Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird have both been successfully ported to SkyOS. Additionally, a WindUI Firefox theme has been created, ensuring that Firefox will have a graphical style that matches the rest of the operating system. Screenshots of both applications are available at the website.
Already congratulated the team on the SkyOS forums, and posted the news on eXp Zone, but I’d like also here to congratulate everyone
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Great work this, and the two native ports of these two fine apps will ensure that SkyOS is currently the leading alternative alternative desktop OS
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SkyOS – Our OS is ours alone.
Our apps, we will take from the open source community without giving anything back.
The software creators licensed these products in a “free” manner and SkyOS has not violated that license. They have followed it exactly as writte right? So why are you upset? If the creators of the software wanted to always get “something back” they would have specified more restrictions in the license.. but they didn’t. What is it that you want “given back” to the community?
Heck, How DARE anyone port FireFox and Thunderbird to Windows since Windows isn’t a FREE OS! They didn’t give anything back. Would you be upset if the people who ported Thunderbird for OS X also ported it over to SkyOS or are you only upset because the creator SkyOS did it and his OS isn’t free (though TB and FF run on OS X and Windows and they aren’t free either)
this is good for SkyOS…
Our apps, we will take from the open source community without giving anything back.
I didn’t spend too much time on the SkyOS site, but what little I did allowed me to see their announcement that they’re releasing a 30 page document explaining how to port Mozilla & Thunderbird to other non-supported OS’s.
It may not be what you personally want to see them do, but it is definately giving something back to the community! They’re not at all obligated to do this, but it sounds like their work will help to assist others with similar endeavors.
And as soon as SKYOS (or Haiku) can get me an Office Suite and digital audio apps, maybe a Bryce port – I am there! – goodbye Microsoft.
There is the spirit and there is the intent of a license or piece of text.
Go watch the movie Dogma. It will make you laugh and teach you that just because you can hack or argue your way into or out of a license, it doesn’t mean that you should in good consciense violate its spirit and true meaning.
But how is this any different than a port to Windows and OS X?
Considering they are ‘profiting’ GREATLY from OSS (there is no way they’d have a modern, cutting-edge, standards supporting email client, web browser, photo editor and word processor without it), they should at least offer everyone a free (as in beer) version that isn’t full of restrictions.
It isn’t. I am equally opposed to those, but Microsoft is a big monopolistic corporation and there isn’t much hope that it will change its ways.
It would be nice to see a one-team show or a small group of developers do the right thing, on the other hand. The ignore this advice at their peril. SkyOS will never leave the toy OS status without significant community support.
thats all you people can do. Theres absolutely nothing wrong with porting open source apps to SkyOS. Nothing in the GPL against that. Besides, iirc any beta tester than wants the source to the ported apps can have it and the source to the apps will be available when the full version is released. If some commercial app you all wanted was poted to linux you’d be all happy an excited. If the opposite happens you get all bitchy. Grow up.
iTorrey explained why they have done nothing wrong, and Mr. Banned explained why the port was good in spirit.
Saying that software is Free, but only if your operating system is free is the bigest load of shit I have ever heard.
SkyOS will never leave the toy OS status without significant community support.
Its still in beta stages for crying out loud.
Helf, it’s useless argueing with these oss zealots. They have a distorted view of the world that’s just as wrong as how MS has acted in the past.
MS: We keep the source and no one can see it.
OSS Zealots: We open the source so everyone must.
Both add up to: NO CHOICE.
ummm, I was always under the impression that porting applications to various operating systems was part of the big deal about free software. didn’t some of the software available on linux exist before the whole linux project was started?
To me, being able to switch between using a mac, linux and windows yet still use the same applications is a really nice thing. If there were more operating systems around to sample, which had the same benefits, then that would please me even more so if the OS was any good.
Only a decent media player and irc client to go and I would consider trying out skyOS to run when I am not working & have a go at porting the odd simple application myself.
>SkyOS will never leave the toy OS status without significant community support.
SkyOS already has much more community support than other OS that aren’t considered as “toy OS”…
Leo.
I said community support, not a bunch of fans who bow to the whims of the developers without asking for anything in return.
Community is like family, you often argue but you stay together to make things work. Each part must give a little.
SkyOS is a selfish project by selfish people. That’s what I can conclude from the fact that they don’t mind using other people’s code but they are unwilling to share their own.
Stop making false dichotomies.
Free Software advocates don’t mind if you want to use proprietary software. We just think you are a hypocrite if you do so and also try to use free software without contributing anything in return. Let me break it down to you, just so you understand.
You write proprietary OS, write your own apps, no problem.
You write proprietary OS and make use of years or research that went into the current crop of open source apps and you are a hypocrite.
Don’t try to confuse the issues by insinuating that Microsoft as a company and open source advocates have anything in common. It only makes you look silly.
So, is this a native SkyOS port? Are Thunderbird and Firefox using GTK+ for SkyOS or SkyOS’s native toolkit?
Does it feel more integrated and “just right” than the BeOS port of Firefox?
Its safe to clarify, but Mozilla uses its own veresion of OSS license called MPL. It is no where near GNU.
The whole idea of Opensource is the ability to have both the application and the code. No where does it say you have to submit modifcations or “give back to the community”. You have the ability to buy the software which results in you obtaining hte source code and you have the ability to run the software. Some people even allow you to have the software for free in return any modifications you make goes back to the community. From what I understand they are going to give instructions on porting the software, so they are giving back to the community. I see the positives of both closed source and open souce software and I also see the negative. Neither are the right or wrong solution. They have their place in the market. Buzz off EU
Jim
Eu, since when are you part of the Mozilla team? THEY are the ONLY ONES who are allowed to say whether they agree to this port and SkyOS’ methods or not. Since they wrote their own license, they agree.
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No. Mozilla team has licensed software under MPL/LGPL/GPL. they have no say over already licensed software now. However everyone is free to express their opinions without being associated with Mozilla or SkyOS in any way….
“Only a decent media player and irc client to go…”
Well, I *personally* think that our media player/infrastructure is top notch.
As far as an IRC client goes, I know one was in the works (“Skirc”, http://www.skirc.com), but I don’t know that anything has been done with it in the past few weeks. I’m sure one will turn up eventually.
“So, is this a native SkyOS port?”
Yes.
“Are Thunderbird and Firefox using GTK+ for SkyOS or SkyOS’s native toolkit?”
SkyOS’s.
Keep using capitals all over your post to compensate for the weakness of your arguments.
I assure you that the Mozilla developers did not start an open source foundation and release code as open source because they are keen to spread the use of proprietary systems.
Kelly, what about Gaim?
That has irc, and I’ve already used it in SkyOS and it works great.
I assure you that the Mozilla developers did not start an open source foundation and release code as open source because they are keen to spread the use of proprietary systems.
And I’m sure that they appreciate the fact tat their software now runs on yet another system. If they did not want to see their software on ie. Windows, OSX and SkyOS, they would’ve added that in their license.
Since they didn’t, I think you are making stuff up here, dude.
That’s pretty cool, you’re so few people and always bringing out stuff so fast.
The BeOS people are working on bringing out a native fast Mozilla-based browser for quite some years now. Maybe because the Be API is radically different from most others.
You can choose to ignore what the developers themselves say. Read their blogs and tell me where you see them wanting to spread proprietary software.
For what is worth, Blake Ross, one of the key Firefox developers is an old friend of mine and I have sent patches to and bug reports. This doens’t grant me any authoritative say in the matter, but you are twisting the intent of open source licenses when you pretend that developers don’t care about how their code is used.
BeOS has had Mozilla for… 5 years now. Maybe 4. But a LONG time.
We don’t have a native Gecko browser yet, but its being worked on. We do have Firefox, Mozilla, Thunderbird and Nvu though.
An alternative OS gets better and people just can’t wait to bash it for porting OSS stuff. Gee.
I thought the whole point with Mozilla being ported to several platforms was that people could run it disregarding which OS they’re currently using – ending in loads and loads of users using it.
Or? Aren’t they encouraging ports to new platforms?
Let people run Mozilla – no matter what platform they’re on. Reclaim the web goddamnit!
You can choose to ignore what the developers themselves say. Read their blogs and tell me where you see them wanting to spread proprietary software.
Then don’t make ads in the NYT for FireFox.
But seriously, you’re saying they aren’t happy with the (deserved) succes of FireFox on Windows? If they truly think like you say they do, then they should be disgusted of their (again, deserved) succes of FF on Windows.
I find that extremely hard to believe.
These are two important apps!
Great work!
Well, actually, it’s only been at most, just over two and a half years now, according to http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=614“>this on OSNews and http://haikunews.org/?id=413“>this on Haiku News.
🙂
Still, there is a history between the BeOS community and the Mozilla foundation, and I’m pretty sure there were unofficial builds before it was “announced”.
Hope this clarifies things.
Now, to bring this back on topic. SkyOS is certainly more than welcome to use whatever open source project/code it deems necessary, as long as the SkyOS developers adhere to the attached license(s). As is natural in any large and growing project, one must use whatever resources are at hand in order to grow.
The SkyOS developers are top-notch in building their OS, and I heartily cheer them on in regards to using a well-known alternative browser and email client. Good on them.
I know that Haiku is our darling OS, but really, a little healthy competition won’t harm anyone.
-Chris Simmons,
Haiku News.
http://haikunews.org
Will this document also help developers port other apps over to the SkyOS enviroment?
Open source zealots are so funny.. Eu, not everyone is like you and is able to see the “spirit” and “true meaning” of a license. Are they violating the license? NO! A license is a license.. a piece of text, it has no “spirit” and it’s “true meaning” is what’s written in it PERIOD Do you still have the right to whine about it? Yes, of course. But doing that won’t bring you anything, nor will it stop them. IMO the best thing you could do now is think about how pointless your replies are
As for community, since the os is still in beta we shouldn’t really talk about that.. xerxes2, might want to get rid of some of the air in your head and get the correct information.. People are not paying just to betatest the os, they will receive the final version once it’s released, in fact they only pay the price of that, to be able to download the betas is only a free extra so they can see how the OS is evolving. You know preaching without even having the slightest idea of what’s going on is just plain stupid and only shows how much of a zealot you are.
I’m all for Linux, in fact, i’ve been using it as my main OS for close to 3 years (Ubuntu lately, but used Slackware and Gentoo for quite some time), but give new OSes a chance. So what if SkyOS isn’t free? What’s wrong with wanting to create a new OS? Nothing. And people flame it and the devs just because Robert decided not to make it free? Deal with it. I gladly paid my $30 to beta test. How else will SkyOS see good hardware support if people don’t support it? Firefox and Thunderbird ports are excellent for SkyOS because they make it that much more useful and modern. So Robert hasn’t sent any sources back to CVS yet, no biggie; SkyOS is still in beta! I’m sure once final is out, he will provide that code back to the respective sources for continued development. This port how-to is great for EVERY community, so that’s definitely a great start. Could it be that people are jealous that their beloved free OSes aren’t always developing as quickly as SkyOS is? Don’t flame the product unless you’ve tried it. Once you have, feel free to do whatever you wish but respect other people’s opinions.
Yeah En, the Mozilla folks must just be pi$$ed at their software being ported to non-free platforms. That is why they release (yes.. they release) binaries for Windows and OS X with each new release. They could say “Nope, we aren’t accepting nor are we compiling binaries for Windows and OS X and any other non-free platform” but they do and when you go to their home page it’s right there “Download for OS X”. The must be just soooooo upset like you are about this.
I think the whining about OSS zealots is worse than the zealotry itself – ya’ll look stupid whining about proprietary software ‘freedom’
Boy, every time i see a new screenshot of Sky, i’m less impressed. Last year Sky was looking better than anyone else on the block, now Linux (Xorg, Gnome, etc) is back with a vengeance. And all the while Sky’s been behind the veil of “beta”.
The longer Sky waits to get something into the world’s hands, the less the world is going to care about it. Linux is back on track to be the best OS in the world after a few years of awkwardness. You guys had a serious shot at relevance, but you missed your window.
Okay I have read the comments and wanted to clarify at least one thing.
Yes at present we are using OSS apps in SkyOS, I have ported GAIM and Robert several applications. And as several people have said these do have many years of research and development to them, why spend years creating new apps when we can use these apps and broaden the supported base for them.
However we are not just stealing them as has been claimed. The long term plan is to contribute back to these projects with bug fixes and enhancements, we want these applications to be successful as well. However at present we are concentrating on SkyOS and getting version 5 finished.
I assure you that the Mozilla developers did not start an open source foundation and release code as open source because they are keen to spread the use of proprietary systems.
No, Mozilla itself was started because they wanted to become ‘the best browser for Windows’. Literally! Linux et al was never the main aim or so, but its very nice that Mozilla runs on non-Windows and non-Linux because some people are stuck on proprietary hard- and/or software.
I, for one, am very happy i’m able to run Firefox on IRIX instead of Netscape 4.8 although Firefox still misses important features. Roaming profiles for example.
I’ll keep my opinion about SkyOS before me. It would be as irrelevant as the topic and the discussion here. Hehe. Have a nice vacation everyone!
How do the SkyOS people expect to generate enough critical mass to get their OS into the mainstream? I see this as an uphill (and eventually losing) battle.
They’re competing against Microsoft, who already owns 90% or more of the x86 desktop market, and Linux, which has most of the rest.
There’s no way they can compete against Microsoft on anything but price, since Microsoft has almost infinite resources. I just don’t see them being able to support all of the hardware drivers necessary to make a go at the mainstream market.
The Linux (and BSD) people have good hardware support because they’ve been able to attract a large number of developers who are willing to write drivers. I don’t see this happening in the case of SkyOS because of its closed, “pay to play” nature. Most of these developers are firm believers in OSS, and I don’t see them flocking to a proprietary, closed OS no matter how technically superior it may be.
Since they seem to be developing their own APIs and libraries (eschewing X, for example), how do they expect to get major application support? I doubt companies such as Oracle, Adobe, and Macromedia are going to be falling over themselves to port their applications to SkyOS. It looks like the only applications they’ll be able to support are open source applications ported to their OS.
Excellent job to the SkyOS guys. Having a pervasive, powerful, truely cross-platform browser does nothing but strengthen the user and web-based development community. Anything to help stop the MS push of to tie all web pages into their single platform API’s!
I might say that it could be wise for SkyOS to just build a new proprietary webbrowser, since these OSS enthusiasts behave the way they do…. on the other hand, it’s not any of these GPL fanatic zealots in this forum who contribute to Mozilla anyway so why they complaining??? I’d say Mozilla foundation are happy to see SkyOS porting their software, I’d even bet they’ve helped out in various ways…
This also brings up another thought. What is free software? Obviously not very free since if you port it you get shot down in popularity by whiners…..
I say great work SkyOS, keep it up and I hope you guys keep up the pace… If lucky, you’ll get into one of the Operating Systems I might choose from, unlike any OS with a userbase which ONLY whines (RMS syndrome?)!
(RMS syndrome?)!
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why blame RMS because of a few petty whiners. be rational
I’ve had discussions with you before, and I’ve all won them. I’m looking forward to yet another win. Bring it on.
Normally, a valid purpose of a discussion is not to ‘win’ it. Besides, who declared you ‘won’ it anyway? A discussions purpose is for example to trade arguments, thoughts, insights or to point to information previously unknown, or to reflect wether your arguments hold water and what their vulnerabilities are. If your only purpose of a discussion is to convince others then you’re not only a zealot, it makes you also a loser. Especially if thats your purpose on this forum.
i guess perceived zealotry develops counter-zealotry…
What made Robert decide to port Firefox over when SkyOS already has Skykruzer? Haven’t had a chance to try Kruzer yet, is it no good?
SkyKruzer was going to be too much work to bring up to speed. The time was better spent porting Firefox, which we all know and love.
Firefox was ported because SkyKruzer did not like the move to GCC 3.4.0. It was a choice of spend time fixing SkyKruzer which was very outdated or finding a better browser which supports the current Web standards.
You heard it here first! 2005 will be the year of the SkyOS desktop.
You heard it here first! 2005 will be the year of the SkyOS desktop.
Now that’d turn some heads at the end of 2005
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Nice to see another port! Some pretty impressive work.
A comment on why BeZilla may still not be perfect: We don’t have the full source to our OS
I’m looking forward to reading that document.
/tqh, BeZilla team
Because RMS is the ultra whiner of ultra whiners.
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he contributed much more to the software industry that you ever will. so shut up
“You heard it here first! 2005 will be the year of the SkyOS desktop.”
no. it wont be. you can hear that everywhere else
What can I say to your obviously silly posts.
What is now known as the Mozilla Foundation and it’s community of developers created Firefox and Thunderbird for Windows.
Go and harass them. You will soon realise many communities will have no place for you.
Since there was never going to be a Firefox port to SkyOS, Robert did the work for them.
If they didn’t do this port. Others would have starting complaining that SkyOS doesn’t have good applications.
The main contributors to SkyOS are hoping this OS can become a day job for them. Who are you to tell them that they can’t do this? Who are you to tell them to stop breathing, after all air is still free.
I am amazed at the progress these guys are making. Abiword, Gaim, Firefox, and now Thunderbird have all been ported. Truly a stellar example of how OSS works.
And Eu, you are hilarious! Please keep posting.
It’s amazing how much crap the skyos team gets to endure (I wouldn’t blame them for staying away from osnews, but somehow, they don’t) just for .. well for what really.. For stealing code that’s freely available? How on earth can you steal things that are freely available.
I’m an open-source software developer myself and I wouldn’t mind them porting my applications. For some of them, yes they would be required to open up the modifications they made because of the license, for others they wouldn’t because I chose a different license form.
The way I see it is that if you’re angered when they port one of the apps that fall in the latter category to their platform and not open up the changes, the only person you should be getting angry at is me for not picking a different license or nobody at all.
Hey SkyOS team? Happen to be looking for an open-source client for the soulseek peer 2 peer client? Taunt these people some more, feel free to port museek! 😉
Ok Folks….
Porting apps like Firefox and Thunderbird isn’t easy and it takes time.
I think that the point here is
1) that we should congratulate the SkyOS Team for the feat and the speed of the port.
2) We should rejoice because SkyOS is slowly but steadily becoming a good product/a serious OS alternative.
The endless fights between OSS zealots and members of the SkyOS community are becoming annoying. The same disputes keep happening the obvious proofs of the Skyos Tream’s good will and deeds towards Open source community.
Before posting accusations, I would recommand
a) browsing the SkyOS forum or reading the arguments/explanations given by Kelly Rush in the many topics about SkyOS posted in OSnews…
b) checking the facts you refer to, to be on the safe side.
You wouldn’t falsely accuse, out of ignorance or driven by bias, right ?
ps : go go go SkyOs, please become a great OS,
maybee one day an alternative (for a precise job ?)
to Windows, Os X or Linux…
“Hey SkyOS team? Happen to be looking for an open-source client for the soulseek peer 2 peer client?”
Actually, surprisingly (not surprisingly?), a P2P client has been the next-most requested application after a web browser/e-mail client. I’m sure our community would love to see one.
“And people flame it and the devs just because Robert decided not to make it free? Deal with it. I gladly paid my $30 to beta test. How else will SkyOS see good hardware support if people don’t support it?”
I don’t care. It’s not my problem. I certainly don’t see the sense in paying to do it, though. Traditionally, the relationship would be the other way around. But to be honest, I can’t exactly agree with Eu, in that I agree it’s perfectly fine for SkyOS to do this if it wants to. I think anyone who pays to use it is certifiably nuts, though.
“I don’t care. It’s not my problem. I certainly don’t see the sense in paying to do it, though. Traditionally, the relationship would be the other way around. But to be honest, I can’t exactly agree with Eu, in that I agree it’s perfectly fine for SkyOS to do this if it wants to. I think anyone who pays to use it is certifiably nuts, though.”
The way I look at its supporting an Operating System that I think has a bright future. That is one of the sole reason people buy(or in some cases donate, or even both) a Linux distro is because they feel that it is supporting their favorite distro and want to see it survive.
If you don’t see it that way I think that is cool, everybody has the right to their own opinion.
I paid for the beta program because it is going to a company that I believe has a great future ahead. I like their vision what an operating system is suppost to be. It might not be your vision on what an OS should be and that’s fine, check SkyOS off your list and move on and find an OS that works for you. But don’t go off bashing people just because they paid for something that they believe in.
I paid for the beta program because it is going to a company that I believe has a great future ahead. I like their vision what an operating system is suppost to be. It might not be your vision on what an OS should be and that’s fine, check SkyOS off your list and move on and find an OS that works for you. But don’t go off bashing people just because they paid for something that they believe in.
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is this vision documented and company documented anywhere?
well if you do believe in things irrationaly then people might choose to criticise you (not talking about skyos here)
@Kelly Rush
the gui on the music player, which i class as a media player, didn’t look terribly nice. the irc client looked a bit spartan too. so, while usable & quite possibly technically fantastic, they didn’t inspire me to be comfortable parting with £30 to aquire it.
I personally don’t have a problem with the idea of a paid beta, it seems like it was extremely successful in driving development. But enough is enough already, release what you got and then continue adding features for the paying users.
This is coming from someone who is a big supporter of Robert and Sky, i’ve never talked shit on any of your decisions, not licensing, not the paid beta, nothing:
But if you do not make a free release soon, like yesterday, you’re going to lose your audience almost entirely.
“well if you do believe in things irrationaly then people might choose to criticise you (not talking about skyos here)”
LOL, there will always be person A that will criticise person B for what he or she believes in. Just look at the whole Windows vs. Linux/open source thing. Both sides criticise each other for the operating system they are using.
“How is skyos working?”
Once I get access to the beta forum to download the the SkyOS 5 betas I will let you know(I’ve been following SkyOS since 4.0a, they started the beta program when I went to Basic Training and Tech School). Right now I can only tell you about SkyOS 4.0a. I liked the way the OS ran, felt very familiar and not to hard to find my way around the OS. Can’t wait to play with version 5 and the new UI.
“If it’s just a POS it’s better to say it so not more people pay for some unusuable crap.”
Can’t really judge the product right now because its still in the beta stage.
Sandman
Very impressive. Congratulations to the SkyOS team, and happy holidays!
Peace on earth.
I see, well, it’s not so easy for you to comment on how it’s running if you haven’t got access to the binary yet. Normally there are some kind of restrictions when you are beta testing software but I don’t know if it’s legal to have it if you got to pay for it. Maybe you can give a review of it here on osnews.
That is SO cool. I’m glad to have paid for SkyOS, I see that they are doing some realy cool stuff. I don’t know when Beta 8.3 will be out but it will be a realy huge «fix» to 8.2 !
Keep the good work and please, don’t mind all the bi*ching going on around here. Happy Holidays!
I can’t believe it. Thom Holwerda and me are on the exact same page on this one
Just wanted to express congratulations-what SkyOS has pulled off in porting Firefox and Thunderbird is quite impressive. Hats off to the hard work of those who did it.
Although I have been labeled an OSS zealot by others on this thread I can still most whole heartedly appreciate the work than went it to making this happen. I also believe that what SkyOS has done is completely in the spirit of the MPL.
Question: is there any plans to port OpenOffice-2.0 to SkyOS ?
[OK] Windows is closed source but MS does not make a profit from OSS.
[OK] Apple uses opensource technology but contributes back (KHTML,etc).
[OK] Linux distros sell support but their products are opensource and they contribute to the community.
[NOPE] The SkyOS team takes OSS, slaps it into a closed source product, and sells it. No contributions back.
It’s legal but it upsets some people.
How exactly is it that by using a free app you’re indebted to ‘linux’ or something called ‘a community’? It’s them that are indebted to the app’s author just as you are. App’s author who may have no use for ‘linux’ or ‘the community’.
A writes X.
B uses X as well as Y
C writes Z and ports X to it
So, C is indebted to B and Y???
Think of it as:
A writes X
B improves X
C takes X, improves it, and sells it
D takes the improved X and sells it
D adds no value to X, why do they deserve to earn money?
BTW, Linux distributions which don’t open source their own innovations and don’t provide free downloads should be criticised exactly as much as SkyOS, following the logic of the people who’ve criticised them here. Any competitors?
I first have to say that I *am* very impressed by Robert. He must be certifiably the best hacker on the planet. To have virtually single-handedly developed an OS in record time that almost rivals other OSes that armies of developers work on is a feat almost beyond my understanding…(I sometimes have some conspiracy theories about this 🙂
On the other hand, I think that the decision to keep SkyOS closed source and charge for it to boot has in effect killed SkyOS as an alternative desktop OS. Yes, I know a few people will pay for it, no doubt. But I don’t see how a non-free OS with no ISV support and less features + less hardware support than free Linux can hope to develop traction.
Non-free doesn’t have to mean expensive. What if they sold it very cheaply? OSS advocates always seem to overlook the simple facts of life: we all need money for food, clothing and shelter. Someone choosing to develop software to support this isn’t a sin. Some people (strange as it may appear) might not want to code away all their free time to have a life etc. and prefer to do this during the time they are working.
Nope, I’m not a OSS zealot. I make my living out of coding, if developing software were not remunerated, I would be (as you pointed out) with no money, food, clothing or shelter. I am more than happy to pay for the hard work that software companies put into their products: Example, I happily paid Crossweavers for their hassle-free Wine implementation rather than waste my time configuring Wine myself. However, I think software products, just like any other products, need to offer competitive advantages over their competitors to be successful. Tell me something: Suppose you go to Best Buy and they have 2 hard drives for sale (a) an 80Gb hard drive for $30 and (b) a 120Gb hard drive free after rebates. $30 is quite cheap for the 80Gb hard drive, but would you buy it?
This thread is just too painfull.
Don’t OSS advocates always promote that one of the great things about OSS is that noone has to ‘recreate the wheel’
and can create their own versions of existing software with little trouble? So why act as though SkyOS has some inherent obligation to create their own browser from scratch and that OSS operating systems somehow own FireFox? No one/thing owns Mozilla. The Mozilla developers don’t think closed source to be immoral. Why else would they have a link to download the Win32 version of FF on their front page and diligently maintain it?
The SkyOS people are adhering to the license, so people whine because the SkyOS people aren’t doing what they want them to. Porting FF isn’t ‘stealing’ in any sense of the word. If anything it’s a gift. A very welcome one. I paid for the beta just about a year ago and have gotten more than I had originally hoped. This is another plus. Switching from Windows to SkyOS is now much easier.
I think the problem here is that the alternative OS people are split between two major motives. One wants to use the alternative OS scene as a place to advocate OSS. Others want to use the alternative OS scene as a place to promote the awareness of alternative OSes and software. I could care less if something is OSS or CSS as long as the industry has a healthy balance, and it does.
SkyOS has no obligation to give anything back. SkyOS hasn’t taken anything away. This news of a finished port for FF doesn’t affect anyone outside of the SkyOS world. No kittens were killed, none of your resources were used up, the alternative OS scene is now much more healthy now that a currently maintained alternative OS has Firefox.
As for claims that SkyOS is somehow profiting off of this is simply ludicris. They have a DEFINATE negative cash flow right now. And how dare anyone speak ill of someone else who has done nothing to hurt them or cheat anyone. Take your religious crusades elsewere and let us talk about software instead of politics.
If this discussion haven’t been held a lot of times before, I wouldn’t object.
But this OSS shit starts up each time a skyos article comes along.
Just one question: Could you please stay on topic and stop bickering about OSS and “giving back”?? That’s so old it already has grown a beard.
ad SkyOS: hehe, I’m waiting for the next release. Gonna check Firefox with some tricks of mine. :-)) I like the ability of the developers (robert&chris) to take constructive critics and simply adapt them. There comes no “It is as is, I won’t change this” and sorta. Sometimes they say “This we will set on our schedule but for the moment, we have things of higher priority to fix”, which is ok for me because the lads have a iving of their own too.
“Non-free doesn’t have to mean expensive. What if they sold it very cheaply? OSS advocates always seem to overlook the simple facts of life: we all need money for food, clothing and shelter. Someone choosing to develop software to support this isn’t a sin. Some people (strange as it may appear) might not want to code away all their free time to have a life etc. and prefer to do this during the time they are working.”
No-one suggested coding closed-source software was wrong. People suggested writing closed source software and then selling it with vital functionality provided by open-source software was a bit rich.
If someone gives you a gift, and you sell it to someone later, is that wrong? If wrong, are you basing that on the ten commandments or something? Right or wrong in this situation comes purely from the license agreement presented by those who originally wrote the code, and in this case nothing wrong has been done.
While i am not a supporter and believer in the SkyOS.
I applaud for the team and all the hard work they managed to do.
Best wishes to the team and keep up the good work!
I don’t understand why people would even bother to support the makers of SkyOS. Maybe someone can explain to me but I just don’t see the innovation in making yet another OS. What does SkyOS do that’s better than anything else? Nothing, and that would be ok with me if SkyOS were an academic endeavor. It’s not though, they’re asking for money to beta test their OS and I don’t understand it. They’re entire software stack is gnu based. I have no problem with proprietary software, VMWare is an excellent example of quality proprietary software I’d be willing to pay for. Lets face it, writing an OS isn’t rocket science. It’s tedius and long but it’s been done and there’s tons and tons of code you can look at. What does SkyOS bring to the table that warrants them charging me to beta test it?
SkyOS doesn’t charge you to beta test it. It’s just that if you buy SkyOS now, you happen to get access to the betas.
For the rest of your post: what does Linux bring that BSD doesn’t have? What does HP-UX bring that IRIX doesn’t have? What does PPC bring that x86 doesn’t have? What does Ford bring, that Toyota doesn’t have? Etc.
erm … have you done it so that you know what you are talking about?
“If someone gives you a gift, and you sell it to someone later, is that wrong?”
Interestingly, some cultures believe that you are indeed wrong to do so. A gift is in some senses a social interaction, not simply the transfer of property, and future actions involving the gift can have implications for the original interaction.
I’d like to see the OS in action, but the video links from SkyOS’s webpage is broken. Mirrors anyone?
>For the rest of your post: what does Linux bring that BSD doesn’t have?
GPL, major vendor support, Oracle Databases, IBM Z server, the list goes on and on..i agree on your point but you justhappen to give the wrong example.
ps. Ford produces the GT40, Toyota does not have anything similair
ps. Ford produces the GT40, Toyota does not have anything similair
Ford produceD the GT40– they also produced a small number of Ford GT’s. There’s a world of difference between the two, allthough the GT is heavily inspired by the GT40
.
Great work on the ports
cant wait for b8.3.
why are people pissed about these great products being ported anyways, I mean sure, anything is easier to sell if it has more software with it, but they have not increased the cost of the product whatsoever because of it, there is no, skyos 30$, skyos w/ Firefox,abiword etc.. 45$, its been staying the same. Linux distros that charge include the software with them too, are they wrong as well? to say that free software cant be made with closed source software is rediculous, and foolish. there will always be OSS and there will always be closed source, and they can co-exist. deal with it.
Just wanted to congratulate the SkyOS team on these 2 very important ports.
I can’t understand why people think they are ‘stealing’ anything from the OSS community, the code is available, they ported it, they are not selling it, its the OS they are selling and these ports will be available with it, no different from products like Linspire. They have always said that they will return any fixes and improvements to these projects back to the source tree when things become stable.
Keep up the great work Robert.
Because they are using all GPL software to hoist their OS into usfulness quickly. Linus did that to with Gnu/linux, but he also released his work under the license. SkyOS is hoisting themselves up and not properly paying back the community.
However, i don’t have a problem with this at the early stages, but at some point they are going to have to contribute as they say they are going to. My understanding is that they will definitely be releasing the improvements they make to BFS.
I think the real reason people are pissed is because of the speed of the OS development. Many people believe it would be impossible if Robert wasn’t taking GPL’d code to do it. There’s nothing wrong with taking GPL’d code, but if your code isn’t GPL you are breaking the law. I personally don’t think this is the case either, but these topics tend to get people up in arms.
And to the person who said Apple contributes to open source? You gotta be kidding me. KHTML?!? They’ve built their whole system on open code and then closed the stuff the community is interested in. And you say they contributed because they “help” on an HTML engine that isn’t even the best OSS has to offer (Gecko).
To get real OS competition we need to have the possibility to use every application on any OS we choose to use. Cross platform applications is the key to get an eceptional OS insted of all these halfass things thrown at us. Because of the compitition it will be a neceassity to evolve and get better faster then the competition.
And that´s how we reclaim our right to choose and have good software.
“thanks to etc. mozilla and openoffice.org we are getting chois back into the market”
Linux distros that charge include the software with them too, are they wrong as well?
No, and there’s nothing legally wrong wth SkyOS asking money for a license. Although, when you pay $30 or $45 for a Linux distribution you may also assume you get some kind of services such as e.g. hardprinted book, free updates, support, CDs, or whatever. The problem is rather, to me, whats in it for the customer?
With free software / open source as a basis (framework), or with open standards, you have a certain guarantee that it’ll be picked up by some other guy (see AtheOS for example). Especially if you’re able to finance that person or have peers otherwise. Nobody knows what happens if SkyOS suddenly stops or doesn’t fullfill its promises. This really is a problem to some; BitKeeper (BK) for example, has a license which circumvents this very problem. If the corporation behind is ever sold out or ceases to exist, the source of BK is released under the GPL.
Also, regarding the big Linux distributions, you know they’re here to stay by themselves, just like you know thats true with Windows and MacOSX. Basing yourself on a proprietary and commercial framework about which you don’t know when its ready, how long it’ll stay, and other major questions. Finally, SkyOS doesn’t allow something unique which makes it what it is: a hobby OS for which you have to pay. Thats an interesting setup; BeOS for example, was proprietary but free for personal use. And BeOS, in contrast to SkyOS, delivered stable releases not betas or development versions. Zeta though, uses a similar setup as SkyOS, but still hasn’t delivered after 2 years. I’d be very conservative to a scheme like this…
And to the person who said Apple contributes to open source? You gotta be kidding me. KHTML?!?
Besides Webcore (khtml), Apple has given a completely working operating system back (Darwin), so don’t whine.
And you say they contributed because they “help” on an HTML engine that isn’t even the best OSS has to offer
Now that’s a weird assumption. YOU may find Gecko the best OSS html engine– that’s your opinion. I myself heavily prefer khtml.
Sometimes I see posts on OSNEWS that anger me because they are so stupid, but this thread is getting out of hand. So, I’m just going to ignore everyone else :-P. My questions are directed at the SkyOS team. OK, here goes.
1) I would hardly call AbiWord a “professional” word processor. Its import/export filters for certain filetypes crash the program (at least on windows and linux it does) and it doesn’t have the vast number of features OOo has. Have you guys considered porting OOo to SkyOS? Or is its code base too much of a behemoth? OOo would get you an excellent spreadsheet, word processing and powerpoint suite all in one shot. Plus, more people are familiar with OOo than with AbiWord/Gnumeric.
2) If the answer to question 1 is no, then have you considered porting Gnumeric to SkyOS?
3) The FreeBSD team has Java running on their platform. If I am not mistaken, the source code was released to the team under some form of non-disclosure agreement. Am I mistaken here? Anyways, have you considered doing something similar to get Java running on SkyOS?