idiotnot's Journal: Linux Fanboys

This is in response to this. I would have commented there, but it would have surely been lost among all the +5 Funny comments and I had mod points. I used to mod points to mod up people who didn't take the bait to ridicule The Hurd.

A few observations:

- Because it takes a long time to release software doesn't mean that the software sucks. Umm, Mozilla, Gnome2, anyone, anyone? The Hurd has a small number of developers working on it. Not nearly as big as those projects. Why? Well, the ridicule that people who like The Hurd receive actually hurts development. I run into very few people today who ever speak highly of the Hurd. Those who do normally are *very* skilled programmers. The GNU/Linux fanboys don't care. They run a development kernel and think they're 1337. They couldn't care less about the non-free kernel modules for their nVidia cards....

- GNU's potential is not tapped. It *is* innovative. It works now. No, it's not as advanced as the Linux kernel, but it does work. I have two machines that run the Hurd. Last time I checked there were 6,000 some Debian packages that run on the Hurd -- far more than many Linux distros. I can grab a tarball from freshmeat, ibiblio, etc., and it'll normally compile and run.

- Jokes about the Hurd are no more funny than the *BSD is dying posts.

I guess my bottom line is: use what you like, but be intellectually honest about it. I, philosophicaly, like Free Software. The Hurd is the essence of that. Debian GNU/Linux is close. You like to have the source, be able to contribute, and have somebody take your work and do whatever to it? Run BSD. You like to be a slave, run Windoze. But if you truly believe in Free Software (and if you don't, run FreeBSD, as it's superior in many ways to Linux), don't make fun of the Hurd.

I'm leaving comments enabled, but if you wanna flame me, just STFU, I don't wanna hear it.

BTW: Thanks to paladin_tom for his defenses on that post....I don't have the patience.