Re: UserLinux with MySQL

From: Christopher Browne <cbbrowne(at)acm(dot)org>
To: pgsql-advocacy(at)postgresql(dot)org
Subject: Re: UserLinux with MySQL
Date: 2003-12-21 05:13:59
Message-ID: m3brq2lpm0.fsf@wolfe.cbbrowne.com
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In the last exciting episode, xzilla(at)users(dot)sourceforge(dot)net (Robert Treat) wrote:
> Here is an article from Bruce Perens that lays out the decision to go with
> Gnome, and in passing explains the rational for going with PostgreSQL. It's
> dated December 15th....
>
> http://www.newsforge.com/software/03/12/16/0029234.shtml?tid=130&tid=150&tid=2&tid=82&tid=94

It's interesting how dramatically "partisan" the discussion gets,
surrounding the GNOME/KDE dichotomy.

The point that KDE partisans bring to the fore is that there's quite a
lot of third-party support for "business use" of use of Qt, whereas
there isn't so rich a set of visible "business use" of GTK.

Of course, that probably has a great deal to do with there being a
company with a not-insignificant marketing budget pushing that usage
of Qt, whereas there is no large company with a big marketing budget
behind GTK. (Other than maybe Ximian...)

What is entertaining is that one might also get a pretty accurate
accounting (probably even in Slashdot discussion threads :-)) out of
doing just three global searches and replaces:

s/Qt/MySQL/g
s/GTK/PostgreSQL/g
s/KDE/MySQL/g

What is also interesting is that the objectors deliberately ignore
that Perens' reasoning was based on _what licenses are used_, not on
some choice of 'what software he thought was technically best.'

They are missing the entire point of why "UserLinux" was being created
in the first place. It is being created because of _licensing_
concerns, and with a specific need to reject things that "perpetuate
the lock-in situations that exist today." Qt has that lock-in
problem, as does MySQL.

I would note that the fact of this "lock-in" has _not_ been "thrashed
out" on the UserLinux mailing list. There's some bare mention of
PostgreSQL using a BSD license, but little further comment in that
regard. (The main other thing mentioned was Jan Wieck's work on
Replication:TNG...)
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