Tales From The Bazaar

Last week, The Bazaar, an Open Source meeting and exhibition, was held for the first time in New York City. It was not a well-attended event, with fewer than 3000 registered visitors, and the view from the show's main floor was downright dismal because most of the people there spent most of their time in tutorial sessions, not cruising the (sparse) display booths. But it was still an event many found valuable. Here are some "show tales" from Slashdot readers who were there. (click below)

From Jordan Greenberg:

The Bazaar was my first real chance to meet any of the big names of the Linux community. Though I missed all of the daytime events due to work, I showed up just in time to be bored by Ralph Nader and retreat to the Andover.net party before things got too crazy. Once there I was able to chat with such legends as ESR, Bruce Perens, Maddog Hall, Jeff and Robin, and was even able to make RMS laugh about the whole to GNU or not to GNU Linux naming debate. Personally, I was never a big fan of saying GNU/Linux - I think it sounds awkward and confusing and I did not like RMS demanding that people in his presence use the GNU (right Chris?).

With almighty tequila coursing through my veins, I found myself in the midst of a sermon by RMS on why he believes we need GNU terminology - and coming from his mouth it suddenly made sense (or perhaps that was the tequila too). Linux, or GNU/Linux as RMS would have it, depends not only on the quality of the software but about the freedom within, granted by the GPL. By using the GNU prefix we remind ourselves and others of this. GNU/Linux is not just about the software, but about the ideals behind that software.

But it still sounds awkward. "The problem is," I said to RMS and the others that were still listening, "that you need a catchier name for it. How about calling yourself an "impaladin?"

"Impaladin?" asked RMS

"Yes, impaladin - Have GNU will travel"

RMS laughed - he approved

So feel free to use this new name - maybe even create an impaladin distribution or just laugh at it - but enjoy.

-------------

Isaac Salpeter's take:

The heart of this conference was not to be found on the exhibition floor, nor in the (repetitive axe-grinding of the) keynotes, but in the classes and general sessions. Suggestion for the future: more open discussions and cooperation, less Ralph Nader yammering about how much Microsoft sucks.

Best conversation overheard:

"So, will the Andover party have a cash bar?"

"No, there's free beer."

"Uh-oh, Stallman's gonna be pissed..."

--------------------

Annelise Anderson, representing FreeBSD, says:

Whatever its raw edges, The Bazaar conference was worthwhile for the usual networking reasons. The best of the networking went on at the reception hosted by andover.net and the follow-on reception at the FAO Schwarz toy store, an inspired location for this crowd. This one was thanks to FAO Schwartz and IBM.

The BSDs could -- should -- have had a stronger presence here, perhaps with a combined exhibit booth in addition to the volunteers demo-ing on their own computers. Patrick Lynch of the NY users' group organized a pan-BSD BOF; Bob Bruce showed up there and said we might see an IPO with FreeBSD's name on it before the middle of next year. My little Sony picturebook was a source of some amazement -- FreeBSD -current running on such a little thing, with a couple of those stunning Eterms. The publishers in attendance were generally unaware that along with the multiple Linux distros, FreeBSD and the other BSDs exist and transfer an enormous amount of the traffic on the Internet.

---------------

Adam Matos, Systems Administrator and Student, The Beacon School, writes:

While attending The Bazaar here in Manhattan, I found it to be fascinating that so many people support the Linux community. I came with a colleague and teacher of mine, Chris Lehmann, Technology coordinator for The Beacon School. Chris was the one who first showed me Linux and how useful it can be. At Beacon we use Linux on our primary servers and wanted to let others know that schools, too, use Linux.

I attended a tuturial Wednesday morning, Enterprise System Management, that was suposed to teach me about running Linux servers. I walked out 10 minutes into the tuturial. I took a quick look at what was planned for the session and noticed I knew a majority of it. Not because I think I know it all, but because we've done most of it at Beacon. Such things as configuring Samba and writing shell scripts were something I learned under Chris Lehmanns's coordination at school. With less than two years Linux experience, I've been given the title Systems Administrator.

As I leave The Bazaar, I feel more comfortable about how many other Linux enthusiasts are out there. Linux is something everyone I feel can start adapting to. People can change.

---------------

From Nopalzin Torrres, Systems & Network Administrator, IllusionFusion!:

I was nervous when I first arrived, but the Open Source community welcomed my desire to learn and contribute. I walked out of the Building Firewalls with Open BSD tutorial saying "Damn, I can really make this work". I also picked up some great info on Samba and Linux system admin. I had a great time and met some great guys.

---------------

starlady (AKA Jessica Lee Sheffield) finishes off by saying:

Having been to a show every month for the past four months, I thought I had some idea of what to expect when entering the exhibit floor, but my expectations were largely confounded as this was a much smaller show than I have experienced. I wasn't surprised to see Geek Compound 3.0 greet me as I walked through the door - Andover's .org pavilion, which was comprised of Linux.com, Linuxfund.org, NetBSD, KDE, and others, in addition to Slashdot and Freshmeat, of course. As I continued on through the floor looking for the UserFriendly booth, I noticed that several of the powerhouse booths at past shows, notably Red Hat and VA Linux, had a surprisingly subdued presence at this one, while Caldera (of "E-business!" fame at COMDEX) wasn't even in attendance.

The atmosphere at The Bazaar was very community-oriented, which is why it's a shame that the attendance was so low. Without the distractions of marketing ploys, people were free to discuss projects, collaboration, or simply say "Hey, I like your work." I had very nice conversations with some of the leading names in the Open Source community, and even witnessed a random guy walk up to Bob Young, notice his red beret, and ask, "Hey, are you with Red Hat or something?"

When Mr. Young nodded with a smile, the guy proceeded to ask him support questions, while I and Paul Ferris of LinuxToday snuck off before our snickering gave the game away. To his credit, Mr Young was very gracious in answering the man's questions and making him feel comfortable.

The relaxed nature of The Bazaar made it possible for smaller organizations to catch the eye and ear of the community and publicize their own open source efforts. One such was The Beacon School, an alternative public school in New York City where the students administrate Linux servers and run projects on them. The students are very enthusiastic and eager to be involved in the community, and I believe they made a very good impression on the attendees (except perhaps the ones that kept shooting the Nerf weapons kindly provided by Copyleft). Speaking of Nerf, Copyleft's "Shoot the Star Wars action figures, win a prize" campaign was a roaring success. I took a Slashdot frisbee home with me, so I can't complain. :)

All in all, I think The Bazaar was a success for its first year. The traffic wasn't as high as anyone would have liked due to bad placement within the Javits center, but I believe that is something they can improve in the future. The show was a great chance to see old friends and make new ones in the Open Source world, and I think a lot of positive things will come of that.

---------------

There were things that could have been improved, and the timing was wrong; theBazaar was held in the middle of finals week for most area colleges, which I believe was a big factor in the low attendance. And for some reason the heat in the Jacob Javits Convention Center wasn't working properly, which gave the whole thing a (literally) chilly atmosphere. Oh, well. Maybe next year's edition will be better-timed and better-attended.

- Robin "roblimo" Miller

Sounds like it was fun.

But if you want more people to visit the booths, you'll need to make the sessions more boring, or get some hideous guest speaker. Next time, I suggest you have Al Gore give a discourse on how he invented the Internet. The booths should have plenty of people looking round, then.

Attendance

It was not a well-attended event, with fewer than 3000 registered visitors

Possibly because it was not well publicised. I would have like to have gone, but I didn't find out about it until after the event.

I don't even remember a mention of /. about it...
(prepares to be flamed)

Re:FIRST

Why doesn't slashdot add a feature to posting so that the first person to read an article will get a big banner saying "YOU ARE THE FIRST PERSON TO READ THIS ARTICLE. WE HAVE AUTOMATICALLY MADE A FOOL OF YOU AND POSTED AN I AM THE FIRST POST MESSAGE FOR YOU".

Guh-noo-Linnucks

Hmmm, Richard is still personally offended by the mention of Linux in his presence. To paraphrase, "no one should own software, but if you don't call I claim is mine by the name I prefer, I will take great umbrage".

No, I wasn't involved in the creation of any of the original Linux distributions. I never rolled my own OS with linux 0.99. But I can make some educated guesses as to what that primordial atmosphere was like.

First of all, there was no GNU System in 1993-94. All there was from the GNU camp was a collection of software. Linus managed to get some GNU software running under his linux prototype. No big deal, and certainly not sufficient to call the result "GNULinux". After all, at the same time, I was using gcc, emacs and some other GNU software under OS/2.

So then Linus gets his kernel working. Added to this were some core OS parts like lilo. Missing is a central C library. Linus wanted to use GNU's. But it didn't work with Linux! It was Linus and Co., *not* RMS Esq., that ported glibc to Linux. Bear this in mind, GNU was ported to Linux, and not the other way around.

Add in a few naughty non-GNU stuff like a filesystem, drivers, etc., and you still don't have a workable OS. Throw in some GNU software, some BSD software, and a few other miscellaneous pieces, and you now have something that can be called an OS. Where are we, 1995? There is still no GNU Sytem. But a lot of GNU software is vastly improved however, the beneficiary of a thousand prying eyes. A new paradigm had arisen not seen before. It didn't come from the ivory towers or dank dungeons of MIT, but from the trenches of Finland, Norway, India, Brazil, United States, Germany, and other equally important locations too numerous to mention.

Enter the first ur-distro. Probably only three or four floppy disks given to a neighbor. From this humble creature with the bravery to crawl up from the antediluvian sludge into the bright sunlit atmosphere, arose all of the distributions we know today.

And what did this ur-distro contain? Four basic parts: kernel, infrastructure, libraries and apps. The kernel was Linux, and included some non kernel stuff like drivers and lilo. The infrastructure was provided by the ur-distro and included stuff like init scripts and messy bits. The libraries, for the most part, originated from GNU. But remember that they were ported to Linux. Finally, there were the applications. Stuff like bash, gcc, lprd, slipd, etc. Most of the front end apps were GNU. Most of the back end were BSD. However, none of the apps were truly necessary for an operating system.

As I see it, this ur-distro does not resemble the GNU System as envisioned by the FSF. The only essential part of the distro is glibc, and that had to be ported to get it to work. The other GNU software are not essential. Of all of them, only bash is the universal default of the various distributions, but it can be trivially replaced by any other shell.

In short, contrary to the claims of RMS, the Linux kernel was NOT inserted into the GNU System as its final missing piece. Rather, pieces of GNU were inserted into what its creator named "Linux" to add functionality.

If RMS wants to see a genuine GNU System, then it is up to him to make it. He has all the parts. Just finish hurd, and release a new distro called "GNU". Or use the Linux kernel temporarily and call it "Linux/GNU". But until I can download a workable version from ftp.gnu.org, there is no such thing as the GNU System.

Re:In defence of Gore

And the embarassing ignorance shown by Declan McCullagh and Wired in trying to ridicule Gore for his pronounciation of "router"! Yes, the correct prounciation is "raut-er" if you're talking about a wood-working tool! But cisco makes machines which selects routes (a new meaning, not in standard dictionaries), so surely the pronounciation he used is completely valid. (I've heard many versions of the American classic "Route 66" and all pronounced it "root 66." Now where are the songs about routers?)

In many places in this country, "route" and "root" do not rhyme. In such places, "route" rhymes with "out", "root" rhymes with "foot" -- at least when it means the base of a tree. It tends to rhyme with "boot" only when you're rooting for the other team, and with "foot" when rooting in the ground. And to finish the series, "rut" rhymes with "hut", and "rout" (as in a disorderly retreat) with "out". Oh, and such places tend use the same vowel in "roof", "hoof", and "soot" as they do in "put" and "foot".

Let's not be ridiculingly prescriptivist here. It's not a matter of right or wrong. This is just the way it is. It may not be a prestige accent from Nyoo Yawk, but it's a legitimate American accent from the heartland, one that's been around a long, long time. And considering that it conserves more different pronunciations than do places in the country where these many r- words have merged together due to more frequent wear and tear there, it's probably an older one, too.

I don't get it

I really don't understand why so many people seem to take such deep offense at what comes down to a naming issue. Whether or not to call it GNU/Linux or Linux. Personally, I prefer GNU/Linux, but I don't think it honestly matters.

Consider what the terminology is for. It's supposed to get across what it is that you're dealing with. I think that both names accomplish that. RMS' point about attaching GNU to Linux to accentuate the freedom that comes along with GNU/Linux is something that I think is good and very important, but at the same time, totally superfluous for beginning users and the PHBs out there that are trying to get their minds around the concept of why somebody would give software away in the first place. Calling it just Linux in my mind is also totally functional, (since that's what it is) but I think it denies the theoretical, philosophical, and practical reasons behind why most of the software is what it is and how it got there. But again, this point is totally superfluous to beginners and PHBs.

People often want to squabble over what percentage of code in the "Linux System" is from GNU. Then some say it doesn't matter how much is from GNU, only the amount that is GPL'd. Others want to extend that from GPL'd to "Free Software". But one thing is for sure in my mind (and since this is an opinion post, it has to be in my mind since I'm not speaking for anybody else) is that even if we were solidly able to nail down what percentage of code was ever written by, sanctioned by, looked at by, or breathed on by RMS, we still wouldn't be able to say, "Ok, at X% we can officially call it GNU/Linux".

I think some of the naming war goes back to the differences between the "Open Source" camp and the "Free Software" camp. For the record, to disclose my biases, I'm with Bruce Perens when he wrote his article "It's time to talk about Free Software Again" when he resigned from OpenSource Initiative - Open Source was meant as a rebranding, not a replacement. I think that that comes in here in that people want to rebrand GNU/Linux to suit their political motivations, i.e. getting more businesses to adopt linux, or increasing its commercial success. Here's where the sticking point is, because we've got two major camps in the linux community as I see it. The first wants to talk about freedom, and the second wants the software to be popular. People of course can argue about that point, but as far as I can see, the only point of the open source initiative is to push it onto outside people and increase the popularity of GNU/Linux. I'm not against that, but I am against it when it comes to weakening what GNU/Linux means. (And what GNU software means in the larger sense - freedom)

SO! On one hand, it really doesn't matter what you call it. I'm often a bit lazy in writing style and I'll write Linux even though I mean GNU/Linux. No matter what you call it, as long as you get the functional point across as to what you mean, (and don't call it something like FooOS or "Gnulix") then it really doesn't matter to me personally much (and probably not 90% of other people) but what does kind of tick me off is people saying that the name GNU/Linux is totally illegitimate or silly for any myriad of reasons. I think the name GNU/Linux is totally justified and should be preferred when talking about specifics and not in a conversational sense.

So, I guess all of that makes me just another fence straddler. :)

Re:I don't get it

"I really don't understand why so many people seem to take such deep offense at what comes down to a naming issue."

I don't take offense at people calling it GNU/Linux. I don't throw tirades at reporters when they call it GNU/Linux. I don't interrupt people in mid-sentence to correct the misuse of GNU/Linux. However, one extremely influential individual takes great exception at the term Linux. Are you saying it's okay for him to state his opinions but I'm off base in stating mine?

"RMS' point about attaching GNU to Linux to accentuate the freedom that comes along with GNU/Linux..."

But the freedom he is talking about applies equally well, or more so, to the non-GNU components of Linux. Furthermore, the GNU and FSF websites say a whole lot more about a particular political and economic philosophy than they do about freedom. If Richard really wants to promote Free Software through a distribution's name, he should insist on "Free/Linux" instead. If you read through "Open Sources", you'll find that all of the authors believe in Free Software, but only one adheres to the GNU philosophy. Yet every one of these authors was instrumental in bringing Linux to where it is today.

"even if we were solidly able to nail down what percentage of code was ever written by, sanctioned by, looked at by, or breathed on by RMS, we still wouldn't be able to say, "Ok, at X% we can officially call it GNU/Linux"."

RMS clearly defines what he means by "The GNU System", and Linux is certainly not it.

"I think that that comes in here in that people want to rebrand GNU/Linux to suit their political motivations..."

Nonsense. No one is renaming Linux other than Richard Stallman! No one. It was called "Linux" from day one. RMS didn't start insisting on the GNU/Linux name long after Linux made a foothold in the hacker camp. Indeed, it is Richard Stallman himself who is rebranding Linux to suit his political motivations!

"The first wants to talk about freedom, and the second wants the software to be popular."

I want to talk about freedom. But I am not so ignorant as to equate this freedom with political liberty, free speech or human rights. I don't misidentify it with a philosophy. I don't delude myself into thinking that Solaris will enslave me. Businesses have no problem with the concept of freedom, but they do have problem equating freedom with the "thou shalt not" uttered by RMS.