Re: [ART] Background image for GRUB

[Bruno Félix Rezende Ribeiro]

address@hidden (Taylan Ulrich Bayırlı/Kammer) wrote:

> Let me shamelessly indulge in this bikeshedding discussion.

"Bikeshedding" like those discussions of whether the operating system
should be called "Linux" or "GNU/Linux"?

> Even if the kernel component or any other number of components are 
> individually maintained by third parties, the effort/project of
> bundling them together can alone justify giving the resulting OS a
> wholly different name.  That would be the brand/project name, akin to
> Fedora, CentOS, or Ubuntu.  (And also bad choices like "Arch Linux",
> "Gentoo Linux", etc.  They can justify themselves by saying that they
> chose that name for the project.)

That's not a matter of it being technically justifiable, although it
is.  It's a matter of strategy to maximize the effects of our efforts
to convey the GNU philosophy to the world.

> I think it's a good idea to go with the GNU brand name.

I'm glad about that.

> But many people will intuitively desire a more technical name, like 
> "Guix GNU/Linux," naturally shortened to "Guix"...

How can you be so sure?  What people, the users?

It's not a matter of what people's wishes for dubbing projects and
packages could possibly be.  It's a matter of our stance about an
important issue which brings implications as to the visibility of our
ethics by society and may affect the destiny of the GNU Project, and
the world's computing.  I'm not exaggerating here!  Do an exercise of
thought: try to think how would be the computing today without the GNU
Project or without the "Linux" misconception.  The revolution begins
with one agreement on principle and an endless stream of actions to
hold it up.

> I'm not sure if there's much we can do about it, since "GNU" is 
> awfully prone to confusion too so people will avoid it.

Of course there is!  The fundamental thing is to hold the firm belief
we are developing the one true and complete GNU operating system,
which in fact we are, and tell people that.  If we don't stand by that
idea, why are people supposed to respect or acknowledge it at all?

> To at least prevent confusion between the package manager and The GNU
> System, we could sanction calling the latter GuixOS as an 
> alternative?

How can one, in one's right mind, conflate the two?

*Guix is the package manager, GNU is the operating system.*

We have to agree on that so we can make it clear to future developers
and users, and then move on fulfilling our mission.

-- 
 ,= ,-_-. =.  Bruno Félix Rezende Ribeiro (oitofelix) [0x28D618AF]
((_/)o o(\_)) There is no system but GNU;
 `-'(. .)`-'  GNU Linux-Libre is one of its official kernels;
     \_/      All software must be free as in freedom;

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