Roy Schestowitz wrote:
> The Ides of March Approaches for Novell
>
> ,----[ Quote ]
> | So, Novell now has something concrete to ponder - on or about the
> | 15th of March, 2007, they should expect to lose the right to
> | distribute updates and improvements to the very software that
> | gives them their precious "interoperability" with Windows -
> | Samba. And they should expect other projects to follow,
> | leaving Novell and Microsoft to maintain their own forks.
> `----
>
>
http://boycottnovell.com/2006/12/04/the-ides-of-march-approaches-for-novell/
>
> Shuttleworth comments on the deal in the Open Week IRC chats:
>
> http://boycottnovell.com/2006/12/04/more-shuttleworth-on-novell-microsoft/
I can understand Samba's concerns, but isn't the fact of their taking away
Novell's right to distribute updates one of those things that the free
software movement is trying to prevent.
MS's document lock in, we need ODF so that we can not be locked in to MS nor
blackmailed into either using their applications or paying a license. IT
people everywhere should be pushing their people towards ODF.
Niether do we want to be locked in to smb nor blackmailed or bullied if we
choose another.
I always thought that the basic smb had a limited life anyway, Samba did the
job they set out to do which was smb communications. I am not keen that
their can act as if they own the communications systems and are willing to
threaten the users of it in any way.
The clever part of smb is that in the packets the server and client tell
tell each other a great deal about capabilities, that is good and worth
keeping in some capacity. It also carries a good detail of information
concerned with resource connections. But it is also true that on a busy
network smb packet types are larger than necessary, per packet. Even a
single command, one of the hunting commands for example, you have much more
wasteage than with other packet types.
Samba did their job. They could then have chosen to carry on and provide the
server/client end of a new packet type that is less waste full. But they
didn't. It is well known that a new packet type is needed, particularly
where communications are busy, Samba should have been one of those aiming
towards that goal.
I don't believe that one Linux section attempting to shut out another Linux
section can be a good thing in any way. What would happen if for example OO
and StarOffice were suddenly only available for Yellow Dog, or if Debian
said that their system can only be updated on 'one' of the Debian
derivatives of their choosing.
All of Linux is dependant in some way on all other areas of Linux. I don't
think it is a good idea at all to support Samba's actions.
Look at it another way. MS has most of the desktops, Novell have one of the
best of the Linux servers. If MS and Novell come up with a brand new
communications method that takes away the waste of smb, with the potential
increase in comms speed that suggests, they can now shut us all out in the
same way Samba is wanting to shut Novell out.
We can't say to them 'Hey, comms is the basis for all of modern computing
therefore has to be public knowledge', we can't say that because all they
have to say is 'Samba shut us out, so we can shut you out'.
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