From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Lennart Borgman Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Icon designer wanted (Aquamacs Emacs) Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 22:52:05 +0100 Message-ID: <43BD9505.9070309@student.lu.se> References: <54321A2A-3F36-4416-B473-49AC11FF057F@gmail.com> <853bk5gwa8.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> <792D87C1-B9A9-495E-9335-7139845D1CB0@gmail.com> <85fyo4zvei.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> <87sls47lvd.fsf@vh213602.truman.edu> <85wthftsme.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> <85mziasu6z.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> <851wzmsqcs.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> NNTP-Posting-Host: main.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: sea.gmane.org 1136497958 12734 80.91.229.2 (5 Jan 2006 21:52:38 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@sea.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 21:52:38 +0000 (UTC) Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Thu Jan 05 22:52:34 2006 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by ciao.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1Eud26-0000xo-PO for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Thu, 05 Jan 2006 22:52:31 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1] helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1Eud3p-0002gC-Ib for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Thu, 05 Jan 2006 16:54:17 -0500 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1Eud3b-0002fM-4I for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Thu, 05 Jan 2006 16:54:03 -0500 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1Eud3a-0002f3-JP for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Thu, 05 Jan 2006 16:54:02 -0500 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1Eud3a-0002et-E9 for help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org; Thu, 05 Jan 2006 16:54:02 -0500 Original-Received: from [81.228.8.164] (helo=pne-smtpout2-sn2.hy.skanova.net) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.34) id 1Eud57-0000Y7-55; Thu, 05 Jan 2006 16:55:37 -0500 Original-Received: from [192.168.123.121] (83.249.218.244) by pne-smtpout2-sn2.hy.skanova.net (7.2.069.1) id 43BA872F000B4DF7; Thu, 5 Jan 2006 22:52:05 +0100 User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.7 (Windows/20050923) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en Original-To: David Kastrup In-Reply-To: <851wzmsqcs.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:32468 Archived-At: David Kastrup wrote: >The ability to craft a pretty MacOSX-only thing from Emacs is part of >the value of free software. Doing so exercises the freedom, but it >does nothing to sustain it. > > In a sense you are right, but I wonder if this is really true. I think it is important to be very careful here. Can you for sure say that the last sentence is true? From my perspective I doubt it. I have to use proprietary software (read Windows) in my job. It is quite hard for me to be able to use Emacs for example since it has been so very difficult to install and setup on Windows. I have tried to change this by making it easier to install and setup Emacs on Windows, not only for me but for others too. This is Windows only since that is the only reasonable way to do it on Windows. I believe this sustains the freedom of free software. It is questionable, but I would hardly be doing what I have done if I did not think so. My reasoning is that this makes it possible for more people to learn to use Emacs and this is of great value when working on different platforms. In other words: This makes it easer to switch from MS Windows to GNU/Linux or the reverse. However here is an important point: Think of this as a kind of osmosis. There are far more people today that can switch from MS Windows to GNU/Linux than the reverse. Lessening the barrier will then (maybe) help to switch to GNU/Linux. There is also another reason to do work for proprietary platforms like Windows. The main part of the work is done on GNU/Linux - at least that is what I believe. This means that we do not sometimes have enough knowledge or people to get things working on Windows. For example currently emacsserver/client does not work on Windows for CVS Emacs. This has been known for several months to be a problem (but there is a workaround using gnuserv/client), but nobody has had enough time to solve it yet. There are more examples, but that is unimportant here. I just wanted to say that it can be very important to do work on the proprietary platforms too. There are a lot of hurt feelings in this thread and most sane people probably stay out. I am however the optimistic type (a type that often gets hurt ;-). Can we please try to find the important positive points from all people here? BTW is there maybe a useful page on EmacsWiki for summarizing things?