[ale] mint 13 vm running out of storage space

[Jim Kinney]

On Tue, Oct 15, 2013 at 2:11 PM, Ron Frazier (ALE) <
atllinuxenthinfo at techstarship.com> wrote:

>
>
> Here's another thing I just thought of.  I don't want the flight control
> software (or hardware) on the Boeing 747 I might be sitting in at 30,000
> feet above the ground to be FOSS (or FOSH).  I want that to be rigorously
> designed by highly trained engineers working in a cohesive manner and
> thoroughly tested.  Furthermore, if I'm an airline and I bought the plane,
> I want world class support in case there are problems.
>

I WANT OpenSource software/hardware running my planes, cars, traffic
lights, internet, beer fridge, etc. I WANT a zillion people to have the
ability to look at the code designed and written by top engineers as an
extra set of competent eyes to see things from a different perspective and
find bugs not found earlier. There's a reason that as a physicist I get
some pretty decent jobs in software, hardware and general technology: I see
it from a different perspective and can turn that perspective into good
operating processes/code/design/ideas, etc.

FOSS does not mean "No Support". It means access to the code. Free does not
mean "no monetary value or no cost". It means freedom to use and analyze.
RedHat is a billion dollar company. They sell support for code they
provides full source for free (That's how CentOS gets built). Want support,
buy RHEL. Do your own support, use CentOS (or Scientific Linux - developed
on US taxpayer cash from RHEL srpm packages at Fermi Lab, CERN and some
major universities.).

Big Corps pay RedHat a load of cash for top quality support. In return,
RedHat delivers that support and in turn makes the new code fixes available
to all. It's the same way that ALE'rs help out newbies with a zillion "I
didn't bother to google this first so I'll ask ale instead" questions.
Support. Try getting that from Oracle or Microsoft. Hell, I even PAID
Microsoft for a support issue (how do I lock a kiosk machine from having
it's background image changed to offensive images by a current user in a
college lab setting? - Answer? Nope. Refunded the money. Not solvable. I
installed RedHat 6.2 and solved it myself.) and that was a waste of time.


> I'm not bashing FOSS.  I'm questioning the concept that it is the only
> viable or proper way to do things.
>

Um. You ARE bashing FOSS. Again. Stop it.

The overall concept of FOSS is the ONLY long-term, viable method of
advancing human society through technological achievements. All of
education works on a FOSS concept (Think about that for a long time before
you come back with a counter response. I've work in academia a long time
and have seen it in action for 20 years and historically for thousands.). A
shared idea is one that has a better chance of being built and tested. If
automakers shared ideas instead of keeping them secrets, a breakthrough by
one group is a windfall for all. Does it hurt the others or the original
group? Nope. They get kudos for the new stuff and now are expected to
continue with more. The others can use their expertise to solve a different
issue. In Linux-land, RedHat focused on the large-scale stuff, SuSE focused
on X drivers for a long time, Debian churned more and more code into GPL
versions, Ubuntu tackled newbie ease-of-use, Fedora pounds on advancing the
technology. The stupid distroA vs distroB crap is juvenile chest thumping
(all y'all chumps know MyOS kicks your distro in the gnome-ads :-) and
serves basically to give weak journalism something to write about.

After you ponder on that for a month or so, go read this article from RMS
in wired today:

http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/10/a-necessary-evil-what-it-takes-for-democracy-to-survive-surveillance/

I posted that link because I see the concepts of the GPL as critical to the
system of organization we're supposed to be using.

And it's RMS.

-- 
-- 
James P. Kinney III
*
*Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail. What you gain
at one end you lose at the other. It's like feeding a dog on his own tail.
It won't fatten the dog.
- Speech 11/23/1900 Mark Twain
*
http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/
*
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