FOSS Resources Page

[A. Mani]

Please ADD more to this FAQ It will have links. I will edit/structure
this later.


Definitions

What is Free Software?

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

Open Source Software:

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html

Licenses:

Difference Between Free Software and Open Source Software:

Do I need to know about free software philosophy to use free software?

It helps if you can understand the basic terms and start building on
the work of others or start your own project.

I am an end-user. Do I need to know about software and free software licenses?

Yes, unless you want yourself killed.

Which GNU/Linux Distributions are easier to use from GUI interface?:

Most of them do not require you to use the shell (CLI) for day to day use.
Debian, Kubuntu, Mint
Fedora,
Arch Linux



Which is the easiest BSD distribution?

PC-BSD

Why do FOSS activists campaign against Microsoft and proprietary software
companies?

Because closed source proprietary software companies including Microsoft
violate the rights of users, do not care about the privacy or security
of users, follow unethical corporate practices to derail public
policies and commit a number of corporate crimes for their own profit.

You can find basic documents at

More advanced information with detailed documents are at

techrights.org
groklaw.net


What is M$?



Is Apple evil?



Can free software be commercial?

Yes, you can charge for copies of free software in source or binary form.








Best

A. Mani


--
A. Mani
CU, ASL, AMS, CLC, CMS
http://www.logicamani.in

[A. Mani]

Addendum 1 (Advocacy Related)

What is Microsoft bashing?

Marketing software companies like Microsoft do not care to make good
software and instead produce buggy badly designed ones. This has not
really been a bad thing for the free software movement, but pointing
out that it is bad (by way of some benchmarking and testing) consumes
developer time and energy. 'Microsoft bashing' refers to this aspect.

Note: Benchmarking is a difficult task and the reliability of end
results may not have any universal appeal.

What is paid AstroTurfing?



Does Microsoft spy on its users?


What is EDGI ?



Why should I be bothered about Microsoft or some other software spying on me?






______________________

Licenses Subsection


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Basic Guide to distributions

Just links


_______________________________

Low Cost Computers Subsection



____________________________

Section: Self-Learning and Help Groups





__________________________________________

Section: Women in Free Software




______________________________
Section: Workplace Issues

Key links


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If everybody proceeds with this we can have a nice FAQ on our site in
simple and expanded form.
Should be done on wiki/git.