Re: Emacs vista build failures

[David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org>]

Alan Mackenzie <acm@muc.de> writes:

> Hi, David!
>
>> There is nothing to be gained by putting the cart before the horse and
>> confusing the means to an end with the end itself, to the degree of
>> abandoning the end in order to run after the means.
>
> The central point.  As I said before, I think for Richard (and
> possibly for you), free software is an end in itself.

It most certainly isn't.  But if the software or its platform is unfree,
it is _utterly_ out of your control whether or not a user might benefit
from it, and whether he has to pay through his nose to be allowed to
reap the benefits of _your_ work.

> For me it's a tool towards a better world.  I suspect that's the
> essential difference between us which is fuelling this discussion.

No, the essential difference is that you consider proprietary
corporations and business models suitable and responsible caretakers for
a better world.

If that were the case, there would have been nothing wrong with letting
the market sort out the problem of software availability.  But the
market will do whatever people let it get away with.  Read a current
Windows license: people are comfortable with signing away their privacy,
their security, and their system contents and control over it to
Microsoft and think that that's what they deserve.

The problem with the notion that it is ok to water down free software is
that free software does not fall from the trees.  You have to _create_
it before you can start with watering it down.  And that is what the GNU
project is about.  The watering down is not what needs our help.  It
will happen anyway.

>> Emacs is a free program, not a free system.  And I doubt that people
>> preferring to use Emacs on Windows do that because they want to use a
>> free system, but rather because they want to use Emacs.
>
> Yes, I think that's true.  A lot of them do want to use a free system
> but can't, because their employers' setups won't let them.

So should we go out of our way to make it _comfortable_ for them to stay
with unfree systems?  There is nothing to be gained except more work and
more demands and fewer free systems and fewer people working on them.

>> > This will often be the case.  Other times, Windows will be merely a
>> > platform for developing portable software or embedded software.
>> > The ethos of free software is that its creators do not constrain
>> > what its users may do with it, even if that aim is writing non-free
>> > software.
>
>> But the ethos is not that its creators need to applaud or help the
>> users writing non-free software.
>
>> So I don't see that you are doing anything for free software by
>> attacking my opinion.
>
> Maybe promoting deeper understanding of the issues for both of us?

You are presuming that I don't understand what I am talking about, and
there is a point to your arguments that I am not able to comprehend.  Do
you really think I (or Richard) have never been where you are?  Do you
think that the marvels of unfree platforms are so rare that only chosen
people like yourself get to see them?

> I agree with all that, and none of it contradicts what I've said.  I
> would just add that the fact that software is free tends to promote
> its technical excellence, Emacs and Linux being two good examples.

Two rather bad examples since they never were non-free to start with, so
you can't say whether the freedom promoted the excellence or not.  Both
projects have certainly much more been impacted by the personality and
the technical decisions of their original creators.  And Linux (by which
you presumably mean the kernel) would have stayed a fringe product
without GNU to run on it.

If you take a look at the development cycles and feature growth of free
software products, you'll find that more often than not they are dwarfed
by proprietary products.  And Emacs is certainly an example for slow
development.

But the freedom means that the software stays around and retains its
breathing space.  And software that keeps getting developed for 30 years
_will_ gather some usefulness over the time.  But the quality attained
through longevity is an indirect consequence of the freedom.  If you
start a free and a closed-shop project with equal developer power at the
same time, there is no reason that the free one should become better.

That does not mean that it's a bad idea to bank on the free project:
that way, every one is a winner.

>> > The only context an MS-Windows user is going to see free software
>> > in is on MS-Windows.
>
>> That's his problem.
>
> :-)  But we can help him.

Taking pity on someone who fails to shoot himself in the foot and
loading his gun for him...

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum