Re: Advocating non-free softwares

[David Kastrup]

Tim Roberts <address@hidden> writes:

> Jan Nieuwenhuizen <address@hidden> wrote:
>> james writes:
>>>> >> Could you please be more aware and more careful about advocating
>>>> >> the use of non-free operating systems?
>>> >
>>> > Does this mean we shouldn't mention that we use non-free operating
>>> > systems? Or ask questions, comments about non-free operating
>>> > systems?
>> I think we can proudly advertise that LilyPond runs on all common
>> operating systems, I personally invested quite some time to create
>> that.  This empowers users who are for one reason or another still
>> stuck with a freedom-denying operating system.
>>
>> I think it is wise to have some awareness about it when saying how
>> fantastic the experience is of using a certain piece of
>> freedom-denying software.
>
> Are you at all aware of how nutty this sounds?  You have taken a sharp
> right turn into religion here.  You are asking people to be ashamed of
> themselves because they are using Windows.  That's fanaticism, not
> technology.

No, but they should realize that they are handicapped when using
Windows.  Technology is that you can't even build the Windows version of
LilyPond on Windows because getting all the tools to work there would be
prohibitively expensive.  People using Windows exclusively will not be
able to contribute and test any C++ parts of LilyPond.

We do have quite the pragmatic interest in getting more people to work
on LilyPond.

> This is exactly the same thing as having a minister expect you to be
> ashamed to admit that you have a gay child.  It's extremism.  It's
> certainly not productive.

A gay child will have different needs than a heterosexual one.  Ignoring
that is not productive.

> Here's another example.  Python works great on Windows.  It's
> increased my productivity measurably.  There is nothing shameful about
> me admitting that.  If you want to tell me that it would work better
> on Linux, that's perfectly fine, but it is completely unreasonable for
> you to expect me to censor myself because it happens to work great on
> Windows.

If people gather that switching to Windows will make themselves get a
great working Python, you are not necessarily doing yourself a favor by
promoting a platform that does not help its users actually contribute to
Python.

-- 
David Kastrup