About Linux, and why some people are confused why not all things made with it are free:

[Deja Q]

many products include Linux as part of their operating system. Including Google's android, and the OS found in any number of consumer appliances such as televisions and cell phones.

Open source does not mean it can be free. And modifications and integrating closed source code code also adds a dimension.

I think Linus should have been suckin' on his thumb instead of putting out a OS that everybody is freely leeching off of, to one extent or another. Make these companies pull themselves up by their own bootstraps and stop sucking off the socialist teet.


(None of the puns in this post were intended.)

[thunder rising]

1. This message sent from a Linux box. Consider, the more people that use Linux, the more influence

it has. There are only a few situations (specifically, new box) where you need to adapt an OS.

Also, Google has given much back to the SW community. They play the game well.

[Deja Q]

2. Not just computers, appliances - the stuff one does indirectly.

On the plus side, at least Microsoft ____ isn't being used in yon TV set, but Windows OS is made for general use computing. Linux is niche and is in the background; self-contained. No real user interaction. Unlike a computer.

I always thought Linux was about a free OS for computers to counter Microsoft's dominance. Not to be put into equally expensive PDAs, televisions, cell phones, refrigerators for those folks who simply must have a TV embedded in their refrigerator (those things are actually sold!!!), et cetera... that's where the gray area for me is. For what that's worth... :D

[cliffordu]

3. self delete for not reading what I responded to...sheesh.

[foo_bar]

5. no, you were right the first time

I thought it was parody at first, what with the (misspelled) "socialist teat" quip (it's what Rush would say if he spoke quasi-technical gibberish) and the use of bootstraps in a Clarence Thomas sense, but maybe Hypno's ginning up the courage to install Debian. All you have to do these days is press a Big Red Button, I don't really grok the OP's problem with employing Linux for embedded stuff, but there seems to be a larger pattern at play in terms of remaining current:

India needs to get off its lazy ass and make something.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x620460#621005

It's sad, really... my $50 paid of gloves read "Made in India". That's $50 leather gloves. Seems cows aren't so sacred anymore... and wasn't anybody told which animal it came from? Nobody asking questions... hardly a sign of intelligence. America does not have a monopoly of stupidity, that's for sure...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x620460#621338

Yes Virginia, there are non-Hindus in India.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

7. Where did you get the idea that Linux is not for general use?

Its a perfectly fine general use OS, better in some ways the Windows or the poor imitation done by Apple.

[RoyGBiv]

4. Free does not imply cost ...

Free, as in speech, as opposed to beer...

There is nothing in the GPL that prevents a person from charging for software licensed under it. What the GPL does is require that the source code remain open and available so that you can acquire it and compile it and implement it yourself.

What you suggest goes entirely against everything the GPL is about.

[ecstatic]

6. I did wonder about that

I worked in a research lab and I noticed hundreds if not thousands spent to keep the linux machines up and running. Same with the apple machines.

[retread]

8. Kinda like mac built on freeBSD? n/t

[L0oniX]

9. I'm a FreeBSD user and yea that is an interesting fact about the Mac OS.

The general GPL rule is that you are allowed to use open source for your projects as long as you give credit to those that did the original programming which I always do ...even with the websites I design using Open Office.