Re: [gentoo-dev] Gentoo internal structure

[Paul Varner]

On Sat, 2003-11-22 at 01:32, Jon Portnoy wrote:
> On Sat, Nov 22, 2003 at 01:06:05AM -0600, Matthew Kennedy wrote:
>
> > I suppose I am dismayed that we are failing to promote free software
> > over proprietary software.
>
> We are promoting giving users a choice. What we are failing at is trying
> to force them into using free software.
>
> Quick poll of people reading this thread: Would you like to see the
> removal of nonfree software from the tree? That means things like
> vmware, the java packages, etc.

If Gentoo were to do that, I would be back to SuSE in a heartbeat with
all traces of Gentoo wiped from my systems.  I came to Gentoo because of
the philosphy of giving the user choices.  For that freedom, I'm willing
to put up with the installs that take all day and the ever changing
portage tree.  Without that freedom of choice, Gentoo for me would no
longer be worth the effort.

What I would like to see is for the developers to flesh out the
ACCEPT_LICENSES variable. Set the defaults so that what is installed now
still gets installed by default. Finally, Document it in a very visible
way.  For those that don't want "non-free" software on their systems,
they now can be assured that they are getting what they want.  For those
of us that want the free (as in freedom, not beer) OS, but aren't as
picky when it comes to applications, we have that choice as well. To me
that is in keeping with the philosphy of Gentoo.  That philosphy is why
I decided to move to Gentoo.  Take that away from me, and I will be
moving on.

PS:  Just a thought, if the licensing were implemented, why not create
another set of Live CD's with only the free licenses implemented.  Then
we could have GNU/Gentoo (for lack of a better term).

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