Posted on 06/28/2004 9:48:52 AM PDT by Golden Eagle
Maybe some here have a derivative version that starts "We the US Software Vendors.....".
Just think what it cost us to have that document. And people all over the world have been copying it for free, and we aren't lifting a finger to stop them.
First, you always seem to miss the fact that "we" don't give them Linux. Linux is made also by hundreds of non-American programmers. You remember that fact when you want to call Linux a European socialist conspiracy, but forget it when you complain of us giving things to China.
Now to your question. Any programmer who wants to make something free would of course be available to the Chinese for free. It's not my say as to what others make available for free. Now as far as selling them stuff, from operating systems and likely all the way to nuclear warheads, you don't seem to mind as long as an American company makes a profit.
Windows can be used to make a marginal supercomputer. Why don't you complain about Microsoft selling it to the Chinese?
First point: most BSD variants have had SMP support for long enough that your claim they don't reflects poorly on your fact checking (google is your friend).
Second point: Darwin (a BSD variant) is the core of more then one of the top ten super computers. See above comment on fact checking.
Bonus point: Building massively parrallel super computers is not so much about SMP as interconnects, RPC and writing the code to do actual work with multiple processors. You could do it with many single CPU machines. Economics, not shared memory, drive supercomputers to use multi CPU boxes.
Still planting words in my mouth, which I clearly disagree with, and refusing to provide anything else they should be getting for free. I already told you don't hold back, and this is the best you could come up with?
Sure, they can have that, but they obviously don't want it. So what else, since giving stuff to China for free is high on you list?
DUH, because they are using free Linux for their supercomputers. Or haven't you heard?
When BSD is used on a single supercomputer in the Top 500 give me a ping. Linux put China in the top 10.
Check your list.
See any entries using OS X?
That IS BSD (the parts that matter). Last I checked it was number 2. Was number 1 till recently, will be again shortly.
No, American designed high-speed processors, interconnects and cluster computer technology put China in the Top 10. Any modern operating system could have been used (except probably Windows, as it doesn't seem to do well).
Personally, I think China should have used SCO UNIX, so they'd be next in Darl's lawsuit gunsights. Wait, nevermind, that would show them the dark side of capitalism and an open legal system run amok, so it might impede their progress towards freedom.
OSX isn't free, or did you already forget your point?
But nothing else was needed, as they got their Linux for free.
Sorry, the VA Tech cluster was offline for an upgrade to XServes when the deadline came for submissions to the latest list. Expect at least one OS X (BSD) machine in the next Top 10, as the Army is buying a cluster that right now would probably be at #3. The VA Tech cluster would be at #5 if it were running now in original configuration, probably #4 if they'd gotten their new XServes in time for this list. Either one would have knocked China off the Top 10, leaving GE to complain that they're on the Top 20 instead.
Yeah GPLed software requires you pass out communist leaflets if you want to distribute it. You can't even ditch the license's commie preamble. Die Software Manifesto. Public domain, BSD or MIT licenses are free. GPL isn't freedom it's slavery to distributing marxist propaganda.
Good for them. They could have also gotten Darwin or BSD for free. But since we know of their respect for IP rights, they could have also downloaded Solaris or other modern UNIXes. But as usual, you just have a problem that an American corporation didn't make a buck off this cluster. It wouldn't have made a bit of difference to the Chinese effort to build this cluster to either steal a for-sale OS or to pay a relative pittance in licensing fees. You're mad that a government with the wealth of 1.3 billion people to draw upon didn't pay less than $1 million in OS licensing, but instead got the OS for free. Do you really think a free OS is what let them do this? That's insane.
And when I lied to them about deleting it, they sent me to the gulag....which was bad.
You asked for a BSD in the top 500. Perhaps YOU have forgotten your point.
Apple got BSD for free after repeatedly failing to ship a protected memory/real multitasking OS. There is a real arguement the open source (via the BSD license) has already saved one american company (Apple).
The point you continue to ignore is that any OS could be used. Linux/x86 is used because it's low total cost per MIPS.
You can build a supercomputer with OS/2 or Win ME if you really really wanted to. All you really need from the OS is a robust RPC mechanism (that's Remote Procedure Call). Of course you need much more then that to build a 'parallel supercomputer'. You won't be getting it from the OS.
Unlike modern commercial licenses that are extremely restrictive, any restrictions of the GPL do not apply to you if you're just a regular user.
However, if you want to distribute someone else's IP, you have to abide by the license. If you don't like those terms, then don't use someone else's IP in your project -- write it yourself, hope it's available for theft-for-profit under a BSD license, or pay your life savings to a commercial software house to use their code. It's your choice.
The reason for the "commie" restrictions in the GPL is to ensure that the software gets progressively better. It plays off the ideals of the scientific community where scientists are free to build on the work of others for advancement of the science (Where have I heard phrasing like that before? Oh yeah, in the Constitution).
In a BSD or public domain case, a company can improve the codebase, but then lock those improvements, stalling further advancement of the publicly available product along that line. In the GPL world, it goes back into the pool to advance the public knowledge, to be again improved upon by others (and the person who made those initial improvements in turn gets to reap those benefits). It is exactly this GPL license that allowed Linux to go from the spare-time hobby of a university student to an operating system that can run mainframes, supercomputers and compete with Windows on many fronts in only 13 years.
GREAT POST! I miss the days when this board was filled with guys like you and I.
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