From: Stan Shebs <stanshebs@earthlink.net>
To: gdb@sourceware.org
Subject: Re: xz-compressed release tarballs?
Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2012 19:54:00 -0000 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <4F26F55C.8050408@earthlink.net> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <201201281809.17343.vapier@gentoo.org>
On 1/28/12 3:09 PM, Mike Frysinger wrote:
> On Saturday 28 January 2012 03:18:47 Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>> I see nothing ridiculous in a request to cater to a situation of your
>> fellow developer of Free Software, and don't understand how can you
>> ridicule such a request.
> sorry, but i really can't find anything worth replying to here. being a free
> software developer doesn't mean being able to force people to adhere to what
> works on their personal legacy systems where the user refuses to upgrade the
> software. that is unreasonable.
>
> i've got plenty of old systems, but i don't try and force everyone else to try
> and support them at the detriment of future progress.
> -mike
I have to take exception to this; there are several good reasons to make
allowance for older and legacy systems.
One is that our volunteers are just that - working on the software on
their own time, and without spare cash (or time) to upgrade to the
latest and greatest hardware or software.
Another is that free software has frequently been able to displace
proprietary software on older systems, as a way to extend useful life.
This has been a major factor in the spread and acceptance of free software.
A third is that the requirement to run on a variety of systems is good
for self-discipline. When our code has "all the world's a Vax", "all
the world's an x86", or "all the world is Linux" assumptions wired into
it, that reduces our ability to adapt when all the world changes to
something else.
So while we can certainly debate whether this feature or that helps or
hinders future progress, I don't think it's in our interests to
disparage all the legacy support.
Stan
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2012-01-30 19:54 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 25+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2012-01-26 20:22 Jim Meyering
2012-01-26 20:32 ` Jan Kratochvil
2012-01-26 21:31 ` Eli Zaretskii
2012-01-26 22:15 ` Jan Kratochvil
2012-01-26 23:10 ` Samuel Bronson
2012-01-27 1:49 ` Mike Frysinger
2012-01-27 9:13 ` Eli Zaretskii
2012-01-27 5:02 ` Joel Brobecker
2012-01-27 9:36 ` Eli Zaretskii
2012-01-30 19:08 ` Tom Tromey
2012-01-27 1:48 ` Mike Frysinger
2012-01-27 9:12 ` Eli Zaretskii
2012-01-27 18:41 ` Mike Frysinger
2012-01-28 8:21 ` Eli Zaretskii
2012-01-28 23:08 ` Mike Frysinger
2012-01-29 3:55 ` Eli Zaretskii
2012-01-30 6:26 ` Mike Frysinger
2012-01-30 17:49 ` Alfred M. Szmidt
2012-01-30 19:54 ` Stan Shebs [this message]
2012-01-30 20:53 ` Pedro Alves
2012-01-30 21:06 ` Mike Frysinger
2012-01-27 2:37 ` Ralf Corsepius
2012-01-27 9:26 ` Jan Kratochvil
2012-01-27 20:27 ` Mike Frysinger
2012-01-27 20:30 ` Marek Polacek
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