18 Mar
2017
18 Mar
'17
3:20 a.m.
On 2017 Mar 15, 20:45, Clem Cole wrote:
Josh -- all I am asking is you to be respectful of the
term and the folks
that created it, industry and frankly the market and opportunity that Linux
and today's tech has so wonderful exploited.
Clem, I am respectful of you and of all the list members from whose
experience and direct contact with "primordial Unix" I try to constantly
learn.
I, however, try to express opinion on the "openness" of Unix (post
V7). Nobody has been able to write a Unix from scratch without having had
access to the Unix source code: Tannenbaum had access to the Unix sources
before writing Minix, Linus had access to Minix source before writing
Linux, and in Dennis Ritchie's opinion Coherent was a "rewritten Unix"
done with the Unix sources printed next to the keyboard ("some parts
were written with our source nearby, but at least the effort had been
made to rewrite").
GNU rewrote all the surrounding Unix tools from scratch, that's true,
but they could not a kernel make.
So much for "openness of concepts".
It's the source that matters. Anything else, is ivory-towerism.
Post Lions' book being forbidden, Unix can boast little openness.
I do fear a problem is that you seem to be equating
"open" with "having
access to the source" - where as the term was coined to mean "the ideas are
available for all to see and share in" - as in a mathematical, and academic
style of openness.
Regards,
--
Josh Good