Dennis, there is a difference between free as in libre and free as in speech. You cannot tell me that there is no money to be made by distributing free (as in speech) software.
Red Hat? SuSE?
Some of the previous posters were worried about whether or not to unrar a self-extracting file. It seems to me that this is a problem that has been solved by digital signatures and PKI (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_key_infrastructure). Once the source of the file is trusted, then the only consideration should be for the efficiency of the algorithm. Though, in my own opinion, I have to fall in on the side of F/OSS movement. Tar and bzip2 are so nearly ubiquitous as to be a good choice.
Noah, Linux is free (as in speech) only because Linus decided to make it that way, he could have and still could enact his intellectual rights copyright if he so chooses. An make people license the kernel. I like open software and its concepts but I also think that people deserve to get paid for code that the write if they so choose, and that good, low cost, software should be supported.
You mention Red Hat, I think they violate the spirit of open software by charging for the management tools they’ve writen that wouldn’t have a place to run if Linus and countless other people hadn’t be generous with their “free speach”.
Lck - “7zip is not only slower, but has also - IMHO - an ugly interface.”
True, but I still use it as its the only one with shell support for WinXP64.
WinRAR is free anyway… trial period never expires.
hi Noah Slater,
could you post a reasonable business plan for writing and releasing software like winrar? (software that everyone understands)
thanks
Noah, Linux is free (as in speech) only because Linus decided to make it that way, he could have and still could enact his intellectual rights copyright if he so chooses. An make people license the kernel.
Your point being? The Linux kernel isn’t the be-all and end-all of all free (though Linus would prefer the term open source) software.
My point was that Linus could do what we wants regarding the kernel but it wouldn’t make a shred of difference. He could continue to develop his non-free version of the kernal but the rest of the free software and open source communities would thrive around the free version of the kernel as Linus cannot revoke the GPL licence on previously released version.
That is the core of my point. The Linux kernel will be around longer than me, I doubt I can say the same for WinRAR.
Which sounds like the best option from a pragmatic, future proof, perspective?
I like open software and its concepts but I also think that people deserve to get paid for code that the write if they so choose, and that good, low cost, software should be supported.
I agree completely. I am a professional programmer. However, not everyone chooses to make money solely by distributing non-free binary blobs.
hacktick, sure thing. Type “Noah Slater” into Google to get my email and we can discuss my consultancy fees.
Defacto standard, cross platform, widely implemented… or some bizarre format that most end users can’t read, isn’t ported to all operating systems and is heavily encumbered.
Yes, RAR has technical advantages, but you better need them to take all the pain that goes with it. I refuse to even attempt to open RAR files anymore.
Noah Slater: "Sorry to disappoint mrprogguy, I am a proponent of the Free Software movement. The Open Software movement is something entirely different.
Using the words cult and socialism clearly show a lack of understanding on your part and you would do well to do some research into the issues at hand."
Wrong. The Free Software Movement is socialist (or at least communist). “Everything belongs to everyone.”
Free software is great, for those developers who want to give away their work. It’s not an entitlement, as you seem to think. I write software for a living, both at my full-time job and on my own time. I choose to pay my bills, have a roof over my head, eat at least once a day, and being paid for my skills does that.
And Red Hat charges money for supporting free software.
I do believe you’re at the wrong site. Try http://www.slashdot.org instead. 
Randolpho: The WinZip notification area icon can be turned off. I do that every time I install WinZip on a machine.
Aaron Isotton: Future access isn’t an issue. In this day and age of the Internet, you’ll always be able to find a way to get to the data. The .ZIP format started out as a proprietary format a long time ago.
7zip has sped up considerably in their last few releases. I think they took advantage of multi-threading for multiple processors. My Dual Core 1.8’s compressed a 1 GB archive into a 680 or so MB .7z file in about ten minutes. Other programs I’ve used for that usually take about a half an hour or so. Maybe it just seems faster because I walk out of the room when I compress large archives, because I’m used to the bad old days of ancient speeds. Slowness, thy name is StuffIt 2.0…
Noah,
“My point was that Linus could do what we wants regarding the kernel but it wouldn’t make a shred of difference. He could continue to develop his non-free version of the kernal but the rest of the free software and open source communities would thrive around the free version of the kernel as Linus cannot revoke the GPL licence on previously released version.”
Once again, you’re wrong. Linus couldn’t revoke the license for the kernel, but the license requires that he have approval of changes to the kernel itself. All he would have to do is stop allowing changes to the kernel except in the version he was selling. That would prevent changes to support new processors, memory, etc.
And you say you’re a “professional programmer”. How exactly do you pay your bills, if programming is your profession and you don’t believe in charging money for software? Rich parents? Public welfare? Panhandling on the street corner? Or just have a job writing code for internal use at your company? Gee… I guess that means you’re charging money for your software - you’re not doing it for your boss for free, are you?
KenW, you are horribly mistaken. The Free Software movement is founded on copyright law to enforce the four freedoms [1].
I assure you, just because you find something licensed under the GPL DOES NOT mean you can take it and treat it like your own.
“Everything belongs to everyone.”
I challenge you to find this phrase or something even remotely similar on www.fsf.org or www.gnu.org.
As a side issue, you have hit on one of the most profitable areas of software development. Support costs. I suspect Microsoft make a large (if not THE largest) % of there revenue from business support contracts.
[1] a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_software_definition"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_software_definition/a
Once again, you’re wrong. Linus couldn’t revoke the license for the kernel, but the license requires that he have approval of changes to the kernel itself.
Incorrect. The kernel is licensed under the GPL which freely allowed me to do whatever I like as long as my modified version is also distributed under the GPL.
All he would have to do is stop allowing changes to the kernel except in the version he was selling. That would prevent changes to support new processors, memory, etc.
Completely incorrect. See above.
And you say you’re a “professional programmer”. How exactly do you pay your bills, if programming is your profession and you don’t believe in charging money for software?
I develop web sites and intranets for private clients. As my software is not publicly distributed the licensing is a moot point.
Ok, my two cents worth here:
I see free and open source software as a great benefit as it allows us to do a lot more together than as individuals. Free and open source software is inherently smaller and more secure because many people look at it and say “Oh, this method doesn’t work very well, this is faster and smaller.” Go Linus!
However, sometimes people need proprietary software (Like WinRAR) because it has an easy interface, does it’s job well, and allows them to do their work quickly and efficiently. Many open source applications do not yet have smooth streamlined interfaces that are easy for your poor grey-haired mother to understand. True, there are many out there that do, but when my mother can right click on her files, pick add to archive, and click ok, that’s a lot easier for her to remember than having to write “tar cjf csharp.tar.bz2 ms-csharp-files/”. For codes like you and me, this is easy, but most people still don’t understand computers.
“Not many people have the luxury”… for me, that is speaking of the knowledge we have of these crazy machines. How many people truly have the luxury of going in and trying to learn how to do a mail merge, or tar and gzip a batch of files? Most common users need things simple, and that keeps companies like Microsoft, Apple, and Rarsoft in business. They have proprietary software that has been tested and recieved feedback not only on functionality, but ease of use and understandability (if that’s even a word). Likewise, I don’t do any front side design without getting input from at least 3 people. That way, not only can I make it a powerful application, but others can understand and use it fairly easily to get the data they need.
To sum my statements up: free and open source is great, but not for everyone (yet). For those who need simple, proprietary is often the main way since they can’t find much free and open source that works as well or as easily. Try teaching a lawyer how to backup his files, and you’ll see why I just set them up to put a black cd in a drive, double click a batch file, and let the batch file take care of everything.
“right click on [your] files, pick add to archive, and click ok”
That’s exactly how you do it on the Gnome desktop.
Have you tried Ubuntu recently? Desktop GNU/Linux has come a LONG way.
Ok, here is an argument for RAR: Unicode support for file names!
Try compressing then uncompressing a folder structure containing files/folders with a mixture of Japanese, Korean, Russian, Greek names and tell me what your preferred tool does.
Noah: True. Unfortunately, my desktop is dead, and backing everything up on my laptop would require too many cd’s (no dvd burner on the laptop), so I have to wait for my desktop to get fixed (hopefully i’ve got it finally). As soon as I can, I plan on switching to a recent flavor of Linux (last one I tried was Red Hat 9 in virtual PC and loved it, but the box died right after). But there’s still the underlying command line for a lot of things. My only questions about Ubuntu are how easy is it to install new drivers, and how easy is it to install new third-party applications? Some linux apps still require extra packages to be downloaded and manually installed, and some things still require command line usage. Even with Red Hat 9, I wasn’t able to install all my test applications (made it a virtual version of what I did in Windows), and some that I was able to install took a lot of experimenting to get the settings right. Red Hat 9 may be too old for this example, but unfortunately, I can’t try anything newer yet.
So do the free software alternatives…
nslater@mahora: ~ $ mkdir #5801;#5809;#5798;#5817;#5846;#5802;#5809;#5854;#5794;#5847;
nslater@mahora: ~ $ touch #5801;#5809;#5798;#5817;#5846;#5802;#5809;#5854;#5794;#5847;/#10250;#10263;#10261;#10269;#10253;#10261;#10269;#10267;#10299;#10297;
nslater@mahora: ~ $ tar -cvvf #5801;#5809;#5798;#5817;#5846;#5802;#5809;#5854;#5794;#5847;.tar #5801;#5809;#5798;#5817;#5846;#5802;#5809;#5854;#5794;#5847; | gzip -9 #5801;#5809;#5798;#5817;#5846;#5802;#5809;#5854;#5794;#5847;.tar.gz
nslater@mahora: ~ $ rm #5801;#5809;#5798;#5817;#5846;#5802;#5809;#5854;#5794;#5847;
nslater@mahora: ~ $ tar -xvzf #5801;#5809;#5798;#5817;#5846;#5802;#5809;#5854;#5794;#5847;.tar.gz
nslater@mahora: ~ $ ls -l #5801;#5809;#5798;#5817;#5846;#5802;#5809;#5854;#5794;#5847;
total 0
-rw-r–r-- 1 nslater nslater 0 2007-02-23 17:34 #10250;#10263;#10261;#10269;#10253;#10261;#10269;#10267;#10299;#10297;
Tom, Ubuntu is a great choice for your desktop. I have been running it for 2 years now and have not had to compile a single package.
Everything your will probably* need is handled via a GUI installer!
- 2 years and not a single thing I wanted didn’t already exist in the Ubuntu repository.