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On 10/07/2014 11:19 PM, Harry Holt wrote: |
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> On Tue, Oct 7, 2014 at 10:28 PM, Rich Freeman <rich0@g.o> wrote: |
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>> You're basically arguing that if somebody putting together an OS has a |
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>> working solution for something, they should spend just as much effort |
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>> maintaining 3 other solutions for that something, and ensure that none |
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>> of the solutions becomes any better than the others. OpenRC and |
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>> Portage should work just as well with only csh installed as it does |
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>> with bash installed, etc. |
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>> |
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> |
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> No. Just no. If somebody is putting together an OS, they maintain the |
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> interfaces / APIs that applications on top would use. That's all. If one |
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> solution for, say, package managers or daemon startup works better than |
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> another, so be it. It's not the responsibility of the Kernel / OS |
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> developer, unless some application reveals a bug that others do not. Other |
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> than that, pick the package manager / initializer / etc. that works best |
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> for YOU. |
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> |
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>> |
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>> That just isn't realistic. |
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> |
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> |
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> The above scenario is ABSOLUTELY realistic, and the way it should work. |
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> The straw man you've created above, not so much. But it's just a straw man. |
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You may think its absolutely realistic, but the market doesn't agree |
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with you. Red Hat, SUSE, Canonical, et al call their products |
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*distributions*, not *operating systems* because their customers don't |
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want to create their own solutions. They want a collection of software |
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pieces--kernel, libraries, applications--that solve their (end-user) |
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problems. |
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>> Most distros would rather support 47 |
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>> features that users want, and not 3 features implemented 5 different |
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>> ways each in a manner that is completely interchangeable. If a distro |
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>> did things the way you wanted, very few would bother to use it, and |
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>> likely fewer would bother to maintain it. |
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Precisely. |
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> But isn't that the point of Gentoo in the first place? You're selecting |
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> packages for various functions that are typically source compatible, and |
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> you compile them yourself. How many text editors can you choose from? How |
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> many cron implementations? How many development languages and libraries? |
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> How many email servers and clients? What would happen if the maintainers |
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> decided Gentoo should only support one desktop environment, one shell, one |
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> option for everything? Would emacs users look elsewhere because only VI is |
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> available in Portage? I suspect so. |
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> |
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> The beauty of Gentoo is that even options not available from official |
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> sources can be integrated with either an overlay, your own ebuild, or even |
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> just building from source. |
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But Gentoo is still a *distro*, not just an operating system. And it is |
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less commercial than most, relying on volunteers to code "useful" stuff. |
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There's coding going on, and a lot of whining going on. It's easy to |
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see who's credible. |
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>> Nothing is preventing you from starting a "Foundation for Redundant |
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>> Solutions" - with the express aim of maintaining all the stuff nobody |
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>> uses any longer. I can't imagine you'll get a lot of donations - even |
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>> if people might agree with you philosophically at some level, they're |
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>> going to want to spend their money investing in stuff they actually |
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>> use. |
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Thank you, Rich. This is perfect. |
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Phil |
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