Why I Hate proprietary software

Ok this post is not about why I like the Open Source Movement. Its the views of Eric Raymond, author of the awesome book, The Cathedral and the Bazaar. Its an interesting point of view. Not the usual geeky, kiddish ideas that say "I don't like Microsoft because of this blah blah blah". More militant in his views (as usual), Eric says how he felt like a slave when working with proprietary software and some people who have coded for a long time never realise that they are after all, slaves to the system!

"The stupid and the timeservers were lucky. It was the really bright, creative people among my peers that hurt the most. And we were all very young and malleable and eager to please; it took me years after I’d escaped to understand that I had a right to feel angry about how I had been used, and many of my peers never figured that out at all."

Interesting ideas and thoughts and if you are a coder, open your eyes and read the whole post here....

Reliance Wimax on Ubuntu

I recently installed Ubuntu Hardy Heron on my PC and loved the performance even after it was installed using Wubi as an application within Windows. I then wanted to use the internet on Ubuntu. I have a Reliance Wimax connection (I have since moved to Airtel due to the lousy service Reliance gave me). When I checked the network configuration on Ubuntu, I saw that there was no network connection. Logged back into Windows and Googled for some information. Came across this information given by pk_rulz on the Ubuntu Forums. He advises that the problem was due to the avahi daemon assigning an IPv6 address to the eth0. He advises:

Bring down avahi daemon using
sudo /etc/init.d/avahi-daemon stop
then use
sudo ifconfig eth0 down
sudo ifconfig eth0 up - this is basically to restart ur eth0

I did the same and I am now able to use Reliance Wimax on Ubuntu. (Not anymore. Reliance Customer No Care has since made me so frustrated with their service that I have moved to another provider).

Wubi

Since my last update on the new computer and Ubuntu, I have done nothing about it except download and burn the new Ubuntu version Hardy Heron. Since getting the new computer might actually take some time, I am thinking of installing Ubuntu in the existing computer itself. This can be accomplished using Wubi - about which I have blogged before. What Wubi does is install Ubuntu on your hard drive, on an existing partition, just like you would any Windows software. The only downside being that disk usage would be high and accessing files would be a tad bit slower. But I think thats a sacrifice you can make for using some great bit of software!!. I also see that the new Ubuntu version has this bundled with it. You can actually install Ubuntu Hardy Heron directly onto the existing Windows partition. In fact, I am going to try that today. Lets see how the disk usage is going to be. Err, I also read that this type of filesystem is more vulnerable to power-shortages. Thats like pulling the plug if you do not have a UPS!.

Spread the.....love

Came across this actually from Planet Ubuntu...its actually from Cerebrosus Lens Geek. Beautiful....

FUD

FUD. A term that not many of us may have used but have certainly used as a strategy. As I was reading up on some books on Open Source, I came across this term and read up on its definition in Wikipedia (Oh! what would I do without you!!). FUD - Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. It kinda reminds me of what you'd feel like if you were facing the Black Gate of Mordor. Bile rushing up your throat, you become uncertain about your actions and doubt creeps in. Its worse when you stop believing in yourself. Self doubt more like? Just imagine you are running a business and you choose to go with Open Source tools. It may be because of the financial situation or just cause you believe in Open Source. In comes a competitor or just someone who actually wants to help. He creates a situation or utters something meaningless. Or should I say with just enough meaning to make you think twice on the steps you are taking. You face the Gates of Mordor through again!.

Wikipedia mentions in its article - "By spreading questionable information about the drawbacks of less well known products, an established company can discourage decision-makers from choosing those products over its wares, regardless of the relative technical merits. This is a recognized phenomenon....."more here.

Its kinda disgusting to see that this is an accepted business strategy and well, part of business ethics. Ethics as in, its an accepted practise!!. Well, its also quite ironical to see that though IBM was accused of starting this practise, it itself was at the receiving end when SCO launched a series of FUD attacks against it!!.

Well, how can I talk about Open Source and FUD and not mention Microsoft in the same sentence? Hehe, I just did it!!. Also reading up on this incredible book - "Open Sources - Voices From The Open Source Revolution" and some information on the web (more like Wikipedia), I came across the Halloween Documents. These were a series of internal memos and whatnot that Microsoft was circulating amongst its staff about Linux and the Open Source Movement. Its kinda funny that though Microsoft is so derisively dismissive of Linux et al in the open, its actually a little worried about the inroads that Open Source is making!!. These documents have been comprehensively ripped by Eric S Raymond and he has done a great job of it.

You can read up on Eric's article here and the Halloween Documents FAQ here.

Want to join the bandwagon? Be part of the FOSS Exhibition in December this year!!.

GNOME's 10th Birthday!!

Since 1997, the GNOME project has grown from a handful of developers to a contributor base of coders, documentors, translators, interface designers, accessibility specialists, artists and testers numbering in the thousands.

As the leading user experience platform for Open Source and Free Software operating systems, GNOME has received massive commercial adoption and support among distributors such as Novell, Red Hat, Sun Microsystems and Ubuntu, and software vendors targeting those platforms such as Eclipse, Google, Mozilla and VMWare.

More on their official site......here!

SCO loses......Linux wins!!

Woohoo....news just in I guess. Got this from Aaron Toponce's blog!. The courts have finally ruled against SCO and said that "The court concludes that Novell is the owner of the UNIX and UnixWare Copyrights". To read on the complete story and know why this is so important a news, visit Wikipedia's article on SCO-Linux controversies.

IBM Saves $250M Running Linux On Mainframes

Yeah to all you haters of the Open Source Movement - shove this up!!

Linux users are crooks

Yeah - atleast thats what Steve "Fucking" Ballmer is saying to the world. Off from BoingBoing, I read that this bozo is going around calling Linux users thieves. He has this to say about Novell - that shit-in-the-pants company - "Novell pays us some money for the right to tell customers that anybody who uses SUSE Linux is appropriately covered. This is important to us, because [otherwise] we believe every Linux customer basically has an undisclosed balance-sheet liability." Undisclosed balance sheet liability?? You stupid fuck! - what about all those years I used your shitty piece of software called Windows and I got to re-install them everytime something went wrong?? Are you going to pay me back? Check what Steve "Rageaholic" Ballmer has to say....

DRM doesn’t work

Came across this article where Mark Shuttleworth had written about DRM - "There are some ideas that are broken, but attractive enough to some people that they are doomed to be tried again and again". DRM also known as Digital Restrictions Management (to the opponents of DRM), is a doomed piece of technology brought into the distribution of entertainment in digital formats. When I first heard of DRM, my question was - "If I buy the bloody song, then how is it that I do not own it? How is it that I cannot transfer it from my MP3 player to my computer or elsewhere?". When I read that I still do not own the damned piece of music, this made me more intrigued about DRM. I read up on artistes (who actually created the damned music in the first place) mention that the digital format of selling music has pretty much left them high and dry. They do not still make much money from the distribution of the music. Many of them do not like such restrictions on their music!. Then why - just cause some major music labels think its right to restrict the way we listen to our music?.

Some of the points that Mark touches upon are very interesting. He says - "Those folks who try to impose analog rules on digital content will find themselves on the wrong side of the tidal wave". Interesting point there. Another is that "It only takes one crack". We know that the processing key for all HD discs produced to date has been discovered and published. They brought about insane rights managements on CDs, then DVDs and now for HD discs. But time and time again, we see that they have been cracked. So are any of these insanities really doing any good? NO!.

Friends say - "Why get so worried about something? You need a whole album, download it off some torrents site". But my point being - shout out atleast. Make yourself heard. DRM sucks!. Write about it on your blog. Give power back to the people. Not some fucked up record company somewhere.

Mark also touches upon Steve Jobs' sudden high moral ground on DRM. So fucking see-through, Steve. The article written by Mark is really a very interesting read and you can read it and other articles by Mark on his site - www.markshuttleworth.com

On another note, came across this cool software for installing Ubuntu on your local Windblows hard drive partition itself - called Wubi. All you need is the software and the ISO image for Ubuntu. Check it out. I haven't - yet!. Let me see if I can somehow install it and check it out for myself.