Linux cult is dead, long live Linux enterprise.

Take a look at this. An article by Stuart Cohen, CEO OSDL.
"Take Torvalds' key lieutenant overseeing the Linux kernel, Andrew Morton. He's no amateur hacker. Morton worked for 10 years as a development manager at NortelNetworks building carrier-grade global telecommunications software. Carrier-grade systems must meet service availability requirements in the range of five 9's -- 99.999% uptime. So he knows all about business hardening of enterprise software.Make no mistake, Linux is in professional hands."

Sad? or good? in a way its little sad as the OSDL CEO is not in his heart a believer of a hacker's cult. In a way its good cause it mean Linux the enterprise is becoming stronger and stronger.
The observation he makes is however wrong in my view. He says a professional is handling linux not the hackers anymore. Well, who the hell told him hackers cant be professionals. All these people he gives examples of are pro hackers. Till linux was around the only way to survive for these people was to have some other day job, or join some research institute like MIT AI labs. Linux just opened up a way for hackers to remain hackers even in their day jobs. And who is he kidding? this industry is pioneered by hackers like K&R and Unix guies. No wonder Linux seems to follow the same software process as enterprises. There is no other way weather you are a hackers or professionals, and linux combines both. It not linux inc. sir, its still a linux cult. Alan Cox is still fighter, rude and arogant. Linus is still a bully, as big as a bully can gets. They still do write their own SCM :-)) when they don't find the right solution and don't settle for a sucker like clearcase/cvs. They are still Just Men(TM)* :-)).


* : For all the feminist people, i won't accept the argument of men and wemen being equal untill wemen start contributing to Linux. And i mean not just those few exceptions where a female is stuck with writing ldd. And there are no barriers no opportunity problems. linux has so far been developed and architected by people accross borders, continets and language barriers. The process and the community is truely open. There are more or less uniformly distributed statistics accross all catagories of human race in linux community. Except for the female catagory.

Free* fonts under GPL

I remember a thread on scribus mailing list about usage of GPLed fonts. While
bathing today it struck me suddenly, that its a non issue. Basic problem
somebody raised was that, if a document is prepared using GPLed fonts they
are linked into it and thus the document itself becomes a derivative work and
then it must be distributed under GPL.
I for one don't have any problem with that. Only professional documentors
which right now get paid against a doc layout and content liscencing are in
trouble and the issue is parrallel to the issue of free software. Hence i
will like most of the fonts to be in GPL domain making most of the documents
in that domain too.
Think about it how many times i have made a document which i didn't send in
its original source form or as pdf and sent it in a bitmap or othe non
recoverable format? how many documents i don't want people to modify when i
give it to them?
But GNU is slipping this thing under the rough and waiting till the fonts
become mainline then they can charge on... this is bad GNU is now using the
same corporate strategies they so stressfully protest.
Neways i dream of the day when the society potrayed in Star Trek becomes a
reality**, then people will fight to keep their documents under GPL

Wishing you a free second quarter :-))Abhijit

* : Free as in free speech not as in free beer.
** : I know i am afreak, you don't have to remind me.

Bainback (sad slashback mod )

Today its been 5 days since the Bapu passed away. I am still not in shape to
write about him. But i am well enough to try and start to move on. So as a
first step i am updating this blog. Lot !!! i mean lot has happened within
last two-three months. The lack of updated entries in my blog is not without
reason and there has been lots happning in outside world too... the world
outside my life, the world of slashdot, formula one and lkml that is.(Nothing
to do with _real_ outside world.) This blog entry will be mostly about the
later one. The other events demand their own blog entries if not blogs
themselves. But more on that someday later.

First and foremost Ferrari is at the bottom. This is perhaps the most
significant moment in formula one history. Ferrari is known to make a
comeback. They are champs for 6 consecutive years. and the fans are waiting.
This time we will find out who are the real Ferrari guies and who is just a
bluff. I for one am sticking with Ferrari. They have the most beautifull car
and i can't take my eyes off it.Unfortunately the rule changes have taken
their toll and Ferrari deciding to just modify the car rather than bring in
new one early is at clear loss. The last two races however they did launch
the new car and Schume was back on podium starting from 13th place ... i
think THEY ARE BACK !!!! lets just wait and see. As i said before only time
and the checkered flag will tell.

The second significant thing to happen was the launch of Mac OS X 10.3
"TIGER". This has been very hyped up thing. Lot of good reviews and quite
frankly an admirable creation. Unfortunately the noise about Apple and OSS
relationship is a sour spot in this whole OS X saga. Darwin is nothing but a
PR stunt as far as i interprete it. KHTML people just declared to stop
talking about the wonderfull Apple-KDE cooperation happening in the browser
front, "it does not exist" they said. Overall apple looks stronger though. OS
X is something i really feel good about, and gets my praise, which is a rare
occasion. Although i am not likely to use mac any time sooner, i would ask
people to switch to it untill linux gets good enough.

On linux front the demise of bitkeeper is something significant. But more
ashtonishing is creation of GIT. A home grown source management tool.In the
end i wonder if linux will end up being a full operating system on its own,
all we have to do is stop producing good quality desktop and somehow make
linus want one :-)). Anyway, immediate action item is : LEARN GIT.
Long time no see SCO stories are now popping up again. Basically its a lost
battle and a war for SCO. I remember the times when my company director was
surprised and was talking about linux troubles. I never felt any. As
always :-)) i was right :-))>>.

Lot of other things happened in these months too but thats all that i care
about and i can recall right now.
To heighlight other stuff in my own personal life...well
1. i found the girl of my dreams :-)).
2. i quit my job and found something to do for myself :-||.
3. i lost my grandfather :-((.

Wishing a happy second quarter to everyone...... (boy!!, i have started using
corporate terms :-(( )
Abhijit