jan 2004 10:42:47 -0800, Brian K. White
>>>> <br...@aljex.com> wrote:
>
>
>>>> >And people wonder why I refuse to allow linux into the professional
>>>> >work environments I'm responsible for? Happily though, I happen to
>>>> >already know that your attitude is merely one of a very vocal but
>>>> >happily very minor minority.
>
>
>
>>>google amazon et al, can afford to have full time 24/7 on-site IT
>>>staff that can immediately deal with the vagaries of life with linux,
>
>>Linux does not need 24/7 support. If you think that you are
>>showing your ignorance. On the other hand, I don't see any
>>SCO installations in Netcraft's list of machines with longest
>>uptimes.
>
>You say Linux does not need 24/7 support. You also say that you
>don't see any SCO installation on Netcraft's list of machines with
>longest uptimes. Well I don't see any Linux machines there
>either.
That's true, today. But a week or so ago, there were some. I also know
from personal experience that Linux machines will run for long times at
high CPU loads without crashing or the need for reboots.
>
>I support several OSes including a dwindling number of SCO clients.
>But personally I'd never put SCO up as primarily a web server where
>it would even be in running for being on one of those lists. It's
>a good office/business server, but from my POV it is not what I'd
>consider a server to use in and applications like you'd see on
>Netcraft. So I don't see the point of bringing in Netcraft and
>Linux. Am I missing something there.
Brian claimed the Linux is unstable. I was trying to prove otherwise. It
looks like my evidence did not support my argument, today (as mentioned
earlier, Netcraft did show some Linux boxes in the top 50 only 2 weeks
back)
>
>>> Yes, I do tell them the PRO's as well as the cons, no I do not
>>>invent or even exagerate the cons, yes I have used and continue
>>>to use linux myself enough to be quite knowledgeable about it
>>>from first hand experience.
>
>>So we are to believe that you honestly tell your customers about the
>>pros and cons of Linux vs. SCO yet you also state that:
>>>> >.... I refuse to allow linux into the professional
>>>> >work environments I'm responsible for?
>
>>These two statements cannot be reconciled. You have shown your true
>>attitude here: you have some irrational bias against Linux and you are
>>most likely doing your customers a disservice when you advise them.
>
>All Brian said was that he refuse to allow it in the environments
>for which he's responsible. That's not much difference from
>someone who has a bias saying "I will never own a Ford" [or
>whatever the object of derision will be].
It's OK to say "I will never own a FORD" -- it's OK to make an
irrational decision that only affects yourself.
It's OK for a Ford dealer to only sell Fords. Everyone understands that
a Ford dealer will not give impartial advice.
What is not OK is to say that you will act in the best interests of your
client yet rule out the possiblity that one particular OS could ever be
used. His statement is equivalent to saying that he can never envisage a
situation where Linux would be the best alternative.
>
>He's not doing them a dis-service if they want him to work for them
>and he's not comfortable working in that environment.
If the client understands that there could be a situation where the
client will not get the best alternative because Brian will never
recommend Linux, then I agree. But I rather doubt that Brian has made
this particular point clear to his customers.
I suspect that Brian rationalizes it by thinking that Linux COULD NEVER
BE the best alternative. I doubt many people here would agree with such
a sweeping claim.
>If the
>customer wants Linux and he doesn't care to support it, he should
>point them to someone who does.
Does he do this? I believe he does his best to force an SCO alternative.
>
>>Either that or you are lying about not allowing linux into "the
>>professional work environments [you are] responsible for"
>
>Isn't just his preference of which OS to support?
No, it's OK to say he prefers OpenServer of UnixWare, but Brian states
that he *never* allows Linux. It's OK to have a preference, but he
should still be recommending what is best for his customer.
>
>>Even other posters on this newsgroup don't agree with you. How many
>>posts have we seen from multiple posters in this very newsgroup who say
>>that that SCO is dying and they are migrating customers to Linux.
>
>And there are others who have migrated to other platforms other
>than Linux - though Linux is the 'hot' brand now.
And I don't have a problem with migrating to other OSes. I do have a
problem with people claiming that Linux can never be the best solution.
Brian's alternative appears to be SCO. Yet, SCO has reduced it's
development staff and bet the company on lawsuits that appear to be
very unlikely to pay off. What is Brian going to tell his customers if
they run into a bug and there is no support because the SCO is a
bankrupt shell?
Brian
>> the closed source Unix community with a little more sympathy and
>> understanding but at the moment you guys are persona non grata.
> So you're saying that some open source projects are going to drop support
> for all closed source Unixes, including Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, etc.? Cool!
By "you guys" I meant you SCO keeners.
While you are actively supporting SCO and propping up their renegade
organization you should consider yourselves contagious lepers.
> The point I'm trying to make is, open source means "open", it doesn't
> mean "open except for all the platforms the maintainers don't approve
> of today". If it starts to mean the latter, game over.
Anybody is welcome to deploy open source software and change it to their
hearts content - that is the nature of open source. However, when you
distribute open source software, many times you must abide by the
conditions as stated by a license like the GPL. If you don't agree with the
GPL, you do not have a license to distribute GPLed software - simple as
that.
So, while the GPL will not prevent SCOG from using Linux as it's webserver
platform, the GPL does not permit distributing GPLed software with
additional licensing conditions.
SCO continues to distribute the Linux kernel and continues to attempt to
enforce additional license requirements.
Therefore, SCO is in violation of the GPL and is distributing the Linux
kernel without a license from the copyright owners. SCO is stealing from
the open source community and specifically from the Linux kernel project.
When, and I mean 'when', SCOG is crushed like a bug and it's assets are
being fought over by the insider creditors, you guys are going to drift
away to more appropriate and deserving operating systems and will be
welcomed back to the open source community, if you wish.
People like Brian White may need a little counseling but he is young and he
will come around. Tony will continue to root for SCO refusing to face the
reality that SCO never had any evidence. Tony will proclaim to all who will
listen; "SCO is entitled to protect their property" After a while people
will stop listening.
Brian
Brian K. White
> In article <cz2Sb.179512$na.292957@attbi_s04>,
> Joe Dunning <joedunning12...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >On 28 Jan 2004 19:47:26 -0800, Brian K. White <br...@aljex.com> wrote:
>
> >>j...@blahblah.invalid (Joe Dunning) wrote in message
> >news:<soXRb.46152$U%5.240446@attbi_s03>...
>
> >>> On 28 Jan 2004 10:42:47 -0800, Brian K. White
> >>> <br...@aljex.com> wrote:
>
> >>and to highly customize their linux installations to minimize those
> >>vagaries in the first place. The "technical justifications" are many
> >>and I rarely get past the first one or two before a client decides
> >>"Never mind I don't need that!" in those instances when they ask me to
> >>explain our particular choice of OS.
>
> That sounds like the customers needs vs wants were not specified
> before the installation started. That's not a good way to go with
> any OS, but I have seen many customers that start out that way.
> Part of my job I feel is discussing with the customer so everything
> is known beforehand.
The conversations I refer to above ARE taking place long before any
actual action. This is typically during the very very first
demonstrations and pre-sales info gathering. But also, once in a while
a long-time already existing client who never cared before and doesn't
really care now so long as the job is getting done, will ask me about
it just out of curiosity.
>
> >> Yes, I do tell them the PRO's as well as the cons, no I do not
> >>invent or even exagerate the cons, yes I have used and continue
> >>to use linux myself enough to be quite knowledgeable about it
> >>from first hand experience.
>
> >So we are to believe that you honestly tell your customers about the
> >pros and cons of Linux vs. SCO yet you also state that:
> >>> >.... I refuse to allow linux into the professional
> >>> >work environments I'm responsible for?
>
> >These two statements cannot be reconciled. You have shown your true
> >attitude here: you have some irrational bias against Linux and you are
> >most likely doing your customers a disservice when you advise them.
>
> All Brian said was that he refuse to allow it in the environments
> for which he's responsible. That's not much difference from
> someone who has a bias saying "I will never own a Ford" [or
> whatever the object of derision will be].
Actually, I have never said "never". I used to use it a lot, I have
used it here and there in production, and have decided it's OK but
there just happens to be something superior available and as long as
that is true, I feel it's my duty to the customer to give them what I
honestly judge to be what is best for them. That also implies a duty
to stay current and be as widely knowledgeable as possible so that
"what I judge to be best for them" is in fact based on current
practical issues rather than emotions or practical issues that are no
longer true. So I continue to use and watch linux and redhat's history
is a perfect example of why even today, even with all the crap sco is
pulling, I still install new sco boxes. I could probably make linux
work farly well, but it would end up having to be by starting with
some particular distribution, modifying it a little maybe for our
needs, and then from then on maintaining it as our own distribution
instead of accepting the changes to the parent distribution. That
might not be all that horrible... but, I don't have to do that with
sco, so moving to that model is not a win. I'm basically trying to do
something like that with freebsd, but I just happen to be more
comfortable putting freebsd-style-developed code out in the field than
linux-style.
> He's not doing them a dis-service if they want him to work for them
> and he's not comfortable working in that environment. If the
> customer wants Linux and he doesn't care to support it, he should
> point them to someone who does.
The problem usually comes from the customer already having someone
they think they like who talks them into linux. So they are not
looking for recommendations or support at first except for us to
install our software on their new linux box. What happens is their
linux guy turns out to be about exactly like the grocery-bagger-by-day
"NT experts" I'm sure we've all encountered. I end up having to
"support linux" because by the time the customers gets hit with some
problem it is too late for warnings and it is utterly unhelpful to say
"Well I told you so", and they really just need their existing linux
box made to work because they are hanging on a hook by then and it
doesn't matter at that point that they made the hook themselves.
Unless I actually think I wouldn't do a good job then I have to admin
the box myself.
Brian K. White
I never said "never". I said "I do not ..."
It's a simple matter of out of all of the options that I know anything
about, Linux comes up as the 2nd best choice for me and 99% of my
clients.
What's so irrational or unethical about that? Merely the fact that
when you make that same evaluation linux comes out ahead?
(Actually, I wish to clarify something, that that last question may
not be applicable, or even if it is it's beside the point of your
reason for joining this conversation. I do remember that you never
actually said anything about being "pro linux" yourself vs my "pro
sco" but rather that your issue is with something you perceived as me
being fanatical or hypocritical. Just wanted to indicate that I "got"
that.)
> >He's not doing them a dis-service if they want him to work for them
> >and he's not comfortable working in that environment.
>
> If the client understands that there could be a situation where the
> client will not get the best alternative because Brian will never
> recommend Linux, then I agree. But I rather doubt that Brian has made
> this particular point clear to his customers.
>
> I suspect that Brian rationalizes it by thinking that Linux COULD NEVER
> BE the best alternative.
I don't have any conflict with logic or reality that must be
rationalized.
Please refrain rom suspecting. Stick to what I say and any facts you
may know.
Because...
> I doubt many people here would agree with such a sweeping claim.
Indeed. Neither do I.
> Brian's alternative appears to be SCO. Yet, SCO has reduced it's
> development staff and bet the company on lawsuits that appear to be
> very unlikely to pay off. What is Brian going to tell his customers if
> they run into a bug and there is no support because the SCO is a
> bankrupt shell?
And here you have stated exactly my current biggest problem. And it is
exactly why I am in fact working on putting together an alternate
solution myself, beleive it or not including linux. Like I said, all
things considered, it comes up 2nd best and the gap is closing from
both directions (linux gets better, sco gets worse). Why am I putting
more effort into my 3rd choice (freebsd) instead of my 2nd? Because on
all technical bases I like freebsd much better. Where freebsd comes up
short of linux is application support & availability, and my own level
of competence to administer it. All of my necessary apps are available
in native linux versions except 1, and that one I have already proven
under very heavy production use for over a year, that the sco version
of that app is reliable and performs well under linux-abi (certain
versions of linux-abi anyway, linux-abi itself comes & goes like the
weather as different linux kernel versions come out.) So If I can
merely manage to find suitable alternatives for some apps that are
natively available in freebsd (hylafax vs vsifax, shh+anzio+samba vs
facetwin, ttysnoop vs doublevision), and certain apps that are only
very very recently available in native freebsd form turn out to be OK
on the new platform (filepro), and other apps turn out to at least be
stable under linux or ibcs emulation (pcmiler), then freebsd will no
longer be my 3rd choice but my 2nd or maybe even my 1st. I would also
have to become quite a bit more knowledgeable in freebsd before it is
a good choice for customers because I don't beleive in selling
something that I can't provide every conceivable form of support for,
including diagnosing and fixing even obscure problems without losing
data or needing to do full re-installs every time anything unusual
happens.
But application support and consultant competence are both easily
fixable problems. They are not innate problems that just are a fact of
life that must be accepted. All that is required is putting in some
work and they both go away.
The development model for linux's kernel, drivers, and 90% of the
supporting os, and 90% of distributions IS a simple fact of life that
must be accepted, or not.
to...@pcunix.com
>People like Brian White may need a little counseling but he is young and he
>will come around. Tony will continue to root for SCO refusing to face the
>reality that SCO never had any evidence. Tony will proclaim to all who will
>listen; "SCO is entitled to protect their property" After a while people
>will stop listening.
When you deliberately misrepresent people's positions, you make
yourself even more of an idiot. I'm not "rooting for SCO" - quite
the opposite, in fact, and you know that:
http://aplawrence.com/Blog/B752.html
J. L. Schilling
> On 30 Jan 2004 05:37:25 -0800, jlsels...@my-deja.com (J. L.
> Schilling) wrote:
>
> >And then a few projects will drop support for Red Hat, since they're
> >really ticked off that RH abandoned the Red Hat Linux product for their
> >expensive commercial RH AS line.
>
> An obvious lie. Redhat develop Fedora, which is actually free. They
> also employ a number of lead Kernel developers and make their tools
> available to the community.
As I'm sure you're aware, Fedora is a project rather than a box set
product like the old Red Hat Linux. Plenty of RHL users were *very*
upset by the change, as any Google Groups or Slashdot search would
remind you. I'm not critizing Red Hat; the RHL product was losing
them money and they had to do what they had to do. But if open
source developers start de-supporting platforms and companies that
they are peeved with, Red Hat would be a possible casualty.
> >And then some other project will drop
> >support for SuSE because they got bought by Novell which also owns
> >Ximian which runs Mono which will help .NET take over the world.
>
> Now you're just being silly.
You obviously haven't checked out the level of paranoia around .NET
and related MS technologies, then.
> >And then FSF GCC will drop support for all Linux distros that don't
> >call themselves GNU/Linux. And so on ...
> >
> >The point I'm trying to make is, open source means "open", it doesn't
> >mean "open except for all the platforms the maintainers don't approve
> >of today". If it starts to mean the latter, game over.
>
> No Jonathan. GPL'ed software is freely available for users and vendors
> who abide by the terms of the GPL. SCO refuse to acknowledge the GPL,
> and continue to violate it.
I believe SCO thinks the GPL is unlawful and will lose a legal
challenge, but I do not believe that SCO has stated that they will
violate the GPL. In point of fact SCO continues to follow the rules
for distributing their modifications of open source components that
they use (Apache, Squid, Mozilla, etc.), both to the maintainers and
to the public (the sources are put on ftp.sco.com for all to get).
Now I understand that you and others will consider this use of
open source components to be hypocritical, which is a discussion for
another day; but the requirements of GPL and other licenses for
redistribution of source code are indeed being met.
Jonathan Schilling
Bill Vermillion
I was surprised to see Sun and a few others missing myself and it
was copletely BSD variants. But since Netcraft is for showing what
web servers are up most of the time, those who run them most are
going to use the ones that work best for that.
>>I support several OSes including a dwindling number of SCO clients.
>>But personally I'd never put SCO up as primarily a web server where
>>it would even be in running for being on one of those lists. It's
>>a good office/business server, but from my POV it is not what I'd
>>consider a server to use in and applications like you'd see on
>>Netcraft. So I don't see the point of bringing in Netcraft and
>>Linux. Am I missing something there.
>Brian claimed the Linux is unstable. I was trying to prove
>otherwise. It looks like my evidence did not support my argument,
>today (as mentioned earlier, Netcraft did show some Linux boxes
>in the top 50 only 2 weeks back)
Instability often seems to depend upon several factor, least of
which seems to be the OS [unless we are talking of older items from
Redmond]. Having run Unix or Unix like systems for about 20 years
I definately prefer the BSD approach as opposed to Linux. And I
detest - well maybe destest is a bit strong - the RPM concept and
all the dependancies, but that was only after being spoiled by the
ports systems and the portupgrade and building everything from
sources each time.
From my POV of the systems I've worked with the absolute best for
upgrading and making sure all dependancies were met, and that
everyting was in sync, was IRIX from SGI. You never got left
hanging and everything was down to a yes or no when making choices
if there were such things as library conflicts.
The nastiest one I had was years ago on an old SCO 3.2.?.?
intalling 3rd party serial driver that required non-standard flags.
It was all supposed to work, but it would fail. And it was one of
those install packages that when it failed it would remove all the
things it installed. But it did more than that. It also
uninstalled part of the link kit so I'd have to reinstall that
before continuing. But that was fixed by the time the first OSR5s
came out.
But admins who have no clue as to what they are doing seem to be
one of the largest reasons for instabiltiy - at least from systems
I've been aound. The other is cheap hardware and when it has a
problem in a *n*x system and I talk to the HW vendor I get "but it
works in DOS".
I inadvertantly got a person fired who gave me that line, because
they had no clue, and the reason it 'worked in DOS' and not in *n*x
was the way the hardware was treated. The former approached the
device from a sofware perspective, and the latter from the hardware
side. It was faulty hardware, but since the application 'worked in
DOS' I got no satisfaction from the outlet. Only when I talked
with person who handled the region of all the Southern states did
it get fixed and fast.
That same company sent out a repair person [the HW was under
contract support] who replaced a motherboard that was failing to
see all the RAM. That person was a buy the book in that you put in
this piece, try it, put in next piece.
I was told that she was on the phone talking with the remote
support people who were talking her through the replacements, and
she turned it on, and then she told the support person, now there
is smoke coming out of the machine, and the far side person had to
say 'turn it off'.
Next day there was yet another motherboard. So instability is
often caused by people who know what steps to take and do them
blinding without knowing what they are doing - and that applies to
software, hardware, and all points in between.
I've had SCO machine stay up for 1.5 years at the most. Got 770+
days out of a BSD, and my longest Linux uptime have never been more
than 6 months BUT that was NOT a Linux problem - it was a long
power failure that was longer than UPS. But that system didn't
come back to life because of the way xinetd would start everyting
up, but when it found ONE program that did not start correctly, it
turned off all other programs that it had started. That is my one
major complaint about Linux so far - but now I know what the
problem is in that system I'll work around it.
And knowing how to work around a problem so it won't happen again
is one way to make it stable. But given and equal level of
expertise almost all *n*x systems are stable, at least from my POV.
....
>>>So we are to believe that you honestly tell your customers about the
>>>pros and cons of Linux vs. SCO yet you also state that:
>>>>> >.... I refuse to allow linux into the professional
>>>>> >work environments I'm responsible for?
>>>These two statements cannot be reconciled. You have shown your
>>>true attitude here: you have some irrational bias against Linux
>>>and you are most likely doing your customers a disservice when
>>>you advise them.
>>All Brian said was that he refuse to allow it in the environments
>>for which he's responsible. That's not much difference from
>>someone who has a bias saying "I will never own a Ford" [or
>>whatever the object of derision will be].
>It's OK to say "I will never own a FORD" -- it's OK to make an
>irrational decision that only affects yourself.
>It's OK for a Ford dealer to only sell Fords. Everyone understands that
>a Ford dealer will not give impartial advice.
>What is not OK is to say that you will act in the best interests
>of your client yet rule out the possiblity that one particular OS
>could ever be used. His statement is equivalent to saying that
>he can never envisage a situation where Linux would be the best
>alternative.
And he did say this about 'systems for which he is responsible'.
So if Brian does not like Linux for any reason, real or imagined,
and he has to support them, then he has two choices. The most
logical one is 'don't install linux'. The other alternative is
"fire me and find someone else".
That sometimes is a good alternative. Years ago on a Xenix system
with a non-standard SCSI controller I was doing programming and
support on a system that others installed and spec'd. One day it
failed and the fsck destroyed the system. Since it was a 'custom'
way to build the boot disks, which had to be build on a non-SCSI
machine, I could not fix it.
He called is HW vendor who said "what did he do to my machine". And
I told him what the problem was. I have never seen a person so mad
or red in the face he was not shouting. But I do recall close to
what I said. "They are saying one thing, and I'm telling you the
exact opposite, and you have no way to know which is right. The
only solution I see is to fire us both and find someone else".
He wound up callling SCO, they put him in touch with an authorized
support house, he came out, looked at things. And two week later I
was back installing a correct version for the HW. Trying to
salvage an untenalbe position by not admiting you can't handle it,
or making some excuse is far worse than walking away. In the end
the only thing that has validity is 'will the customers system do
the work they need done in the best way for them'.
>>He's not doing them a dis-service if they want him to work for them
>>and he's not comfortable working in that environment.
>If the client understands that there could be a situation where the
>client will not get the best alternative because Brian will never
>recommend Linux, then I agree. But I rather doubt that Brian has made
>this particular point clear to his customers.
I have no idea of what Brian may have done or not done. But I have
seen posts by his on this and other places where he does know what
he is doing.
>I suspect that Brian rationalizes it by thinking that Linux
>COULD NEVER BE the best alternative. I doubt many people here
>would agree with such a sweeping claim.
What neither you or I know is exactly what customer base Brian is
dealing with. You can come up with a scenario where certain OSes
should never be considered for a particular type of
operaton/business - and the reasons could vary. So if Brian won't
recommend Linux for any of his clients, and to judge that statement
valid, would we not have to know exactly what his client base
consists of?
>>If the customer wants Linux and he doesn't care to support it,
>>he should point them to someone who does.
>Does he do this? I believe he does his best to force an SCO
>alternative.
Don't most people who sell/support something do the best to keep
the customer with what they sell/support. Life is not like the
Santa in Miracle on 34th Street where Santa says "we don't have
this but Macy's does".
Any one pushing Linux where SCO would be better would fall into
the same category. There are vertical aps that are supported best,
and sometimes only, on one OS variant. I had one client whose SW
vendor was pushing them very hard to move from SCO into an AIX
system on an RS6000. That vendor had recommended AIX for all
systems over 16 users, and kept SCO for 16 users and under. This
client [ who is now self-supporting with a full-time computer
person on staff ] was running 122 uses the last time I saw it.
And a price far cheaper than the only other OS the vendord
supported, AIX.
>>And there are others who have migrated to other platforms other
>>than Linux - though Linux is the 'hot' brand now.
>And I don't have a problem with migrating to other OSes. I do
>have a problem with people claiming that Linux can never be the
>best solution.
There is no one OS that is best for everything. But Brian never
said that Linux can't be the best solution except for HIS current
customers.
>Brian's alternative appears to be SCO. Yet, SCO has reduced it's
>development staff and bet the company on lawsuits that appear to be
>very unlikely to pay off. What is Brian going to tell his customers if
>they run into a bug and there is no support because the SCO is a
>bankrupt shell?
Considering the first SCO systems I did work on date from about
1984 and they were almost all just one major application - I've not
seen that many bugs. I don't recall any that were show stoppers
that didn't involve a 3rd party driver and the 3rd party got those
fixed.
I would wait until all the legal disputes are finshed to see what
the final outcome is before speculating on a future events which
may or may not happen.
>IF< SCO were to go bankrupt, that would be the time to 1)
recommend someone else or 2) convince the customer that you can fix
any problems that may crop up or 3) something completely different.
I think Chicken Little was wrong.
Bill Vermillion
Brian K. White <br...@aljex.com> wrote:
>b...@wjv.comREMOVE (Bill Vermillion) wrote in message news:<HsBI9...@wjv.com>...
>> He's not doing them a dis-service if they want him to work for them
>> and he's not comfortable working in that environment. If the
>> customer wants Linux and he doesn't care to support it, he should
>> point them to someone who does.
>The problem usually comes from the customer already having someone
>they think they like who talks them into linux.
And the problem is often that the customer isn't knowledeable
enough to ask the correct questions. Having someone talk you into
linux is somewhat like having someone select your life-partner for
you. And from what I've observed, may *n*x business installations
last far longer than some marriages. Considering the amount of
money that can be involved installing a system in medium sized
company, it's often more expensive to divorce your computer than it
is your spouse. Yet the choice of the business tool often isn't
looked at that closely.
>So they are not looking for recommendations or support at first
>except for us to install our software on their new linux box.
>What happens is their linux guy turns out to be about exactly
>like the grocery-bagger-by-day "NT experts" I'm sure we've all
>encountered.
I did have to work with a real ex-bag-boy turned computer expert -
who did has a CS degree and was hired for that degree. Of course
the job he did there did not require a CS but would have been far
better served by an MBA. He gave up after 6 months of screwing
thing sup and went to work for a hardware vendor writing device
drivers - which was what he wanted to do and was well suited for.
>I end up having to "support linux" because by the time the
>customers gets hit with some problem it is too late for warnings
>and it is utterly unhelpful to say "Well I told you so", and they
>really just need their existing linux box made to work because
>they are hanging on a hook by then and it doesn't matter at that
>point that they made the hook themselves. Unless I actually think
>I wouldn't do a good job then I have to admin the box myself.
I'm supporting one like that myself. The former admin didn't have
a true handle on Linux but was really a very good Unix person and
from the scripts in the system would have been far more comfortable
as a Large System Admin. But large Unix system experience didn't
mesh to well in the Linux environment they had to manage.
I remember seeing one of the system that person admined. They put
Vaxen to shame in power and speed. And were one of the few systems
that could perform high end graphics before SGI got into the act.
The nickname on those machies was "The FireBreathers" and they
lived up to it until they were acquired and just went *poof* as
dragons are wont to do.
So part of making things work is having the proper mindset, just a
being an F1 driver is no the proper preparation for 1/4 mile dirt
track encounters.
FyRE
Schilling) wrote:
[...]
>> An obvious lie. Redhat develop Fedora, which is actually free. They
>> also employ a number of lead Kernel developers and make their tools
>> available to the community.
>
>As I'm sure you're aware, Fedora is a project rather than a box set
>product like the old Red Hat Linux. Plenty of RHL users were *very*
>upset by the change, as any Google Groups or Slashdot search would
>remind you. I'm not critizing Red Hat; the RHL product was losing
>them money and they had to do what they had to do. But if open
>source developers start de-supporting platforms and companies that
>they are peeved with, Red Hat would be a possible casualty.
Actually this issue was brought up during my RHCE course with some
members of Redhat's staff. For all intents and purposes, Fedora is
RHL10. I use it myself (along with Gentoo) and all the tools are the
same, along with a few new ones. The filesystem layout, startup
scripts etc are virtually identical. In fact, if you altered a few
banner files, an operator would be hard pressed to tell the difference
between RHL9 and Fedora (aside from the version numbers on the
tools/kernel). I realize there is a certain amount of FUD spread by
the tin-foil-hat brigade in the various Linux fora, but in my opinion
it's unwarranted. I believe RH did the right thing. There's nothing to
stop a company buying support if they wish, or using the free version.
I honestly can't see what the problem is...
>> >And then some other project will drop
>> >support for SuSE because they got bought by Novell which also owns
>> >Ximian which runs Mono which will help .NET take over the world.
>>
>> Now you're just being silly.
>
>You obviously haven't checked out the level of paranoia around .NET
>and related MS technologies, then.
I'm aware of it, yep. So long as Mono allows Linux to become a
platform capable of supporting the deployment of .Net apps, and MS
doesn't patent it out of existance, I'm not bothered. In fact, I've
yet to see .Net making any real progress. As far as I can see, MS are
having serious problems migrating away from the desktop PC, and onto
embedded devices and other platforms where .Net makes any sense at
all. It's only visible presence has been making it easier for crackers
to compromise a subscribers account passwords, bank account details
etc all in one place.
>> >And then FSF GCC will drop support for all Linux distros that don't
>> >call themselves GNU/Linux. And so on ...
>> >
>> >The point I'm trying to make is, open source means "open", it doesn't
>> >mean "open except for all the platforms the maintainers don't approve
>> >of today". If it starts to mean the latter, game over.
>>
>> No Jonathan. GPL'ed software is freely available for users and vendors
>> who abide by the terms of the GPL. SCO refuse to acknowledge the GPL,
>> and continue to violate it.
>
>I believe SCO thinks the GPL is unlawful and will lose a legal
>challenge, but I do not believe that SCO has stated that they will
>violate the GPL. In point of fact SCO continues to follow the rules
>for distributing their modifications of open source components that
>they use (Apache, Squid, Mozilla, etc.), both to the maintainers and
>to the public (the sources are put on ftp.sco.com for all to get).
You forget that they are also distributing the Linux kernel with an
additional set of restrictions (ie, for binary only use), thus
violating the GPL. This is the issue, and they are currently open to
an avalanche of lawsuites from the kernel developers as far as I can
tell.
>Now I understand that you and others will consider this use of
>open source components to be hypocritical,
Well I think anyone on Earth who understands the meaning of the word
hypocritical will consider it such. Of course, maybe I'm not
understanding it here and you can explain how a company putting all
its efforts into destroying GPL'ed/OS software whilst including it in
its own product line for profit is NOT rank hypocrisy.
I think it's moot anyway, since after reading the latest revelations
at Groklaw, it's blatantly obvious that SCO have absolutely no case.
There's now documented evidence in the pulic domain of their
involvement with the development and distribution of numerous header
files (including errno.h) and ABI code under the terms of the GPL,
amongst other things. They've also admitted they don't actually know
which, if any code in Linux is violating their "IP". Their stock price
is falling daily now, and their SEC filing admits their "core
business" will likely suffer due to the lawsuites, and there's a very
real risk they're going to fail.
Tony must be getting a bit twitchy, sitting up there on his fence now
;-)
Shawn Johnston
> You forget that they are also distributing the Linux kernel with an
> additional set of restrictions (ie, for binary only use), thus
> violating the GPL. This is the issue, and they are currently open to
> an avalanche of lawsuites from the kernel developers as far as I can
> tell.
This will be one of the many interesting things with SCO, if any
developers take this track and how it works out.
> Well I think anyone on Earth who understands the meaning of the word
> hypocritical will consider it such. Of course, maybe I'm not
> understanding it here and you can explain how a company putting all
> its efforts into destroying GPL'ed/OS software whilst including it in
> its own product line for profit is NOT rank hypocrisy.
Right, but buisness is buisness.
> I think it's moot anyway, since after reading the latest revelations
> at Groklaw, it's blatantly obvious that SCO have absolutely no case.
Very possible, however despite the quality of Groklaw, Groklaw does
not control the outcome of the case nor is it privy to anything
closely resembling the whole picture.
> Their stock price
> is falling daily now, and their SEC filing admits their "core
> business" will likely suffer due to the lawsuites, and there's a very
> real risk they're going to fail.
Again possible, but I've been hearing this same line for 3 years
already.
Cheers,
Shawn
Brian
> FyRE <Fy...@toktik.demon.ku.oc.x> wrote...
>> You forget that they are also distributing the Linux kernel with an
>> additional set of restrictions (ie, for binary only use), thus
>> violating the GPL. This is the issue, and they are currently open to
>> an avalanche of lawsuites from the kernel developers as far as I can
>> tell.
> This will be one of the many interesting things with SCO, if any
> developers take this track and how it works out.
It *is* interesting because IBM is countersuing on this very point.
IBM will succeed.
>> Well I think anyone on Earth who understands the meaning of the word
>> hypocritical will consider it such. Of course, maybe I'm not
>> understanding it here and you can explain how a company putting all
>> its efforts into destroying GPL'ed/OS software whilst including it in
>> its own product line for profit is NOT rank hypocrisy.
> Right, but buisness is buisness.
No, business is business - not what you said.
It is interesting to see you hold the same high moral standards that seem to
pervade The SCO Group. Just curious, are you an American?
>> I think it's moot anyway, since after reading the latest revelations
>> at Groklaw, it's blatantly obvious that SCO have absolutely no case.
> Very possible, however despite the quality of Groklaw, Groklaw does
> not control the outcome of the case nor is it privy to anything
> closely resembling the whole picture.
How do you know?
I would have to say Groklaw has a much better understanding of the legal
situation than The SCO Group lawyers.
>> Their stock price is falling daily now, and their SEC filing admits
>> their "core business" will likely suffer due to the lawsuites, and
>> there's a very real risk they're going to fail.
> Again possible, but I've been hearing this same line for 3 years
> already.
Can you not tell the difference between three years ago and now?
That is fascinating!
Sell SCOX short now if you want to make some money.
8^)
Brian
The Future Is Open
pisymbol
> Shawn Johnston wrote:
> I would have to say Groklaw has a much better understanding of the legal
> situation than The SCO Group lawyers.
I wouldn't site a paralegal's opinion. Especially one that is
completely one-sided and speculative.
[snip]
Groklaw is hosted, free, by a non-profit outfit called iBiblio, which
runs on $250,000 worth of Linux-based computers donated by IBM and a
$2 million donation from a foundation set up by Robert Young, founder
of Red Hat. Of course none of these sponsors has anything to do with
the content of these sites. Then again, they don't seem too upset
about it, either.
[\snip]
Source: http://www.forbes.com/2003/12/16/cx_dl_1216linux.html
Please don't tell me Groklaw is not part of the FUD war because it
clearly is. If the SCO building exploded I'm positive Groklaw would
claim it was a hoax and have some "non-partisan" expert analyze the
reckage site noting that the point of impact of the nuclear missile
couldn't possibly destroy the entire building and that the following
IP addresses are still alive on their network. Then Slashdot would
run the article entitled "SCO fakes own death in effort to gain
industry sympathy" (as many people have posted on various SCO related
articles that Slashdot should just mirror Groklaw which is probably a
good idea) and the many geek sheep of the world would believe all of
it.
What Groklaw does do is post links to the various legal filings which
is very helpful if you find this situation entertaining. If you
believe SCO is not telling the truth or their case is weak, please
site the legal filings and explanations within those filings, not some
biased website.
> Brian
> The Future Is Open
Yes, hopefully for everyone including SCO. That's the beauty of open
source.
If you believe in freedom of speech, then you must believe in the
right to burn the flag (no matter how revoluting that is).
Open source doesn't work unless its free for everyone, including the
people on Fyre's blacklist.
I believe that is the point Jonathan is making.
-aps
Treebeard: "Side, I'm on nobody's side, because no one is on my
side!"
J. L. Schilling
>
> >Now I understand that you and others will consider this use of
> >open source components to be hypocritical,
>
> Well I think anyone on Earth who understands the meaning of the word
> hypocritical will consider it such. Of course, maybe I'm not
> understanding it here and you can explain how a company putting all
> its efforts into destroying GPL'ed/OS software whilst including it in
> its own product line for profit is NOT rank hypocrisy.
OK, here goes. An OS and all the pieces that go with it is obviously
a huge product. A company trying to put out such a product will face
a series of "make or buy" decisions. Unless the company is a behemoth
like MS or IBM, they can't possible afford to "make" every piece.
Thus some of the pieces will have to be licensed from elsewhere.
So, you would say that SCO should license commercial software for
each of these pieces that it doesn't make. But, an effect of the
open source software movement has been that for certain components,
there *isn't* any viable commercial software choice anymore. For
example for web servers on Unix platforms, there isn't any viable
alternative to Apache at this point. (SCO tried in the past,
with Netscape Enterprise Server, and it was definitely lacking.)
Apache has succeeded in essentially eliminating all Unix-based
competition, both because it is subsidized and free and because
it is a very high-quality implementation. So realistically, SCO
has no choice but to put Apache on its OSes. And similarly for
many of the other open source technologies that are on SCO OSes.
Note that for some other OS pieces, this is not the case. For
example, SCO licenses Sun's core Java J2SE implementation
(Java virtual machine, JIT compilers, core Java libraries)
for real $$ license fees. So do almost all other OS vendors,
either directly or indirectly. In this case there isn't any
open source alternative: in almost 10 years of trying, the open
source world has failed to come up with a fully functional and
up-to-date core Java implementation.
Jonathan Schilling
Billy O'Connor
>> The Future Is Open
>
> Yes, hopefully for everyone including SCO. That's the beauty of open
> source.
>
> If you believe in freedom of speech, then you must believe in the
> right to burn the flag (no matter how revoluting that is).
>
> Open source doesn't work unless its free for everyone, including the
> people on Fyre's blacklist.
>
Yes, I agree with that, and with the following, reprinted without
permission from the Samba website, http://www.samba.org:
Over the past few months, the SCO Group (formerly Caldera
International, Inc. a Linux distribution vendor) has been complaining
about violations of its Copyright works by the Linux kernel code.
Recently, Darl McBride, the Chief Executive Officer of SCO has been
making pejorative statements regarding the license used by the Linux
kernel, the GNU GPL. In a keynote speech he recently said:
"At the end of the day, the GPL is not about making software free;
it's about destroying value."
In light of this it is the depths of hypocrisy that at the same event
SCO also announced the incorporation of the Samba3 release into their
latest OpenServer product. Samba is an Open Source/Free Software
project that allows Linux and UNIX servers to interoperate with
Microsoft Windows clients. The reason for this is clear; Samba3 allows
Linux and UNIX servers to replace Microsoft Windows NT Domain
Controllers and will add great value to any Operating System which
includes it. However, Samba is also developed and distributed under
the GNU GPL license, in exactly the same manner as the Linux kernel
code that SCO has been criticizing for its lack of care in ownership
attribution.
We observe that SCO is both attacking the GPL on the one hand and
benefiting from the GPL on the other hand. SCO can't have it both
ways. SCO has a clear choice: either pledge not to use any Open
Source/Free Software in any of their products, or actively participate
in the Open Source/Free Software movement and reap the benefits. For
SCO to continue to use Open Source/Free Software while attacking
others for using it is the epitome of hypocrisy.
The strength of Open Source/Free Software is that it is available to
all without restrictions on fields of endeavor, as the Samba Team
believes the ability to freely use, modify and learn from software
code is one of the grounding principles of computer science, and a
basic freedom for all.
Because of this, we believe that the Samba Team must remain true to
our principles and our code must be freely available to use even in
ways we personally disapprove of.
Even when used by rank hypocrites like SCO.
Billy
Shawn Johnston
> Shawn Johnston wrote:
> > FyRE <Fy...@toktik.demon.ku.oc.x> wrote...
> > developers take this track and how it works out.
>
> It *is* interesting because IBM is countersuing on this very point.
>
> IBM will succeed.
Perhaps. Either way it looks like we agree on the interesting part.
> > Right, but buisness is buisness.
>
> No, business is business - not what you said.
>
> It is interesting to see you hold the same high moral standards that seem to
> pervade The SCO Group. Just curious, are you an American?
>
LOL
> >> I think it's moot anyway, since after reading the latest revelations
> >> at Groklaw, it's blatantly obvious that SCO have absolutely no case.
>
> > Very possible, however despite the quality of Groklaw, Groklaw does
> > not control the outcome of the case nor is it privy to anything
> > closely resembling the whole picture.
>
> How do you know?
>
> I would have to say Groklaw has a much better understanding of the legal
> situation than The SCO Group lawyers.
>
Groklaw may have a better understanding of the law than SCO, however
Groklaw doesn't represent either SCO or IBM and so is not privy to
what is occuring in either organization behind the scenes. Groklaw can
only offer analysis on what's been played and what's been leaked, not
bad but not an omniscient point of view.
Additionally Groklaw is not part of the court that is dealing with the
case. The site is interesting but it isn't a part of the court any
more than this news group.
> >> Their stock price is falling daily now, and their SEC filing admits
> >> their "core business" will likely suffer due to the lawsuites, and
> >> there's a very real risk they're going to fail.
>
> > Again possible, but I've been hearing this same line for 3 years
> > already.
>
> Can you not tell the difference between three years ago and now?
>
> That is fascinating!
>
Too clarify my statement about 3 years ago: people have been saying
similar things about Caldera/SCO since the merger if not before. 3
years ago RMS and Love had a few nice sparing sessions when Caldera
implemented a per seat cost for OpenLinux. I think RMS called Caldera
a "virus". Caldera's stock price has been low since the initial IPO.
However they're still here and don't look like they're going away
anytime soon.
> Sell SCOX short now if you want to make some money.
>
Good advice. Unfortunately I didn't buy when it was 0.6 USD a share. I
knew I should have but I didn't have the cash to gamble. Ah well.
Cheers,
Shawn
FyRE
Schilling) wrote:
>FyRE <Fy...@toktik.demon.ku.oc.x> wrote in message news:<m1mn105j19pqpdppu...@4ax.com>...
>>
>> >Now I understand that you and others will consider this use of
>> >open source components to be hypocritical,
>>
>> Well I think anyone on Earth who understands the meaning of the word
>> hypocritical will consider it such. Of course, maybe I'm not
>> understanding it here and you can explain how a company putting all
>> its efforts into destroying GPL'ed/OS software whilst including it in
>> its own product line for profit is NOT rank hypocrisy.
>OK, here goes...
Well I was looking forward to you attempting to explain why you
wouldn't consider SCO's antics as being hypocritical. I'm a bit
disappointed that you've completely ignored that part and wandered off
to bang out a few excuses for SCO using Apache etc.
>An OS and all the pieces that go with it is obviously
>a huge product. A company trying to put out such a product will face
>a series of "make or buy" decisions. Unless the company is a behemoth
>like MS or IBM, they can't possible afford to "make" every piece.
>Thus some of the pieces will have to be licensed from elsewhere.
So why didn't SCO "licence" the SMB protocol from MS and develop their
own proprietary (and no doubt inferior) solution to allow their
offerings to integrate into MS networks? Surely they have a couple of
coders left working over in Utah? If they're continuing to claim that
OS software is "electronic terrorism from a bunch of long-haired
sandal wearing commies" (para) then why do they include it with their
products? Wouldn't that mean that SCO are contributing to this threat
against capitalism? Clear cut hypocrisy.
>So, you would say that SCO should license commercial software for
>each of these pieces that it doesn't make.
There are better things SCO should do in my opinion; but yes, it's
probably better for them not to be taking handouts from people they're
attacking, slandering and trying their damndest to drive out of the
software business.
>But, an effect of the
>open source software movement has been that for certain components,
>there *isn't* any viable commercial software choice anymore.
Rubbish. Ask Brian K. White. Apparently he seems to think that paying
thousands of pounds to buy proprietary software over free alternatives
is a sound management technique. Of course, many people would consider
Brian an idiot, but still...
>For
>example for web servers on Unix platforms, there isn't any viable
>alternative to Apache at this point. (SCO tried in the past,
>with Netscape Enterprise Server, and it was definitely lacking.)
>Apache has succeeded in essentially eliminating all Unix-based
>competition, both because it is subsidized and free and because
>it is a very high-quality implementation. So realistically, SCO
>has no choice but to put Apache on its OSes.
A webserver is actually a very simple tool. Anyone with a few weeks of
C/Perl/Java/whatever under their belts could write one. Of course,
writing a "good" webserver is another matter. Never the less, many
other individuals have written their own webservers (just look on
sourceforge, there are loads). There are still commercial offerings
available, and if SCO are so committed to proprietary, closed systems
they should be paying IBM (heh!), Netscape or Sun for a web server.
They could even buy a licence from the Apache foundation for each
install ($699 a pop seems like a good number ;-)
>And similarly for
>many of the other open source technologies that are on SCO OSes.
>
>Note that for some other OS pieces, this is not the case. For
>example, SCO licenses Sun's core Java J2SE implementation
>(Java virtual machine, JIT compilers, core Java libraries)
>for real $$ license fees. So do almost all other OS vendors,
>either directly or indirectly. In this case there isn't any
>open source alternative: in almost 10 years of trying, the open
>source world has failed to come up with a fully functional and
>up-to-date core Java implementation.
Blackdown is about there.
Anyway, there's little point arguing the case anymore, since SCO are
no longer a software company as such. In fact, it's looking
increasingly likely that they won't be any type of company for much
longer. Let's hope so! ;-)
Bill Vermillion
>> >Now I understand that you and others will consider this use of
>> >open source components to be hypocritical,
>> Well I think anyone on Earth who understands the meaning of the word
>> hypocritical will consider it such. Of course, maybe I'm not
>> understanding it here and you can explain how a company putting all
>> its efforts into destroying GPL'ed/OS software whilst including it in
>> its own product line for profit is NOT rank hypocrisy.
>OK, here goes. An OS and all the pieces that go with it is obviously
>a huge product. A company trying to put out such a product will face
>a series of "make or buy" decisions. Unless the company is a behemoth
>like MS or IBM, they can't possible afford to "make" every piece.
>Thus some of the pieces will have to be licensed from elsewhere.
>So, you would say that SCO should license commercial software for
>each of these pieces that it doesn't make. But, an effect of the
>open source software movement has been that for certain components,
>there *isn't* any viable commercial software choice anymore. For
>example for web servers on Unix platforms, there isn't any viable
>alternative to Apache at this point. (SCO tried in the past,
>with Netscape Enterprise Server, and it was definitely lacking.)
It was my impression [though never having used it] that Zeus is an
extremely high performing web server.
According to their latest press release [Dated Jan 20, 2004] it has
hit twice the performance of the previous SSL enabled server.
They claim eBay, TDWaterhouse, Qualcomm, Cable & Wireless, and MCI
in their sample customer list. Testimonials also come from places
such as Sony.
It's not cheap - starting at $1700 for two cpus and $850 for
each additional CPU, or $2210 for two hyperthreading CPUs and $1150
for each additional.
Those prices aren't much higher than the cost of Netscape years ago
when I had it running on SGI Challenge servers.
They are targeted for very heavy use and have such products as load
balancers too. They seem to be holding about the same for the past
2 or 3 years with about 750,000 sites world wide.
Just thought I'd toss that out as I find a great many have never
heard of Zeus. www.zeus.com To give you an idea of their target
market they have a migration plan for the Tru64, SGI, and Unixware
users who were using the SunOne/Iplanet server which has been
dropped. The quote the average migration cost at L50,000, or
$70,000US. [Sorry for the L but I don't have a pound symbol
available :-)]
But it's definately a high-end niche market server.
Joe Dunning
>
>When you deliberately misrepresent people's positions, you make
>yourself even more of an idiot. I'm not "rooting for SCO" - quite
>the opposite, in fact, and you know that:
>http://aplawrence.com/Blog/B752.html
Tony,
I've read your opinions and expecially your thoughts on what might
happen if IBM ever decides that open source software is contrary to its
interests.
I suspect that the weapon that IBM plans to wield is its patent
portfolio. I suspect this because it is quite consistent with IBM not
having its own Linux distribution -- since such a distribution would
also include patent licenses (I think).
Which brings me to another thought: you have often stated that in the
event SCO loses, SCO's products won't immediately disappear, but, in
reality, they might. Part of IBM's claims against SCO include patent
violations and if IBM prevails in these, end users would also be liable.
Would IBM go after end users? I don't know, but it is risk for SCO's
(and some of your) client base -- they might have to migrate (or pay)
based on IBM's timetable, not the clients'.
thegr...@theriver.com
> Re: No longer supporting Unixware / Open Server
>
> Reply to: to...@pcunix.com
> Date: Fri, 30 Jan 2004 19:32:44 +0000 (UTC)
> Organization: http://www.aplawrence.com
> Newsgroups:
> comp.unix.sco.misc
> Followup to: newsgroup
> References:
> <bveavg$tbr$0...@206.25.50.24>
> . . . but punishing the customers of a company you don't like is foolish.
Punishing SCOG customers is not my job, and, in fact, SCOG doesn't seem to
need any help in that particular department, thank you.
As an aside, if you are one of the SCOG customers who received the
letter threatening you with audits and lawsuits should you (oh!) sully
your lilly-white hands with Linux, then you have a simple recourse. Sue
SCOG for breach of contract. With lawsuits on three fronts (so far),
they probably won't even be able to contest and you'd win by default.
> It's this kind of childish nonsense . . .
>
> Grow up.
It's profoundly difficult having a rational discussion with someone who
is Always Right and Never Makes Mistakes. Sigh.
> You are punishing folks who . . .
You seem to have this strange fixation on punishment. Possibly you're
in the wrong newsgroup. Have you tried alt.sex.whips-and-chains?
Shawn Johnston
> It was my impression [though never having used it] that Zeus is an
> extremely high performing web server.
>
> According to their latest press release [Dated Jan 20, 2004] it has
> hit twice the performance of the previous SSL enabled server.
>
> They claim eBay, TDWaterhouse, Qualcomm, Cable & Wireless, and MCI
> in their sample customer list. Testimonials also come from places
> such as Sony.
>
I've heard of it before, but I've never really looked at it. I've used
Netscape FastTrack on SGI and UnixWare before - which I liked but its
so old now. Are you considering migrating too Zeus?
> Just thought I'd toss that out as I find a great many have never
> heard of Zeus. www.zeus.com To give you an idea of their target
> market they have a migration plan for the Tru64, SGI, and Unixware
> users who were using the SunOne/Iplanet server which has been
> dropped.
It's too bad that they don't have full support for UnixWare and the
BSD*'s.
Thanks for the link,
Shawn
to...@pcunix.com
>Tony,
That's what I mean by "wouldn't disappear". If IBM sued SCO out of
existence in the manner you describe, they'd pick up the product and
sell it. Too much business there to just throw away to Microsoft.
to...@pcunix.com
>Source: http://www.forbes.com/2003/12/16/cx_dl_1216linux.html
I think that the GrokLaw apologists like to carefully distinguish
between PJ (the paralegal who runs the site) and the other people
who post there. PJ is technically near clueless but hard working,
tries to be thorough, fair, etc. The posters.. well, not so
thorough, etc.
I think it is quite fair to say that GrokLaw as a whole is a
biased, rumor-mongering pile of trash that is not worth
reading. PJ's contributions, while sometimes inaccurate and
careless, don't fall into that opinion.
Bill Vermillion
Shawn Johnston <sjoh...@satshot.com> wrote:
>b...@wjv.comREMOVE (Bill Vermillion) wrote in message news:<HsFF1...@wjv.com>...
>> It was my impression [though never having used it] that Zeus is an
>> extremely high performing web server.
>>
>> According to their latest press release [Dated Jan 20, 2004] it has
>> hit twice the performance of the previous SSL enabled server.
>>
>> They claim eBay, TDWaterhouse, Qualcomm, Cable & Wireless, and MCI
>> in their sample customer list. Testimonials also come from places
>> such as Sony.
>I've heard of it before, but I've never really looked at it. I've used
>Netscape FastTrack on SGI and UnixWare before - which I liked but its
>so old now. Are you considering migrating too Zeus?
Not with what I'm doing now. Everything runs fine an Apache.
I looked it as a potential at another IPS before the dot-bomb went
off. I'd like to work around a place that needs that.
>> Just thought I'd toss that out as I find a great many have never
>> heard of Zeus. www.zeus.com To give you an idea of their target
>> market they have a migration plan for the Tru64, SGI, and Unixware
>> users who were using the SunOne/Iplanet server which has been
>> dropped.
>It's too bad that they don't have full support for UnixWare and the
>BSD*'s.
I noticed that the Unixware has been deprecated. I also see that
BSDI has been deprecated. But WindRiver announced a few months ago
they were dropping that as a commercial entity. I guess to
concentrate more on their embedded products.
However the BSD 4.x and 5.x are supported. The only commerical
Intel '86 family support is for the Solaris 7 and 8, and not even
9, so that leaves only Linux and FreeBSD as the real alternatives
on the small iNTEL [eg non-64 bit] platform.
What is telling is the support on 64 bit processors or HP-IA64, Sun
Sparc, SGI Irix, IBM AIX, and Compaq Tru64. They fit into the
high-performance niche market just like the $100K+ performance
automobiles.
>Thanks for the link,
You are welcome.
J. L. Schilling
>
> So why didn't SCO "licence" the SMB protocol from MS and develop their
> own proprietary (and no doubt inferior) solution to allow their
> offerings to integrate into MS networks?
"Old SCO" did in fact have such a product, called Vision FS, and it
was incorporated into the SCO UNIX OSes. However it went with Tarantella
when Caldera acquired old SCO. And indeed Tarantella stopped aggressively
developing it, because it was undercut in the market by the free Samba.
> A webserver is actually a very simple tool. Anyone with a few weeks of
> C/Perl/Java/whatever under their belts could write one. Of course,
> writing a "good" webserver is another matter. Never the less, many
> other individuals have written their own webservers (just look on
> sourceforge, there are loads). There are still commercial offerings
> available,
I wasn't aware of the Zeus server mentioned in another response, it
might well be another alternative. Nevertheless for general purpose
web serving Apache is clearing the solution with the most mindshare;
to me it's the most successful open source software project ever,
even moreso than GNU or Linux.
> >In this case there isn't any
> >open source alternative: in almost 10 years of trying, the open
> >source world has failed to come up with a fully functional and
> >up-to-date core Java implementation.
>
> Blackdown is about there.
Wrong. Blackdown is a Sun Java source licensee and is not open source
at all. They work cooperatively with Sun on IA-32 Linux ports, and then
they do Linux Java ports to other architectures on their own.
> Anyway, there's little point arguing the case anymore,
Suit yourself.
> since SCO are
> no longer a software company as such.
Wrong, but there's zero point in arguing this with you, since you
refuse to acknowledge reality.
Jonathan Schilling
Bill Vermillion
>>
>> So why didn't SCO "licence" the SMB protocol from MS and develop their
>> own proprietary (and no doubt inferior) solution to allow their
>> offerings to integrate into MS networks?
>
>"Old SCO" did in fact have such a product, called Vision FS, and it
>was incorporated into the SCO UNIX OSes. However it went with Tarantella
>when Caldera acquired old SCO. And indeed Tarantella stopped aggressively
>developing it, because it was undercut in the market by the free Samba.
>
>> A webserver is actually a very simple tool. Anyone with a few weeks of
>> C/Perl/Java/whatever under their belts could write one. Of course,
>> writing a "good" webserver is another matter. Never the less, many
>> other individuals have written their own webservers (just look on
>> sourceforge, there are loads). There are still commercial offerings
>> available,
>I wasn't aware of the Zeus server mentioned in another response, it
>might well be another alternative. Nevertheless for general purpose
>web serving Apache is clearing the solution with the most mindshare;
>to me it's the most successful open source software project ever,
>even moreso than GNU or Linux.
There is one more, while not called open source it's been free
since it first came out. Not everyone needs/runs web servers, but
almost everyone needs mail, and sendmail had made the mail move on
the 'net almost since it's inception.
Apache really is good. I moved from a commercial Netscape on SGI
Challenge servers, to Apache ?? [dont' recall the rev number] on
FreeBSD 2.2.5 [that's late 1997] and the people I was working for
were impressed. A 120MHz Pentium with 128MB RAM - with a total
system cost of under $3000 [9MB Seagate Baracudas were expensive at
that time] - was out performing the SGIs with the 400MHz MIPS
chips.
They liked the performance, but were a bit chagrined that they had
five SGIS - two were servers and three were Indys - that were about
$7K for the cheapest at about $20K for the most expensive. [One
Indy had a highend video in it as they were going to user it for
real time highend video editing - which never happened].
Apache is what made it affordable for small ISPs to operate.
Free vs $1K or more was a dramatic difference.
Brian
> If IBM sued SCO out of existence in the manner you describe, they'd
> pick up the product and sell it.
Where did you hear that?
Don't tell me you are speculating... without a law degree or any
corroborative evidence in support?
What has happened to our loveable "Tony the Tuna" who doesn't have a clue
how the SCO v IBM case will go, 'cause he ain't a lawyer and he ain't a
judge, but apparently knows that SCO Unix will somehow survive.
Here is Tony the Tuna, without the aid of an MBA or any experience with IP
law, here he is stating matter of fact that "IBM will sell SCO Unix if it
wins"
Bwahahahahahahahahahahahaha...
*sigh*
Can you cite a single case anywhere in the free world where a litigant has
absorbed the IP of another litigant and then goes right on selling said IP?
And what do you think all the insider creditors and David Bozo & Co. going
to be doing while this goes on? And what about all the IP stakeholders?
What about Novell and their claim to the Unix IP copyrights and patents?
You really are incredibly thick, Tony!
Thanks for the great laugh Tony, you may have a new career in comedy once
the SCO thing bombs out.
One last thought, PJ and Groklaw have earned an enviable position in the
Internet community as a skilled legal investigator and news source -
something which has apparently eluded you.
Could your little rant about PJ and Groklaw be like, oh... Sour Grapes?
Tony the Tuna does Pathetic Bitter Whiner!
8^)
Brian
to...@pcunix.com
>to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>> If IBM sued SCO out of existence in the manner you describe, they'd
>> pick up the product and sell it.
>Where did you hear that?
>Don't tell me you are speculating... without a law degree or any
>corroborative evidence in support?
Yes, I'm speculating. I don't need a law degree to guess at that.
>What has happened to our loveable "Tony the Tuna" who doesn't have a clue
>how the SCO v IBM case will go, 'cause he ain't a lawyer and he ain't a
>judge, but apparently knows that SCO Unix will somehow survive.
I don't have a clue. What has that to do with the survival of the
product?
>Here is Tony the Tuna, without the aid of an MBA or any experience with IP
>law, here he is stating matter of fact that "IBM will sell SCO Unix if it
>wins"
No, that's not what I said.. but never mind.
One the thing the morons here forget is that SCO may win even if they
are as full of bull poop as y'all insist. This is complicated stuff,
not easy for lay people to follow. Take your basic VM system: there's
only so many ways to write it, and I guarantee that any two professionals
will likely produce code that is eerily similar: maybe even identical
in sections. They are working on the same hardware, trying to get
the same results and implement the same system calls: it would
be startling if it were not very similar. Tech people understand
why, but will a judge?
Scott Burns
>That's what I mean by "wouldn't disappear". If IBM sued SCO out of
>existence in the manner you describe, they'd pick up the product and
>sell it. Too much business there to just throw away to Microsoft.
>
>
>
I seem to recall reading somewhere that if SCO goes under the UNIX stuff
automatically goes to the canopy group. If true, there would be no easy
way for IBM to just pick up the product and sell it. Anyone else hear
this, or better, know a good link?
--
Scott Burns
Mirrabooka Systems
Tel +61 7 3857 7899
Fax +61 7 3857 1368
to...@pcunix.com
>>That's what I mean by "wouldn't disappear". If IBM sued SCO out of
>>existence in the manner you describe, they'd pick up the product and
>>sell it. Too much business there to just throw away to Microsoft.
>>
>>
>>
>I seem to recall reading somewhere that if SCO goes under the UNIX stuff
>automatically goes to the canopy group. If true, there would be no easy
>way for IBM to just pick up the product and sell it. Anyone else hear
>this, or better, know a good link?
Well, my point is that SOMEBODY will pick it up.
The other moron was saying that IBM will end up owning SCO outright.
Joe Dunning
>
>
>No, that's not what I said.. but never mind.
>
>One the thing the morons here forget is that SCO may win even if they
>are as full of bull poop as y'all insist. This is complicated stuff,
>not easy for lay people to follow. Take your basic VM system: there's
>only so many ways to write it, and I guarantee that any two professionals
>will likely produce code that is eerily similar: maybe even identical
>in sections.
But that's not what SCO's claims against IBM are about: it's not about
whether the code looks alike or not, it's about whether IBM violated
it's contracts with SCO.
SCO has not claimed that IBM has violated SCO's copyrights. So far, the only
copyright claims made in this case are BY IBM against SCO.
On the other hand, IBM's claims against SCO are quite seperate. In
theory, both sides could "win" -- guess who's going to be bankrupt and
who's going to still be around if this happens?
Shawn Johnston
> Here is Tony the Tuna, without the aid of an MBA or any experience with IP
> law, here he is stating matter of fact that "IBM will sell SCO Unix if it
> wins"
>
Someone will. Too many McDonalds in the world.
> Can you cite a single case anywhere in the free world where a litigant has
> absorbed the IP of another litigant and then goes right on selling said IP?
http://alive.singnet.com.sg/features/aureal-creative.htm
> What about Novell and their claim to the Unix IP copyrights and patents?
If Novell was smart, they'd add another company too their buying spree
and resolve their issues, after all this whole thing between Novell
and SCO is kind of a family thing anyways. Probably not that simple
though.
Cheers,
Shawn
Scott Burns
>Scott Burns <sc...@mirrabooka.com> wrote:
>
>
>>to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>>
>>
>
>
>
>>>That's what I mean by "wouldn't disappear". If IBM sued SCO out of
>>>existence in the manner you describe, they'd pick up the product and
>>>sell it. Too much business there to just throw away to Microsoft.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>I seem to recall reading somewhere that if SCO goes under the UNIX stuff
>>automatically goes to the canopy group. If true, there would be no easy
>>way for IBM to just pick up the product and sell it. Anyone else hear
>>this, or better, know a good link?
>>
>>
>
>
>Well, my point is that SOMEBODY will pick it up.
>
Most likely, yes. As Shawn Johnston points out, there are too many
McDonalds in the world. But it's not a 100% certainty. If we assume
SCO loses, and loses bad, Canopy may want a high price for Unixware and
OpenServer, basically hold McD's over a barrel and they may just get a
huge bundle for it. What is that likely to do for the license price?
What if McD's buys it and stops supporting anyone else? What if Canopy
holds on after SCO is dead, trying other routes and not letting other
people support SCO's products? What if SCO wins, but get mortally
wounded in the countersuits, possibly lingering this side of bankruptcy
for years to come?
In short, you are most likely right, someone will buy it. But it's a
bigger leap of faith to assume that everything will continue on as it
has in the past.
Brian
> Brian <br...@stanley-park.com> wrote:
>>to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>>> If IBM sued SCO out of existence in the manner you describe, they'd
>>> pick up the product and sell it.
>>Where did you hear that?
>>Don't tell me you are speculating... without a law degree or any
>>corroborative evidence in support?
> Yes, I'm speculating. I don't need a law degree to guess at that.
But Tony, aren't you the guy that absolutely refuses to have an opinion on
the state of the evidence in SCO's claims concerning copyright
infringement?
How could you go out on a limb like this?
>>What has happened to our loveable "Tony the Tuna" who doesn't have a clue
>>how the SCO v IBM case will go, 'cause he ain't a lawyer and he ain't a
>>judge, but apparently knows that SCO Unix will somehow survive.
> I don't have a clue. What has that to do with the survival of the
> product?
Well, Tony, if you really are keeping up with current events you would know
that Darl & Co have invited a whole bunch of new financial participants
into the fold. What do you suppose His Darlness has promised them? Hmm?
>>Here is Tony the Tuna, without the aid of an MBA or any experience with IP
>>law, here he is stating matter of fact that "IBM will sell SCO Unix if it
>>wins"
> No, that's not what I said.. but never mind.
It's just so refreshing to see our little Tony extending himself in this
manner. Could it be "wishful thinking"? Could it be a case of the
"blindness of zealotry" that he loves to lavish onto the Linux community?
> One the thing the morons here forget is that SCO may win even if they
> are as full of bull poop as y'all insist.
No they won't. They are a bug compared with the power and influence sitting
behind Linux and Open Source.
Let me spell it out for you, Tony: SCO has no case! Never had! Never!
And you know why? Because the Linux kernel is built out in the open for all
to see, every single step!
Both SCO and Caldera were participants in it's construction and that fact is
also out in the open for all to see!
And lastly, the GPL is not an extension of copyright, it is a license to
distribute. The GPL relies on copyright for it's ability to enforce its
licensing conditions. And that fact is also out there for all to see!
> This is complicated stuff,
Oh please, it's only complicated if you are Thick.
> not easy for lay people to follow.
Not easy for Tony the Tuna, you mean.
> Take your basic VM system: there's only so many ways to write it, and I
> guarantee that any two professionals will likely produce code that is
> eerily similar: maybe even identical in sections.
That's an awful lot of thinking, Tony. But that argument is as old as the
proverbial hills.
> They are working on the same hardware, trying to get the same results and
> implement the same system calls: it would be startling if it were not very
> similar. Tech people understand why, but will a judge?
That is the job of the lawyers. Now, I agree, Darl's brother is something of
a punter when it comes to arguing a case but the IBM lawyers sure seem up
to the challenge.
You should read the Groklaw transcript of how it went down last December
between SCO and IBM. SCO was squirrelly and all over the road whereas IBM
was concise, succinct and convincing.
You may enjoy talking trash about PJ and Groklaw but they sure burn your
website down as far as credibility and influence goes. I know that is a big
problem for you but hopefully you will learn to deal with it.
Darl McBride is a pathological liar and a consumate conman and he has sold
you all out for an imagined pipe dream. If you think I am wrong, you should
have a look at all the insiders selling off their SCO investments as fast
as they can. What does that tell you Tony?
Next time you call somebody a moron Tony, be sure you are looking in a
mirror!
Brian
Brian
> Brian <br...@stanley-park.com> wrote in message...
>> Here is Tony the Tuna, without the aid of an MBA or any experience with
>> IP law, here he is stating matter of fact that "IBM will sell SCO Unix if
>> it wins"
> Someone will. Too many McDonalds in the world.
Really?
Well, according to SCO financial statements, SCO has been losing money for
four years. Just why would anybody want to lose money selling SCO Unix?
Further, just how hard could it be to slip in Linux in place of SCO Unix at
yer local MikeyD's? Not hard at all! Probably considerablely less than
another round of SCO license upgrades.
>> Can you cite a single case anywhere in the free world where a litigant
>> has absorbed the IP of another litigant and then goes right on selling
>> said IP?
> http://alive.singnet.com.sg/features/aureal-creative.htm
Well, that appears to be a case of BUYING the IP as a result of a bankruptcy
- not the same at all. Further, when was the last time you bought an Aureal
sound card?
>> What about Novell and their claim to the Unix IP copyrights and patents?
> If Novell was smart, they'd add another company too their buying spree
> and resolve their issues, after all this whole thing between Novell
> and SCO is kind of a family thing anyways. Probably not that simple
> though.
If you consider SCO as an insane and destructive loser, sure - it could be a
family thing.
You will note that Novell divested itself of the SCO business, remember? Why
would they want it back? It's not like it's going to make any money now,
not after all this. My Gawd, it was losing money as it was!
Why pay to support a dying and shrinking codebase when you can get a
superior codebase, actively developed and supported by a world community? I
am talking about both *BSD and Linux. Even SUN is giving away Solaris 9
these days.
Darl & Co are going down and they will take you with them if you allow it.
Brian
FyRE
[...]
>I think it is quite fair to say that GrokLaw as a whole is a
>biased, rumor-mongering pile of trash that is not worth
>reading. PJ's contributions, while sometimes inaccurate and
>careless, don't fall into that opinion.
http://aplawrence.com/Blog/index.html
You'll notice that Tony Lawrence "administers" the above site. I think
"rumour-mongering pile of trash" is actually too kind when you see the
regurgitation of slanderous Darl'isms peppering the "blog". According
the Tony here, the "Linux community" authored the spam-relay worm
that's hammering SCO's site into the floor at the moment. Not for one
moment did mr Lawrence consider the fact that it might actually be a
spam-gang's latest offensive to set up a massive network of mail-hosts
to push their shite around the net.
Even the lazy, parasitic hacks who peddled the line about Linux
advocates writing this thing have since changed their tune after its
real purpose has been revealed. But not old Tony; nope, the boy's
sticking by his guns that it was those "damned commie hippies". Maybe
he really does realise he's wrong; maybe not; but I'm sure he's happy
to be earning the click-through money from his ugly SCO-banner filled
site by attracting Brian White and the rest of the feckless SCO
supporter's club to read his "insights".
I've done SCO management a disservice; I'd assumed they were the worst
hypocrites in this current mess... Tony here could still teach them a
thing or two ;-)
to...@pcunix.com
>It's just so refreshing to see our little Tony extending himself in this
>manner. Could it be "wishful thinking"? Could it be a case of the
>"blindness of zealotry" that he loves to lavish onto the Linux community?
You always forget: I don't want SCO to win.
>> They are working on the same hardware, trying to get the same results and
>> implement the same system calls: it would be startling if it were not very
>> similar. Tech people understand why, but will a judge?
>That is the job of the lawyers. Now, I agree, Darl's brother is something of
>a punter when it comes to arguing a case but the IBM lawyers sure seem up
>to the challenge.
>You should read the Groklaw transcript of how it went down last December
>between SCO and IBM. SCO was squirrelly and all over the road whereas IBM
>was concise, succinct and convincing.
GrokLaw won't be settling this case.
>You may enjoy talking trash about PJ and Groklaw but they sure burn your
>website down as far as credibility and influence goes. I know that is a big
>problem for you but hopefully you will learn to deal with it.
GrokLaw IS trash. PJ is an apparently reasonably conscientous person,
but the posters have the general IQ of Slashdotters. Not to say there
is never anything good in either place, but the crapola tends to drown
it out.
BTW, I didn't know I was competing with GrokLaw, but for a one man
site NOT subsidised by anyone, I think I do pretty well:
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=aplawrence.com
>Next time you call somebody a moron Tony, be sure you are looking in a
>mirror!
Awww, did I hurt your little feelings?
to...@pcunix.com
>On Mon, 2 Feb 2004 13:08:33 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>[...]
>>I think it is quite fair to say that GrokLaw as a whole is a
>>biased, rumor-mongering pile of trash that is not worth
>>reading. PJ's contributions, while sometimes inaccurate and
>>careless, don't fall into that opinion.
>http://aplawrence.com/Blog/index.html
First, re: your subject: http://aplawrence.com/wiz.html
>You'll notice that Tony Lawrence "administers" the above site. I think
I OWN it.
>"rumour-mongering pile of trash" is actually too kind when you see the
>regurgitation of slanderous Darl'isms peppering the "blog". According
>the Tony here, the "Linux community" authored the spam-relay worm
>that's hammering SCO's site into the floor at the moment. Not for one
>moment did mr Lawrence consider the fact that it might actually be a
>spam-gang's latest offensive to set up a massive network of mail-hosts
>to push their shite around the net.
Maybe. Or maybe that was just a convenience. If you read what
I said, my objection was and is to the gleeful reaction of assholes
like you. Who WROTE it is unimportant.
>Even the lazy, parasitic hacks who peddled the line about Linux
>advocates writing this thing have since changed their tune after its
>real purpose has been revealed. But not old Tony; nope, the boy's
>sticking by his guns that it was those "damned commie hippies". Maybe
Obviously quoting from an article that went way, way over yourt head.
Brian
> Brian <br...@stanley-park.com> wrote:
>>It's just so refreshing to see our little Tony extending himself in this
>>manner. Could it be "wishful thinking"? Could it be a case of the
>>"blindness of zealotry" that he loves to lavish onto the Linux community?
> You always forget: I don't want SCO to win.
Yeah, that's your story.
> GrokLaw won't be settling this case.
Neither will you Tony.
>>You may enjoy talking trash about PJ and Groklaw but they sure burn your
>>website down as far as credibility and influence goes. I know that is a
>>big problem for you but hopefully you will learn to deal with it.
> GrokLaw IS trash. PJ is an apparently reasonably conscientious person,
> but the posters have the general IQ of Slashdotters. Not to say there
> is never anything good in either place, but the crapola tends to drown
> it out.
Then you should not read the comments, if they upset you so much.
Wow, I really touched a nerve - thought that might be the case.
> BTW, I didn't know I was competing with GrokLaw, but for a one man
> site NOT subsidized by anyone, I think I do pretty well:
> http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=aplawrence.com
What, you are ranked 70,298 out of 100,000 whereas Groklaw is up around
42,623 - you suck Tony.
Further, you are on the decline whereas Groklaw is a shooting star.
Also, Groklaw is a one women show although she has had some help *recently*
with transcribing PDF docs to text.
Erm, you do know that the lower numbers are better, don't you?
Oh, you can probably blame the decline in your readership to the fact that
you are dealing in a dying company fielding questions about a dying
operating system and a dying marketing model.
Not to worry, IBM will be dealing Darl & Co a deathblow in the next little
while. Then you can turn your site into an SCO memorial.
Bwahahahahahahahahahahaha
>>Next time you call somebody a moron Tony, be sure you are looking in a
>>mirror!
> Awww, did I hurt your little feelings?
Yeah, that's it. You hurt my liddle feewings... Moron!
Brian
Shawn Johnston
> Shawn Johnston wrote:
> > Brian <br...@stanley-park.com> wrote in message...
> >> Here is Tony the Tuna, without the aid of an MBA or any experience with
> >> IP law, here he is stating matter of fact that "IBM will sell SCO Unix if
> >> it wins"
>
> > Someone will. Too many McDonalds in the world.
>
> Really?
>
> Well, according to SCO financial statements, SCO has been losing money for
> four years. Just why would anybody want to lose money selling SCO Unix?
>
Because someone else may be able to make money at it. Recall Ransom
Love if you will, one of the reasons Caldera _probably_ bought SCO was
the idea that as Linux grew up you could exploit the SCO channel to
sell Linux and transition your user base. While you were
working on the transition you could still make money by supporting the
existing product base. The idea was a good one, it probably saved
Caldera as a company. Unfortunately SCO Unix products were the cash
cows, and OpenLinux wasn't, as a result the SCO products and their
marketing took over the whole company. Good for the short term
unquestionably. Perhaps not for the long term though.
You almost have to blame RMS and friends. He should have been out
there jumping up and down over what Love and Caldera was doing and
encouraging people too purchase products from them instead of ranting
about Love and calling Caldera a virus. Now we're down too really only
one viable Linux company Novell/SuSE as they are the only ones who are
offering a consistent message with a product stack going from the
small time hobbyist to big iron SGI and IBM (and others) systems, and
RMS seems to be silent.
> Further, just how hard could it be to slip in Linux in place of SCO Unix at
> yer local MikeyD's? Not hard at all! Probably considerablely less than
> another round of SCO license upgrades.
>
Now you're just being stupid my friend. ;) As you must surely know,
businesses usually don't mess with things that work, even if there are
"better" alternatives available.
> >> Can you cite a single case anywhere in the free world where a litigant
> >> has absorbed the IP of another litigant and then goes right on selling
> >> said IP?
>
> > http://alive.singnet.com.sg/features/aureal-creative.htm
> >> Can you cite a single case anywhere in the free world where a litigant
> >> has absorbed the IP of another litigant and then goes right on selling
> >> said IP?
>
> > http://alive.singnet.com.sg/features/aureal-creative.htm
>
> Well, that appears to be a case of BUYING the IP as a result of a bankruptcy
> - not the same at all. Further, when was the last time you bought an Aureal
> sound card?
>
I haven't bought an Aureal card, and it is almost exactly the same and
that is the point. Creative basically knowingly violated Aureal's
patents in the knowledge that it could out spend them in court and
that Aureal had no choice but too pursue the matter. Aureal "won" but
lost everything in doing so.
> >> What about Novell and their claim to the Unix IP copyrights and patents?
>
> > If Novell was smart, they'd add another company too their buying spree
> > and resolve their issues, after all this whole thing between Novell
> > and SCO is kind of a family thing anyways. Probably not that simple
> > though.
>
> If you consider SCO as an insane and destructive loser, sure - it could be a
> family thing.
>
Everyone has family they would rather hide in the closet. You for
example. ;)
Seriously though, doesn't the Canopy group have large financial
interests in Novell as well as SCO? IBM, SCO, Novell are all long time
players who have had long relationships with each other. It's almost
incest.
> You will note that Novell divested itself of the SCO business, remember? Why
> would they want it back? It's not like it's going to make any money now,
> not after all this. My Gawd, it was losing money as it was!
>
Yes but... First Novell could have been years ahead of where it is now
if Ray Noorda had been able to have his way. Because Novell lacked
vision Noorda was ousted, Unix was "sold" off to SCO, and Novell's
spent the last 10 years wondering what happened. Novell's got a vision
again and this time the company seems united in it. Buying off SCO is
potentially expensive but allows them too continue their strategy
which may leave them as the only big commercial Linux player left on
the field.
> Why pay to support a dying and shrinking codebase when you can get a
> superior codebase, actively developed and supported by a world community? I
> am talking about both *BSD and Linux. Even SUN is giving away Solaris 9
> these days.
I think you've unintentionally touched on a major point. It's
expensive too produce software, especially an OS, however SCO
_CHARGES_ way too much to be competitive. Forget Linux and the free
BSD's. Head to head SCO compared to Microsoft on the server, SCO costs
more for less. I'm not sure on Netware, but I'd suspect it too costs
less. Cost being up front purchase costs, not TCO or whatever other
ownership burden.
I can't speak for OpenServer as I don't have great familiarity with
it, but UnixWare has many outstanding features but you have to pay
good money too get things that are included as standard with MS. They
don't have a competitive price/feature model. If SCO was serious about
the success of their products they should be giving them away for
desktop and developer usage, or at least at a greatly discounted price
with an option to purchase directly from SCO. Hard too sound
financially though for the short term.
In addition too the price issue, SCO does not deal well with end
users. They work through their channels, and that's great. But if your
in an area that doesn't have a VAR or if you don't want to deal with a
VAR you have to go through a run around too purchase anything. In my
opinion they're so concerned about their channel that they will blow a
sale instead of risking upsetting a partner. Good loyalty too their
channel, but not good when you can buy direct from everyone else.
> Darl & Co are going down and they will take you with them if you allow it.
>
Not bloody likely.
Cheers,
Shawn
Brian
>> for four years. Just why would anybody want to lose money selling SCO
>> Unix?
> Because someone else may be able to make money at it.
Yeah, that's gonna happen.
> Recall Ransom Love if you will, one of the reasons Caldera _probably_
> bought SCO was the idea that as Linux grew up you could exploit the
> SCO channel to sell Linux and transition your user base.
Unfortunately The Channel wasn't interested in an expensive version of
Linux. These guys were/are pros, they know they can download a version of
RedHat, SuSE or Debian for free - who needs Caldera/SCO.
> While you were working on the transition you could still make money
> by supporting the existing product base. The idea was a good one,
> it probably saved Caldera as a company.
Well, errm, it didn't.
> Unfortunately SCO Unix products were the cash cows, and OpenLinux
> wasn't, as a result the SCO products and their marketing took over
> the whole company. Good for the short term unquestionably. Perhaps
> not for the long term though.
I guess not.
> You almost have to blame RMS and friends. He should have been out
> there jumping up and down over what Love and Caldera was doing and
> encouraging people too purchase products from them instead of ranting
> about Love and calling Caldera a virus. Now we're down too really only
> one viable Linux company Novell/SuSE as they are the only ones who are
> offering a consistent message with a product stack going from the
> small time hobbyist to big iron SGI and IBM (and others) systems, and
> RMS seems to be silent.
Evolution always has it's price - big bucks operating systems are on the way
out.
>> Further, just how hard could it be to slip in Linux in place of SCO Unix
>> at yer local MikeyD's? Not hard at all! Probably considerablely less than
>> another round of SCO license upgrades.
> Now you're just being stupid my friend. ;) As you must surely know,
> businesses usually don't mess with things that work, even if there are
> "better" alternatives available.
Well, once SCO disappears along with it's flavours of Unix, then change will
occur - Because it has to. Do you think McDonalds is going to close up shop
because they can't get any more Unix?
>> >> Can you cite a single case anywhere in the free world where a litigant
>> >> has absorbed the IP of another litigant and then goes right on selling
>> >> said IP?
>> > http://alive.singnet.com.sg/features/aureal-creative.htm
>> Well, that appears to be a case of BUYING the IP as a result of a
>> bankruptcy - not the same at all. Further, when was the last time you
>> bought an Aureal sound card?
> I haven't bought an Aureal card, and it is almost exactly the same and
> that is the point. Creative basically knowingly violated Aureal's
> patents in the knowledge that it could out spend them in court and
> that Aureal had no choice but too pursue the matter. Aureal "won" but
> lost everything in doing so.
Well, using that logic, Darl must be crazy suing IBM - oh yeah, Darl is
crazy.
>> >> What about Novell and their claim to the Unix IP copyrights and
>> >> patents?
>> > If Novell was smart, they'd add another company too their buying spree
>> > and resolve their issues, after all this whole thing between Novell
>> > and SCO is kind of a family thing anyways. Probably not that simple
>> > though.
>> If you consider SCO as an insane and destructive loser, sure - it could
>> be a family thing.
> Everyone has family they would rather hide in the closet. You for
> example. ;)
I deny it. And so do all the voices in head.
> Seriously though, doesn't the Canopy group have large financial
> interests in Novell
No.
> as well as SCO? IBM, SCO, Novell are all long time players who have had
> long relationships with each other. It's almost incest.
That would explain a lot.
>> You will note that Novell divested itself of the SCO business, remember?
>> Why would they want it back? It's not like it's going to make any money
>> now, not after all this. My Gawd, it was losing money as it was!
> Yes but... First Novell could have been years ahead of where it is now
> if Ray Noorda had been able to have his way. Because Novell lacked
> vision Noorda was ousted, Unix was "sold" off to SCO, and Novell's
> spent the last 10 years wondering what happened. Novell's got a vision
> again and this time the company seems united in it. Buying off SCO is
> potentially expensive but allows them too continue their strategy
> which may leave them as the only big commercial Linux player left on
> the field.
That's a pretty good string of 'supposes'!
>> Why pay to support a dying and shrinking codebase when you can get a
>> superior codebase, actively developed and supported by a world community?
>> I am talking about both *BSD and Linux. Even SUN is giving away Solaris 9
>> these days.
> I think you've unintentionally touched on a major point.
Nothin unintentional about it. I have been saying that for year.
> It's expensive too produce software, especially an OS, however SCO
> _CHARGES_ way too much to be competitive. Forget Linux and the free
> BSD's. Head to head SCO compared to Microsoft on the server, SCO costs
> more for less. I'm not sure on Netware, but I'd suspect it too costs
> less. Cost being up front purchase costs, not TCO or whatever other
> ownership burden.
SCO and Microsoft are totally unrelated markets. Microsoft is attempting to
own the server market which has been traditionally Unix but the migration
is going towards Linux and the *BSDs. The fact is, Microsoft server is not
a good product, it never has been and Server 2003 is little better now.
Further, most of the big iron servers staff HATE Mictrosoft products with a
passion, partly because it is an inferior product but also because
Microsoft has made a lot of enemies in the last 25 years and memories are
long in the IT field.
> I can't speak for OpenServer as I don't have great familiarity with
> it, but UnixWare has many outstanding features but you have to pay
> good money too get things that are included as standard with MS. They
> don't have a competitive price/feature model. If SCO was serious about
> the success of their products they should be giving them away for
> desktop and developer usage, or at least at a greatly discounted price
> with an option to purchase directly from SCO. Hard too sound
> financially though for the short term.
Too little too late - open source will be the successful development model
for the near term - perhaps the next 20-30 years.
> In addition too the price issue, SCO does not deal well with end
> users. They work through their channels, and that's great. But if your
> in an area that doesn't have a VAR or if you don't want to deal with a
> VAR you have to go through a run around too purchase anything. In my
> opinion they're so concerned about their channel that they will blow a
> sale instead of risking upsetting a partner. Good loyalty too their
> channel, but not good when you can buy direct from everyone else.
Just arranging the deck chairs...
>> Darl & Co are going down and they will take you with them if you allow
>> it.
> Not bloody likely.
It all depends upon your ability to adapt.
8^)
Best regards,
Brian
to...@pcunix.com
>to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>> Brian <br...@stanley-park.com> wrote:
>>>It's just so refreshing to see our little Tony extending himself in this
>>>manner. Could it be "wishful thinking"? Could it be a case of the
>>>"blindness of zealotry" that he loves to lavish onto the Linux community?
>
>> You always forget: I don't want SCO to win.
>Yeah, that's your story.
Huh? Are you a complete idiot? Over and over again I have said that
SCO winning this would only help Microsoft and that SCO would at
best have a short term gain. Worse, this could do permanent
damage to Linux, which is very, very serious.
>> GrokLaw won't be settling this case.
>Neither will you Tony.
Right. What's your point?
Oh, right: your point is that SCO loses BECAUSE YOU WANT THEM TO.
Brian hosies that SC loses. OK.
>> GrokLaw IS trash. PJ is an apparently reasonably conscientious person,
>> but the posters have the general IQ of Slashdotters. Not to say there
>> is never anything good in either place, but the crapola tends to drown
>> it out.
>Then you should not read the comments, if they upset you so much.
I don't. It's only when someone like you references some TERRIBLY
IMPORTANT item there that I go look. And always find the same
immature, unintelligent ranting: thousands of Brian's and FyRE's,
all in one place, such a joy.
>> BTW, I didn't know I was competing with GrokLaw, but for a one man
>> site NOT subsidized by anyone, I think I do pretty well:
>> http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=&url=aplawrence.com
>What, you are ranked 70,298 out of 100,000 whereas Groklaw is up around
>42,623 - you suck Tony.
Right. I suck. Where are you, Brian? Somewhere up in the 5 millions
or so? Get real.
>Further, you are on the decline whereas Groklaw is a shooting star.
I'm not on the decline. Alexa waxes and wanes because it only can
track Windows users. My actual site stats continue to grow
steadily.
>Also, Groklaw is a one women show although she has had some help *recently*
>with transcribing PDF docs to text.
>Erm, you do know that the lower numbers are better, don't you?
>Oh, you can probably blame the decline in your readership to the fact that
>you are dealing in a dying company fielding questions about a dying
>operating system and a dying marketing model.
No decline: increasing daily.
http://aplawrence.com/advert.html
>> Awww, did I hurt your little feelings?
>Yeah, that's it. You hurt my liddle feewings... Moron!
:-)
to...@pcunix.com
>What, you are ranked 70,298 out of 100,000 whereas Groklaw is up around
>42,623 - you suck Tony.
Funny that a site dealing with a dying piece of crap manages to
rank that high, isn't it? Must really tick you off..
>Further, you are on the decline whereas Groklaw is a shooting star.
Actually, my site is NOT specific to SCO, I cover Linux, Mac OS X
and other things too.. but you consistently lie about everything
else, so why not that too?
My bet is that after the lawsuit is done GrokLaw will be a backwater
used-to-be.
FyRE
>Brian <br...@stanley-park.com> wrote:
>
>>What, you are ranked 70,298 out of 100,000 whereas Groklaw is up around
>>42,623 - you suck Tony.
>
>Funny that a site dealing with a dying piece of crap manages to
>rank that high, isn't it? Must really tick you off..
Tony, I think the reason you have so many visitors is the content of
your site (god knows it's not the design). Such is the rabid,
nonsensical ranting about SCO being this fantastic company, besieged
by spamware writing, DDosing, thieving Linux criminals that any sane
person automatically assumes it to be satire. Your fevered scribblings
would give TheOnion a run for its money.
I think the traffic is declining though as more people realize, to
their horror, that you're actually being serious! It's not fun to
learn you've been laughing at somebody who requires professional help.
to...@pcunix.com
>On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 16:39:23 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>>Brian <br...@stanley-park.com> wrote:
>>
>>>What, you are ranked 70,298 out of 100,000 whereas Groklaw is up around
>>>42,623 - you suck Tony.
>>
>>Funny that a site dealing with a dying piece of crap manages to
>>rank that high, isn't it? Must really tick you off..
>Tony, I think the reason you have so many visitors is the content of
>your site (god knows it's not the design). Such is the rabid,
Gotta agree with you there: if there is an award for worst site design
ever, I have to be a contender.
>nonsensical ranting about SCO being this fantastic company, besieged
>by spamware writing, DDosing, thieving Linux criminals that any sane
>person automatically assumes it to be satire. Your fevered scribblings
>would give TheOnion a run for its money.
Right. Except that it was popular long before this crap and will
remain so long after.
>I think the traffic is declining though as more people realize, to
>their horror, that you're actually being serious! It's not fun to
>learn you've been laughing at somebody who requires professional help.
Traffics not declining, boopy: it's increasing. And, if you weren't
such a bonehead, you'd understand that my site encompasses Unix and
Linux in general, not just SCO.
But I still fail to see what the merits or dismerits of MY site
have to do with the quality of information on GrokLaw?
FyRE
[...]
>Traffics not declining, boopy: it's increasing. And, if you weren't
>such a bonehead, you'd understand that my site encompasses Unix and
>Linux in general, not just SCO.
Yes I suppose it does "encompass" Linux. In much the same way SCO's
site doesH^H^H^id. I did notice that you managed to squeeze a few
attacks in there amongst the hailstorm of SCO adverts and "how to grab
GPL'ed products to shoehorn into your OpenServer".
>But I still fail to see what the merits or dismerits of MY site
>have to do with the quality of information on GrokLaw?
Nothing Tony. Absolutely nothing. They are diametrically opposed. Well
done.
to...@pcunix.com
>On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 21:32:00 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>[...]
>>Traffics not declining, boopy: it's increasing. And, if you weren't
>>such a bonehead, you'd understand that my site encompasses Unix and
>>Linux in general, not just SCO.
>Yes I suppose it does "encompass" Linux. In much the same way SCO's
>site doesH^H^H^id. I did notice that you managed to squeeze a few
>attacks in there amongst the hailstorm of SCO adverts and "how to grab
>GPL'ed products to shoehorn into your OpenServer".
Huh? I'm sorry: I'm too dumb to understand whatever it is you
are trying to say here.
>>But I still fail to see what the merits or dismerits of MY site
>>have to do with the quality of information on GrokLaw?
>Nothing Tony. Absolutely nothing. They are diametrically opposed. Well
>done.
So: you two idiots think that attacking me somehow bolsters your
unreasoned insistence that Linux must win because.. well because
you hosie it, right?
It is so incredibly ridiculous: I'm not on SCO's side here, I
don't want them to win this. I don't want Linux damaged and
really believe that the future of Unixish computing depends on
its survival.
One would assume that you two jackasses share that opinion.
But I don't agree that SCO losing is a foregone conclusion,
and won't sign on with your stupid insistence that there is no
possibility whatsoever that IBM COULD have released SCO code, or
that there is no way SCO can win even if they are full of bull.
The fact is that SCO MIGHT be right, but right or wrong, they
MIGHT win this anyway. Again, I DON'T WANT THAT TO HAPPEN.
I'm just making a realistic assessment based on known facts
(as opposed to chest thumping bravado on Slashdot and Groklaw).
So since you can't convince me with your braying, you have
resorted to childish name calling, personal attacks, denigrating
my web site, etc. That's supposed to convince me that you
are right? That kind of immature response is SO typical of
the Linux community, unfortunately: as a group you mostly
sound like a bunch of 7th grade hosers bragging about how
virile you are.
How old are you two buffoons anyway?
Jeffrey D Angus
to...@pcunix.com wrote:
> How old are you two buffoons anyway?
Sorry about the delay in answering, they're busy trying to count
over 10 without unzipping their fly.
Jeff
--
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." Benjamin Franklin
"A life lived in fear is a life half lived."
Tara Morice as Fran, from the movie "Strictly Ballroom"
to...@pcunix.com
>On Mon, 2 Feb 2004 13:08:33 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>[...]
>>I think it is quite fair to say that GrokLaw as a whole is a
>>biased, rumor-mongering pile of trash that is not worth
>>reading. PJ's contributions, while sometimes inaccurate and
>>careless, don't fall into that opinion.
>http://aplawrence.com/Blog/index.html
>You'll notice that Tony Lawrence "administers" the above site. I think
>"rumour-mongering pile of trash" is actually too kind when you see the
>regurgitation of slanderous Darl'isms peppering the "blog". According
You are SO full of lies, aren't you? Can't win with honesty and
logic, so you just lie and lie and lie. There are no "Darlism's"
peppering my blog; I'm no fan of Darl at all and in fact have
said so more than once right there and here.
>the Tony here, the "Linux community" authored the spam-relay worm
>that's hammering SCO's site into the floor at the moment. Not for one
>moment did mr Lawrence consider the fact that it might actually be a
>spam-gang's latest offensive to set up a massive network of mail-hosts
>to push their shite around the net.
Bruce Perens says it isn't Linux. To his credit, he also warns the Linux
community not to gloat or cheer the atacks on - advice that has been
largely ignored by the Linux jackasses who populate Slashdot, Groklaw
and the newsgroups.
But even Bruce himself contributes to the problem by suggesting that
SCO created this virus themselves. That's nothing less than moronic:
SCO has enough problems without this kind of stupidity.
I don't give a damn whether it was Linux people or not, though my
opinion leans strongly toward that given the immaturity demonstrated
by the responses. The point is that a lot of the Linux community
applauds this and continues to act like a bunch of school children
gleefully applauding some hated teacher's misfortune. Bunch of
jackasses who deserve nothing but scorn. As much as I like
Linux, as much as I don't want SCO to win this, I am infuriated
by the puerile reactions of the Linux community and the tepid
and largely absent chastisement by more responsible members.
Reference: http://perens.com/Articles/SCO/DOS/
to...@pcunix.com
A bunch of crapola I'm not through responding to.
I got interrupted in my previous response to this when my laptop
battery got too low to continue after a sudden failure of its power
adaptor. Had to run out and buy a new one..
Anyway: I really object to the slander, innuendo, and outright lies
of FyRE and Brian. People have asked me why I even bother to respond
to this trash, and the answer is the same as it has always been: I
don't think it is smart to leave such things unchallenged because
new readers will assume that an accusation without any rebuttal
must be true.
So: I've covered the other nonsense in other posts, but here I want
to protest the subject line:
Subject: Re: Tony Lawrence: "the guru".
I'm NOT a guru. I have had the pleasure of knowing some people who
deserve that appellation, but I don't. I have known other
people who will take that title as a mantle but don't deserve it
any more than I would. I don't like that; I think it cheapens
and demeans the value that real gurus bring to our community, and
I refuse to be part of that: http://aplawrence.com/wiz.html
Therefore, FyRE's subject line infuriates me because it could be
taken that I HAVE made claim to such status and that FyRE is
belittling me for doing so. Had I ever aspired to such an accolade
I certainly would deserve derision, but since I have specifically
and repeatedly disclaimed any such title, even by inference, I am
disgusted by FyRE's tactics.
FyRE
[...]
>First, re: your subject: http://aplawrence.com/wiz.html
>
>>You'll notice that Tony Lawrence "administers" the above site. I think
>
>I OWN it.
Well aren't you the lucky one? I wouldn't admit to it if I'd been
spending so much time filling html documents with largely baseless
accusations and half-remembered rumours. Nope, I certainly wouldn't
claim ownership... I'd blame it on someone else; I'd probably put your
on it.
>>"rumour-mongering pile of trash" is actually too kind when you see the
>>regurgitation of slanderous Darl'isms peppering the "blog". According
>>the Tony here, the "Linux community" authored the spam-relay worm
>>that's hammering SCO's site into the floor at the moment. Not for one
>>moment did mr Lawrence consider the fact that it might actually be a
>>spam-gang's latest offensive to set up a massive network of mail-hosts
>>to push their shite around the net.
>
>Maybe. Or maybe that was just a convenience. If you read what
>I said, my objection was and is to the gleeful reaction of assholes
>like you. Who WROTE it is unimportant.
Yes yes, we've all seen your latest backpeddle from:
"It's hard to like the Linux community when they do things like this."
to:
"MYDOOM not created by Linux folk?"
Now, your latest mindless rant was hardly the ringing apology I'd
hoped for, but better than nothing I suppose. I'll tell you this Tony;
I have a hell of a lot more respect for Bruce Perens than a guy who
purports to write unbiased articles, on a site that's little more than
one big mess of SCO adverts, broken in places by venomous tirades
against the open source community.
>>Even the lazy, parasitic hacks who peddled the line about Linux
>>advocates writing this thing have since changed their tune after its
>>real purpose has been revealed. But not old Tony; nope, the boy's
>>sticking by his guns that it was those "damned commie hippies". Maybe
>
>Obviously quoting from an article that went way, way over yourt head.
I'd scarcely call it an article, Tony. www.aplawrence.com appears to
be an online soapbox that you seem to feel the need to clamber up onto
every day to vent your spleen at the world around you. Rarely have I
seen such an unbridled display of mouth-frothing, fist-waving anger
being bashed out of a keyboard with such alarming regularity. This is
Tony Lawrence's middle finger, digitally waving at the world around
him. Hear him roar, and his keyboard clatter. One can only suppose you
invite feedback to your diatribes in order to spur you on to greater
depths of seething rage.
Sorry Tony, but your "poor little me" act isn't working on this
reader...
Larry
>
> I'm NOT a guru. I have had the pleasure of knowing some people who
> deserve that appellation, but I don't. I have known other
> people who will take that title as a mantle but don't deserve it
Um, he's being sarcastic.
> Therefore, FyRE's subject line infuriates me because it could be
> taken that I HAVE made claim to such status and that FyRE is
> belittling me for doing so. Had I ever aspired to such an accolade
Righto.
> I certainly would deserve derision, but since I have specifically
> and repeatedly disclaimed any such title, even by inference, I am
> disgusted by FyRE's tactics.
Actions speak louder than "disclaimers."
to...@pcunix.com
>On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 02:12:28 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>[...]
>>First, re: your subject: http://aplawrence.com/wiz.html
>>
>>>You'll notice that Tony Lawrence "administers" the above site. I think
>>
>>I OWN it.
>Well aren't you the lucky one? I wouldn't admit to it if I'd been
>spending so much time filling html documents with largely baseless
>accusations and half-remembered rumours. Nope, I certainly wouldn't
>claim ownership... I'd blame it on someone else; I'd probably put your
>on it.
Fortunately, all anyone has to do is visit my site to see how
ridiculous the above is.
Nachman Yaakov Ziskind
> On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 02:12:28 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>
> [...]
> I'd scarcely call it an article, Tony. www.aplawrence.com appears to
> be an online soapbox that you seem to feel the need to clamber up onto
> every day to vent your spleen at the world around you. Rarely have I
> seen such an unbridled display of mouth-frothing, fist-waving anger
> being bashed out of a keyboard with such alarming regularity. This is
> Tony Lawrence's middle finger, digitally waving at the world around
> him. Hear him roar, and his keyboard clatter. One can only suppose you
> invite feedback to your diatribes in order to spur you on to greater
> depths of seething rage.
Is this a different Tony Lawrence than the one I usually see posts from? I
don't recognize him from this description ...
Seriously, I like what FyRE writes, and he has a lot of good points - when he
stays away from the ad hominem attacks. I'm working on teaching mutt to filter
those out. :-)
> --
> FyRE < "War: The way Americans learn geography" >
--
_________________________________________
Nachman Yaakov Ziskind, EA, LLM aw...@egps.com
Attorney and Counselor-at-Law http://ziskind.us
Economic Group Pension Services http://egps.com
Actuaries and Employee Benefit Consultants
to...@pcunix.com
>FyRE wrote (on Thu, Feb 05, 2004 at 08:38:11PM +0000):
>> On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 02:12:28 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
>>
>> [...]
>> I'd scarcely call it an article, Tony. www.aplawrence.com appears to
>> be an online soapbox that you seem to feel the need to clamber up onto
>> every day to vent your spleen at the world around you. Rarely have I
>> seen such an unbridled display of mouth-frothing, fist-waving anger
>> being bashed out of a keyboard with such alarming regularity. This is
>> Tony Lawrence's middle finger, digitally waving at the world around
>> him. Hear him roar, and his keyboard clatter. One can only suppose you
>> invite feedback to your diatribes in order to spur you on to greater
>> depths of seething rage.
>Is this a different Tony Lawrence than the one I usually see posts from? I
>don't recognize him from this description ...
>Seriously, I like what FyRE writes, and he has a lot of good points - when he
>stays away from the ad hominem attacks. I'm working on teaching mutt to filter
>those out. :-)
Tell me what "good points" either of these jackasses have ever made?
Nachman Yaakov Ziskind
> Nachman Yaakov Ziskind <aw...@egps.com> wrote:
> >FyRE wrote (on Thu, Feb 05, 2004 at 08:38:11PM +0000):
> >> On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 02:12:28 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
> >>
> >> [...]
>
> > he stays away from the ad hominem attacks. I'm working on teaching mutt to
> > filter those out. :-)
>
> Tell me what "good points" either of these jackasses have ever made?
Hmmmm .... I can't remember right now, k? But there were a couple of FyRE posts
(NOT related to the jihad) that made me wonder if his nickname was hijacked by
someone reasonable. Maybe I'll look over the weekend.
It was the rage thing that struck me. From reading your posts over the years,
I'd suppose I'd have to give you a LOT of testosterone injections to get you in
a state of rage. Not even Charles Regalia, who RICHLY deserved it. Now, I'm not
denying your characterization of them as jackasses. But even stopped clocks are
informative sometimes ...
"Happiness is a twit filter."
> --
> to...@pcunix.com Unix/Linux/Mac OS X resources: http://aplawrence.com
> Get paid for writing about tech: http://aplawrence.com/publish.html
--
Shawn Johnston
> Nachman Yaakov Ziskind <aw...@egps.com> wrote:
> >FyRE wrote (on Thu, Feb 05, 2004 at 08:38:11PM +0000):
> >> On Wed, 4 Feb 2004 02:12:28 +0000 (UTC), to...@pcunix.com wrote:
> >>
> >> [...]
>
> >> I'd scarcely call it an article, Tony. www.aplawrence.com appears to
> >> be an online soapbox that you seem to feel the need to clamber up onto
> >> every day to vent your spleen at the world around you. Rarely have I
> >> seen such an unbridled display of mouth-frothing, fist-waving anger
> >> being bashed out of a keyboard with such alarming regularity. This is
> >> Tony Lawrence's middle finger, digitally waving at the world around
> >> him. Hear him roar, and his keyboard clatter. One can only suppose you
> >> invite feedback to your diatribes in order to spur you on to greater
> >> depths of seething rage.
>
> >Is this a different Tony Lawrence than the one I usually see posts from? I
> >don't recognize him from this description ...
>
> >Seriously, I like what FyRE writes, and he has a lot of good points - when he
> >stays away from the ad hominem attacks. I'm working on teaching mutt to filter
> >those out. :-)
>
> Tell me what "good points" either of these jackasses have ever made?
Very few. However, I think the spelling is getting better.
Cheers,
Shawn
to...@pcunix.com
Well, FyRE has made some good POSTS unrelated to this issue..
Markus Weber
here goes.
To disclose my position up front, I have used Linux personally and
professionally for many years, but in the twenty years of my
professional life I have yet to encounter OpenServer or Unixware.
While it is true that few people know for a fact why new SCO embarked
on its current course, the public record does indeed speak for itself.
Even if some regular posters in this newsgroup may beg to differ, I
cannot conceive of the situation as anything but a failed buy out/off
attempt.
It's one thing for somebody opposed to SCO to post negative comments
to this newsgroup, but the persistent personal attacks against Mr.
Lawrence are tiresome and inappropriate.
Having said that, it is not my belief that Mr. Lawrence can claim the
moral high ground. For example, his unqualified and rude dismissal of
the Groklaw posters - of which I am a very infrequent one - has
insulted me personally and puts him on a par with the lesser reasoned
posters on Growlaw. My impression is that Mr. Lawrence is not above
name calling where the opponents of SCO are concerned, but even in the
face of what I perceive as slander committed by SCO's PR machine, he
at most mildly censors SCO.
In conclusion, I regret that some individuals allow themselves to fall
into the trap of responding inappropriately to SCO's malicious
portrayal of the Linux and OSS communities, but on the other hand it's
asking for too much to keep turning the other cheek until the court
cases run to completion. As far as I'm concerned, it is my firm belief
that SCO must be relentlessly, vigorously, and politely opposed.
Markus
--
http://www.itsecuritygeek.com
to...@pcunix.com
>Having said that, it is not my belief that Mr. Lawrence can claim the
>moral high ground. For example, his unqualified and rude dismissal of
>the Groklaw posters - of which I am a very infrequent one - has
>insulted me personally and puts him on a par with the lesser reasoned
>posters on Growlaw. My impression is that Mr. Lawrence is not above
>name calling where the opponents of SCO are concerned, but even in the
>face of what I perceive as slander committed by SCO's PR machine, he
>at most mildly censors SCO.
If you think I've only "mildly censored" SCO, you haven't read very
much of what I've written.
You may be one of the intelligent GrokLaw/Slashdot posters - judging
by this, I'd guess you probably are. My opinion remains the same
however: taken as a whole, neither place is worth reading and there
is far too much unchallenged Linux zealotry present.
>In conclusion, I regret that some individuals allow themselves to fall
>into the trap of responding inappropriately to SCO's malicious
>portrayal of the Linux and OSS communities, but on the other hand it's
>asking for too much to keep turning the other cheek until the court
>cases run to completion. As far as I'm concerned, it is my firm belief
>that SCO must be relentlessly, vigorously, and politely opposed.
Absolutely. Though I think there are more important threats afoot, you
are correct that the Linux community needs to fight this. The WAY to
fight is not the kind of childish nonsense FyRE and Brian indulge
themselves in, but to counter the FUD with rational responses.
to...@pcunix.com
>Having said that, it is not my belief that Mr. Lawrence can claim the
>moral high ground. For example, his unqualified and rude dismissal of
>the Groklaw posters - of which I am a very infrequent one - has
>insulted me personally and puts him on a par with the lesser reasoned
>posters on Growlaw. My impression is that Mr. Lawrence is not above
>name calling where the opponents of SCO are concerned, but even in the
>face of what I perceive as slander committed by SCO's PR machine, he
>at most mildly censors SCO.
I've said all this before, but in case you missed it:
SCO's management has been bumbling along for years, screwing up right
and left. The evidence we've seen so far indicates that this whole
case might be based on stupidity, but even if it is not, they are
still fools for not recognizing that Linux and Open Source are the
ONLY things that are keeping Microsoft from total dominance. SCO
will be out of business completely very quickly if they win this
case (yes, I said if they *win*). They'll probably last longer
if they lose.
As to the crapola of Dar's "Open Letters", you can find numerous comments
on my web site expressing my utter disdain for his comments and positions.
If that's "mild censor", I am guilty as charged.
Joe Dunning
> The evidence we've seen so far indicates that this whole
>case might be based on stupidity,
That's one possible explanation. In my view an unlikely explanation.
Given the latest filings, I think the evidence suggests it is based upon
naked greed and a lack of any scruples. In other words, I believe that
the evidence now suggests it is a scam and it always was a scam.
Stupidity did come into it: believing that IBM would pay up rather than
fight.
Have you seen the latest changes in SCO's complaint? SCO has now
withdrawn the allegations of trade secret violations, but now claim
copyright violations, based on continuing distribution of AIX after SCO
revoked IBM's license. There are so many things wrong with this, but the
funniest is that SCO's original reason to revoke IBM's irrrevokable
license was based on trade secret violations, which SCO now does not
claim. Work it our for yourself.
Shawn Johnston
> SCO
> will be out of business completely very quickly if they win this
> case (yes, I said if they *win*). They'll probably last longer
> if they lose.
>
What is your reasoning here?
Cheers,
Shawn
to...@pcunix.com
Linux gives credence and vitality to Unix in general. Credence that
Unix is a good system to run, and vitality in innovation (which
can be "lifted" into the commercial systems like SCO). These
things contribute strongly to user retention and developer fidelity.