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On Wed, 2007-02-07 at 06:56 -0800, M. Edward (Ed) Borasky wrote: |
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> supported hosts can be found ..." disclaimer. All I'm saying is that |
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> they don't "support" us -- why should we "support" them by distributing |
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> their package and even supplying patches so that it works on Gentoo? |
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|
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For starters, I don't have such a self-absorbed view of the world. I |
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use VMware products. I use them on Gentoo. So do lots of other people. |
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Because of this, I will continue to spend my *volunteer* time doing what |
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I think I should do and will be supporting VMware. I don't care that |
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they don't support Gentoo. They have supported my maintaining VMware |
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Workstation (so far) by providing me with free licenses. Whether they |
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continue to do this in the future or not is unknown, but it won't affect |
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my maintaining the package. |
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|
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> I think I had this discussion a while back, and the upshot was that a |
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> number of the Gentoo developers used VMware Workstation themselves, so |
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> they made it work, and as long as VMware didn't forbid them from |
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> distributing it, they didn't see anything wrong with distributing it. |
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|
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There's not really a *they* about it. I've been maintaining VMware |
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Workstation for a couple years now, all by my little self. If you |
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talked to anyone but me, you were mistaken. ;] |
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|
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> Gentoo developer resources are finite, though, and if you've got the |
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> right hardware in place, Xen beats the doodoo out of VMware for quite a |
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> few "interesting" tasks like running a Windows guest. Gentoo developer |
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> resources being finite ... :) |
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|
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Finite and completely voluntary on what we want to work on within the |
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confines of Gentoo. Until someone pays me *not* to maintain VMware |
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products or until I lose interest, I will continue to do so, user wishes |
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be damned. |
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|
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(In case you're wondering, I don't develop Gentoo for the users, I do it |
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entirely for myself. That doesn't mean that I don't support our users, |
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it means that I do this solely due to my own motivations and wishes, |
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like many open source developers. Making users happy is just a positive |
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side-effect.) |
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|
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-- |
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Chris Gianelloni |
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Release Engineering Strategic Lead |
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Alpha/AMD64/x86 Architecture Teams |
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Games Developer/Council Member/Foundation Trustee |
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Gentoo Foundation |