2 Nov
2004
2 Nov
'04
4:42 a.m.
On Mon, 2004-11-01 at 19:43, Mark Knecht wrote:
On Mon, 01 Nov 2004 16:50:05 -0600, Jan Depner
<eviltwin69(a)cableone.net> wrote:
I'm definitely in favor of open standards. I don't understand why you
think that the Linux kernel code is available only to *most* people.
Also, final decisions on the main branch of Linux are made by a select
few. Anyone can change the code and use, run, distribute it. It's
almost like it's completely open but not completely standard (unless you
stay with the main, blessed-by-Linus, branch). Monta Vista (and Ingo
and others) are trying to sway that decision making process right now
but, if they don't, I'm sure they'll keep going.
Jan
On Mon, 2004-11-01 at 15:15, lau(a)lupulin.net
wrote:
It's an interesting topic and discussion. Probably my comments will be
from a little different direction. (what's new...?) I've served on a
number of standards committees (both IEEE like 1394 and closed/company
driven like PCI-X) so I'll add comments from that POV.
What I haven't seen discussed much yet is 'standards' vs. 'open
standards' vs. 'closed standards'.
Windows - closed standard - They apparently know what they are doing
with their architecture. Applications can be written by other
companies that don't have access to the source. Apps work within the
accepted norms of the Windows standard. (Hey - I Didn't say they had
'high' standards...) ;-)
Linux kernel - semi-open standard - The kernel is documented. The code
is open and available to most* people that want to look at it. Changes
are discussed in an open environment but final decisions are made by a
select few.
Java - semi open standard - Much like the Linux kernel many changes
are discussed in the open, but final decisions are made by Sun. (Has
this changed yet?)
IEEE standards (1394, 802.11) - open standard - Discussed in open.
Decisions made by vote of working group members through voting.
Committee rules prohibit 'loading' by individual companies. (At the
discretion of the committee chairman.) Working group participation
open to pretty much anyone willing to attend the meetings.
On Mon, Nov 01, 2004 at 02:04:36PM -0600, Jan
Depner wrote:
Nope. A startup script is just a startup script. Grub is not part of
the operating system either. The OS is, by definition, the kernel. An
interesting thing to consider is RTLinux. Linux is *not* the OS in
RTLinux. The RT microkernel is the OS. Linux is merely the idle
process. I guess you could say it's part of the OS since it is in the
inner loop so to speak. And, speaking of which, has anyone taken a look
at Monta Vista's Open Source Real-Time Linux Project in relation to
audio? It's using a lot of Ingo's patches.
Jan No disrespect intended to Richard Stallman and
the GNU crowd. The OS
wouldn't exist without those tools but the tools are not part of the
OS. They are merely applications that are bundled in with the
distribution.
Given the more widely accepted definition of an operating system I think
it is perfectly acceptable to speak of Linux as a standard.
This is a gray area, but I think that you cannot just say that the gnu
tools are _not_ a part of the operating system.
Would you say that the startup scripts are _not_ a part of the OS ?
All the startup scripts that I've seen rely are parts of gnu coreutils.
I think that qualifies as being _part_ of the OS.