From: Aaron W. L. <aar...@aa...> - 2008-06-27 08:44:47
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Earnie Boyd wrote: > Quoting Richard M Stallman <rm...@gn...>: > >> The word "win", in hacker parlance, is a term of praise. >> Instead of naming an option `--win32', how about calling it >> `--windows32', to avoid calling Losedows a "win"? > The win32 has a lot of history and comes from Microsoft itself. My > preference is to leave it alone but if the developers wish to add > windows32 as an alias of win32 I can live with that. I think honoring minor requests such as these is a small price to pay for the privilege of having the FSF's support in bringing these significant morsels of free software to people using Windows. MinGW treads a dangerous course between enemies. Microsoft might suddenly decide that we're somehow "pirating" their property; the FSF may determine that Windows is just too "Evil," and cast us out of GNU. If there's anything we can do to lubricate our interface with either of these animals, I'm all for it. To be clear, I think we should support the FSF in these matters because we share the same goals, even if we don't support all of Richard's ideals--which I don't. Personally I think people have forgotten too quickly that Apple has been no more kind to liberty than Microsoft--only less successful in the marketplace; yet, these days Apple is some sort of darling child among GNU projects. |