Re: [Savannah-users] http://savannah.nongnu.org/contact.php

[Bengt Richter]

On 03/26/2012 10:05 PM Kaz Kylheku wrote:
> On Mon, 26 Mar 2012 15:18:00 -0700, Bengt Richter<address@hidden>  wrote:
> > Hi,
> > What is nongnu ??
> >
> > Funny that your contact address for this email in the mailto: link
> > on http://savannah.nongnu.org/contact.php is @gnu.org,
> > not @nongnu.org or some subdomain thereof.
> >
> > What's the significance of the nongnu distinction??
> There is software which is free (needless to say, given the
> context, in a "GNU compatible" way) but which is not part of
> the GNU project.
>
> Most programs start as part of the GNU project. The GNU
> project is absolutely desperate for anyone who can
> write anything that compiles, and so the bar is incredibly
> low. (Think: crud like GDB, bash, etc.)
Yeah, a bash script that I'd been using for some time just broke on this line:
    # XXX if [[ "$1" =~ "^[./:]" ]]; then #XXX does not work with quotes on 
regex in new version!
Terrible :)
> But as soon as these programs reach a low bug count,
> achieve user-friendly interfaces for interactive and
> programming use, and demonstrate pristinely clean,
> perspicuously transparent code base, GNU programs get
> promoted to the Non-GNU side.
>
> (Or wait, might I have that somewhat backwards?)
Well, I am very sympathetic to GNU, and my initial reaction to
"nongnu" was to interpret it as rejecting GNU, which I thought
strange in the context. I think I would have reacted differently
to, say, "pregnu.org" or "pre-gnu.org" ;-)

> > BTW. Note that you get to http://savannah.nongnu.org/
> > if you ping gnu.org and use the returned ip address in a browser like:
> Amazing, isn't it! Welcome to the 1990's, where we have multiple
> domains on one host. (And even multiple IP's on the same network
> interface, bah!)
>
> (Wanna rent one? $15.95 a month, 5 kilobytes of personal space,
> and you get yourdomain.com.meaningless-string.my-domain.com
> to promote your "brand" in a professional way! Wow, deal!)
>
> :)
Your humor is appreciated. It was an unexpected pleasant surprise to encounter
your name in reply to my question. I've enjoyed reading your comments years ago
when I was active on a few newsgroups. I'll have to explore your site when I 
get some time.
Mostly just lurking and overcooking my own stew these days ;-)

BTW, IIRC, couldn't apache be configured to present gnu.org as a default when 
accessed
by IP number, rather than nongnu.org? If so, then the question becomes why the 
choice,
or did it just happen by accident :)

Regards,
Bengt Richter
PS. I think you might enjoy http://lambda-the-ultimate.org/