Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!bu.edu!snorkelwacker!bloom-beacon!LARRY.MCRCIM.MCGILL.EDU!mouse
From: mouse@LARRY.MCRCIM.MCGILL.EDU (der Mouse)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
Subject: Re: Motif vs OpenLook (again, oh no!)
Message-ID: <9007050956.AA27114@Larry.McRCIM.McGill.EDU>
Date: 5 Jul 90 09:56:22 GMT
Sender: daemon@athena.mit.edu (Mr Background)
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 51

>> (This posting is anti-Motif, but can be equally well applied to any
>> proprietary $-required software whose price is bundled into the
>> machine's price.)
> Well, then what do you plan to do when you leave your educational
> institution?  Unix is not free, ya know.

If and when I leave academia, I will write whatever is necessary to
have my own OS, entirely free of cost.  (In particular, I expect to
have to write a kernel.  And yes, I do have some idea of the magnitude
of the task; I've already done a small-scale kernel.)

>> If I ever buy a workstation...I will require that it *not* come with
>> Motif.  I have no interest in paying extra for something I don't
>> want and won't be using.
> Do you own an automobile?  Do you smoke?  Did you make them rip the
> cigarette lighter out before you bought it?

No and no and not-applicable; sorry to render your analogy pointless.
It's an interesting point, though.  I would say that a better analogy
would be insisting on a stick shift instead of an automatic; a window
system is not as minor a component as a cigarette lighter.  I don't
complain when the workstation comes with wall(1), even though I don't
think I've ever used it and don't expect to.

> Anyway, you're not the type of customer being discussed.  Companies
> who buy hundreds of workstations at a pop want system software
> supported by the company they bought them from (ie. they're one-stop
> shoppers).

Oh, so this whole discussion applies only to large buyers?  First I've
heard of it.  If all you're claiming is that someone who buys hundreds
of machines at once wants Motif, I have no desire to argue with you nor
any arguments ready to bring to bear.  Nor do I care whether it's true
or not, until someone tries to extrapolate from that to the (incorrect)
conclusion that the rest of us also want Motif.

> Take a vacation from your ivory tower and get a look at the world
> (aka the military-industrial complex from which the money flows that
> makes this all possible).

And what do the developers in the M-I complex run?  GNU emacs, in an X
window, on a BSD UNIX based system.  It's not as one-way a street as
you imply.

(  "Private industry?  Harold, you're a Latin teacher."
   "And a damn fine one!  I'd be snapped up in a minute!" :-)

					der Mouse

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