Re: we now have "lilypond" organization on GitHub

[David Kastrup]

Janek Warchoł <address@hidden> writes:

> 2013/9/16 David Kastrup <address@hidden>:
>> [a rant about GitHub being proprietary etc.]
>
> Well, that's true.
> I wish github was Free, but see below.
>
>> The whole genesis of Git itself is a story about how "free" proprietary
>> services can come to bite you in your behind at the least convenient
>> moment: Linux was developed using BitKeeper, and BitKeeper's owner
>> decided to lock Linux out when someone developed a free client for
>> accessing the repository that he did not like.
>>
>> So Torvalds had to write his own version control system in a hurry, and
>> not everybody has a Torvalds at his disposal.
>
> Speaking of Torvalds and Git genesis, in a talk about Git he said this:
>
> Quoted from https://git.wiki.kernel.org/index.php/LinusTalk200705Transcript:
>> I needed a replacement for BitKeeper. The reason for that was
>> BitKeeper is a commercial product, but BitMover and Larry McVoy
>> allowed it to be used freely for open source projects, as some of
>> you may know, the only restriction was that you were not supposed
>> to reverse engineer it and you were not supposed to try to create
>> a competing product. And I was happy with that, because quite
>> frankly as far as I am concerned, I do open source because I
>> think it is the only right way to do software, but at the same
>> time I would use the best tool for the job, and quite frankly
>> BitKeeper was it.
>
> I agree with him: use the best available tool for the job.

And yet he wrote Linux instead of using the best available tool for the
job: he already had a copy of Minix, interactive UNIX was quite
affordable, and other cheap versions came around.  i386BSD (or whatever
it was called) became even freely available soon after he started Linux,
and it was at that time quite clearly in a better state than Linux.

> It would be great if the best tool was Free Software, but if it's not,
> move on.

That's not what Free Software is about.  And it is most definitely _not_
what the GNU project is about of which LilyPond is part.

You are, of course, free to use proprietary technology to any degree you
personally like, but your personal indifference towards Free Software is
nothing you are in a position to prescribe for GNU LilyPond.  As a GNU
project, we have agreed to follow the guidelines for maintaining a GNU
project, in particular

<URL:https://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/maintain.html#Ethical-and-Philosophical-Consideration>

This states, among others:

    Please don’t host discussions about your package in a service that
    requires nonfree software. For instance, Google+ “communities”
    require running a nonfree JavaScript program to post a message, so
    they can’t be used in the Free World. To host discussions there
    would be excluding people who live by free software principles.

    Of course, you can’t order people not to use such services to talk
    with each other. What you can do is not legitimize them, and use
    your influence to lead people away from them. For instance, where
    you say where to have discussions related to the program, don’t list
    such a place.

This will hold to a much larger degree to actually hosting repositories.

> In my opinion Github is the best tool for the job, and i'm going to
> use it.  I'm not forcing anyone to use it,

You are essentially currently trying to migrate work on the LSR there:

    From: Janek Warchoł <address@hidden>
    Subject: Re: Problem with hemiola notation
    To: Thomas Morley <address@hidden>
    Cc: David Kastrup <address@hidden>, lilypond-user <address@hidden>
    Date: Mon, 16 Sep 2013 10:59:10 +0200 (1 day, 31 minutes, 26 seconds ago)

    Hi Harm,

    2013/9/16 Thomas Morley <address@hidden>:
    > Hi again,
    >
    > I now come up with a (hopefully) improved version.
    > It is a function which takes a dotted(!) note as argument replacing it
    > with the main note and a dot (instead of a tied note)

    Looks nice!

    > \version "2.16.2"
    > % Does not work with 2.14.2 !
    > [...]

    If i understand correctly this cannot be added to LSR, so maybe you
    could add it here http://github.com/openlilylib/snippets ? (scroll
    down to see description)

    I believe that it won't take you more that 10-15 minutes to submit the
    snippet even if you're not familiar with GitHub at all (and of course
    the next time will probably be under 2 minutes).

    best,
    Janek


This whole thread is under the title "we now have "lilypond"
organization on GitHub" which means that you are not speaking just for
yourself but are trying to refocus the LilyPond community to GitHub.

And you can't even be interested in discussing how Savannah could be
made to serve our purposes better.

If one does not even permit oneself to _think_ how Free Software could
be made to fill places currently served by proprietary software, Free
Software will go nowhere.  Including LilyPond.

-- 
David Kastrup