Re: Icon designer wanted (Aquamacs Emacs)

[David Kastrup]

Lennart Borgman <lennart.borgman.073@student.lu.se> writes:

> David Kastrup wrote:
>
>>The ability to craft a pretty MacOSX-only thing from Emacs is part of
>>the value of free software.  Doing so exercises the freedom, but it
>>does nothing to sustain it.
>>
> In a sense you are right, but I wonder if this is really true. I
> think it is important to be very careful here. Can you for sure say
> that the last sentence is true?

The point is "MacOSX-only".  We are not talking about a working port
to MaxOSX, but an extended feature set which is restricted to benefit
only MacOSX users in spite of not being a MacOSX-specific feature.

We are talking about a call for volunteers to replace inferior icons,
but this is intended to be only done on MacOSX, and in a manner that
precludes this work being integrated into the main Emacs.

And yes, I believe that this does nothing to sustain free software.

>  From my perspective I doubt it.

Your perspective does not apply to this case.

>  I have to use proprietary software (read Windows) in my job. It is
>  quite hard for me to be able to use Emacs for example since it has
>  been so very difficult to install and setup on Windows. I have
>  tried to change this by making it easier to install and setup Emacs
>  on Windows, not only for me but for others too. This is Windows
>  only since that is the only reasonable way to do it on Windows.

Sure.  That is porting work: making available on Windows what is
available elsewhere.

> I believe this sustains the freedom of free software. It is
> questionable, but I would hardly be doing what I have done if I did
> not think so. My reasoning is that this makes it possible for more
> people to learn to use Emacs and this is of great value when working
> on different platforms. In other words: This makes it easer to
> switch from MS Windows to GNU/Linux or the reverse.

Correct.  But the work that I have been criticising was intended to
make it _harder_ to switch from MacOSX to GNU/Linux, by providing
features only for MacOSX.

> However here is an important point: Think of this as a kind of
> osmosis. There are far more people today that can switch from MS
> Windows to GNU/Linux than the reverse. Lessening the barrier will
> then (maybe) help to switch to GNU/Linux.

But the work I was talking about is increasing the barrier, not
lessening it.  And without good reason I can see.  Emacs is available
as a technically and legally reliable starting point for developments
like Aquamacs precisely because others bothered enough to dedicate and
assign their own work to the FSF, making sure that no conflicting
claims could be construed.

I can't see how you can consider it the same whether a particular
proprietary platform gets supported in the main CVS of Emacs, or
whether a fork for MacOSX-only gets divergent features that can't be
used upstream.

> There are more examples, but that is unimportant here. I just wanted
> to say that it can be very important to do work on the proprietary
> platforms too.

But we are talking here about forking a port to a proprietary
platform, and improving only the fork in areas which would benefit the
main version as well.

> There are a lot of hurt feelings in this thread and most sane people
> probably stay out.

I don't see hurt feelings (the only one getting personal instead of
focusing on the facts in this thread was Tim, but nobody took him up
on that).  I see quite opposed viewpoints.

There is no law against differing views, but I take the liberty of
putting forth my case such as I feel necessary.  It is not like the
case of a fork with conflicting legal standards for the purpose of
platform-specific enhancements is new.  That's what started XEmacs.

> I am however the optimistic type (a type that often gets hurt
> ;-). Can we please try to find the important positive points from
> all people here?

Well, the important point from me: if you value free software, try
working on it in a manner that helps everybody, not just yourself or
the users of a non-free system.

There is a difference between making Emacs available for proprietary
systems (which makes it easier for people to switch from proprietary
to free systems), and improving it for proprietary systems only (which
makes it harder for people to switch from proprietary to free
systems).

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum